Lets Chat: Legions of Nagash

[ianob]

3 minutes ago, Killax said:

Tzeentch relies on it's leaders for the effectively Skyfires, that's one aspect and most certainly Order armies do aswell. What I see here is that you willfully ignore the potential summonning has given to you. 

Since when is placing them on your side of the field an issue if you are a melee combat orientated army that as a result benifits from opponents moving towards you and your gravesite? 

The oppossing army is either bound to shoot, and stay away from you, whilst you summon near them.
OR
The oppossing army is nearing you in which case you have a fair fight.

What exactly are these units that you summon near them doing unsupported? If they are supported, why is your opponent not taking easy snipes on your characters? 

alternatively, if you’re setting up something worrying in the grave, why is your opponent not moving to make the Grave unusable?

you seem to be assuming all opponents are terrible. Personally I assume my opponents will be capable.

no one is saying grave sites are ******, or at least I’m not. But they are limited in their use. You seem to think they’re some kind of super deep strike, which they most definitely are not.

[RoyalDachshund]

The book is an upgrade, no doubt about it.

But I still don't see how death will stand against Changehost / Shooty Stormcast / Kharadron Clowncar / Kunnin-Ruk. That's all, I just don't see how you can build an army to deal with the "top tier" lists, and this is, at least for some, a concern.

I'm far from saying Death will be bad, after all, it's situation couldn't be worsen much so everything new is a buff. But it still, again, at least for me, feels like a try to clear the warehouses by GW rather than complex and fully thought product. For Pete's sake, they've re-packed a 20 years old zombie kit to round bases. A kit that is older than some of the players

[Killax]

Just now, ianob said:

What exactly are these units that you summon near them doing unsupported? If they are supported, why is your opponent not taking easy snipes on your characters? 

alternatively, if you’re setting up something worrying in the grave, why is your opponent not moving to make the Grave unusable?

you seem to be assuming all opponents are terrible. Personally I assume my opponents will be capable.

no one is saying grave sites are ******, or at least I’m not. But they are limited in their use. You seem to think they’re some kind of super deep strike, which they most definitely are not.

1. As if every army has support for every unit they have.
2. As if every army can snipe your characters...
3. As if every army can completely occupy four Gravemarkers.

Gravemarkers are as limited in use as you place them.
 

[kozokus]

52 minutes ago, ianob said:

The new summoning mechanics are fine, but we are still vulnerable to focus fire and now we have to spam heroes to get the most out of this. The abilities want us to go wide to maximise summoning on multiple units but that is not how good players play; it really needed an option to return more models on less units to be truly good, but I still think it’s better than before.

Lets also not forget that everything we do is hero based, in a game where sniping heroes is a core tactic. Sacrament and then putting the two anti shooting artefacts on two necromancers will be common, but having to do that *just to get to use your abilities* is a tough sell. Outside of Sacrament we’re going to be very vulnerable to simply having all of our characters sniped as we have no real good ways to protect them. The main problem we’re going to have is this, and it’s going to be quite binary - shooting opponent and nowhere to hide? Lose game. Opponent has no shooting? Awesome. 

Yeah, boohoo, we loose against skyfire, we all do. On the other side, an army that canot pick ennemy heroes will have trouble going throught Skeletons that regenerate 6D3 wounds each turn (on each unit!)

Sure, people can snipe your heroes, but can they snipe them all 6 in one turn? brobably not.

 

 

 

 

[smucreo]

Let's chill guys. We all have our opinions but I'm sure we can give them in a more civilized manner.

[Jamopower]

I think the split to different kind of gamers are very visible here. The book seems to not be an answer for people that want to compete on the top tables of the tournaments, but it seems to be very good for people that have their interests and ambitions set bit lower. It's not a matched/open/narrative split, but more of a very hard matched / bit more relaxed matched split

[Xasz]

Grand Host of Nagash + Lords of Sacrement seems to be the most appealing army setup. At least for me personally.

In case I haven't missed any restrictions, this way you get:

• GG as battleline
• a nice 790p magic/support package, with access to curse of years and 7 spells per turn
• the possibility of a non-named general (the constraining "x has to be general under y" rules are bound to the mortarch legions)
• therefore, access to nice items and command traits (especially if lead by a Wight King)
• probably the best legion abilities or at least the most generally useful 
• still ~1200p to flesh out your army the way you want...

