Legion of Blood v3.1

[Gothmaug]

So has anyone tried out a Legion of Blood army with the White Dwarf 471 updates, and the reduced point costs of Black knights/Coven Throne? I'm trying to build a thematic list around Neferata, a coven throne, and a bunch of black knights. Probably two vamp lords on foot for support models to take advantage of the +2 to cast, the new Deadly coordination/and the LoB ignore rend bubbles, and a big ole block(s) of skeletons to provide some bodies to accompany them. 

The question is, what else to add?

- Do I add 2 units of blood knights and go heavy on black knights as battleline,  trying and make a fast moving army, using black knight screens and the supporting debuffs/command abilities from Nef/Throne?

- Do I toss in a terrorgheist endless spell, and related command/artifacts and play the bravery bomb?

- Do I utilize the boost in spellcasting, drop Nef or the throne for an additional vampire lord in the form of a  VLoZD and go spell heavy?

Coming from an Ironjawz player, I feel spoiled for options with Gravelords, not sure where to put my resources at this point. 

In the end, my local meta isnt super competitive, so I can probably make any theme work. I like the idea  of the army led by a coven throne with a bunch of female vampire lords as support, just trying to figure out the rest. 

 

 

[Wordy9th]

The Vlozd with LoB artefacts and Martial specialization is quite a pick. Soulbound garments is incredibly nice for shooting lists (it gets around not having access to all out defence in the hero phase or charge phase).

I think Black Knights have the potential to be a better version of Wolves for the one specified role of fast speedbump / objective holders (if you've ever paid 135 for wolves to sit on a point all game and never die then you'll know what I mean). Wolves have 10 more wounds but if you're speed bumping the unit probably will do more than 20 damage anyway.

The VL +2 to cast is also +2 to dispel, that's actually really good!

Deathrattle being immune to maluses doesn't sound that hot, but it's not a miserly 9inch range like the Vyrkos one is, and with +1 to wound as a buff you'll be glad of it when on occasion that Frostheart Phoenix comes to town which would make your GG wound on 5s(!) otherwise.

I think LoB does have play, though it doesn't quite fix the problem of facing a shooting meta enough for me just yet.

[JackStreicher]

I've tried a fun list with lots of Grave Guards and 2 Vampire Lords (one martial one arcane). I was able to beat 2 Tournament lists (Knights of the e. Throne and Shootcast eternals)

Overall: The new LoB makes foot Vampires more useful and actually worth their points. I am not blown away by Black Knights - still too expensive, a warscroll rewrite would've made sense for them. 
LoB still isn't that great though. If you want to utilize it I'd recommend at least one caster vampire (mostly for dispelling and delivering an endless spell) and that's it. You could also do well with multiple Zombie Dragons.


Edit:
About the Legion Trait: It's rather useless. Your Deathrattle has either the issue of dealing no damage, dying in droves or both. A negative modifier to hit is rarely an issue (+1 to wound would be ace...). What this legion would need instead is a +2 movement for deathrattle or a save stat increase of 1 across the board, getting them anywhere is a chore (too slow and too fragile) unless you spawn them from the grave.

I know that the designers wanted to make LoB more attractive, however, both Legion Traits (Blood and Kastelei) should be accessible in every Legion imo.

Edited February 8, 2022 by JackStreicher

[Liquidsteel]

Yeah I'm not overly sold on LoB still.

Vyrkos offers a better package in my opinion, as does Legion of Night.

 

[Gothmaug]

On 2/8/2022 at 9:33 AM, Liquidsteel said:

Yeah I'm not overly sold on LoB still.

Vyrkos offers a better package in my opinion, as does Legion of Night.

 

Thanks for all the input everyone. Hmm.. I've played a bunch of Vyrkos games a this point, just got done an entire 10 week narrative campaign with them vs 5 other players. Ended up winning in the end, the Vrykos re-roll of spells and +1 to wound were clutch. 

I'll probably dabble in LoN eventually, but I just finished painting Neferata and a coven throne, so LoB seemed like a good avenue to try. I thought about building around the Red banquet battallion (two 5-model Blood Knight units, 1 coven throne, 1 vamp lord on foot, and 1 vamp lord on zombie dragon), then backfill with black knights(3) and deathrattle (2) as cheap objective holders and speed bumps. That leaves 275 points left for specialist units, perhaps some grave guard or a vengorian lord to accompany the Dragon/

 

[Liquidsteel]

12 hours ago, Gothmaug said:

Thanks for all the input everyone. Hmm.. I've played a bunch of Vyrkos games a this point, just got done an entire 10 week narrative campaign with them vs 5 other players. Ended up winning in the end, the Vrykos re-roll of spells and +1 to wound were clutch. 

