AoS 3 - Nighthaunt Discussion

[lare2]

4 hours ago, Gothmaug said:

Has a new hexwraith kit been spotted? If so, I missed that leak. 

Nope... just wishful thinking on everyone's behalf. 

[That Guy]

Honestly the current ones aren't THAT horrible. I know they are a bit more skeletal like because they have their legs and arms like that, but most ghosts have skeletal faces still. I would love to see an update that makes them look more like dreadblades. Currently I would just make them float in the air, through scenery, trees and perhaps even ethereal smoke at their hooves or so. You can make them a lot more ethereal than they seem to be. 

[Bayul]

8 hours ago, Gothmaug said:

Has a new hexwraith kit been spotted? If so, I missed that leak. 

No, I misread.

[Gothmaug]

6 hours ago, lare2 said:

Nope... just wishful thinking on everyone's behalf. 

I think i'm going to get my hands on the Corpsemare stampede Endless spell, split all 5 horses, and then stick 5 glaivewraith stalkers or grimghast reapers on them, and use them as a unit of hexwraiths. 

[lare2]

I've 20 unbuilt which I bought back when I focused more on Legions of Nagash. Then 3.0 hit, along with reinforcement rules, and I've been a bit scared of actually making them. Gonna wait for the book and see how they fare.

[EnixLHQ]

People have unbilt models? *looks as his 32 Glaivewraiths* 

[That Guy]

23 hours ago, Gothmaug said:

I think i'm going to get my hands on the Corpsemare stampede Endless spell, split all 5 horses, and then stick 5 glaivewraith stalkers or grimghast reapers on them, and use them as a unit of hexwraiths. 

That’s an amazing idea. I might even borrow it. Athough i have 2 original units already. A bit variety in the mix is nice. If i don’t i knight regret it. 😉

Getting a few packs of dreadblades and kitbash those is another option or go 3rd party and i dunno… 

9 hours ago, EnixLHQ said:

People have unbilt models? *looks as his 32 Glaivewraiths* 

I’ve actually just build a few. I just love the look of the mini’s and they seem to have a spot in reikenors right? No? Okay. Please re-write their datasheet and make em awesome GW.

Edited February 6, 2022 by That Guy

[dmorley21]

I’m attending a GT this weekend in Columbus called Brewhammer. Currently am 1-2. 

My list is Nagash / Olynder / Torment / 3 x 5 Hexes / Chainrasp Horde / Harridans

Not optimized, but it’s what I got together.

Played 50 pink horrors, a dracothian’s tale Seraphon list, and mixed arms Idoneth. Beat the Seraphon.

Overall, Nagash is insane. He’s lifted a unit of 20 pinks, 2 Stormdrake Guard and a reinforced salamander pack that alpha’d him, 5 Saurus Guard, 10 skinks, 10 thralls that alpha’d him, a tide caster, and 2 sharks. He’s also been a battle tactic beast and an absolute anvil even when I mess up his screens.

However, I really don’t think the Olynder match works as well as I thought it would. With so many points into Nagash, you really need efficiency in the rest of your army and Olynder isn’t that and just doesn’t do enough reliably. After this tournament, I think I will look into other combos. 
 

I will say the first matchup is a tough one, but had I gone first it would’ve helped immensely. I also should’ve won against Idoneth and came close to doing so, but made a couple critical mistakes (like forgetting about high tide which my opponent failed to mention to me as well until the combat phase, sigh) that cost me the game. 

[Rors]

How important is spell portal to support Nagash and does anyone know where you can get it second hand or if there's a decent proxy model for it?

 

 

[darkdaysdawn]

On 2/4/2022 at 2:32 PM, That Guy said:

Honestly the current ones [hexwraiths] aren't THAT horrible. 

Yes.  Yes they are. 

[That Guy]

22 minutes ago, darkdaysdawn said:

Yes.  Yes they are. 

Let's agree to disagree. I'm not disagreeing that they're basically our worst looking unit and should get a visual update, but you can definitely work with the current kit. You have your right to have your opinion of course. There's several ways to make them look more their part just like these: 

 

Edited February 6, 2022 by That Guy

[darkdaysdawn]

2 hours ago, That Guy said:

Let's agree to disagree. I'm not disagreeing that they're basically our worst looking unit and should get a visual update, but you can definitely work with the current kit. You have your right to have your opinion of course. There's several ways to make them look more their part just like these: 

 

Yeah, I'm just kidding dude...people are free to buy whatever models they want and do whatever they want with them.  You do you!

As for conversions:  Some people have just glued Grimghasts to the backs of the Hexwraith horses, which, I think, looks a little better than the base model, and it's not too expensive to do.  There are countless examples online.

Personally, I was planning to combine Dreadblades with Grimghast's arms.  I guess that's not exactly "working with the current kit"...oh well.  The idea is to remove the lower hand (left hand) from the shaft of a Grimghast's scythe, and swap it with the Dreadblade"s right arm, leaving his left holding his horse's reins.  There are only 5 or 6 Grimghast models per box that have appropriate weapon/arm parts so you need 1 box of Grimghast and 3 boxes of Dreadblades -- definitely not a cheap solution, but I think it would look great.  Haven't decided what weapon/arm/combo to do for a Hellwraith yet though.

