Starting AoS, suggestions for starting Death

[Glennykravitz]

Hey! Some friends and I have decided to start this as a group so we’ll have a dedicated base to play against. They’ve chosen chaos (likely korne or slaves to darkness) and stormcast eternals. I’m leaning towards legions of Nagash or Grand host for skeletons with tombs Kings and necromancers for graveyard shenanigans, I like that kind of stuff and I’d like to field a Nagash of my own at some point. But I’m seeing and hearing a lot about how good bonereapers are. I feel like they don’t have as much flair as masses of skellies being continuously raised by necromancers but if I intend to put up a fight against people who tend to be competitive, do I need to look at more stable options, like bonereapers? 
 

all thoughts, suggestions, and lists are welcome. We plan to shoot for around 1k to start and then move towards 2k 

[Overread]

A few thoughts :

 

1) Right now Bonereapers are powerful to very powerful if you pick the Petrifax subfaction. They already have good abilities and are tough and that subfaction gives them all +1 to their saves. Making them even tougher. So they are certainly powerful (petrifax is likely on the limit of broken-powerful). This also makes them rather easy to build armies with because everything is pretty tough you can almost pick whatever you want. Before Corona there was even an army that was almost all Deathriders (cavalry) doing very well. 

2) Bonereapers are very different to a skeleton horde and are instead more of an elite skeleton force. They will put down fewer models, but each one is tough to kill; hits hard and there's a good few restoration abilities to bring them back from the dead. 
Their core weaknesses are that they have fewer units in general and have generally slower movement. You can boost it and they do have some faster units; but they are by and large a slower moving force. They also don't use command points, but have a similar system. They can generate more points to use those skillss, but units rely on using them. 

This makes Bonereapers powerful, but also heavily reliant on having a good game plan. You don't have numbers nor speed to be highly reactionary and there's every chance that your opponent will be scoring objectives before you will. However if you stick to a game plan you can push them back more easily; toughing it out and generally pressing forward to gain advantage in the mid to late game. 

3) As a result Reapers are both easy to use in terms of individual power; but tricky to use in terms of the overall game plan. 

 

I'd also note that Legions of Nagash has two core forces - Skeletons and Vampires (soulblight) that people expect to get armies of their own at some point. Vampires are almost certain based on hwo popular they have been in the past and how much GW pushes them in the lore - however there are no guarantees nor timescale. Skeletons could get lumped in with vampires or be their own thing - again its impossible to predict. 

Legions of Nagash is decent and gives you a bit of all Death's flavours in one armed force. So it gives you a huge variety of choice - from some reaper units like morghasts; to ghosts, necromances, vampires, zombiedragons and more. So its got a wealth of options should you go for it. Plus by its very nature you can always build a Legion force and then in time take the few ossiarch units in it and expand them into a capable force 

[Glennykravitz]

Thanks for the reply and info. I’m not too enthralled... by vampires and such but I see LoN lists with a VL on a zombie dragon and I don’t hate it. I really think I’ll build towards some variant of the VL on a zombie dragon, necromancer, 40 skeletons, etc lists I see around. Get a good mix of things I like and expand later on, like you suggested. 

[Overread]

Sounds good! 
Also don't forget Flesheaters - if you like the zombiedragons/terrorgasts - they can build a whole army which is basically all dragons/terrorgasts. 

[Glennykravitz]

What are your thoughts on this for a list around 1k? 

wight king

necromancer

40 skeletons

5 black knights 

10 grave guard 
 

and particularly the black axe wight king? That model is so cool 

[Overread]

 I'll have to lead Death faction experts weigh in on that army list (I really only know Ossiarchs well). 

 

Cool models though are always worth picking up.

[Glennykravitz]

Bah, oh well. I really appreciate your input 

[Sception]

OK, Death in AoS as of May 2020...

Death as a grand alliance tends to be marked by a few advantages & disadvantages:

• If there is a unifying mechanical theme to Death in AoS, it's recursion/regeneration/summoning, with necromantic magic bolstering undead forces and returning dead warriors to battle.  The extent to which this is present varies from faction to faction, but in general part of the undead strategy will be winning wars of attrition by returning dead models to your units.
   
• Other unifying mechanics are leadership 10 - making undead units take fewer wounds from battleshock (though Inspiring presence being what it is most armies in the game autopass the really important battleshock tests - and the 'deathless' save - a 6+ roll to ignore wounds and mortal wounds, generally restricted to a range around your heroes.  This makes undead units just a bit tougher than similarly statted peers, particularly against mortal wounds, though the need to stay within range of our heroes can restrict positioning options.  These two features combined make it more likely that even if a fight doesn't go your way there's usually at least a chance that a few models will survive to your next command phase, which is when those healing & recursion abilities usually kick in.
   
• Death tends to be a very synergistic faction, relying heavily on buffs, or debuffs to enemy units, that come mostly from support heroes and spellcasters, which also /tend/ to be the source of the previously mentioned recursion abilities and dethless saves.  Together, these mechanical themes build the narrative of necromantic heroes empowering hordes of dead soldiers and spirits.  These undead soldiers rely on those heroes to function, and will falter if those heroes are removed.  Again, the extent of this varies from faction to faction and even unit to unit, but even the strongest and most independent undead factions still incorporate these themes to some extent.
   
• While slain undead can be returned to the field multiple times, and their offensive buffs can be stacked up to truly frightening levels, this is balanced out by the fact that undead units tend to be weaker point for point than equivalent units in other factions, both offensively and defensively.  Again, this varies from faction to faction, but in general you are going to need to rely on recursion to maintain your presence on the table and on your stacked buffs to deal reasonable damage, and to the extent that these features are tied to your heroes you do tend to be more vulnerable than most non-Death factions to the 'just shoot the heroes' meme.
   
• Contributing further to the 'weaker undead units empowered by strong heroes' theme, Death units, especially battleline units, tend to be hoardy chaff units by nature - albeit more expensive than equivalent hordes in other alliances - while on the other hand our heroes tend to be even more individually powerful and much more expensive compared to equivalent heroes in other factions.
   
