Are Morghasts worth it?

[Honk]

I think morghast are underrated and maybe used wrongly ...

of course other units are better offensively/defensively/points in real or on paper and whatever, buuut field that list and watch getting wrecked by a nurgle-triple plaqueclaw list with your grimghast spam.

they bring high rend, they are mobile, they bring bravery debuff aaaand on top of that, they are big scary looking things, so they carry big kick me signs, who will never ever run away.

While a 4+ for outriders (often without hero support) with 2x6hp  is not much, 3d6 overcharge into backfield heros, holding up fast troops to get my troops onto objectives. And buffed up they can even put a dent in big scary unit, befor they get crumbled.

So imo: not stellar in anything, but pretty good fast attack choice especially against high armor.

[Kokoshi]

I'm not much of an experienced player, but I think Harbringers still have a spot in a GHoN army.
With halberds they will cause 10,67 damages (2 morghasts, 4 attacks, 3 damage each, 4/6 hit, 4/6 wound) pre-save with -2 rend. There might be some deviation in the mean damage output because of 3-damage attacks, but that's still decent.
Considering they have a mean 20.5' flying threat radius, they are a canon ball to throw at enemy's line, possibly back line. In a rather slow army, that's a good way to cripple enemy units turn 1.
Adding a -1 Bravery debuff, they might make things worse in battleshock phase after making some casualties in elite units.
I find them pretty useful when fielded near another expensive and powerful unit (in my army, Neferata) because they force target selection.
All in all, they are a decent one-time fast damage dealing unit and distraction carnifex. Quite expensive but not useless.
And they are damn gorgeous.

[Lucky Snake Eyes]

They lack sustainability but after talking with the death player I mentioned earlier they can make for good bravery bombs against factions like freeguild or most chaos when stacked with banners and other debuffs from vampires or running LoB. He also says their good for trying to burst down heavy cav with the two handed weapons since the high rend munches tougher models. Just pray they kill them before having to suffer a retaliation from something like concussors 

[Titus]

On 10/8/2018 at 11:24 AM, Honk said:

Pour écraser tes ennemis, les voir chassés devant toi et entendre les lamentations de leurs femmes...

Conan the barbarian right? Man  you made my day .

Concerning the mohrgast, they are a very good option for a Legion of NIght army, i always use 1 unit of Harbinger. They make the opponent looking at his mirror during his deployment and turn 1/2 (defensive move, protecting his characters etc...), making life easier for my horde coming upfront.
They certainely dies very fast but they always give me strategic opportunities thanks to their threat on the back of the army.

[Honk]

5 hours ago, Titus said:

Man  you made my day .

??

good thing the internet provides translations...

Das Beste im Leben ist, deine Feinde zu zerstören, sie vor sich
herzutreiben und das Lamentieren der Weiber zu hören...

i could even do the accent kinda right

[AverageBoss]

On 10/8/2018 at 3:21 PM, El Syf said:

Well until we can have units of vhordrai’s I don’t know what your going to rely on to give you high rend and high damage output.  Obviously you need to get the charge and hope the dice are with you but I’d rather take morghats over pretty much anything.

Well 12 Myrmourn banshees brought in as allies is an option now. More durable, summon keyword (relevant for Invocation at least), brings an extra dispell.

As far as the main discussion goes. Outside Grand Host and LoNight, I would never even consider taking Morghasts. The latter in particular is a great help for Harbingers, as it practically guarantees they see at least 1 combat completely on your terms.

[Ravinsild]

12 minutes ago, AverageBoss said:

Well 12 Myrmourn banshees brought in as allies is an option now. More durable, summon keyword (relevant for Invocation at least), brings an extra dispell.

As far as the main discussion goes. Outside Grand Host and LoNight, I would never even consider taking Morghasts. The latter in particular is a great help for Harbingers, as it practically guarantees they see at least 1 combat completely on your terms.

Isn’t there a FAQ that says allies (Nighthaunt etc..) don’t benefit from Graveyards and Deathly Invocations and such? 

[Lucky Snake Eyes]

53 minutes ago, Ravinsild said:

Isn’t there a FAQ that says allies (Nighthaunt etc..) don’t benefit from Graveyards and Deathly Invocations and such? 

Banshees do not benefit from gravesites, however glaivewraiths, grimghasts and chainwrasps do

[AverageBoss]

1 hour ago, Ravinsild said:

Isn’t there a FAQ that says allies (Nighthaunt etc..) don’t benefit from Graveyards and Deathly Invocations and such? 

Non-Soul Wars units don't benefit from gravesite or endless legion. Deathly Invocation is fair game.

Soul Wars units get everything though.

