Battlebeard

A couple of my friends went to their first doubles tournament and loved it, so now they want to play against me and another friend in the same format, but using the latest GHB. My doubles partner will be playing Slaves to Darkness, so I thought I'd go with the Hedonites for some all Chaos fun. I'm not the most competitive player by nature but I'm going to have to up my game a bit for this, so I was looking for some suggestions about solid choices for a 1k army. Any suggestions gratefully appreciated!

I have a probably silly question about the Lord of Hubris and Phantasmagoria before my first game tomorrow. If I charge a unit under the effects of Phantasmagoria with the Lord of Hubris and another unit, say Painbringers, and use the Lord of Hubris' ability to make the enemy unit target him... ...what happens if the Lord of Hubris retreats when the enemy unit is picked to activate? Can they then target the Painbringers because the Lord of Hubris has run away, or can they not target anything at all? Sorry if this question has already been asked, I did a quick search but didn't find anything.

I had another game on Wednesday and I just wanted to say your advice was really helpful - I still got tabled by the Kruleboyz but I did a LOT more damage to him this time, so that's good progress! In case anyone's interested we were playing Turf War, which was a bit unfortunate as I couldn't deep strike set anyone up in the Celestial Realm, which meant I couldn't put some of the advice into practice. We were also trying to play "properly" with the recommended amounts of terrain, and I've got to say 8 bits of terrain on a 60" x 44" board looks very sparse - we'd previously been playing with a lot more. It also gave him pretty open fire lanes. The two drop army list allowed me to go first and I think I made the mistake of playing too aggressively - my opponent had one unit of six Boltboyz screened by Hobgrotz facing the Stormdrake Guard and Yndrasta, and I went for them. I seem to always fall into the trap of assuming the Stormcast have a higher damage output than they actually do - the Draconic Flamestreams from the Stormdrake Guard only killed a couple of the Boltboyz, so I had to charge them into the Hobgrot screen and have the dragons reach over them to get at the Boltboyz, while the riders fought the Hobgrotz. I had to rely on battleshock to kill the last Boltboy, and even after battleshock there were still a few Hobgrotz left. I should probably have thrown Yndrasta into them as well, but I got greedy as I rolled well on her charge and caught one of his Shamans - I thought she would easily kill him but it didn't happen. I had a similar issue on the other flank, where he redeployed his Mirebrute Troggoth into no man's land near one of the objectives. I could still only get a couple of Castigators into range, but I got some hammers from the Prosecutors into him as well and chipped some wounds off. I threw the Prosecutors into his other unit of Boltboyz to eat the overwatch unleash hell (which they did, and died as you would expect) to clear the way for the Chariot to charge into the Mirebrute - unfortunately it couldn't kill it. He then killed Yndrasta, the Stormdrake Guard and the Chariot in his turn (and then got the double turn), but I was on both objectives and managing to score secondaries battle tactics so it turned into a war of attrition. I was ahead on points in the first two rounds and he only levelled the score in the third... but after that I was tabled so he was well ahead at the end. Still, aside from Gobsprakk he was down to a few bits and pieces so at least he knew he'd been in a fight! In retrospect I possibly should have deployed well back - well out of range - and waited out the army wide -1 to wound the Kruleboyz have for the first round - but in a game where I couldn't use reserves, if I ceded the objectives to my opponent at the start I'm not sure how I'd have dealt with him sticking a unit of six Boltboyz on each objective - I think I'd have been shot down as I walked into range. Any suggestions would be welcome! I'm also not sure I used the Knight-Judicator properly - I fired off his mortal wound bomb immediately as I could hit seven units, but it only affected three and only did a couple of mortals to each unit. I only used his spell once because it was the only time he wasn't in denial range of Gobsprakk who would have murdered him with his 3D6 denial plus mortal wounds. I'll have to think about how to get more out of him. Thanks again!

I hadn't thought about the order in which the mortal wounds from the chariot and unleash hell operate - I only used the chariot for the first time in my last game. Thanks, that makes a lot more sense now.

Thanks for all the info! I've got another game next week, I'll give that list a try! EDIT: Sorry one more question, you mention that the Chariot is tanky but it only has 12 wounds, if my maths are right six properly buffed Boltboyz will do 11 mortal wounds on average via unleash hell, so my opponent only needs to roll slightly above average to kill it on the way in? Would it be best to suicide the Prosecutors to eat the overwatch if I have to use the Castigators to clear the screen?

Thanks for the comprehensive information! One question on Option 1 - if my opponent is Grinnin' Blades, isn't his whole army invisible outside of 12"?

