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The living city!


DmcZwerg

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Hi guys, 

i´m new in the hobby and read a lot about all the armies and stuff.   And i wanna start a living city army, cause that way i can field a lot of models which i like :D

my thoughs without knowing much about the game:

 

i need wyldwoods, and i get them with a Treelord Ancient or a Branchwych with the right spell. then i want some gladeguards for a alphastrike (20) with their arcanshots (once per game) 

next: i like the sisters of thorn and the buff is nice for the treelord. so 5 of them.  a knight incantor with everblaze comet would be nice too, so i´ll add him haha. 

at least i take 3x10 dwarf warriors.  makes the following list:

 

Treelord Ancient

Branchwych

Knight Incantor

 

20 Gladeguard

3x10 Dwarf Warriors

5x Sisters of Thorn

Everblaze Comet

 

thats 1320 points. 670 left

 

what do you guys think?  totally ****** or some potential to build a good list?  what should i add for more punch? i dont know all the models from the armies i can include. maybe someone had build a "competitive" living city list and have some advices for me :)

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sorry, cant see the "edit"- button. so i need to answer to my own post. 

i wanna also add a Freeguild General on Griffon, cause the model is amazing.  Following setup:

Freeguild General on Griffon

-Ghyrstrike,  Greathammer and Shield, Legendary Fighter.   It gives us 4 attacks with the Hammer, 2+/2+ d3 damage. + Damage from Griffon. Should be nice

 

+the list above we´re at 1580 Points. 

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You should check out the Free Cities thread, there is some discussion about the Living City there and I did a breakdown on my thoughts of each battle line choice.

As for getting Wyldwoods it's important to note the only way is by having a treelord ancient. The spell required to make them is Slyvaneth allegiance only and you can't use that with the Living City.

The Branchwych is still a solid pick for being able to summon Dryads though you have to be careful since your non-Slyvaneth units can be hurt by your own forests.

Unfortunately Sisters of the Thorn don't actually synergise well with the Treelord Ancient either as his command ability already lets him reroll saves of a 1 meaning you're spending a lot of points on a chance to reflect mortals on a 6.

If you like the models (I really like them too) and still want to use them however, id look into using them on larger units of Dryads. More than 12 in a unit means they get +1 save taking them to a 4+ reroll reflecting mortals on a 5+. If you park them in one your forests for cover you'll go up to a 3+ rerolling ones and reflecting on a 4+!

Another option might be Ironbreakers. Whilst they don't have any +save outside of cover the fact that they ignore rend means they will also get the chance to reflect wounds as opposed to the Treelord who loses the ability against rend-1 or better.

Hope that helps. You can take a look at my list idea in the aforementioned thread and why I chose things though of course it's up to you what you use. The best advantage of the Free Cities is the huge amount of choice you get after all.

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Hi,

yeah i saw your list and write up, great work and realy helpfull.  i also saw the Ballista idea and what should i say? its amazing.  

 

Allegiance: The Living City
Mortal Realm: Ghyran

Leaders
Knight-Azyros (100)   
Lord-Ordinator (140)
- General
- Trait: Master of Defense
- Artefact: Ghyrstrike 
Knight-Incantor (140) 
Treelord Ancient (300)  
Branchwych (80)      
Battleline
20 x Glade Guard (240) 
30 x Freeguild Guard (240)   
- Swords and Shields
30 x Freeguild Handgunners (300)
20 x Warriors (160)
- Axes or Hammers

War Machines
Celestar Ballista (100)
Celestar Ballista (100)
Celestar Ballista (100)

Total: 2000 / 2000
Extra Command Points: 0
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 153
 

pretty decent alpha strike with the Ballistas buffed by Ordinator / Knight-Azyros combined with the Glade Guards -3 shots. 

 

30 Freeguild Guards and 20 Dwarf Warrios should act like a anvil. at least we have 30 Handgunners for some serious damage, buffed by the Knight-Azyros, the hit on 2s when they not moved. 

 

what do you think? 

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22 minutes ago, DmcZwerg said:

Hi,

yeah i saw your list and write up, great work and realy helpfull.  i also saw the Ballista idea and what should i say? its amazing.  

