AoS Cities of Sigmar Battletome 2023 Discussion

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

4 hours ago, loky100 said:

So got a tournament in Dec.

I think steam tanks are quite strong and here is my list idea.

City: Lethis This is to turn off wards. Also allows the steam tank commanders to get heal which is strong on a 2+ save.

Steam Tank Commander : Divine Champion and Macroscope artifact.

Steam tank Commander:

Steam Tank

Steam Tank

Steam Tank

Zenestra for the ward save

Command Corps for heal and turn off command abilities

Cavaliers for a counter charge and steal objectives.

Celestial Hurricanum for the +1 to hit for the tanks and mortals.

Put it in a 2 drop. Grand srat is no mages on the board.

 

This list might have a problem with holding the points but I'm hoping with average 30 damage in the shooting phase I can just clear them and hold them with a tank. Also allows me to do all the human battle tactics which will help a lot.

 

What do people think about it? I'm gonna try it this week and see how it goes.

Looks like a solid take on a goodstuff Steam Tank list. The only auto-include unit you are missing is the Alchemite, who you could consider putting in there since both his buffs are good for Steam Tanks.

Personally, after my experience with Steam Tanks that I posted above, I think they are a solid unit, but ultimately spamming them is not optimal. Keep us posted, though! I'm curious to know how this list fares at 2000 points.

Also, GW should really consider putting out more steam vehicles, given how everyone in this thread seems super excited to run them.

[TheArborealWalrus]

16 hours ago, loky100 said:

What do people think about it? I'm gonna try it this week and see how it goes.

I think that it's close to my current steam tank list. Which means I love it! XD

I'll be running it at a RTT this weekend. Currently 1880pts. Tempest's eye. Deciding on the last 120 still...

Battalion 1:
270pts- Steam tank commander- General, divine champion, macroscope
90pts - Alchemist Warforger - Blizzard
690pts - 3x steam tanks
170pts - Freeguild Command corps
Battalion 2:
260pts - Battle mage on celestial hurricanum - comet something
200pts - 2x5 vanguard hunters
200pts - 2x10 steelhelms

[loky100]

I like it. Got a bit more staying power and board control with vanguard hunters.

[TheArborealWalrus]

First tank decal done!

[papary]

Do the steelhelm shields fit on any body?

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

5 minutes ago, papary said:

Do the steelhelm shields fit on any body?

Yes, they are not matched to specific ones.

[papary]

Just now, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Yes, they are not matched to specific ones.

lovely, thanks mate! thought i'd messed up leaving them off

[ReclusiarchRed]

I may have missed it, has the combat patrol been announced? Thanks. 

[TheArborealWalrus]

On 10/27/2023 at 1:51 PM, ReclusiarchRed said:

I may have missed it, has the combat patrol been announced? Thanks. 

Negative. Just the starter box we already have.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

So, I might be joining an AoS league next year.

That means it's time to look into actually building a semi-competitive list.

Currently, this is what I am thinking:

Spoiler

Allegiance: Cities of Sigmar
- City: Hallowheart (Misthavn/Lethis)
- Grand Strategy: Banners Held High
- Triumphs: Inspired

Leaders
Steam Tank with Commander (270)
- Artefact: Glimmering/Arcane Tome/???

Celestial Hurricanum with Celestial Battlemage (260)
- Lore of the Collegiate Arcane: Levitate/Merciless Blizzard

- Artefact: Mastro Vivetti's Maginificent Macroscope
Alchemite Warforger (90)

- General

- Lore of the Collegiate Arcane: Hoarfrost/Transmutation of Lead
- Command Trait: Master of Ballistics
Freeguild Cavalier-Marshal (120)

Pontifex Zenestra (150)

Battleline
10 x Freeguild Steelhelms (100)

10 x Freeguild Steelhelms (100)

20 x Freeguild Fusiliers (300)
 

Units
5 x Freeguild Cavaliers (180)

6 x Freeguild Command Corps (170)

 

 

Behemoths

Steam Tank (230)

Core Battalions
*Warlord

Total: 1970 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 1 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 125
Drops: 11

 

Game plan:

This is a fairly sturdy high-shooting list, so my game plan is to go high drops and get the deployment advantage. If I have to go first, great: I can get all my buffs up and shoot some stuff off the table. I have to go second, that's not the end of the world either, since this list has screens and anvils and can obsorb some damage. Plus, Orders allow Cities to play well out-of-turn.

In general, this list probably wins by picking off key units before engaging. It should play decently on objectives, but it not outstanding on them and needs good target priority to win, I think.

List choices:

Grand Strategy is Banners Held High. This list has 6 banners, which is decent, and can probably keep at least a few of them alive until the end of the game. This will be a near auto-succeed against Monster Mash and similar lists. A lot of armies don't even get banners on most of their units.

To keep things brief, I think Banners Held High is probably the best Cities GS for my list (and likely in general). Of the GHB strategies, the only one I could see myself using is Spellcasting Savant, where you have to keep your wizard-general alive, but that seems harder to do than Banners Held High.

