Boarding Actions Detachment Focus: Arch-Contaminators

In this series of articles we take a deep dive into a specific detachment for a faction, covering the faction’s rules and upgrades and talking about how to build around that faction for competitive play. In this article, we’re covering the Arch-Contaminators Detachment for the Death Guard in Boarding Actions.

The Death Guard have three Detachments available to them in Boarding Actions, and of those the Arch-Contaminators represents their most elite forces, warriors clad in Terminator Armour. These teams don’t offer a lot of models to work with, but make up for their smaller model counts by having some of the toughest models in Boarding Actions, pairing T6 with a 2+/4++ save and three or more wounds each. The catch is that your entire army has a 4″ movement characteristic.

Detachment Rule: Inescapable Corruption

Each time an enemy unit is selected to perform a Tactical Manoeuvre, if that unit is within Contagion Range of one or more units from your army, that enemy unit has to take a Leadership test. If they fail, then that Manoevre has no effect – they can still shoot and charge as normal, they just can’t do the thing.

Additionally, in your Command phase roll a D6 for each Objective Marker within Contagion range of one or more of your units and secured by your opponent’s army. On a 5+, that marker is no longer Secured.

There’s a bit to unpack here. First off, turning off Tactical Manoeuvres inside of Contagion Range is neat, but not particularly reliable and the ones this is most likely to affect will be securing objectives and maybe setting to defend – Overwatch is going to happen long before you get into Contagion Range, even if you’ve got Miasmic Odour. That said, the ability to un-secure objectives at a 6″ distance late-game is huge, particularly for a Detachment filled with  models with a 4″ Movement Characteristic. That it works through walls is also huge, and while it’s not super-reliable, it’s enough of a risk that an opponent may not be able to take the chance on leaving a secured objective unguarded.

There’s also a Rules Adaptation worth noting in this Detachment: Blightlord Terminators can perform the Secure Site Tactical Manoeuvre as if they had the BATTLELINE keyword. This is huge, and while Blightlords aren’t quite as good as Deathshroud when it comes to damage output, this gives you a compelling reason to bring a single unit of them in your list.

Army Composition

You can include up to two of the following units in this Detachment (no duplicates):

• Typhus
• Terminator Sorcerer
• Lord of Contagion
• Lord of Virulence

There’s no Chaos Lord in Terminator Armour option there, which makes me worry for his future, but otherwise this is what I’d expect. The Lord of Contagion is for fighting, the Lord of Virulence for Shooting, and if you take Typhus he loses his Eater Plague ability, making him just a pretty solid melee threat – and a bit overcosted, honestly. The real stand-out here is the Terminator Sorcerer, who brings a fantastic ranged weapon to the table and clocks in at only 70 points, helping you fit everything you want into a list.

On top of that you can have up to one each of the following units:

• Blightlord Terminators (5 models)
• Deathshroud Terminators (3 models)
• Chaos Spawn (2 models)

That’s very proscriptive, but you won’t have much left to work with after including them. For my money, you should have had the option to double up on Blightlords or Deathshrouds, as point changes will really mess up this list, and I think choosing double Deathshrouds over Blightlords to save points and give up secure is an interesting choice. Blightlords are much more competitive with their bodyguard brothers when they have the secure option.

Enhancements

The Arch-Contaminator Enhancements are OK. I don’t think either is worth taking over Trademark Weapon or Peerless Leader, but we’ll come back to those.

• Miasmic Odour – Add 3″ to the Contagion Range of the Bearer. This is my favorite of the two options on offer, as hitting 6″ Contagion Range in Battle Round 2 can really open some things up, and 9″ in round 3+ going through walls and doors can make it possible to threaten multiple objectives with your Inescapable Corruption Rule on some maps, and an aggressive forward strategy with your character can mean opponents can’t hide from your -1 Toughness effect.
• Disgusting Reinvigoration – Each time the bearer destroys an enemy model with a melee attack, roll one D6; on a 5+, the bearer regains one lost wound (to a maximum of two lost wounds per phase). If you’re taking this it’s probably on a Lord of Contagion, where the chances of making things happen in melee is way higher. Either way I’m not sure it’s something you need – heavy-hitters like Fuegan will vaporize you before you can heal and you’re slow enough that once you crash into combat on rounds 3 or 4 you won’t have any problem surviving it.

Generic Enhancements

The reason I don’t love these is because you just have much better options in the Generic Enhancements bucket. While Expert Breacher is solid, I think more often than not you’re going to be Advancing with this group on rounds 1/2 and opening doors at the end of that move, so opening a door before moving isn’t nearly as useful as it was in late 9th edition. Instead, the two Enhancements I’m really high on are:

• Peerless Leader – This is amazing on a Lord of Virulence, where it can give a unit full re-rolls to wound for a Shooting phase. That’s amazing on Deathshrouds in particular, but isn’t too shabby on Blightlords, where going from re-rolling 1s to all wounds lets you really fish for Devastating Wounds with your combi-weapons and Reaper Autocannon.
• Trademark Weapon – This is what makes the Terminator Sorcerer worth taking, turning him into an absolute monster. For once, not having TORRENT on his psychic attack is a blessing and not a curse – it means you can take this Enhancement on Curse of the Leper ranged weapon, giving him a 2D6 shot, S7 AP-2, 2-damage psychic attack with his focused witchfire. That’s one of the most devastating attacks in Boarding Actions, and when you combine it with contagions you’ll be wounding on a 2+. Just remember to save a CP to re-roll your Hazardous checks. Trademark Weapon is the reason to take a Terminator Sorcerer, and the icing on the cake is that he’s the cheapest character option in the army.

