AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion

[Liquidsteel]

There was a strong performance from a Soulblight list this weekend at the Facehammer GT at Element Games, played by Tom Mawdsley (former Team England ETC player/captain).

Went 4-0-1 in the end, losing only in game 5 to the eventual winner and from what I heard, it came down to or was partly effected by Vhordrai fluffing his lines somewhat in an important combat phase.

Nevertheless it holds up what we already knew about Blood Knights, and I am pleased to see Grave Sand Shard make an appearance as I've been touting it as a strong choice in this meta, over the stock pick of Fragment of the Keep, especially when you factor in the re-rolling 1s on Deathless that banners offer. Not to say Fragment is bad, both are excellent, but nice to see it feature so well finally.

Even better is the cameo from Kritza, as well as seeing him forgo any low drops in favour of Vanguard/Hunters.

Worth pointing out his match ups, he played in to Archaon twice, Sons of Behemat twice, and a third list that I cannot see. So the list did not face any strong shooting it seems, though with so many blood knights it may not have been a problem anyway. I would like to have seen how that matchup would have gone against a strong opponent rounds 3/4/5.

Spoiler

Allegiance: Soulblight Gravelords
- Lineage: Kastelai Dynasty
- Grand Strategy: Hold the Line
- Triumphs: Bloodthirsty

Leaders
Prince Vhordrai (455)
- Lore of the Vampires: Amethystine Pinions
Vengorian Lord (280)*
- General
- Command Trait: Rousing Commander  
- Artefact: Grave-sand Shard  
- Universal Spell Lore: Levitate
Kritza, the Rat Prince (95)**

Battleline
5 x Blood Knights (195)***
5 x Blood Knights (195)***
5 x Blood Knights (195)***
5 x Blood Knights (195)**
5 x Blood Knights (195)**

Units
3 x Fell Bats (75)*
3 x Fell Bats (75)*

Core Battalions
*Battle Regiment
**Vanguard
***Hunters of the Heartlands

Total: 1955 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 0 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 123
Drops: 8

 

Edited September 13, 2021 by Liquidsteel

[Warmill]

9 minutes ago, Liquidsteel said:

There was a strong performance from a Soulblight list this weekend at the Facehammer GT at Element Games, played by Tom Mawdsley (former Team England ETC player/captain).

Went 4-0-1 in the end, losing only in game 5 to the eventual winner and from what I heard, it came down to or was partly effected by Vhordrai fluffing his lines somewhat in an important combat phase.

Nevertheless it holds up what we already knew about Blood Knights, and I am pleased to see Grave Sand Shard make an appearance as I've been touting it as a strong choice in this meta, over the stock pick of Fragment of the Keep, especially when you factor in the re-rolling 1s on Deathless that banners offer. Not to say Fragment is bad, both are excellent, but nice to see it feature so well finally.

Even better is the cameo from Kritza, as well as seeing him forgo any low drops in favour of Vanguard/Hunters.

Worth pointing out his match ups, he played in to Archaon twice, Sons of Behemat twice, and a third list that I cannot see. So the list did not face any strong shooting it seems, though with so many blood knights it may not have been a problem anyway. I would like to have seen how that matchup would have gone against a strong opponent rounds 3/4/5.

  Hide contents

Allegiance: Soulblight Gravelords
- Lineage: Kastelai Dynasty
- Grand Strategy: Hold the Line
- Triumphs: Bloodthirsty

Leaders
Prince Vhordrai (455)
- Lore of the Vampires: Amethystine Pinions
Vengorian Lord (280)*
- General
- Command Trait: Rousing Commander  
- Artefact: Grave-sand Shard  
- Universal Spell Lore: Levitate
Kritza, the Rat Prince (95)**

Battleline
5 x Blood Knights (195)***
5 x Blood Knights (195)***
5 x Blood Knights (195)***
5 x Blood Knights (195)**
5 x Blood Knights (195)**

Units
3 x Fell Bats (75)*
3 x Fell Bats (75)*

Core Battalions
*Battle Regiment
**Vanguard
***Hunters of the Heartlands

Total: 1955 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 0 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 123
Drops: 8

 

Really good performance, I've only been running Avengorii (Lauka Bae for lyfe!) so not overly familiar with blood knights, but my instinct was they would struggle against big tough heavy hitters, so happy to be proven wrong!

