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AoS 2 - Grand Host of Nagash Discussion


RuneBrush

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As follows

Nagash

Necromancer

Wight King, mounted (know he's not popular but love him with knights) 

Skellies, spears x40

Skellies, swords x10

Black Knights x5

Morghast Archai, halberts 

With Umbral and tax it adds to 1950. 8 potential spells per turn before taking into consideration malign sorcery and ignoring mystic shield, which is now pointless if you run Nagash. 

Got a potential max of 9 casting per turn. With that in mind I'm leaning towards CP. 

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In that case, I'd definitely take the extra command point, as you'll need some spare points if you ever want to use the wight king's command ability, which is the main (mechanical) point of taking it in the first place.  two extra command points (one from formation, one from underpoints) will let you use nagash's command ability every turn (which you absolutely should do), bring back one summonable unit during the game (which should be saved for the big unit of skellies), and use the wight king's command ability in exactly one important combat.

What are your thoughts on faction spells for Nagash & the Necromancer?  For artefacts?  The default "best" choices for grand host are, in my mind, ossific diadem and gravesand timeglass, but there might be something better among the realm-of-origin based artefacts in the malign sorcery book, if your community seems inclined to use those.

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26 minutes ago, Sception said:

In that case, I'd definitely take the extra command point, as you'll need some spare points if you ever want to use the wight king's command ability, which is the main (mechanical) point of taking it in the first place.  two extra command points (one from formation, one from underpoints) will let you use nagash's command ability every turn (which you absolutely should do), bring back one summonable unit during the game (which should be saved for the big unit of skellies), and use the wight king's command ability in exactly one important combat.

What are your thoughts on faction spells for Nagash & the Necromancer?  For artefacts?  The default "best" choices for grand host are, in my mind, ossific diadem and gravesand timeglass, but there might be something better among the realm-of-origin based artefacts in the malign sorcery book, if your community seems inclined to use those.

Nice one. Thanks mate. 

Spells, I was thinking overwhelming dread, transference and orbs on the big man and soul harvest on the necro. 

Relics, I was thinking time glass on the necro. Love it and have really hurt people in the past with this. Was looking at trying one of the shyish ones on the wight - the ethereal one. We've really embraced malign sorcery where I'm at.

Forget what the relic's called. He'll have a 2+ save, ignoring modifiers and rerolling 1s, against shooting and 3+, ignoring modifiers and rerollong 1s, in cc. That's pretty special. 

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Without arkhan in the list, I'd shy away from soul harvest.  It doesn't do nearly as much as you'd think with nagash's huge base size, since so often opponents in melee range will die off or run away before your next hero phase.  With the spellportals it isn't unplayable, but I still think there are better choices to go for.  Decrepify can be very useful in crippling the few heroes strong enough to really threaten nagash,  Fading vigour is a very powerful unit debuff, especially layered on top of overwhelming dread.

Probably my strongest suggestion would be spectral grasp.  Combined with the spellportals it has a really wide reach across the board.  Potentially crippling the movement of multiple enemy units with a single spell from that sort of range can be game winning in and of itself.

....

Where are you getting the 2+ save vs. shooting on the wight from?  His save is just a flat 3+, regardless of shooting or close combat.  Even if he did have a save modifier against shooting, the 'no positive or negative modifiers' wording on ethereal now would prevent you from benefiting from it, unless the wording on that artefact is different.

Regardless, making that save ethereal is probably pretty good.  I'm still not sure if I'd rather have the diadem on him instead.  Tough call there.

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Hello guys,

I have tried to come up with a GHON list based on lord of sacraments and deathrattle synergies:

Allegiance: Grand Host of Nagash
Mortal Realm: Shyish

Leaders
Arkhan The Black Mortarch of Sacrament (320)
- Lore of the Dead: Soul Harvest (Deathmages)
Necromancer (110)
- General
- Trait: Lord of Nagashizzar 
- Artefact: Grave-sand Timeglass 
- Lore of the Deathmages: Overwhelming Dread
Necromancer (110)
- Lore of the Deathmages: Fading Vigour
Vampire Lord (140)
- Mount: Flying Horror
- Artefact: Ossific Diadem 
- Lore of the Vampires: Vile Transference

