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AoS 2 - Ossiarch Bonereapers Discussion


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Quick question.

I've been seeing lists with Katakros as the general in non Praetorian lists, but you still need someone to take the command trait for the specific legion yes?

Example:

-Katakros (general)

-Liege

-Other Units

I'm getting an error in the app saying someone needs to take the command trait. (Just spitballing a list)

Thanks!

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Also, guys. How are you all finding the Mortek Crawler?

I haven't played AOS since the pandemic started in Australia and I'm thinking about playing some more now that we're opening up. I left off.. buying and assembling two Crawlers.

I've found that OBR has issues keeping and taking objectives due to the lower number of units, being elite. Do you find having the Crawler a hinderance? How many are you running? It seems like a unit you have to buff to get any value out of.

 

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I run one.  It can be  a bit hit and miss and is better against low bravery or low armour save opponents.  However it's worth it for the fear it puts into your opponents and how they are forced to keep important characters out of range.

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OBR are kind of slow, and lack board presence in both model and unit count.  If opponents play for objectives and try to just avoid your stuff, it can be very difficult to get to grips with them.  Crawlers give opponents a reason to come to you, give you the ability to threaten key buff heroes behind enemy lines & msu squads camping distant objevtives, prevent enemy units from stringing out, and maul hordes of chaff which can otherwise tarpit morteks long enough to keep them from reaching objectives.

Yes, the crawlers struggle to damage high save elite units, but when your regular battleline, in petrifex at least, can threaten 2 to 3 exploding ap-2 attacks per model and save on 3+ with rerolls in melee, elite stuff generally isn't your biggest problem.

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2 hours ago, Sception said:

OBR are kind of slow,

It might be because I run katakros as my general, but i've found OBR to be deceptively slow. On paper, yes we are. But if you have the RDP to spend we can be quite quick across the board with the 7' move + run.

I've certainly caught a few opponents with surprise with how quickly my army was able to move across the board.

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Even with RDP, 7' move + run isn't exactly fast, and even with Katakros, burning multiple RDP to move can leave you shy on points to burn on shield wall / bludgeon, making you vulnerable to enemy attack right as you start to come within range.  OBR also lack flying units which mean getting around terrain and screens to target vulnerable units is difficult, and speed bumps can be especially effective against us, since we we usually don't have much in the way of magic phase offense - nagash lists of course excepting - to clear them before our movement phase.  Park a disposable dire wolf unit 3.1" in front of a block of mortek, and RDP or no, they aren't going anywhere in their next turn.   OBR are also lacking outflank/deep strike/teleportation/foreward deployment type shenanigans, outside of protection of nagash - which is really only impressive on Nagash himself - or generic endless spells, which, with Nagash lists again excepting, we lack the casting bonuses to reliably push them over enemy unbinding rolls when we need them.

Kavalos in the army, especially as battleline, does help, but they only go so far.  Lieges help too, but they're kind of an important unit to be moving them ahead of your lines.  Stalkers can help a bit, too, with more speed than morteks and the CA to jump terrain on the charge, but they're really only fast relative to the rest of OBR, not relative to the rest of the game.  Morghasts, especially Harbingers, *would* help if they weren't as woefully overpriced for their abilities as they've been since the first general's handbook.  And both Stalkers and Morghasts are seriously held back by lacking any option to field them as battleline, since that leaves them competing with Harvesters and especially Crawlers for our extremely limited supply of spare points after obligatory battle line and essential characters are accounted for.

So yeah, I do agree that OBR aren't *quite* as slow as they appear... but they are still, overall, one of the slowest armies in the game.  They can outfight most anything, but nearly anything can outmaneuver you - especially when you consider that you're almost certainly going to be outnumbered in model count and especially in unit count.  This can make board presence is very much an uphill climb, especially if the units you do take are trying to stay within aura range of your heroes & unit champions.  Opponents who just charge their armies into a big scrum in the middle of the board will get shreked, but anybody who actually plays for the objectives?  Like, I think OBR are a lot stronger than LoN overall, but I'd have a hard time running my OBR against my own LoN, particularly when it comes to dealing with the multiple, cheap, recursive dire wolf units.

 

NONE of that is to say that OBR is at all weak, but even with the +3" movement CA, I'd still say movement and positioning is one of the faction's most exploitable weaknesses.

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Back again from a weekend game! We decided to bump up the point values to 2000 (with proxy) and it was a closer game than I thought! 

