Soulblight Battletome Wishlisting 2020

[El Syf]

So quite a few rumour engine pics are pointing towards soulblight, what better than a bit of wishlisting for what we would all want from a Soulblight battle tome?

I'll start with my own personal want that is unlikely to happen; ABHORASH. Make the model and take my money GW!

Plastic Blood Knights are overdue although there is probably a risk of them falling by the wayside in favor of some new monstrous cavalry.

Bring back Bloodlines properly. With subfactions being such a thing, I can actually see this happening but maybe with different names.

Make vampire lords feared again, racket up their points boost their stats and abilities and allow us to take pride in fielding a vampire lord and our opponents to fear what they can do. I wouldn't be opposed to them having "legion vampire lords" for LoN like the Black Coach now has two profiles.

Also worth noting on the webstore the old Red Duke model is gone! I know it was a very old model but the Wight King on Skeletal Steed is still knocking about, could be nothing but I swear it was still available to buy a couple of weeks ago...

 

Edited September 11, 2020 by El Syf

[Clan's Cynic]

I'll second Abhorash.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I'd love for them to be a sort of Gothic re-imagining of Bretonnia; an emphasis on heavy shock cavalry and flying monsters supported by chaff in the form of mortal levies. 

 

Edited September 11, 2020 by Clan's Cynic

[Honk]

Abhorash for the win!!! maybe on a live dragon...

Mortals of Shyish with bats and deadly fast vampire knights. I hope they make a well balanced and fun book with more than one way to play them.

[Saiken]

Could you link the Rumour Engine that could be Soulblight in your opinion ?
I'm genuinely interested !

Back in the days Vampire Counts were my favorite army. I just love the lore and it really inspire me.
In terms of what I'd like to see ... plastic Blood Knights, Abhorash Indeed ... Some crazy necromancians ... and that would be a good start !

[JackStreicher]

 

[Honk]

And I pray to Nagash that it‘s not some dark elf BS... 

[Dolinarius]

• Blood Lines as subfactions
• Plastik Blood Knights
• Elite Vampire Footmen
• Endlessspells and magic spells that suck wounds out of enemies and give them to your troops, and make attacking the bravery of the enemy a thing (vampire shoud be feared right?) 
• mortal footman (as your horde option) which represent the mortals of shyish
• a new zombie dragon model - the old one is just ugly imho

 

[El Antiguo Guardián]

Well... this is the MAIN THREAD. So let´s start.

First of all, let´s talk about models:

• Plastic Blood Knights: Please. I have some resin ones for my Vampire Counts army. I want new ones for a new army.
• Plastic elite vampire footmen/vampire bodyguard.
• Some kind of blood dragon hero on undead steed.
• New bats and bat swarms.
• Some kind of scenery (maybe the graveyard pack/mausoleum).
• Not endless spells: the death endless spells of forbidden power... we need some bonuses for casting them.
• Some kind of new zombie monster/golem or monstrous infantry. 
• New zombies (maybe multikit with some kind of zombie bowmen that hits on 5´s... haha).

 

So let´s tal about the rules:

• New battletome that ends with the Legions of Nagash one: Soulbligth models with necromancers, zombies and skeletons. Like the old vampire counts but without stigroi and spirits. 
• We didn´t have ghouls or ghost, just us allies. So we need new models and units.
• Army focused on weak undead minions, high health abilities (the main death battletome focused on recovering models), some good buff wagons (like the mortis engine) for our weak undead minions, and powefull vampire units (but fragiles): anvil and hammer. And army that needs characters support.

[Nirvana]

On September 15, 2020 at 12:37 PM, El Antiguo Guardián said:

Well... this is the MAIN THREAD. So let´s start.

First of all, let´s talk about models:

• Plastic Blood Knights: Please. I have some resin ones for my Vampire Counts army. I want new ones for a new army.
• Plastic elite vampire footmen/vampire bodyguard.
• Some kind of blood dragon hero on undead steed.
• New bats and bat swarms.
• Some kind of scenery (maybe the graveyard pack/mausoleum).
• Not endless spells: the death endless spells of forbidden power... we need some bonuses for casting them.
• Some kind of new zombie monster/golem or monstrous infantry. 
• New zombies (maybe multikit with some kind of zombie bowmen that hits on 5´s... haha).

