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Legions of Nagash: Battle Reports


WoollyMammoth

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There is a topic discussing general concepts with LoN, combos and such, but I wanted to start a specific topic reporting on how people are doing with the new tome - an organization of battle reports. Lets share how the new lists are working out and report on things that seem to be working, or that aren't. 

In the pre-week with leaked rules I played 1000 point lists. First I bombed hard with Arkhan, doing nothing into a harsh double turn and failed all my 4+ for Ama. Orb. Then I played an aggressive Neferata list that was doing really well but we ran out of time. 

This week I had the opportunity to play my first cohesive 2000 point game.  

I played against a list that has been causing me a lot of trouble. Lots of Dracoth Calvary backed by Bow Judicators. This list melted Nagash a few weeks ago, and was the same list that crushed my Arkhan list last week.

His list:
Lord-Celestant on Dracoth,
- Drake-Kin (5+ to reduce incoming damage to 1)
- Staunch Defender (everyone is 2+, re-rolling 1s)
2 Fulminators x2
2 Tempestors x2
5 Judicators x3
3 Order Battlemages

My list:
Nagash - Dread, Transferrence, Orb
Necromancer -Fading Vigor
- Grave-Sand Timeglass
Cairn Wraith
-Tgheist Mantle
2 Archai
30 Skeletons
5 Grave Guard x2
6 Spirit Hosts

We tried Malign Portents / Realm of Shyish. All it really amounted to was that terrain was causing -1 bravery if you are too close, and I prevented one mortal wound on some spirit hosts. He forgot to use his points to bring back a Dracoth, which would have been pretty crazy. 

With less drops I got to dictate the turn, which was immensely important (and a wonderful and rare occurrence for a Death player).
I made him go first and taunted him into shooting Nagash (Archai were far in the back). He scored a few wounds on Nagash and through to the Archai as well. 
He had no choice, he had to move his Dracoth line forward. Even if he hadn't he would have simply delayed the game. He had to cover some ground and hope for the turn roll.

On my turn I started with Dread on a Fulminator unit, into Hand of Dust to cause 2 wounds and heal Nagash to full. Then I cast Fading Vigor on the other Fulminator unit, did an Arcane bolt on the General for 1 wound plus another 2 for the Timeglass to put him at 4. Lastly I cast Mystic Shield on Nagash and Danse macabre on a useless Grave Guard Unit. After moving up about 8", I summoned 6 Spirit Hosts with Nagash and 30 Skeletons with the Necro. The Spirit hosts made a long charge into the Fading Vigor Fulminators and a Tempestor unit, causing about 9 mortals to kill a Tempestor and almost a Fulminator. They really struggled with their reduced attacks and my 4+ reroll 1 save, and I took only 5 wounds.

I lost the turn roll, but i was planning on handing it over anyway to stagger the turns. Half his Dracoth were tied up and the other half had a wall of skeletons to get through. The mages tried to cast but were all shut down by Nagash. In shooting he hit me with mortals on the Hosts, on the  skeletons, Nagash. He really went to town on the Skeletons, -I think he was afraid of the mass of bodies. He didn't charge them, but he took out nearly 20 of them in shooting. In combat he tried to pound on the Spirit Hosts but only got them down to 3 models. 

On my turn the same spells went off, Nagash fully healed.  I rolled an 11 for Orb and caused 9 mortals which really hurt his Dracoths. First I used a gravesite to get a Host Fully Healed, then I put one back with Nagash, then the second gravesite, I rolled a 3 to get the unit back up to 5. I healed a lot of the skeletons, getting them back up to above 20.  I realized that I can still use Transferrence even if I have no models to heal within 6" of my enemy just to do the wounds, and killed his general. His Tempestors were at -3 bravery and I rolled a 9 with a T-gheist shriek off my Wraith to kill one. Nagash shot off a couple Judicators then made a huge charge into his Judicator back line, and the Archai Charged a Tempestor to still stay within 3" to protect Nagash. 

My opponent called it before combat started. He was likely going to have 3 judicators and a Tempestor left (assuming they pass battleshock), and 3 cowering mages. I had only lost 8 skeletons and 1 spirit host.


IMG_7741.JPG.13a4c7d3571ac65b11cb42a9ad8689da.JPG

 

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@Nikobot
Basically that Nagash rocks.

The only thing I thought of is to keep in mind you can use Transference as D3 damage without worrying about the healing part if its not needed. Between Soul Stealer, Arcane Bolt & Transference, you got a nice 3D3 mortals each turn - 4D3 if you roll a 9+ for Transference and maybe even the D6 if you roll high on Soul Stealer.  

Not sure yet, going to have to do a lot of testing with different spells, but Nagash's casting felt like the oppressive force we have all been waiting for.