My List:

Spoiler

 

Arkhan 

Liege Kavalos

Soulmason

20x Mortek Guard

20x Mortek Guard

5x Deathriders

Harvester

Crawler

Crawler

 

My Opponents List: (from memory again)

Spoiler

 

Treelord Ancient

Spirit of Durthu

Arch-Revenant 

Branchwraith/wych 

5x Spites

5x Spites

5x Spites 

6x Hunters w/Swords

3x Hunters w/Swords

3 Hunters w/Scythes

Treelord

 

We played Battle for the Pass I think. 

I'll shorted up the report, but early game I was struggling to hold objectives (we are slow) and my Deathriders got wiped out from Spirit of Durthu turn one. 

Highlights of the game:

-Arkahn managed to kill 2 hunters with Curse of the Years. 

-My 20 Mortek Guard managed to hold off a Treelord, Treelord Ancient, 3x Hunters with Scythes, and 6x Hunters with Swords for 2 turns before being wiped out. 

-A crawler got extremely lucky and managed to take out a lone group of Hunters. 

-When your opponent can't make saves Crawlers really hurt

-Charged the Treelord into my Soulmason and didn't kill him and the Soulmason doing 3 wounds in return

-Never successfully cast Arcane Command 

-Successfully casted Soul-Guide 3 Times (despite rolling 8 or 9 times)

-Three forests really stop Crawlers from shooting.

 

Score at the end was:

Ossiarch Bonereapers - 24

Sylvaneth - 15

 

Next weekend I'll be trying a slight variation on the list:

Spoiler

 

Arkhan

Liege-Kavalos

Soulmason

20x Mortek Guard

10x Mortek Guard

10x Mortek Guard

Harvester

Crawler

Crawler

Bone-Tithe Shriker

Mortek-Shield Corps

 

I figured more staying bodies and an extra artifact for the Liege (Helm of the Ordained) will help if they dispell the Shrieker or my dice fail me. 

 

I'll let you all know how it goes! 

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I'd been playing a lot of Arkhan, but I thinking I'm gonna drop him from my list.

I keep getting screwed by Protection of Nagash forced teleports, he's mediocre in combat and our spells aren't killy enough.. and you can't really afford to take more endless spells due to the way the army is pointed. I will, no doubt, miss his mass regeneration of units and ability to shut down enemy spellcasting. I find I'm not getting enough out of Arkhan. Maybe I'm just playing him wrong. 

Adding the Leige gives me access to his +1 attack command trait and he's pretty decent in combat. Adding a Crawler, well, I haven't tried the Crawler yet. I'm gonna run a single one and use it to try to snipe out characters and generally be a pain in the butt. I can give it extra attacks, rerolls and a bonus to hit rolls as well. 

Leige for +1 attack, Mason for reroll 1s, Shrieker for +1 to hit. (I'll double check it's not melee only.)

Remove Arkhan and Nightmare Predator, add Leige Kavalos and a Crawler.

I'm pretty happy with this list, I'm gonna give the changes a shot on Sunday.

...

Allegiance: Ossiarch Bonereapers
- Legion: Petrifex Elite

Liege-Kavalos
- Trait: Mighty Archaeossian
- Artefact: Godbone Armour
Mortisan Boneshaper
- Item: Artisan's Key
- Spell: Arcane Command (or Drain Vitality)
Mortisan Soulmason
- Spell: Empower Nadirite Weapons

20 x Mortek Guard
- Nadirite Blade and Shield
20 x Mortek Guard
- Nadirite Blade and Shield
20 x Mortek Guard
- Nadirite Blade and Shield

6 x Necropolis Stalkers
- Spirit Blades

Mortek Crawler

Mortek Shield-corps

Bone-tithe Shrieker

Total: 2000 / 2000
RDP: 5+8D6
 

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4 hours ago, Obeisance said:

I'd been playing a lot of Arkhan, but I thinking I'm gonna drop him from my list.

I keep getting screwed by Protection of Nagash forced teleports, he's mediocre in combat and our spells aren't killy enough.. and you can't really afford to take more endless spells due to the way the army is pointed. I will, no doubt, miss his mass regeneration of units and ability to shut down enemy spellcasting. I find I'm not getting enough out of Arkhan. Maybe I'm just playing him wrong. 

