AoS 2 Cities of Sigmar Discussion: Hallowheart

[TheNotebookGM]

I wasnt seeing a specific thread for Hallowheart so I started one!

Share your lists, synergies, combos, hidden gems, and general advice; ask for help from your fellow Hallowhearthicans; and tell us of your gloriously magical victories on the field of battle!

[Thiagoma]

Hello there!

 

So, i am a huge Phoenix Temple fan but didnt quite like it in Phoenicium, so i decided to bring my birds for a Spin into Hallowheart.

My local meta is 1500 with 2 Battlelines and i am planing for a simple list:

Frosty Phoenix (General)

Flame Phoenix (both with anointed)

Battlemage 

Battlemage

20 Phoenix Guard 

20 Phoenix Guard 

Emerald lifeswarm

 

Plan is to split up on 2 forces flinging spells with a lot of staying power, spellcasting and resilience while the birds cause Havok.

2 mages plus one on frosty gives me a huge selection of spells for both ofense and defense, while keeping the units well protected.

 

Edited October 1, 2019 by Thiagoma

[Mandzak-Miniatures]

After thinking on all the previews I feel like HallowHeart works best for my army theme.

I am a modeler and haven’t played a game of AoS but I’d like to build a list that works in game as a way to work towards something to use for play.

The army is what I would imagine as a AoS-ified “Araby”. By this it would use a lot magic and uses elementals and djinn. Ideally they would be from Hysh, but for now the HallowHeart rules work.

Ideally I would like to include some combination of the following.

no idea what I’d use as heroes.

White Fire Retinue - Magi council

Flamespyre Phoenix - Fire elemental/ efreet

Froatheart Phoenix - Ice elemental/ efreet

Sisters of the watch - magic/ elemental bows

Phoenix Guard/ blackguard/ or great swords - 2 handed heavy hitter unit

Need some ideas for which  spear or sword shield type could be used for chaff

I’ve also been working on a Djinn for awhile now, kinda settled he would probably best be represented as a celestant prime. So hoping this center piece model could be squeezed in.

 

Edited October 1, 2019 by Mandzak-Miniatures

[mmimzie]

@Thiagoma I think i would bust one of the phoenix guard units to 2x 10 man. This would give you a screen from alpha strike, and more units to jump on objective or whatever.  You'd still have the 20 man units to buff up and send in to kill stuff, and the 20 man unit will be safe getting covered by the 10 man blocks. 

My list idea:
Sorceress (general w/battleshock immunity aura & -1 to be hit by shooting) (ignite weapons/reflect damage)
Sorceress (eldrich protection/Cyclone)
Battlemage (adjunct) (wildform) (ignite weapons/seer wounds)
Battlemage (chain lightning, chain fire ball, cyclone)
Whitemage of Luminark w/Ignax scales


20xDarkshards (retinue)
20xDarkshards
30xBlackguard

6xMorrsarr Guard

Burning head
Balewind

Whitefire retinue

 

2k pts

Scales let you cheat the command ability some. Sorc is general for CP generation and to provide the sorc some additional durability. 

Darkshards can act as screens, but can also get buffs to be come deadly. 

Luminark because big laser. 

Blackguard and morrsarr guard allow for quite abit of clean up, and are oppressively fast with support. Morrsarr guard are fast with need for little support.Both can get some great buffs for staying power and the +1 to wound (battle mage) and reroll 1s (burning head skull). I had considered emerald life swarm, but i don't have enough good targets in this list.





 

[Thiagoma]

6 minutes ago, mmimzie said:

 I think i would bust one of the phoenix guard units to 2x 10 man. This would give you a screen from alpha strike, and more units to jump on objective or whatever.  You'd still have the 20 man units to buff up and send in to kill stuff, and the 20 man unit will be safe getting covered by the 10 man blocks. 

That is great advice, thanks!

[TheNotebookGM]

I'll probably do something like:

 

Nomad Prince (General)

2x5 Sisters of the Thorn

1x20 Sisters of the Watch

20 Shadow Warriors

6 Demigryph Knights

Battlemage on Griffon

 And then whatever other stuff strikes me, with three or so endless spells to round it out. Goal is twofold, something as far from my Fyreslayers as possible, and my partner wants to paint the sisters and Gryphs

 

[spenson]

The more I read about Hallowheart the more I like it

I made a list that may lack some mobility but will be quite hard to kill and will deal a lot of MW

Anointed	general; Warden of the Flame; Whitefire Tome	100
Celestial Hurricanum with Celestial Battlemage	Warding Brand	280
Battlemage	Ignax scales; Pha’s Protection; Roaring Wildfire	90
Sorceress	Elemental Cyclone	90
Phoenix guards (30)		420
Phoenix guards (30)		420
Darkshards (10)		100
Darkshards (10)		100
Darkshards (10)		100
Whitefire Retinue		140
Prismatic Palisade		30
Umbral Spellportal		70
Emerald Lifeswarm		50
		1990

The empowered portal can threaten any unit of the table with its unlimited range  and Elemental Cyclone. The palisade and the lifeswarm will be used defensively.