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Yes because I could make him go first every time. He might get smart and try to ambush with everything to start doing things the first turn, but unless he gets most of his things to land and makes at least a couple 9" charges its not going to threaten me too much. When he starts deploying things off the table, then I would just decide to bubble wrap everything with the skeletons anyway (instead of deploying them in the grave like this game) , and then there is no scenario where things are going to go well for him. He could also simply forfeit his first turn by doing nothing and making me go to him in which case i would move forward just 6" in my turn, even if he wins priority he still has to make 10" charges to do anything, so we end up with the same result minus one turn.

I think perhaps he could have had better target priority and gotten better rolls. I didn't have particularly amazing rolls, I rolled a lot of 1s for D3 damage. The big rolls were the long charge on my first turn for Spirit Hosts, the 11 for Orb to do 9 mortals total, and the 3 to get a spirit host back off a gravesite. None of these really dictated the game, and with or without them  the result was likely a win in turn 3 regardless.

I don't really see where things could have gone really south for me. I would have to have rolled snake eyes for spells. Against lists with bonuses to unbind or auto-unbind it will be a bit difficult. Against lists like Skyfires that just obliterate the Archai first turn its going to be interesting. This particular list was very, very few wounds which makes it a bad match-up against this new list which has high mortal output.

I'm planning on going to a one day tournament in two weeks and I will really get into this list more and test its capabilities. 

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Two short Games vs. Skaven, Best of Times / Worst of Times style.

My list (varying legion)

  • Wight King with Black Axe general
  • Necromancer
  • 40 spearletons
  • 15 shield guard
  • 10 black knights.

First Game:

I played grand host, gave the wight king lord of nagashizaar and the necromancer ossific diadem.

His list (to the best of my recollection)

  • Gorgon (I think?  Some huge beastmen melee monster converted up as a rat)
  • f-ton of skaven slaves in three huge units
  • infantry skaven hero.

Scenario - we played with the open play cards, ended up with a single central objective that models can pick up and carry around, and a triangular deployment wedge that let me deploy on top of it, with centralized gravesites.  All units got some extra movement speed and charge range from the cards, and we each pulled a ruse for the heck of it, giving my guys immune to battleshock and he pocketed his.  Huge bonuses to me, as if I needed the extra help.

Long and the Short: I got first turn, consolidated around the necromancer, who picked up the objectives.  Black Knights ran up a flank but failed to charge the gorgon.  His turn, the gorgon teleported through a pair of the portal terrain piece to charge my skeletons along with one of the slave units, and all were chopped down over a couple rounds of combat for no significant damage on the skittles.  Black Knights and grave guard fought a couple of the slave units, the grave guard eventually chopping through theirs.  I oafed up spectacularly by forgetting the gate terrain could also teleport to a board edge, so after I moved my necro away he was able to teleport one slave unit out of combat with my knights and into easy charge range of the necro.  His gorgon also came back via his ruse card, appearing on the same board edge to do the same.  Necro goes down, but then the skeletons arrive and wipe out both the gorgon and the slaves before vanhels wears off, leaving the skaven player completely tabled.

......................................

Second game

I played sacrament, made the wight king a wizard and gave it the bracers.

His list:

  • Skryre verminlord
  • like 10ish mortar teams
  • a bunch of 5 model giant rat units to screen them

Pressed for time, we just played a straight beat-em-up to avoid spending time on scenario rules.  I graved the grave guard, deployed everything else centrally.  He bubble wrapped everything.  First turn went to rats, who moved forward into range of a mystic terrain piece and range of shooting my  skeletons, wiping out the entire unit.  I also lost a couple black knights.  My turn I mived up, brought black a black knight, failed to vanhels them, summoned up the graveguard.  Grave guard failed their nine inch charge, black knights failed their 6 inch charge due to a spell effect that halved their charge range.  He went first in turn two, by the bottom of turn two the only models I had left were my characters, and I threw in the towel.

......................................

In the first game, with the list he took, I don't know I possibly could have lost, no matter the scenario, and no matter what army or units I took from Legions of Nagash.  Against that kind of pure melee army, I feel like my victory was automatic, like there was hardly any point in playing it out.

In the second game, with the list he took, I don't know how I possibly could have won, again regardless of what army or units I took from Legions of Nagash.  Playing proper scenarios he would have had to take fewer, more numerous giant rat units to properly score objectives, but I'm not sure I can envision a thousand point LoN list that wouldn't have been tabled by the top of turn three.  Even the new debuffs and such would have done little, as the mortar teams were all individual units of one model.

In the end, neither game felt like it was worth the bother of playing past deployment.

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30 minutes ago, Nikobot said:

@ Sception were either of those 2 skaven lists legal? What was battleline?

Turns out no, but mostly only through excessive BS faction subdivision that he hadn't payed close enough attention to.  In either case replacing the units he thought were battleline (skavenslaves and giant rats respectively) with clanrats, marauders, or the like wouldn't have changed very much.

