Cities of Sigmar in AoS 3

[Ravinsild]

19 hours ago, readercolin said:

From the cities themselves, the only real monster hero's are the Freeguild General on Griffon, the Dreadlord on Black Dragon, and the Annointed on Phoenix.  Of those 3, the Freeguild General is likely the killiest... and this isn't exactly saying much.  The Dreadlord on Black dragon can be very killy, but it can also whiff and do exactly nothing (the most common case in my experience).  Finally, the Annointed on Frostheart Phoenix is a good, durable support piece, but it isn't really something that you can just chuck in and let it go to town like the Maw Krusha.  Finally, the Annointed on Flamespyre Phoenix... yeah, the less that is said on that, the better.

However, all is not lost.  Why?  Because we still have Coalition and Allied monsters to draw from.  Do keep in mind though that all the coalition units can benefit from allegience abilities and artefacts, but none can be your general.  Your allies have to stand on the weight of their own warscroll though.

Almost every city gets stormcast coalition, and there are a few good stormcast combat monsters.  First off, you have Krondys and Karazai, both of which are probably a little overcosted for what they do, but can be solid centerpieces in your cities army.  Celestant Prime remains a hammer from the heavens, and arguably is stronger in the Cities than in stormcast itself.  After that... things drop off pretty hard, and the only other combat monster I would consider bringing would be a Knight-Draconis, as he is a solid artefact carrier and a reasonably tanky and killy hero.  However, if you want to feel really spicy, you can consider bringing bastion.

After stormcast, Cities still have a number of coalition options, but these will all lock you into a single city.

The first city to consider is Har Kuron, which restricts you to basically the old Dark Elf lineup (and also no stormcast coalition), but you get Daughters of Khaine as coalition.  The relevant unit here?  Morathi.  So if you liked the old dark elves, but still want an excuse to run morathi, then you can try this city out.

Next up, Tempest Eye.  Here, you get coalition Kharadron Overlords, which don't really have combat monsters in the same way that the maw krusha is, but you still can get a fabulous centerpiece in the Ironclad.

For the next city, we can look at the living city and their coalition Sylvaneth.  Now, there are only really 3 units to consider from the sylvaneth, and if we are being honest... none of them is particularly great outside of Sylvaneth.  First is the Spirit of Durthu, who is an excelent combat monster, but gets betrayed by the fact that the Living City doesn't really get wyldwoods, and he has to be near them to get +2 attacks for his 6 damage sword.  Second is Drycha, and probably the best choice of monster as she can still do most of her work without any sylvaneth dependencies, but she is still only a 300ish point monster.  Finally, you get Alarielle.  Alarielle is a solid monster, but without other sylvaneth to buff, she is likely not going to be worth the 740 points (or whatever she is currently at) to try to run her.

Moving on, we get Settlers Gain, which lets you bring Lumineth.  Now, lumineth isn't exactly known of for being combat monsters, and settlers gain allegience abilities are honestly kind of trash.  However, if you want to run Teclis but don't want to have to paint a whole fiddly army of Lumineth, you can do so here, or you can run one of their Cow Mountains.

Finally, we move on from coalition units and get to allies.  Here, there are only really 4 allies of note to consider.

Firstly, you have Gotrek.  If you have somehow gotten this far without ever coming across the ginger ninja, just know that he is quite possibly the killiest individual unit in the entire game.  He gets 6 attacks at 3+/3+/-2/3... but he also gets to re-roll all hit and wound rolls, and any 6's to hit result in d6 mortal wounds in addition.  In case that wasn't enough, he also gets to fight a second time at the end of the combat phase if he is still near an enemy unit.  But, you may then be wondering how anyone would let him survive that long... to which I say he is utter BS.  Yes, he only has a 4+ save and 8 wounds, but he also reduces all damage dealt to him by a single attack/ability/whatever to 1, AND he has a 3+ ward on top of that.  The only reason why Gotrek isn't literally everywhere is that he is only a 4" move unit, so getting all that killing power to a target is the hardest part of running him.

Next up, and definitely failing to live up to the ginger ninja's raw killing power, you get Bundo Whalebiter.  As a megagargant, bundo is a solid mountain of wounds, with a reasonable attack profile as well.  Personally, I'm not a fan of megagargants, but if you are, then he is a solid consideration.