 

So let´s tal about the rules:

• New battletome that ends with the Legions of Nagash one: Soulbligth models with necromancers, zombies and skeletons. Like the old vampire counts but without stigroi and spirits. 
• We didn´t have ghouls or ghost, just us allies. So we need new models and units.
• Army focused on weak undead minions, high health abilities (the main death battletome focused on recovering models), some good buff wagons (like the mortis engine) for our weak undead minions, and powefull vampire units (but fragiles): anvil and hammer. And army that needs characters support.

I couldn't agree more!  I feel like we need more synergies!  I want more options to field my army.

[Sception]

My wishlist probably looks pretty different from many others, and draws on the recent thread about Soulblight as a possible replacement for Legions of Nagash.

Book Concept:

• Make the Soulblight battle tome in the style of other oldhammer throwback battletomes.  As with  Lizardmen -> Seraphon and Skaven -> Skaven, so too Vampire Counts -> Soulblight
• Officially Retire the Legions of Nagash battle tome and faction, with the new Soulblight battle tome serving as a replacement.
• That means skeletons, zombies, necromancers, and wights are brought forward to serve as the soldiers and attendants of the Soulblight Lords in the same way that they did for the Vampire Lords in Oldhammer Fantasy, and the overall structure and unit selection of the Soulblight Book looks largely similar to the current Legions of Nagash, except for...
• No ghostly units (which persist as part of the nighthaunt faction, and can still be included via allies & maybe even some cross-faction formations)
• No Nagash/Arkhan/Morghasts, which now live in OBR (and probably cannot be accessed even as allies).
• Instead maybe some new stuff, like possibly a new vampire spy type hero unit that can ambush the enemy mid game sort of like an assssin type unit.  Or maybe not, unit selection is already pretty good with leftover LoN stuff, even after removing Nighthaunt and OBR units.
• Allegiance rules focus on recursion of lesser undead and vampires empowering them (eg death save if within range of soulblight models, maybe bring back grave sites as faction terrain)
• Subfactions are Bloodlines based on the big named soulblight characters Neferata, Mannfred, and Vhordrai.
• Neferata's subfaction focuses on manipulation, infiltration, blood magic, and vampire heroes
• Mannfred's subfaction focuses on low cunning, terror tactics, creatures of the night, lesser undead, and death mages.
• Vhordrai's subfaction focuses on melee combat, shock assaults, & elite mounted units.  This faction makes blood knights troops, and lets cavalry count as extra models for claiming objectives in an attempt to make an all cavalry build viable.
• Each subfaction gets a signature battalion that includes their named hero, similar to their current battalions
• Additional generic battalions focusing on faction subthemes including one similar to the current deathmarch for skeletal stuff, one with deathmage and zombie stuff - if zombies are even still a thing, and one focused on creatures of the night with wolves and bats and vargheits.
• flashy powerful offensive spell lore for soulblight casters.  They can also empower their spells with blood by taking wounds - either making the spell stronger or giving them a bonus to cast.  As vampires, they can then restore lost wounds by inflicting wounds on enemy units or drinking from blood goblets.
• more supportive spell lore for death mages with less flashy effects
• Allies are Nighthaunt and FEC, allowing existing LoN players to keep using some of the units that might not be carried forward into the new Soulblight book.  Vampires may find ghoul kings distasteful, but there are plenty enough lore examples of them working together to justify the option for allies.

Faction Narrative:

With Nagash and Arkhan shifting the attention and resources of Shyish to the new Ossiarch Legions, Neferata and Mannfred realize that their positions of power within the alliance are in jeapordy, particularly when the Ossiarchs begin demanding the Bone Tithe from the human chattle populations of their vampiric dominions.  Nagash's grand plan for the realms is clear for all to see, and it would mean the death of all things, with no mortal chattle left alive and vampires doomed to starve for all eternity.  Neferata and Mannfred begin to work together to consolidate power and even directly resist the Tithe, with Mannfred returning to take control of the lands he previously abandoned.

While the Ossiarch Legions and Nighthaunt Processions are occupied elsewhere, one of the grand alliances launches a major incursion into Shyish.  Maybe it's Archaon, striking at Nagash's exposed underbelly as revenge for the attack on his territory.  Maybe it's a Destruction force, if only to make them actually part of the overall setting narrative for the first time /ever/.  But what I think works best would be an major Order attack on Nagash's strongholds, using the opportunity presented by Death and Chaos battling in the 8 points in an attempt to join with and free the human populations of Shyish, in particular after escaped refugees from NuLahmia make their way to Azyr to beg for aid and promise that the oppressed human populations of Shyish are ready to rise up and help overthrow their undead overlords if only the Stormcast arrive to lend them hope.  I like this especially because it puts some narrative attention on the mortal populations of Shyish, even if my vision for the battle tome doesn't include them as actual units.