 

Allegiance: The Living City
Mortal Realm: Ghyran

Leaders
Knight-Azyros (100)   
Lord-Ordinator (140)
- General
- Trait: Master of Defense
- Artefact: Ghyrstrike 
Knight-Incantor (140) 
Treelord Ancient (300)  
Branchwych (80)      
Battleline
20 x Glade Guard (240) 
30 x Freeguild Guard (240)   
- Swords and Shields
30 x Freeguild Handgunners (300)
20 x Warriors (160)
- Axes or Hammers

War Machines
Celestar Ballista (100)
Celestar Ballista (100)
Celestar Ballista (100)

Total: 2000 / 2000
Extra Command Points: 0
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 153
 

pretty decent alpha strike with the Ballistas buffed by Ordinator / Knight-Azyros combined with the Glade Guards -3 shots. 

 

30 Freeguild Guards and 20 Dwarf Warrios should act like a anvil. at least we have 30 Handgunners for some serious damage, buffed by the Knight-Azyros, the hit on 2s when they not moved. 

 

what do you think? 

Sounds good! What are you planning to use with the living cities deploy abilities? 

I personally would drop a ballista and change the warriors to 20 longbeards and a command point. 

Or maybe some guard and a ballista and upgrade the warriors to ironbreakers even. 

Youll notice soon enough with playtesting of course. But if feel you might have focussed so much on shooting you might need some more close combat resilience :) Because if you don’t get a double turn I don’t know if you’ll make a big enough impact. 

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50 minutes ago, Kramer said:

Sounds good! What are you planning to use with the living cities deploy abilities? 

I personally would drop a ballista and change the warriors to 20 longbeards and a command point. 

Or maybe some guard and a ballista and upgrade the warriors to ironbreakers even. 

Youll notice soon enough with playtesting of course. But if feel you might have focussed so much on shooting you might need some more close combat resilience :) Because if you don’t get a double turn I don’t know if you’ll make a big enough impact. 

Good point. But Longbeards ability Old Grumblers is senseless in a army with only 1 Dwarf unit, or am i wrong? :D i think ill go for Ironbreakers.  But are they worth 140 for 10? Sounds expensive

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Just now, DmcZwerg said:

Good point. But Longbeards ability Old Grumblers is senseless in a army with only 1 Dwarf unit, or am i wrong? :D i think ill go for Ironbreakers.  But are they worth 140 for 10? Sounds expensive

They can grumble themselves in a fury. (AFAIK) But you're right the ability is limited in use.

Ironbreakers are great for that role. 4+ ignoring rend & re-rolling all fails (you don't have to declare it in a phase anymore, so it works with set up in the movement phase), So put them forward in a wood for the cover save, and they should be able to hold your opponent or an 1 or 2 extra turns of shooting. 

But if it's worth it... I only played them in Dispossessed lists so my reference is with the Dispossessed buffs. And with buffs absolutely! 

Like I said, your list looks good to me so playtesting will prove it right or almost right :D 

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22 minutes ago, Kramer said:

@DmcZwerg another option could be changing the branchwych for a branchwraith so you can summon 10 dryads as an extra screening unit. 

Yeah thats actually what i wanted, just wrote the wrong down - haha. 

I‘m actually thinking about the „punch“ in the list. My local meta is pretty „hard“ even against new players...my bad :D what when i‘m facing nagash with Zombiedrakes or something like that?

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11 hours ago, DmcZwerg said:

Hi,

yeah i saw your list and write up, great work and realy helpfull.  i also saw the Ballista idea and what should i say? its amazing.  

 

Allegiance: The Living City
Mortal Realm: Ghyran

Leaders
Knight-Azyros (100)   
Lord-Ordinator (140)
- General
- Trait: Master of Defense
- Artefact: Ghyrstrike 
Knight-Incantor (140) 
Treelord Ancient (300)  
Branchwych (80)      
Battleline
20 x Glade Guard (240) 
30 x Freeguild Guard (240)   
- Swords and Shields
30 x Freeguild Handgunners (300)
20 x Warriors (160)
- Axes or Hammers

War Machines
Celestar Ballista (100)
Celestar Ballista (100)
Celestar Ballista (100)

Total: 2000 / 2000
Extra Command Points: 0
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 153
 

pretty decent alpha strike with the Ballistas buffed by Ordinator / Knight-Azyros combined with the Glade Guards -3 shots. 