 

[WoollyMammoth]

Thank you @Lucky Snake Eyes

@Ravinsild
Morghasts are a very good unit and totally 'worth it'. With the halberds they are -2 rend 3 damage - that is pretty wild. That means most units are going to fail their save and be taking multiple 3 damage wounds. The -2 goes though annoyances like 2+ saves, Seraphon shields and -1 rend ignoring Treemen. At 3+/3+ they have extremely reliable attacks, and with 8 of these attacks I would list them among the most reliable damage dealers in death.  (I tend to play them with Nagash so they are re-rolling hits and saves of 1 which makes them crazy good, but they are still really good without that). If you like this unit and you want to play a Grand Host list, by all means get them and enjoy them.

The only downsides to them is they are not great against ethereal and they can't heal from gravesites, but I expect some changes are coming to that before half the meta becomes broken death lists. 

Note per the FAQ several Nighthaunt units are part of the Legions of Nagash - so they are not allies and are fully part of the army. That is why we have the 60 reaper Nagash lists right now. 

[Diemer84]

WollyMammoth, just for curiosity where have you seen these broken lists or 60 reapers lists, in the tournament lists I´ve seen I haven´t seen anything like that...

Best regards

 

[Rob Hawkins]

I use them in most lists.  Harbingers 3D6 charge is great, -2 rend and 3 damage on the halberds is the way to go. 

Buff them with Dread Knight from a VLoZD so they can re-roll their misses, and if you have a "regular" Vampire Lord, he can give them +1 attack if you've got the command points to spare.  If they are in the Grand Host allegiance, that's another +1 attack.

The bravery debuff is not to be underestimated, and if they are in the Legion of Blood, they will be throwing out -2 Bravery themselves.  I like to stack up the bravery debuffs and then use Banshees or a Terrorgheist to scream mortal wounds at heavily armored targets.  Then the morghasts can finish them off with their high rend, high damage attacks.

They are also useful defensively-- Put them behind a single rank of Skeletons and they will be able to fight through them with the 2" reach of the halberds if the skeletons are charged.  If the enemy doesn't fall for that, the morghasts can always fly over the skeletons to charge out.

[Honk]

Just stumbled upon something, that totally made me lose it ?

the real thing is not, whether or not morghast as elite infantry or heavy hitters and priority targets can be used successfully in a list. They are, they can and they look great doing it.

what really upsets me is the 160 points mournfang pack!!!

[Ravinsild]

I feel like Morghasts are best served as Assassins based on what I’m seeing tbh. 

They suck defensively, but throw them at a lynchpin hero like a Bloodsecrator and murder it, then their whole army will turn around and mulch your Morghasts but you just ruined their most important guy. 

I know Khorne best, but pick any hero like this. Warchanter or MBMK for Ironjawz, or whoever. Against enemy death armies Wight King or Necromancer. 

Nobody plays Dark Elves but the Sorceress would be a good target and so forth. 

[Lucky Snake Eyes]

I'd be interested in trying harbingers with swords as a means of intercepting and mulching light cav. They have the charge to catch them and it would help against stuff like sisters of the thorn and marauder horsemen that can take advantage of our lack of shooting.

[themortalgod]

8 hours ago, Ravinsild said:

I feel like Morghasts are best served as Assassins based on what I’m seeing tbh. 

They suck defensively, but throw them at a lynchpin hero like a Bloodsecrator and murder it, then their whole army will turn around and mulch your Morghasts but you just ruined their most important guy. 

I know Khorne best, but pick any hero like this. Warchanter or MBMK for Ironjawz, or whoever. Against enemy death armies Wight King or Necromancer. 

Nobody plays Dark Elves but the Sorceress would be a good target and so forth. 

The problem is that any assassin that is depending on a charge to do their assassining can be easily screened from achieving their objective. If I was up against Morghasts they wouldn't ever get near my important characters, I'd just feed them a cheap unit then obliterate them as they don't require many resources to wipe out. 

On top of that they don't reliably kill many heroes on the charge. They are prone to big swings in damage output as they have a low number of high damage attacks. I would much rather toss mortal wounds at a distance into say a Bloodsecrator than try to get him into combat. 

 

Compare to units with similar roles in other armies. Tzaangor Enlightened have a higher median damage, much higher pts per wounds, and they are faster. Enlightened also can be brought back to life.  For much less points. Skyfires, add in powerful shooting and are also less pts at the cost of some minor output. Mournfangs are cheaper while hitting harder with a tougher profile. I think either Morghasts need a substantial warscroll buff or a substantial pts reduction to be cost-effective. Fulminators are a bit more expensive but are far tougher while also packing a harder punch. 

Think of this way. Not counting allegiance abilities or battalion benefits or even working in Enlightened's Guided by the past:

Harbingers have 6 attacks at 3+/3+ and -2 rend and damage 3. Against 4+ save they do a total 6.66 damage through the armor. 