• Death factions tend to have good magic *in theory*, but in practice it tends to fall a bit flat lately.  Our factions typically have good to great spell lores, & even have some decent endless spells.  Our casty heroes also often have good buffing or healing abilities on top of that, while our fighty heroes often have some casting ability as well.  Unfortunately, because our heroes tend to be more expensive than equivalent heroes in other factions, we usually have less total casts and unbinds per battle round than other heavy spellcasting armies in the game.  Additionally, while there are some exceptions (Nagash, Legion of Sacrament), we tend to lack the big casting roll bonuses & reroll type abilities that other spellcasting armies use to force their key spells past unbinding attempts.  As a result, Death armies almost always have at least some decent magic ability, you will very rarely see a death army with no wizards at all, but unless you're running Nagash or Legion of Sacrament you are not going to compete for casting dominance with the likes of Tzeentch, Hallowheart, Skaven, or Seraphon, and to the extent that your army's regenration & buffing abilities rely on spells specifically you can run into some trouble there.
   
• In terms of base stats, undead armies tend to lack in range - both in terms of shooting and in movement speed.  There are notable exceptions, more than to the previous traits, but it's still a noticeable trend, especially for the core infantry blocks that you often rely on to win games.  Again, lots of noteworthy exceptions in terms of shooting range or movement speed - OBR catapults, monster-riding Ghoul Kings, Dire Wolves in LoN - but you *do* want to take note of these units when building your lists.
   
• As with weak undead units being counterbalanced by tricky stacking buffs, the low movement speed of undead armies is also often counterbalanced by tricksy deployment & movement shenanigans, ranging from ghouls outflanking to ghosts deep striking to LoN heroes raising units from gravesites to OBR's +3 move CA, and so on.  Combined with individual units that are actually fast & maneuverable in their own right, and undead armies are often much better in terms of positioning than their warscroll rules alone would imply, and this can take unprepared opponents by surprise.

...

So with some general trends established, what are the current factions to choose from?  In more or less reverse order of release, the main subfactions are:

Ossiarch Bonereapers.

Spoiler

In terms of Lore, the Ossiarch Bonereapers are the culmination of all of Nagash's grand plans in AoS to date, an expanding empire beating back the forces of Order and Chaos alike, subjugating the lands around them and slowly grinding them down to lifeless husks, with soldiers more powerful and commanders more cunning than any undead the realms have known before.  Part of what makes the bonereapers so unique is that they aren't simply the physical or spiritual remains of the once living.  Though they are constructed from the detritus of life like any undead, those remains - both physical and spiritual - are first broken down into base components and then carefully molded and reconstructed into something entirely new.

The best bones from dozens of humanoids rebuilt into idealized skeletal forms, then fused with armored shells and face-plates of necromantically shaped and hardened bone.  Their spirits likewise are constructed of bits of many spirits.  A soldier's valor, a scholar's insight, a hunter's patience, a priest's devotion, and a killers hatred might be combined into a single soul, while undesirable traits like fear, doubt, love, sympathy are stripped away.  The composite animus that results might then be divided up into dozens of parts to animate an entire regiment of bonereapers, with the largest share reserved for their squad leader.  Ironically, more powerful bonereapers are constructed from parts of fewer souls - as the most talented, accomplished, and well suited souls have more bits worth keeping, fewer that need to be stripped away and replaced, and the overall whole is too singular to easily combine and divide without losing key parts.  As such, only the highest ranking ossiarchs can really be said to have ever been alive, but even then the version they are now is still quite different from what they were then.  In this way, the ossiarchs avoid the lingering regrets, memories, and mortal scruples that compromise vampires, liches, and ghosts.

These perfected undead are Nagash's tool not just to slay his enemies but to systematically conquer the realms.  the Bonereapers are individually nearly unkillable, their bodies are incredibly tough, and even when smashed to pieces, their soulgems remain and can be fit within new bodies after the battle.  Their fortifications are likewise legendarily resilient.  All this is made possible by a steady supply of bone provided by the Tithe - a payment in bone demanded from nearby living settlements in exchange for being left alone by the OBR.  Paying the tithe is preferable to most populations than fleeing their homes or fighting a seemingly impossible battle against immortal undead, but the tithe is always just a big more than ossiarchs mortal nables can sustainably pay, leading to sacrifices that weaken mortal populations generation after generation until they can neither pay the tithe nor have any hope of fending off the doom that comes when they can no longer pay Nagash's bill.  In this way OBR drain the life from the lands they conquer even as they avoid fighting unnecessary battles and funnel the maximum resources available into their wars against those who refuse to pay from the start.

While Nagash and his most favored mortarch Arkhan prefer to personally lead armies of Ossiarchs on the rare occasion when they take to the battlefield directly, the Ossiarch legions are mainly left to the direction of Katakros, Mortarch of the Necropolis, the greatest military mind and field commander out of any of his Mortarchs.  A peerless general in life, and implacable scourge in undeath, Katakros was defeated but not destroyed by Sigmar at the dawn of the Age of Chaos, and hidden away for centuries.  It was only after the Necroquake that Katakros's prison was revealed to Nagash, and retrieving the soul of his most favored general was the first task assigned to Olynder, Mortarch of Grief, and the endless tide of Nighthaunt at her disposal.

Mechanically, the bonereapers are characterized by being 'elite' for a Death faction.  Their individual warriors are stronger and tougher but less numerous than those of other undead.  They're also distinctly more independent than most other undead.  Which isn't to say that they don't depend on stacking buffs like other ondead, they do, but those buffs and synergies rely less on units being within range of your heroes.  For instance, where other undead factions often need to stay within range of a hero to get their deathless saves, most obr units either always get those saves or else can get them while within range of their own unit champions.  However, many of their offensive and defensive abilities trigger off 'relentless discipline' points - a faction specific alternative system to the usual command points - and most of these points are generated by your heroes, so the faction overall is still quite dependent on its heroes and vulnerable to assassination tactics.  Plus, while your units are less strictly reliant on your heroes than most other undead factions, your heroes are still quite good and will be pretty key to your battle plans.  You've got some decent casters and endless spells - including the double (usually triple) casting mason and the boneshaper - which comes with a recursion ability, or the liege - one of your most points efficient RD point generators AND has a strong +1 attack buff AND is a reasonably tough, fighty, and notably fast option in and of himself, able to chase small chaff units off of objectives all by himself.  You also have some of the best special characters in Death, including Nagash - stronger here than he currently is in his own legion, and still quite viable and impressive, even if he isn't quite as dominating as he was in his early LoN heyday.  Or Katakros, a master general with staggering force multiplying abilities who generates a whopping 5 RD points on his own.  Or Arkhan, who admittedly isn't great, but he's better in Petrifex then he has been at any point before this, so if you like the skeleton pope then the time and place to field him is here and now.