Also, I misstated the mortar teams, there 10ish, not 16ish, still more than enough to blow away units at a time after battleshock (first round he went first, so I didn't have inspiring presence up on the skeletons, second round I had summoned the grave guard, so it was too late to put it on them, not that it would have saved them.

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3 hours ago, Sception said:

black knights failed their 6 inch charge due to a spell effect that halved their charge range.

This is a bit controversial. A black knight unit with a hornblower always moves up to 6" when it charges unless it rolls higher.

The spell you are referring to is most likely Howling Warpgale
https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-verminlord-warpseer-en.pdf

Sure, the unit must halve any charge move it makes, but the unit always moves up to 6". The only unless is that if you roll higher. Well, you are not going to roll higher, since your distance is halved, but halving the distance does not trump always.

At least IMO .. it needs a FAQ.

3 hours ago, Sception said:

In the end, neither game felt like it was worth the bother of playing past deployment.

This is a very negative outlook. I've never played a game that was determined in deployment. Your list looks solid, both Skaven lists are complete BS. You cannot have more than a few war machines, you need battle line, etc. Regardless they are disjointed lists which I would not be afraid to play with your list. I would also never play a straight battleline game because its boring and emphasizes imbalances - your list was supremely better at taking and holding objectives and would probably have won most battleplans. 

Great couple skirmishes, stay positive and keep trying out the new fun stuff!

@Nikobot
Tzeentch is the top tier right now so its hard to say. We are both trying to get within 18" and bring the pain. A LoC is going to really ruin Nagash's day. Tzeentch is incredibly effective at obliterating elite models with their spells, and hordes with the Gaunt Summoner. Nagash being the most elite model in the game, this is scary - but the new battalion can eat about 75% of mortal wounds. I think it would be about taking down the LoC as quick as possible while keeping -1 to hit on any Skyfires. There are a lot of factors, its hard to say.

 
 

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2 hours ago, Sception said:

Also, I misstated the mortar teams, there 10ish, not 16ish, still more than enough to blow away units at a time after battleshock (first round he went first, so I didn't have inspiring presence up on the skeletons, second round I had summoned the grave guard, so it was too late to put it on them, not that it would have saved them.

Skryre Mortar Teams with the allegiance absolutely murder hordes. Its only a 50/50 chance to hit but still

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List cant be better at taking objectives if it has no models on the board, and after two rounds of shooting, that was basically the position I was in.

The poison wind mortar is not a war machine, just a single model unit with a ling range, los not required, 4+/4+/-2r/d6 damage gun that gets +1 to hit units of 10+ and auto rolls max damage against units of 20+ for 60 points a pop, easy enough to fit 10 and his vermin lord in 1k points, and could easily fit more with a cheaper hero.  The rat core of the second list was (accidental) bs, but swapping them out for ungors or the like would have made little difference, especially after the random terrain gave them re-rolls to wound.

Looking back, he did have some above average rolls, but even so.

And yes, the second list was deliberate cheese, but it was also a reaction to his feelings of hopelessness in the first game when he could barely kill skeletons faster than i could bring them back with four gravesites and two heroes, and the skeletons in turn were dishing out literally hundreds of attacks, between horde bonuses, command abilities, command traits.  Vanhels was entirely overkill, any of his units thst so much as touched the skeleton block instantly poofed into a cloud of dust.

I can hardly blaming him for bringing an army designed to wipe them out as quickly as possible from as far away as possible in the second game.

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Wouldn't read much into those games. Taking extremely tailored lists are not a real reflection of the game, lists designed with thinking like that will only work for the specific purpose they are designed and fail the other 80%+ of the time. So it really isn't telling you much, nonetheless a bit of experience under the belt!

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well, I guess I can throw in a battle report here. No pictures, and this is my first report, so let me know what more you want to know.

 

2000 points (100 PL) Legion of Blood vs Ogre kingdoms.

Scenario: that one from Malign Portants that ends in a tie (one objective on either side). I don't know how to read, and my opponent doesn't have the book, so we didn't use the MP stratagems.

 

LoB

Neferata

Covent throne

Vampire Lord

40 Spear skeleton

40 Spear skeleton

10 Choppa skeleton

10 Black Knights

5 Blood Knights

5 Dire Wolves

 

OK

Tyrant

Butcher

Sniper Elephant

2 Ogre Cavalry

12 Foot Ogres

6 Iron Guts

3 Leadbelchers

20 Goblins

2 yeti

 

Terrain: a bunch of obstacles that didn't really do anything, and two big cliffs about 2' in from each side, slightly off center.

|    cliff                                       Obj         hill                       

|                         Grave                                             Grave         swamp

|                    cliff         Grave.        Grave                 cliff

|                                                         Obj

Grave Markers: I put them in an arc so I could get some healing in the killing field between the cliffs

 

Deployment:

I chose the side with the two cliffs, as I could fill the space in between with my skeleton Spear wall. I deployed a flanking skeleton choppa unit by the swamp, and the dire wolves + black knights on the left. Skeletons went in between the cliffs, with Nef throne and blood knights behind. Vampire Lord went next to the black knights. 