Adding the Leige gives me access to his +1 attack command trait and he's pretty decent in combat. Adding a Crawler, well, I haven't tried the Crawler yet. I'm gonna run a single one and use it to try to snipe out characters and generally be a pain in the butt. I can give it extra attacks, rerolls and a bonus to hit rolls as well. 

Leige for +1 attack, Mason for reroll 1s, Shrieker for +1 to hit. (I'll double check it's not melee only.)

Remove Arkhan and Nightmare Predator, add Leige Kavalos and a Crawler.

I'm pretty happy with this list, I'm gonna give the changes a shot on Sunday.

...

Allegiance: Ossiarch Bonereapers
- Legion: Petrifex Elite

Liege-Kavalos
- Trait: Mighty Archaeossian
- Artefact: Godbone Armour
Mortisan Boneshaper
- Item: Artisan's Key
- Spell: Arcane Command (or Drain Vitality)
Mortisan Soulmason
- Spell: Empower Nadirite Weapons

20 x Mortek Guard
- Nadirite Blade and Shield
20 x Mortek Guard
- Nadirite Blade and Shield
20 x Mortek Guard
- Nadirite Blade and Shield

6 x Necropolis Stalkers
- Spirit Blades

Mortek Crawler

Mortek Shield-corps

Bone-tithe Shrieker

Total: 2000 / 2000
RDP: 5+8D6
 

Consider Reinforce Battle Shields instead of Arcane Command. With all the spellcasting in the current meta it keeps Mortek alive a lot longer. With that list you shouldn't need the RDP from Arcane Command, especially with only the 1 crawler.

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Been messing around with some lists lately, I'm a sucker for creating unconventional lists that don't really follow the norm, so what do you guys think? My plan for this list would to Alpha-Strike my opponent, with army wide run and charge from the Stalliarch Lords and the +6" scout movement for the Katakrosian Deathglaive. I haven't been able to test out this list yet (obviously) but I do have several questions:

1. Do you guys think this list is competitively viable? (At least enough to get  a good game in)

2. I would like to take more cavalry, but I'm not sure where to fit it in and still get the most out of the list, taking out the 2 mortek guard units to take some more Deathriders doesn't make much sense, so I'm not really sure what to do

3.  Speaking of mortek, should I take them in a big blob of 20 or keep them in two units of 10. I have the required battleline either way, but it seems most people prefer to take Mortek in bigger units.

Allegiance: Ossiarch Bonereapers
- Legion: Stalliarch Lords

Leaders
Mortisan Boneshaper (130)
- Artefact: Artisan's Key
- Lore of Mortisans: Empower Nadirite Weapons
Mortisan Boneshaper (130)
- Lore of Mortisans: Mortal Contract
Liege-Kavalos (200)
- General
- Command Trait: Twisted Challenge
- Artefact: Nadir-bound Mount

Battleline
5 x Kavalos Deathriders (180)
- Nadirite Spear and Shield
5 x Kavalos Deathriders (180)
- Nadirite Spear and Shield
10 x Mortek Guard (130)
- Nadirite Blade and Shield
- 1x Soulcleaver Greatblades
10 x Mortek Guard (130)
- Nadirite Blade and Shield

Units
2 x Morghast Archai (210)
- Spirit Halberds
3 x Necropolis Stalkers (200)
3 x Necropolis Stalkers (200)

Behemoths
Gothizzar Harvester (200)
- Weapon: Soulcleaver Sickles

Battalions
Katakrosian Deathglaive (80)

Endless Spells / Terrain / CPs
Bone-tithe Shrieker (30)

Total: 2000 / 2000
Extra Command Points: 1
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 113
 

Anyway, that's about it, thanks in advance for any comments, questions or advice.

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13 hours ago, Benji said:

Consider Reinforce Battle Shields instead of Arcane Command. With all the spellcasting in the current meta it keeps Mortek alive a lot longer. With that list you shouldn't need the RDP from Arcane Command, especially with only the 1 crawler.

Fair call. What IS the current meta? I thought the world was pretty much shut down.

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3 hours ago, Obeisance said:

Fair call. What IS the current meta? I thought the world was pretty much shut down.

There are still a lot of games taking place in Tabletop Simulator, and even some tournaments online, so the Meta is still progressing and developing. It is probably moving quicker as well as you don't need to purchase models to try out new lists. 

Seraphon is the core of the current Meta, the standard list being Skink battle line, Kroak with his retinue (Starpriest, Astrolith, Priest) and as many Salamanders as you can fit into the list. There are variations, but Kroak + Salamanders are the strong lists. Reinforce Battle Shields will give you some protection from Kroak's spells as well as the Salamanders Mortal Wounds.