While an OBR army is very elite for an undead faction, as with the independant bit above, the "for an undead faction" part is still doing a lot of work here, as your main core battleline unit will be mortek guard, who still want to be fielded in multiple large, even hoardy infantry squads, with the same max unit size as skeleton warriors and a heft max unit discount to encourage you to get there.  As such, you can espect to be running 60 to 80 of them in 2k point games.  That said, with your discipline buffs up, and subfaction buffs from the near-ubiquitous petrifex elite - your mortek units are increadibly tanky and hit far, far harder than equivalent hoardy infantry units in other Death factions.  Like most undead armies in AoS, Bonereapers have some recursion abilities, coming from Mortarchs, Boneshapers, and Harvesters.  This is less than most other undead factions, but with OBR units being so much tougher to begin with, even a little goes a long, long way. Taken as a whole, your units can walk away with easy, even crushing wins in almost any straight-forward slug fest, even when greatly outnumbered.  Which is good, because most of the time you are going to be outnumbered in both model and wound count, and *badly* outnumbered in unit count.

While you have an easy time beating enemies in scrums, you can have a much harder time in the objective game.  Oh, sure, big blocks of mortek can hold most any objective they sit on to the end of time, but getting to those objectives in the first place?  And having enough units to defend multiple objectives at once?  OBR are slow.  their base speed is generally very slow, and while they can bump that up with discipline points, doing so eats into your fighting ability, and even then you're not exactly fast.  And unlike most other undead factions, your movement shenanigans are very limited.  There's a caster-only teleport spell, but unless you're running Nagash that's not going to do much for you, and you won't be outflanking or deep striking units like some other undead factions can.  You can take the bridge spell, but while you have some ok casters, you generally lack the casting bonuses to push a critical spell through when you really need it, so it's not exactly a tactic you can rely on.  Combine with having fewer models and fewer units than your opponent, and you're going to run into problems with board presence and objective control.  If your opponent comes to you to fight, you're probably going to do well, but if they spread out to claim objectives and dance out of your range or summon big endless spells to block your movement or just throw some cheap chaff in your face to tie you up for a round or two of melee then you can be facing an uphill battle.  This is one of the reasons why the crawler can be such a critical unit for OBR, as the threat of it can force enemy units to come to you.

And while your units are great in a 'fair fight', they struggle against enemies with mortal wound spam or strong shooting phases or tricksy turn shenanigans.  Mortek's powerful shield wall ability only triggers 'at the start of the combat phase'.  It's of no use against spells, or shooting attacks.  It's of no use against enemy units that can fight outside of the combat phase.  And enemy units that can fight 'at the start of the combat phase' can, on their turn, choose to activate their ability to fight first before you get the opportunity to activate your shield wall.  The strongest armies in the game right now tend to be built on those kinds of shenanigans.  Summoning abilities that bog down opponents in unit after unit of disposable chaff, activation shenanigans that let melee units fight out of turn, mortal wound spam, dominating magic phases, and so on.  As a result, OBR as a whole can be an army that is very strong against the weaker armies in the game, while simultaneously being quite weak against what are currently the strongest armies in the game.

Another issue with OBR is that listbuilding can be kind of tricky, as everything is so expensive that once you've covered the essential generalist units, you rarely have points left over for the specialist toys you need for particular gimmicks & match ups.  For instance, you might start with Katakros for force multiplying, healing, and RD generation, 1x40 and 1x20 morteks to have some solid infantry blocks, 5 deathriders and a liege to have some faster mobile elements and more RD points, a pair of crawlers for their general utility and ability to force enemy armies to engage your force rather than just ignoring it, and.... look at that.  You're already at 1980 and you have no wizards, no endless spells, no stalkers, no harvester to support your 20 man mortek block, no 10 man mortek squads to camp your own backfield objectives, no battalions for extra RD efficiency and access to some of the very good OBR artefacts which you otherwise can't access due to subfaction requirements.  You can drop katakros - he is 500 points after all, but that doesn't come close to giving you everything you wanted.  Every faction in AoS has to pick and choose  their units and make some tough choices, but those choices are harder and come with more compromises in OBR than for pretty much any other Death faction.

If I were starting a new OBR army, I'd begin with a Liege & a Boneshaper for some decent heroes with RD generation, support abilities, and a bit of casting and healing, 20 mortek guard and 5 deathriders to give a feel for the battleline, and a mortek crawler for the utility it offers.  Round the list out with a bone tithe shrieker endless spell, which is a solid support option.  It's worth noting that OBR cannot use regular command points, so there's no point in buying an extra one.  Once you have a workable 1000 point army pick up the nexus terrain next.  It's good and free so you should theoretically always run it, but it's big and pricey and time consuming to paint, and you can't run it without an army to run with it, so it's not top priority.

 

Flesh Eater Courts

Spoiler

In the Warhammer lore - both the Old World and Age of Sigmar, the world/realms are bathed in a variety of magic energies, eight flavors with different properties, which collect in places of arcane power according to their nature.  Wherever many corpses are left to decompose, especially corpses of intelligent creatures, there the magic of death collects heaviest, saturating the land and especially the corpses themselves.  In times of terrible famine, where people are forced to eat rotten food, or use their dead as fertilizer, or worst of all where individuals are forced into cannibalism, that death magic builds up within living bodies, eventually corrupting and overwhelming their own animating life magic.  The result are mordants - ghoulish abominations that are not quite undead but also not truly alive.  The danger of this is especially extreme in the Realm of Shyish, where death magic is dominant everywhere, and entire kingdoms can fall to ghoulish corruption, potentially even without resorting to cannibalism if they made their homes near the more magically active areas of the realm, or if they don't take proper precautions to purify their food and water.