With Katakros, Olynder, and Arkhan committed to the Eight Seven Points, and the flesh eater courts still scattered and disorganized without a Mortarch of their own to reign them in, it falls to The Soulblight vampires and their lesser undead servants to defend Shyish.  Which they do, with vampire spies infiltrating and turning key individuals in the invading force, disrupting supply lines, raising armies of the dead behind enemy forces, bogging down enemy armies with ever reviving hordes of the living dead while lightning cavalry raids or vargheist shock attacks pick apart their vulnerable flanks.  Prince Vhordrai's castle teleports him and his blood knights back and forth throughout the realm to launch attack after attack on their unsuspecting foes.  The invasion finally falters and fails completely when the Stormcast realize the mortal populations of Shyish will not rise up to help free themselves.  The people of Mannfred's lands are too terrified and hopeless to oppose their vampire overlords, while the citizens of Neferata's lands are too pampered and decadent to see any reason to do so.  Promises made by emissaries from Shyish begging for Azyr's aid before the campaign began turn out to have been a deception by Neferata all along.

The campaign proves to Nagash that the Soulblight are still a powerful force with a place in his grand plan - at least for now.  The Tithe of Bones is lifted from any lands ruled by Soulblight nobility, and the Soulblight are assigned renewed tasks in infiltrating and undermining the living throughout the realms.  This was, in fact, Neferata's plan in inviting the invasion in the first place, and it buys time for the Soulblight to build and consolidate their power while Nagash is busy elsewhere.  Nagash, however, sees through the plan, even as he respects its cunning and approves of the crushing defeat dealt to Sigmar's forces.  As such, he chooses to elevate Prince Vhordrai to the rank of Mortarch and gives his blood knights dispensation to feed on whatever mortals they wish, in recognition of his service during the campaign but also to throw off the power balance between Mannfred and Neferata and disrupt any potential alliance between the two. 

Importantly, Arkhan does not appear in this narrative at all.  Too much undead lore in AoS has revolved around Arkhan, or had Arkhan pulling the strings.  This book should present Neferata as the main puppet master and build up her abilities to initiate and follow through her own plots, and should end with Nagash responding to them with his own insight and subtlety, not outsourcing all his thinking to Arkhan.

Faction Role within the Grand Alliance

The advent of the Ossiarch Bonereapers has placed the role of traditional undead within the grand alliance into question, not just vampires but also necromancers, wights, skeletons, and zombies.  The purpose of this book both narratively and mechanically would be to give all of those classic undead tropes a reason to still exist and an ongoing role to play within the overall AoS story, and that role is dealing with mortal civilizations that cannot be simply overwhelmed by a shock assault of nighthaunts or steamrolled by the implacable march of the bonereapers.  Among the undead, vampires are uniquely able to infiltrate mortal populations, spread their influence by turning key mortals, and then use that foothold to manipulate mortal populations through terror (embodied by mannfred) or seduction (embodied by neferata).  Once mortal defenses are so undermined, soulblight vampires can "show their fangs" by raising entire armies of the undead in a single evening and call in an assault from their elite blood knight and vargheist shock troops, overthrowing their mortal foes from within and without simultaneously.  Once they have defeated a mortal society and conquered their lands, the vampires transition from wolves to shepherds, managing and feeding on the living populations while diverting resources back to Nagash's power base in Shyish and spawning new soulblight infiltrators to begin the process all over again.

So the key themes are infiltration, subversion, and psychology, on top of the alliance-wide themes of slow, weak, recursive fodder backed by fast elite shock troops and powerful leaders.  Within the faction, various subgroups have their own themes:

Soulblight - these are the leaders and elites of the faction, either powerful, do-everything leaders (combat prowess AND spellcasting AND buffing/healing abilities), or spies infiltrating enemy units and positions, or fast and hard hitting shock troops.  All are able to heal by inflicting melee damage on enemy units.

