Tactics versus Sylvaneth

[Razorfate]

Hi there,

In an upcoming tournament which i am planning to join by the army below, what can you offer tactics, unit pickings, army list composition? The main difficulty of the sylvaneth is:

-Forests everywhere, deadly and very unforgiving if rolled badly for multiwound models.

-Forests attacks enemy units when spells cast inside them on a roll of 5+ dealing d3 mortal wounds.  4 spells per phase really hurt.

- 2++ rerollable save of Treelord, Treelord Ancient and dryads when arcane shielded

- İnability to deal mortal wounds through spirit hosts as dryads in forests and treelords' stomp attack gives -1 to hit penalty.

-Immense ranged attack of Hunters with -1 rending and d3 wounds, furthermore rerolling saves in combat when pile in 1" in combat

 

As i understand best bet to win is inflicting mortal wounds which is a little hard for us.

 

My list is:

VLoZD General, Ring, Ruler of Night

Necromancer for VHDM

Zombies - 10

Zombies-10

Skeletons-40

Blood Knights-5

Blood Knights -5

Spirit Host-6

240 pts for summoning

 

I have terrorghesit, lots of zombies, 3 Varghesits, 6 fellbats, skeletons, skeleton archers, i can borrow other stuff execept Tomb Kings from feloow players.

 

[mmimzie]

odds are you wont get the first turn, but if you do, summoning a unit of zombies and dire wolves will allow you to prevent the forest spread. 

 

You have the spirit bomb for the treelord, your main problem will be to try to deliver that spirit bomb to the tree lord. 

Other than that i wouldn't try to design a list to take it down. I'd say pick your list and practise it as hard as you can. A list used professionally is devastating. 

[Squirrelmaster]

1. Fear of the trees can be as damaging as the trees themselves. You may not want to put elites, characters, etc. within 1" of a wood, but if skeletons or zombies wind up taking D3 mortal wounds, it's not a big deal. Often, you need to get some models close to, or within, the forest in order to stop the teleportation shenanigans, and prevent more woods from being summoned where you don't want them.

Likewise, rolling a 1 may cost you you dragon if you charge, but not charging may cost you the game anyway — you have to weigh up the risks and do the best you can, even if sometimes that means you lose just because luck was against you.

2. Yes, if you want to deal with a 2+ re-rollable (ignoring rend of -1), mortal wounds are the best tool. Failing that, rend -2 or better. Your options are limited, the Terrorgheist is good at this, as are Morghast Archai. Spirit Hosts are still a good option, even though there's a 50% chance of the Stomp basically shutting them down. If you can keep them alive, they will dish out some mortal wounds eventually. If you can throw out some arcane bolts and/or blood boils you can do some damage that way. Even banshees are worth taking against a Treelord Ancient - he may be bravery 9, but any mortal wounds you do inflict will count for a lot.

It's also important to get in some unbindings if you can - mystic shield if he's not injured, but Regrowth in particular is one you will want to shut down if possible.

3. Spirit Hosts are not good against dryads, not only because of the -1 to hit, but because dryads aren't that well armoured in the first place. This is where you want other units to do the fighting.

[Razorfate]

Which of the Morghasts do you think is more benefical? Two handed versions for -2 rend of course, but i feel 3d6 charge range was more good for the surprise value they bring. 

[Xarnax]

The harbingers actually have a higher damage potential against some units. Anything with save 6+/- take more damage than from archai. Against anything better and especially against rerollable saves, you are massively better off with the archai. And remember that they still have move 9 with flying which is alot. 9 times out of 10 I would pick the archai. 

[Squirrelmaster]

Yeah, I have two harbingers but I kep wishing I'd assembled them as Archai. The harbingers only get an extra 3.5" to their average charge, which isn't a lot. They do slightly better against lightly armoured or unarmoured troops, but not by much. The Archai do massively more against armoured opponents, which for me is the key factor, though the ward save against mortal wounds can be pretty useful, too.

It's not just that I regard Archai as better overall, though. The rest of my army (and I would say most of the DEATH allegiance) is lacking serious rend and mortal-wound dealing ability. So the Harbingers are kinda filling a role that many other units in my army could also fill — I can already dish out a large quantity of low-rend attacks from skeletons. Harbingers' speed is good, but not unique (black knights, blood knights), and they're actually pretty fragile, point-for-point. The Archai are also fragile/expensive, but they bring something to the table that DEATH would otherwise be lacking.

I actually have a Necrosphinx now, but if I didn't I'm pretty sure I'd have added some Archai instead.