I picked Hallowheart as my city because I really want to get the Alchemite spell off. 3d6 casting is a huge bonus and actually has some hidden upsides: It makes you immune to miscasts, because those are defined as unmodified casting rolls of 2. If you don't use primal dice, then you won't get primal miscasts out of rolling 2 or more 1s either. Hallowheart makes you suffer d3 mortals on a casting roll of 10+, but that is unmodified as well. It's pretty much a 50/50 chance, and you can mitigate the damage with wards, which is really managable. I think in the current season, the high cast bonus is necessary if you want to rely on spells to any significant extent. Even Settler's Gain is a noticable drop in cast chance, even more so if you factor in unbinds.

Other Cities in contention are Misthavn and Lethis. Misthavn because it helps get units in range and allows them to reposition, which is just generally good. Lethis because it would give me two priests to attempt to Curse opponents and remove wards. I will have to do the math at some point about how many extra wounds I would need to get from prayers to make it worthwhile over the increased cast chance for Blazing  Weapons and whatever the Hurricanum gets up to.

The Alchemite is my general and gets the master of ballistics command trait to enable the Fusilier block. He gets to cast two spells if I want him to because he is an Andtorian Locus, so I put Hoarfrost on there as well. It might be useful on Steelhelms occasionally. I think I will actually limit myself to one cast per phase most of the time (and take the extra command point instead), because at two casts there is a real danger of dying to the Hallowheart battle trait. An alternative would be Transmutation of Lead, which has the potential to at least do more mortals than Arcane Bolt occasionally.

The Hurricanum gets Levitate or Merciless Blizzard as a spell. The Hurricanum is there to support the Steam Tanks, and levitating one of them for counter-charge shennenigans is pretty good. Blizzard has a good chance of going off on the Hurricanum and it should generally be close enough to the front lines to actually cast it. Most of the time, the Hurricanum should probably be casting Mystic Shield or Chain Lightning, so I think picking a toolbox spell like levitate makes sense on it.

For artefacts, I am somewhat undecided. I know that I want to put the Macroscope on the Hurricanum or Steam Tank Commander, because it will make it much more likely that the tanks can shoot with everything turn 1. I will have a second artefact, which I have not yet decided on. In contention are. Shemteks Grimour, Arcane Tome and the Glimmering. I am currently favouring Arcane Tome on the Tank Commander so that he can self-buff with Mystic Shield, but I am not sure if risking mortals from casting on him is actually the play.

Core Battalions are not yet decided. I will take one Warlord battalion, but not sure apart from that. I could get Wizard Finders, but it's not really that good for this list.

 

Strategy:

Unit groupings will probably be:

Tank Group

• Steam Tank Commander
• Steam Tank
• Hurricanum
• Command Corps

Ranged Group

• Alchemite
• Fusiliers
• Steelhelms

Cavalry Group

• Cavalier Marshal
• Cavaliers

Zenestra

• Zenestra
• Steelhelms

The tank group is an offensive threat, but can also take a punch and grind out combats really well. The units support each other: The Hurricanum gives the tanks +1 to hit on all their profiles as well as mystic shield and an extra Order, while the Tanks keep the Hurricanum alive into the later rounds and allow it to deal big damage with its Storm of Shemtek. The Command Corps helps in a bunch of small ways, most notably by healing the tanks and disrupting commands. Orders are probably Counter Fire and Advance for turn 1.

The ranged group will probably hang back and shoot most of the time. You all know how it works: Mortal wound spell, all-out-attack, point-and-click a unit off the board. The Steelhelms help screen for it. Turn 1 the order is probably Counter Fire.

The cavalry group goes for that big charge which the cavalry marshall/cavalier power pair can try to get once per game. It also provides some much needed mobility and a 3rd threat for this list. Engage the Foe order when possible, Counter Charge otherwise.

Zenestra buffs whatever needs it most and tries to position herself so that she gets two prayers and can give a ward to most units. Also, she is a welcome source of an extra order, especially turn 1 for another Advance in Formation.

Battle Tactics:

Battle tactics seem hard.

Cities tactics:

This list can do Raise The Banner (take an objective off an opponent with a Great Herald) because it has a Command Corps.

Bring Full Arms To Bear (destroy a suppressed unit) seems like it should be possible sometimes turn 2 onwards. For this tactic, the unit needs to live through the initial shooting attack in order to be suppressed, but can then be destroyed in any way (even battleshock). Seems situational, but possible.

Likewise with Blackpowder Bombardment (destroy 3 units in the shooting phase). This list has a lot of shooting, so if small or weakened units are hanging around, it seems situationally possible.

Mount The Charge is hard for this list (charge and take an objective with only mounted units). Mounted units are the Tank Commander, the Hurricanum, the Marshal and the Cavaliers. Notably not Zenestra or the regular Steam Tank.

Since I have no elves and dwarves, I can't do the other tactics.

 

GHB tactics:

Intimidate the Invaders (get more units wholly outside of your territory than in it) seems like a good turn 1 tactic. The Tank and Cavalry groups want to advance, and Zenestra wants to get out of our territory as well. Pretty easy depending on the battle plan.

Reprisal (destroy the unit that destroyed your general) should situationally be possible, although ideally the Alchemite won't die a lot.