Opponent deployed in a refused flank, with the Sniper Elephant and cavalry around the cliff; iron guts, ogers, and goblin chaff in the middle between the cliff and the objective, and leadbelchers on the hill. His characters were behind the wall of ogres. yetis deployed off the the side as ninjas [he was using ninja man-eaters for the miniatures, so these were extra stealthy yetis].

Round 1:

Ogres win initiative (he won initiative every round, so its just going to go back and forth) he moves everything up, with the cavalry in front of the sniper elephant, but not completely screening. he makes the goblins unbreakable, moves ogre line forward toward skeleton line. He snipes the Dire Wolves with the elephant since thats the only thing in range, so they take 6 mortal wounds. Yeti-ninjas appear in a smoke cloud between the cliff and the swamp.

I move my skeletons forward, but I make a mistake in that there is enough room on the left between the skeletons and the cliff than an ogre can fit through and pile into the blood knights. I give the black knights ethereal and flight from Neferata since I failed to cast arcane shield on them from [someone, I don't remember]. Neferata does the spooky - hit nonsense. They move toward the elephant + cavalry ogres. I put the blood knights on the left of the skeletons, intending the have them fly over the cliff and charge into the iron guts since I know my opponent is setting them up as a second wave. My choppa skeletons try to charge the yeti-ninjas, and fail. Hero Black knights make the charge into the elephant and equestrian ogres. They kill one horse-ogre, and put 6 wounds on the sniper. I lose 5 black knights.

Round 2:

he destruction moves iron guts to the left of the left cliff, to try to charge the vampire lord hiding behind it since I took enough casualties on the black knights that they aren't blocking the space around the cliff anymore [spoiler, they roll a 10 for the charge and she dies]. big unit of ogres fails to get arcane shield, but he's still going to charge in because he's not afraid of no ghost [I didn't correct him that these were, in fact, skeletons]. Tyrant and leadbelchers chill behind the ogre infantry, putting potshots into the skeletons. He charges into both units of skeletons, and engages both the blood knights and coven throne too. He kills 21 skeletons in the left unit, and 7 skeletons on the right unit [ouch] I fight with the black knights and do a couple wounds to the elephant, but don't take out the last cavalry model. He kills the black knights with the sniper and the vampire lord and dire wolves with the iron guts [and still had like, 12 damage of overkill]. I swing back with the skeletons and blood knights, and kill a few ogres, and he removes enough that the coven throne is no longer engaged. Yeti-ninjas fight Choppa Skeletons... Choppa skeletons pile in to put them in range of the grave marker [meaning this fight is going absolutely nowhere].

Battleshock + ogre nonsense kills all but three skeletons on the left unit, and a couple on the right.

My turn. I get 8ish skeletons back in the left unit, 6 on the right. I try to mesmerize the ironguts with the armchair of doom, but he rolls a 6 on his banner and says "no".I decide that is a dumb thing to charge alone, so the coven throne moves towards the regular ogres (not enough movement to get to the other side fo the fight without being within 3" of an ogre). Neferata does the -hit stuff and fails to wound anything with some spells. she chills next to the right cliff. Fight phase: I kill the regular ogres, they kill all but 4 of the left skeletons. I try to use my pile in moves with the blood knights to try to block off the charge lane for the iron guts. Ninja/choppa fight puts a couple wounds on the ninjas, and I'm down to about 5 Choppas.

round 3:

elephant and cav run towards the fight. Tyrant and leadbelchers set up for a charge Ironguts move toward the blood knights. Tyrant charges the armchair of doom + left skeletons, leadbelchers charge the right skeletons, iron guts charge the blood knights. Ironguts kill a blood knight, coven throne takes a couple wounds, tyrant is down to 3 wounds, I get down to about 25 skeletons on the right he ignores skeletons on the left. I kill 2 leadbelchers, and the last one runs. I kill a yeti-ninja, down to 3 choppy-skeletons.

Skeletons on the left get 7 back, right side get 6, Choppas get 5 back since Neferata is now in range of them. I try to burn down the tyrant to free up the coven throne, but he saves all three mortal wounds from the arcane bolt with his 5++. I do the mortal wound pulse spell, which kills nothing. I put flight on the blood knights, they run through the enemy lines to try to line up for a charge on the goblins holding the objective if I get priority next turn [I don't]. I try to finish off the tyrant with the coven throne, but only get it down to one wound. He activates back and puts 8 more wounds on the throne, leaving it at 2. I think the skeletons on the right are still fighting the leadbelchers at this point. Maybe I charged them here, I don't know. They do some stuff. Left skeletons kill the tyrant. I'm down to 5 choppa skeletons on the right, but the ninja is down to 2 wounds.

