AoS 2 - Living City Discussion

[Lord Hightower]

Hy, there is a whole thread about ME with CoS - check it out - any input is welcome 🙂

 

 

[Eldarain]

Hey all. A friend recommended me getting a bunch of Shadow Warriors for my Living City to null deploy.

Does that work? I'm confused by the Living City wording "for each unit you deploy on the battlefield"

Wouldn't using the Shadow Warriors special ability mean I can't count them as deployed on the Battlefield for the Living City rule?

[readercolin]

1 hour ago, Eldarain said:

Hey all. A friend recommended me getting a bunch of Shadow Warriors for my Living City to null deploy.

Does that work? I'm confused by the Living City wording "for each unit you deploy on the battlefield"

Wouldn't using the Shadow Warriors special ability mean I can't count them as deployed on the Battlefield for the Living City rule?

I'm not sure that that works.  The living city rules state that you can set up 1 reserve unit for each Living City unit you have set up on the battlefield.  Shadow warriors rules state that you can set up this unit on the side as a reserve unit.  I would interpret this to mean that you can go ahead and deploy half (rounding up) of your non-shadow warrior units on the battlefield, the other half (rounding down) in reserve, and then any number of shadow warriors in reserve.  The only way I see being able to have a null deployment would be to run only assassins and shadow warriors, as you can deploy the assassins in reserve and have them pop out of the shadow warriors later.  However, if you were to do things this way, you can't then deploy the assassins within 6" of the table edge, because the assassin's reserve ability is different then the living cities reserve ability.

[Lord Krungharr]

My evil dwarves just moved into the Living City because Azgorh being remodeled by Forgeworld.  They are trying to figure out how to best get along with the rest of the random Order models I have, and use the outflanking Living City traits to compensate for their utter slowness.  Here's what I have thus far, is this able to put up a decent fight?

Warden King (general....old Castellan)

Runelord (old Daemonsmith)

Dreadlord on Black Dragon (that awesome spear to let him fight first)

Anointed on Frostheart

4x10 Irondrakes (old blunderbuss Chaos Dwarves)

6 Demi-bull/gryph Knights (old bull-centaurs)

Steamtank

I know it's a bunch of drops but I could outflank the Irondrakes or Steamtank and a dwarf hero or two.  Anyone think this has some quality?  I am also tinkering with the notion of taking a Durthu and Treelord Ancient to drop a woods and buff the Durthu sword attacks.

[dmorley21]

I know it seems like Durthu isn't optimal in Living City, but I've always liked the model and want to run him. Which artefact should he get though, considering he won't be the general?

The options are:

Ghrystrike (+1 to hit and wound in melee)

Blade of Hammerhal Ghyra (+1 attack)

Spear of the Hunt (an extra rend and auto always fight first on a charge). 

They all seem good and it's hard to choose. 

[adreal]

Had three games yesterday, got another two coming up today.

Lost 2 won 1

Eternal guard are pretty good, but do melt to mortal wounds (dang beast claw raiders)

Sisters do not like being charged, even with loose until the last, I really need to protect them. First game (against beast claw) I was hoping for the early double turn, so I moved them up, yeah, bad move. Third game (against gloomspite) they got hammered two turns by the mushroom, still they were good. 

Shadow warriors are nice, but need support, still they held up a dankhold trogboss in game two which helped me just keep shooting all his guys as they came to me.

Wild riders, glass cannons, need to position them so they get the charge rather then be charged.

Black dragon, while it has died every game, every game he has been good, killing stuff, holding stuff up for longer then he should, really happy with this guy 

I only had 1 game where I didn't generate a extra cp when I had both princes together, and the birds are really good, though beast claws shoot with  a "ability" which is a fresh sort of bull####

 

Just some shots from my last game yesterday, prebattle shot, and my dragon getting yeeted by a giant

Edited November 23, 2019 by adreal

[Satyrical Sophist]

6 hours ago, dmorley21 said:

I know it seems like Durthu isn't optimal in Living City, but I've always liked the model and want to run him. Which artefact should he get though, considering he won't be the general?