More recently, we now can run the Incarnate as an ally.  The incarnate is a solid monster hunter (just ignore anything it says about endless spells), and also has the advantage of not dying/going down a level until the battleshock phase, meaning you can just throw it into stuff and then not worry too much.

Finally, there is one unit that is potentially worth considering as an ally that isn't in any potential coalition cities.  That is the Runefather on Magmadroth.  For 360 points, you get an ally with a 4+ save, 16 wounds, and ~13 damage before saves.  Sadly, he can't benefit from any allegience abilities, but he can still give himself an extra attack on all his profiles once per game, and if someone comes after him in melee, he can blead on them for extra mortal wounds.

-----------

In conclusion, the best "combat monsters" would probably be Krondys, Karazai, Gotrek, and the incarnate.  After that, there are a bunch of fun choices that you can choose from, but nothing that really stands out at the same level that a Maw Krusha does.

Thank you for the in depth break down! 

[Clan's Cynic]

Looking like we might have an idea of what the redesigned Freeguild could look like. Chaos Legionnaires appear to be very similar to the 2.0 banner artwork. Traitor Freeguild?

[zilberfrid]

On 4/24/2022 at 6:46 PM, Ravinsild said:

Thank you for the in depth break down! 

It's probably no longer relevant, but with a Ghur battlemage, you can speed Gotrek up. With a Chamon one, you can slow enemies down.

[Popisdead]

On 6/17/2022 at 2:24 AM, Clan's Cynic said:

Looking like we might have an idea of what the redesigned Freeguild could look like. Chaos Legionnaires appear to be very similar to the 2.0 banner artwork. Traitor Freeguild?

 

That looks very reminiscent of early to mid 1980s.  Which is not uncommon from GW these days.

[readercolin]

So I have been looking at Cities in GHB2022 season 1, and most of my army builds are kind of shot.  The core of many of my armies has been an annointed (on foot or frostheart) and then 20-40 phoenix guard which are battleline as my hammer/anvil.  However, Phoenix Guard are noticeably worse in the new season if they are battleline, as now they are taking double damage from bounty hunter units (and so far, the bounty hunter battalion has been really, really popular locally).  If they aren't battleline though, then I am paying between 270-330 points extra for 3 units of battleline, and my armies usually didn't have enough points to support that without making some significant changes.

My other competitive cities build was a living cities build with 4 stormdrakes and 4 fulminators... this obviously is no longer viable as well.

So what have you been experimenting with in the Cities with the new GHB, and how has that worked out for you?

[Jaskier]

Having run the 4 Stormdrakes and 4 Fulminators list prior, I'm gonna try something very different next - Living City (for the ambush) with 30 Darkshards and some other shooting elements in conjunction with either Krondys casting a Purple Sun at +3 or a Sorceress with Master of Magic plus a Stardrake to cast at +3 with a re-roll. The main benefit to Krondys is he has his own -1 to saves spell to combo for -2 to saves with the Purple Sun. We have super efficient shooting in terms of forcing wounds but the tradeoff has always been lack of Rend outside of Irondrakes, but with the -1s from Purple Sun and/or Krondys it can really tune up otherwise decent shooting units. The nerf to Living City as a combat list hurts but I'm willing to give the rend-stacking a try. 

I don't think it'll be that competitive but I'm gonna give it a run anyway!

Edited July 15, 2022 by Jaskier

[readercolin]

After some consideration, I think I'm going to look to build something that looks like this:

Allegiance: Cities of Sigmar
- City: Tempest's Eye
- Grand Strategy:
- Triumphs: Indomitable

Leaders
Celestial Hurricanum with Celestial Battlemage (290)
- Lore of Eagles: Aura of Glory
Runelord (95)
- General
- Command Trait: Hawk-eyed
- Artefact: Patrician's Helm
- Universal Prayer Scripture: Curse
Anointed (110)
- Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact)
- City Role: General's Adjutant
- Lore of Eagles: Aura of Glory

Battleline
10 x Longbeards (105)***
- Ancestral Weapons & Shields
10 x Longbeards (105)***
- Ancestral Weapons & Shields
30 x Irondrakes (510)***
- Reinforced x 2

Units
20 x Phoenix Guard (350)*
- Reinforced x 1
20 x Phoenix Guard (350)*
- Reinforced x 1