Legion of Sacrement just seems lackluster, especially as you get the nicest things by just adding their battalion for 70p... +1 to cast is nice, but there are already several ways to boost rolls and casting values aren't that high to begin with. The second ability of Sacrement is probably not usable without reinforcement points, at least no one will dare to play it this way until an FAQ drops. (and even then, it's a far cry from being reliable)

 

[smucreo]

I don't know, I still feel Legion of Night has the potential to be scary too if the right list is found for it. I do agree that Grand Host seems like a really solid choice though, and if it's proven that GG can be useful with this allegiance I'll be all over it. 

Your option seems nice though, the relatively cheap support package that Lords of Sacrament offers can prove a viable substitute for the Legion of Sacrament all together and allow you to benefit from the far better (imo, at least) allegiance ability of Grand Host.

[RuneBrush]

Nice to see all the discussions going on (though I do think it went a little wobbly p10~12).  I'm really looking forward to getting the new Battletome in my hand and trying it out (though I do need to pull my finger out and get more stuff painted ).

I would say that it's really easy to get focused on how well an army can dish out or absorb damage because that's all we can do "on paper" so to speak.  What I'd counter is that until we can play a few games, we don't know how they'll really play on objective based battleplans.  I think Gravesites could really throw a spanner in the works - the threat of popping a unit up in an opponents deployment zone will really make them think!  Especially if that's a unit of 20 models that contest an objective.

In case nobody has noticed it, WarhammerTV are doing a Twitch chat with Nick Hoeth about Legions of Nagash at 4pm and chat with Simon Grant about new ways to play in Malign Portents at 5pm (GMT).  Could be relevant and a good opportunity to fire questions/concerns at them

[BURF1]

15 minutes ago, Xasz said:

Grand Host of Nagash + Lords of Sacrement seems to be the most appealing army setup. At least for me personally.

In case I haven't missed any restrictions, this way you get:

• GG as battleline
• a nice 790p magic/support package, with access to curse of years and 7 spells per turn
• the possibility of a non-named general (the constraining "x has to be general under y" rules are bound to the mortarch legions)
• therefore, access to nice items and command traits (especially if lead by a Wight King)
• probably the best legion abilities or at least the most generally useful 
• still ~1200p to flesh out your army the way you want...

Legion of Sacrement just seems lackluster, especially as you get the nicest things by just adding their battalion for 70p... +1 to cast is nice, but there are already several ways to boost rolls and casting values aren't that high to begin with. The second ability of Sacrement is probably not usable without reinforcement points, at least no one will dare to play it this way until an FAQ drops. (and even then, it's a far cry from being reliable)

 

Legion of Sacrment relics are so much better than Grand Host's (you can basically make 2 units immune to shooting) that unless you're taking Morghasts LoS will be extremely close, especially considering if you're taking the Lords of Sacrement and NOT using Arkhans command ability, you're losing out on a lot of potential help. (I can has 36" amaranthine orb?).

So far my List Idea is:

Arkhan General Also Battalion

Necromancer

Necromancer -2 Shooting, Balewind

VLoZD 4++ shooting save

Mortis Engine

Dogs

Dogs

Skellies

Leaves right around 600pts to either pad out the battle line or add Hexwraiths/Black Knights/Spirit Host/AGoTG. Biggest weakness is the VLoZD need to pray to the dice gods a lot.

The same list GHoN uses that 600pts for 2 units of Morghasts and makes the VLoZD your general in exchange for making both the balewind Necromancer and the VLoZD himself much more vulnerable to being shot off the table.

 

[Teuchter]

What you guys think of this list.

Allegiance: Legion of Sacrament

Arkhan

Necromancer x2

Named VLoZD

Mortis Engine

Skellies x40 (Spears)

Dire Wolves 2x5

Grave Guard x20 (Great Swords)

Lords of Sacrament Battalion

1990 points.

 

I like the look of quite a lot of the spell lores. Overwhelming Dread and Fading Vigor on the Necromacers, Vile Transference on Arkhan and Amaranthine Orb on the Prince.

Wristbands of Gold and the Shroud of Darkness on the necromancers.

Thoughts?

[Killax]

I like where the lists are going, still would personally include some more chaff and likely consider a sole Zombie Dragon/Terrorgheist over the VLoZD at this point. Depending offcourse on your own plans. Key is really that I'd also love to see which Legion is taken for the army and which units will be summoned/deep striked on the table.

