Soulblight Gravelords Discussion - 3rd edition.

[RocketPropelledGrenade]

In response to @JackStreicher: The local meta for me has a number of hard hitting units for sure, but I don't feel like this list is going to to get wiped by any means. I haven't gotten much testing in with it yet, but between recursion and the mobility on two of my most durable pieces (VloZD and Neferata), I think I can stay in the game--the primary hammers of my enemy can't be everywhere at once.

The main test game I've done so far was against a Durthu-focused Sylvaneth list with a very competent pilot, which is in theory a nightmare for having vulnerable targets on the board. And sure, I lost some units I'd rather not have lost, but it was a very close game and I could have pulled out the win with some different choices.

Obviously I need more testing, but I think it has legs. I'll let you know how my future games go when I get more in this week.

[Causalis]

Thanks for the pointers! 

Sad that VloZD is pigeonholed into LoB. I don't think he's all that good, honestly. It's not the intrinsic value of his Warscroll that is nice, it's the Boni LoB gives him that make him playable. Take him in any other Legion and his damage is just sooo bad for his points and even in LoB it takes an artefact + CT to make him good. And even then he can only fight 1-3 enemies and only if they are neither heroes nor monsters. Ich 

So taking him in LoN is probably a bad idea. 

I like the look of Black Knights with the Wight King on horse. Taking a reinforced unit will put 10 Mortals into something plus their attacks which is a good deal for 220p (+ Wight King). 

[Sutek]

I'm trying a Legion of Night list out on Wednesday against OBR.  The list also includes a Vengorian Lord and an unridden Zombie Dragon to see how that works out.

[RocketPropelledGrenade]

I think VLoZD is decent outside of LoB, increasing to fairly good in Kastelai and Avengorii (although the rest of Avengorii is, as usual, still questionable).

Kastelai can get +1 attack and +1 damage--not on the mount, but those bonuses work well together. Biggest issue with it in Kastelai is competition with Vhordrai and the pair being too expensive to easily take both. Also, the +1 to wound monstrous rampage there is nice and adds some reliability to the mount attacks to make sure that when you do hit, it actually goes through.

In Avengorii, it can get -1 to be wounded and the possibility to eat unit champs and standard bearers. The latter is especially worth calling out because disrupting bravery bonuses is real nice with the new Terror ability on the warscroll.

Add to all this the improved Hunger and the increase in wounds, and I think the piece is still well worth it. Is it going to tear apart units like a Maw Krusha on the Waaagh does? No. But that isn't the VLoZD's job. Like so much of the rest of our roster now, it does decent to good damage while taking less damage than expected and letting very little of that damage stick. It's not burst damage, it's sustained damage. And sure, burst damage is good. But a lot of sustained damage over an army does add up.

[Leshoyadut]

5 hours ago, N.I.B. said:

Thank you. How do you make your army lists - battlescribe, pen&paper, something else? I'm mucking about in battlecribe, Grand Strategy: Empire of Corpses doesn't show as an option.

Personally, I typically use BattleScribe, though it usually takes a bit of time to get updated. I'm also looking forward to the other couple of listbuilders that are in development, though last I saw neither of the ones I was looking at were open to use quite yet. The WarCom listbuilder is also fine for just getting your points right, though it includes nothing about the actual rules of the army on there, and both takes time to update and can at times just be wrong as WarCom sometimes is.

Right now, I'm using Notepad until I get digital tools for listbuilding on my PC.

 

44 minutes ago, Causalis said:

Thanks for the pointers! 

Sad that VloZD is pigeonholed into LoB. I don't think he's all that good, honestly. It's not the intrinsic value of his Warscroll that is nice, it's the Boni LoB gives him that make him playable. Take him in any other Legion and his damage is just sooo bad for his points and even in LoB it takes an artefact + CT to make him good. And even then he can only fight 1-3 enemies and only if they are neither heroes nor monsters. Ich 

So taking him in LoN is probably a bad idea. 

I like the look of Black Knights with the Wight King on horse. Taking a reinforced unit will put 10 Mortals into something plus their attacks which is a good deal for 220p (+ Wight King).