With 3d6 casting and only a few spells I want to cast per turn, Magical Dominance (successfully cast at least 1 spell and don't have any spells unbound) seems doable.

Same for Magical Mayhem (destroy a unit with a spell).

Everything else seems to situational to plan for or too hard for this list to do.

 

That leaves us with 2 fairly dependable tactics and 6 situational ones. Kind of sucks, but it is what it is.

 

Overall:

I like this list and I think it should be fun to play, but I also have a few things that I wish I could include that I didn't have room for. An extra hero like a battlemage would be cool for that extra order, artefact and cast (since I am already in Hallowheart). I would kind of like to bring more bodies. Getting in 30 Fusiliers would also be a big damage boost that I feel I am leaving on the table after already investing a lot into the shooting group. On the other hand, I would love to be able to fit in another Steam Tank. But fitting both a tank group and ranged group into the list is actually kind of hard to manage. Overall, I think I want that good Fusilier shooting more than I want an extra tank, though.

I'd be grateful for you guys' perspectives, especially when it comes to some of the list building coices that I am not yet 100% set on, like artefacts and battalions.

 

 

Edited November 1, 2023 by Neil Arthur Hotep

[Arathorn185]

So looking at new rules, what would I do for my shadow warrior count as?

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

2 minutes ago, Arathorn185 said:

So looking at new rules, what would I do for my shadow warrior count as?

Run them as Black Ark Corsairs or Darkshards.

[Arathorn185]

Damn, so no stealthy aelves in the book anymore? Mechanically I feel Wildercorps makes the most sense. But I’d need to get Hounds and a Arbablaster.

Darkshards I suppose work I /sigh because Crossbow vs Bow.

[Satyrical Sophist]

10 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

So, I might be joining an AoS league next year.

That means it's time to look into actually building a semi-competitive list.

Currently, this is what I am thinking:

  Reveal hidden contents

Allegiance: Cities of Sigmar
- City: Hallowheart (Misthavn/Lethis)
- Grand Strategy: Banners Held High
- Triumphs: Inspired

Leaders
Steam Tank with Commander (270)
- Artefact: Glimmering/Arcane Tome/???

Celestial Hurricanum with Celestial Battlemage (260)
- Lore of the Collegiate Arcane: Levitate/Merciless Blizzard

- Artefact: Mastro Vivetti's Maginificent Macroscope
Alchemite Warforger (90)

- General

- Lore of the Collegiate Arcane: Hoarfrost/Transmutation of Lead
- Command Trait: Master of Ballistics
Freeguild Cavalier-Marshal (120)

Pontifex Zenestra (150)

Battleline
10 x Freeguild Steelhelms (100)

10 x Freeguild Steelhelms (100)

20 x Freeguild Fusiliers (300)
 

Units
5 x Freeguild Cavaliers (180)

6 x Freeguild Command Corps (170)

 

 

Behemoths

Steam Tank (230)

Core Battalions
*Warlord

Total: 1970 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 1 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 125
Drops: 11

 

Game plan:

This is a fairly sturdy high-shooting list, so my game plan is to go high drops and get the deployment advantage. If I have to go first, great: I can get all my buffs up and shoot some stuff off the table. I have to go second, that's not the end of the world either, since this list has screens and anvils and can obsorb some damage. Plus, Orders allow Cities to play well out-of-turn.

In general, this list probably wins by picking off key units before engaging. It should play decently on objectives, but it not outstanding on them and needs good target priority to win, I think.

List choices:

Grand Strategy is Banners Held High. This list has 6 banners, which is decent, and can probably keep at least a few of them alive until the end of the game. This will be a near auto-succeed against Monster Mash and similar lists. A lot of armies don't even get banners on most of their units.

To keep things brief, I think Banners Held High is probably the best Cities GS for my list (and likely in general). Of the GHB strategies, the only one I could see myself using is Spellcasting Savant, where you have to keep your wizard-general alive, but that seems harder to do than Banners Held High.

I picked Hallowheart as my city because I really want to get the Alchemite spell off. 3d6 casting is a huge bonus and actually has some hidden upsides: It makes you immune to miscasts, because those are defined as unmodified casting rolls of 2. If you don't use primal dice, then you won't get primal miscasts out of rolling 2 or more 1s either. Hallowheart makes you suffer d3 mortals on a casting roll of 10+, but that is unmodified as well. It's pretty much a 50/50 chance, and you can mitigate the damage with wards, which is really managable. I think in the current season, the high cast bonus is necessary if you want to rely on spells to any significant extent. Even Settler's Gain is a noticable drop in cast chance, even more so if you factor in unbinds.

Other Cities in contention are Misthavn and Lethis. Misthavn because it helps get units in range and allows them to reposition, which is just generally good. Lethis because it would give me two priests to attempt to Curse opponents and remove wards. I will have to do the math at some point about how many extra wounds I would need to get from prayers to make it worthwhile over the increased cast chance for Blazing  Weapons and whatever the Hurricanum gets up to.