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57 minutes ago, Benji said:

Reinforce Battle Shields will give you some protection from Kroak's spells as well as the Salamanders Mortal Wounds.

To an extent, but rbs can only be on one unit at a time.  Depending on list and positioning it often just shifts attention from one unit to another.  That can still be valuable, but lately I'm wondering if its a bit overrated, especially in 3x20 mortek lists.

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10 minutes ago, Sception said:

To an extent, but rbs can only be on one unit at a time.  Depending on list and positioning it often just shifts attention from one unit to another.  That can still be valuable, but lately I'm wondering if its a bit overrated, especially in 3x20 mortek lists.

It still has a lot of value, even if it forces the enemy to not shoot at the unit you want to survive. I feel like it's better than Arcane Command in a list with 5+8x6+ RDP. 

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Maybe, but is it better than Empower Nadirite weapons or Drain Vitality?  Maybe for some matchups or in some armies.  RBS becomes better if you focus more resources into a single primary unit - say a 40/20/10 mortek base instead of a 20/20/20 base.

If you take enough wizards to know all three then you probably don't have 5+ RDP before rolling for 6s, at which point I think Arcane Command becomes obligatory, imo.

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20 hours ago, Sception said:

Maybe, but is it better than Empower Nadirite weapons or Drain Vitality?  Maybe for some matchups or in some armies.  RBS becomes better if you focus more resources into a single primary unit - say a 40/20/10 mortek base instead of a 20/20/20 base.

If you take enough wizards to know all three then you probably don't have 5+ RDP before rolling for 6s, at which point I think Arcane Command becomes obligatory, imo.

Drain Vitality is better in sustained combat, it's difficult to get the spell down on a unit before the first round of shooting and combat due to it's range. I find with Mortek if they survive the initial shooting and combat phase, and you have Katakros or a Boneshaper nearby you will win long term.

Give both a try and see which you prefer, I don't think picking one of the two is a game winning/losing move, but RBS does take the edge off the first strike from Salamanders and other alpha units such as eels or cavalry with mortals on the charge.

Arcane Command is just not good though, you need to get the spell off, the enemy needs to not unbind it and then you get D3 RDP. You can't rely on it for your turn planning as you will get 0 RDP quite a bit. Even with Nagash lists I don't find myself casting this unless I desperately need the RDP for tricky objective plays, Arcane bolt is more effective.

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arcane command is a soell that reads: cast on a 5.  D3 of your units get your choice of +3 move in the next movement phase or +1 attack, -1 rend, or reroll saves in the next combat phase.  And you don't have to pick which units or benefits until you need them.

Arcane command is dummy good, unless you already have enough rd points for shield wall, endless duty, and blugeon in both player turns with all your engaged mortek units.  For just one mortek squad, that's already 6 points, which you might have.  The moment your opponent tags a second unit, that's 12 points, and you won't have that.

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So I had a game vs chaos dwarves on the weekend, my first game since lockdown/fear started ramping up.

I'm woefully out of practice. Lol.

Turns out blobs of 30+ dudes shooting, rerolling hits and dealing mortal wounds on 6+ hit is really good against us.

His elemental guys bounced, killed 4 with a catapult turn 1.

I kind of just didn't have the bodies to deal with the shooting and I couldn't roll high enough to stop any magic. Then double turn pushed the game from on the edge to his favour.

Crawler got one shot and spent the game tied up and I didn't have the units to extricate it and move forward.

...

I think I need Arkhan for his mobility, his recursion and ability to shut down enemy magic.

Leige Kavalos looks good on paper, but he didn't really kill anything.  

Catapult needs support/protection, which I don't have the bodies for.

My list is going to revert, but I might try some cavalry.

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Liege kavalos isn't mostly there for his killing ability - I mean, it's not negligible, but he's more there for the RD points (tied with RD points generated per point with katakros for most efficient character, the only more efficient RD generators are a couple of the formations, and those come at the cost of reduced board presence from spending points on not models), and for endless duty for the +1 attack buff.

I do recommend running at least one unit of the kav if you can fit it - they fill battleline and it's important to have at least some faster options that can run for objectives or tie up a shooty squad for a turn.