Battleline
40 x Skeleton Warriors (280)
- Ancient Spears
10 x Chainrasp Horde (80)
10 x Chainrasp Horde (80)
10 x Grave Guard (160)
- Great Wight Blades

Units
2 x Morghast Harbingers (220)
- Spirit Halberds
5 x Black Knights (120)

Behemoths
Mortis Engine (180)

Battalions
Lords of Sacrament (130)

Endless Spells
Umbral Spellportal (60)

Total: 1990 / 2000
Extra Command Points: 1
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 130
 

At the moment, I hesitate to replace the grave guards by hexwraiths (loosing synergies but winning mobility) or by spirit hosts to have some leftover points to add Endless spells.

Please share your feedback on this list!

 

Edited by Essilia
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From a purely mechanical perspective, I would recommend trading both the grave guard and the black knights for a second unit of 40 skeletons, though I certainly understand if you might reject that on aesthetic grounds.

You might also consider swapping up your artefacts slightly.  Timeglass/diadem is a standard combo, but provided you don't play exclusively against leadership 10 opponents, it might be worth your while to switch the diadem to the non-general necromancer, drop the timeglass, and give the winged vamp the terrorgheist mantle.  The banshee screams provided by the cloak can do a lot more damage than the timeglass, especially combined with leadership penalties from banners and overwhelming dread.

And, as I mentioned in my reply to lare2, you might want to consider spectral grasp, which combines very well with umbral spellportal.  Fading vigour is also great, so I wouldn't call your current spell setup wrong, just something to try out a couple times.  I know I was slightly disappointed with spectral grasp in a few games before 2e, since the range meant a lot of times even at half movement by the time you were tagging enemy units with it they were often where they wanted to be anyway.  But the double range from Balewind made it amazing in 1e, especially if you were stuck going first, and spellportals should do about the same job in 2e.

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1 hour ago, Sception said:

Without arkhan in the list, I'd shy away from soul harvest.  It doesn't do nearly as much as you'd think with nagash's huge base size, since so often opponents in melee range will die off or run away before your next hero phase.  With the spellportals it isn't unplayable, but I still think there are better choices to go for.  Decrepify can be very useful in crippling the few heroes strong enough to really threaten nagash,  Fading vigour is a very powerful unit debuff, especially layered on top of overwhelming dread.

Probably my strongest suggestion would be spectral grasp.  Combined with the spellportals it has a really wide reach across the board.  Potentially crippling the movement of multiple enemy units with a single spell from that sort of range can be game winning in and of itself.

....

Where are you getting the 2+ save vs. shooting on the wight from?  His save is just a flat 3+, regardless of shooting or close combat.  Even if he did have a save modifier against shooting, the 'no positive or negative modifiers' wording on ethereal now would prevent you from benefiting from it, unless the wording on that artefact is different.

Regardless, making that save ethereal is probably pretty good.  I'm still not sure if I'd rather have the diadem on him instead.  Tough call there.

Got a local tourney soon and a practise game Friday so will try out your spell recommendations and let you know. Cheers mate. 

Might've got that wrong. The new hero protection, - 1 to hit or +1 to the save? Can't remember which and the book's upstairs... I'm bone idle by nature. If the save, you're right. I was getting excited and the ethereal relic would nullify it. 

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Nagash list I'm plannin on doing after I finish my nighthaunts thoughts?

2000 Grand Host of Nagash

1 Command points
2 drops

Battalions/Endless Spells
First Cohort 160

Umbral Spellportal 60

Purple Sun of Syish 100

Prismatic Palisade 30

Heros
Nagash, Supreme Lord of the Undead 800

Necromancer 110

Battleline
40 Skeleton Warriors 280

20 Skeleton Warriors 160

10 Skeleton Warriors 80

2 Morghast Archai 220

Army total 2000

Edited by LordDrakonus
updated list
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1 hour ago, LordDrakonus said:

Nagash list I'm plannin on doing after I finish my nighthaunts thoughts?