[Liquidsteel]

4 minutes ago, Warmill said:

Really good performance, I've only been running Avengorii (Lauka Bae for lyfe!) so not overly familiar with blood knights, but my instinct was they would struggle against big tough heavy hitters, so happy to be proven wrong!

I've been impressed with them in general, though have only got 2 units painted as I initially opted to run a horde style lists with lots of grave guard and zombies, only just about clearing my backlog (one more box of wolves to go and I'm there).

Rend -1 isn't great but damage 2 is nice, or damage 3 if you can rousing commander them in Kastelai. By spamming them you can force multiple combats so neuter the save stacking game.

I'll probably get up to 4 units total myself then see where we end up in January points, if it comes.

[Predien]

On 9/13/2021 at 4:14 AM, Warmill said:

Really good performance, I've only been running Avengorii (Lauka Bae for lyfe!) so not overly familiar with blood knights, but my instinct was they would struggle against big tough heavy hitters, so happy to be proven wrong!

What do your Avengorii lists look like? That's the dynasty I've been drawn to the most but haven't had much time to test out lists outside of a weird 2500pt event I went to before 3.0 came out and used them. What are your overall thoughts on Avengorii?

[TechnoVampire]

I know it’s been out a little while, but not heard much discussion about it. What do people think of vile transference since the FAQ:

‘Vile Transference is a spell that has a casting value of 7. If successfully cast, pick 1 enemy unit within 3" of the caster that is visible to them. Roll a number of dice equal to that enemy unit’s Wounds characteristic. For each 6, that unit suffers 1 mortal wound and you can heal 1 wound allocated to the caster.’

 

I’m considering using it on my VLOZD for extra survivability, but it feel situational and the 3” range kind of puts me off. 

 

 

 

[Btimmy]

1 hour ago, TechnoVampire said:

I know it’s been out a little while, but not heard much discussion about it. What do people think of vile transference since the FAQ:

‘Vile Transference is a spell that has a casting value of 7. If successfully cast, pick 1 enemy unit within 3" of the caster that is visible to them. Roll a number of dice equal to that enemy unit’s Wounds characteristic. For each 6, that unit suffers 1 mortal wound and you can heal 1 wound allocated to the caster.’

 

I’m considering using it on my VLOZD for extra survivability, but it feel situational and the 3” range kind of puts me off. 

 

 

 

I think its pretty solid tech v. giants, healing you 6 and dealing 6 mortals on average. Other than that its a big questionable. 

[Ghark]

Hi guys!

Just a quick question, how are you dealing with archers-heavy lumineth lists?

I've had two games against them, and each time I just can't approach them (this and the double turn which put the last nail in my coffin).

First list I tried was Kastelai with Vordrai, a VLoZD, 3*5 BK and 20 grave guards, the heavy hitters ran towards the lumineth block (2*10 archers, Teclis, some spearmen and a catalar) but got murdered.

Second list I tried was Avengorii with Lauka Vai, Radukar the beast, VLoZD, 5 BK,1 terror and 1 zombie dragon, with all "run and charge" abilities I could get, but it still ended up as target practising.

Is it even a good idea to try removing them from the table? Or shall I just run lists with many bodies and just play the objectives will I'm being shot at?

[oggurt_da_bog_zombie]

17 hours ago, Ghark said:

Hi guys!

Just a quick question, how are you dealing with archers-heavy lumineth lists?

I've had two games against them, and each time I just can't approach them (this and the double turn which put the last nail in my coffin).

First list I tried was Kastelai with Vordrai, a VLoZD, 3*5 BK and 20 grave guards, the heavy hitters ran towards the lumineth block (2*10 archers, Teclis, some spearmen and a catalar) but got murdered.