As @RocketPropelledGrenade said, I think the VLOZD has space in other subfactions, for sure. Making one your Kastelai general for Undead Bladelord, plus having Vhordrai on the field, means you can get three units their upgrades by killing models with some Blood Knights. Ramps up your power very quickly with your hero hammers. Even just +1 damage and AOA on Vhordrai brings him up to over 13 damage to a 2+ on the charge. +1 damage also puts a sword VLOZD in spitting distance of LoB damage, plus you still have the chance to get +1 attacks.

Comparing lance VLOZDs also doesn't place them too far apart, though the LoB VLOZD does pull a little further ahead. Combined just +1 damage and just +1 attack since they have the same effect for the Kastelai lance vamp.

...Except when you have both attack and damage from Kastelai, then it puts the Kastelai VLOZD ever so slightly ahead of LoB. Kastelai seems like a fully legit choice for VLOZDs with the levelup stuff.

For Avengorii it's slightly more complicated because it comes more down to the monstrous rampage, which only matters after you've done your Roar for the turn, and isn't exclusive to the VLOZD. So while Avengorii doesn't specifically help VLOZDs much, they do fit in with the various monster related bonuses you can get (fighting with top profile, the rampages, once per battle strike first, etc.).

An idea list I have for Kastelai could be something like:

Allegiance: Soulblight Gravelords
- Lineage: Kastelai Dynasty
- Grand Strategy: Take What's Theirs
- Triumphs:

Leaders
Prince Vhordrai (470)
- Lore of the Vampires: Vile Transference
Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon (440)
- General
- Vampiric Sword
- Command Trait: Undead Bladelord
- Artefact: Fragment of the Keep
- Lore of the Vampires: Spirit Gale

Battleline
10 x Blood Knights (460)
- Reinforced x 1
5 x Blood Knights (230)
5 x Blood Knights (230)
10 x Deathrattle Skeletons (85)
10 x Deathrattle Skeletons (85)

Total: 2000 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 1 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 112
Drops: 7

Gives you the double dragon that a lot of folks wanted to make work previously, plus a bunch of Blood Knights and a couple skellie screens/objective nabbers. Probably things to improve with it, maybe you don't actually want the double dragon, but I like the idea of leveling three units up every turn when one of your Blood Knights gets some skills. Also considering the Blood Knights can fly over small troops all the time now, you can more easily strike a hero in their backline for the +1 damage.

[Tizianolol]

Guys I played against beast of chaos, an endless spell count as my unit if he wanna set up a unit in reserve within 9?

[RocketPropelledGrenade]

11 minutes ago, Tizianolol said:

Guys I played against beast of chaos, an endless spell count as my unit if he wanna set up a unit in reserve within 9?

Endless Spells are not units.

[TechnoVampire]

3 hours ago, Leshoyadut said:

Personally, I typically use BattleScribe, though it usually takes a bit of time to get updated. I'm also looking forward to the other couple of listbuilders that are in development, though last I saw neither of the ones I was looking at were open to use quite yet. The WarCom listbuilder is also fine for just getting your points right, though it includes nothing about the actual rules of the army on there, and both takes time to update and can at times just be wrong as WarCom sometimes is.

Right now, I'm using Notepad until I get digital tools for listbuilding on my PC.

 

As @RocketPropelledGrenade said, I think the VLOZD has space in other subfactions, for sure. Making one your Kastelai general for Undead Bladelord, plus having Vhordrai on the field, means you can get three units their upgrades by killing models with some Blood Knights. Ramps up your power very quickly with your hero hammers. Even just +1 damage and AOA on Vhordrai brings him up to over 13 damage to a 2+ on the charge. +1 damage also puts a sword VLOZD in spitting distance of LoB damage, plus you still have the chance to get +1 attacks.

Comparing lance VLOZDs also doesn't place them too far apart, though the LoB VLOZD does pull a little further ahead. Combined just +1 damage and just +1 attack since they have the same effect for the Kastelai lance vamp.

...Except when you have both attack and damage from Kastelai, then it puts the Kastelai VLOZD ever so slightly ahead of LoB. Kastelai seems like a fully legit choice for VLOZDs with the levelup stuff.