 

2000 Grand Host of Nagash

1 Command points
1 drop

Battalions/Endless Spells
First Cohort 160

Umbral Spellportal 60

Purple Sun of Syish 100

Prismatic Palisade 30

Aethervoid Pendulum 40

Heros
Nagash, Supreme Lord of the Undead 800

Necromancer 110

Battleline

30 Skeleton Warriors 240

30 Skeleton Warriors 240

2 Morghast Archai 220

Army total 2000

Nagash + lots of endless spells is legit.  You are one skeleton/grave guard unit short of a valid FC batallion, though, and technically the necromancer makes it a 2 drop.

But a bit of tweaking will fix it right up.

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6 hours ago, lare2 said:

Got a local tourney soon and a practise game Friday so will try out your spell recommendations and let you know. Cheers mate. 

Might've got that wrong. The new hero protection, - 1 to hit or +1 to the save? Can't remember which and the book's upstairs... I'm bone idle by nature. If the save, you're right. I was getting excited and the ethereal relic would nullify it. 

The new look out sir is -1 to hit for shooting attacks targeting non-monster heroes that are near friendly units of sufficient size.  Not as good as +1 save in many cases, but fully compatible with ethereal.

Edited by Sception
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Hi mates,

not sure if this one is playable, any thoughts? :-)

Leader:
VLoZD
- Deathlance + Shield + Chalice
- Amarathine Orb
Vampire Lord
- General
- Flying Horror
- Lord of Nagashizzar
- Vile Transference
Wight King with Black Axe
- Ossific Diadem
Necromancer
- Overwhelming Dread

Units:
- 5x Dire Wolves
- 40x Skeletons
- 40x Skeletons
- 4x Morghasts

Total: 1870 Pts.
+2 CP

Really appreciate your help since I'm new to tabletop. :-)

Thanks in advance.

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On 6/29/2018 at 8:43 AM, RuneBrush said:

Just flicking through things in my head.  I'm currently planning to ally in a unit of Myrmourn Banshees (because the models are ace and it's extra unbind/endless protection).  I'm trying to work out if I'd be able to use my Gravesites to heal or my Endless Legions command ability?

I can actually argue this both ways... 

One - they wouldn't as those are Allegiance Abilities and allies cannot benefit from them.

Two - they would as allegiances don't "exist" once you start playing the game and as such you run the ability as written and Banshees fulfil the keyword requirement (Endless Legions has even been errata'd to remove the allegiance keyword).

Before I wing a question into the FAQ guys, I just thought I'd enquire to see if anyone here was aware of a paragraph somewhere that I've missed.

image.png

I'd like to know this too. Most allegiance abilities have the faction keyword, these do not. I would assume it's a no though but I think it says in core rules that allies cannot benefit regardless (don't have it to hand).

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4 hours ago, Jaehaerys said:

I'd like to know this too. Most allegiance abilities have the faction keyword, these do not. I would assume it's a no though but I think it says in core rules that allies cannot benefit regardless (don't have it to hand).

I would say yes, allies will benefit from your graveyards. See Legions of Nagash, designers notes, 3rd question “can opposing LoN armies use each other’s graves”. Answer: yes.

Given enemy death units can use your graves, surely your own allies can too. Should be FAQed to be sure.

@RuneBrush what is your opinion of that?

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2 hours ago, Wraith said:

I would say yes, allies will benefit from your graveyards. See Legions of Nagash, designers notes, 3rd question “can opposing LoN armies use each other’s graves”. Answer: yes.

Given enemy death units can use your graves, surely your own allies can too. Should be FAQed to be sure.

@RuneBrush what is your opinion of that?

I've sent off an FAQ e-mail to enquire.  I've changed my mind three of four times on this, but my own feeling is Invigorating Aura should work on any of your army, allies or not.  My own feeling is that you could argue Endless Legions should work like that - but that's a little more questionable.

Deathless minions, Unquiet dead & Legions Innumerable I'd say your allies wouldn't get as they're triggered from the allegiance ability (where as Invigorating Aura and Endless Legions grant an ability to a Legions item/unit which you're free to use as you wish with the keyword restrictions on the ability).

Not sure of other peoples thoughts?

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Is it really important competitively to use some units with SUMMONABLE keyword ? The only SUMMONABLE unit that could appeal to me are Grave Guards, but I've heard they are really outmatched and a waste of points.

Wanting to make an elite Death army, I wanted to mix Nagash with Morghasts and Grave Guards, in a First Cohort.