Thanks for the replies, here are the models I have available: (and if someone could explain how to use spoiler tags I'd be grateful, I didn't want this wall of text!) Vandus Hammerhand Astreia Solbright Aventis Firestrike Yndrasta Vorrus Starstrike Dacian Anvil Larissa Shadowstalker Lord Arcanum Lord-Arcanum on Gryph-charger Lord Relictor Lord Imperatant Knight Relictor 2 Knight-Incantors 2 Knight-Arcanums Knight Questor Knight Vexillor with Banner of Apotheosis Knight-Judicator 2 Stormdrake Guard (swords) Stormstrike Chariot (spear) Celestar Ballista 10 Liberators 24 Sequitors 15 Vindictors 5 Retributors 6 Evocators 3 Evocators on Dracolines 11 Castigators 3 Annihilators 3 Praetors 3 Prosecutors (hammers) Steelheart's Champions Endless Spells I've tried a few different approaches: Trying to take out one of the gunlines of Boltboyz by dropping in some sacrificial Prosecutors to eat the overwatch, sorry unleash hell, with some Annihilators to follow them in. Very dependent on making the charge rolls which I only seem to be able to do with one of the units - with the result that whichever unit makes the charge dies to unleash hell and the unit that doesn't make the charge dies to the Boltboyz in the following turn. I've also tried to get at the Boltboyz with Dracolines but my friend screens them with Hobgrotz so I can rarely get near them without being shot to pieces. In the last game I tried ignoring the Boltboyz and going after a couple of units that were masked from his shooting by terrain - a Mirebrute Troggoth and some Gutrippaz. I threw the Stormdrake Guard, Yndrasta and the Chariot at them - mostly to see what they could do, not having played many games, and in an effort to get him to react to me for a change. The Stormdrake Guard bounced off the Troggoth and died straight away, and while I did manage to eventually clear those units with Yndrasta and the Chariot, it was a hard slog and they were so badly hurt they were easily taken out when he brought his Snatchaboss into play. I have thought about trying to avoid unleash hell by shooting his Boltboyz, but because he's invisible outside of 12" I'd have to deep strike my missile units very close - so even if they did eliminate one block of Boltboyz (he runs 2 x 6) they wouldn't survive the experience. The other thought I had was to use magic - the Everblaze Comet, for example, because I don't need to target a specific unit, but he has the chap on the vulture who has multiple unbinds and kills your wizards when he does so. So that doesn't seem like it'll work. The only way I can see things working is to take objectives via deep strike and try to hold them as he volleys mortal wounds at me - I usually play Hammers of Sigmar so at least I get a ward save - but that feels deeply unsatisfying, not even really like I'm fighting him, if that makes sense? Perhaps I'm too used to 40k where the units holding objectives can generally return fire, even if the damage done is low, and need to adjust my mindset?

I'm trying to get back into AoS with Stormcast after a break and I'm really struggling against my friend's Kruleboyz, which he assures me are one of the worst armies in the game. Can anyone point me towards some basic tactical advice for Stormcast, please? I've played a lot of 40k with various armies but I'm having trouble getting to grips with a mostly slow, mostly melee army - it feels like I either attack and die to mortal wounds, or stand back and die to mortal wounds after he walks towards me for a couple of turns.

I have a small amount of Slaanesh daemons (20 Daemonettes, 10 Seekers, 6 Fiends, 2 Infernal Enrapturesses and a Keeper of Secrets). I've played about two games with them, none with the current battletome. Would adding the battleforce and a Lord of Pain be a good step towards turning this into a proper army, and if so, any suggestions on how to build the dual kits that are in there? Thanks!

Thanks for the replies! I don't have any Vanguard Chamber Stormcast, although I do have the Knight-Judicator. Otherwise my shooting is currently limited to a Celestar Ballista and three units of Castigators, which seem particularly bad. Still, it's something to think about! When it comes to deep striking, would you suggest bringing in everything at once and trusting to luck and rerolls with the 9" charges in the hope of maximum damage, or spacing things out to take advantage of the Lord-Imperatant's ability to grant deep strike at 7"? The difficulty with spreading things out is that my opponent can heal his ships for 5-7 wounds every turn, so I really need to take them out in one turn. Finally, what spells would you suggest? The only thing I can think of of that can reach out and do direct damage is the Everblaze Comet, which I took in my last game but didn't get to use as my wizard was focused down turn one.

That's a fair comment. We played an open play mission today that didn't involve any objectives, which made things particularly tricky. I have considered using mages, but so far they've been focused down before they can do anything. I'm also not really sure how to employ them against him, most of the spells seem relatively short ranged and in AOS spells are cast before moving, rather than after as in 40k, so I'm unsure how I would get in range to do any damage with them. My army is definitely sub-optimal but I can at least make it interesting against other factions I've played against - just not the Kharadron. I'm not complaining about the Kharadron here - I actually have a small army of them myself - or my opponent, but I would like to make a game of it in the interests of fun. What units would be necessary to actually fight the Kharadron?

I'm sure this has come up before, so if anyone could point me towards a post or a website with some tips I'd be grateful... but I'm really struggling against a friend of mine's Kharadron Overlords army. I'm primarily a 40k player but I do have some Stormcast - primarily the Stormcast halves of the three starter sets, plus some extras - and I'm finding it very difficult to even make the game interesting for this particular opponent. Basically: I can't catch my opponent's units. The skyvessels and skyriggers are too fast for my foot units. When I do catch my opponent's units (with Dracolines, Prosecutors, or a charge from deep striking Annihilators) my attack is blunted by unleash hell and being bombed by the skyvessels, all out defence, etc. Not enough reaches my opponent's units in enough strength to kill anything. The damaged skyvessels are then repaired and fly high, repositioning to finish off my fast units. My opponent then controls the range and destroys my slow units piecemeal. The above assumes that things have actually gone fairly well for me, and my opponent hasn't simply focused down my fast units before they have chance to do anything. I'm clearly missing something fundamental about how to play a slow, primarily melee army against the kind of fast, mechanised, shooting army that I'm very used to playing in 40k, and any suggestions would be gratefully received!

Unfortunately the Soul Wars sprue for the Lord Arcanum just has that one Evocator on it as well. The Knight Incantor is on a different sprue.

Any chance of some quick advice? I'm looking to make Slaanesh my next AoS army and I have the Slaanesh half of Wrath and Rapture. Am I better off picking up another of those boxes while they're still available and selling the Khorne half, or is the start collecting box a better bet to fill out the basics? Thanks!