Lets Chat: Idoneth Deepkin

[Kaedus]

2 hours ago, march10k said:

I'm loving the forgotten nightmares rule with Ishaelans in front of a turtle with mystic shield.  Can't touch me till I'm good and ready to charge!  I'm thinking:

Dhom Hain

Royal Court

King, wizard, priest

Akhelian Battalion

Turtle

Shark

2x6 Ishaelan Guard

6 Morrsarr

Very low model count at 23, but very fast, pretty much immune to shooting, and has enough hammer to do what's needed.

Is this not 80 points over? 

[Reeve]

Hey everyone, new poster here thought I'd join the discussion. 

Finished my first thrall on Monday: 

 

And I'm currently aiming for this list: 

Allegiance: Idoneth Deepkin
- Enclave:  TBD
Akhelian King (240)
- General
ISHARANN (100)
10 x Namarti Thralls (140)
3 x Akhelian Ishlaen Guard (140)
Akhelian Leviadon (380)

Total: 1000 / 1000
Allies: 0 / 200
Wounds: 50
 

The Leviadon might be a bit too much for Vanguard games, and I'm gonna experiment with different ISHARANN heroes to see which one offers the best support (Soulrender is gonna be my first choice but not quite sure how much mileage I'd get out of him with only 10 thralls). Has anyone succeeded in making a round 750 point list? Since that's technically the smalles 'legal' vanguard game size. 

[march10k]

1 hour ago, Kaedus said:

Is this not 80 points over? 

Sorry, not paying for the royal court battalion, I keep using that as shorthand, and then get things muddled in my mind when I don't have the hard copy list in front of me.  Come to think of it,  I think it's actually volt, not the generic king, as well...coming to1980?  I'll edit my post.

[march10k]

1 hour ago, Reeve said:

Hey everyone, new poster here thought I'd join the discussion. 

Finished my first thrall on Monday: 

 

And I'm currently aiming for this list: 

Allegiance: Idoneth Deepkin
- Enclave:  TBD
Akhelian King (240)
- General
ISHARANN (100)
10 x Namarti Thralls (140)
3 x Akhelian Ishlaen Guard (140)
Akhelian Leviadon (380)

Total: 1000 / 1000
Allies: 0 / 200
Wounds: 50
 

The Leviadon might be a bit too much for Vanguard games, and I'm gonna experiment with different ISHARANN heroes to see which one offers the best support (Soulrender is gonna be my first choice but not quite sure how much mileage I'd get out of him with only 10 thralls). Has anyone succeeded in making a round 750 point list? Since that's technically the smalles 'legal' vanguard game size. 

My problem with this is that I don't see any units that actually perform as either hammer or anvil.  I guess the king and leviadon default into those roles based on how many points they eat up, but what are the Ishaelans and thralls actually doing?  The guard can float around in front of the turtle to tank shooting with a 3+ that ignores rend, I guess, but that makes them feel like ablative wounds on the turtle, not a unit in their own right.  And the thralls are just 100% a tax  you're paying.  I would drop them like a bad habit. even a second unit of 3 Ishaelans would be better.

The solution, as you yourself say, is dropping the turtle.  And the thralls.  I would start with a king and 6 morrsarr, that's 560 points.  You have your hero and your hammer.  Add 6 Ishaelans as an anvil, leaving 160 points.  Now it gets interesting.  You can add three more morrsarrs, consuming all of it, three more Ishaelans, leaving 20 points unspent, or take either a wizard or a priest and upgrade the king to Volturnos.  All of them are viable, but I'm liking the third option, I would take a wizard to put mystic shield on your Ishaelans so they're a 3+ save rend ignoring closest enemy unit nightmare (pun intended) to the enemy, and you have TWO beatsticks striking from behind that shield. 

 

The thrall is a beautifully painted model, but at 1000 points, I don't think you can effectively have both Akhelians and Namarti in your army.  I would focus on one or the other, and look to combine them at 2000 points, or even as low as 1500?

[Reeve]

11 minutes ago, march10k said:

My problem with this is that I don't see any units that actually perform as either hammer or anvil.  I guess the king and leviadon default into those roles based on how many points they eat up, but what are the Ishaelans and thralls actually doing?  The guard can float around in front of the turtle to tank shooting with a 3+ that ignores rend, I guess, but that makes them feel like ablative wounds on the turtle, not a unit in their own right.  And the thralls are just 100% a tax  you're paying.  I would drop them like a bad habit. even a second unit of 3 Ishaelans would be better.