Endless Spells & Invocations
Purple Sun of Shyish (70)

Core Battalions
*Bounty Hunters
**Command Entourage - Magnificent
***Expert Conquerors

Additional Enhancements
Artefact

Total: 1985 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 4 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 111
Drops: 8

This gives a solid frontline of phoenix guard without opening them up to bounty hunters, as well as the shooting hammer that Cities is good with, and the ability to cast the Purple Sun on a +2 (+1 from hurricanum, +1 from it being an endless spell) so your irondrakes can potentially be hitting on rend -3.  A list like this could also work in Hallowheart, and I'm not actually that sure how much you need the annointed over say, a battlemage or a sorceress (or even a knight-incantor) if you take an artefact or command trait that gives battleshock immunity.

[Thugmullet]

Been a bit quiet here.

Anyone had a game lately and got a battle report they can post up?  Or something of the like.

Any played experiences of how the new GV units have affected Cities?

[Triz Varnor]

On 7/15/2022 at 6:02 PM, readercolin said:

After some consideration, I think I'm going to look to build something that looks like this:

Allegiance: Cities of Sigmar
- City: Tempest's Eye
- Grand Strategy:
- Triumphs: Indomitable

Leaders
Celestial Hurricanum with Celestial Battlemage (290)
- Lore of Eagles: Aura of Glory
Runelord (95)
- General
- Command Trait: Hawk-eyed
- Artefact: Patrician's Helm
- Universal Prayer Scripture: Curse
Anointed (110)
- Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact)
- City Role: General's Adjutant
- Lore of Eagles: Aura of Glory

Battleline
10 x Longbeards (105)***
- Ancestral Weapons & Shields
10 x Longbeards (105)***
- Ancestral Weapons & Shields
30 x Irondrakes (510)***
- Reinforced x 2

Units
20 x Phoenix Guard (350)*
- Reinforced x 1
20 x Phoenix Guard (350)*
- Reinforced x 1

Endless Spells & Invocations
Purple Sun of Shyish (70)

Core Battalions
*Bounty Hunters
**Command Entourage - Magnificent
***Expert Conquerors

Additional Enhancements
Artefact

Total: 1985 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 4 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 111
Drops: 8

This gives a solid frontline of phoenix guard without opening them up to bounty hunters, as well as the shooting hammer that Cities is good with, and the ability to cast the Purple Sun on a +2 (+1 from hurricanum, +1 from it being an endless spell) so your irondrakes can potentially be hitting on rend -3.  A list like this could also work in Hallowheart, and I'm not actually that sure how much you need the annointed over say, a battlemage or a sorceress (or even a knight-incantor) if you take an artefact or command trait that gives battleshock immunity.

What do you think about your list ? Have you tested it ? What's your feedback ?

I would like to try something like that, missing some units.

[readercolin]

4 hours ago, Triz Varnor said:

What do you think about your list ? Have you tested it ? What's your feedback ?

I would like to try something like that, missing some units.

Haven't had a chance to try it as I am missing the dwarfs for it.  At the moment, I am currently busy getting my Lumineth army up and running, so haven't ordered them yet and haven't been able to test the list.

[Lord Krungharr]

I haven't used my Cities yet in 3.0....I'm thinking my next game to try out the Steam Tank squadron (Greywater Fastness). 

Steam Tank Commander (general, Ghoul Mere Ranger, Steam Piston Plate Mail)

Hurricanum w Mage

Runelord

Warden King

20 Ironbreakers (single unit)

30 Longbeards (great weapons) (single unit)

3 Steam Tanks

2 Gyrocopters (single unit)

Not sure Steam Tanks will ever be really great but they must better in bigger numbers and they look super duper cool!  I'm considering getting another 2 for nearly pure Steam Tanks plus Hurricanum and Gotrek.

[KydbrookP]

On 7/27/2022 at 3:01 AM, Thugmullet said:

Any played experiences of how the new GV units have affected Cities?

I’ve only played a couple of games, but I’ve found putting Demigryphs in Bounty Hunters makes them useful - partly because it makes them deal more damage, but also because it makes them a priority target for opponent, and in TE, if you sit them in cover, they’re on a 1+ save (without mystic shield or AAD) in turn 1, so opponent can waste a lot of resources not killing many of them.