Round 4: 

arcane shield from the butcher fails to go off. iron guts move to charge through the coven throne, left flank is now in a position to charge me. Goblins throw stuff at the blood knights, who don't really care. Sniper elephant puts 3 mortal wounds on the covent throne, which goes down. 6 iron guts charge the right skeletons, elephant and horse-ogre charge the blood knights. Butcher charges the left skeletons. Ironguts roll horribly, and only kill 5 skeletons. I swing back and kill 3 Ironguts. Butcher kills the left skeletons, Choppa Skeletons kill the ninja, blood knights kill the last cavalry, and one knight dies from the elephant.

I get 7 spear skeletons back, who surround the iron-guts and are now at 3 attacks each, they get arcane shield, and neferata charges the goblins. Skeletons kill the iron guts, Elephant whiffs on the blood knights, and the blood knights kill the elephant.

We call it at this point since he doesn't really think the Goblins can hold off neferata and the blood knights next turn.

 

Conclusion:

Recursion from the new book is really powerful. After the game, we came to the conclusion that he should not have charged both units of skeletons: he needed to focus on just eliminating the left one, then focusing on the right. Game would have been very different if the iron guts had not whiffed their charge swing at the right skeletons. We also forgot about their mini-feat which lets him re roll ones.

full, or 30+ sized units of skeletons do some work. Just with sheer number of attacks, you can put some hurt on the enemy. 

Blood knights are sturdier than I was expecting... but don't really do as much damage as they should if they get charged.

Game would have been very different if the elephant sniper was deployed in the center of the table, or didn't lose half its health to the black knights on turn 2. He creates a 26" + run move + destruction move bubble that Neferata cannot go into without losing half her health and most of the range of the -1 hit bubble. I don't really know how I would handle that (or two of them which could then take out the covent throne or neferata in one turn) if he had them centered in his line with a wall of chaff in front. 

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Played first game with new book yesterday.

My Grand Host of Nagash army vs friends Blades of Khorne.  I was eager to also test out the new Knight of Shroud so I made a Nighthaunt list.

My List(990):
Knight of Shrouds (General)
   -Aura of Ages
   -Deathforged Chain
Carin Wraith
Tomb Banshee
Necromancer
   -Fading Vigour
5 Direwolves
10 Skeletons (Hand Weapon)
10 Skeletons (Hand Weapon)
5 Hexwraith
3 Spirit Host
3 Spirit Host

Opponents List (960):
Mighty Lord of Khorne (General)
   -Slaughterborn
Bloodthirster of Intense Rage
   -A'rgath, the King of Blades (always 2+ to hit heroes)
Slaughterpriest
   -Killing Frenzy
Bloodsecrator
10 Blood Reavers (2 HW)
10 Blood Reavers (2 HW)
10 Blood Warriors (Gorefist)

We used open war cards to randomly generate a scenario. I can't remember the exact sequence of everything but here are some highlights that stood out.
I had turn 1 I make a box cars charge with 3 spirit hosts onto the bloodthrister (thought process to tie him up in combat because he was deployed near two grave sites for regenerating.  Ended up causing 7 mortal wounds and 2 unsaved wounds in first round of combat due to Knight of Shroud command ability!

His slaughter priest committed sudoku after two failed prayers turn 1 and 2 causing d3 mortal wounds and rolling a 3 for each!

While on Arcane ruins my necromancer failed Mystic Shield on direwolves turn 1 (rolled a 4 +1 from ruins)
Turn 2 he uses blood tithe to unbind my spell.
While on Arcane ruins my necromancer failed Fading Vigour (double 1's) turn 3.
Turn 4 finally succeed with a natural 10 for Fading Vigour and reduce his blood reavers that were camping an objective from 3 attacks each down to 1.

3 Hexwraiths made a strategic retreat onto an objective and caused 3 mortal wounds on their passover!

Going into final round of the game the score is Nagash (13) vs Khorne (18).  If I win the roll off I can take out his backfield objective denying him 3 points and gaining 1 point.  Gain 3 points for my own backfield objective and control the middle for an additional 1 point which would give me 20 total points to his 18.  He could then make a desperate run to get to my backfield objective and I would win 20:19... If he wins the die roll the final score would likely be 17:23...   We roll off... both 6's... reroll... both 5's... he rolls a 2... I roll a 1...

Final Score Nagash (17) vs Khorne (23)

 

Lessons Learned:
I forgot on multiple occasions to roll a 5+ for my grand host command ability, this could have added potential units back to the board that would have been crucial.

Hexwraiths felt much more worth their points now, especially with the knight of shroud command ability.

Knight of Shroud command ability unfortunately only works the turn you use it not until your next hero phase.