The Alchemite is my general and gets the master of ballistics command trait to enable the Fusilier block. He gets to cast two spells if I want him to because he is an Andtorian Locus, so I put Hoarfrost on there as well. It might be useful on Steelhelms occasionally. I think I will actually limit myself to one cast per phase most of the time (and take the extra command point instead), because at two casts there is a real danger of dying to the Hallowheart battle trait. An alternative would be Transmutation of Lead, which has the potential to at least do more mortals than Arcane Bolt occasionally.

The Hurricanum gets Levitate or Merciless Blizzard as a spell. The Hurricanum is there to support the Steam Tanks, and levitating one of them for counter-charge shennenigans is pretty good. Blizzard has a good chance of going off on the Hurricanum and it should generally be close enough to the front lines to actually cast it. Most of the time, the Hurricanum should probably be casting Mystic Shield or Chain Lightning, so I think picking a toolbox spell like levitate makes sense on it.

For artefacts, I am somewhat undecided. I know that I want to put the Macroscope on the Hurricanum or Steam Tank Commander, because it will make it much more likely that the tanks can shoot with everything turn 1. I will have a second artefact, which I have not yet decided on. In contention are. Shemteks Grimour, Arcane Tome and the Glimmering. I am currently favouring Arcane Tome on the Tank Commander so that he can self-buff with Mystic Shield, but I am not sure if risking mortals from casting on him is actually the play.

Core Battalions are not yet decided. I will take one Warlord battalion, but not sure apart from that. I could get Wizard Finders, but it's not really that good for this list.

 

Strategy:

Unit groupings will probably be:

Tank Group

• Steam Tank Commander
• Steam Tank
• Hurricanum
• Command Corps

Ranged Group

• Alchemite
• Fusiliers
• Steelhelms

Cavalry Group

• Cavalier Marshal
• Cavaliers

Zenestra

• Zenestra
• Steelhelms

The tank group is an offensive threat, but can also take a punch and grind out combats really well. The units support each other: The Hurricanum gives the tanks +1 to hit on all their profiles as well as mystic shield and an extra Order, while the Tanks keep the Hurricanum alive into the later rounds and allow it to deal big damage with its Storm of Shemtek. The Command Corps helps in a bunch of small ways, most notably by healing the tanks and disrupting commands. Orders are probably Counter Fire and Advance for turn 1.

The ranged group will probably hang back and shoot most of the time. You all know how it works: Mortal wound spell, all-out-attack, point-and-click a unit off the board. The Steelhelms help screen for it. Turn 1 the order is probably Counter Fire.

The cavalry group goes for that big charge which the cavalry marshall/cavalier power pair can try to get once per game. It also provides some much needed mobility and a 3rd threat for this list. Engage the Foe order when possible, Counter Charge otherwise.

Zenestra buffs whatever needs it most and tries to position herself so that she gets two prayers and can give a ward to most units. Also, she is a welcome source of an extra order, especially turn 1 for another Advance in Formation.

Battle Tactics:

Battle tactics seem hard.

Cities tactics:

This list can do Raise The Banner (take an objective off an opponent with a Great Herald) because it has a Command Corps.

Bring Full Arms To Bear (destroy a suppressed unit) seems like it should be possible sometimes turn 2 onwards. For this tactic, the unit needs to live through the initial shooting attack in order to be suppressed, but can then be destroyed in any way (even battleshock). Seems situational, but possible.

Likewise with Blackpowder Bombardment (destroy 3 units in the shooting phase). This list has a lot of shooting, so if small or weakened units are hanging around, it seems situationally possible.

Mount The Charge is hard for this list (charge and take an objective with only mounted units). Mounted units are the Tank Commander, the Hurricanum, the Marshal and the Cavaliers. Notably not Zenestra or the regular Steam Tank.

Since I have no elves and dwarves, I can't do the other tactics.

 

GHB tactics:

Intimidate the Invaders (get more units wholly outside of your territory than in it) seems like a good turn 1 tactic. The Tank and Cavalry groups want to advance, and Zenestra wants to get out of our territory as well. Pretty easy depending on the battle plan.

Reprisal (destroy the unit that destroyed your general) should situationally be possible, although ideally the Alchemite won't die a lot.

With 3d6 casting and only a few spells I want to cast per turn, Magical Dominance (successfully cast at least 1 spell and don't have any spells unbound) seems doable.

Same for Magical Mayhem (destroy a unit with a spell).

Everything else seems to situational to plan for or too hard for this list to do.

 

That leaves us with 2 fairly dependable tactics and 6 situational ones. Kind of sucks, but it is what it is.

 

Overall:

I like this list and I think it should be fun to play, but I also have a few things that I wish I could include that I didn't have room for. An extra hero like a battlemage would be cool for that extra order, artefact and cast (since I am already in Hallowheart). I would kind of like to bring more bodies. Getting in 30 Fusiliers would also be a big damage boost that I feel I am leaving on the table after already investing a lot into the shooting group. On the other hand, I would love to be able to fit in another Steam Tank. But fitting both a tank group and ranged group into the list is actually kind of hard to manage. Overall, I think I want that good Fusilier shooting more than I want an extra tank, though.