 

30 Freeguild Guards and 20 Dwarf Warrios should act like a anvil. at least we have 30 Handgunners for some serious damage, buffed by the Knight-Azyros, the hit on 2s when they not moved. 

 

what do you think? 

Seems like a solid list though as you stated there isn't a huge amount of punch outside of the ballista and handgunners (though they sound deadly with the Azyros, good spot!).

My other concern is that you have quite a lot of ranged units. The Living City is somewhat hampered by its excellent choice of ranged units whilst being an army that wants to generate line of sight blocking terrain (Wyldwoods). Whilst I think it's perfectly viable to take ranged units to take advantage of the ambush rules, too much of a skew towards and you run into the issue of not wanting to place your Wyldwoods because you'll be blocking off your own units.

To that end I'd consider dropping one of your ranged units and replacing it with something with a bit more hitting power. Looking at your general game plan id lean towards dropping the Glade Guard and picking up something like Hammerers, Great Swords, Wyldwoods Rangers (not the best but a themed option), Evocators, or, Kurnoth Hunters with swords or scythes. Any spare points can be used on something like Eternal Guard or upgrading the Warriors to Longbeards (or increasing unit size).

Hope that helps :) I've not really played around with the army myself yet so a lot of what I say is on the theory side of things but I do have a lot of experience with the similar Slyvaneth. One of the great things about the Free Cities is the option to theme them how you want though meaning everyone is different (I'm avoiding Free Guild for personal lore reasons for example yet your army has them as the core!)

 

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I think you‘re right. 

 

What when we take Stormcasts as an Anvil + punch? A unit of 10 Sequitors, 1 Lord Arcanum on Gryph  Charger and Evocators ? Maybe also on Dracolines. 

1 Lord on Gryph

10 Sequitors

6 Evocators on Dracolines

makes 1080. at least its fast and has punch. + the Sequitors are durable with rerollable save in combat phase 

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2 hours ago, DmcZwerg said:

I think you‘re right. 

 

What when we take Stormcasts as an Anvil + punch? A unit of 10 Sequitors, 1 Lord Arcanum on Gryph  Charger and Evocators ? Maybe also on Dracolines. 

1 Lord on Gryph

10 Sequitors

6 Evocators on Dracolines

makes 1080. at least its fast and has punch. + the Sequitors are durable with rerollable save in combat phase 

That's quite a large change so I'd say the first thing you should do is sit down and decide what kind of army you want. Maybe pick 3~4 units that you must have and see if that gives your army a certain skew towards one thing or the other and then build from there.

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Yeah...maybe its better to start with a army which has only a few units haha.  

What i want to play:   A Big Treeman + a Branchwraith which can summon other trees.  

Leaders
Treelord Ancient (300)
Branchwych (80)     

380. Check! 

then i want some Ballistas, cause they´re amazing (statwise and i like the model and i have a few conversion ideas). i feel like they need support, and the Lord-Ordinator is a cool modell and i feel like he´s pretty cool with the +armor trait and Ghyrstrike + Knight-Azyros gives them another +1 to hit. 

Allegiance: Order
Mortal Realm: Ghyran

Leaders
Knight-Azyros (100)
Lord-Ordinator (140)
- General
- Trait: Master of Defense
- Artefact: Ghyrstrike 

Battleline

War Machines
Celestar Ballista (100)
Celestar Ballista (100)

440. Check!

now we´re at 820 Points.  

We have the nice deployment abillity and the Knight-Azyros. He gives friendly units +1 Hit. thats why i want to add the Freeguild Handgunners. 30 of them, with deepstrike we can bring them into position, they does not count as moved (errata) and get (with Azyros) +3 to Hit (not moved, 20+ models, not moved) these are 30 shots, 3+/3+/-1 1d.  which is pretty cool i think :D 

Battleline
30 x Freeguild Handgunners (300)

300. Check! 

we´re at 1120 Points.  At this points i need some beefy guys which can hold the line. a true anvil. and we need 2 aditional battleline units. 

no i´m lacking in knowledge about the whole models which we can chose from.  maybe you can help me out now :D

 

 

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Ok, that makes things a lot clearer on what kind of stuff is 'core' and what's 'flexible'.