The options are:

Ghrystrike (+1 to hit and wound in melee)

Blade of Hammerhal Ghyra (+1 attack)

Spear of the Hunt (an extra rend and auto always fight first on a charge). 

They all seem good and it's hard to choose. 

He both is and isn't. The command trait is really good, and he has auto healing in living city. He also gets an almost guaranteed flanking t1 charge. 

He loses out on the woods buff, unless you are triggering it with a treelord ancient to summon them.

[Maturin]

On 11/3/2019 at 6:02 AM, Rogue Sun said:

Has anyone tried or thought about going all in on a SotW build? Seems like it could be fairly devastating with the sheer amount of shots and mortal wound potential.  

I just played a 20 Units of SoTW. In my second  shooting phase with 40 shots I only made 3 MW 😢. All of those sixes ? I goet them to wound

[Aelfric]

29 minutes ago, Maturin said:

I just played a 20 Units of SoTW. In my second  shooting phase with 40 shots I only made 3 MW 😢. All of those sixes ? I goet them to wound

Sisters cause mortal on 6s to wound.  It sounds like you were counting 6s to hit.  Apologies if I got this wrong.

[Maturin]

Just now, Aelfric said:

Sisters cause mortal on 6s to wound.  It sounds like you were counting 6s to hit.  Apologies if I got this wrong.

No you're right, I just read that in here! I played my game wrong, to my own detriment! I had a lots of 6 to wound but no 6s to hit!
Luckily I won my game

[dmorley21]

Okay, so I've been thinking of a list that is just meant to be fun but competitive enough to give my opponents a game. It's a collection of things I've wanted to play:

Annointed on Frostheart (general)

Spirit of Durthu

Gotrek

30 Phoenix Guard

10 Handgunners

10 Handgunners

That list leaves me with 200 pts leftover.

My idea to play it is to make blocks of threats. The general with the guard. Gotrek with a unit of handgunners. Durthu deepstriking with a unit of handgunners. 

That creates three different areas of threats. What would you do with the remaining points?

I've so far thought about upping a unit of handgunners to 30, adding a unit of gyrocopters, and adding a unit of scourgerunners and a command point, or adding a Flamespyre. 

Once again, I know it isn't the most competitive list but I've always wanted to play Durthu, a phoenix, and now Gotrek. 

[Eldarain]

Unless you're deadset on Durthu you could do a Treelord and a Runelord General. That way you could change the Handgunners to Irondrakes who love the appear and not count as moving.

It would also give you a caster and 2 denies something you are direly missing. Running the Tree with the Phoenix would also give you the potential of buffing the Anointed's save.

The Treelord also allows you to drop a Forest messing with enemy movement/LoS and giving you the ability to make the most of his spell.

Just some food for thought.

Edited November 27, 2019 by Eldarain

[dmorley21]

@Eldarain

That makes a lot of sense, but my original goal was to find a way to play both Gotrek and Durthu in a list together. In the particular list that I have, I think I'd be better off trying to delete the wizards than unbind spells. That's why things like gyrocopters, scourgerunners, or a flamespyre were jumping out at me.

If I wanted to go the unbind route, having a Knight Incantor to auto-unbind one game-changing spell would seem to be the way to go, no? The main magic that scares me with this list is something like Nagash's Hand of Dust.

[Eldarain]

5 hours ago, dmorley21 said:

@Eldarain

That makes a lot of sense, but my original goal was to find a way to play both Gotrek and Durthu in a list together. In the particular list that I have, I think I'd be better off trying to delete the wizards than unbind spells. That's why things like gyrocopters, scourgerunners, or a flamespyre were jumping out at me.

If I wanted to go the unbind route, having a Knight Incantor to auto-unbind one game-changing spell would seem to be the way to go, no? The main magic that scares me with this list is something like Nagash's Hand of Dust.

I like the aggressive approach. What about swapping to an Anointed on foot and using those points to be able to afford a nice amount of Irondrakes, Copters, Scourgerunners etc.