I'd be grateful for you guys' perspectives, especially when it comes to some of the list building coices that I am not yet 100% set on, like artefacts and battalions.

 

 

I will try to give a more helpful response when I get a chance but looks interesting! I have a couple of questions. Are you assuming that Steam Tank Commanders are meant to get the steam tank keyword for issuing the command to themselves and another tank? I'd be really tempted to see if I could find the missing 10 points to upgrade the steam tank to a commander, the extra shots and option for extra orders seem good.

The other thing is that I don't think a hurricanum can take blizzard? It has to be a locus and has too many wounds I think. 

[Landohammer]

7 hours ago, Arathorn185 said:

Damn, so no stealthy aelves in the book anymore? Mechanically I feel Wildercorps makes the most sense. But I’d need to get Hounds and a Arbablaster.

Darkshards I suppose work I /sigh because Crossbow vs Bow.

Yea unfortunately Sisters of the Watch/Shadow Warriors don't have a good proxy option. I feel your pain bc I have 30 sisters of the watch painted. Darkshards are close, but if you plan on taking our one good grand (banners) then you would need to somehow add a banner to 1 in 10. 

I would definitely not proxy them as Wildercorps, unless you rebase them. Wildercorps have 3 different base sizes and the models have distinct profiles. So in any kind of semi-competitive environment it might not work bc your footprint would be off (especially for screening purposes) and pulling models would be confusing to your opponent. 

Casualties in wildercorps matter bc each model you pull either diminishes their shooting (pulling bows) or their combat (pulling dogs). 

[Landohammer]

Quick summary of my experience with the codex after 8 games. Overall going 2-5-1 fielding Greywater 7 times and Living City once. 

Orders- I run light on heroes (just 2 max) so Pretty much every game has the same sequence. I start with +3 movement on turn 1 to get into position, then use engage the foe on my cavaliers for big charges. I think use Supressing Fire or Return Fire on fusiliers as needed. Most of my heroes are either out of position or dead by turn 3 so its largely not relevant after that lol. 

Dwarfs- Hammerers hit like a truck and gyrocopters are a steal for their points. I often did just as much damage with gyrocopters as with cannons and gyros melee profile surprised quite a few people. The +3 movement order seems like a godsend here but considering they are "normal moves" only its really only useful on the turns you plan to charge which seem like never. I often found myself just using runs bc they netted more movement. Dwarf orders were extremely weak but at least the dwarf Heroes bring decent buffs themselves. 

Aelves - Spears are ok screens. Darkshards are bad. Executioners are amazing. Executioners absolutely butchered anything they touched with or without aelven orders. Sorceress is a must have in any aelf list. 

Humans - I think Cavaliers definitely have some potential. When combined with Engage the foe they can put out a shocking amount of damage. But the squads of 10 are clunky bc only range 1" on their weapons. Fusiliers are the cornerstone of the army BUT ONLY if you keep the +1 to wound artefact near them and all out attack up (greywater helped here). I also tried the marshal on griffin  kitted out with the magic runehammer and he always did fine for his cost. The warforger is the best unit in the army clearly and games will often be determined by if he can get his spell off. 

Steelhelms and Cannons are heavily overpriced but I often found myself fielding them just bc they filled out convenient slots (battleline unlocks or artillery slots in battle regiments). Steelhelms make competent screens but seems like Wildercorps are just flat out better for a mild point/model difference. The cost difference after factoring in the extra body comes out to like 2-3pts per model but they have very significant shooting and the dogs have superior melee profiles. Not even considering the better special rules.

Overall - I think most of the book is super fun to play but probably about 15% over costed. The order system tends to fall apart under pressure. I think the Lioness of the Parch and Cavalier Marshal will be interesting additions once they arrive because they add a lot to Cavalier armies. Being able to rally a unit of Cavaliers on 4+ that is in combat seems huge, and being able to chain activate cavaliers with the Cavalier Marshal could lead to alpha strikes where your opponent loses a lot of their army in one charge. I look forward to playing a lot more games! 

 

[TheArborealWalrus]

Oh! I forgot to report my tournament with the stanks!

Match 1 VS Gloomspite Gits.
Horde of squigs that he individually sent at me and were wiped out. I actually kept the objectives off of him due to his caution of my cannon fire. Between overwatch and shooting I almost tabled him. It was a nasty one. (for him)

Match 2 VS Ironjaws
This is one of my least favorite matchups. Fighting speed jaws is like no other army (or so I thought) in the game. You have to castle up turn 1 or die. You get to actually play the game once the jaws realize it's not a first turn tabling.
I split my tanks on two sides of a building (3 and 1) which was probably a mistake. Maw crusha and 3 pigs came in turn 1 and I almost killed the pigs but the lone tank was almost killed by the cabbage.
He wins priority and sends in 6 pigs while I lose my last screen to the other 6 on the right. He finishes my tank and a second is wounded. I kill 5 pigs between the units and leave one on 4 and the other on 2. The crusha is left on 5 wounds. 
 Here comes the real deciding turn and ... I lose the roll off. Crusha kills the command squad, the alchemist is killed by one unit and the other kills a tank in a flurry of 1s. Long story short, I get trapped up and lose by 2 points from only tying him on objectives. 