The solution, as you yourself say, is dropping the turtle.  And the thralls.  I would start with a king and 6 morrsarr, that's 560 points.  You have your hero and your hammer.  Add 6 Ishaelans as an anvil, leaving 160 points.  Now it gets interesting.  You can add three more morrsarrs, consuming all of it, three more Ishaelans, leaving 20 points unspent, or take either a wizard or a priest and upgrade the king to Volturnos.  All of them are viable, but I'm liking the third option, I would take a wizard to put mystic shield on your Ishaelans so they're a 3+ save rend ignoring closest enemy unit nightmare (pun intended) to the enemy, and you have TWO beatsticks striking from behind that shield. 

So my idea was that the Ishlaens, in conjunction with Low Tide or the Leviadon shield, act as the anvil. A 3+ unmodifiable save is pretty hard to beat, and because of their speed, it will be fairly simple to force my opponents to focus fire on them. The Thralls, which I will include regardless since I have the miniatures,  will then be my hammer since 30-40, 3/3,-1 attacks are nothing to sneeze at.

I could then either run a Soulrender to make them a bit more resilient or a Tidecaster for some magic goodness (and Mystic Shields). Obviously, in the the High Tide Turn I charge with the whole force and put the King buff on the most valuable unit in that turn (which could very well be the thralls). I also have a Gloomtide Shipwreck, so getting some ward saves on the Thralls should be doable. 

Now the real reason that I made this outline for my force was that it's varied to point and will allow me to test most of the units they have, which will help me further theme the force. I'm currently quite fond of the Mor'Phan and Namarti combination and painting a Leviadon (I never get to paint large monsters currently) seems like a lot of fun.  Another issue with skipping Namarti is that you don't have any bodies to contest objectives that you score based on miniatures present (which is obviously not a Idoneth strong point, but still)

[march10k]

Even at 1000 points, 10 one wound models with a 5+ save don't provide and mass on the objective.  If you're running Namarti, run Namarti.  You need real blocks, not minimum-sized tokens, with soulrender support, preferably augmented soulrenders at that.  With ten models, they're going to hit kind of hard, but only  once.  unless they wipe the enemy out on the charge, they take casualties that grind them down hard.  Since 30 attacks only kills 13 wounds worth of enemy with no save or only a 6+, you're effectively betting that this unit is always going to be able to charge, and only ever going to charge ten man units with ****** saves.  Run into almost anything that's twice the minimum size, and you're dead.  Run into anything with 2 or 3 wounds per model and you're dead.  run into just about any kind of cavalry, and they can maybe bypass the eels and charge you, not to mention that they have 2 wounds.   If that cavalry is hexwraiths, they run over the eels and charge you.   I'm not saying thralls are bad, I'm saying ten man units of thralls are bad.  I'd say the same thing about 10 skellies, 10 gors, you name it.  I'm just not a fan of min-sized units in a 1000 point game.  Not saying go max, points obviously prohibit.  3 Ishaelans is okay because they have great saves that ignore rend and are only there to absorb the enemy's shooting pre-charge.  But for actual melee units? Ten one wound models with a 5+ save doesn't cut it. 

 

Going back to your original list, how about a king, 20 thralls, 2x3 Ishaelans, a render, and a caster?   That lets you put mystic on the lead Ishaelans, use one unit of Ishaelans to run nightmare shenanigans while the other one pins down the thralls' charge target, the render heals the thralls, and the king is your QRF?

[Drofnum]

45 minutes ago, march10k said:

Even at 1000 points, 10 one wound models with a 5+ save don't provide and mass on the objective.  If you're running Namarti, run Namarti.  You need real blocks, not minimum-sized tokens, with soulrender support, preferably augmented soulrenders at that.  With ten models, they're going to hit kind of hard, but only  once.  unless they wipe the enemy out on the charge, they take casualties that grind them down hard.  Since 30 attacks only kills 13 wounds worth of enemy with no save or only a 6+, you're effectively betting that this unit is always going to be able to charge, and only ever going to charge ten man units with ****** saves.  Run into almost anything that's twice the minimum size, and you're dead.  Run into anything with 2 or 3 wounds per model and you're dead.  run into just about any kind of cavalry, and they can maybe bypass the eels and charge you, not to mention that they have 2 wounds.   If that cavalry is hexwraiths, they run over the eels and charge you.   I'm not saying thralls are bad, I'm saying ten man units of thralls are bad.  I'd say the same thing about 10 skellies, 10 gors, you name it.  I'm just not a fan of min-sized units in a 1000 point game.  Not saying go max, points obviously prohibit.  3 Ishaelans is okay because they have great saves that ignore rend and are only there to absorb the enemy's shooting pre-charge.  But for actual melee units? Ten one wound models with a 5+ save doesn't cut it. 