I imagine Drakespawn would work the same (although perhaps more difficult to fit all five in cover).

[Lord Krungharr]

I saw some rumor picture somewhere, can't remember where, but it had a big warmachine that looked like a Steam Tank on legs in a piece of artwork.  Anyone know about that?  If Cities get a new book with something like that, I imagine all the Warmachines/Ironweld Arsenal stuff will get some help right?!  Hate getting my hopes up, but the Dawnbringer Crusades must be making progress, especially after that white bearded Dwarf said he had work to do at the end of Broken Realms.  

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

On 8/24/2022 at 9:10 PM, Lord Krungharr said:

I saw some rumor picture somewhere, can't remember where, but it had a big warmachine that looked like a Steam Tank on legs in a piece of artwork.  Anyone know about that?  If Cities get a new book with something like that, I imagine all the Warmachines/Ironweld Arsenal stuff will get some help right?!  Hate getting my hopes up, but the Dawnbringer Crusades must be making progress, especially after that white bearded Dwarf said he had work to do at the end of Broken Realms.  

That's a Cogfort:

They have been part of the lore for a while. They have stats in Soulbound and recently featured in an episode of Hammer and Bolter. I think chances are pretty good we will see them on the tabletop after the Cities update.

[Lord Krungharr]

Ooh wow, I want one!  Really wouldn't take too much to pump up the Dispossessed and Ironweld Arsenals.  This and the white bearded mystery Dwarf would do it.

[Dylanface]

I can see this thread has gone a little quiet. I've found it pretty helpful as there doesn't seem to be a lot of CoS resources out there and with the faction having so many internal groupings it's hard to find the thing you want. I recently started playing CoS (freeguild) because I found some cheap second hand painted bodies and I snatched them up. I loved the empire in fantasy when I was a kid but collected tomb kings instead. 

I'm trying to keep this a thematic army as I already play Tzeentch and my friend group is sick of my Tzeentch shenanigans. I mostly play against Ironjawz, skaven, sylvaneth and nurgle. I'm after any advice anyone can throw my way on lists, city choices general tactics etc. Any help is appreciated ofc. :) 

 

Currently what I own and can work with: 

1x Freeguild general on griffon 

1x freeguild general on foot

1x Hurricanum (how good was that 2x broken realms box).

1x luminark 

1-2 battlemages depending on the previous two models.

1x steam tank/commander

 

30x greatswords

20x guard with sword/shield

20x handgunners

 

1x hellstorm 

1x hellblaster

 

[Lord Krungharr]

3 hours ago, Dylanface said:

I can see this thread has gone a little quiet. I've found it pretty helpful as there doesn't seem to be a lot of CoS resources out there and with the faction having so many internal groupings it's hard to find the thing you want. I recently started playing CoS (freeguild) because I found some cheap second hand painted bodies and I snatched them up. I loved the empire in fantasy when I was a kid but collected tomb kings instead. 

I'm trying to keep this a thematic army as I already play Tzeentch and my friend group is sick of my Tzeentch shenanigans. I mostly play against Ironjawz, skaven, sylvaneth and nurgle. I'm after any advice anyone can throw my way on lists, city choices general tactics etc. Any help is appreciated ofc.

 

Currently what I own and can work with: 

1x Freeguild general on griffon 

1x freeguild general on foot

1x Hurricanum (how good was that 2x broken realms box).

1x luminark 

1-2 battlemages depending on the previous two models.

1x steam tank/commander

 

30x greatswords

20x guard with sword/shield

20x handgunners

 

1x hellstorm 

1x hellblaster

 

You look to be in good shape using Hammerhal or Hallowheart, or even Living City....that would let you try Outflanking a Luminark; could be great fun as it would give you opportunity to find optimal beam line-ups.  Run up the Griffon/Hurricanum/Steam Tank together.  Good times!  Put Spear of the Hunt and Ironoak Artisan on the Griffon too for a real beatstick who can strike first and extra rend, heal a wound per hero phase.  You'd have like 2-3 power bubbles to absorb and clean up stuff, then expand to other objectives after thinning things out.  Outflanking doesn't necessarily mean go all the way to the other board edge either, just finding different points of entry, though you'll miss out on hero phase stuff.  But sometimes worth it.  For your artillery, I recommend finding points to get a Lord Ordinator Stormcast guy to give them +1 to hit.  Omitting battlemages is fine, unless you'll run Hallowheart, in which case you'll need them.