The primary anvils for Living City are probably large units of Dwarf Warriors, large units of Longbeards, and units of ~10 Liberators in my opinion. Freeguild Guard with sword and shield also make for a decent anvil. Luckily, all these options fulfill battle line and all can be taken for under 300pts making the choice primarily a personal one. I'd recommend maybe taking one large unit of Warriors, Longbeards or Guard and then taking a smaller unit of any just to satisfy battle line and act as a more plug in the battle line.

If you want more specialised anvils, Eternal Guard (super cheap but not battle line and very cover dependent) and Ironbbreakers (probably the toughest infantry in the army) are very good but will need to be taken alongside other battle line options.

You probably want to take a hero to support your battle line anvil of choice. Runelords are amazing for Dispossessed lines, letting them be tankier or hit harder for 100pts and add more dispels. Freeguild Generals provide a good command ability that will also work on your handgunners whilst also be cheap and if you want a Stormcast anvil a Lord-Castelant is your best option for that +1 save.

After that you probably want some 'bullies' to hit back hard. Kurnoth Hunters with scythes are great for this with their 2" range, high wound pool and rerollable saves, as are Stormcast Retributors who can bypass their normal slow movement with the ambush abilities of the army. Evocators provide the mortal wounds you lack and are very solid choices anyway. I've heard good things about Hammerers but I believe you need large units to make them work which is expensive points wise.

For a more mobile choice Stormcast Fulminators are very good on the charge and have mortal wound output. They also have great saves against shooting. Dracolines may be good too though I've heard they are out good when taken with a Lord Arcanum on Dracoline for the command ability due to their high costs meaning you want to make the most out of them.

A Freeguild General on Griffon would also provide a mobile beatstick and distraction from the important Treelord. I've seen lots of good feedback about them and many consider them to be one of the best 'affordable' behemoths.

 

I hope that helps somewhat. I know it can be very overwhelming with so much choice but I think if you break it down it becomes easier. For now, you should choose your battle line and supporting hero and then based on that look at remaining points and what is missing (you currently have low mobility for example) and simply look for units that satisfy that need rather than looking at everything which is good.

 

 

 

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Nice answer, thanks a lot :) 

i think ill go with the following:

Freeguild General with Banner

-+1 Save trait 

30 Freeguild Guards with Sword/Shield

now these guys are 3+ reroll 1s saverolls which sounds amazing :) and „hold the ground“ from the General is awesome! 

For the last battleline spot ill go with 10 Longbeards. 

Costs 440 points. 

1560 points for now. 

440 for some punch or another distraction carnifex next to the Treelord

hard choice for me, really I have no idea haha :D

 

/edit I also think about to swap the 30 Handgunners to 30 crossbowmen. The doubletap sounds amazing, combined with „Hold the line“ and the Knight Azyros. Massive damage!

 

/edit2

what do you think about:

Runelord

10 Ironbreakers

3 Kurnoth Hunter 

Another target for the Longbeards ability, 2 targets for the Runelord. And exactly 440 points :D

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Sounds good! Nice mixture and with summoned Dryads you should have a good amount of infantry for holding objectives.

Just one thing, I noticed that you mentioned +1 for the Knight Azyros earlier. He actually lets you reroll hit rolls of a 1 rather than adding to your hits. A minor difference but an important one.

Look forward to hearing about your experiences with the army. Seems there is quite a bit of interest in the Living City hidden around and it would be great to gather people's experiences to encourage more to take the leap!

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6 hours ago, Yoshiya said:

Just one thing, I noticed that you mentioned +1 for the Knight Azyros earlier. He actually lets you reroll hit rolls of a 1 rather than adding to your hits. A minor difference but an important one.

