Lords of the Mortal Realms - Death Previews

[El Syf]

Kind of hoping Soulblight Gravelords releases after third edition.  Even though I'm only getting older 😅

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

18 minutes ago, Sception said:

"Ulfenwatch" is not a kind of unit, it is the name of the city guard of Ulfenkarn, the setting of Warhammer Quest: Cursed City, specifically.  It would not make sense for there to be a unit called ulvenwatch outside of that setting.

As for what the ulfenwatch would be called elsewhere, they are in fact referred to as skeleton warriors in their preview article on warhammer community. (link)

"While an individual skeleton warrior shouldn’t cause your party much trouble, they will be inspired to fight even harder by their banner bearer, so make sure that you try to take him out first."  (emphasis added)

So yeah, these guys are almost certainly skeleton warriors.  I could see these new armored skeleton warriors *replacing* both the current skeleton warriors and grave guard, leaving us with just one skeletal infantry unit, but I absolutely cannot see them coexisting with both.  Grave guard are only barely, fractionally, marginally more elite than regular skeleton warriors.  Offensively and defensively they're barely any different.  there really isn't room for a 'mid point' unit between them because there is no space between them for such a unit to occupy.  If anything, grave guard are already too close in ability to skeleton warriors to begin with.

So yeah, I barely see room for two skeletal infantry units, certainly not three, especially with a bunch of new units being added, and double especially with some rumors that FEC might be getting folded back into this faction as well.

I pretty much agree with this, and the point about the Ulfenwatch being referred to as skeleton warriors is in the community articel is solid, too. I am currently leaning towards them just being variant Skeleton Warriors sculpts, then. Let's hope they stay on 25mm bases if that is the case.

Although I don't think you are giving Grave Guard enough credit. They have a pretty insane damage output for infantry because they are on 25mm bases and can easily be buffed with extra attacks. They are just outclassed by Grimghast Reapers right now.

I suppose there is another option, which is Grave Guards getting a warscroll rewrite to be more elite, which would make room for the Ulfenwatch as a mid point. But at that point, Grave Guard would be more elite than Mortek Guard (the two units are already nearly the same), so that seems unlikely.

It could also be possible (although unprecedented, I think) to treat the Ulfenwatch plus Halgrim like a Warcry or Underworlds warband, where they are playable as a special unit of 11 models. Again, though, what makes this unlikely is that the Ulfenwatch really seems like just another normal skeleton warrior unit without special abilities that would make this an interesting option.

[Sception]

29 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Although I don't think you are giving Grave Guard enough credit. They have a pretty insane damage output for infantry because they are on 25mm bases and can easily be buffed with extra attacks. They are just outclassed by Grimghast Reapers right now.

I suppose there is another option, which is Grave Guards getting a warscroll rewrite to be more elite, which would make room for the Ulfenwatch as a mid point. But at that point, Grave Guard would be more elite than Mortek Guard (the two units are already nearly the same), so that seems unlikely.

They only have one point more armor than skeletons, and while their attacks are better, skeletons at full unit size have fully twice as many attacks per model, before you even get to any buffs.  And skeletons are around half as many points per model, and battleline by default.  It's the comparison to basic skeleton warriors that has left grave guard largely without a niche in AoS since basically day one.  The introduction of Grimghasts just highlighted in stark relief now not-elite grave guard really are by showing what an elite undead infantry at their approximate points value unit could be.

I could see grave guard getting a stronger warscroll if they also get new models, which is a possibility I suppose.  I still don't see room for three different skeletal infantry units in a faction that also has zombie infantry, possibly vampire infantry, and maybe even ghoul infantry as well.

We'll see, though.  I wouldn't exactly be complaining if it happened, it just seems really unlikely to me.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

3 minutes ago, Sception said:

They only have one point more armor than skeletons, and while their attacks are better, skeletons at full unit size have fully twice as many attacks per model, before you even get to any buffs.  And skeletons are around half as many points per model, and battleline by default.  It's the comparison to basic skeleton warriors that has left grave guard largely without a niche in AoS since basically day one.  The introduction of Grimghasts just highlighted in stark relief now not-elite grave guard really are by showing what an elite undead infantry at their approximate points value unit could be.