The ignax scales should prevent an unlucky OS of the battlemage if I use the Hollowheart CA.I have 7 casts per turn with either +1 or +3.

I can gain CP from both Honoured Adjutant and Warden of the Flame.

I wanted to add an anointed on frostheart phoenix but it doesn't really fit in the list.

[stratigo]

I have a question considering up until now I haven't ever really looked at magic. Does an elemental cyclone work through an umbral spell portal?

[Thiagoma]

2 hours ago, spenson said:

The more I read about Hallowheart the more I like it

I made a list that may lack some mobility but will be quite hard to kill and will deal a lot of MW

Anointed	general; Warden of the Flame; Whitefire Tome	100
Celestial Hurricanum with Celestial Battlemage	Warding Brand	280
Battlemage	Ignax scales; Pha’s Protection; Roaring Wildfire	90
Sorceress	Elemental Cyclone	90
Phoenix guards (30)		420
Phoenix guards (30)		420
Darkshards (10)		100
Darkshards (10)		100
Darkshards (10)		100
Whitefire Retinue		140
Prismatic Palisade		30
Umbral Spellportal		70
Emerald Lifeswarm		50
		1990

The empowered portal can threaten any unit of the table with its unlimited range  and Elemental Cyclone. The palisade and the lifeswarm will be used defensively.

The ignax scales should prevent an unlucky OS of the battlemage if I use the Hollowheart CA.I have 7 casts per turn with either +1 or +3.

I can gain CP from both Honoured Adjutant and Warden of the Flame.

I wanted to add an anointed on frostheart phoenix but it doesn't really fit in the list.

I would split the PG into 3 units of 20 and replace the Darkshards with something else., since you would have 3 BLs already.

[spenson]

56 minutes ago, Thiagoma said:

I would split the PG into 3 units of 20 and replace the Darkshards with something else., since you would have 3 BLs already.

You get a pretty nice discount for 30 phoenix guards. I save 120 points if I take 2x30 instead of 3x20.

The darkshards were mainly there as screening units and sacrifice for the sorceress. however I agree that it could be reasonnable to take only 1 unit of darkshards/bleakswords/dreadspears and use the remaining 200-220 points for something else.

[spenson]

1 hour ago, stratigo said:

I have a question considering up until now I haven't ever really looked at magic. Does an elemental cyclone work through an umbral spell portal?

RAW is yes. It gets even stronger when you notice that the empowered umbral spellportal can be set anywhere on the table.

[XReN]

1 hour ago, stratigo said:

I have a question considering up until now I haven't ever really looked at magic. Does an elemental cyclone work through an umbral spell portal?

We have discussed it amongst local players yesterday and the answer is, unfortunately, no. Because you can measure range and visibility from Spell portal, but when you cast Elemental Vortex you than roll dice for models within 12" from the caster specificaly. 

[spenson]

27 minutes ago, XReN said:

We have discussed it amongst local players yesterday and the answer is, unfortunately, no. Because you can measure range and visibility from Spell portal, but when you cast Elemental Vortex you than roll dice for models within 12" from the caster specificaly. 

The warscroll specifically says: "the range and visibility of the spell can be measured from the other Umbral Spellportal model from this endless spell." Doesn't it imply that you replace every mention of your hero with the portal? if not that's a bummer, and I guess that the balewind vortex doesn't work either.

I thought I remembered seeing people use the portal with the gaunt summoner in (recent) tournaments.

Edited October 1, 2019 by spenson

[Forrix]

Its a small synergy but looking at Wild Riders I could see them being a great hammer except a 4+ to wound really hurts. Hallowheart's Ignite Weapons gives them +1 to wound though and all the bonuses (and improved spell portals) means its pretty reliable too.

[Maturin]

30 minutes ago, spenson said:

The warscroll specifically says: "the range and visibility of the spell can be measured from the other Umbral Spellportal model from this endless spell." Doesn't it imply that you replace every mention of your hero with the portal? if not that's a bummer, and I guess that the balewind vortex doesn't work either.

I thought I remembered seeing people use the portal with the gaunt summoner in (recent) tournaments.