However, if Grave Guards are really that terribly point-efficient, I might as well go with Nagash and 10 Morghasts, plus a Purple Sun. However, this leaves me without any SUMMONABLE unit to benefit from Legions Innumerable, Endless Legions, and Deathly Invocations.

Better to have terrible Grave Guards to revive, or to go full Morghasts and forget about summoning ?

Edit: I'm not a competitive player. Might play in some tournaments for fun, but I don't intend to win. However, I'm not sure I want to have a battleline full of what some people call the worst unit of LoN (point-efficiency wise).

Edited by Alaric83
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Grave Guard are rather points inefficient, sadly.  They're not so bad that you can't field a unit or two and make them work if you like them aesthetically, but even then I wouldn't really advise building a whole list around them.  And yeah, a lot of the power of the Legions in general, and Grand Host in particular, comes from hordes of summonable units, in particular basic skeletons.  You might want to consider Legion of Night or Blood, as their playstyle and allegiance abilities lean more towards elite stuff.  No nagash, but Legion of Night goes a long long way with a dragon lord, a couple units of harbingers, and a terrorgheist, plus maybe an allied terrorgheist and just a few dire wolves to grab objectives and gum up charge lanes, and Legion of Night can make the Castellans of Dread Keep work, again relying on some dire wolves for battleline.  If it's an aesthetic thing, fenrisian wolves make good dire wolf substitutes and look really good, though admittedly they're a bit pricey.

All that said, Nagash is a beast and a half, and morghasts are pretty hurty, especially in grand host.  You can definitely build a working, if perhaps not optimal, list around them - with or without a few tiny grave guard units to qualify for a first cohort.  The problem will come in holding objectives, which in many scenarios is difficult to do without some bigger units.  It's not unplayable, though.  I'd definitely proxy it a few times before buying that many morghasts.

 

Test out something like:

Nagash

Coven Throne with Ethereal Amulet (Shyish Relic)

2 Archai with glaives

2 Archai with glaives

2 Harbingers with glaives

2 Harbingers with glaives

Umbral Spellportals

 

See how it goes for you.

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16 hours ago, Lemon Knuckles said:

Nagash + lots of endless spells is legit.  You are one skeleton/grave guard unit short of a valid FC batallion, though, and technically the necromancer makes it a 2 drop.

But a bit of tweaking will fix it right up.

Each wizard can only cast one Endless spell per turn though, so I don’t see Nagash getting the chance to cast all those.

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Speaking of the big guy and portals, I've been thinking about best when to pop it. As you have to be within an inch to cast spells through it, if you cast it first turn you basically don't get to move him and therefore limit the range of the second portal's placement. I really want to HoD through that bad lad so was thinking the second turn's where it's at. Move Nagash first turn, weather the storm, and then unleash unholy hell the second turn. 

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A lot of lists in this thread are neglecting some important things, assuming they're meant for matched play. People seem to be busy squeezing models into lists without considering how they're going to actually win games!

1) Nagash should not be your only hero/behemoth. Multiple missions require you to hold or at least push more than one objective with a hero/behemoth, a hero with an artifact, or a wizard. You have to work extra guys in there somewhere.

2) Much like above, some missions require you to move as the objective moves. These armies posted are all quite immobile (even Nagash isnt that fast without Pinions which many people don't take).

3) There is a big cost to using Nagash as your only hero, in that you dont get an artifact - and in the case of squeezing in 1-drop First Cohort, you actually miss out on two! It might look good on paper, but you're really wasting army potential by doing this.

4) Another cost to not having extra casters with Nagash is the lack of spells for him to cast. Endless spells will get you somewhere, but he really wants to spellportal himself on turn 1 if he's your only caster, meaning no more ES until turn 2. This is another reason to squeeze in at minimum one Necromancer.

5) Always start the game with a command point. Period. It lets you reactively Inspiring Presence against turn 1 alpha strikes, it lets you use Nagash's command ability in a turn in which you also need to rez a unit. 2 would be ideal but it's hard to squeeze that in.

6) Don't neglect damage output! Nagash does not do a lot of damage by himself, ultimately. You can debuff things til thw cows come home but if you're not putting out the hurt you aren't winning games. If you havent got a Necromancer you're missing Vanhels Danse, if you're running nothing but Dire Wolves and a few skellies you have effectively no damage potential.