[Dylanface]

3 hours ago, Lord Krungharr said:

You look to be in good shape using Hammerhal or Hallowheart, or even Living City....that would let you try Outflanking a Luminark; could be great fun as it would give you opportunity to find optimal beam line-ups.  Run up the Griffon/Hurricanum/Steam Tank together.  Good times!  Put Spear of the Hunt and Ironoak Artisan on the Griffon too for a real beatstick who can strike first and extra rend, heal a wound per hero phase.  You'd have like 2-3 power bubbles to absorb and clean up stuff, then expand to other objectives after thinning things out.  Outflanking doesn't necessarily mean go all the way to the other board edge either, just finding different points of entry, though you'll miss out on hero phase stuff.  But sometimes worth it.  For your artillery, I recommend finding points to get a Lord Ordinator Stormcast guy to give them +1 to hit.  Omitting battlemages is fine, unless you'll run Hallowheart, in which case you'll need them.

Thanks for that! I'll give it a try. I haven't played with general on griffon (Franz), luminark, or the steam tank yet as they're all new additions I've just added. I've found the hurricanum was the single thing that carried any victories I had. In hammerhal it did great and then in hallowheart I did the wound for casting bonus and rolled a 5 which gave me +5 to casting rolls (I think that's how the rule works). I don't think I'd want to do that in another friendly game. My friends already find my tzeentch magic phase pretty obnoxious. 😁

 

I liked hammerhal for the ignoring morale tests and cindercloud spell to add some durability to my paper armoured great words. 

 

With the artillery I've had no luck with the helblaster but have been sitting my general on foot near the handgunners and artillery to give them a +1h +1w. Would the ordinator add much to this? 

[Lord Krungharr]

The Ordinator would only add the +1 to hit for the artillery pieces, which sadly, just aren't very impressive these days no matter what.  

You could stick some propellers on them though and have some Gyrocopters!  Those can come in very handy actually for 1) nabbing objectives which are vulnerable using their speed 2) Unleash Hell to any horde unit charging you.  Having one or a pair can be quite useful, especially in Greywater Fastness with the +3" to weapon range on Ironweld Arsenal units....which actually might also be a good City to try for your artillery and Steam Tank Commander.  With Ghoul Mere Ranger I think units within an aura range can run and shoot or something?  Haven't played that one in a long while.

[NauticalSoup]

12 hours ago, Lord Krungharr said:

The Ordinator would only add the +1 to hit for the artillery pieces, which sadly, just aren't very impressive these days no matter what.  

So sad I really miss my ballista battery 😞

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

2 hours ago, NauticalSoup said:

So sad I really miss my ballista battery 😞

On the upside, have you seen that new Ogor Ironblaster warscroll? Makes me feel confident that the Steam Tank and  whatever artillery Cities gets after the update will be finally be good.

[NauticalSoup]

I have seen it I had this discussion with my ogors buddy just the other day, since most artillery is pretty bad and either needs to be cheap or do what the ironblaster can. Personally I'm hoping for the latter- arty doesn't synergize with buffs and is usually slow I think you ought to get a good bang for your buck as a result!

[RocketPropelledGrenade]

The Lumineth Star Shard Ballista is also a decent piece of Artillery that could be useful in place of or alongside real ranged units like Sentinels in some lists, so I think there are definitely signs that GW is getting better at doing the warscrolls for this stuff.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

39 minutes ago, RocketPropelledGrenade said:

The Lumineth Star Shard Ballista is also a decent piece of Artillery that could be useful in place of or alongside real ranged units like Sentinels in some lists, so I think there are definitely signs that GW is getting better at doing the warscrolls for this stuff.

The Plague Claw from the new Skaven book also looks pretty good. I think we can call it a trend at this point.

[Nasnad]

,Just found out that had 2 boxes of Scourgerunner/drakespawn chariots, from back when Cities of Sigmar was first release. Was relly hyped for CoS, but never got it started when the book was release.

Now I am thinking of getting back into AoS again, and would love to do some Cities of Sigmar (Would fit in with my friends starting gravelords and orcs )

Is it viable to do a mixed race army, how does the dark elves models hold up ? .. Will it all be gone when the new cities models get released ?