Similar corruption also affects vampires.  Vampires require the lifeblood of the living to maintain the mortal semblance of their bodies, minds, and souls.  They can sustain themselves and the blood of animals, or the dead, or even on necromantic magic collected from the wind of death itself, but without mortal lifeblood their minds warp and twist, afflicting them with paranoia, madness, and delusion.  Their bodies warp in turn - with those who feast on the blood of beasts or the dead becoming monstrous horrors.  Such abhorants are rejected by their prideful soulblight kin, who hate to be reminded of their true nature.  However, they are embraced by tribes of ghouls, as their similarly twisted spiritual nature gives them a sort of kinship, and causes ghouls to take on the same madness and delusions as their ghoul-king masters.  Those mordants most favored by their masters are blessed with meals of the abhorant's blood, causing them to bloat and warp into massive horrors and winged flayers.  The abhorants themselves maintain some of the necromantic power that all vampires posses, and they use it to animate great undead beasts which they ride into battle.  The resulting 'Flesh Eater Courts' are entire armies of insanity and horror, believing themselves to be brave soldiers, shining knights, and noble kings and queens, embarking on virtuous crusades to free the realms from evil.  In truth they are ravening hordes of cannibalistic monstrosities spreading death and madness like a plague, flooding the land in their wake with corrupted death magic.

Saturated as they are with death magic, Nagash, the god and personification of Shyish itself, and the mortarchs who share a portion of his power and soul, can impose their will on the Flesh Eater Courts, and have done so many times to lead their cannibalistic crusades against the enemies of Death.  However, the semi-living nature of the mordants, along with the all-consuming madness and delusion of the abhorants, mean that this control is tenuous at best, and breaks down as soon as the Flesh Eaters are out of their direct attention.  Left to their own devices, Ossiarchs will continue to actively advance Nagash's goals.  Deathrattle legions will continue to carry out their last orders until their bones grind to dust.  Nighthaunts will become overwhelmed by their bitterness and hatred of the living, but while they might forget their standing orders they will at least reliably attack the living.  Flesh Eater Courts, on the other hand, when left to their own devices, may be driven by their madness to do anything - at times even attacking other Death armies.  As such, they are something of a tool of last resort for Nagash and his mortarchs.

There may be one individual who could fully command the Flesh Eater Courts - the Carrion King, said to be the first Abhorrant and the original source of their cursed madness.  Nagash has long sought to capture and control the Carrion King, and through him countless armies of ghouls hidden away in the dark places of the realms, unleashing a cannibalistic tide upon the mortal realms equal to the ghostly tide set loose by the Necroquake.  But, if he even exists, the Carrion King's madness has thus far made him impossible for Nagash to control.

I haven't run FEC myself, so cannot say as much mechanically, or offer much in the way of specific and informed advice.  Still, in terms of general traits FEC is a very small faction when it comes to the available number of units.  For basic units they have semi-hoardy ghouls, fast & hurty flayers, tough but pillow-fisted horrors, and that's basically it.  For monsters they have powerful zombie dragons & terrorgheists, and varghulfs which can heal nearby basic units and are decent smaller monsters in their own right.  What I understand to be the strongest subfaction even makes unridden zombie dragons and terrorgheists battleline, so if you want to run a monster mash Death army, FEC is the premier way to do that.  For leaders you have courtiers - including the varghulf - that aren't great but provide recursion & can potentially make horrors or flayers battleline, and ghoul kings - powerful melee heroes with strong buff abilities, some casting, and command abilities that can bring extra units onto the board.  In particular the arch-regent is an infantry multicaster with great buffing abilities and multiple options to summon an additional unit, while ghoul kings on zombie dragon or terrorgheists are among the most deadly large flying monster heroes in the game with their own buff and summon abilities.  FEC also have an out-of-turn attack ability in feeding frenzy, and outflanking abilities in the previously mentioned summoning rules, and some interesting battalions.  There are multiple playable subfactions, and even non-subfaction is an option, with delusion rules instead, including one that grants a free feeding frenzy a turn.

If I were starting a new FEC army, I'd maybe look at a Ghoul King on Royal Terrorgheist, 2x20 ghouls for battle line, and three flayers as a fast threat, with three more off to the side to be summoned by the Ghoul King during the game.  Most of that comes in their start collecting box, after which you'd need to get some more ghouls and an extra box of flayers.  Getting two start collecting boxes plus another box of ghouls is probably better in the long run, as you will want the extra terrorgheist or zombie dragon eventually.  The bone throne faction terrain is decent and free so eventually you will want it, but it's not a top priority since the biggest bonus from it relies on running an archregent, and it's hard to fit one in 1k points if you're fielding a big monster.

 

Nighthaunts

Spoiler

Following the Malign Portents event, Nagash unleashed a ritual of terrifying power, inverting the balance of magic in Shyish, drawing the wild storms of death magic from the fringes of the realm to the city of Nagashizzar at its center.  The resulting apocalyptic implosion of death magic echoed through the realms, turning all the ghosts and spirits that had resisted the call of Shyish to rest at piece in their graves into Nighthaunts, spectral killers shaped by the will of Nagash and driven by an overwhelming hatred of the living.  Further, the rebalance of magic in shyish turned it into something of a black hole, a great gravitic accumulation of death magic, dragging at all mortal souls, so the spirits of those who die are pulled away to Nagash.  The gods of order, destruction, and chaos can still hold onto the spirits of their most valuable servants, but doing so is a terrible drain on their strength, so now most dead souls are dragged inescapably to Shyish, as they were always meant to, to be reshaped into ever more nighthaunts.  At least, those that aren't torn into their component parts to form the souls of new ossiarchs.