[ZLee Syn]

Hello guys. I was thinking about using 2 dreadlords on dragons to assasinate/pin enemy in deploy zone + fast cheap units to screen while my infantry shoots and score points. I think dreadlord is better then stardrake because of the base size. I never played any order army (I play death) and so I am not sure which units are considered great and if there is some synergy I need to know about so I would like some pointers. Do you think that this is valid strategy and what other units shpuld I look into?

Edit: also do you think treelord ancient and branchwraith combo is worth it?

Edited November 28, 2019 by ZLee Syn

[zilberfrid]

On 11/6/2019 at 5:52 PM, bilbo said:

Hey all,

++NOOB WARNING++

Boychick has been warhammering me into the ground for about six months now, and now only communicates in dice rolls. Beat em / Join em, I've given in and reckon that CoS and Living City interest me enough to jump in. Currently corralling an army out of assorted D&D figures, toy soldiers, matchstickmen etc. until payday kicks in.

I've got the germ of an idea from this: namely, an upstart offshoot of the LC setting up in a Wyldwood, deep in jungle on the edge of the Vindpool and occupied by a ragtag band of misfit humans and a few WWR, with some kind of dryad component. Backstory is that the General (human, female) was the lover of a SCE general - based on Neave Whatsername - and, through some unfortunate Thing in Her Past, had to take up the 'offer' of starting a colony and leaving the City.

Further misfortune means that the chosen spot has, of course, been chosen before, and the colonists disturb a necropolis and thus find themselves fighting off a bunch of Undead (kiddo plays Nagash, see).

Thus far can imagination take me. I need to know:

- if my human female general can have any sylvaneth-like traits? I see her as a retired badass with new skills,  growing a settlement in the woods and somewhat grumpily taking up arms again.

- what are my artillery options? I seem to have formed the idea that a lot of the archery units have been squatted, which is upsetting.

- I want a bunch of females,  too. Are there any human women in AoS? Secondly, the relief force (lead by General's ex-lover,obvs) are going to be all female. Which might be tricky.

-  Is my idea bollocks?

 

Oh yeah. And hi.

B

 

I like your idea!

Since you are starting, you can choose a lot better than someone who already has models.

Look at the LOTR lines for a mix of male and female elves, and towards Frostgrave (as indicated before) for female soldiers (bows/crossbows/swords/spears that can be halberds).

This should give you quite a decent mix. I myself want to make a few types of breastplate for females to print, and maybe a few legs as well, because that is the most difficult part to get. Frostgrave gives you 40 heads in a 20 body box (designing and printing heads requires a lot of finesse). With 20 extra bodies, they will all still have arms to spare, but specifics might work better from bits boxes.

If you don't plan to play at GW shops, it should not get you in a bind, and end up being about half the price of a full GW army.

[ZLee Syn]

Came up with something like this:

Nomad prince (general- ironoak artisan)

Treelord ancient

Branchwraith

Dreadlord on dragon (spear of the hunt, crossbow + lance)

20 sisters of the watch

20 sisters of the watch

20 eternal guard

10 shadow warriors

5 sisters of the thorn

Command point

 

What do you think?

Also does the rend bonus from spear work on lance while charging ?

[Double Misfire]

On 11/23/2019 at 8:47 PM, adreal said:

♥️

Marauder Giant. That is all.

[Raffonerd]

On 11/23/2019 at 9:47 PM, adreal said:

Had three games yesterday, got another two coming up today.

Lost 2 won 1

Eternal guard are pretty good, but do melt to mortal wounds (dang beast claw raiders)

Sisters do not like being charged, even with loose until the last, I really need to protect them. First game (against beast claw) I was hoping for the early double turn, so I moved them up, yeah, bad move. Third game (against gloomspite) they got hammered two turns by the mushroom, still they were good. 

Shadow warriors are nice, but need support, still they held up a dankhold trogboss in game two which helped me just keep shooting all his guys as they came to me.

Wild riders, glass cannons, need to position them so they get the charge rather then be charged.

Black dragon, while it has died every game, every game he has been good, killing stuff, holding stuff up for longer then he should, really happy with this guy 

I only had 1 game where I didn't generate a extra cp when I had both princes together, and the birds are really good, though beast claws shoot with  a "ability" which is a fresh sort of bull####

 

Just some shots from my last game yesterday, prebattle shot, and my dragon getting yeeted by a giant

Your army is cool mate.

