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AoS 2 - Slaves to Darkness 2 Discussion


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Ah, right, I forgot that He is not anyone, but the Everchosen. Well, my strategy was not really one to win friends with anyway. 

However, the Cathallar may halt him for a turn, but next turn, he can retreat and have someone else kill the Cathallar, since she is so squishy. Or He can avoid her with clever movement. You could use that strategy, but you have to have someone beating Archaon up mean while. So have Eltharion or a big Moo-Moo nearby. If you get a double turn, Archaon might be dead or almost dead when he can react.

 

But These strategies are rather fragile in a way that they can be countered quite easily if the other Player knows what might Happen. He can, for example Charge Archaon outside of 6" of the Cathallar and have her Charged by another unit at least clipping her. There is really nothing in a Lumineth army that can safely beat Archaon. It really comes down to strategy and positioning. 

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2 hours ago, Salyx said:

Ah, right, I forgot that He is not anyone, but the Everchosen. Well, my strategy was not really one to win friends with anyway. 

However, the Cathallar may halt him for a turn, but next turn, he can retreat and have someone else kill the Cathallar, since she is so squishy. Or He can avoid her with clever movement. You could use that strategy, but you have to have someone beating Archaon up mean while. So have Eltharion or a big Moo-Moo nearby. If you get a double turn, Archaon might be dead or almost dead when he can react.

 

But These strategies are rather fragile in a way that they can be countered quite easily if the other Player knows what might Happen. He can, for example Charge Archaon outside of 6" of the Cathallar and have her Charged by another unit at least clipping her. There is really nothing in a Lumineth army that can safely beat Archaon. It really comes down to strategy and positioning. 

Just play cow dudes in their own sub faction. Ignore rend 1 and 2, reroll saves. Just sit on objectives and not dying and push the enemy away or simply kill them with the big cows. Or use the big named and non named cow to stack -2 to hit for fun times and use that critical aetherquartz when ARchaon fights you to have 2+ reroll saves ignoring rend 1 and 2 and see Archaon do 2 damage to you and cry.

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The way I play Archaon is super dirty (Lurid Haze Pleasurebound) and he has multiple ways to get RR Hits/Wounds/Saves, 6” pile in, exploding attacks, and can stack + saves to a 1+ (melee) or 2+ (shooting).  
 

kill the Sorc Lords, Warshrines, Chaos Lords first, aka his buffing supports, and he becomes straight warscroll Archaon.  Which is still pretty good, but it’s not buffed Archaon :) 

The Cathalar trick is pure evil btw, I got caught by it my first game against LRL, but don’t rely on it as someone who’s had it happen to them, I’ll never let it happen again without a contingency.  It was both funny and sad though lol...Archaon was basically a retreating paperweight for 3 turns.  Luckily the 40 marauders chewed through half his army by themselves, and then took the brunt of his rebuffing spell casts (bravery reductions/missiles/spell like Be’lakor Dark Master ability).

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Had today my second game since march. Went up against OBR and even won. The mission was the one with 3 diagonal objectives that can only be scored by heroes. I had the advantage of 4 Heroes against 3 of the OBR. The game was tense and a lot of fun and my first win ever against OBR. MVP of the Game was a Soul Grinder that had hilarious save rolls which allowed me to stop the OBR Countercharge of some Cavalos-Units by a turn, allowing me to get hold on the objectives. The game ended turn 3 as from this point I was able to outscore him as he only had a last lone hero left.

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38 minutes ago, Scurvydog said:

WCAoSRules Oct21 ScionsSheet73j2Another useless cultist warband. 6+ saves, still 4+/4+, they are only good at making Grots look like regular heroes in comparison.

DoK gets a teleporting unit with -1 to being hit, mortal wounds on a ranged attack and  a unit champion with a hero attack profile... 

I mean, when you put it like thaaaaaaat!

 

I think they're like... Okay, to be able to throw a fairly okay missile weapon around. Deffo should've been a premium option with some rend though imo.

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I've been thinking around build a list centered around a solid khorne battleline.

2 units of 15 warriors, each backed with a lord, sphiranx, and ally blood secrator. Despoiler korne demon price in the center for an 18 inch bubble.