 

Making good Nagash lists is hard, but don't fall into these traps!

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44 minutes ago, ianob said:

A lot of lists in this thread are neglecting some important things, assuming they're meant for matched play. People seem to be busy squeezing models into lists without considering how they're going to actually win games!

1) Nagash should not be your only hero/behemoth. Multiple missions require you to hold or at least push more than one objective with a hero/behemoth, a hero with an artifact, or a wizard. You have to work extra guys in there somewhere.

2) Much like above, some missions require you to move as the objective moves. These armies posted are all quite immobile (even Nagash isnt that fast without Pinions which many people don't take).

3) There is a big cost to using Nagash as your only hero, in that you dont get an artifact - and in the case of squeezing in 1-drop First Cohort, you actually miss out on two! It might look good on paper, but you're really wasting army potential by doing this.

4) Another cost to not having extra casters with Nagash is the lack of spells for him to cast. Endless spells will get you somewhere, but he really wants to spellportal himself on turn 1 if he's your only caster, meaning no more ES until turn 2. This is another reason to squeeze in at minimum one Necromancer.

5) Always start the game with a command point. Period. It lets you reactively Inspiring Presence against turn 1 alpha strikes, it lets you use Nagash's command ability in a turn in which you also need to rez a unit. 2 would be ideal but it's hard to squeeze that in.

6) Don't neglect damage output! Nagash does not do a lot of damage by himself, ultimately. You can debuff things til thw cows come home but if you're not putting out the hurt you aren't winning games. If you havent got a Necromancer you're missing Vanhels Danse, if you're running nothing but Dire Wolves and a few skellies you have effectively no damage potential.

 

Making good Nagash lists is hard, but don't fall into these traps!

That makes a lot of sense. I am building some lists atm with Nagash, a Necromancer and a Flying Vampire Lord and 40 Skeletons and The Spell portal. What I cant decide is whether or not to use 2 or 4 morghasts harbringers.  4 limits me to 2 units of dire wolves to fill out the battleline and leave me with at 1950 for the command point.  2 lets me take 20 chainrasps and 3 units of wolves, or 40 chainrasps and 1 unit of wolves. 

Is 2 a big enough reliable hammer. I am short on cash atm and I dont want to buy it all to experiment.  

Any advice for a scrub?

Cheers, 

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5 hours ago, lare2 said:

Speaking of the big guy and portals, I've been thinking about best when to pop it. As you have to be within an inch to cast spells through it, if you cast it first turn you basically don't get to move him and therefore limit the range of the second portal's placement. I really want to HoD through that bad lad so was thinking the second turn's where it's at. Move Nagash first turn, weather the storm, and then unleash unholy hell the second turn. 

Why not work a palisade into your list? He can't be seen over the model then on your turn 2 drop the mirrors and just hide behind the palisade as all LOS is drawn from second mirror? As far as I can read you don't need LoS to drop the second mirror so...you can make Nagash very hard to do anything to except magic through the mirror back at you

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17 hours ago, Teuchter said:

That makes a lot of sense. I am building some lists atm with Nagash, a Necromancer and a Flying Vampire Lord and 40 Skeletons and The Spell portal. What I cant decide is whether or not to use 2 or 4 morghasts harbringers.  4 limits me to 2 units of dire wolves to fill out the battleline and leave me with at 1950 for the command point.  2 lets me take 20 chainrasps and 3 units of wolves, or 40 chainrasps and 1 unit of wolves. 

Is 2 a big enough reliable hammer. I am short on cash atm and I dont want to buy it all to experiment.  

Any advice for a scrub?

Cheers, 

Personally I don’t think that you can afford to take anything else in a Nagash list.; all that you have room for are units and at least one necro. In the new missions you have to be able to be mobile and/or cover a lot of board. Forget theorycrafting things like “hammer unit” and so on; if you don’t have bodies on the board, you aren’t winning the game.

1 hour ago, AverageBoss said:

You can only dispell endless spells at the start of the hero phase. So you can only do so before your other casting, not after.

@Sception is right, and further than that, you *will* find yourself dispelling your own portal most turns to reposition it. As an example, I played two games lastnight and there were exactly 0 turns where I didn’t dispel and reposition my portal.

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