I'll probably dabble in LoN eventually, but I just finished painting Neferata and a coven throne, so LoB seemed like a good avenue to try. I thought about building around the Red banquet battallion (two 5-model Blood Knight units, 1 coven throne, 1 vamp lord on foot, and 1 vamp lord on zombie dragon), then backfill with black knights(3) and deathrattle (2) as cheap objective holders and speed bumps. That leaves 275 points left for specialist units, perhaps some grave guard or a vengorian lord to accompany the Dragon/

 

That actually sounds very good, I'd recommend the 20 Grave Guard.

Make the VLoZD Martial and the Foot Vamp Arcane.

[warhammernerd]

On 2/8/2022 at 3:33 PM, Liquidsteel said:

Yeah I'm not overly sold on LoB still.

Vyrkos offers a better package in my opinion, as does Legion of Night.

 

Which says a lot about how good those two subfactions are

[KK in HK]

5 hours ago, warhammernerd said:

Which says a lot about how good those two subfactions are

Just wondering, what makes LON good? I like Mannfred very much but not sure how to utilize LON.

 

[oggurt_da_bog_zombie]

Somehow missed this thread, as a big LoB fan I've had a great time with the new WD stuff, it certainly gives LoB an edge. 

This is the list I ran at a big tournament:
 

Neferata and The Blood Cartel

Allegiance: Soulblight Gravelords
- Lineage: Legion of Blood
- Mortal Realm: Ghur
- Grand Strategy: Prized Sorcery
- Triumphs: Bloodthirsty

Leaders
Neferata, Mortarch of Blood (365)*
- Lore of the Deathmages: Overwhelming Dread
Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon (435)**
- General
- Deathlance
- Command Trait: Premeditated Violence
- Artefact: Soulbound Garments
- Expertise: Martial
- Mount Trait: Foetid Miasma
- Universal Spell Lore: Flaming Weapon
Vampire Lord (140)*
- Expertise: Arcane
- Lore of the Vampires: Amethystine Pinions

Battleline
5 x Black Knights (100)**
5 x Black Knights (100)**
10 x Deathrattle Skeletons (85)**

Units
5 x Blood Knights (195)*
5 x Blood Knights (195)*
20 x Grave Guard (280)*
- Great Wight Blades
- Reinforced x 1

Endless Spells & Invocations
Suffocating Gravetide (50)
Chronomantic Cogs (45)

Core Battalions
*Battle Regiment
**Battle Regiment

Total: 1990 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 1 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 111
Drops: 2

The list certainly has problems but the new WD updates and drop in black knight costs gave it a competitive edge. I only went 1-4 at the tournament but had I had a bit better luck I think I could have gone 3-2. This list was able to win against a very tough HotEc Archaon + Varanguard list, but I got brutalized by a Thunderlizards shooting list and lost a tough match against the only other Legion of Blood player in the whole tournament. Then I had a very close game against Ossiarch Bonereapers but rolled super badly in some key situations. Even with the Arcane trait I barely got any spells of with Arkhan running around, and then my VLoZD whiffed on killing ~6 Mortek Guard I needed for taking an objective and getting broken ranks, so I blame this loss on luck. Finally lost against a LotFP list with a GUO who had the ridiculous Fourfold Blade + Nurgling thing and did 18 MWs against my VLoZD (opponent didn't explain the crazy rules interaction until too late) which basically cost me the game.

The strengths here are obviously Neferata, Blood Knights, and super fast Black Knight chaff that I use to soak up unleash hell to get my knights and GG in safely. The decrease in points allowed me to fit in the Chronomantic Cogs, which combined with the Vamp Lord on foot casting bonus, I'm able to more reliably bring GG out of the grave and into combat right away (assuming a re-roll charge via CP, its a likely chance to get an 8+ to make a GG charge). 

The weakness is obvious, bodies and dealing with heavy shooting. Trying to play a more "elite" Soulblight list in anything but Kastelei is really tough. Successful Soulblight lists usually have lots of bodies for taking objectives, whereas this list needs to kill things fast to hold objectives. The VLoZD is very swingy so theres a lot of risk in this list, but I've had success with this list outside the big tourney, and some more practice I think I'll be able to win more often. My opponent who happened to also be a LoB player ran a Vengorian Lord with Soulbound Garments on it, which was just an awesome idea I hadn't considered, so I might try swapping out the VLoZD for a Vengorian Lord at some point and seeing if I can get more bodies into the list too.

Anyway, LoB is certainly worth looking at now, although Vyrkos still seems to be the more flexible subfaction for competitive play.

Edited February 16, 2022 by oggurt_da_bog_zombie