The plan is warriors get an extra attack and get to fight twice before the enemy. So the basic warriors have 6 attacks, hitting on 3s (reroll 1s) and wounding on 2s that always stike first.

Does this seem like a competitive core to build a 2k list around?

 

 

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11 hours ago, Rors said:

I've been thinking around build a list centered around a solid khorne battleline.

2 units of 15 warriors, each backed with a lord, sphiranx, and ally blood secrator. Despoiler korne demon price in the center for an 18 inch bubble.

The plan is warriors get an extra attack and get to fight twice before the enemy. So the basic warriors have 6 attacks, hitting on 3s (reroll 1s) and wounding on 2s that always stike first.

Does this seem like a competitive core to build a 2k list around?

Depends heavily on meta.

It will probably get shot up if its that kind of place, otherwise its a fun core!

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Hello,

Just made a 5 round tournament with the following list and made 4-1.

Quote

Allegiance: Slaves to Darkness
- Damned Legion: Knights of the Empty Throne
LEADERS
Knights of the Empty Throne Varanguard x 6 (560)
- General
- Command Trait: Wall of Cursed Iron
- Artefact: Grasping Plate
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
Knights of the Empty Throne Varanguard x 3 (280)
- Artefact: Corrupted Nullstone
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
Chaos Lord (110)
- Reaperblade & Daemonbound Steel
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
Chaos Sorcerer Lord (110)
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
- Spell: Mask of Darkness
UNITS
15 x Chaos Warriors (270)
- Pair of Hand Weapons
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
5 x Chaos Knights (160)
- Ensorcelled Weapons
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
5 x Chaos Knights (160)
- Ensorcelled Weapons
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
BEHEMOTHS
Chaos Warshrine (170)
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
BATTALIONS
Plaguetouched Warband (180)

Was a blast to play. There is no real subtility in this list. Stack buff on a unit and throw it at your opponent. Here is quickly how it went.

1)Changehost conflagration on Blade edge.

Took the first turn, took all 6 objectives. Began to chew through pinks and blues for an eternity. At one time i manage to cut a hole in the wall of pinks to make a second 6" pile in into the flamers, which closed the game. WIN

2)Lumineth Teclis on forcing the hand.

Hard to face but there is an enormous gap between our armies. I let him go first, archers took a few knights away. On my turn i casted teleportation on a fully buffed Varanguard unit and throwed it away in the back of Teclis (ooops moment on his side) then failed the rerolled charge (oops moment on my side) But took the double turn (ooof), made a normal move on the T-pose guy and OBLITERATED him and the cathalar and a dozen of archers while the rest of the army made some long charges on spearmens or just get closer. He ended killing far more guys than i expected but he fought too much time on his side and never took a single of my objectives. WIN

3)Seraphon Dracothion on battle for the ass.

Unsual list. I knew that there was going to be 40 saurus in the sky and a salamander. I let him go first, he tried to cast balewind but i auto-dispelled it. On my turn i tried to cast teleportation but he unexpectedly failed to dispell it so the Varanguard made a 9 charge on the first row of 20 skinks and killed them all while the rest of the knights/varanguards was running forward, hoping for the double. Didn't get it. On his hero phase, Kroak was unable to pierce reliably the 4+ warpsteel (frown) and he teleported his 40 saurus and 20 guards in front of my nose and made the 9" charge. The i began to cut througn the scales while he couldn't pierce the 2+ reroll save. My turn + my double turn i overcharged the 3-man varanguard unit and obliterate all saurus things. unfortunately leaving Kroak to 1 wound, which allowed him to stay in the game but the sorcerer got a lucky arcane bolt that ended his journey. 32-21 WIN

4)Tempest eye on Total conquest.

The plan was to invade his space and make him loose time in his deployment zone while i score. Unfortunately i missed all my spells and prayers. He had a couple of very mobile units and an annoying aziros that lived far too long and gave him too much points. To his surprise, the irondrakes where unable to destroy the varanguard in one go, which i suspected. But this, coupled with two hard missplay and bad luck was too much. Sometimes you need more than a good plan to win a game. Loss.

5)Changehost duplicitous on Escalation.