Re. the Hexwraith models themselves:  It's the scale of the rider to the oddly short (nose to tail-wise) horse, and the size of the rider's feet, that looks weird to me.  The feet look like flippers.  The horse looks like a pony.  The GW Black Riders for LotR have the same scale issues.  Also, the Hexwraith's pose is not nearly as dynamic as anything else NH, so it just doesn't fit my collection and the way I've painted it.  I don't use Black Knights, Grave Guard, or either Wight King model in my Soulblight army for the same reason -- they're not terrible in and of themselves, they're just no where near as nice as everything else in either army and there are lots of other choices to spend one's hobby time and money on.

Edited February 6, 2022 by darkdaysdawn

[That Guy]

4 hours ago, darkdaysdawn said:

Yeah, I'm just kidding dude...people are free to buy whatever models they want and do whatever they want with them.  You do you!

As for conversions:  Some people have just glued Grimghasts to the backs of the Hexwraith horses, which, I think, looks a little better than the base model, and it's not too expensive to do.  There are countless examples online.

Personally, I was planning to combine Dreadblades with Grimghast's arms.  I guess that's not exactly "working with the current kit"...oh well.  The idea is to remove the lower hand (left hand) from the shaft of a Grimghast's scythe, and swap it with the Dreadblade"s right arm, leaving his left holding his horse's reins.  There are only 5 or 6 Grimghast models per box that have appropriate weapon/arm parts so you need 1 box of Grimghast and 3 boxes of Dreadblades -- definitely not a cheap solution, but I think it would look great.  Haven't decided what weapon/arm/combo to do for a Hellwraith yet though.

Re. the Hexwraith models themselves:  It's the scale of the rider to the oddly short (nose to tail-wise) horse, and the size of the rider's feet, that looks weird to me.  The feet look like flippers.  The horse looks like a pony.  The GW Black Riders for LotR have the same scale issues.  Also, the Hexwraith's pose is not nearly as dynamic as anything else NH, so it just doesn't fit my collection and the way I've painted it.  I don't use Black Knights, Grave Guard, or either Wight King model in my Soulblight army for the same reason -- they're not terrible in and of themselves, they're just no where near as nice as everything else in either army and there are lots of other choices to spend one's hobby time and money on.

It's cool dude. I'm not trying to be a "gottem" person here, just trying to show some examples to people who wonder to still make the original kit work with some minor adjustments. Turns out it's mostly about making them more dynamic looking indeed. As for your idea i've seen some examples as well and they look amazing. It's a passion conversion, because this one does cost you a penny but this is what i've seen done with the dreadblade / grimghast idea:
 

Spoiler

Even in our own community the dreadblade conversion was done by @Nevar, but with bladegheist revenant and think he even used some black coach horses:

Spoiler

Beautifully done by them. 

The corpsemare endless spell idea from @Gothmaug is harder to pull off since some of the horses are stuck to each other, but it's still a great idea nonetheless. You can make them shift through all manners of environments. As you can see on the sprue, a bit harder to let it work: 
 

Spoiler

 

Edited February 7, 2022 by That Guy

[darkdaysdawn]

Those are some great conversions.  And yes, the first one is exactly what I was talking about.  That's a good idea to combine them so they ended with more than two different sculpts.

I think I've seen a Reikenor without the wings used for Hexwraiths in some way too.  Probably to make a Hellwraith.  That could look great.  And to keep it from looking too much like actual Reikenor, change the weapon, maybe?  How about the "Vampiric Sword" from the Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon, with the gantlet too?  It'd be easy to do and anyone who plays FEC or SBGL will likely have a few to spare.  Might be able to change the face pretty easily too.   

[dmorley21]

So I ended up going 3-2 and finishing 13/40 with my Nighthaunt list. Won a close game against Soulblight that I really had control of the whole game… but it was close. Then eked out a lucky win against Nurgle. This was the only game where Nagash was killed. A combined charge from a Glottkin and Orghotts after some chip damage from shooting and contagion points did him in. Also, he failed to lift a minimum sized unit of Blightkings after I had chosen broken ranks for them due to a whiffs and a miscast on the third spell. 
 

Overall, it was great to go 3-2 and feel like I was in every game. Think I’ll ditch Olynder and the 3 x 5 Hexes if I get to play more before the new book (a 15-month-old at home limits my playtime). She did a bit here and there, but wasn’t a hammer or an anvil really. It’s an okay combo, but I just feel like there might be better options. 
 

The Harridans were easily my second best unit. 

[Rors]

Did you run anything with Nagash as support? Can we see your list? Apologies if you've already posted it somewhere in this thread.

[dmorley21]

1 hour ago, Rors said:

Did you run anything with Nagash as support? Can we see your list? Apologies if you've already posted it somewhere in this thread.

I’ve posted my list elsewhere but it was:

Nagash / Olynder (general, Spirit Drain)/ Torment (PotFW)

3 x 5 Hexwraiths / 10 Chainrasp / 10 Harridans

I’ll try to get a longer post or even a blog post about it up later this week. 