Match 3 VS Godseekers slaanesh.
So ... I was expecting the standard pretenders nonsense and got ironjaws that shoot. He was a 1 drop and chose to go first.
The short version is that 2/3rds of his army charged me turn 1 and I spent the rest of the game chewing my way through them while the rest shot me. Sigvald did manage (with 3d6 charge/attacks) to kill 2 tanks but ignominiously died to falling rocks very suddenly. (a flurry of failed 4++s)

So, 1 win and 2 losses. Not terrible. Can it be competitive? As long as you don't get stuffed in your deployment. Tanks need freedom of movement. Bogged down is bad, and the damage is good, but not infalible. my cannon shots were awful all tournament. Hitting on 3s even in overwatch and still had less than 50% hit rate. Xp (huricanum + lord ordinator = +2 vs -1) 
Fun, wierd skew army.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

12 hours ago, Satyrical Sophist said:

I will try to give a more helpful response when I get a chance but looks interesting! I have a couple of questions. Are you assuming that Steam Tank Commanders are meant to get the steam tank keyword for issuing the command to themselves and another tank? I'd be really tempted to see if I could find the missing 10 points to upgrade the steam tank to a commander, the extra shots and option for extra orders seem good.

That's a very good point, actually. I had been looking only at the possibility of fitting an extra small hero in, but upgrading the Tank is actually a lot easier. Would pretty easy, too, I could just replace a unit of Steelhelms with Dreadspears. They will miss out on HUMAN keyword synergies, but since I am only using them to screen anyway, I think that is acceptable.

13 hours ago, Satyrical Sophist said:

The other thing is that I don't think a hurricanum can take blizzard? It has to be a locus and has too many wounds I think. 

Thanks for the heads up, you are right. Honestly, I would prefer not to play with all the extra magic rules if I had a choice, but it is what it is. I'll just run Levitate in that case, because Twin-Tailed Comet is kind of garbo and the Hurricanum already has a direct damage spell on its warscroll, anyway.

 

11 hours ago, Landohammer said:

Orders- I run light on heroes (just 2 max) so Pretty much every game has the same sequence. I start with +3 movement on turn 1 to get into position, then use engage the foe on my cavaliers for big charges. I think use Supressing Fire or Return Fire on fusiliers as needed. Most of my heroes are either out of position or dead by turn 3 so its largely not relevant after that lol. 

This is a super different experience from what I had running several pretty sturdy heroes. Really interesting. I found the Orders super valuable for how they allowed me to play out of sequence with counter charges and counter fire. I would honestly say that they are Cities main allegiance ability and not packing on at least a few heroes would kind of be like playing Stormcast without deep striking.

 

12 hours ago, Landohammer said:

Steelhelms and Cannons are heavily overpriced but I often found myself fielding them just bc they filled out convenient slots (battleline unlocks or artillery slots in battle regiments). Steelhelms make competent screens but seems like Wildercorps are just flat out better for a mild point/model difference.

I definitely agree with you on the cannons (just from the damage math), but I think the Steelhelms have some extra potential if you build around them. In Hammerhal Ghyra, they get 10 bravery, which in turn makes the Freeguild Marshal's "count as two on objectives" ability a lot more likely to work. They are a natural 4+ save and likely 6+ ward, and also get access to several easy +1 to saves buffs, a potential 5+ ward from Zenestra, rally into combat from Tahlia Vedra, mortal wounds from the Warforger... I think you can 100% play a Steelhelm horde if you want to, it's just not the most attractive way to play the army because painting 60+ Steelhelms honestly sounds like torture.

[Landohammer]

2 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

 

 

This is a super different experience from what I had running several pretty sturdy heroes. Really interesting. I found the Orders super valuable for how they allowed me to play out of sequence with counter charges and counter fire. I would honestly say that they are Cities main allegiance ability and not packing on at least a few heroes would kind of be like playing Stormcast without deep striking.

 

I definitely agree with you on the cannons (just from the damage math), but I think the Steelhelms have some extra potential if you build around them. In Hammerhal Ghyra, they get 10 bravery, which in turn makes the Freeguild Marshal's "count as two on objectives" ability a lot more likely to work. They are a natural 4+ save and likely 6+ ward, and also get access to several easy +1 to saves buffs, a potential 5+ ward from Zenestra, rally into combat from Tahlia Vedra, mortal wounds from the Warforger... I think you can 100% play a Steelhelm horde if you want to, it's just not the most attractive way to play the army because painting 60+ Steelhelms honestly sounds like torture.

I do need to try counter charge more often. I am often finding my screens getting in the way of the countercharge but that is probably just my user error.

I personally don't have any interest in building/playing a zombie list using steelhelms. That might end up being the meta though. The painting isn't so much the issue for me as much as the playstyle being just "stand around on objectives and don't die" lol.

I am itching for Tahlia Vedra too. I think she will be the anchor of the army similar to Morathi or Teclist. But I think the true cheese in the army is going to be charging with the Cavalier marshal and then using his first strike activation shenanigans to activate two squads of cavaliers. If you have engage the foe up (or maybe even a cheeky warforger spell if he can keep up) then I think it will be absolutely devastating. 