Deathmages - these are advisors and support casters, and return to the subservient role they had in some oldhammer Vampire Counts books.  When the Bonereapers appeared on the scene, many necromancers had their souls harvested to create the mortisans, and those that remain know their soulblight masters are all that stand between them and the same fate.

Wights - these powerful skeletal warriors are often placed in charge of their Soulblight Masters' undead armies while the vampires themselves infiltrate enemy forces or lead outflanking flying or cavalry assaults.  Some also serve as semi-elite bodyguard regiments escorting undead heroes.  As with the deathmages, they serve their vampire masters loyally, for they are aware enough to know that they will be ground up to serve as raw material for the bonereapers otherwise.

Skeletons/Zombies - with the Bonereapers ever hungry for raw materials, large standing armies of the undead are largely a thing of the past, and the slow speed of the undead, made even slower during daylight hours, makes it difficult to armies of such creatures with any speed.  However, large quantities of corpses are never hard to find in the mortal realms, allowing Soulblight Vampires and their Deathmage servants to raise massive armies of the undead with little advance warning on the eave of any battle.

Creatures of the night - The innate dominion of Vampires over lesser forms of undead extends to the various death-magic-tainted beasts and monsters that haunt Shyish and the darker corners of other realms.  These range from bats and wolves that carry the soulblight taint up to great undead monstrosities like Terrorgheists and Zombie Dragons animated and controlled by a vampire's dark influence.

Mortal Dregs - the mortal peoples under the dominion of the Soulblight Aristocracy are not soldiers, so they do not appear as an actual unit in the book.  However, they remain central to the narrative and theme of the army as a key resource cultivated for the blood to sustain their vampyric masters and the bodies to fill out their undead armies.  In exchange, these mortal peoples are defended from the depredations of Chaos and, as of the resolution to the lore section, the Tithe of the bonereapers.  Those under the thumb of the cruelest vampire masters, like Mannfred Von Carstein, are kept in constant terror, with public hunts and executions of potential dissidents keeping the rest in line.  Those ruled by more subtle vampires, like Neferata, are coddled and pampered, leading lives of idle bliss as the dead cater to their every desire... at least until they catch the eye of a hungry vampire and are spirited away to the palace of Nulahmia never to return.  Prince Vhordrai, on the other hand, does not maintain a standing flock of mortals at all.  Instead his castle the Blood Keep appears from the mists of Shyish at his will, and his knights ride out in a Blood Hunt to slaughter and feed on whatever unlucky locals they can round up and drag back to the feast halls.  Mortals who try to fight back instead of fleeing may, if they show enough skill and valor, instead be offered the opportunity to join his order of vampire knights.

Units:

Returning Units

• Neferata - but make her significantly stronger, with full soulblight lore access and additional offensive and defensive options.  In particular play up her manipulation and spy network abilities, possibly via options to redeploy your own army or force redeployment of part of the enemy army before the game, or to delay an enemy unit so it doesn't deploy normally and must instead walk onto the battlefield during the game, or the ability to turn enemy models against each other forcing a unit to make melee attacks against itself, that sort of thing.   Maybe force a unit to pass a bravery check before they can even target her.  If the blood empowered spell thing makes it into the rules, then other nearby vampires can take the wound to empower her spells.  She is the face and beating heart of the faction, the first vampire and queen of all others, she should get top narrative and mechanical billing, sort of like katakros does in OBR.
   
• Mannfred - again, stronger than his current form and focused on terror tactics.  Bravery penalties, forced bravery checks (but by another name so that bravery check immunity doesn't help), hit and run abilities, while maintaining his current outflanking / ambush gimmick.  If separate lores are maintained for vampires and deathmages, give him access to multiple spells of his choice taken from either lore.
   
• Vhordrai - he's pretty decent as is.  Maybe focus more on buffing his own attacks rather than using him to augment another hero's attacks.  Build up his healing and casting abilities a bit to match his new position as mortarch.
   
• Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon
• Blood Palanquin - but make it significantly stronger, particularly as a caster.  If the blood empowered spell lore makes it in, her blood cauldron can empower some of her spells without taking wounds.
• Coven Throne - put some extra spy network / manipulation rules here.
• Vampire Lord - with flight or no flight opitons, but going without flight gives some bonus - maybe a better save, or maybe an alternate deployment option.  Maybe that can represent the vampire spy concept without a separate unit entry?
• Mounted Vampire Lord (the trend has been to make these separate entries)
• Wight King - but ditch the black axe wight king, maybe include it as a possible magic item choice for wight kings, also ditch the mounted option unless a new model is made available for it, possibly dual kit with mounted vampire lord.
• Necromancer
• Mortis Engine - possibly now a hero and/or spellcaster in its own right.  Refluff the reliquary as carrying vampire remains instead of necromancer remains, let the mortis engine take over the lore of the old corpse cart, which is now a nighthaunt thing.
• Corpse Cart
• Blood Knights
• Vhargheist
• Fell Bats
• Dire Wolves - but rebranded as vampire wolves rather than zombie wolves & buffed a bit to match
• Grave Guard - but emphasize the 'guard' part by letting them soak wounds for nearby non-monster death heroes
• Black Knights - give them a bodyguard rule like grave guard to distinguish them from blood knights
• Skeleton Warriors - pretty much as now, maybe limite them to 1 extra attack for unit size
• Zombies - /maybe/.  Or maybe roll them in to skeleton warriors as a singular 'undead fodder' entry.
• Terrorgheist - or maybe not.  could leave them as a FEC thing and let them be included via allies.
• Zombie Dragon - or maybe not.  Maybe keep ZD as a mount only in soulblight, and leave unmounted big monsters to FEC.

New Units:

• Maybe a new named mounted vampire lord hero, possibly a favored lady consort and field general for Neferata, or maybe a herald of Nagash who travels shyish keeping an eye on the various soulblight factions.
• Maybe a vampire spy/assassin that can appear mid game out of a unit - potentially even an enemy unit, allowing the vampire to deploy mid game within melee range of an enemy unit, though if you try that there should be some risk that the spy is discovered and either killed outright or take wounds and be forced to deploy out of an allied unit instead.  or maybe this can be a special rule that can be given to vampire lords.

Models

New Models:

• Prince Vordrai - sharing one or two sprues with the current zombie dragon kit the way the named blood thirster shares some sprues with the generic blood thirster kit.
• Vampire Lord - with options for wings or cape
• Mounted Vampire Lord, possibly a dual kit with a new named hero and/or a mounted wight king, if that option is carried forward
• Vampire Spy, maybe, if that is implemented as a separate unit from regular vampire lords.
• Blood Knights - plastic 5 model kit
• Fell Bats - plastic 2 model kit
• Dire Wolves - redone as vampire wolves instead of zombie wolves, new models
• Endless Spells - including one 'swarm of bats' spell replacing bat swarms as a unit
   
• Zombies - if they're carried forward they need new models, preferably maintaining their current count of 20 per box.  If not getting new models, better to shift them to legends or tack a note saying to run them as skeleton warriors.  Regardless, drop the current kit.

note: ideally new vampire models should include a mix of genders.  At least one or two lady vampires in the blood knight unit, and at least one of the new vampire models should be a lady vampire or have options to be built as a lady vampire.  This could be as simple as some female head options - a fully armored body can be pretty gender neutral otherwise.  With coven throne and Neferata, the current range of vampire models isn't the worst sausage fest in age of sigmar, and skeleton models are pretty gender neutral by default, but I would like to see some badass, heavily armored vampire warrior ladies added to the range.  Miniac on youtube converted a female vampire champion for his kit bashed blood knight unit which is a good example of the kind of thing I'm envisioning here.  https://youtu.be/QRLrMap6yaU

Returning Models

• zombie dragon/terrorgheist
• coven throne/blood palanquin/mortis engine
• Necromancer, maybe recut with a round 32mm instead of the square 25mm
• Wight King, maybe recut with a round 32mm instead of the square 25mm
• black knights
• grave guard
• skeleton warriors
• corpse cart
• vargheists
• mannfred/neferata

Faction Terrain

• Maybe new models for multiple grave sites, or maybe just use the existing Sigmarite Mausoleum - either as a singular piece or multiple bits - as the soulblight faction terrain.

Box Sets

• Start Collecting 'Blood Hunt' highlighting new models: Mounted Vampire Lord, 5 blood knights, 2 fell bats, 5 dire wolves.  These models might temporarily be only available in this set, similar to the current slaves to darkness chaos box.
• Start Collecting Skeleton Horde - repackaged to show Neferata or Mannfred instead of Arkhan, otherwise unchanged

[Sception]

I cannot believe how badly my formatting got screwed up on that post, nor how completely unfixable it is.  That was supposed to be separate spoiler blocks, not nested, and when I try to edit the post, it won't even let me access the text within them, so I can't move it back out into separate sections.  Yeesh.  I am sorry about that.