As for arkhan... it's tough.  OBR is very vulnerable to magic if you don't take him or nagash, what with lacking any bonuses to unbinding apart from kind of sort of the nexus.  But he's very points inefficient, particularly when it comes to RD generation, and he's super fragile, even in petrifex.  An army like range spam chaos dwarves with units that can put out 6 to 7 mortal wounds at range is exactly the kind of opponent you *least* want to field a 360 point 11 wound model against.  Between mortals and just regular damage, that squad has an uncomfortable likelyhood of one-shotting arkhan at range, even in petrifex, even with protection of nagash up.

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Another weekend another battle! 

Sadly was only able to get one game in, but it was fun!

My List:

Spoiler

 

Nagash

Liege-Kavalos

20x Mortek Guard

20x Mortek Guard

10x Deathriders

Bone-Tithe 

 

 

Opponents List:

Spoiler

 

Treelord Ancient

Arch-Revanant

Branchwraith

Everqueen

5x Spites

5x Spites

5x Spites

3x Hunters w/Swords

3x Hunters w/Swords

3x Hunters w/Swords

 

We played the mission where only heroes could capture objectives. And I only had two. 

Turn One:

I wanted to go first so I could put up all my buffs and spells. The Liege and Deathriders went straight for my right side objective while Nagash and the Mortek trundled forward. No shooting or combat. 

He tried casting some spells but got off summoning some Dryads. He then placed two forests on both sides objectives. Everqueen tried shooting the Kavalos but his relic negated it. 

Turn Two:

I win the roll off and repeated buffing with spells and the Bone-Tithe. One of the Mortek Guard formed a circle around Nagash in the center objective. The second squad ran to the left objective and tried to intercept the Dryads and Branchwraith. Kavalos stays on the right objective and never moved again. Deathriders charge a two units of three Hunters and kills off one squad and brings the other down to 2. His attacks kill two riders.

The Everqueen pops out a Treelord and makes his way toward my Kavalos. The Ancient, Everqueen, and the wounded Hunters go into combat with riders. The fresh Hunter squad manage to kill all 20 of my Mortek (I ran out of RDP for Shield Wall). Nagash then proceeds to make sure they don't exist. My Deathriders went down to two left. I managed to pull them from the Ancient and Hunters to deny a pile in. 

Turn Three:

He wins and tries casting some spells but I largely stop them. The Everqueen is tied up with two riders, but the remaining Hunters and Ancient are free to go after Nagash. The Treelord decides to charge into the Kavalos, but they were both wet noodles and nothing happened. Everqueen kills the rest of the Riders and Nagash took a wound and teleported to the far objective to claim it. 

Again I buff up the remaining Mortek Guard who have been killing Dryads and blocking a way to the objective. Nagash put some wounds on the Ancient and killed the Branchwraith. Mortek Guard charge in and take out both the Ancient and Hunters. All he has left is some shambles of Dryads, the Spites which won't do much, and a Treelord and the Everqueen.

Turn Four:

He wins again and charges forward to kill the Kavalos and score some points. The combat ended up with the Kavalos taking 3 wounds and doing 2 back to her (the horse kicks really hard I guess).  At this point it's 5-0 and he concedes seeing he can't kill Nagash on the other side of the board and only one hero left.

We still play out my turn just to see if he can kill the Kavalos but he doesn't do enough wounds and Nagash will just heal him every turn. 

VICTORY TO THE OSSIARCH.

 

Lessons I have learned.

-Nagash is good AMAZING. But he doesn't fit my play style. I'll probably play him when tournaments come back around.

-While buffed the Deathriders hit really well. But they can't be in combat for more than a turn as their buffs are wasted. 

-Hunters still hurt when they attack twice. 

-The list has low RDP. I tried casting Arcane Command but rolled low every time and denied or just got one RDP from it. 

-Even with the model I still forget to use the Nexus. It could have saved some of the Mortek Guard with the -1 to hit. 

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So question. For context, this is my list:

Arkhan

Boneshaper: Key, Reinforced Shields.

Soulmason: Empower Weapons.

3*20 Morteks: Swords.

6 Stalkers: Blades.

Mortek Batallion

Nightmare Predator

Bonetithe Shrieker

...

If I trade out the Mason for another Shaper and drop the Predator, I've got 50pts.

Endless spell wise, what would you take? Sun? Pendulum? I feel like I need something to make Arkhan more dangerous.

With the Palisade, I'm tempted to take it to try and protect against shooting. How have you used it to good effect in the past? I feel like people just walk and shoot or unbind it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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