For Avengorii it's slightly more complicated because it comes more down to the monstrous rampage, which only matters after you've done your Roar for the turn, and isn't exclusive to the VLOZD. So while Avengorii doesn't specifically help VLOZDs much, they do fit in with the various monster related bonuses you can get (fighting with top profile, the rampages, once per battle strike first, etc.).

An idea list I have for Kastelai could be something like:

Allegiance: Soulblight Gravelords
- Lineage: Kastelai Dynasty
- Grand Strategy: Take What's Theirs
- Triumphs:

Leaders
Prince Vhordrai (470)
- Lore of the Vampires: Vile Transference
Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon (440)
- General
- Vampiric Sword
- Command Trait: Undead Bladelord
- Artefact: Fragment of the Keep
- Lore of the Vampires: Spirit Gale

Battleline
10 x Blood Knights (460)
- Reinforced x 1
5 x Blood Knights (230)
5 x Blood Knights (230)
10 x Deathrattle Skeletons (85)
10 x Deathrattle Skeletons (85)

Total: 2000 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 1 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 112
Drops: 7

Gives you the double dragon that a lot of folks wanted to make work previously, plus a bunch of Blood Knights and a couple skellie screens/objective nabbers. Probably things to improve with it, maybe you don't actually want the double dragon, but I like the idea of leveling three units up every turn when one of your Blood Knights gets some skills. Also considering the Blood Knights can fly over small troops all the time now, you can more easily strike a hero in their backline for the +1 damage.

Thanks for calculating the damage breakdowns, that’s really useful… Your list is the exact same as one I’m running, except that I’m currently using 1 x 20 skeletons and 4 x 5 blood knights. If you get a chance to test it let us know how you get on.

(Fist of Nagash is also “a friendly Kastelai vampire unit” so he can share any buffs he acquires that turn, and he’s good at hunting hero’s.) 

Edited April 18, 2023 by TechnoVampire

[Causalis]

What vexes me so much about the VLoZD is just that his rules don't fit his aesthetics (big, scary monster) or fluff (can kill whole regiments etc.). He's a 440p anvil in an army that is filled to the brim with anvils. Historically, the Death factions always had bad to mediocre units and really good/scary heroes. And I just don't get why GW is so against the idea of making a Vampire ON A FREAKING DRAGON hit like an absolute truck! 

He occupies the same design-space as our summonable units and to me that just feels so wrong. 

[TechnoVampire]

I’m hoping there are some points adjustments in the not too distant future. I feel like dragons and blood knights are too expensive for what they do, and reducing them a little would create some space for supporting them more with summonable units. I love grave guard but they are painfully slow, which makes them unreliable as hammers. 

Edited April 19, 2023 by TechnoVampire

[JackStreicher]

5 hours ago, TechnoVampire said:

I love grave guard but they are painfully slow, which makes them unreliable as hammers

I know what you mean. Their lack of speed also means that the enemy can choose when and with what to engage them, often wiping them off the board with a single unit.

Edited April 19, 2023 by JackStreicher
Spelling- typing on a phone is torture

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

1 hour ago, JackStreicher said:

I know what you mean. Their lack of speed also means that the enemy can choose when and with what to engage them, often wiping them off the board with a single unit.

This is the reason why I actually favour Graveguard with Shield. 4+ save is OK and they still easily output more than 1 damage per model fighting against 3+ saves with buffs.

[TechnoVampire]

49 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

This is the reason why I actually favour Graveguard with Shield. 4+ save is OK and they still easily output more than 1 damage per model fighting against 3+ saves with buffs.

Makes sense. If you are using V-lord and wight king with them as well, you can fish for 6’s and probably still get good mileage from them. The difference between 4+ and 5+ save is significant, especially with AOD. I’d imagine significantly reduces chances of them being wiped out in 1 combat/ shooting phase. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

7 minutes ago, TechnoVampire said:

Makes sense. If you are using V-lord and wight king with them as well, you can fish for 6’s and probably still get good mileage from them. The difference between 4+ and 5+ save is significant, especially with AOD. I’d imagine significantly reduces chances of them being wiped out in 1 combat/ shooting phase. 