The forces of chaos did manage to corrupt the great ritual at the very last moment - just enough that Nagash was not able to simply absorb the entirety of Shyish's magic directly into his own form to become powerful enough to personally crush all the rival gods.  The taint also twisted the hatred animating the Nighthaunts into a maddened frenzy.  As a result, Nagash did not have direct simultaneous control of the hordes of nighthaunt unleashed on all the realms.  He could control them wherever he focused his attention, but could not leave them to their own devices or they would abandon plan and strategy to attack the living in an disordered spectral wave.  To manage this problem, Nagash raised a new Mortarch - Olynder, the Mortarch of Grief - a ghostly queen cursed to feel the accumulated sorrow of all mortal souls, and able to inflict that despair on any mortals in her presence.  This new mortarch was empowered to bind massive legions of nighthaunt to her control, bending massive processions of spectral horrors to Nagash's will while allowing him to focus his attention on the next great work - the construction of his Ossiarch Legions.

Even with the Ossiarch Legions now unleashed upon the realms, the Nighthaunt Processions remain the greatest shock and terror troops available to Nagash.  Their twisted & cursed forms are supernaturally unnerving to the living, they can appear en masse seemingly out of thin air to take enemy forces completely by surprise, and their ethereal bodies can float through or fly over almost any natural fortifications, making them unparalleled siege breakers.  Where before Soulblight agents of the Undead Legions might spend weeks, months, or even years carefully infiltrate an enemy  position and subvert its defenses before raising an undead army to overwhelm it, now the Nighthaunt processions simply sweep through defenses like they're not even there in a single terrible night of slaughter, leaving the fortifications undamaged for the Ossiarch Legions to then occupy and reinforce with raw materials drawn from the freshly slain mortal defenders.

Nighthaunt units are shaped by Nagash's bitter sense of humor, each cursed in death to punish or reward their acts in life according to Nagash's will.  Traitors are lifted up and made commanders, healers find their hands converted into spectral blades that tear the living, those who died imprison hoping for release in death are chained in eternal servitude.  The nature and lore of individual Nighthaunt units lend a ton of flavor and characterization to Nagash, and through him to the undead in general in Age of Sigmar, which is a lot of fun on a narrative level.

Nighthaunt are another faction I haven't run myself, so again refer to the faction thread for specific advice.  That said, where OBR are something of an exception to the usual undead traits in terms of eliteness, Nighthaunts are, well, a little bit of that - ethereal saves make them a fair bit tougher than most other non-OBR death armies - but even more so are an exception in terms of death armies usually being slow.  Everything in the army flies, most of the units have at least decent movement scores, some units much better than decent, and most notably of all, half the units in your army can deep strike, deploying them nearly anywhere on the board - though they must deploy more than 9" from enemy units, so even the slower nighthaunt units can be wherever you want them.  Between decent move, flight, and deep strike, enemy armies have a very hard times screening vulnerable parts of their army from your assault.  And with your ethereal saves expensive offensive units that pay a lot of points for good rend find their attacks are little better than chaff units.  Playing against a Nighthaunt army is thus radically different from playing against most other armies in the game.

Additionally, Nighthaunts get an extra round of combat when they roll 10" or more on a charge.  Combine that with the ability to deploy within 10" of the enemy from the start of the game, and you get a very swingy army.  Roll a bunch of 10+ charge rolls and your army jump-scares the opponent dealing a ton of damage before they can begin to react.  Fail those long charge rolls, and your army barely gets a chance to yell 'boo!', before the enemy kills your buff heroes and starts ripping your army apart.  As such, methods of improving your charge are quite valuable.  The chronomantic cogs endless spell, and extra command points to re-roll charges are both quite useful.

Unit-wise, you've got a variety of strong buff heroes, but while they have decent ethereal saves they tend to have low wound counts making them rather vulnerable.  Dreadblade Harrows have another nice teleportation ability.  You've got casters with some decent spells, but again are somewhat lacking in casting boosts so it can be hard to get out key spells.  The special character Reikenor can get a solid casting boost so if you want to use the cogs he's probably the best option to get it on the table.  For core units you have a few different options, but the main two are chainrasps - a cheaper hoardy unit with good recursion - and grimghasts - more expensive and killier infantry that still want to be fielding in bigger units if you can manage, but won't be quite as numerous as chainrasps and will eat more points from the rest of your army.  Beyond that you have a lot of somewhat redundant units - a lot of medium killy ghostly infantry including bladegheists, dreadscythes, etc.  Hexwraiths give you a faster option, but with deep strike deployment you might not need that.  For a big centerpiece model the black coach looks awesome and hits hard, but looks to be a bit of a pain to assemble, paint, and transport.

If I were starting a new Nighthaunt army, I might look at something like a Knight of Shrouds as a decent general, Reikenor because I love the model so much, Chronomantic Cogs because they make those 10" charges much more viable, 20 grimghasts to threaten those charges, and 2x20 chainrasps to hold objectives and let you get a feel for both battleline options.  Deploy the rasps and Reikenor, cast the cogs, deep strike the grimghasts along with the knight of shrouds to enable the charge reroll CA, profit?

 

Legions of Nagash

Spoiler

Narratively the Legions of Nagash are the most archetypal undead faction.  This is the classic horror-trope horde of shambling corpses, screaming ghosts, and deathless horrors all animated and sustained by the dark wills of unyielding wight kings, potent necromancers, and aristocratic vampires.  These masters of the undead are in turn commanded by the Mortarchs - Deathlords blessed and cursed with shards of the Great Necromancer's own nightmarish soul - and by Nagash, the unliving manifestation and master of Shyish itself.