Second list I tried was Avengorii with Lauka Vai, Radukar the beast, VLoZD, 5 BK,1 terror and 1 zombie dragon, with all "run and charge" abilities I could get, but it still ended up as target practising.

Is it even a good idea to try removing them from the table? Or shall I just run lists with many bodies and just play the objectives will I'm being shot at?

I'm having a ton of trouble playing a shooting heavy Seraphon - Thunder Lizards monster list, just getting slaughtered before I can even get to any of their units. I suspect the play experience is similar to Lumineth -- a crazy hero phase then a ton of shooting -- although I haven't actually played a Lumineth list yet. The best ideas I've had so far have involved getting units to move across the board quick and act as screens, which is not easy for Soulblight. I think gravesites and movement shenanigans are key.

I tried putting my GG in a gravesite and waiting until one of the big shooty lizards was nearby, then popped up but my GG got shot off the board after failing a 9" charge, re-rolling the charge via Forward to Victory, then failing again. Relying on 9" charge after popping out of a gravesite is a long shot...

I've had some luck just throwing my VLoZD w/ Amethystine Pinions 20" across the board right into the shootiest units which is somewhat successful, but it puts the VLoZD at high risk for an early death.

To deal with the risk of losing my key units like VLoZD or Blood Knights early, I'm actually running a unit of Black Knights in an attempt to move 12" then get the auto 6" charge (from their hornblower ability) into a shooting unit to act as a cheap screen, die, then come back at half strength the next turn to ideally do it again. If I ran Vyrkos I'd probably do a similar thing with Dire Wolves, but I'm running Legion of Blood so Black Knights fill a Battleline slot which is great.

Not really useful unless you are running Neferata, but one of the nice things is Nef casting Dark Mist -- ignore rend when making saves -- on a Wight King w/ Steed general that has aura of dark majesty -- subtracting one to hit but melee only -- on a 3+ save makes him tank pretty well if he can make it across the table and into a shooting unit, keeping them tied up for awhile. I might switch to trying Aristocracy of Blood to get some re-rolls for charging but its wholly within only 12", which means I'd have to keep my battleline (GG,Skellies,Black Knights) and/or Blood Knights close.

I'm even running a Prismatic Palisade which is helpful if only to annoy the opponent into having to move around it to shoot.

The above is working... sort of... I feel like my strategy against shooting heavy lists is getting better but I'm sure others here have better ideas than I do. The problem with the above is it sorta takes my whole army to tie up shooting units, so I don't have anything left to actually do damage, cap objectives, etc.

Edited September 16, 2021 by oggurt_da_bog_zombie

[Warmill]

On 9/14/2021 at 8:08 PM, Predien said:

What do your Avengorii lists look like? That's the dynasty I've been drawn to the most but haven't had much time to test out lists outside of a weird 2500pt event I went to before 3.0 came out and used them. What are your overall thoughts on Avengorii?

I wrote the list when the book dropped before 3.0 because I love Lauka Vai and the venga boys, but it's turned out to actually be pretty good. Just cycle buffs, finest hours, mystic shields and all out defences to keep all the heroes on a 2+ save and run around living their best lives. Currently 5-1 with it, I lost in the final game of a local 1-dayer to a morathi bow snake list but heavily outscored them turns 1 and 2, if I'd played a bit better and had a bit more luck turn 3 I reckon I could've taken it but sadly the bow sneks took their toll and I had some bad whiffs at crucial moments.

[Malakithe]

Any guesses when Soulblight get its 3.0 book? Based on the new Warclans and SCE book the Soulblight one was definitely not made with 3.0 in mind.

[Liquidsteel]

21 minutes ago, Malakithe said:

Any guesses when Soulblight get its 3.0 book? Based on the new Warclans and SCE book the Soulblight one was definitely not made with 3.0 in mind.

I mean they are just guesses, but it probably won't? It came out on the fringe, some rules were definitely written with AoS 3.0 in mind (Riders of Ruin, removing the command ability on VLoZD etc).

I think we will get a White Dwarf issue with new Battalions, Tactics and Strategies and that might be it.