Oh, you‘re right, totally missed that, but okay :) 

 

7 hours ago, Yoshiya said:

Look forward to hearing about your experiences with the army. Seems there is quite a bit of interest in the Living City hidden around and it would be great to gather people's experiences to encourage more to take the leap!

I‘ll try my best. My brother has a huge collection and he does not play anymore. I’m only missing the Ballistas, Ordinator, and the Kurnoth-Hunters. So a Kind of low budget army for me haha. 

 

 

Quick question to all: I love the saint Celestine modell (40k) and have one with a geat paintjob. When I rebase her on a 40mm base, would you accept the Knight-Azyros count as?

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12 minutes ago, Yoshiya said:

I can't see why most people wouldn't accept her as a conversion as long as you make it clear in advance what she is. You may need to be more careful in a tournament but in a casual game it should be fine :)

Okay, i mean: she acutally looks exectly like a Knight-Azyros. She just fits better (in my opinion) in my team :)

 

Just to be clear, this is (for now) the final list:

Allegiance: The Living City
Mortal Realm: Ghyran

Leaders
Knight-Azyros (100)
Lord-Ordinator (140)
Treelord Ancient (300)
Branchwych (80)
Freeguild General (100)
- General
- Stately War Banner
- Trait: Indomitable 
- Artefact: Writ of Dominion 
Runelord (100)

Battleline
30 x Freeguild Crossbowmen (300)
30 x Freeguild Guard (240)
- Swords and Shields
10 x Longbeards (100)
- Axes or Hammers & Shields

Units
3 x Kurnoth Hunters (200)
- Scythes
10 x Ironbreakers (140)

War Machines
Celestar Ballista (100)
Celestar Ballista (100)

Total: 2000 / 2000
Extra Command Points: 0
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 146
 

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2 hours ago, DmcZwerg said:

Freeguild General (100)
- General
- Stately War Banner
- Trait: Indomitable 
- Artefact: Writ of Dominion 

Sorry mate, you can't use Freepeoples traits or artefacts. The Free City acts effectively as alleigiance ability, therefore only generic order Traits and Artefacts, as well as those of the Realm are available to you

EDIT:
Just so you know it read through Citadel Wood rules in GHB 2018, because It blocks line of sight if it (line) crosses more that 1 inch of Citadel Wood, what that means is you need to be VERY cautious with deployment of your ambushers, but also you heroes will have insane levels of protection sitting in the middle of the wood.

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3 hours ago, DmcZwerg said:

Quick question to all: I love the saint Celestine modell (40k) and have one with a geat paintjob. When I rebase her on a 40mm base, would you accept the Knight-Azyros count as?

Get her a lantern and  pauldrons and she'll make perfect Azyros
Also, just to clearify it even further from what @Yoshiya mentioned: Azyros give all your units rerolls against enemy units within 10" of him. Therefore, your units does not need to be anywhere near.

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1 hour ago, XReN said:

Sorry mate, you can't use Freepeoples traits or artefacts. The Free City acts effectively as alleigiance ability, therefore only generic order Traits and Artefacts, as well as those of the Realm are available to you
 

oh good points.  then i maybe chose another General. but that does only effect the +1 armor for the Guards. should be okay.

 

maybe the lord ordinator with Ghyrstrike and Legendary fighter.  he´s maybe more behinde enemy line then the rest haha. i´ll try to deploy him + the 2 ballistas behinde enemy line to snipe support character.

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On 12/8/2018 at 8:33 AM, MacDuff said:

Are Irondrakes any good? I love the models.

i can only quote some other players:

 

Irondrakes– These beardy boys are every Dispossessed player’s snuggle-buddy and every opponent’s worst nightmare, these brutal shooters are arguably the best in all of AoS. Able to move and still double-tap as long as they’re not within 3” of an enemy unit (and have 10 or more models in the unit), they’re you biggest hammer and the most obvious choice to take away with the Ancestral Pickaxe. Keep in mind how terrible they are in combat because they’re useless come the combat phase.

 

its from this post on thehonestwargamer:

https://thehonestwargamer.com/aos-list-rundowns/ironbait/

so it sounds they´re good haha.  and on paper they look solid. 

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