[Dragon10]

Wow I never new the wood elves tree models where so strong 

[MidasKiss]

My main army is Sylvaneth. I wouldn't worry so much about the woods, losing models to them is rarer than I would like. Finish as many models off the woods and pile in onto them to avoid rolling for those models (unless they HAD to cross over the woods to get there). Monsters and heros don't have to roll the deadly terrain test. The 5+ spell thing happens but again not regularly. Death with their mortal wound save are in a good spot when it does happen.

Hunters are very tough. If it's scythes chaff them with the spirits to ignore that -2 rend. If it's bows know that they are actually very resilliant with 3 having rerolling saves in the combat phase and 15 wounds to chew through. If it is a Gnarlroot formation the have a good chance to bring back one a turn if they want to also (kill heros if you can).

Lastly, the big guys fall off massively as they take wounds. Much more than some other armies. They can offset this with the heal d6 regrowth spell, but your vampire will give you a chance to dispell that at least. Let me know if you have any specific questions.

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[MidasKiss]

Also (I guess it wasn't lastly haha). I would think skeletons to do well at holding up dryads. 20 dryads is 240 points, 41 attacks on 4/4-/1 (hitting on +1 in their combat). On average only about 10 attacks would get through to your 5+ save (+1 because 0 rend) and then into your Wight king save, Minions save. Probably 80 points of skeletons would hold them up for a while if you can roll average on your D6 coming back, which is a pretty good points return.

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[Xarnax]

If only the tomb king models were for sale still... So many good answers to these things. The necrosphinx is amazing at dealing with heavily armored models. 

[MidasKiss]

The necrosphinx can be picked up on eBay or elsewhere without much hassle. I have one new in box but haven't been bothered to sell it because the value isn't that crazy. I think they will come back eventually, because from what I heard the reasons they didn't make it sounded pretty flimsy.

Maybe they will give them a new release without some of the crapper looking models + some new ones, but they obviously aren't in a big rush to do it.

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[TheFrenchBaron]

Ive played against Sylvaneth a bit, and by the sounds of it a fairly similar list. My advice is;

1/ focus on the scenario 
2/ limit their movement by camping on the forests with chaff, they need them to get around the table
3/ bog down the tree lord ancient with chaff don't bother trying to kill him unless you have mortal wounds 
4/ get table control early to stop them placing woods
5/ the hunters are a pain especially if your opponent is running 3 units, but inconsistent I find. In your list it get the VLoZD into a unit of them early
6/ focus on the scenario 

Cheers 
TFB

[Nico]

Sadly the best hard counter to Sylvaneth is the Mourngul - Dryads get -2 to hit against it (as does a Treelord - ouch Bravery 6) - they don't have the mortal wound Spam to take it out.

Catapults plus Terrirgheists or Banshees would also wreck Dryads.

Nagash also wrecks them by shutting down all their magic. Also Soul Drain is strong against Dryads.

You can try to outgrind them with FEC. Suggest 9/12 Crypt Horrors with GKoTG for double ward save.

Shooting the Hunters is the answer but not easy for Death.

[CoffeeGrunt]

19 hours ago, Squirrelmaster said:

Likewise, rolling a 1 may cost you you dragon if you charge, but not charging may cost you the game anyway

Monsters and Heroes aren't affected by that rule with the Sylvaneth Wyldwoods, so you're fine to charge them.

[Razorfate]

So what is your opininons with this list?

Leaders
Vampire Lord On Zombie Dragon (440)
- General
- Deathlance & Shield & Chalice
- Trait: Ruler of the Night
- Artefact: Ring of Immortality
Necromancer (120)
Abhorrant Ghoul King on Terrorgheist (400)

Units
Zombies x 10 (60)
Zombies x 10 (60)
Blood Knights x 5 (260)
Blood Knights x 5 (260)
Skeleton Warriors x 40 (320)
- Ancient Spear & Crypt or Tomb Shield
Total: 1920/2000
 

GKoTG and VLoZD can deal a bunch of wounds together. GK will protect himself and will get rerollable 5++ save after his 4+ save, i think he can be quite tough to be killed. Blood knights will go for the weaker stuff of the enemy (small dryad squads and such). Large skeleton infantry will go for the center of the table, looking for the 30-40 strong arcane shielded dryad unit, tanking them. Zombies will be meatshield for the necromancer. The last 80 points is for the banshee if the 3 places of power scenario is rolled, normally i will summon a unit of direwolves to act as screen for the army.

I'd like to add spirit host but this means one of the blood knight unit must be dropped. They are too good for taking wth their regernation and good save to drop, but i am uncertain now.

 

[CoffeeGrunt]

Well you're 80pts under, a Banshee might helps spread Deathless and provide some Mortal Wounds against the low Bravery of Sylvaneth? Either that or just throw in a 10 man Skeleton squad? How does the GK get a re-rollable 5++?

Personally I run a fundamentally-different list, so I probably can't advise much. I can only suggest trying it out and seeing where the weaknesses are.