Here are the calcs for 20 Grave Guard:

Save	Grave Guard Shield	Grave Guard Shield +1 attacks	Grave Guard Greatweapons	Grave Guard Greatweapons +1 attack
2+	10.63	15.81	12.53	18.64
3+	13.67	20.33	17.08	25.42
4+	16.7	24.85	21.64	32.19
5+	19.74	29.37	26.19	38.97
6+	22.78	33.89	30.75	45.75
-	22.78	33.89	30.75	45.75

In my opinion, it really is just a choice you need to make. No option is clearly better.

I calculated these values with just +1 attack from the vampire lord. But of course, you can easily add +1 attack to that from AAO.

Another use case I see is to put Great Weapon Grave Guard in the grave with a Wight King. Even though the Wight King buff is weaker than +1 attacks, with the naturally higher damage of Great Weapons it's going to easily be significant. I even think 10 Grave Guard with Great Weapons on their own are a good unit to just have in the grave to threaten the deep strike.

If you want you GG to contribute to holding points, though, I think the shields make sense. And if they are already sitting on a point, you might as well support them with a hero that can't deep strike but gives a better buff in the Vampire Lord.

[Leshoyadut]

1 hour ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Here are the calcs for 20 Grave Guard:

Save	Grave Guard Shield	Grave Guard Shield +1 attacks	Grave Guard Greatweapons	Grave Guard Greatweapons +1 attack
2+	10.63	15.81	12.53	18.64
3+	13.67	20.33	17.08	25.42
4+	16.7	24.85	21.64	32.19
5+	19.74	29.37	26.19	38.97
6+	22.78	33.89	30.75	45.75
-	22.78	33.89	30.75	45.75

In my opinion, it really is just a choice you need to make. No option is clearly better.

I calculated these values with just +1 attack from the vampire lord. But of course, you can easily add +1 attack to that from AAO.

Another use case I see is to put Great Weapon Grave Guard in the grave with a Wight King. Even though the Wight King buff is weaker than +1 attacks, with the naturally higher damage of Great Weapons it's going to easily be significant. I even think 10 Grave Guard with Great Weapons on their own are a good unit to just have in the grave to threaten the deep strike.

If you want you GG to contribute to holding points, though, I think the shields make sense. And if they are already sitting on a point, you might as well support them with a hero that can't deep strike but gives a better buff in the Vampire Lord.

To expand on this a little: you get about 15%-26% more damage with greatweapons (with the largest difference at worse saves) in exchange for about 25%-33% damage reduction depending on if you AOD them, not including incoming rend. Even a single point of rend (not terribly uncommon) changes that to ~20%-25%, and two points of rend changes it to 17%-20%.

This also doesn't include the hard-to-numerically-describe value of being able to fight in three ranks with greatweapons, which can make it easier to get all of them in to fight. While I haven't typically had a ton of trouble doing that with 20, it's not an unheard of situation for that to give you more models fighting, and does make a big difference if you bump the unit to 30. Also also, the best form of damage reduction is just killing a unit so it can't attack you, and extra damage makes that more likely to happen.

I think I'd lean more toward greatweapons if you just want a big hammer. If you want something a little more anvil-y, though, shields genuinely seem like a decent option. The army may not lack anvils, but having a heavy hitting summonable, but slow, anvil makes for a decent contrast to the faster but similarly heavy hitting Blood Knights who aren't summonable. I may very well try some shields in a TTS game I'm playing later, in fact, because that sounds pretty sweet.

[Nightseer2012]

59 minutes ago, Leshoyadut said:

I think I'd lean more toward greatweapons if you just want a big hammer. If you want something a little more anvil-y, though, shields genuinely seem like a decent option. The army may not lack anvils, but having a heavy hitting summonable, but slow, anvil makes for a decent contrast to the faster but similarly heavy hitting Blood Knights who aren't summonable. I may very well try some shields in a TTS game I'm playing later, in fact, because that sounds pretty sweet.

Looking at the "new" shielded Grave Guard, they are statistically close to Mortek Guard, which I find kind of funny.  I would love to see an in depth comparison between the two, considering in OB Mortek are the whole infantry, I wonder if it is feasible to use Shielded GG as mainstay infantry instead of just a hammer now that the extra +1 to save is now "native".

