Valarion,

I am strongly on the side of those who feel you can’t “fight” a god. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t “defeat” him for the purpose of your story.

The showdown with Nurgle shouldn’t be players wielding weapons against Nurgle’s wound score (be it 500, 777 or 2,000). It should be a philosophical debate, or a religious one. Or a distraction.

Nurgle is the god of death, decay and rebirth. So that is the plane on which he must be challenged.

Threaten Nurgle with a player who can’t be reborn after he commits suicide in Nurgle’s presence….

Present Nurgle with a flower which doesn’t decay.

Present Nurgle with a slave army/zealot army/horde of penitent sinners/army of sisters of battle in chainmail bikini’s which commits ritual suicide after being infected before they can suffer and decay, thereby robbing Nurgle of much of his pleasure…

Engage Nurgle in a debate on the different ways of suffering and how religious fervour alleviates suffering.

In short, think up some role-playing way in which to “defeat” Nurgle (just a temporary defeat) by befuddling him, dazing him, engaging him in a puzzle, etc…..

In game terms, this will both require the players to come up with innovative ways of engaging a god (the GM can help them by having them visit with an assortment of seers, wise men, living saints etc. beforehand to get pointers), and maybe occasional dice rolls using perception, willpower, fellowship, toughness etc. (the not combat stats…).

In the end, a meeting with Nurgle should be epic and well…different. Not just another combat with a supersized Greater Daemon. I am sure the players will enjoy and remember something totally different far more than another boss fight.

Or equally, don't give him a wounds score for "he dies if he takes that much". If you're absolutely set that you can't kill him - and I agree you shouldn't be able to - such that if he's losing badly you'd pull the wires and change the scenario, then don't make it a damage capacity.

Instead, as part of the 'grab Isha and run' plan, you need to do X wounds (ideally a multiple of 7!) to 'fend him off' - think end-of-level boss; each time it telegraphs an attack, you need to do damage to a particular thing, in a particular way, or it attacks in a way that's devastating.

The attacks themselves - as noted, just have the players instantly contract various diseases or poisons. Don't worry about the nanotech you mentioned; this is nurgle himself poking you. The nanotech and Gellar fields are the only reason you're not instantly dead.

The scale....it depends. In fairness, I've had a plague marine end up in the garden himself. But what attacked him was 'just' a Great Unclean One, and he wasn't supposed to survive it - just learn a lesson about death and rebirth. His face was a picture when he realised where he was and being told there was a creaky wooden shack on stilts over the river up ahead....

Oh - and yes, Isha should need to be 'handed off' before you return to real space. She can't exist in the materium (she's not Khaine). The webway.... possibly. Rules there are highly variable.

As to Nurgle's size - as noted, his scale is whatever he wants it to be. But then so is the surroundings. The Garden and the Manse are Nurgle, just as the dude with the pot is. So if he wants to be the size of a warhound titan, he will be. And the Manse will be so immense that the players feel like they're stuck on the set of Jack The Giant Slayer. By comparison, if he wants to be elderly creole voodoo guy in a shack the size of someone's outhouse, that's how he'll appear.

A nice idea is them not realising at first that they have encountered Nurgle 'himself' as opposed to one of the Daemon Princes.

(Note: Daemon Princes are a bit more interesting in that respect - because they have a mortal origin they retain a spark of independent free will that a greater daemon doesn't. Nurgle could have a 'conversation' with Mammon or Cor'bax in a way that for Ku'Gath or Scabiathrax would essentially just qualify as talking to himself...)

I'll be honest, I'm not going to get too wound up - it's your game, after all, and to a lesser extent, my Black Crusade players are doing something similar on a much smaller scale - they've been annoyed, repeatedly, by a Daemon Prince so many times that they've decided to punch him repeatedly where he lives, and they're assembling the means and allies (primarily another daemon's patronage) to hit the daemon's realm in the warp.