Still not use to 6" deathless minion bubble and got punished for this (have been playing a lot of kharadron since GHB2017 not so much death)

Had poor grave-site placement, will need to practice more to figure out more strategic way to place these.

IMG_20180217_103233987.jpg

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 1k game last night vs Tzeentch.

 We played the first matched play plan from Malign Portents and used the rules from the book except the shyish time of war rules.

 My list-

 Grand Host of Nagash

 Arkhan the Black/Gen/Overwhelming Dread

2xMorghast Harbingers with dual swords

40x Spear Skeletons

10x Direwolves

10xZombies

 

 Tzeentch list


 Tzangor Shaman on disc

 Curse of eye, Cheeseling
 10 xTzangors

 3xskyfires

10 xPink Horrors

3x Flamers

 

 Im still learning Tzeetch and was looking forward to see how this goes.I won the drop count but let my opponent go first.He buffed a bit,repositioned Skyfires to take a shot at the wolves,,did 3 wounds.Scored 3 pts +3 for portent points.
 My first turn leaves me wondering why in the f`k do I play this game!>>>first off,for regrow I easiy get the dead wolf back and heal the other point,then the fun starts!..I choose to use Arkhans command ability to increast his spell range to 24",then proceed to cast curse of years on his Tzangors,which I roll a total of 10 on for it to go off,then I find out how this Cheeseling works,,he can steal spells that he counters,,which he did with fate dice!(but no,they arent broken right?),,then HE easily casts the spell on my 40 strong block of skellies,,and YES you can imagine how that worked out for me..this is the second time I actually tried curse of years in a game,the first time I had a bare minimum casting total and my opponent countered it /rolleyes,,then I get to see it go off on MY OWN FN UNIT AND IT WIPES IT OUT!...

   Anyhow,,vent over,

 Back to the remainder of my first turn,I pushed up Arkhan and the Morghasts,,got mystic off on Arkhan.Ran the wolves up the left side then hoped for a double turn or the game was pretty much over.I score 3 pnts + 3 for portent points,,game tied at 6 each.

 Turn 2,,I get the initiative and the game continues!..or the suffering as I was thinking at the time..I Shield up on Arkhan again,,try to get Overwhelming Dread on his Tzangors,,but YUP!,,stolen again,he didnt need fate dice this time with my awesom below average roll.Anyhow, he put it on the wolves,,meh.I charge in the Morghasts,they jump the line and end up in the Shamans face,ArKhan easily maked it into the Cheeselings face,and the Dogs make it in on the Flamers.Combat consists of me removing the Shaman with massive overkill from the Morghasts,Arkhan takes out the Cheeseling despite him using 3 fate dice trying to save him and the dogs take out 2 flamers..his strikes back were minimal.His turn he pretty much focused as much as possible on Arkhan and took him down to 5 wounds,,though Arkhan gained 2 back with a kill on the tzangors.He almost killed a Morghast with his Skyfires discs(they charged in on the Morghasts).End of turn I managed to get numbers in on his objective,mainly due to the dogs charge and pile in and scored 9 pts,6 for both objectives and an additional 3 for portent points.He scored 3 for portent points,,,score 15 to 9 in favor of the Grand Host..Looking at it,,I knew I had him at this point as I still had Zombies on my objective and I could hide them from shooting if needed,plus I had my objective within range of all 4 grave markers.

 Turn 3 I maintain initiative and cast out Overwhelming Dread on the Skyfires this time,finish off the flamers in combat,and take out one Skyfire with the Morghasts and wittle down the Tzangors to 4 models with Arkhan.Whats to note here is that the low bravery of the Skyfires as well as the Tzangors really hurt them,,I had the debuff from the spell on the Skyfires as well as the -1 from the Morghasts,making one additional Skyfire run,,then with the Tzangors he lost 3 due to bravery 3  and I used a portent card to make anothe model run away thus wiping them out.I scored another 9 pots total and really started to run away with it at this point,,we finsihed the game out though and even though he was able to regrow his Pink horrors back to full streanth in turn 4 I still tabled him in Turn 5 with the game ending at a score of like 39 to 15 or something like that.

 In closing,,Tzeentch sure falls apart once you are in their face,and I think our large blocks coupled with the awesome regrows can weather their shooting and mortal wound spam,,but we need to keep our squishy heres far away from them if possible,,and of course be aware of Cheeselings!