In any case, the only reason I hesitate to use them shielded is because our army is chalk full of anvils.  I find in most of my lists I need better hammers.  Even most of our hammers are kind of anvilly.  Blood Knights don't really burst down targets, they wear them down using mortal wounds, a better save, and Hunger based attrition.  For its points, a VLoZD is certainly capable of killing lesser targets in one combat, but is geared (again with its better save & hunger) to dive in and preferably cripple a strong enemy, than outlast them.

GG w/GW are a hammer, a glass hammer, but a true hammer none the less.  Everyone here knows how scary they are if you can get a whole bundle of 20 into something unprotected.  When they connect, they regularly out preform my VLoZD, but it requires that they connect.  I guess all of this isn't me disagreeing with you, I am actually intrigued about the "new" shielded option of GG and the uses we could get out of them.  This is more me commenting on how the paradigm of our 3rd edition book has shifted even more into the "you win by grinding" mindset with almost every army build, and I am somewhat loathe to give up my last true blender unit, lol.

[TechnoVampire]

2 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Another use case I see is to put Great Weapon Grave Guard in the grave with a Wight King. Even though the Wight King buff is weaker than +1 attacks, with the naturally higher damage of Great Weapons it's going to easily be significant.

I did this in a game I played at the weekend and gave my wight king (general) the swift and deadly command trait (reroll charges) which worked a treat and meant I got my charge off the same turn I deep-striked. I can also testify that the 2” reach was very helpful in allowing me to hit multiple targets… I do wish the wight kings buff triggered in the hero phase though for this reason, as that would make them a very effective pairing. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

10 minutes ago, Nightseer2012 said:

Looking at the "new" shielded Grave Guard, they are statistically close to Mortek Guard, which I find kind of funny.  I would love to see an in depth comparison between the two, considering in OB Mortek are the whole infantry, I wonder if it is feasible to use Shielded GG as mainstay infantry instead of just a hammer now that the extra +1 to save is now "native".

In any case, the only reason I hesitate to use them shielded is because our army is chalk full of anvils.  I find in most of my lists I need better hammers.  Even most of our hammers are kind of anvilly.  Blood Knights don't really burst down targets, they wear them down using mortal wounds, a better save, and Hunger based attrition.  For its points, a VLoZD is certainly capable of killing lesser targets in one combat, but is geared (again with its better save & hunger) to dive in and preferably cripple a strong enemy, than outlast them.

GG w/GW are a hammer, a glass hammer, but a true hammer none the less.  Everyone here knows how scary they are if you can get a whole bundle of 20 into something unprotected.  When they connect, they regularly out preform my VLoZD, but it requires that they connect.  I guess all of this isn't me disagreeing with you, I am actually intrigued about the "new" shielded option of GG and the uses we could get out of them.  This is more me commenting on how the paradigm of our 3rd edition book has shifted even more into the "you win by grinding" mindset with almost every army build, and I am somewhat loathe to give up my last true blender unit, lol.

I have actually been thinking the same things with regard to Grave Guard with shields and Mortek Guard. In my opinion, Grave Guard with Shield are pretty much straight up better, cheaper Mortek guard if you compare just their warscrolls. Of course, things get more complicated than that if you look at the armies as a whole: You can fairly effortlessly pile a huge amount of very significant buffs into Mortek, plus they are the best bodies per point in OBR which by itself gives them a different niche to Grave Guard in SBGL. On the other hand, Grave Guard do pretty ridiculous damage even with minimal buffs, so you don't need to buff stack them as hard to make them work.

I think in general, units with a defined role do better than all-rounders in AoS. Grave Guard with great weapons definitely have a defined role and it is worth it to build around them. They are a great hammer, but they are also slow and fragile. To make the most out of them, you need to have a way to reliably deliver them where you want them or play very positionally, screening them and zoning out your opponent. Grave Guard with shields by contrast are a bit more well rounded and can actually hope to live a charge, but as a downside they don't have a ridiculous damage output, but just a good one. I think they are good if you just want a generalist unit to power-pair with a buff hero, but don't want center your game plan around them.

Also, I think shield Grave Guard start looking better when you move down a level of abstraction and start considering what you want the unit to do instead of comparing just raw damage numbers. It's easy to calc them with all kinds of buffs stacked onto them and get super excited because they kill a mega-gargant dead from full health. But then again, if a unit of shield grave guard with a vampire lord giving them all out attack can one-shot units with 20 wounds on a 3+, it really becomes a question whether the extra damage is necessary or even worth it.