Edited October 22, 2020 by Sception

[OkayestDM]

1 hour ago, Sception said:

I cannot believe how badly my formatting got screwed up on that post, nor how completely unfixable it is.  That was supposed to be separate spoiler blocks, not nested, and when I try to edit the post, it won't even let me access the text within them, so I can't move it back out into separate sections.  Yeesh.  I am sorry about that.

Regardless, it's a great write-up, and I'd love to see them go that route. I particularly like the idea for giving Neferatta an ability to force-redeploy an enemy unit, or force it to go into reserves, it's thematic as hell!

The rules would have to be treated carefully so it doesn't become too punishing for the other player, but also can't be turned to their advantage (as in, the unit is lost or delayed and therefore cannot benefit from things like Stormcast or Living Cities reserves rules.)

 

[Blueraven84]

Ok here goes hard wishlisting

It has to be battletome not some random offshoot underworlds warband with couple models.

If I can't get my old school heavy armoured vamps I want at least option for many sub lists of different themes.

All plastic and different style models regardless of the theme they come up with at GW

Horrors of the night and halloween ghoulies, though this might be closer to Legions of Nagash style book...

Bring back all tiers of vampires from lowly thralls to full blown Vargheist style monster (centerpiece model if Nagash is not in this book)

Different kinds of vampires from weak melee but great spell casters to dragon slaying blood dragon melee monster

Mansion on a hill might be too much asked for terrain piece but something cool

Shyish style undead farmers, or living allies

Ruleswise: Hard hitting vampires with something to help big monsters to stay on table more than one round.

Something to make it interesting to play, from summoning undead to making baby vamps from enemy heroes, not just your basic run to melee army

Endless spell or warscroll ability batswarm, for either movement or prevent enemy shooting

[Lanoss]

I’d like to see GW take them to vintage horror fantasy with all the classic horror movie tropes (Bram’s Stokers Dracula, Dracula Untold, Frankenstein, Van Helsing, Werewolves)

- Head Vampire, followed by a retinue of vampires 

- Elite Vampire Units

- Mortal units (entranced or enslaved by Vampires to do their bidding)

- ghoulish bats

- Werewolves

- Abominations 

And vampire units have powers/abilities to affect themselves and the board while also being difficult to kill. Abilities to (turn into a swarm of bats and) teleport, drain the life out of units (and heal), mask themselves in darkness, cripple enemies’ morale and ability to fight

[Honk]

I‘d love me some Horror-Castlevania-Vamp Counts book, hopefully GDubs has similar plans.

 I also would love a „Katakros-Rip-off“ for the centre pieces as Retinues or covens...

Necrarch Lord with Necromancers around

Queen of the night surrounded by her handmaidens and lackeys

with a unique bracketing System that kinda gives extra abilities.

 

but after I was excited for the big reveals last week and all I got was Warcry and underworld...

[lare2]

Simply because I have an obscene amount of skellies, I'd like the new vamps to be able to run with them. 

More than anything though... I'd just like some confirmation that this is gonna happen! 

[Sception]

22 hours ago, Sception said:

My wishlist probably looks pretty different from many others, and draws on the recent thread about Soulblight as a possible replacement for Legions of Nagash.

Book Concept:

[misc nested blocks here]

adding to this:

skeleton warriors - repackaged in a box of 20.

zombies - if maintained - new models in a box of 20, in an aesthetic style to match those pulling the corpse cart.

*IF* zombies are maintained as a unit (and honestly I'd like them to be, but they really *really* need new models in that case), then they're made more of a mannfred thing, to go with the classic gothic horror sylvanian type tropes.  His subfaction runs fewer vampires and more necromancers & lesser undead in general, as he prefers more subservient minions and is more cautious of potential rivals given his own long history of betrayals as warhammer's resident Starscream.   Skeletons then become more of a neferata thing, fitting with her ties to the old tomb kings.  Current grand host abilities buffing skeletons are shifted into the Neferata bloodline subfaction, along with its separate focuses on misdirection & manipulation and buffing hero level vampires particularly via enhancing their soulblight blood magic.   Vhordrai's blood-dragon-esque bloodline has access to lesser undead if they want, but their subfaction rules focus more on an elite all mounted build with battleline blood knights and so on.