I played his list a couple of time so i know what it is all about. The deployment meant that the LOC and the altar where out of the show for one turn. Pinks are annoying but if you punch them enough they disapears. I gave him the turn one and he took the whole tablewhile making corner charges to immobilize warriors and knights, which was expected but not that soon. He admit he missplayed here as he believed he could score points on turn one which he don't. On my turn i overcharged the Varanguard General and threw EVERYTHING in the 20 pink pack. He lost his big pack too quickly and failed to re-summon it (pfeeew) Then i began my turn 2 which was a quick walk through the rest of the army but he had no teeth capable of realiably kill my threats. WIN.

 

Curiously a lot of people when complimenting me for my list beeing so cool/badass to watch.

I like the list but there is no real trick. Your things are incredibly tanky. Sure varanguards are overpriced but once you stacks buffs on them you see the return quickly. The artefacts are amazings.

I haven't made a single 5+ comeback out of 6 tries.

 

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58 minutes ago, kozokus said:

battle for the ass.

I'm glad you performed well. StoD have been slowly gaining traction in the competitive scene, although this is likely due to less opportunities to play right now rather than anything else. It's a secret competitor which I think gets overlooked too often.

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4 hours ago, Killamike said:

Are there any other tips and tricks you have or what the specific counters are?  

Outdropping your opponent is key in the toughest matchups.

Factions that out-combat you are the toughest to beat, Gargants, Ironjaws and Fyreslayers notably. High rend is the key to beat you. Factions that rely on quantity over quality are much more easy to fight as they can't pass rerollable high armor and kills themselfs on the Nurgle bataillon.

Mark of Nurgle was a soft mitigation against shooting but noticeable. Not too big against COS but much more against KO and Changehost. Useless against Lumineth.

Lumineth are a nightmare to beat, Spearmens deals terrible terrible dammages and Varanguard have no defenses against mortal. Teclis casting total eclypse really shut down a tons of your options.

You laugh at factions that rely on magic to deal dammages. 

The Nurgle bataillon can deal a surprising amount of dammage, even against non combat armies. Force your opponent to attack you with every model he can and count the 6'. 20 mortals by games is not an exceptionnal result.

The chaos lord can't make Varanguard Attack three times in the same phase but they can make you save that ability for later. Timewalking your attack phase is huge.

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Hi Kozokus !

Thank you for your feedback on the tournament.
As a fellow french player, I was quite intrigued by your list (while I did not participate at Limoges, I was competing at Voiron).
I am a Khorne player myself, and around the time I saw your list, I also noticed someone winning a 35 man event in UK with a list similar to yours, but with the Khorne battalion plus a Tzeentch marked sorcerer.

Do you think Khorne could be good, or Nurgle is just better ? (that and the 1 drop vs 2 with the sorcerer who does not fit into the battalion)

Really curious about that, because I own most of the models and I'm a fan of armoured StD design-wise (especially Knights and Varanguards).

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31 minutes ago, Tango said:

Do you think Khorne could be good, or Nurgle is just better ? (that and the 1 drop vs 2 with the sorcerer who does not fit into the battalion)

Tough question and probably not with a clear winner. Some pros and cons of Nurgle battalion instead of khorne battalion:

Nurgle Pros:

Less drops and less units needed, so can combine warriors to 15 man unit (benefitting from 10+ models reroll saves).

Battalion is arguably more useful all around and makes all units annoying to deal with and attack.

Varanguards of Nurgle will be more survivable vs shooting due to -1 to hit.

Sorceror can share the mark with the rest of the army.

Nurgle Warshrine prayer for +1 save is really powerful, especially when put on the 6 man varanguards, quite easily giving them a 2+ rerollable save, -1 to be hit with shooting 4+ ignore spells and 6+ ignore wounds from warshrine.

 

Nurgle Cons:

A great deal less raw output, losing reroll 1s to hit and especially +1 to wound aura reduces damage quite a bit and the +1 dmg on 6 to wound from nurgle does not make up for this anywhere close.

The lack of damage is felt bad in a StD army with not so great output, the khorne mark and battalion allows them to actually punch a hole in an enemy army, and a nurgle army might lack the ability to get rid of key targets fast enough.

 

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Hello,
Interesting discussions, thank you.