 

 

 

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So I managed to get two 1500 point games in over the weekend, first time using Death and the new Battletome so was a massive learning curve.  Both games were against Nurgle and rolling for Matched Play battleplans (in preparation for a friendly event in a couple of weeks time)

Quote

Allegiance: Grand Host of Nagash
Neferata Mortarch Of Blood (400)
- General
- Lore of the Dead: Soul Harvest (Deathmages)
Necromancer (110)
- Lore of the Deathmages: Overwhelming Dread
Vampire Lord (140)
- Artefact: Grave-sand Timeglass 
- Lore of the Vampires: Soulpike
Wight King with Baleful Tomb Blade (120)
40 x Skeleton Warriors (280)
- Ancient Spears
10 x Skeleton Warriors (80)
- Ancient Blades
10 x Skeleton Warriors (80)
- Ancient Blades
6 x Spirit Hosts (240)

Total: 1450 / 2000
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 104

List is basically what I have mostly painted.

Game 1: Nurgle (mostly Daemon) - Starstrike

Only played 3 turns due to time limits, but suffered a major loss as my opponent managed to tap all three objectives with some super fast daemons (he rolled the +2" movement on his wheel for the first turn).  I put the Spirit Hosts and one unit of 10 Skeletons underground, but a combination of not great Gravesite placement and good daemon movement meant I was unable to bring any of those units onto the board.  Overall very happy, didn't loose any full units.  Nurglings are super good now!  I did swap out the artefact for Ossific Diadem as my opponent's heroes only had 5 wounds (and I felt a right *** using the Timeglass on one of them).  Having two 6++ saves is really good!

Game 2: Nurgle (more mortal) - Knife to the Heart

We called this a draw at turn 4, very interesting game.  I ended up with only my Wight King dying but removed a unit of Blight Kings, Harbinger, Bloab basically through attrition.  Tried being super aggressive with Neferata which worked but more by luck than judgement and her ability to heal 3 wounds if she kills a hero.  Kept the same units underground and had the same issues as before - it's really easy to block most of the deployable area, however playing for a double turn meant I was able to kill Bloab and move Neferata to within 9" of a gravesite to pull 5 of my 6 spirit hosts up to try and claim my opponents objective - would have done it if it weren't for a very lucky battleshock roll bringing back 6 plaguebearers :D  Forgot spells a couple of times and the Timeglass until turn 2.  However I don't think it would have made much difference.  Having a flying vampire would have made a massive difference and allowed me to assail my opponents objective - plus I was lucky that his Great Unclean One basically did very little all game.

Overall

Really enjoyed the games, very different to playing Bloodbound and certainly has more toys available (including spells!) and felt significantly more competitive.  Big units of skeletons with Neferata nearby to confer her -1 to hit are amazing for nullifying elite infantry units like Blight Kings.  You really have to hit skeletons hard and wipe them out else they'll just replenish up.  Spirit Hosts are not a good unit to put underground, their big bases make them really difficult to summon and I'm not sure that long term they'll stay in the army, they also don't really benefit from Legions Innumerable - in fact I'm not convinced that Grand Host is the best legion to pick for this list either, Legions Innumerable only kicked off once, and doesn't replenish multi-wound summonable units.  I actually think Legion of Blood would be a better choice as the -1 bravery would have more impact - however I didn't actually take many casualties overall and the Timeglass is a reliable way to inflict mortal wounds on that annoying 5 wound general (i.e. Stormcast, Freeguild etc).

I do need to make a cribsheet as there were quite a few bits I forgot to do - at one point I forgot my unit of 40 skeletons had 3 attacks each :S  Neferata needs using more surgically than I did, going up against a Harbinger and Bloab wasn't a sensible idea (especially with Bloab's -1 to cast ability).  I will also create some spell cards for the spells on warscrolls, just makes it that bit quicker for finding the cast roll and letting my opponent see what the spell does.  One big thing I need to improve on is counting out attack dice - 29 models with 3 attacks was taking forever to count, effectively negating the speed I'd gained for using movement trays.

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5 hours ago, RuneBrush said:

 One big thing I need to improve on is counting out attack dice - 29 models with 3 attacks was taking forever to count, effectively negating the speed I'd gained for using movement trays.

My dice cube has 36 d6.

For this I find it easiest to pour all the dice into my hand (36) take 7 out (29) and just roll this 3 times.

Can be helpful if you bring a tiny notepad (like a hotel size or post it notes) and you can write the # of hits each time so its something like (16, 19, 21).

That removes the stress and makes this more a practice of picking up dice.

It's worth noting if you have non standard dice like the IronJawz or Ultra Marine, or if your dice has numbers written out instead of the pips, it simply takes longer to eyeball how many successes you had. Really when my opponent has annoying hard to read dice, I'm sorta stuck hoping they are fast and honest, otherwise it's certainly gonna take me longer to see what they are really rolling.

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21 hours ago, Bradifer said:

My dice cube has 36 d6.

For this I find it easiest to pour all the dice into my hand (36) take 7 out (29) and just roll this 3 times.

Can be helpful if you bring a tiny notepad (like a hotel size or post it notes) and you can write the # of hits each time so its something like (16, 19, 21).

That removes the stress and makes this more a practice of picking up dice.