[N.I.B.]

On 4/17/2023 at 12:07 AM, RocketPropelledGrenade said:

--Cloak of Night and Screams artefact

Typo? You meant Cloak of Mists and Shadows?

[TechnoVampire]

4 hours ago, Nightseer2012 said:

This is more me commenting on how the paradigm of our 3rd edition book has shifted even more into the "you win by grinding" mindset with almost every army build, and I am somewhat loathe to give up my last true blender unit,

I feel similarly. I use a lot of blood knights and they are my all rounders, they are fast so can grab objectives and cover the board, they can take a hit and they also have reasonable damage against the right target. When using GG I like them to be the true hammers I can rely on to kill things, and I’m often willing to use a unit of bloodknights to screen them and allow them to get into position. For this reason I like them with GW’s as opposed to shields, but I think it totally depends what role you want them to fill. They are quite a versatile (though slow) unit. 

[RocketPropelledGrenade]

4 hours ago, N.I.B. said:

Typo? You meant Cloak of Mists and Shadows?

Sure, whatever the Ethereal Amulet is called these days.

[JackStreicher]

As our army already has a lot of anvils I‘d have preferred if GG with shields would have gotten a tanky-offense buff in addition to the 4+ save meaning: Rolling an unmodified 6 for a save causes a mortal wound. Now call it cursed shields and they’re good to go.

[Leshoyadut]

7 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Also, I think shield Grave Guard start looking better when you move down a level of abstraction and start considering what you want the unit to do instead of comparing just raw damage numbers. It's easy to calc them with all kinds of buffs stacked onto them and get super excited because they kill a mega-gargant dead from full health. But then again, if a unit of shield grave guard with a vampire lord giving them all out attack can one-shot units with 20 wounds on a 3+, it really becomes a question whether the extra damage is necessary or even worth it.

This is something I've been trying to keep in mind, as well. As funny as it was to calc out that 30 GW GG do ~49 wounds to a 2+ with AOA, a Vamp Lord, and a Wight King on foot, there's no situation where that would actually be useful in reality. That being said, having overkill built into the unit can be useful in situations where we're fighting opponents with shooting, which is fairly common right now, because then you can lose some to stuff and still potentially hit important damage numbers. Even putting them in the grave, they then have to make a 9" charge, not a guarantee even with re-rolls, making them potentially need to weather a turn of shooting or being charged into before they can attack. Having spares means they can still potentially hit important calcs when they need to.

I think it's also worth considering our more consistent recursion here, too, because Endless Legions meaning a half unit coming back potentially makes you want to have some overkill in the base unit for the same reason. When you have 10 come back after the 20 were killed, you want them to still hit hard (which GWs certainly will, and shields will less so). This obviously shouldn't be your primary concern, but it is definitely something to think about with the army. Adds layers to the consideration of listbuilding, which I love.

1 hour ago, JackStreicher said:

As our army already has a lot of anvils I‘d have preferred if GG with shields would have gotten a tanky-offense buff in addition to the 4+ save meaning: Rolling an unmodified 6 for a save causes a mortal wound. Now call it cursed shields and they’re good to go.

While I can see the appeal here, this would just make them start stepping on the toes of the new zombies, and I feel like they'd honestly just be worse than zombies for it. As they are now, they provide a step on the anvil-hammer spectrum between Deathrattle Skeletons and greatweapon Grave Guard. They can take defensive buffs well, and they can take offensive buffs well, they're summonable for recursion/healing. They're slow, but otherwise a pretty versatile unit, I think.

Edited April 19, 2023 by Leshoyadut

[N.I.B.]

Bought the tome yesterday. About Deadly Invocation - is that once per hero phase, OR once per Hero in the hero phase?

[TechnoVampire]

2 minutes ago, N.I.B. said:

Bought the tome yesterday. About Deadly Invocation - is that once per hero phase, OR once per Hero in the hero phase?

Up to 3 friendly summonable units wholly within 12” of any friendly hero can each receive it once in your hero phase. It can be the same hero or multiple hero’s. The trigger just requires the unit is within range of a hero and the effect resolves once on each receiving unit (is my understanding).