I'm a new AOS player (also from France btw) and I'm building my first StD army. I've only played a couple of 1000 points games so far but here is the list I plan to use for my first 2K games:

Quote

 

Allegiance: Slaves to Darkness

LEADERS
Slaves to Darkness Daemon Prince (210)- Axe
Chaos Lord on Daemonic Mount (170)
Chaos Sorcerer Lord on Manticore (260)
Chaos Sorcerer Lord (110)

UNITS

10 x Chaos Knights (320)- Cursed Lance
15 x Chaos Warriors (270)- Hand Weapon & Shield
5 x Chaos Knights (160)- Ensorcelled Weapons
5 x Chaos Chosen (140)

BEHEMOTHS

Chaos Warshrine (170)

BATTALIONS

Plaguetouched Warband (180)

TOTAL: 1990/2000

 

I plan to player ravager to add some marauders/marauders horsemen during the game.

In my 1000 points games my 15 chaos warriors were my most useful units, they are so good as holding objectives. My opponents were actually surprised of all the save reroll we have (warriors > 10, warriors/knights shields, oracular visions, and now I also have the warschrine). That combined with the Plaguetouched + the daemon prince nurgle ability seems interesting on paper.

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Working on a list that's good against both shooting and magic. Feedback welcome.

 

Allegiance: Slaves to Darkness
- Damned Legion: Despoilers

Leaders
Be'Lakor (240)
Chaos Sorcerer Lord (110)
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
- Spell: Mask of Darkness
Chaos Sorcerer Lord (110)
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
- Spell: Mask of Darkness

-Artefact: Diabolic Mantle
Slaves to Darkness Daemon Prince (210)
- General
- Sword
- Command Trait: Lightning Reflexes
- Artefact: 
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle

Battleline
10 x Chaos Warriors (180)
- Hand Weapon & Shield
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
5 x Chaos Warriors (90)
- Hand Weapon & Shield
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
5 x Chaos Warriors (90)
- Hand Weapon & Shield
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
5 x Chaos Warriors (90)
- Hand Weapon & Shield
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle
40 x Chaos Marauders (160)
- Axes & Shields
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle

Behemoths
Chaos Warshrine (170)
- Mark of Chaos: Nurgle

Battalions
Plaguetouched Warband (180)

Endless Spells / Terrain / CPs
Emerald Lifeswarm (50)
Darkfire Daemonrift (80)
Eightfold Doom-sigil (40)

Total: 1960 / 2000
Extra Command Points: 0
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 128

Basic idea is have a 3 drop list, park on objectives, and let them come to me. -1 to hit in shooting, -2 against my general, mortal wound shrugs, bouncing mortals back, healing units with Lifeswarm, Belakor to make Kroak or Teclis shut up for a turn, Pitch Black to block LoS, Demonrift to nuke wizards, Nurgle prayers to give +1 to save to a unit, etc.

Seems solid on paper. Wanted to fit some Blightkings in here but they don't fit the battalion unfortunately.

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In my opinion, that list has many flaws that make it not that good. You have too many endless spells. You got 4 casts in total, 3 endless spells are too much. Furthermore, you do not have enough Combat troops. The 10 Chaos Warriors Lose their re-rolls after the First slain Model. The Marauders can be shot to pieces quite easily and the Demon Prince alone cannot make up for that. 

So I would drop all endless spells which frees 170 points. Then, I would merge two units of Chaos Warriors so that you have 15.

Which leaves you with 210 points for another Nurgle unit. But why only use one? Those 5 man Chaos Warriors do not offer very much to your army, so you could replace them. Which Puts US at 390 for 3 units. I would invest these points into 2 units of Chaos Knights. 70 left and still need one more unit. So just Use the emergency Bataillon slot filler- Chaos Spawn. Then xou can buy the Gravetide got the remaining 20 and you are good to go. 

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1 hour ago, Archion89 said:

Are daemonforged blades the best overall weapon for those Varanguard? I'm guessing so because the mortals help chew through certain tougher units? I know the Khorne list used those, what about your Nurgle list? @kozokus

It depends on how you run them.

In Knights of the Empty Throne (so you don't get a circle) then daemonforged do math-out the best. (I spent a day rolling dice on this).

If, however, you are running them outside of KotET, and especially if you are running them with Archaon, then the best damage output is to make them 6th Circle and give them enscorceled weapons. On the charge those weapons will be damage 2, and with the 6 attacks vs the 3, that works out better in almost all situations. (I think daemonforged is still a reasonable (if not conservative) choice outside KotET because of the safety of some mortal wound output and the fact you don't need to get the charge in.) 