 

Going back to your original list, how about a king, 20 thralls, 2x3 Ishaelans, a render, and a caster?   That lets you put mystic on the lead Ishaelans, use one unit of Ishaelans to run nightmare shenanigans while the other one pins down the thralls' charge target, the render heals the thralls, and the king is your QRF?

I have to say I disagree with a lot of this.  I ran a 10 man unit in a 2k game, along with a 10 man unit of reavers and due to forgotten nightmares they dont get targeted until you want them to basically.  Sure something could possibly charge and kill them, but you have a giant turtle and 3 eels to shield them from the charge.  You basically get to pick your charges and if you run them into any other battleline at even double their number they will kill enough of them that the counter attack isnt going to matter.  

 

10 man units can definitely work, they arent always ideal but an unwieldy block of 30 isnt always ideal either.  

[Kugane]

Nearly finished Volturas! Time to go buy some new Idoneth minis. They truely are quite expensive, lol. Anyone else worried the eels will keep breaking off their bases? How to avoid that?

[Richelieu]

@mmimzie 9 Morrsarr on the charge, using their once per game mortal wounds blast should do about 12 damage to a Stardrake.  Remember to not attack with your zero rend weapons, otherwise you'll heal the stardrake before the wounds from the lances get allocated (assuming the Stormcast player has had a turn to put on warding lantern).  Otherwise, if you can reach him before then, they should kill him outright.   If you can make the trade of 9 Morrsarr for a stardrake, you should.  

[SirPug]

7 hours ago, Kugane said:

Nearly finished Volturas! Time to go buy some new Idoneth minis. They truely are quite expensive, lol. Anyone else worried the eels will keep breaking off their bases? How to avoid that?

You could glue the eels to the bases using some cork between the eels and the base, basing like they would be on top of a big slab of rock instead of the poles.

How did you paint that dark armor?

[Kugane]

3 hours ago, SirPug said:

You could glue the eels to the bases using some cork between the eels and the base, basing like they would be on top of a big slab of rock instead of the poles.

How did you paint that dark armor?

Thank you for the advice, I suppose I will do something like that. Hopefully I can make it look natural haha.

My take on the Mor'phann armour:

1. light grey primer (army painter brush on primer). I suppose coral white would do the job or the stormvermin fur primer of GW. 

2. stegadon scale and mix it  1:1 with water, paint the armour all over one layer, this will create an effect where the grey of the primer will still shine through and "highlight" the edges. Don't bother with a solid coat. 1 layer is enough.

3. Wash with Drakenhof Nightshade, right out of the bottle, dont need to thin it down.

4. Wash with Nuln oil after the previous wash has dried, again, dont thin it down.

5. Do a VERY dry brush of temple guard blue, to the extend that if you wipe the brush on a tissue, no paint seems to come off anymore. Brush it as lightly over and over on the edges and small details, slowly it'll build up. 

If you prefer more greenish blue edge highlight you could use sotek green for the last step instead. Since I used quite a lot of sotek green for the deepmare and cloak already, I decided to go for temple guard blue. 

Hope it helps!

[Reeve]

So the problem I have with massive units of Thralls is that with their large base size and limited range, only 10 can attack at max I think. So aside from being able to raise them back, I don't see a point in making big units. Our gaming group uses relatively large quantities of terrain in 1k as well. 

But I appreciate all the advice, so my current goal is just to get some stuff running as quickly as possible for testing games. Maybe start with some casual Path of Glory 

[Kugane]

19 minutes ago, Reeve said:

So the problem I have with massive units of Thralls is that with their large base size and limited range, only 10 can attack at max I think. So aside from being able to raise them back, I don't see a point in making big units. Our gaming group uses relatively large quantities of terrain in 1k as well. 