Enlightened have 9 attacks at 4+/3+, -1 rend and damage 2, 3 attacks at 4+/5+, no rend and damage 1, as well as 3d3 attacks at 4+/3+, rend -1 and D3 damage which comes out to an average of 6.91 against that same 4+ save. 

Pretty close, until you realize enlightened have a built-in re-roll to hit and wound, at which point they leave harbingers in the dust. They also both have an aura that more often than not amounts to an extra model running due to battleshock so those cancel each other out. Enlightened pay 11.6pts per wound, Morghasts pay 18.3pts per wound. 

Another comparison to consider. for 20pts more you can get 6 spirit hosts, which pay 13.33 pts per wound (less if you consider the value of being immune to rend) while doing almost as many MWs on average as a Morghast does normal damage. (though spirit hosts are prone to big fluctuations so are less reliable)

My 2¢ is that if GW feels 140pts for 3  Tzaangor Enlightened is a good balance then 2 Morghasts should also be 140pts or so. There are very few situations where a Morghast is better than Enlightened. The only one I can think of is against high, re-rollable saves. (Though in that situation, neither are ideal, better to throw MWs than to hope -2 rend is enough)

In my opinion, Morghasts shouldn't be assassins anyway. They should be a front line hammer that slams into the enemy quickly and with a thunderous impact. To do so either they need the above pts drop so you can run them in a bigger unit without breaking the bank or they need to hit a lot harder and be a lot tougher. Personally, I'd prefer the latter as those models 'look' more powerful than they are. 

 

 

 

[Lucky Snake Eyes]

They are supposed to be the bodyguards of nagash and his mortarchs, They should have a better save or more wounds or even an FNP wound negation ability considering their role in the lore. Maybe if Archai got their 5+ MW negation changed to all wounds and harbingers got a weapon buff similar to most cav on a successful charge like extra rend or +1 to wound or a free mortal wound to each unit it ended the charge near.

[Sception]

they're not lousy, and in particular they don't 'feel wrong' to play.  Like, if you ignore points values, their abilities and points seem about right, though archai in particular could maybe stand to be a bit more durable, maybe 3+/4++ instead of 4+/5++, especially since they don't have exclusive access to the halberds now?  Or, if not that, maybe give them a bodyguard ability for death heroes similar to that in the first cohort battalion, and replace that batallion's benefits with something else?  And I guess maybe the paired swords could stand to be a bit better, maybe give them the same AP as the halberds, making the tradeoff between them slightly more damage output for swords vs. reach for halberds, which seems even enough to go either way, as opposed to the current balance which makes halberds pretty much a no brainer choice.

But that's fairly minor stuff.  The main problem with morghasts isn't how they work, but rather one of points efficiency.  They were never that great for their points, and similar units from other factions have only gotten more and more efficient over time.  GW has tweaked their points down, and I expect they will continue to do so, and eventually will reach a place where they're actually a competitive choice, probably somewhere south of 80 points per model, but given how timid the adjustments have been, it'll probably take a couple years.

The only real alternative I could see that might push them up into being worth the over 100 ppm where they've been to this point would be to make them summonable.  Nighthaunt establishes precedent for even relatively high cost, elite units having the keyword, and morghasts (especially harbingers, which, again, might indicate archai could need a slight relative boost of some kind) would be a very different unit if you could answer their fragility issues with healing & re-summoning.

That said, it's not exactly a direction I'd want to see them go in.  If it were me - archai would gain the bodyguard ability from the first cohort by default, but for any death hero giving them a more distinct role from the significantly-better-as-an-offensive-hammer harbingers, swords would have -2 rend putting them more on par with halberds, points would come down another 10 to 15 points per model, and since I'm giving the first cohort ability to archai by default, maybe I'd give morghasts the summonable keyword just in that formation, maybe make first cohort 1+ units of morghasts as well instead of just one.

 

But headcannon fixes could be bandied about all day.  In the mean time, morghasts aren't terrible, they're perfectly playable in casual contexts, particularly in Grand Host or (harbingers only) Legion of Night lists, but I don't expect to see them on top 8 tournament tables any time soon, and if playing in that sort of context is important to you, I'd avoid leave them on the shelf for now.

[Honk]

Make them summonable... 

bhaaaammm, I‘d pay 240 anytime (same for bloodknights)

as it stands now, they compete with other melee elite and are just not equal. Mournfang 160pts; Bloodcrushers 150pts; Idoneth Eels 140pts; gore gruntas 140pts...

but big melee elite units is just not meant for us, so I can see that we have to pay extra for that.

And they work beautifully in a number of lists, just have to be a bit more careful in commiting them as the standard ironjawz player whose best strategy is RL screaming waaaaaagh and charging forward