 

[spenson]

3 minutes ago, Maturin said:

 

The designer's commentary linked in the post indicates that the balewind would extend the range of the spell to 18".

It is however still a bit unclear whether or not you can use the range from the spellportal. 

[mmimzie]

So note that is no specific definition of "every spell has a range and that range is the first range mentioned on the warscroll, every other range is different."

As such the balewind vortex and spell portal both can be used to extend the range of cyclone. 

[Dr Ben]

 

3 hours ago, Forrix said:

Its a small synergy but looking at Wild Riders I could see them being a great hammer except a 4+ to wound really hurts. Hallowheart's Ignite Weapons gives them +1 to wound though and all the bonuses (and improved spell portals) means its pretty reliable too.

Good point. With Nomad prince command ability or hurricanum in range and spell on the charge you would have 2 attacks 2+, 3+, -2, d2 for each rider + reindeer attacks. Effectively makes them into better endrinriggers, but you have to work a bit harder for the combo. So that seems like it could work pretty well. The +1 attack spell from tempests eye would also work as long as you could keep up with them. For that reason maybe better to use the hurricanum than the nomad prince for the +1 hit and to cast the spells.

Before the book I was originally thinking about tempests eye because I have some KO, but Hallowheart looks very fun. Although I will need to find the hobby budget for the luminark/hurricanum…...

I'm thinking of a list something like:

Celestial Hurricanum w/ Battlemage – 280

Luminark w/ Battlemage – 270

Lord Arcanum on Gryph Charger – 220

Knight Incantor – General - 140

Battlemage Chamon – adjucant - 90

Whitefire retinue 140

 

Longbeards – retinue - (10) 110

Longbeards (10) 110

Longbeards (10) 110

Hammerers (30) 360

 

Aethervoid pendulum - 50

Everblaze comet – 100

Suffocating gravetide - 20

2000

 

Spells and artefacts to be decided. I have mostly duardin infantry. So the big block of Hammerers is just what I have already, at least they are a bit better than before and then can be hitting and wounding on 2+ in the right situation. Phoenix guard would be a more optimal competitive choice I'm sure. Might need to swap out the luminark for a warden king and more dwarven bodies. Gravetide is just using up the last 20 points!

The Longbeards are in the list as 2 frontline chaff and 1 retinue battleline choices. They are also a tech choice because they can dispel the comet and pendulum with 'there's too much magic flying about these days'. Then you can re-cast the endless spell without wasting an actual cast from a wizard.

The Lord Arcanum on gryph charger can take the d6 mortal wounds from the command ability and then use their warscroll spell to immediately heal the damage to themselves. Might give them ignax scales to help with that too.

What do you think?

[Eaglsphan]

I was playing around with a few variations of a themed Hallowheart list, and I think they actually seem pretty fun.

Mage on Griffon
Mage on Hurricanum
Mage on foot
Empire General (give him WhiteFire Tome, and the trait Famed Spell Hunter)
Runelord
20x Longbeards
30x Guard (probably spears)
20x Greatswords
20x Crossbowman
Emerald Lifeswarm

Comes out to having just over 100pts spare to add more endless spells. Lots of buffs to go around, and lots of potential MW generation.

[swarmofseals]

Hallowheart is definitely in the running for most competitive city, and I think it's certainly the most "broken". Don't get me wrong -- the other cities all have some really powerful abilities and builds, but nothing changes the fundamental functioning of the game as seriously as Hallowheart does. 

Hallowheart mirror matches are going to be so, so weird.

[Eaglsphan]

Mirror matches, and I think Tzeentch players. They might actually get to summon stuff against Hallowheart.

[swarmofseals]

Just now, Eaglsphan said:

Mirror matches, and I think Tzeentch players. They might actually get to summon stuff against Hallowheart.

Ohh yes, they will get a lot of summoning points. But with the 5+ or possibly 4+ spell shrug I think Hallowheart has a huge advantage there.

[Eaglsphan]

My  buddy, who plays Tzeentch, is actually super excited about my interest in Hallowheart. I'm onto him.

On topic though : Even with the summoning boon that Tzeentch players will get I agree with you, Swarm, that Hallowheart's spell output will outweigh the benefits gained by summoning.

[mmimzie]

Tzneetch doesn't really go summoning crazy off spells. It's more about them killing thier own models. 

 

With 5 hollow heart wizards even if you are 100% successful they'll only get a blue horror squad out of your efforts.

[Kokoshi]

I did not see anyone include Sisters of the Thorn in their Hallowheart list. For their points they are good objective grabbers with decent attacks and as CITIES OF SIGMAR HALLOWHEART WIZARDS should cast two spells including the Hallowheart domain.