It's worth noting if you have non standard dice like the IronJawz or Ultra Marine, or if your dice has numbers written out instead of the pips, it simply takes longer to eyeball how many successes you had. Really when my opponent has annoying hard to read dice, I'm sorta stuck hoping they are fast and honest, otherwise it's certainly gonna take me longer to see what they are really rolling.

Funnily enough I was thinking something along this lines, basically make a dice "sandcastle" :D  I tend to use a dice tray too which helps prevent them going everywhere too.

Completely agree about the whole dice symbol thing too.  The dice I normally use are regular 12mm D6's (bulk of 100 off eBay) - no special symbols or other such fun, but I do normally have a set of 16mm ones for "special" rolls - priority, the odd spell etc.

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On 2/19/2018 at 10:20 AM, Bradifer said:

My dice cube has 36 d6.

For this I find it easiest to pour all the dice into my hand (36) take 7 out (29) and just roll this 3 times.

Can be helpful if you bring a tiny notepad (like a hotel size or post it notes) and you can write the # of hits each time so its something like (16, 19, 21).

That removes the stress and makes this more a practice of picking up dice.

It's worth noting if you have non standard dice like the IronJawz or Ultra Marine, or if your dice has numbers written out instead of the pips, it simply takes longer to eyeball how many successes you had. Really when my opponent has annoying hard to read dice, I'm sorta stuck hoping they are fast and honest, otherwise it's certainly gonna take me longer to see what they are really rolling.

I have exactly 60 dice with colored blips. I can roll 60 ghoul attacks with re-roll in about 45 seconds. If you are going to play hordes, you are required to have a good system, otherwise you will (rightfully) be accused of slow-playing, which is bad. Some TO are taking about extreme measures against slow playing, as it is legitimately a problem in competitive right now.

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Hi guys,

Here's some reports from a 3-games tournament I did last sunday.

My list:

Nagash: Orb, Transference, soul harvest

Necromancer: Overwhelming dread, Tomb sand Hourglass

2 Morghast Harbringers (double swords, just have those models :/ )

30 Grave guards

20 skellies

20 skellies

3 spirit hosts

The idea behind this was to focus everything on the summonable units, that would revive soooo much thanks to nagash and the tombs, Nagash is packed with spells that could heal him, so that he can sustain himself. Before going into the reports, let's say I won the tournament, with 3 wins, but I still have some doubts about Nagash in a competitive way.

1st GAME: vs Kharadrons (1 Ironclad, 2 Chemists, 6 Skywardens with drill-cannons and other troops, 20 fyreslayers with priest. He could pop anywhere in the map with almost his entire army)

Those little dwarfs can shoot :o 

I was VERY lucky, and managed to keep Nagash alive for 2 turns. He managed to crush an Ironclad and 2 heroes, together with many troops before dying, and he also gave me the VP that made me win the game. But I admit it, I was too lucky, my opponent couldn't believe my rolls. Against a shooting force like the one I had to face, Death is still very vulnerable, even with all the healing. And after Nagash dies, the army can't sustain a lot. I won the game, but was wiped out of the board.

2nd GAME: vs High Elves (3 units of phoenix guards, 1 cryo phoenix, 1 pyro phoenix, 1 ballista, 2 heroes and some sea guards)

This was very easy. He had almost no rend in his army, even though the guards are really hard to kill (4+ and 4+ save), they could do nothing against a 2+ save (rerolling 1s) Nagash. The phoenix tryed to charge Nagash, but  he 1shot the pyro one in combat, and sniped the other with spells and his lazer gaze. His ballista was too far from the center of the board, so Nagash was untouched by it.

3rd GAME: vs Legion of Sacrament! (Arkhan, mortis machine, 2 necros, 40 skellies, 60 zombies, 1 corpse cart, 1 wight king, 40 skellies with spears, some bats)

This was funny. We checked the book, and Nagash knew Arkhan's spells!!!! :D Needles to say, I spammed curse of time as much as I could. Managed to blow up the bats, but then not much else. This time I won thanks to the superior command ability from Nagash, and the grave guards who chewed all the  zombies in 2 rounds of combat.

It was funny, because with all his buffs, Arkhan was casting with a +5, so I rarely managed to dispel anything of his. Anyway, I won thanks to a fast objective taking, thanks to summoning (which he did not capitalized on).

 

So... I still think that Nagash is not that much competitive. Yes, he's a beast, and now he's worth his 800 points. But there are still too many ways he can be melted, especially by shooting. His healing spells are not so effective, so he normally doesn't heal too many wounds in one turn. My current thinking is that the most competitive list is something with Mannfred, VLOZD and some Vargheists. You make them ambush and destroy the sides of the enemy's army, while keeping them safe from early game shooting. I'm also going to try an Arkhan list too, giving to the VLOZD the shroud of darkness, to protect him from shooting.

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