[BaylorCorvette]

40 minutes ago, Malakithe said:

Any guesses when Soulblight get its 3.0 book? Based on the new Warclans and SCE book the Soulblight one was definitely not made with 3.0 in mind.

If the new Warclans and SCE book are a glimpse of 3.0 books, I hope SBGL does not get another book for a long time. Stuff way simplified in the new books and pretty much removed all but a handful of Command Abilities. I really like SBGL book, only thing I would want going forward is a new unit or two and not a rewrite / update of the book. Plus this book just came out so I really do not think we will be getting another book for a few years.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

54 minutes ago, Malakithe said:

Any guesses when Soulblight get its 3.0 book? Based on the new Warclans and SCE book the Soulblight one was definitely not made with 3.0 in mind.

Gravelords do not seem to be having problems participating in AoS under the 3rd edition rules at the moment, so it's not like we are particularly in need of a new book. It's definitely possible that our faction won't get a 3rd edition book at all, or only towards the end of the edition again.

However, I think there is also a real chance that Gravelords jump the queue in ~1.5 years or so, much like Lumineth or Slaanesh. There is still room to flesh out the Vyrkos and Avengorii dynasties and a few sculpts like Grave Guard could still get updated in theory.

[BaylorCorvette]

In other news, I am preparing for a two day tournament down here in Houston, TX. I will be playing a Kastelai list which I've played at a single local tournament and ended up going 2-1 with. Over 80 people are signed up for this GT and here are some stats (lists are not public yet but the GT host posted these):

Armies

8 Sons of Behemat

7 Seraphon

6 Stormcast Eternals

6 Soulblight Gravelords

6 Daughters of Khaine

6 Ogor Mawtribes

5 Ossiarch Bonereapers

4 Orruk Warclans (2 Ironjawz, 1 Bonesplitterz, 1 Big Waaagh)

3 Flesh Eater Courts

3 Maggotkin of Nurgle

3 Kharadron Overlords

3 Nighthaunt

3 Skaventide

3 Idoneth Deepkin

2 Gloomspite Gitz

2 Disciples of Tzeentch

2 Legion of the First Prince

2 Lumineth Realm-Lords

1 Fyreslayers

1 Beasts of Chaos

1 Blades of Khorne

1 Slaves to Darkness

1 Hedonites of Slaanesh

1 Cities of Sigmar

Notable characters:

6 Morathi/The Shadow Queen

5 Gotrek Gurnisson

3 Yndrasta

3 Nagash

3 Kragnos

3 Lord Kroak

3 Be’lakor

3 Prince Vhordrai

2 Archaon

2 Mannfred

2 Arkhan the Black

2 Katakros

1 Teclis

Total number of Mega-Gargants: 21

Average Wounds (all lists):

116.125

Highest Wound Total:

183 (Big Waaagh)

177 (Gloomspite)

161 (Skaventide)

Lowest Wound Total:

72 (Tzeentch)

74 (Tzeentch)

76 (Ossiarchs)

Average Drops (all lists):

5.54

Highest Drop Total:

19 (Skaven)

15 (Beasts of Chaos)

14 (Stormcast)

Lowest Drop Total:

8 One Drop Lists

12 Two Drop Lists

13 Three Drop Lists

[Liquidsteel]

Very nice, which list will you be taking?

I'm giving the below a run out tonight against Sons of Behemat.

Allegiance: Soulblight Gravelords
- Lineage: Kastelai Dynasty
- Mortal Realm: Shyish
- Grand Strategy: Hold the Line
- Triumphs: Inspired

Leaders
Vengorian Lord (280)**
- General
- Command Trait: Rousing Commander
- Artefact: Grave-sand Shard
- Lore of the Vampires: Vile Transference
Prince Vhordrai (455)*
- Lore of the Vampires: Amethystine Pinions
Belladamma Volga, First of the Vyrkos (200)*
- Lore of the Vampires: Soulpike

Battleline
5 x Blood Knights (195)*
5 x Blood Knights (195)*
5 x Blood Knights (195)*
5 x Blood Knights (195)**
10 x Dire Wolves (135)*