But I appreciate all the advice, so my current goal is just to get some stuff running as quickly as possible for testing games. Maybe start with some casual Path of Glory 

You can congo line them to make sure they can all fight. 2 rows of units rather than 1 big block should get them all into range.

[Iradekhorne]

I think the best indoneth army have this core:

Allegiance: Order

Leaders
Vulturnos, High King of the Deep (280)
- General

Battleline

Units
3 x Akhelian Ishlaen Guard (140)
3 x Akhelian Ishlaen Guard (140)
6 x Akhelian Morrsarr Guard (320)

Behemoths
Akhelian Leviadon (380)

Total: 1260 / 2000
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 72

In front, at the flanks, the two ishlaen guard to stop charges and take the shooting atacks, leviadon in the middle giving him bonus, and helping them if the case. The morrsarr guard + volturnos/king are the hammer, this unit can do tons of dmg, and they moove 14" fliying, you want mantain safe this unit until they chargue.

Volturnos/akellian king to give +1 attack to the morrsar guard, when this unit charge is just brutal, withouth repeat to hit, or to wound, they do 8,4 wounds of rend -2 and dmg 2, 5-6 wounds withouth rend but with dmg 1d3 and 8 wounds of dmg 1. And you can put them to repeat to hit with akellan king, and to wound with an eidolon, really really strong charge for 280 points, i consider them underpriced on 40 or 60 points.

For me, thats the best army core, you can put whatever you want, but this is the best of the army.

t this is the best of the army.

[mmimzie]

3 hours ago, Iradekhorne said:

I think the best indoneth army have this core:

Allegiance: Order

Leaders
Vulturnos, High King of the Deep (280)
- General

Battleline

Units
3 x Akhelian Ishlaen Guard (140)
3 x Akhelian Ishlaen Guard (140)
6 x Akhelian Morrsarr Guard (320)

Behemoths
Akhelian Leviadon (380)

Total: 1260 / 2000
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 72

In front, at the flanks, the two ishlaen guard to stop charges and take the shooting atacks, leviadon in the middle giving him bonus, and helping them if the case. The morrsarr guard + volturnos/king are the hammer, this unit can do tons of dmg, and they moove 14" fliying, you want mantain safe this unit until they chargue.

Volturnos/akellian king to give +1 attack to the morrsar guard, when this unit charge is just brutal, withouth repeat to hit, or to wound, they do 8,4 wounds of rend -2 and dmg 2, 5-6 wounds withouth rend but with dmg 1d3 and 8 wounds of dmg 1. And you can put them to repeat to hit with akellan king, and to wound with an eidolon, really really strong charge for 280 points, i consider them underpriced on 40 or 60 points.

For me, thats the best army core, you can put whatever you want, but this is the best of the army.

t this is the best of the army.

-turlte and you might just be right. 

 

 

The turtle doesn't bring enough to the table, and an aspect of the sea can do the turtles job alot better in most cases. Against heavy anti magic it's a little less effective. 

 

That said the power and lost of units you can just drop with 9xmorrsarr guard is just too good to pass up. 

[DantePQ]

Doubt it 

The best Deepkin armies will have minimum 2x30 Thralls and minimum 2x3 Ishalean Guards and no Leviadon 

Turtle is quite average. 

Maybe some Morssar but I also doubt it as big units of them aren't viable, 6 should be optimal - 9 not so much as you won't be able to fit them all into combat (even fitting 6 in will be troublesome in a lot of situations) 

[Drofnum]

13 minutes ago, DantePQ said:

Doubt it 

The best Deepkin armies will have minimum 2x30 Thralls and minimum 2x3 Ishalean Guards and no Leviadon 

Turtle is quite average. 

Maybe some Morssar but I also doubt it as big units of them aren't viable, 6 should be optimal - 9 not so much as you won't be able to fit them all into combat (even fitting 6 in will be troublesome in a lot of situations) 

They have a 2" range on the weapon that matters, fitting them in isnt a problem at all in most situations.

[DantePQ]

With their bases it's is a problem, also considering other units and terrain. 

[mmimzie]

1 hour ago, DantePQ said:

Doubt it 

The best Deepkin armies will have minimum 2x30 Thralls and minimum 2x3 Ishalean Guards and no Leviadon 

Turtle is quite average. 