Nagash and his Mortarchs (apart from Katakros, who exclusively leads armies of Ossiarch Bonereapers) each lead their own unique Legion.  These legions share most of the same units and special rules (though Olynder's Legion of Grief is a bit of a special case that will be discussed separately), but with a unique twist reflecting their master's unit preferences and combat style.  Nagash's Grand Host is an endless horde of implacable skeletons and deadly morghasts, an endless, unstoppable apocalypse that Marches from Nagashizzar to bring an end to all life.  Arkhan's Legion of Sacrament is animated by the most talented spellcasters available to Grand Alliance Death, each a necromantic prodigy who studied at the feet of Arkhan himself, charged with carrying out terrible rituals and taking or defending places of arcane power.  Neferata's Legion of Blood are commanded and spearheaded by darkly noble vampire aristocrats blessed with additional power by a taste the Vampire Queen's own dark blood, and are charged with both ruling over the mortal lands and peoples conquered by the Undead and with manipulating the enemies of Nagash into battling each other instead of opposing the Great Necromancer's will.  Mannfred's Legion of Night is devious force that ties foes up with sacrificial skeletons before ambushing from all directions with deadly undead monstrosities, and are charged with sowing terror and confusion among Nagash's enemies, striking where least expected, drawing enemy forces out of position before disappearing into the darkness to strike again somewhere else.

The Mortarchs each have their own plots and plans, sometimes scheming against each other or even against Nagash himself, but they are all soul-bound to Nagash, existing as portions of the incomprehensibly vast machine of spirit and sinew that is the mind of Nagash, in tension with each other but, only in ways that still serve the same horrific entity, acting in ways even they cannot comprehend to advance the Great Necromancer's apocalyptic aim - the extermination of all life.

Mechanically, the Legions of Nagash are again the most archetypical undead faction in Age of Sigmar.  Their traits are the defining undead traits - strong heroes, decent magic, weak hordes made deadly and deathless by stacking buffs and tons of recursion, seemingly slow but with several fast units and deployment and movement tricks that can make them surprisingly fast.

LoN armies will typically be grounded in a few maxed out units of your preferred undead infantry - skeleton warriors being the strongest offensively on sheer quantity of attacks, chainrasp hordes - added after the release of the nighthaunt book - being faster, flying, and tougher thanks to ethereal saves, but less dangerous offensively.  Zombies are also an option, and are the cheapest per model, but suffer from being the worst of both worlds, lacking in both offense and defense.  In addition to your infantry hordes, the Legions also have excellant fast, cheap, screens and objective campers in dire wolves, which also fill battleline requirements.

Supporting this you have some decent heroes.  The Mortarchs are sadly mostly too fragile for their points, and since the OBR release Nagash has been changed to not work too well here, so you're kind of lacking in good named heroes, but your generic heroes have a lot to offer.  Necromancers have a great signature spell, a good lore, and are much harder to kill than most other 5 wound wizards as long as you keep them in range of a summonable unit.  Vampire lords are also casters with a different lore, but are also reasonably fighty, have some self healing ability, and very good buffing command abilities.  Vampire Lords can also ride Zombie Dragons for a potent monster hero - not on the same level as monster mounted Ghoul Kings, but still quite dangerous, and with the ethereal amulet quite durable.  Wight Kings are basically non-casting, non-self healing versions of Vampire lords for only a slight discount, but you have to take one if you want to run the decent deathmarch battalion, really the only good battalion for LoN, and if you're taking one anyway it can still get some work done supporting nearby deathrattle units.  All of these heroes can heal nearby 'summonable' units at the start of your command phase, giving your army a lot of recursion.

Once you've got heroes and battleline squared away, you'll typically have some points left over for either some monsters - LoN can run Terrorgheists which are still a pretty decent unit - or some elite units with a bit of rend.  Grave Guard and Grimghasts can give you a summonable hoardy unit that, while much more expensive than your battleline units, are also a fair bit killier with some built in rend and the ability to benefit from most of the same stacking buffs.  Alternatively Morghasts especially in Grand Host, Morghast Harbingers in Legion of Night, or Blood Knights in Legion of Blood are all rather overpriced for their power but still can hit hard enough to get some work done.

The real engine of the Legions of Nagash, the thing that defines their play style, makes them work, and makes playing with and against them such a cinematic experience, is the faction rules.  Specifically the Gravesites.  Had the army been released year or so later these would be their free faction terrain, ass it is they're just points to pick on the table and mark with whatever kind of token you have available.  Two have to be in your territory, two can be anywhere. on the table.  Each gravesite can heal nearby summonable units like your heroes do, plus you can deploy summonable units 'underground', and then bring them onto the table from one of your gravesites provided you have a hero nearby to call them up, and finally your general gains a command ability to bring back an entire dead summonable unit from a nearby gravesite so long as there aren't any enemies within 9".  This can bring back entire 40 model hordes of skeletons or chainrasps, multiple times per game.  Doing so is a burden on your command points, so you *always* want to buy that extra command point, and this make the legions' one somewhat decent battalion worth strong consideration.  It also means protecting your general is very important.  You want them to be very tough, you want to play conservatively with them, holding them back until it's safe to engage.  Sadly this means the mortarchs, who are again all rather fragile for their points and who have to be the general in their own legions, aren't really competitive at all.  But it does make games play out in a very narrative faction, with a deadly necromantic master hiding behind endless hordes of the living dead like a boss monster.

In addition to the shared gravesite rules, the various legions have additional rules, plus unique artefacts and command points, that lend them their individual character.  Legion of Nagash have command abilities and artefacts that buff deathrattle units and give morghasts an extra attack.  Legion of Sacrament give your spellcasters an extra bonus to casting rolls which stacks with bonuses from corspe cart or mortis engine.  Legion of Blood give blood knights and vampire lords extra attacks.  Legion of Night let you outflank a few units - especially deadly for deploying terrorgheists and banshees into screaming range or to put morghast harbingers into easy charge range.  In a more recent book these would all be subfactions, and as such taking them would lock you into often inferior command traits and artefacts, but since LoN predates that design style they instead operate as four different factions that share unit selection and gravesite rules.