Stratagems

The Stratagems here are pretty varied, and honestly pretty strong. There’s something here for every phase.

• Allies of Entropy (Strategic Ploy, 1 CP) – Used in the Fight phase, when an enemy unit picks targets. Your unit’s models can fight on death on a 4+. This is situational but pretty solid – each terminator has a ton of attacks to throw out, and having even one model clap back effectively on death can be a huge deal. The big downside here is that it’s only a 50/50 chance, so you want to save it for when you’re going to lose more than one model or when you really need the upside – remember though that the dead models have to be within range to fight an enemy unit when they die.
• Seed of Corruption (Strategic Ploy, 1 CP) – Used in your Shooting phase, on a Death Guard Terminator unit that was just set up on the battlefield that turn and hasn’t shot yet. That unit can perform a Tactical Manoeuvre as though it wasn’t set up. This is situational but huge for something like a unit of Deathshroud or a Lord of Virulence, where they can arrive from Deep Strike and then set Overwatch. This can let them absolutely control or dominate a spot of the table when they arrive, giving you an extra turn to set up movement.
• Corrosive Curse (Strategic Ploy, 1 CP) – Used at the start of your Shooting phase. Pick a Terminator unit from your army that isn’t in Engagement Range of an enemy but is within Contagion Range of a visible objective marker. That marker is secured by your army. You can only use this once per game, and after you do your unit can’t shoot or charge, but this is incredibly good, allowing you to secure an objective at a distance or letting one of your characters secure an objective, giving you more room to spread out and leave those objectives behind.
• Cloud of Flies (Battle Tactic, 1 CP) – Used in your Shooting phase, when an opponent picks one of your units as a target. Until the end of the turn, each time an attack targets your unit, subtract 1 from the hit roll. This is just very good, making an already super durable army even moreso. Use it whenever you’re worried about taking a bunch of attacks, or when you really need one big attack to miss. But also: That effect lasts until the end of the turn, meaning that it also gives you protection in melee. I don’t know if that’s intentional or not, but it means that if a melee unit is coming in for the kill and makes the mistake of shooting you, you should absolutely pop this off as a way to protect your guys.

Playing This Detachment

Your biggest challenge with this Detachment is going to be speed: While your Spawn have 7″ movement, your Terminators only go 4″ and that means they’ll struggle to cross most small rooms without Advancing. That means you’ll want to avoid doors if you can and rely on your toughness and strong saves to carry you through walking into the open, something that’s much more reasonable in Boarding Actions than it is a regular game of 40k. Use your Blightlords and the Corrosive Curse Stratagem early to secure objectives (be mindful to screen if your opponent can come back to steal them later), and leave them behind so you can move up with your limited units and crush the opponent. Your units are pretty solid both shooting and in combat, and you can mix it up however you need. The important thing is making sure you control the lanes of movement for your opponent so they can’t outflank you – the biggest fear you’ll have is someone just going around you, stealing your objectives, and watching helplessly as your units can’t move fast enough to react.

Sample List

There are theoretically a few different ways you could build the Arch-Contaminator list but for my money there’s only one way to go, and that’s the list below.

Arch-Contaminators Boarding Actions (495 Points)

Death Guard Sorcerer in Terminator Armour (70)
– Enhancement: Trademark Weapon (Curse of the Leper)
– Force Weapon
– Combi-Weapon

Lord of Virulence (80)

Blightlord Terminators (155)
– 4x Bubotic Blade
– 2x Combi-Weapon
– 1x Reaper Autocannon
– 1x Blight Launcher
– 1x Flail of Corruption

Deathshroud Terminators (120)

Death Guard Chaos Spawn (70)

You can swap out the Lord of Virulence for a Lord of Contagion or Tyhpus if you want -they’re each 80 points – but you can’t swap out the Terminator Sorcerer without losing an entire character and becoming the Underdog. Not that you should want to – that Trademark Weapon Enhancement is huge. I prefer the LoV to the LoC, if only because his re-roll wounds Leader ability and the twin-linked TORRENT snot cannon give him more versatility but be aware that in melee he’s just not good as he only hits on a 3+ with his heavy plague fist.

In terms of deployment, you can deploy this entire force even on a 3-access point map but I think that in most games you’ll want to hold the Deathshroud in Deep Strike. They’re perfectly capable of dropping in and wiping a unit out with snot pistols or you can drop them in and use Seed of Corruption to have them arrive out of Line of Sight but Set Overwatch to deter an opponent from coming near, controlling a massive section of the table in the right circumstances. The army works both as a shooting threat and a melee threat, and you’ll want your Terminator Squads mixing it up in both. Your Chaos Spawn can do just fine in that role as well, but you’ll want to use them as your faster, flanking options to capture out-of-the way objective markers and perform mission actions.

Final Thoughts

The Arch-Contaminators are a small model-count, highly elite force but one which can be very effective in the Gallowdark. They have some solid tools to make up for their lack of speed and their durability makes them one of the toughest armies in Boarding Actions, if not the toughest. Their low speed means you’ll need to plan out your moves ahead of time, but if you can bottle opponents in and control their movement, your own shortcomings won’t matter.

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