[Sutek]

I tried Nagash out for the first time last night against Bonesplitters.  I lost heavily but was impressed with my Spirit Hosts ability to hold out against over half his army with support from the Cruciator.  Unfortunately I got double turned so couldn't make use of the healing.

I also lost Nagash turn 3 because I got over excited and decided to charge Kragnos.

[dmorley21]

Got a tournament recap up as a blog post:

 

[That Guy]

16 hours ago, dmorley21 said:

Got a tournament recap up as a blog post:

 

Very interesting insight on your games. What i noticed is in your analysis you said, the hexwraiths weren’t too impressive and you know what… they might be a small trap. Not saying they are bad, no they do their job and always at least bring 1 unit of them in an emerald list. But perhaps for the purpose of Nagash lists and the already mobile nature of the Nighthaunt, more units might not be needed. Once again when you look at the list that went 4-1 at LVO you can see that only 1 Hexwraith unit was taken and no Olynder at all. In fact the only other hero than Nagash was a spirit torment. The rest was 3 units of chainrasps, unit of hexwraiths and a double reinforced unit of spirit hosts with a spell portal. The guy was playing on all of Nagashs’ strengths. He MSU’d most units, he was able to death incarnate spirit hosts. He was able to amplify the spirit torments revive ability and so on and so on. It just goes to show that if you can add bodies and survivable bodies at that to Nagash, it seems to be rather effective. Probably why my dreadblade build was having success too. I played off the utility ability of tricksy redeployment instead of creating another centerpiece unit like Olynder. Not saying she can’t work because she brings her own utility with her, but it is a points sink perhaps in the wrong place.

EDIT: If you want to read more into the tactics used. This page describes it a bit:

https://www.goonhammer.com/lvo-the-age-of-sigmar-top-8/

Edited February 11, 2022 by That Guy

[dmorley21]

4 hours ago, That Guy said:

Very interesting insight on your games. What i noticed is in your analysis you said, the hexwraiths weren’t too impressive and you know what… they might be a small trap. Not saying they are bad, no they do their job and always at least bring 1 unit of them in an emerald list. But perhaps for the purpose of Nagash lists and the already mobile nature of the Nighthaunt, more units might not be needed. Once again when you look at the list that went 4-1 at LVO you can see that only 1 Hexwraith unit was taken and no Olynder at all. In fact the only other hero than Nagash was a spirit torment. The rest was 3 units of chainrasps, unit of hexwraiths and a double reinforced unit of spirit hosts with a spell portal. The guy was playing on all of Nagashs’ strengths. He MSU’d most units, he was able to death incarnate spirit hosts. He was able to amplify the spirit torments revive ability and so on and so on. It just goes to show that if you can add bodies and survivable bodies at that to Nagash, it seems to be rather effective. Probably why my dreadblade build was having success too. I played off the utility ability of tricksy redeployment instead of creating another centerpiece unit like Olynder. Not saying she can’t work because she brings her own utility with her, but it is a points sink perhaps in the wrong place.

EDIT: If you want to read more into the tactics used. This page describes it a bit:

https://www.goonhammer.com/lvo-the-age-of-sigmar-top-8/

Yeah, that might be on to something. I do think there's a lot of gas in 9 Spirit Hosts. However, the return on a unit of 30 Chainrasps or Reapers is more reliable. In that case, you're always getting 4 models/4 wounds back with the Spirit Torment/Nagash combo. In the Spirit Host case, it really depends on how many wounds are on a Spirit Host. There's really a lot to play around with when it comes to Nagash - I just wish I had the time to do so! 

[EnixLHQ]

I think the Spirit Hosts might be a bit of a trap. Even with Nagash and a ST the damage profiles of our units hasn't changed. Hosts will do more damage against high-save targets, Reapers against hoards, Bladegheists against targets they can charge at, and Harridans have staying power and so will do more damage where you can't otherwise keep model count up.

If you start enforcing units, Reapers are probably the best bang for the buck, being both a battleline and also attacking over each other so you have more swinging while maintaining cohesion.

And Harridans are a good pick now if you have a ST with them for exploding hits and model return if you have plenty elsewhere on the board, like with Nagash.

I'd bet we'll see more lists heavy in those units. Nagash and ST; Reapers to pal with Nagash, Harridans for the ST. And the rest either being Hexwraiths in an Emerald list or Chainrasps in a Comdemned list. And if you're worried about casting, Oly can still come in either, or take Reikenor for a more consistent cast.

Edited February 11, 2022 by EnixLHQ

[dmorley21]

Spirit Hosts are not there for their output - though they are a nice counter to save stacking Stormcast. They’re there to be a tarpit. They’re also the second best value unit on a point per wounds basis, making them an efficient tarpit. 
 

But yeah, lots to play around with. Myrmourns even have some synergy as they can eat an endless spell cast by Nagash and then be healed pretty easily. 

[lare2]

It's great to see such discussion about NH again 👍

[dmorley21]

3 hours ago, lare2 said:

It's great to see such discussion about NH again 👍

I’m expecting discussion to really crank up with the new book. A lot of people have some Nighthaunt and/or really like the look of the army.