Sadly, this isn't the only way LoN have been left a bit behind in AoS 2e.  Power Creep has left them a fair bit weaker than most recent books, a number of overwhelming spellcasting factions make it hard to get some of your key spells off outside of Legion of Sacrament, and even there it can be hit or miss.  Some of these units have been revised to fit better into more recent books - Nagash and Arkhan in particular play much better in a petrifex OBR list than in their own Legions.  If Soulblight does get a stand alone battletome the same will likely happen for Manfred, Neferata, and even some of the other vampire untis.  The lore has largely left the Legions of Nagash behind as well - they were Nagash's primary tool when undertaking the Great Ritual, but the results of the Necroquake have gifted with two new forces - the Nighthaunt and the Bonereapers, which have supplanted the Legions as Nagash's prefered weapons.  While these rules aren't going away any time soon, It feels increasingly unlikely that the Legions will ever get an updated battletome.  And even if they do it might actually make them weaker, implementing the various legions via the more modern, less flexible subfaction design, likely removing the added nighthaunt units, maybe even removing other nighthaunt and soulblight units.  So while the Legions of Nagash are perfectly playable right now, they aren't exactly top table competitive, and they may not have much of a future in Age of Sigmar.  On the other hand, this army, minus the end times units (Nagash, Mortarchs, Morghasts) and newer Nighthaunt units, is mostly just the oldhammer Vampire Counts army, so even as the Legions slowly fade in Age of Sigmar, they may rise again to new glory when the Warhammer Old World game is released.

With the future uncertain, Legions may not be the best choice for a new player.  That said, GW continues to reliese armies that collect vintage oldhammer units and give them updated rules - from Skaven and Cities of Sigmar to Maw Tribes and Seraphon, so it's safe to say that Legions of Nagash will likely be with us for a long time yet.  If you do want to start LoN, I'd suggest looking at something like the following: Vamp Lord on Zombie Dragon for a strong, survivable general who also serves as a decent late game hammer, support caster necromancer, 30 skeleton warriors to start building up your foundation of recursive hoard infantry, and 2x5 dire wolves for a bit of speed & utility - they can screen for your flying dragon, grab undefended objectives, babysit the necromancer, etc.  That leaves 50 points for an extra command point to bring back the entire skeleton hoard mid game.

This is honestly not as much infantry as you'd like for LoN, and you might be better off trading the dragon lord for a wight king (not as good as a vamp lord, but you'll eventually want one to have the option of running deathmarch) and enough more skeleton warriors to run 2x40.  But that leaves you without a cool centerpiece, and 80 infantry might be biting off more than you can chew at once for a new army, especially if this is your *first* army.

 

Legion of Grief

Spoiler

A fifth Legion of Nagash, the Legion of Grief were added in the Forbidden Power campaign/endless spell box, representing a combined for of Nighthaunts and most Legion of Nagash units - basically anything other than vampires and the unridden big monsters.  They have their own spell lore, traits, and artefacts - albeit fewer than other legion.  And they have the gravesite rules typical of Legion of Nagash armies.  Basically, this is a way to run the full selection of Nighthaunt Units, but with LoN style gravesite recursion instead of the Nighthaunt's normal deep strike and extra attacks if you roll big charges rules, with some extra unit options from LoN as a bonus.  Much of what I said about the Legions of Nagash applies here, but again no vampires, and you'll definitely want to run chainrasps as your core infantry.  It's worth noting that the december 2019 White Dwarf added some battalions to Legion of Grief which may be worth looking into.  In terms of future prospects, as a campaign specific variant list the Legion of Grief is unlikely to get updated rules in the future, and the existing rules are unlikely to remain playable into the next edition of the game.  For now they're here as an interesting alternative ruleset for mostly nighthaunt armies, one that leans on recursion-based defensive tactics instead of deep strike based assault tactics.  The result is a more reliable, albeit less aggressive army of ghosts.

If I were starting Legion of Grief as a new army, I'd probably start with Reikenor because he's a decent caster and I love the model, A guardian of Souls for some extra recursion and casting, 2x20 chainrasps to start building up your infantry base, 20 grimghasts for a harder hitting unit that's still summonable so it can still benefit from gravesites & other buffs, which leaves enough points left over for an extra command point.  That's pretty much the same as the sample Nighthaunt starter list, and honestly you could run either as Legion of Grief or Nighthaunt and get radically different gameplay experiences, much more so than running the same LoN list under various legion rules, so that's pretty cool.  And while LoG may not continue to be supported long term - much as the Wraith Fleet from the 1e Firestorm campaign wasn't, as long as you stick entirely or at least mostly to Nighthaunt units your collection should continue to be playable as a Nighthaunt army even if Legion of Grief goes away.

 

Soulblight

Spoiler

The Soulblight Vampires are the princes and princesses of undeath, their corrupted bloodline tracing back to Neferata, the first vampire and the queen of her kind, whose dark curse is itself only a slight variation from Nagash's original elixer of Mortality, from which the first Liche's were born.  This gives vampires tremendous necromantic power manifesting as a natural command over other, lesser forms of undead.  This is combined with greatly enhanced strength, accelerated reflexes, and supernatural cunning that make them more than a match for their mortal counterparts even before you take into account their immortality, which allow them to perfect their chosen skills - be they martial prowess, arcane sorcery, or other more esoteric pursuits far beyond what a mortal lifespan allows.  Most dangerous of all, the soulblight curse is itself contageous.  Through a blasphemous ritual, a vampire can infect mortals with this curse, especially the ever-corruptible humans, creating more of its kind.  In this way, covens of vampires can infiltrate mortal societies throughout the realms, spying on the plans of rival gods and sabotaging any efforts they make to oppose the will of Nagash.

A single vampire can topple an entire kingdom in a matter of months, infiltrating its aristocracy, converting its rulers and subverting its defenses, before raising an army of the dead to deal the finishing blow.  Before the Necroquake, this was Nagash's primary means of conquering the lands of the living and acquiring raw materials - the souls and corpses of mortals - to construct what would eventually become his Ossiarch Legions.  The Legions of Night and Blood were especially adept in these methods, with the soulblight mortarchs Mannfred and Neferata spawning a steady supply of vampiric commanders and infiltrators.  In those times, vampires ruled over the mortal lands that fell to the forces of death, and tended to their mortal subjects as a farmer might tend to livestock before the slaughter.

Now the Nighthaunt Processions and Ossiarch Bonereapers overthrow Nagash's enemies and conquer their lands, and it's unclear what role the aristocracy of the night still have in Nagash's grand design, if indeed they have any at all.  In particular, Vampires require a steady supply of the lifeblood of mortals to maintain the semblance of humanity in their bodies and minds, without which they can fall into the bestial madness of the ghoul kings.  With the coming of the Ossiarch Bonereapers and the slow expansion of their vast, lifeless Necropolis, even the most loyal and devoted vampires will soon have to confront the cold inescapable truth that Nagash's perfect vision would leave them all to starve.