In this case, manifested as "The City Of Lies". They're trying to steal a portion of the daemon's name which is kept concealed in the warp (which is why the daemon can never be bound permanently, as no one ever realises they don't know its full name) - which will be perceived as a treasure held in the heart of "The Citadel".

It is, of course, a trap. But one they can potentially turn to their advantage.

Useful ideas and I thank you. I'm a reasonable man and when presented with a well thought out argument I am willing to admit when I'm wrong and change my plans. I had intended for Isha to make for the Webway as soon as she was outside of Nurgle's domain. That part just makes sense. As for the fight I like the idea of a gimmick based victory. Temporarily defeating Nurgle will serve just fine. I just need time enough to have one of the players open Isha's cage. Resistance rolls against disease also seem like a good idea but i want more than just that. I'm thinking Ag rolls to avoid being swallowed by the ground. It's Nurgle's domain after all and he control's every aspect of it. Giant poison covered thorns shooting off of trees in the garden. I still want one gross attack from Papa. I'm sticking with a vomit attack of horrible poisons and acid.

If you use vomit, then you should have them make swim checks, if nothing but for the sake of actually having them swim in a campaign.

If you use vomit, then you should have them make swim checks, if nothing but for the sake of actually having them swim in a campaign.

The PC's in my Black Crusade campaign had to make swim checks once. The Heretek is now much more careful about where he points that plasma cannon of his.

If you use vomit, then you should have them make swim checks, if nothing but for the sake of actually having them swim in a campaign.

The PC's in my Black Crusade campaign had to make swim checks once. The Heretek is now much more careful about where he points that plasma cannon of his.

Well now that just begs the question of where did the heretek shoot it in the first place.

Well now that just begs the question of where did the heretek shoot it in the first place.

They were on board a mostly-submerged voidship which had bobbed up to the surface on Furia. The heretek fired the plasma cannon (on maximal and using his Weapon Tech talent) at any enemy who, at the time, was standing with his back to an un-shuttered viewport. He rolled very high damage, the viewport shattered, and the area quickly began to flood with seawater (which, to make matters worse, was full of dagger-fish which had been schooling around the viewport; attracted to the light).

....Ah, Furia.

The first time the players see the stats for a Leviathan makes it all worthwhile.

"....The [swearword] is that!?!?!"

"Why do you think they hired chaos space marines for a 'fishing expedition'?"

In every iteration of anything (save Kaldor Draigo) entering the Warp all items from realspace not only cease to function but cease to exist in any tangible sense of the word. (see Necrons 3E with the Nightbringers weapon being destroyed by being flung into the Warp)

Even if I mostly agree with you, I disagree with this.

Gellar shields failure have catastrophic consequences, but the ship continue to work even with big troubles. It will finally get broken, corrupted or mutated, but it doesn't cease to exist; space hulks generally not have gellar fields and get back from the warp (in a totally different aspects, generally, but still).

Finally, I agree this is a bit too much for ME, but I don't think this is not doable.

-Statting nurgle isn't entirely undoable, to me, without going against the concept of it...being a concept. Nurgle could have stats that represents him and special rules like this:

-When nurgle dies, he must test toughness at -60 on the first turn. If he succeeds, he rises back with half of his woulds. If he fails, he continue each turn with a +10 bonus eacht tiem (-50 the second turn, -40 the third, an so on). On the seventh turn, if he isn't already up, he gets up with half his wounds. Nurgle automatically regenerate at a rate equals to the player's total corruption points. He has stats; he still won't die...or not permanently.

Daemons are sparks of said concepts and can be broken, fought, destroyed, and such. We also know that they fight each other in the realms of chaos. We know that said realms are coherent-chaotic mass of incohrent energies (yes, it's contrary), and it can be interpreted the way you want. It is also described in many sources, if I remember well, that the gods built realms that do exists as other dimensions.

So yeah, players could walk there, fight demons and try this steppette...but I don't think they should succeed or, at least, only in a pyhrric sense.