In addition some info about the Herald:
- Knight of Shrouds is 120 points. Leader role.
- Heralds are always taken as part of Allies and only have to share a Grand Allegiance Keyword to be taken (so it's not under the Ally/faction umberella).
- You can always make your Herald a general, when you do so it gains acces to the Allegiance Command Traits and Artefacts (of Power) based on it's own Keywords.

For the Knight of Shrouds and Legions it translates that it can become part of Legion armies, doesn't obtain any Keywords but could be the General if you want to (offcourse it means you leave out on a Command Trait).
Alternatively it can be the general for Nighthaunt and then obtains all regular Command Trait and Artefact acces because it also has the Keyword for that.

Like most Heralds though I don't think the KoS is a particular great general for 2K armies but I do see some nice potential for lower point battles or indeed for players who want to solely play nighthaunt. 

58 minutes ago, smucreo said:

I don't know, I still feel Legion of Night has the potential to be scary too if the right list is found for it. I do agree that Grand Host seems like a really solid choice though, and if it's proven that GG can be useful with this allegiance I'll be all over it. 

If you are going to ambush a Zombie Dragon or Terrorgheist I think you'll love Legion of Night. I think that for a lot of foot heroes the Legion of Secrament is the best option. At the same time if players want to thake 6+ Morghast the Grand Host of Nagash becomes awesome and likewise those who indeed want to go heavy on the Vampire Lords on Zombie Dragon should certainly consider Legion of Blood.

As before what's better completely depends on army context  
 

[Undeadly]

4 hours ago, Killax said:

Yeah I am very suprised by this opinion. The ability to deep strike Summonable units automatically in this game is such a huge factor that somehow seems to be missed by a ton of players. My guess is that it's missed because it's new?  Or that Death players have disregarded this aspect for so long that they stopped seeing the value in it?

I guess the only way to give some insight on that is to physically show it? Bubble-wraps on command for any character are a huge asset, especially if you have enough Flying units and Legions of Nagash certainly doesn't have a shortage in that. This is just covering the Grave aspect, excluding all Legion benifits, 9+ double cast effect and extremely cheap Battalions.

If you see the Lores as garbage I really don't know what you are comparing it too...

The problem is, however, that our deep strike is as easily disabled as just slapping a unit into the Gravesites bubble. If the enemy moves within the radius or deploys some thing like, say, Stormcast Vanguard or a Cannon or another warmachine, the gravesite might as well be removed from play. This is problem only further compoubed by our lack of shooting, so we can't get them off at a range, and than couple in the fact that a Hero needs to physically be nearby makes it very hard to utilize these Gravesites with any certainty; there isn't even a way to discourage camping like Nurgle or Sylvanneth, which deals MW to enemies nearby. 

To put it bluntly, if we play against a smart oppenent, he'll know to move units to block our Deep Striking. Then its a matter of Making it Across the field, Getting in range of the Gravesite, and than Clearing the enemy away. Not exactly easy, and by that time, the unit probably would have gotten into combat by than.

 

Those battalions are either very expensive when it comes to point costs for the models, or are lacking in actual substance, like Mannfreds. Arkhan is still the best, because of giving another cast, than March, than the prince, and than Neferata's. But even than rerolling some DI, none of them really help our summomanable units.

I will say though, that I appreciate the optimistic voice in this thread.

[Xasz]

30 minutes ago, BURF1 said:

Legion of Sacrment relics are so much better than Grand Host's (you can basically make 2 units immune to shooting) that unless you're taking Morghasts LoS will be extremely close, especially considering if you're taking the Lords of Sacrement and NOT using Arkhans command ability, you're losing out on a lot of potential help. (I can has 36" amaranthine orb?).

Pretty much comes down to what you wanna focus on.

Your approach is centered more around heroes and spells, while mine concerns itself more with units and buffing/supporting them.

My problem with LoSacrement is that both abilities are rather useless.  Their items are nice indeed, but depend on your opponent bringing the hurt in exactly that phase (ergo, dependent on meta). 

The orb combo can be played around (static caster) and more range does not always mean more targets. The jump from 12 -> 24 is much more impact-full than 24 -> 36. Either way, might be kinda funny blasting people left and right with a volleyball of death.

[Calum Todd]

Thinking of running this list for a bit of fun. The general is a bit of an easy target, but there's not too much I can do about it - other than there's probably better targets for the opponent. I'm not sure if 5 knights will do anything, I used to have 10 as a tarpit and halving that might make them useless. GHoN Archai should do a tonne of damage though (a Vampire Lord while squishier than the King could boost them even more).