My opponents reactions when they charge and easily kill my 10 cavaliers: "Man cities are kinda bad"

My opponents reactions when I charge them with 10 cavaliers with engage the foe: "Man cities are way OP!" 🤣

 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

So, I have been doing some calculations to get an idea of how much of a benefit going Hallowheart actually is for my above list.

To start: This is really pretty hard to quantify, and you need to make a lot of assumptions. But I think you can at least get a pretty good idea of what it would take for a different subfaction to beat Hallowheart in terms of expected mortal wounds.

So, assumptions:

• A warforger casts Ignite Weapons every round
• A unit of 20 Fusiliers receives the buff (nobody else, even though it is an aura).
• The opponent tries to unbind every time.

Without going over the math, this adds ~10.5 mortals over the course of a game. Since my list also had a Hurricanum that will probably occasionally want to cast a direct damage spell, I will assume another 3 extra mortals over the course of a game from that. So my assumption is that I would need to add about 13-14 mortals/unsaved damage to match Hallowheart if that is the only thing I am taking into consideration.

The city I want to compare this to is Lethis. Lethis makes non-wizard characters into priests, giving them a 4+ prayer that turns off wards and allowing them to take generic players like Curse (4+. 6s to hit cause 1 mortal in addition on an enemy unit). The question is, can this get you to 13 or so mortals over a game?

More assuptions:

• My list gets 3 extra priests: two Tank Commanders and a Cavalier-Marshall
• Since Curse is 9" range, no hero will be in position round 1 to use it.
• Of the 4 remaining rounds, it will fail twice. So expect two successful curses per game.

But this is where it gets tricky. The expected mortals added by the warforger spell are easy to calc, since they are added to the attacks of just the Fusiliers, while the mortals from curse can in theory come from any unit that attacks into the cursed unit. That includes the Fusiliers, but only if they don't also have Ignite Weapons, since they don't stack (thus having bothe would not add any mortals).

The Cavalier-Marshal will probably not benefit from Curse, because he and the Cavaliers are supposed to make long-range charges and then die fairly quickly, so would probably be either out of range or dead.

A round of shooting and melee from a Steam Tank Commander adds 4.25 mortals with Curse up. Assuming a Tank Commander gets curse off 2 times and is the only unit that fights two times (I think this is a reasonable floor), that is 8,5 mortals. Over the course of the game, you would need to find 5 extra wounds between ward negation and mortals to make the choice of Lethis worth it for my list.

I think this is doable, but it would probably raise the skill floor of piloting the list pretty significantly. The Hallowheart build has a real upside in my mind, which is that it is a lot more simple and significantly more consistent. 3d6 casting close to guarantees that the Warforger spell will go off, even taking Andtor special rules into account (~90% to cast through a 2d6 unbind, and you can stack as many extra dice into your cast as you opponent can stack into their unbind). And you don't need to make any decisions other than what you want to shoot. With Lethis, although you can probably get more mortals out of it realistically, you need to make a lot of on the fly decisions to get them. So I will personally be sticking to Hallowheart for big games/tournament scenarios.

TL;DR: Hallowheart is difficult to beat for mortal wounds output and consistency even if you just run a 20 Fusilier + Warforger power pair.

[Landohammer]

2 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

So, I have been doing some calculations to get an idea of how much of a benefit going Hallowheart actually is for my above list.

To start: This is really pretty hard to quantify, and you need to make a lot of assumptions. But I think you can at least get a pretty good idea of what it would take for a different subfaction to beat Hallowheart in terms of expected mortal wounds.

So, assumptions:

• A warforger casts Ignite Weapons every round
• A unit of 20 Fusiliers receives the buff (nobody else, even though it is an aura).
• The opponent tries to unbind every time.

Without going over the math, this adds ~10.5 mortals over the course of a game. Since my list also had a Hurricanum that will probably occasionally want to cast a direct damage spell, I will assume another 3 extra mortals over the course of a game from that. So my assumption is that I would need to add about 13-14 mortals/unsaved damage to match Hallowheart if that is the only thing I am taking into consideration.

The city I want to compare this to is Lethis. Lethis makes non-wizard characters into priests, giving them a 4+ prayer that turns off wards and allowing them to take generic players like Curse (4+. 6s to hit cause 1 mortal in addition on an enemy unit). The question is, can this get you to 13 or so mortals over a game?

More assuptions:

• My list gets 3 extra priests: two Tank Commanders and a Cavalier-Marshall
• Since Curse is 9" range, no hero will be in position round 1 to use it.
• Of the 4 remaining rounds, it will fail twice. So expect two successful curses per game.

But this is where it gets tricky. The expected mortals added by the warforger spell are easy to calc, since they are added to the attacks of just the Fusiliers, while the mortals from curse can in theory come from any unit that attacks into the cursed unit. That includes the Fusiliers, but only if they don't also have Ignite Weapons, since they don't stack (thus having bothe would not add any mortals).