Pure Soulblight armies have faction rules, which are presented in the Legions of Nagash book.  These rules are pretty neat, as they let you choose from a variety of vampyric bloodlines to lend distinct character to your blood knights and vampire lords.  Unfortunately they're not the most playable right now, with blood knights and vargheists as their only battle line.  Blood Knights are far too expensive in both units and models to establish any kind of table control at all.  Plus the models are in resin - bleh - and absurdly overpriced when you can even get them at all.  Vargheists are plastic - so easier to work with and more affordable - but the models are a bit wonky and lack the aristocratic feel that is, imo, the primary appeal of the soulblight.  Both units are fast and hard hitting but fragile (for their points) and expensive elite hammers, the kind of units you might want one or two of in a list, but not the kind of unit that really works as an army's backbone.  Soulblight's version of recursion works by letting wounded vampires heal at the end of combat if their unit has inflicted casualties on enemy units in melee, but that can only restore a wound or two to a damaged model, it doesn't do anything for slain models, which makes armies made entirely of soulblight units even more fragile compared to other Death armies.

If you want to play a vampire themed army right now, I'd recommend Legion of Blood instead.  At least then you can have a decent base of cheapish infantry to flesh out your army and establish some board control.  Legion of Blood also gives vampire lords and blood knights extra attacks, which is less interesting but probably more powerful than the bloodline rules.

Still, the Soulblight are worth mentioning because there have been some consistent rumors that we might see a new stand alone battletome for soulblight some time in the next year or so - give or take an extra delay due to covid.  If and when that happens, it would likely come with new units to flesh Soulblight out into more of a functional army, some plastic blood knights (Nagash willing), and new lore to establish the role of the Soulblight Vampires within Grand Alliance Death after the Necroquake changed everything.

Again, I would not start a pure soulblight army right now.  Still, if you simply cannot help yourself, Maybe start with a Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon, 2x5 Blood Knights, and 1x3 Vargheists.  Just, for the love of Nagash, look up some conversion & kitbashing articles for alternative Blood Knights.

 

Defunct, if possibly technically still playable factions:

Spoiler

Grand Alliance: Death

The generic Grand Alliance death rules exist, but for the most part aren't used.  Legions of Nagash generally serve that role, letting you take nearly all death units either in faction or as allies, apart from bonereapers (which won't play well outside of their home faction anyway due to the relentless discipline system), but with effective spell lores, artefacts, and faction rules, all of which generic Death lacks.  The main exception here is if you want to field old Tomb Kings stuff - which includes some really interesting units allowing for both typical and atypical play styles for undead in age of sigmar, some of which are even still reasonably competitive, even without real faction rules, and even after multiple "updates" that mostly just served to nerf the old Tomb Kings compendium with arbitrary points cost increases, remove their summoning rules, and remove any synergies they might have had with non-TK death units.  Unfortunately, TK models are largely unobtainable now, and 3rd party or kit bashed alternatives are fairly limited, especially for the faction's iconic chariots and sphinxes.  One can only hope they might eventually see new unlife in the upcoming Warhammer: Old World game, but even there hope is limited.  I might come back and talk about them a bit more, but for a brand new player - as opposed to someone who used to play oldhammer and still might have a bunch of TK models in storage - I don't see too much point to it.

 

The Wraith Fleet

In 1e AoS there was a campaign supplement called Firestorm that included rules for an undead army called 'the wraith fleet', which included soulblight, deathrattle, nighthaunt, and deathmage units, with some pirate themed faction rules.  Unfortunately those rules haven't been updated since 2e, are no longer available to purchase, and the wraith fleet hasn't been referenced in the lore for years, so while these rules may or may not still be usable at all (I'm not familiar enough with them to say), it's probably safe to call this faction dead.  Deader than the tomb kings, even.

These factions may or may not still be playable, but they're certainly not actively supported, and new players really shouldn't even consider them.

 

And that's the state of Grand Alliance Death as I see it right now.  If you're looking for arbitrary power ratings, I'd put OBR and FEC about even, with FEC being stronger offensively and OBR stronger defensively - but still able to pack quite a punch, just not quite as adept at delivering that punch where and when they want it.  I'd say both armies are high tier, but not top tier compared to the kinds of shenanigans that armies like Slaanesh or Tzeentch can pull, at least not after a few nerfs to FEC that curbed some of their more notorious abuses.

I'd put Nighthaunt and the Legions, including Legion of Grief, a bit behind OBR and FEC, with the Nighthaunt being a slightly weaker and much less reliable offensive army then FEC, and the Legions being a slightly weaker and considerably less offensively threatening army than OBR, albeit one with slightly better magic (not counting Nagash) and much better board control.

All of these factions are at least casually playable.  They may not all be serious top table tournament competitors, but the tournament meta shifts so frequently and so wildly that it's really a pain to keep up unless you're the kind of player who can collect and prepare a new army every year, sometimes even more than once per year.  As a new player to AoS, you really shouldn't worry about it, and instead should focus on a reasonably functional army with models, narrative, and play style you enjoy, and all of the above factions can clear that bar.

Soulblight, unfortunately, don't really clear that bar right now.  However, they are the most likely of the existing Death factions to see new rules any time soon.  Granted some new models have been teased for what looks like FEC and OBR, but the odds are those will be Warcry releases, not new AoS stuff.  Otherwise, Death has seen a ton of narrative focus and game content in 2e to date, but at the moment attention seems to be panning away, more towards what the Elves and Chaos are up to, so I don't personally expect any big changes or shake ups to Death in AoS for a while, again apart from maybe Soulblight, so unless you're especially interested in running a vampire themed army, you should feel safe in choosing from the currently available options without worrying that some unexpected new release will change which undead army you would want to field.

Edited June 8, 2020 by Sception

[Souleater]

@Sception thank you for the very extensive writeup.