Grand Host of Nagash

Wight King with Black Axe
- General, Lord of Nagashizzar, Ossific Diadem
Necromancer - Overwhelming Dread
Necromancer - Spectral Grasp
Necromancer - Fading Vigour
Cairn Wraith
-Grave-sand Timeglass

40 x Skeleton Warriors 
10 x Skeleton Warriors
10 x Skeleton Warriors
10 x Grave Guard
5 x Black Knights

4 x Morghast Archai
2 x Morghast Archai

Battalions:
Deathmarch

[Killax]

16 minutes ago, Undeadly said:

The problem is, however, that our deep strike is as easily disabled as just slapping a unit into the Gravesites bubble. If the enemy moves within the radius or deploys some thing like, say, Stormcast Vanguard or a Cannon or another warmachine, the gravesite might as well be removed from play. This is problem only further compoubed by our lack of shooting, so we can't get them off at a range, and than couple in the fact that a Hero needs to physically be nearby makes it very hard to utilize these Gravesites with any certainty; there isn't even a way to discourage camping like Nurgle or Sylvanneth, which deals MW to enemies nearby. 

To put it bluntly, if we play against a smart oppenent, he'll know to move units to block our Deep Striking. Then its a matter of Making it Across the field, Getting in range of the Gravesite, and than Clearing the enemy away. Not exactly easy, and by that time, the unit probably would have gotten into combat by than.

 

Those battalions are either very expensive when it comes to point costs for the models, or are lacking in actual substance, like Mannfreds. Arkhan is still the best, because of giving another cast, than March, than the prince, and than Neferata's. But even than rerolling some DI, none of them really help our summomanable units; infact, for some odd reason, very few things DO help summonable units. You would think in an army based around hordes, we'd have better horde support, wouldn't we?

I will say though, that I appreciate the optimistic voice in this thread.

No it's not as easily disabled. It simply isn't... Unless you put those gravesites in a place where your opponents army needs to be there is absolutely no option that they will be able to cover those in your territory. In other words, there does not excist a scenario where it isn't relevant unless the Legion of Nagash player has no clue what he or she should be doing. 

To put it better, there is some act in this topic going on as if deep striking in this scenario is easy to stop on a 6'x4' board whilst both Stormcast and Seraphon's whole reason to continiously appear in top 5 places comes from the fact they can arrive at points located. The mere suggestion that any player can instantly stop this at 4 marked points on the table, two of which are in your territory, which might aswell be four, is just false.
If you want to have it be an effective part, consider flying Vampire Lords on foot. Cheap, reliable source, very manouvreable and easy to hide. It's basically the AoS equivelant of a 40K HQ with jump pack doing exactly the same and being a consistent factor in 40k top competitive lists since the inception of deep strike rules.

What I can say on the subject is that you should feel free to dismiss these aspects if you think they are bad. Fact is, they arn't nearly as easily countered as some of you make it out to be. At the same time I can state to you that LoN with this can easily compete into the current competitive meta because of this. As the options to summon smaller pockets to deny boardspace leads to objective based victory. If you are willing to focus on it the next month you will see what I mean by this.



 

[Malakithe]

Just a quick list I came up with while at work. Not sure about spells/items since I can sift through pages and pages of leaks and blurry pics lol 

Leaders
Arkhan The Black Mortarch of Sacrament (320)
- General
Necromancer (110)
Necromancer (110)
Vampire Lord (140)
Vampire Lord (140)

Battleline
40 x Skeleton Warriors (280)
- Ancient Spear & Shield
20 x Skeleton Warriors (160)
- Ancient Spear & Shield
20 x Skeleton Warriors (160)
- Ancient Spear & Shield
10 x Black Knights (240)
Units
1 x Corpse Cart (80)
Behemoths
Mortis Engine (180)
Battalions
Sacrament  (70)

Total: 1990 / 2000
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 149
 

[Iradekhorne]

why nobody play 30 grave guard? they are sumoneable, and have really strong dmg ouput with vanhel dance and +1 atack, also are batleline Oo

[Xasz]

8 minutes ago, Iradekhorne said:

why nobody play 30 grave guard? they are sumoneable, and have really strong dmg ouput with vanhel dance and +1 atack, also are batleline Oo

Slow, expensive infantry. 

New rules might help but this will probably need more than theorycrafting.