A last comment on this matter because it's off topic, but I think you are under-valuing Grave Guard.

The niche of Grave Guard over Skeleton Warriors is as an offensive unit. They are not worth for their extra armour. Skeletons do the job of a defensive unit much better just in virtue of being a lot cheaper per wound alone. That's why I would always take Grave Guard with two hand weapons and pretend the shield option does not even exist.

Offensively, Grave Guard are a lot better than Warriors, however. If you compare 40 skeletons with spears against 26 Grave Guard (because if you can get 40 skeleton warriors into combat in three ranks, you are guaranteed to be able to fit at least 26 Grave Guard in two ranks), Grave Guard are better against every save except '-'. Often, quite significantly better.

Crucially, Grave Guard also absorb buffs better than Warriors. +1 attack is a lot more valuable on them, simply because they get fewer, higher quality attacks comparatively. They can reach some pretty insane levels of damage under ideal circumstances. Offensively, they are not just a little bit better than Warriors. They are absolute blenders that are able to take down nearly anything they get into combat with, while Warriors will bounce off anything with a 3+ save or better even in the best case. Not to mention skeleton warriors lose a lot of their offensive presence if they drop below 30 models, due to them losing their bonus attacks. Grave Guard lose offensive presence linearly with model loss, while Warriors lose it at an accelerated rate. So while 40 skeletons vs. 26 grave guard looks somewhat close, 20 vs. 13 is no contest.

What holds them back, in my opinion, is that Grimghast Reapers are faster and more defensive, while also flying and being ethereal. Plus, they don't need much in terms of support. The only way to make Grave Guard really worth it right now is in Deathmarch, I think, because in that build they are suddenly not just fighty, but also fast enough to actually get into combat. And in that build, I would actually take 30 of them every time. There is just little reason to do so otherwise, while Reapers exist.

[lare2]

Related to the guard vs. skellies debate, I fully expect NH to be pulled out of Soulblight Gravelords. Maybe allies but I can't see NH being included in a manner comparable to how they're used in LoN. 

I personally think we'll have 4 very distinct Death factions after this (OBR, FEC, NH, and SBG) with very little overlap beyond allies.

Edited February 22, 2021 by lare2

[Honk]

3 hours ago, Sception said:

we might see newer, beefier, heavier grave guard as well.

What are you talking about?!? Who would think about that? That´s not happening...

*looks at the Kosargi Nightguard*

 

Although, if the bloodlines are dried up, and the new setting is more Horror and Transylvanian Vampires, I would also like to have some Frankenstein monsters or Necromantic Abomination so i can have Skellis, vamps and monsters as triumvirate of Death

[Lich King]

26 minutes ago, lare2 said:

Related to the guard vs. skellies debate, I fully expect NH to be pulled out of Soulblight Gravelords. Maybe allies but I can't see NH being included in a manner comparable to how they're used in LoN. 

I personally think we'll have 4 very distinct Death factions after this (OBR, FEC, NH, and SBG) with very little overlap beyond allies.

Agreed - with the exception that FEC may in fact merge into SBG. I always thought that faction should’ve been just a “Legion of Hunger” or something like that in the LON Tome. Just too few kits to feel like its own thing. They can keep the fluff and all and just be a smaller part of a large faction easily. After all, these were all once under Vampire Counts anyway - which is a force I enjoy most. Multiple different undead creatures fighting under a Death Lord or Vampire.

[Sception]

38 minutes ago, Honk said:

What are you talking about?!? Who would think about that? That´s not happening...

I wouldn't have thought we'd be getting new skeleton warriors, either, but here we are.  Anything is possible.