Units
3 x Fell Bats (75)**

Endless Spells & Invocations
Umbral Spellportal (70)

Core Battalions
*Battle Regiment
**Battle Regiment

Total: 1995 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 0 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 122
Drops: 2
 

[Sception]

I doubt we'll see a new book soon, and good for it.  The more time that passes, the more chance of the design team moving away from the early 3e faction design paradigm.  The stormcast and orruk books aren't weak or boring, not if you stick to the new units anyway, but the flagrant difference in not just power level (that could be fixed with later points cost revisions) but effort and interesting rules between the new and old warscrolls is downright alarming, and the lack of depth to the faction and subfaction rules means you get your mechanical depth from your warscrolls in these books or you just don't get any.

I really don't like it.  When SBGL came out, I really thought we were a preview of what to expect from faction rules in 3e, especially with how some of our unit rules only made sense in the context of 3e core rules (eg 'Riders of Ruin' on the blood knights) - and I was pretty happy about that.  I thought the gravelords set a pretty solid precedent for a cool faction where nearly all of the units were interesting, had some clear effort put in by the designers (SBGL does a better job of making skeletons and zombies distinct units that are each worth fielding in their own right than any previous warhammer undead faction ruleset).  Yeah, Black Knights are a bit of a dud, and maybe a couple of the Ulfenkarn characters, but that's, what, a couple units out of a couple dozen?

Right now I'm just hoping the design of the Stormcast and Orruk books are a fluke, that they're weird because GW's trying to push the starter set stuff, and doesn't want new players why buy in to feel like they have to go chasing a bunch of old stuff to make their armies work.  Either way, the sooner GW moves away from these two the better.  In particular, I'm hoping we're off of this design style by the time the next Nighthaunt book is released, because they in particular really need and deserve a better ruleset this time around.

[Liquidsteel]

Yeah Nighthaunt were my first army but I was immediately pushed in to Legion of Grief, then gave up and went FEC and never looked back til Gravelords came out.

I've held on to the army though, collecting dust for the past 18 months, in the hope that an eventual new book gives me the impetus to play them properly.

[BaylorCorvette]

13 minutes ago, Liquidsteel said:

Very nice, which list will you be taking?
 

I'll be taking the below list. Prior to this I tested a list at a local tournament (and also a few casual games) that was basically the same but instead of the 20 Grave Guard it had a third unit of Blood Knights and a unit of 10 Skeletons. In all of those games the Skeletons never really did anything impactful. So IMO it came down to 5 Blood Knights vs 20 Grave Guard with Great Swords. The pure damage of the Grave Guard was a huge improvement (and gave me a lot more MW output overall). This list has several threats and to be very honest Prince Vhordrai has rarely pulled his weight for me (part of it is bad dice rolling), however what he does do is take A LOT of my opponents attention. The real damage is the Vengorian Lord with the two units of Blood Knights and popping Rousing Commander and then the Grave Guard swinging into something valuable. IF Prince V does kill some stuff then great. I'm in love with Belladamma Volga and I still believe she is one of the best models for her points in our book. She has served as a fantastic utility piece for me.

Allegiance: Soulblight Gravelords
- Lineage: Kastelai Dynasty
- Grand Strategy: Hold the Line
- Triumphs: Bloodthirsty

Leaders
Vengorian Lord (280) in Battle Regiment**
- General
- Command Trait: Rousing Commander
- Artefact: Fragment of the Keep
- Lore of the Vampires: Amethystine Pinions
Prince Vhordrai (455) in Battle Regiment*
- Lore of the Vampires: Amethystine Pinions
Belladamma Volga, First of the Vyrkos (200) in Battle Regiment*
- Lore of the Vampires: Amaranthine Orb

Battleline
5 x Blood Knights (195) in Battle Regiment*
5 x Blood Knights (195) in Battle Regiment*
10 x Dire Wolves (135) in Battle Regiment*
10 x Dire Wolves (135) in Battle Regiment**
20 x Deadwalker Zombies (115) in Battle Regiment**

Units
20 x Grave Guard (280) in Battle Regiment*
- Great Wight Blades
- Reinforced x 1

Core Battalions
Battle Regiment*
Battle Regiment**

Total: 1990 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 1 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 143

[Liquidsteel]

Yeah I can't leave Bella at home these days, she's been in almost every list I've tried recently. 