In so far as this would be LoN 2.0 in the form of a soulblight book, Mannfred's Legion of Night would pick up some of the themes left over by Arkhan's abandoned Legion of Sacrament, while Neferata's Legion of Blood would take over some of the leftover gimmicks of Nagash's abandoned Grand Host.

Edited October 23, 2020 by Sception

[Gibs]

• Return of Vampire Lords as the cornerstone of the army
  • Including customization
  • Should be feared once again by both the living and the dead
• Bloodlines linked to your vampire lord/s
  • When they die all vampire units with the same bloodline are weakened 
• Mortal units - acting as a dual resource (aka aspiring vampires
  • Do they get the bite and ascend of get consumed to fuel your characters?? 
  • Elite vampires can consume mortal models (D3, D6, 2D6) to gain incrementally more powerful effects and/or recover from damage
  • Do you send your mortal units into the fray or hold them back as food for your vampires??
  • Move away from summoning skeletons (domain of other death factions now)
• Models
  • New larger Vampire Lord sculpts (on foot)
  • Élite foot slogging vampire knights (on foot)
  • Blood dragon cavalry
  • Mortal units as battleline (aspiring vampires, slaves or food!?)
  • New vampiric beasts to be summoned
• lore
  • New vampire family/line to challenge Nagash/Mannfred's rule over the Vampire race. Basically begin the split from LoN and let vampires have their own place in AoS.

 

Edited January 8, 2021 by Gibs

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

I'd like the new book to be an update or replacement for Legions of Nagash. For me that means:

• Existing Legions of Nagash playstyles are somewhat preserved
• No more sharing kits with Nighthaunt. They are separate now.
• LoN subfactions are built out to the point where they can stand on their own (this would mean 2-3 new kits each for Deathrattle, Deadwalkers and Soulblight)
• "Vampirates" are added as a shooty faction
• The book gets organized according to the Cities of Sigmar model: Some shared general allegiance abilites (Deathless Minions, Locus of Shyish) plus a choice of "city" which encourages building in a certain way.

Some example cities:

• Neo Vampire Counts: Vampires and their minions (creatures of the night, thralls...). Aggressive playstyle with a melee focus. Get bonuses for or heal by killing/wounding. Bloodlines mechanics.
• The Bone Zone: Deathrattle focussed. Can take 1 in 4 OBR. Retains something like Endless Legions, where they can bring back completely destroyed units. Fairly fast, lots of suicide charges.
• Zombietown: Deadwalkers. Endless horde. Grindy playstyle. Could maybe do something like summon a free unit from the board edge every turn.
• Wraithfleet v2: The vampirate faction. Shooty. Interacts with objectives somehow to convey that they are pirates stealing your treasure.
• The Monster Mash: Generalist faction which gives some bonuses to everything for those that want to mix it up.
• Necromancers: Magic bonuses. Summoning. Probably Deathmages heroes in control of Deathrattle and Deadwalker troops. 1 in 4 Nighthaunt?

I'd like an update to Nagash and Arkhan so they stay playable in the faction, too. Nagash should probably play more like he does in OBR, getting to heal himself and knowing the whole spell lore. Arkhan is just off-brand Nagash, so whatever. Maybe he gets an interesting home in the new book where he can bring a few of his new Null Myriad toys in.

[RocketPropelledGrenade]

3 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

 Arkhan is just off-brand Nagash, so whatever. Maybe he gets an interesting home in the new book where he can bring a few of his new Null Myriad toys in.

I like your ideas overall, but there's mechanical problems with this one. Namely, Ossiarchs don't play with command points, and don't play well without Relentless Discipline points. In all likelihood, that, more than any lore reason, was why they got zero allies, and it's why I don't think we'll see them being able to be souped in anywhere else.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

7 minutes ago, RocketPropelledGrenade said:

I like your ideas overall, but there's mechanical problems with this one. Namely, Ossiarchs don't play with command points, and don't play well without Relentless Discipline points. In all likelihood, that, more than any lore reason, was why they got zero allies, and it's why I don't think we'll see them being able to be souped in anywhere else.

I'm just wishlisting, that's a problem for the rules writers to solve 😎

Seriously though, I recognized that problem, too, but I think it's solvable. Maybe that faction would just get one RDP per turn in addition to normal command points.