Anyway, what I see about living city. First of all is not very efficient tho (in term of rulings, respect to Hallow). Plus on top of it the "nerf" of eternal guards it is hard do deal with for a pure wanderers army. If you think that you are paying 13 points per model, which is per wounds like a sequitors without discount and less effective. I think that they are viable only at 30x or in wanderers army cause you are forced to pick 20 of them.

What i suggest you to improve the list:

drop eternal insert 30 Phoenix guards.

Drop black dragon bring in 1 frost anoited phoenix

Drop one prince

Then drop the sisters of thorn (cause you don't use EG anymore) and bring in a knight incantor and maybe another unit of wild riders (which are really effective for their points now).

To solve the Bline problem spread one unit of SoW into 2. So, to sum up, 20 10 10. Less easy to charge them. The first 10 screens for the unit of 20.

Try this out and let me know.

 

 

 

 

Edited November 29, 2019 by Raffonerd

[Orsino]

So, I've seen a few people in this thread post lists featuring Alarielle, and I'm really curious, how's that working out? It's a great model, but such a big chunk of points, do you use the full 1/4 Sylvaneth to make her worth it?

Here's my own  Living City  list I'm putting together:

Nomad prince 120

 

Dreadlord  on Dragon 300

Sorceress on Dragon 300

 

10 Dark Riders  220 (Riding drakespawn of course)

5 Sisters of the Thorn 130

 

20 Sisters of the Watch  320

20 Eternal Guard  260

3 Ishlaen Eels 140 (Allies, have converted eels into juvenile forest dragons)

5 Blood Knights 200 (Mercenaries using Dragonblades models, I may like dragons too much)

You can probably tell from this list that I lean more fluff than competitive, but I'd ideally prefer to be in with a chance. I'm conscious I've got some very small units there that are at risk of getting wiped out before they do anything. I feel like I could probably make a more competitive list by swapping out the Sorceress for a Celestial Hurricanum and losing the allies and mercenaries to take full advantage of the Dark Rider horde discount...

[Matt Sandi]

Playing against changehost soon.  I'm running hurricanum, 2 runelords, 30 iron drakes, 30 hammerers, 4 fulminators, 2x10handgunners. Any advice appreciated?

[overtninja]

Got a game in today with my Nurgle-playing buddy, we ran at 1500 points with the Duality of Death scenario in Chamon (using the realm rules, we ended with 'no rend', which ended up mattering a good deal). He ran a GUO with bell and EG artefact, Rotigus, Bloab, a unit of 30 Plaguebearers, and a unit of 10 Plaguebearers, plus the Chrono Cogs and Lifeswars endless spells. This game him a great number of strong field-wide mortal wounds spells, big tough monsters, a huge blob of infantry to clog up everything, and, as I found out, an outrageous first-turn lurch forward.

My army was LS (...obviously) with a Nomad Prince general (with the Ironoak Artisan trait and the Spear of the Hunt, which made them an unkillable badass), Beastmage adjutant (who was never close enough for that to matter), a Lightmage, 20 Wildwood Rangers as my entourage (true champions in CoS, my goodness), 3 Sword Kurnoth Hunters (shockingly good), two groups of 10 Sisters of the Watch, a group of Shadow Warriors, and 10 Wild Riders, who accidentally brought their real spears to the table today instead of the foam ones they usually bring. I also brought a Lifeswarm endless spell, which led to some rules uncertainties about having two on the field at once from each player.

We used the terrain generation rules from the rulebook, with 4 instead of 5 major scenery pieces, and generated the rules for each with rolls. We ended up with 3 pieces of healing scenery in a line through the middle of the table, a volcanic house (because of course), and two pieces of commanding terrain on one flank that did not really come into play for my opponent, who ran a refused flank strategy.