The Cavalier-Marshal will probably not benefit from Curse, because he and the Cavaliers are supposed to make long-range charges and then die fairly quickly, so would probably be either out of range or dead.

A round of shooting and melee from a Steam Tank Commander adds 4.25 mortals with Curse up. Assuming a Tank Commander gets curse off 2 times and is the only unit that fights two times (I think this is a reasonable floor), that is 8,5 mortals. Over the course of the game, you would need to find 5 extra wounds between ward negation and mortals to make the choice of Lethis worth it for my list.

I think this is doable, but it would probably raise the skill floor of piloting the list pretty significantly. The Hallowheart build has a real upside in my mind, which is that it is a lot more simple and significantly more consistent. 3d6 casting close to guarantees that the Warforger spell will go off, even taking Andtor special rules into account (~90% to cast through a 2d6 unbind, and you can stack as many extra dice into your cast as you opponent can stack into their unbind). And you don't need to make any decisions other than what you want to shoot. With Lethis, although you can probably get more mortals out of it realistically, you need to make a lot of on the fly decisions to get them. So I will personally be sticking to Hallowheart for big games/tournament scenarios.

TL;DR: Hallowheart is difficult to beat for mortal wounds output and consistency even if you just run a 20 Fusilier + Warforger power pair.

My devil's advocate thoughts: Curse looks really good on paper but its short range and relatively hard to hit value make it extremely tricky to pull off. You need to already be in range in your hero phase. I often found myself trying get into position for next turn just to end up giving my opponent an easy charge, or failing the 4+ prayer lol. Besides its better served on units with lots of attacks and the Warforgers Blazing Weapons does a similar job and is more reliable. IMHO There are easier ways to get priests rather than committing your entire subfaction to them.

Hallowheart seems more useful in a variety of circumstances but keep in mind its a magic meta and many competitive players are bringing strong magic or anti-magic. It would stink to bring Hallowheart into games vs Tzeentch, Khorne, OBR, SBGL, LRL, etc because those guys are going to shut down your critical spells everytime. 

If I was viewing the subfactions from a purely competitive point of view (and not a fluff one) then Lethis or Mishavn seem like the strongest to me. I actually personally use Greywater in my semi competitive environment just because I know I will get value out of it in the shooting phase just about every game (probably in every turn!) 

 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

3 minutes ago, Landohammer said:

Hallowheart seems more useful in a variety of circumstances but keep in mind its a magic meta and many competitive players are bringing strong magic or anti-magic. It would stink to bring Hallowheart into games vs Tzeentch, Khorne, OBR, SBGL, LRL, etc because those guys are going to shut down your critical spells everytime. 

In my opinion, if I am going into this with the expectation that the Warforger spell won't go off anyway, I might as well leave the Fusiliers at home.

But I actually think Hallowheart has a pretty good chance at competing in the magic game. 3d6 casting is +3,5 to cast on average and the Warforger has +1 to cast on its warscroll. That's a huge bonus. If it's just about getting a spell out through a normal or +1 unbind, they can do it.

Of course, there are better and worse match up for an army that relies on magic, and Tzeentch, Khorne, Teclis or Nagash certainly are bad match ups. But I don't think they are bad to the point of being unbeatable. Notably, the list is not especially affected by Null Myriad, because the Alchemite spell can't be blocked by their spell shrug.

[TheArborealWalrus]

I've decided to try and get the dwarves to work next, and by that, I mean, "Everything looks like a dwarf but doesn't have to have the keyword."

Battalion 1:
Lord Ordinator
3x gyrocopters
cannon
Battalion 2:
Dwarf lord - general
2x10 ironbreakers
3x10 hammerers
cannon
Battalion 3:
Rune lord
Sorceress (Rune lord?) - blizzard
Gyrocopter
Dreadspears

So far, the hypothesis is gyrocopters as speed with cannons clearing the way for hammerers to finish what's left. Ironbreakers are there because they're cool. Xp Only 3 "not dwarf" unit in the current list. (Don't count the cannons) Will try it this weekend. (I also want to try a kharybdiss. Not sure what dwarf tech/creature it'll be)
Any suggestions are welcome, especially subfaction choice.

Cheers!

[Lightbox]

Out of curiosity how feasible do people think running a marshall griffon and Tahlia could be? Thinking having the two big threats to run around terrorizing stuff could be fun but I'm also not sure if they're considered deadly enough to warrant the cost in the list. I generally prefer running smaller model count lists but don't want to be too janky.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

4 minutes ago, Lightbox said:

Out of curiosity how feasible do people think running a marshall griffon and Tahlia could be? Thinking having the two big threats to run around terrorizing stuff could be fun but I'm also not sure if they're considered deadly enough to warrant the cost in the list. I generally prefer running smaller model count lists but don't want to be too janky.

The Marshall on Griffon is a really strong choice for general. You can kit him out to be tanky and fighty with the Sigmarite Warhammer artefact and Grizzled Veteran trait. Double Roar, double orders, counter charge over screens... Lots of benefits here, I would say absolutely worth the points.

I think you can run him alongside Tahlia no problem. They are about equally fighty, too. If I was running a cavalry heavy list, they are probably the two heroes I would start with.