As for bloodlines, I fully expect to see bloodlines as the subfactions, but rather than the oldhammer ones I'd expect new bloodlines to be based on our existing AoS named Vampires - Manfred (necromantic magic, beasts of the night, focus on zombies, necromancers, and other lesser undead troops and heroes over vampires since Mannfred, ever the traitor, is afraid of being betrayed), Neferata (blood magic, nobility/command/intrigue/politics, focus on vampiric heroes with serried skeletal ranks filling out the army), and Vhordrai (martial power over magic, small armies of elite vampire cavalry with comparatively little use of lesser undead).  Maybe a fourth bloodline for FEC if they get rolled into the book (I don't expect or even really want them to be, but it could happen).  Plus maybe some rules for generic bloodlines like how the current FEC book has generic delusion rules if you don't use one of the named courts.

That's all guess work and wish listing, though.

The one thing that I wish for more than anything else is for Neferata to finally get her due as a proper impressive and scary faction leader, with new rules that make her has iconic to the new soulblight as Katakros is to OBR.  As the Queen of all vampires and the first of their kind, she really deserves it, and her past rules have never really lived up to that.  This is also why I desperately hope they DO NOT bring back vlad, abhorash, or any of the other random old world vampire dudes who were constantly stealing her thunder.

Edited February 22, 2021 by Sception

[JackStreicher]

I‘ll just get 20+ of Halgrims Skeletons to add them to my 80 other bones boys  👌🏻

[Sception]

4 hours ago, El Syf said:

Kind of hoping Soulblight Gravelords releases after third edition.  Even though I'm only getting older 😅

Despite it being seemingly very unlikely for Death to get to be in two edition starter boxes in a row, there's a very distinct possibility that the gravelords might be one of the starter box factions for 3e.  If only because they're supposedly coming 'later this year', but we've still got the new lumineth release wave and army book, and at least two broken realms campaign books coming out before the 3rd edition release, and then we'll have the third edition release, and then we'll have the inevitable new army book and release waves for the two factions that are /in/ the starter box before anything else has a chance to release, and all that's on top of releases for other games including 40k.  If the gravelords aren't one of the two starter box factions for 3rd edition, well it's still possible to fit them in before the end of the year, but it mean cramming some pretty big releases in pretty close together.

[Sception]

Shifting from grousing about potential price point concerns to a more positive note, the more time that passes from the preview, the more I absolutely adore the new mounted wight king.

Part of why I'm so excited for this model is because I wasn't sure "wight king on skeletal steed" was going to continue to be an option going forward. In fact, I had kind of resigned myself to the idea that the option was probably going to be removed, so this confirmation that the option will continue into the new battle tome comes as something of a relief.

But more than that is just the model itself, which is just fantastic model in its own right.  In particular, it's very evocative of the classic Warhammer Armies: Undead artwork and aesthetic, just updated to take advantage of GW's improved model making abilities. There's distinct, recognizable elements brought forward not just from the old metal mounted wight king (the helmet, the shield emblem), but also from other classic undead models. The steed's barding takes queues from the old Red Duke model in particular (the barding on the steeds neck) while blending it with more modern design elements taken from the black knight models this wight king will most likely be fielded alongside (the layered plate/chain/cloth barding on the steed's body).

This kind of faithful, almost reverential update of a classic model blending in modern design elements and elevating the result to spectacular new heights is a treatment that up till now had mostly been reserved for faction-defining special characters like Abaddon the Despoiler or Sigvald the Magnificent. Seeing that kind of effort and care lavished on a relatively minor character model like the Wight King makes me feel like the Soulblight Gravelords release could really be something special.

[lare2]

Agreed. I love it and it makes me feel very happy for remaining loyal to my skellies for many a hard year.

How big do you think it will be? Varanguard size? Dracoth maybe? Black Knight? A horse is just a horse, after all. 

[Sception]

I think he's on a 60mm oval base, which would make him just barely enough bigger than a black knight to stand out as a hero model without being so much bigger as to look like a different kind of creature.  But that's pure guesswork & speculation.

