Prelude

My Crusade Force’s first mission was an incursion scale battle using the full 50 power level points I had available. My initial order of battle included Typhus, two 20 model units of Poxwalkers, a Chaos Lord armed with plasma gun and Powerfist, a Noxious Blightbringer, a Plague Surgeon, a Lascannon Helbrute and a 10 man squad of Plague Marines armed with 3 plasma guns.

When putting together my order of battle I spent 4 requisition points on bolstering some of my most valuable units. I spent 1RP on Typhus to gain the Harbinger of Nurgle stratagem allowing friendly death guard units within 6” of him to reroll hit rolls of 1. I also spent 1RP to give Typhus The Putrid Periapt relic, allowing him to know one additional psychic power for the remainder of the campaign. This relic also allows Typhus to regain D3 lost wounds whenever successfully manifesting a psychic power. I spent an additional 1RP to give my Lord character the Arch Contaminator Warlord Trait, meaning models within 6” of him may now re-roll failed wound rolls made with plague weapons. As some of the new Death Guard stratagems in this edition allow units to turn weapons with the boltgun profile into plague weapons this trait will certainly come in handy.

The last Requisition Point I spent was on giving my Helbrute the Contaminated Monstrosity stratagem for the remainder of the campaign giving it that much needed Disgustingly Resilient trait. One thing that had always baffled me about the 8th Edition Death Guard Codex was some of the vehicles lacked Disgustingly Resilient… Now, hopefully my helbrute might stick around a little longer as it's always been a bullet magnet.

With all these Requisition Points spent I was left with just one until the end of my next battle.

My enemy for this mission and the first on my Crusade Journey was against the technologically advanced Necrons. They proved too numerous and organised for my Death Guard and I was unable to secure the relic. They quickly overcame and drove back my Horde of reanimated dead, leaving only my Chaos Lord on the table. The Plague Marine Squad did however destroy a full unit of Necron Warriors and caused a disastrous blow to the enemy before falling back. It's Champion destroyed an enemy Ghost Arc with a huge Power Fist punch, The Ghost Arc then exploded in an electric-green ball of flame, crippling a nearby Doomsday Arc and felling the enemy’s commander, a gigantic skittering Skorpekh Lord. A small consolation I guess.

My Plague Marine squad earned a huge 7 experience points in their first battle, (1 for participation, 1 for Dealers of Death, 3 for being Marked for Greatness and 2 for successfully achieving the Reaper Agenda). I was then able to give this unit battle honours and chose to improve their bolter guns with a weapon enhancement, I rolled a 4 giving me Improved Sites which means they now hit on a 2+. With my Chaos Lord in close proximity allowing me to re-roll 1’s to hit, this will be absolutely devastating. Luckily no units suffered battle scars this game however I made a decision to drop a number of units from my Crusade force and replace them with more elite ones. In the end I replaced my Plague Surgeon, Noxious Blightbringer and both my full strength Powwalker units with another 10 man unit of Plague Marines, 5 Blightlord Terminators and a Foul Blightspawn. I needed to spend 2 requisition points to achieve this taking my supply limit up to 60 and my power level up to 57 but leaving me with no spare Requisition Points until the end of my next game. Hopefully my next mission will be more fruitful and the new units I've added will perform better than my Poxwalkers.

Besides this battle was just a test and the real enemy is still out there.