Vhordrai is definitely whiffy sometimes and I wish quickblood was easier to cast but alas it is what is, and thematically I have to take him.

[TechnoVampire]

On 9/15/2021 at 4:49 AM, Btimmy said:

I think its pretty solid tech v. giants, healing you 6 and dealing 6 mortals on average. Other than that its a big questionable. 

I feel the same. I don’t play competitively, and no one in my group uses SOB so I’ll probably give it a miss and go for pinions or flaming weapon. 
 

thanks for weighing in. 

[Predien]

I've got a doubles tournament this weekend and decided to bring SBLG to it since my partner is playing a board control list of LFP. Each person could only bring 1 monster so I wanted to try out Kastelai. This is what I'm bringing:

Allegiance: Soulblight Gravelords
- Lineage: Kastelai Dynasty
- Grand Strategy:
- Triumphs:
Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon (435)
- General
- Deathlance
- Command Trait: Swift and Deadly
- Artefact: Amulet of Destiny (Universal Artefact)
- Universal Spell Lore: Flaming Weapon
Radukar the Beast (315)
5 x Blood Knights (195)
5 x Blood Knights (195)
3 x Fell Bats (75)
The Burning Head (20)

Total: 1235 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 0 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 65
Drops: 5

Will end up doing a Battle Regiment so it's only a 2 drop. Not sure what our grand strategy will be but I think this will pair nicely with my partner's list. 

[Malakithe]

Yeah I thought the Soulblight book was sort of a beta test style book for 3.0. Which it could have been given that going forward the other books are formatted very differently. Im not saying we need a new book at all, its fine, but its definitely not a 3.0 book now.

As much as I hate getting piecemeal rules from WD that is probably what will happen for stuff like the core battalions. 

[Honk]

5 hours ago, Malakithe said:

As much as I hate getting piecemeal rules from WD that is probably what will happen for stuff like the core battalions. 

Need to sell those WH+ subscriptions 😇

5 hours ago, Malakithe said:

the Soulblight book was sort of a beta test style book for 3.0.

With all the production hiccups and in your face explosions, AoS 3.0 is a bit messy… it feels a bit like LoN, when it dropped before 2.0

But as many stated above, we have all the tools to compete at top level, Mortals, Monsters and Mobs…

the rules are very nice and interesting, we have a lot of variety to play around with. looking at other factions (obr, nh) we transitioned very smoothly. Sure we didn’t get the cheese package like SoB, but we can field most lists and not be outright banned for friendly games 😇😈

[Malakithe]

52 minutes ago, Honk said:

Need to sell those WH+ subscriptions 😇

With all the production hiccups and in your face explosions, AoS 3.0 is a bit messy… it feels a bit like LoN, when it dropped before 2.0

But as many stated above, we have all the tools to compete at top level, Mortals, Monsters and Mobs…

the rules are very nice and interesting, we have a lot of variety to play around with. looking at other factions (obr, nh) we transitioned very smoothly. Sure we didn’t get the cheese package like SoB, but we can field most lists and not be outright banned for friendly games 😇😈

Oh im not saying the current book is bad or we need a new one. I was just pointing out that after everyone was saying it was designed as a 3.0 book it turns out that it wasnt. It was just a beta test that was thrown out.

I dont like how they are stripping the unique command abilities away. I do like the different versions of core battalions though.

[Holy_Diver]

Hi, death people, here's the thing: a friend of mine (long time death player) almost lost hope of playing his favorite army and started buying SoB. Now, me and others have decided to challenge him with lists that he believes are underperforming, and I, who have never touched a death model, will play Soulblight.

Where can i start creating a tournament list? I played against Vyrkos and legion of the night, but Vyrkos seems better now.

ps: if anything should interest the experiment I will post the battle reports. 😁