[Gery81]

I am with Sception on this one,  I would just add a few more things.

- I would like to see a Necromantic bloodline, so we have four bloodlines in the book. Their mortarch, and centrepiece model could be a vampire on a Mortis engine.

- I want our endless spells to be our way of summoning. We already have some mechanics with soul-bound endless spells they could build upon.

- A way to join the activation wars. This could be achieved with spells, the Coven Throne (giving always fights last) or the Blood-seeker Palanquin (giving always strikes first). 

-Some way of defence against ranged attacks. Scouting batswarms, Flag of the bloodkeep (4+ against shooting), better deathless save, artifacts, spells, or something.

Otherwise, if we get what Sception envisioned, I am happy  

[Sception]

So earlier in the thread I posted a broken-formatted garglemess of my own take on a new soulblight book, and for part of the lore I proposed an invasion of Shyish by an Order force while the Nagash's Nighthaunt and Ossiarch forces are committed to battle against Chaos in the All Points, forcing Nagash to rely on the Soulblight Vampires and their lesser undead minions to defend his realm, and in the process reminding him of their value and reinforcing their otherwise slipping position within the hierarchies of the undead.  This invasion would provide the key narrative context for a hypothetical Soulblight-as-replacement-for-LoN faction going into their new battle tome.

It sounds like the actual direction of the game narrative may be moving in similar lines:

Granted, the details are quite different than what I had proposed.  I had envisioned a Stormcast & Cities based invasion aimed at freeing the people of Shyish.  This is a Lumineth invasion aimed at Nagash himself, punishing him for and possibly even attempting to undo the necroquake itself.  I had also proposed that the invasion itself be instigated and manipulated by Neferata for the direct purpose of re-establishing the power and importance of the vampires and their forces within Nagash's empire, but that particular twist seems significantly less likely with Teclis in charge.

Another possible difference to my proposed narrative: I had envisioned the undead /winning/.  Like, going back and forth a bit, but in the end winning completely because the order invasion plan hinged on the aid of the people they were attempting to liberate, and none of that is remotely viable for a Lumineth invasion.  They're not going to care about, let alone rely on the humans of Shyish.

But looking at this, I'm half expecting the Lumineth to win.  Or at least to win enough to force Nagash to withdraw his armies from the All Points to stop them?  Any way you slice it, the Vampires are the C team among the undead right now, the legions of last resort, and I'm still not fully convinced their new battle tome will be much more than a fresh coat of paint on the legions of nagash, with fewer new model kits total then the book is losing to Nighthaunt and OBR.  Mostly an oldhammer holdover book, a bone tossed to players with established collections so that other customers will feel more confident spending big money on the shiny new factions.  Shiny new factions like the Lumineth - a major, multikit release seeing significant additions to their faction in a second wave less than a year after the first kit's release.

If I were a betting man, I would not be putting money on the undead coming out on top in this particular narrative push.  Granted, I didn't bet on the undead doing as well as they did in the Wrath of the Everchosen campaign, either.  But there's a big difference between the two.  Wrath of the Everchosen was very much grounded in the overall AoS 2e narrative, and the 2e narrative overall has largely revolved around the Soul Wars generally and specifically the rising power of Nagash.  In many ways, 2nd edition AoS has been the 'Age of Nagash'.  But now it feels like we're approaching the end of 2nd edition, and much the way Malign Portents set up Nagash to take center stage in 2nd edition, the Shattered Realms books look like they might be pulling out the hook to drag Nagash off that stage so that other figures, in particular Slaanesh and the Elven gods - can take top billing in 3rd edition.

Edited January 22, 2021 by Sception

[lare2]

2 hours ago, Sception said:

the Shattered Realms books look like they might be pulling out the hook to drag Nagash off that stage so that other figures, in particular Slaanesh and the Elven gods - can take top billing in 3rd edition.

Agreed. I'd actually welcome the opportunity for Death to take a back seat as well. We've been riding high and continuously changing as an alliance since LoN dropped, in one form or another. Once the new vamps are out, it'd be cool narratively and model wise to consolidate on what the alliance is. 

Edited January 22, 2021 by lare2

[Honk]

So teclis still constipated and whining about Nagash doing big magic work, while pointy ear daffodil muncher seconds as lighttower of the realms?

Nagash had his spotlight, can take a throne nap and be like: Yeah, whatever you try GW, rules aside, can’t take them cows serious...