[Sception]

The leg armor on this guy also looks to be from the Red Duke, so that's pretty cool.  A lot of nods to a model that formed the basis of more than a few mounted wight king conversions back in the day.

Edited February 25, 2021 by Sception

[El Syf]

I'm guessing Knight of Shrouds size?  Look similar from photos at any rate, 

[Lich King]

Agreed with all - at first I was like “cool but let’s see a full release / blood knights “. But as time goes on I really appreciate all of the detail on him and maybe a future purchase after all ..

[Sception]

 

24 minutes ago, El Syf said:

I'm guessing Knight of Shrouds size?  Look similar from photos at any rate, 

I think it'll end up being a smaller than the knight of shrouds.  The 2e nighthaunt models in general, apart from the chainrasps, are all pretty big.  The knight of shrouds in particular is on a 75mm oval base, and I think this Wight King might be on a 60mm.  Even if they're on the same base size, the KoS is a lot taller, kind of squished in a bit horizontally in order to looms over that base more vertically, where as the wight king's steed is kind is sprawled out more yet still easily fits on it's base, whatever sized base that is.

So yeah, I think this guy's going to be smaller than a mounted knight of shrouds, and significantly smaller than a liege kavalos.  A fair bit in both respects, actually.  That might just be wishful thinking on my part, as I don't want a wight king to be huge.  They're not big powerful charismatic army leaders like the knight of shrouds or liege kavalos.  In oldhammer parlance they're 'heroes', not 'lords'.  The gravelord equivalent to those models should be a vampire lord, not a wight king.  Between underworlds, warhammer quest, and the leaked gravelord release there will be a number of nice new infantry vampire lord models to choose from.  Hopefully there will be a proper impressive cavalry vampire lord model as well.  We'll see.

As for the wight king, though, yeah I think he'll be pretty small, more or less in line with the black knights, but there's no telling for sure until it's in hand.

[lare2]

1 hour ago, El Syf said:

I'm guessing Knight of Shrouds size?  Look similar from photos at any rate, 

Good shout. I think that'd work well. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

18 hours ago, Sception said:

Shifting from grousing about potential price point concerns to a more positive note, the more time that passes from the preview, the more I absolutely adore the new mounted wight king.

Part of why I'm so excited for this model is because I wasn't sure "wight king on skeletal steed" was going to continue to be an option going forward. In fact, I had kind of resigned myself to the idea that the option was probably going to be removed, so this confirmation that the option will continue into the new battle tome comes as something of a relief.

But more than that is just the model itself, which is just fantastic model in its own right.  In particular, it's very evocative of the classic Warhammer Armies: Undead artwork and aesthetic, just updated to take advantage of GW's improved model making abilities. There's distinct, recognizable elements brought forward not just from the old metal mounted wight king (the helmet, the shield emblem), but also from other classic undead models. The steed's barding takes queues from the old Red Duke model in particular (the barding on the steeds neck) while blending it with more modern design elements taken from the black knight models this wight king will most likely be fielded alongside (the layered plate/chain/cloth barding on the steed's body).

This kind of faithful, almost reverential update of a classic model blending in modern design elements and elevating the result to spectacular new heights is a treatment that up till now had mostly been reserved for faction-defining special characters like Abaddon the Despoiler or Sigvald the Magnificent. Seeing that kind of effort and care lavished on a relatively minor character model like the Wight King makes me feel like the Soulblight Gravelords release could really be something special.

There is one thing in particular that I appreciate about GW Skeletons is that they don't deform their skulls to give them cartoon angry skeleton expressions like a lot of model companies do. This image of mantic skeletons shows what I mean pretty well:

And yet, with the two Wight Kings they have managed to make them expressive and give them personality. For the new Wight King on Steed, they have actually done something incredibly smart: They used his helmet and the horse's armour to suggest facial expressions. The rim of the Wight Kings helmet gives him a brow line that he would not otherwise have, and the horse's armour partially covers it's eye sockets to give it an menacing expression. It's just such a smart move that makes the models much more expressive without becoming cartoony.