My opponent refused one flank and piled everything except for ten Plaguebearers on one flank. I deployed 10 SotW on the same flank, and later my Beastcaster, as insurance to take the objective, as I knew I'd be behind and I didn't think I could chop through my opponent's huge wall of snotty things fast enough. I was additionally worried by both giant demons, especially the GUO who usually proves to be a flabby damage sponge that never dies, so I reserved my WWR, NP, Beastmaster, one group of SotW, and the SW, because I knew I was going to eat a bunch of field-wide spells and wanted to preserve their lethality.

Turn 1 saw my opponent cast the Cogs and surge across the field with his giant block of Plaguebearers and GUO on one flank and the small group of Plaguebearers on the other, to take both objectives. Both the GUO and Plaguebearers then plowed right on into my Wild Riders, and thanks to the complete lack of rend this game and the GUO tripping on his own fat rolls and duffing his attacks, my Wild Riders were able to escape with only 3 casualties. The Plaguebearers ended up pretty stretched out by this play, which was very fortunate for me.

My return swing made use of my opponent's Cogs to get my WR away from combat and evac them to the healing woods in the lower center of the map. I then deployed all of my other units onto the field to counter-charge, whilst moving my Kurnoth up to pin the far end of the Plaguebearer unit to the objective and further stretch the unit and to prevent any repositioning. The Kurnoth spent the rest of the game gleefully hacking Plaguebearers and not dying, especially thanks to the full-field healing that LC gets (it's a lot stronger than it appears, and definitely swung the battle thanks to keeping my general alive the whole game, even when they dipped down to 1 wound left multiple times, and topped off my wounded Wild Riders, allowing multiple models to come back on turn 2).

My NP and WWR hurtled from the very corner of my deployment zone and, after many games, finally managed to saw the GUO down in a single round, with help from SotW shooting. The dependable 2 damage vs. monsters made a huge difference here.

The rest of the game saw lots of healing from my empowered Lifeswarm, lots of healing from the city ability, and lucky healing from the hospital forest for my nearly-dead Lightmage. The central combat was a concerted grind, which was really slanted in my favor thanks to the lack of rend in the game. Between Kurnoth rerolling on 4s and my 2+ Nomad Prince striking first and cleaving heads, they took almost no damage in combat, and their attacks were all multiple wounds. The Honored Retinue ability kept my Nomad Prince alive by itself - I think I shifted probably 6 MW directed at him from spells and abilities. Definitely one of the stronger things in the book, especially when combined with the army-wide healing.

It also saw deadly charges from my Wild Riders, which really pulled their weight even without rending, and with no rend on the table their 5+ save actually ended up mattering. There were a few key dispels from me and missed casts for my opponent, which kept my heroes alive and prevented them from gaining the upper hand in the central combat - mostly caused by my Nomad Prince's formerly useless flappy bird attack, which meant that Rotigus couldn't cast properly with his eyes getting poked at. Ultimately, I managed to chew through his giant pile of Plaguebearers and chase Bloab away with my Wild Riders, leaving only Rotigus to take the contested objective surrounded on all sides by angry elves, at which point we shook hands and my opponent retired the field.

I have to attribute my victory largely to healing - in any other city allegiance, my infantry heroes would have died between Rotigus' and Bloab's field-wide MW signature spells, and without my own casting and subsequent regrowth of multiple WR and WWR models over the course of the game with an empowered Lifeswarm, my army would have crumpled. I was really pleased by the durability of my NP (2+ save is dumb) and the general potency of my Wanderer units, who all preformed admirably, even without rerolls on ranged attacks (I used them on melee to make sure the WWR and NP did their job). CoS really gave them a boost as a faction, even with the loss of all their heroes.

[overtninja]

18 hours ago, Matt Sandi said:

Playing against changehost soon.  I'm running hurricanum, 2 runelords, 30 iron drakes, 30 hammerers, 4 fulminators, 2x10handgunners. Any advice appreciated?

I'd reserve some of your shooting to infiltrate and snipe out his infantry casting heroes asap, even if it means stranding them, because it will pay large dividends over the course of the game to deny your opponent those extra casts.