Maybe some Morssar but I also doubt it as big units of them aren't viable, 6 should be optimal - 9 not so much as you won't be able to fit them all into combat (even fitting 6 in will be troublesome in a lot of situations) 

The point of 9 is for the alpha strike electric damage as they don't all need to get in range to use it only one guy does. 

 

Longer has Can definitly cause getting into combat issue however with 2" range on the main even weapon means you should get all of them attacking with spears and tail. And most attacking at full force. 

 

Thralls just can't realisticly kill anything. If you are in a. Place where you can only get base to base with 6 eels... you'd likely be lucky to get 10 thralls in there.  Not to mention morrsarr have true fly and rerollable charge letting you really fiddle woth terrain and enemy models.  Where bromdar can only at best ignore terrain. 

 

The thrall list has literally no teeth. Did a mirror test game and 3 ishlaen could tie up a thrall units for 2 turns or more with out side healing. While doing that 9 morrsarr would sweep through a block of thralls a turn. 

 

I'd really like to see the thrall tide on the table to see it doing its thing. However, it doesn't seem realistic. It's not durable enough to do what vulkites do and not killy enemy to hold a candle to what witches do (because of 32mm bases).   The thing thralls have going for them are the regeneration in morphann and the  1 turn liandras.

[Drofnum]

1 hour ago, DantePQ said:

With their bases it's is a problem, also considering other units and terrain. 

I've used them and had no problems so far in 3 or so games.  If you think its hard to get 9 eels into combat how are you expecting to get 20-30 Thralls in?

[Kugane]

So I just unpacked and washed a box of Thralls, a soulscryer and a soulrender and was about to assemble them when I noticed that I have 11x 32mm base and 1x 40mm base. I went to check the GW website to figure out which character is supposed to go on the 40mm base, but they all show as "supplied with (a) 32mm base(s)".

I'm a bit at a loss now, what base should be used?

[Drofnum]

Just get a 32mm base and put them all on 32's.  Or contact GW/Store where you got them and let them know you have the wrong base and they will replace it i'm sure, I would personally just buy another base but either one works.

[SPlatte]

The Soulrender has the 40mm base and the Soulscryer the 32mm base. You can see it in the Battletome on page 70/71, they are both next to each other and the Soulrender is on the bigger one.

[Kugane]

29 minutes ago, Drofnum said:

Just get a 32mm base and put them all on 32's.  Or contact GW/Store where you got them and let them know you have the wrong base and they will replace it i'm sure, I would personally just buy another base but either one works.

 

11 minutes ago, SPlatte said:

The Soulrender has the 40mm base and the Soulscryer the 32mm base. You can see it in the Battletome on page 70/71, they are both next to each other and the Soulrender is on the bigger one.

Thank you both for the quick response! I guess I'll put the soulrender on the 40mm base then^^, its strange the webshop mentions its supposed to be on a 32mm base, but I suppose mistakes happen.

[Cookiez]

1 hour ago, mmimzie said:

The point of 9 is for the alpha strike electric damage as they don't all need to get in range to use it only one guy does. 

Longer has Can definitly cause getting into combat issue however with 2" range on the main even weapon means you should get all of them attacking with spears and tail. And most attacking at full force. 

Thralls just can't realisticly kill anything. If you are in a. Place where you can only get base to base with 6 eels... you'd likely be lucky to get 10 thralls in there.  Not to mention morrsarr have true fly and rerollable charge letting you really fiddle woth terrain and enemy models.  Where bromdar can only at best ignore terrain. 

The thrall list has literally no teeth. Did a mirror test game and 3 ishlaen could tie up a thrall units for 2 turns or more with out side healing. While doing that 9 morrsarr would sweep through a block of thralls a turn. 

I'd really like to see the thrall tide on the table to see it doing its thing. However, it doesn't seem realistic. It's not durable enough to do what vulkites do and not killy enemy to hold a candle to what witches do (because of 32mm bases).   The thing thralls have going for them are the regeneration in morphann and the  1 turn liandras.

My 6 games so far showed the same. One big unit of Thralls is enough and even then I rarely used it, because I had problems to fit them anywhere between the terrain and my own units. Morrsarr, on the other hand, always were the kings of the battelfield - and I had only 6. Realistically in the first or second turn a unit of 9 kills 2 units - one from mortal wounds and second one from the insane damage output - and if lucky, maybe 3 if opponent clumps few units together.