[Jamopower]

32 minutes ago, Killax said:

To put it better, there is some act in this topic going on as if deep striking in this scenario is easy to stop on a 6'x4' board whilst both Stormcast and Seraphon's whole reason to continiously appear in top 5 places comes from the fact they can arrive at points located. The mere suggestion that any player can instantly stop this at 4 marked points on the table, two of which are in your territory, which might aswell be four, is just false.
If you want to have it be an effective part, consider flying Vampire Lords on foot. Cheap, reliable source, very manouvreable and easy to hide. It's basically the AoS equivelant of a 40K HQ with jump pack doing exactly the same and being a consistent factor in 40k top competitive lists since the inception of deep strike rules.

 

Seraphon and stormcast deepstriking is quite a different thing from the gravesite summoning. As said, it's relatively easy to stop, but on the other hand that has a tactical side on its own. By placement of the gravesite, there are many factors that need a little playing to see how they turn out. I wouldn't be too aggressive on placing them, but having them bit further along the side you can make your opponent doing hard decision whether to go and babysit them, or have an option of having something annoying coming out of them. If you just slap the gravesites middle of the table, there will be an opponent model standing on top of them on turn 1 forwards for sure.

[gariont]

Did I miss something reading through the leaks or are Vargheists no longer battleline for soulblight? Seems weird to add that in GHB 2017 and then  remove it for legions of Nagash while keeping the rest of soulblight the same?

[Killax]

42 minutes ago, Jamopower said:

Seraphon and stormcast deepstriking is quite a different thing from the gravesite summoning. As said, it's relatively easy to stop, but on the other hand that has a tactical side on its own. By placement of the gravesite, there are many factors that need a little playing to see how they turn out. I wouldn't be too aggressive on placing them, but having them bit further along the side you can make your opponent doing hard decision whether to go and babysit them, or have an option of having something annoying coming out of them. If you just slap the gravesites middle of the table, there will be an opponent model standing on top of them on turn 1 forwards for sure.

Yeah whoever thinks that it is that easy to stop, I cannot dissagree more. The fact is that a Gravemarker in itself is a point on the table. Models that can be placed have an effective 18" diameter to be placed. I would personally go relatively aggressive on them if the objective is to play aggressive, the scenario at hand matters, the units used for them matter and most importantly knowing how far your opponent can reach them matters.

As before, because there are four of them and all of them can quite easily be placed in your territory it's either A. Impossible for your opponent to cover them all or B. Leads your opponent in a position that is improving for the Legions of Nagash player because it means you can reach them for melee combat.

The most flexible model to be used for summonning in my opinion is the flying Vampire Lord, which is cheap, has a very small base to stand on and can fly to any particular cover required. Cover that can also assist you in opponents not being able to completely occupy that 18" diameter per gravesite.

Some seem worried about Tzeentch and shooting Order and the like, valid. But you know how those armies become less problematic? If they present themselves towards you. Meaning that if they stand on top of all of them turn 1 (which is impossible with the right placement but lets assume they have done that  ) still means now you can reach them with every unit in your army. 

[Jamopower]

I guess you haven't read the rules in detail. You need to put the summoned units completely within the 9" bubble from the grave marker and 9" from the enemy. Thus a single model standing on top of the counter will make it impossible to summon anything out of that grave.

 

[RuneBrush]

1 minute ago, Killax said:

Yeah whoever thinks that it is that easy to stop, I cannot dissagree more. The fact is that a Gravemarker in itself is a point on the table. Models that can be placed have an effective 18" diameter to be placed. I would personally go relatively aggressive on them if the objective is to play aggressive, the scenario at hand matters, the units used for them matter and most importantly knowing how far your opponent can reach them matters.

Surely an opponent would only need to place a model directly on top of a gravesite to lock it out?  You'd never be able to place a unit wholy within 9" and 9" away from enemy models because you measure from the centre of a gravesite and the edge of the base of a model.  Not saying their awful or anything along that line, but I think their threat is actually more important than their application.

[Killax]

1 hour ago, Malakithe said:

Just a quick list I came up with while at work. Not sure about spells/items since I can sift through pages and pages of leaks and blurry pics lol 
 

List looks solid to me, same question as before though:

- Legion used?
- Units used for Summonning?
 

One thing I think is a very potent consideration so far is using Legion of Night with this or Legion of Sacrement. With the Legion of Night I'd be very tempted to include a Terrorgeist or Zombie Dragon as a hammer for the army from the ambush rule. This in turn allows you to present a combination of very solid attrition units and one scary target that cannot simply be dealth with in the initial Shooting phase.