I'd also try to absolutely obliterate the inevitable unit of birdboy disksurfers with extreme prejudice, because their damage output is absurd thanks to the 'Guided by the Past' ability. They are fragile though, and your Irondrakes will make short work of them. Don't be afraid to move your unit of 30 to get shots off if need be - you'll want to drop them as soon as you can, since they are the main workhorse of most Changehost armies. I'd expect 9 or more, supported by the caster birdboy on disk as well. If your opponent lets you infiltrate this unit and get shots off on them, you will handily take them off the table, but I'm going to assume your opponent knows about this kind of sneakiness.

The Lord of Change will get mowed down by your Hammerers, especially with Runelord support.

It will largely come down to deployments and whether your opponent knows how to deal with infiltrating ranged units that are so tough and shooty, like Irondrakes. If you don't position your hammerers well, you'll have trouble getting use out of them as your opponent's more mobile army flies around them shooting them with spells.

Best of luck!

[Matt Sandi]

2 hours ago, overtninja said:

I'd reserve some of your shooting to infiltrate and snipe out his infantry casting heroes asap, even if it means stranding them, because it will pay large dividends over the course of the game to deny your opponent those extra casts.

I'd also try to absolutely obliterate the inevitable unit of birdboy disksurfers with extreme prejudice, because their damage output is absurd thanks to the 'Guided by the Past' ability. They are fragile though, and your Irondrakes will make short work of them. Don't be afraid to move your unit of 30 to get shots off if need be - you'll want to drop them as soon as you can, since they are the main workhorse of most Changehost armies. I'd expect 9 or more, supported by the caster birdboy on disk as well. If your opponent lets you infiltrate this unit and get shots off on them, you will handily take them off the table, but I'm going to assume your opponent knows about this kind of sneakiness.

The Lord of Change will get mowed down by your Hammerers, especially with Runelord support.

It will largely come down to deployments and whether your opponent knows how to deal with infiltrating ranged units that are so tough and shooty, like Irondrakes. If you don't position your hammerers well, you'll have trouble getting use out of them as your opponent's more mobile army flies around them shooting them with spells.

Best of luck!

Thank you!

[amsoly]

Hey all!  Had my second game with my growing living city list. It was a 1k battle of the pass on a 4x4 board against ossiarch bonereapers. 
 

my list-

drycha

nomad prince (General)

2x10 sisters of the watch

steelhearts champions 

wildriders (5)

 

bone reapers (apologies for bad names)

von morty (hero from feast box)

3x10 motrek Guard 
3x stalkers (1 big falchion) 

2x morchai aghast

I finishes deploying first and chose to go second. 
 

turn 1:  OBR took 3 objectives with some really solid run roles and took 5 points to begin. During my turn drycha and 10 sisters came on the field and wiped his General with a ton of shooting. Drycha then engaged the back objective motrek Guard. Wild riders failed their charge roll, and everyone else began to move in to contest objectives. 
 

turn 2:  OBR got some charges into my wildriders, steelheart champions, and drycha wiping the wildriders out but leaving the stormcast and drycha largely untouched.  During my phase shooting wiped out: the aghasts, the stalkers, and the back objective motrek Guard. In the combat phase  steelhearts champions swung for the fences and finished off the guard squad they were fighting (nice having the grand hammer and broadsword AND a shield in 3 models.  Not super competitive but they look great)  

 

aftee turn 3 resolved we called the game with only a unit of 7 motrek Guard still on the field.

 

Couple things:

- Drycha is a beast with living city.  Popping out and shooting 20 times and command point charging is brutal.

- My friends hate sisters of the watch.  bonus attack if not moving and the mortal wound in addition really helps justify the 160 point cost.  Having them as battle line with a nomad prince is great.  Highlight was a unit of 10 with the nomad prince +1 to hit deleting 3 stalkers in one turn of shooting.

- Wildriders: I really need to be more careful and play to where they won’t need a 7+ to charge when they don’t have bonuses.  They did manage to speed bump a unit of guard and stalkers so 130 points even just to prevent them overwhelming my back objective.

other note: I don’t have the wild riders built yet so trying to decide between them and sisters of the thorn is difficult!  I don’t own any melee units yet (cities wise) so deciding between PG, EG, or something else?

 

anyone else get any games in this weekend?

(WIP shot of some of the army so far)