 

I like the Nurgle/Plaguetouched combo for tanky varanguard, but if you're interested in pure damage output, obviously marking them Khorne is also the way to go. 6th Circle Khorne Varanguard with enscorceled weapons getting the charge in within a general's aura is a site to behold!

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On 10/27/2020 at 2:53 PM, Tango said:

Do you think Khorne could be good, or Nurgle is just better ? (that and the 1 drop vs 2 with the sorcerer who does not fit into the battalion)

I saw the Khorne list you named and it was my start base. 

For me the Nurgle Bataillon won because of thoses metagame points

-Low drop : It was a bet, (that i lost) that there would be Hero scenarios or Battleline scenarios, where having the choice of the first turn really change the face of the game. Seizing all objectives with your heros really put your ennemy on the backfoot and he has to make something happen. Piercing the rerollable 3+ of the varanguard for 30 wounds can take some time.

-1 drop vs 2 drops : 1 drops in my meta are Changehosts (common), slaves mirror (uncommon), Vang Stormcast, BoC, Lurid haze, I really wanted to compete against Changehost, because this is the most common of onedrop. Two drops are quite uncommon but there is some Lumineth lists that i simply cannot afford to let choose the pace of the game. So i elected 1 drop.

-More damage vs anti-shooting. Real though decision. Wounding on 2" can be murderous but i expected a lot of thoses matchups : CoS, seraphons and tzeentch where shooting can be prevalent (or not). Statistically the basic Mark of Nurgle is better than rerolling 1 of Khorne. So i already have a dammage boost. I found out that stacking buffs on units that can strike twice was more key than having a general to survive and spread his +1 to wound aura.

-Both bataillon are really cool but i was really surprised by how much dammage the Plaguetouched can deliver at the end of the game vs +1 A that is sometimes hard to trigger on another unit once you have used your double pile in with varanguard. I would say this is even here.

-Nurgle is a popular army in my meta and i made the bet (that i lost) that there would be a Nurgle opponent. In this case you enjoy all his buffs, the wheel, the trees. +3 mov if you start a movement near a GUO. Plus you are immune to all his speshul abilities, plague winds and so on.

-The Prayer of Nurgle is probably the best if you match the keywords out of the five of the altar. When playing Khorne you end up rerolling hit wounds and saves. which is ok too but having +1 armor on a  3+ reroll really helps to completly ignore some combat armies.

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On 10/28/2020 at 3:09 PM, Archion89 said:

Are daemonforged blades the best overall weapon for those Varanguard? I'm guessing so because the mortals help chew through certain tougher units? I know the Khorne list used those, what about your Nurgle list? @kozokus

as @annarborhawk says. 

Lances are out of the league because they are bad except when they charge, which you don't do often. Khorne used it because having +1A on them is strictly better than ensorcelled. For Nurgle this more or less even, they spike differently because of Mark of Nurgle on more attacks or rolling 3 on a D3. For my part, the occasionnal mortals won the equation.

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Tried out a fun 2k Knights of the Empty Throne list this weekend, with a 6 man unit varanguard as the general, mark of khorne, grasping plate artifact. I will just have to say that the grasping plate adds soooo much utility and makes it super dangerous, as you can engage within 6" you can really manipulate the combat phase, you can even just move and run to be within 6" and you can simply pile in and attack when you wish, saving a CP to change a run roll to 6 could be important, as you simply have to be within 22" to fight something. You can then attack with something else first and then pile in the Varangards later for devastating effect. I will say it again if you are just within 22" you can at least with a CP for the run roll guarantee to get into combat AND not get hit before you decide to activate first, that is huge!

Also we are getting a box with 3 chariots, a box I would never have guessed to see. They tease that the battalion makes one of them into Rokar Gresh, so it sounds like a Chariot hero. Also with 4 new allegiances mentioned (sounds like a lot). I am interested in seeing where this is going, could open up some new interesting list maybe. Heroes in chariots are badass though, I think anyone can agree on that, the questions is, what on earth does that battalion needs to do to make anyone take 3 chariots...

 

 image.png.57dfbf55856fb7a5e86fbc0f3977a6d5.png

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