Marzillius

I've been experimenting with lists since the points dropped of course, and I've been considering 10 man Judicator units with crossbows. They are only 280 points now, and they do put out a whole lot of shots vs infantry units. A 10 man unit with 2 Thunderbolt Crossbows has 32 shots and 2d3 MWs against any infantry. Supported by an Azyros, and having 2 units, you can deepstrike down anywhere on the board and cripple a weaker flank. I came up with this list: Lord-Castellant (Staunch Defender, Lantern of the Tempest) Knight-Azyros Knight-Incantor (Azyrite Halo) Knight-Incantor (Celestial Blades) Celestant-Prime 5 Liberators (Hammers/Shields, 1 Grandhammer) 10 Judicators (Boltstorm Crossbows, 2 Thunderbolt Crossbows) 10 Judicators (Boltstorm Crossbows, 2 Thunderbolt Crossbows) 6 Desolators Desolators has been a favourite unit of mine during the last year, and they just got even cheaper. Very nice. Since there is no Stormhost that synergises with the list I just go with Staunch. Now they can tank everything except Skarbrand. The Lantern also really mess with Lumineth archers, as long as you scroll their innate spell. It's assuredly not competitive, but hey, there are no major tournaments right now. We might as well muck about and experiment until a new book arrives.

The worst part is he doesn't even have 2 unbinds, only one. Despite costing 320. He's kind of an ****** unit, but the thinking is that if the opponents melee unit comes close and gets bound up with Aetherwings, then you can move the Tauralon over them and get +1 to hit with the Hurricanes and more importantly Ballistas. The problem is that even with his 14" move the enemy needs to be within 8" for it to work (you need to move the 3" that you have to stay out of twice). So I don't think it will work. But I'm curious about taking this kind of full shooting list to a tournament just to see how it goes. A 2-3 army maybe, 3-2 if lucky with matchups. But that's pretty true for any Stormcast list that you can come up with lol. Did anyone see the latest Honest Wargamer stats? 38% winrate for Stormcast, that's pretty sad.

Yeah, if the Hurricanes go down you have to CA a Ballista instead. But if the Hurricanes go down you are probably going to lose anyway. I also don't like the 10 Evocator unit. They hit real hard sure, but then they all die since they're made of tissue paper. 4+ save is nothing in this meta. So why even fight in combat at all since Stormcast are really not on top of it at all? Another way to play the list is to run a foot Arcanum instead and have 2 10-man Sequitor units, then you could punch away weaker units from objectives while the shooting units mop up the opponent's heavy hitters. But the Tauralon is so cool!

Shootcast? I laugh at your shootcast and present the real shootcast. No, but for real, what do you think about this list? Switching around all the damage into shooting could probably wreck some melee only armies. Ironjawz, Slaanesh, Fyreslayers etc could probably have some real trouble with this list unless you lose all priority rolls. Also I want to use the Tauralon for once, it's a cool model. The Hurricanes are worse than Longstrikes but they are the ones I built since I'm a special snowflake. What do you think? Allegiance: Stormcast Eternals- Stormhost: Anvils of the HeldenhammerLeadersLord-Arcanum on Tauralon (320)- General- Trait: Deathly Aura- Artefact: Soulthief- Spell: Stormcaller- Mount Trait: Steel PinionsLord-Ordinator (140)Lord-Relictor (100)- Prayer: TranslocationBattleline5 x Judicators (160)- Skybolt Bows- 1x Shockbolt Bows5 x Judicators (160)- Skybolt Bows- 1x Shockbolt Bows5 x Sequitors (130)- Tempest Blades and Soulshields- 1x Stormsmite GreatmacesUnits9 x Vanguard-Raptors with Hurricane Crossbows (420)3 x Aetherwings (50)3 x Aetherwings (50)War MachinesCelestar Ballista (110)Celestar Ballista (110)Celestar Ballista (110)Celestar Ballista (110)

Here's a small write-up of an RTT I attended this saturday. Maybe it isn't fun reading about a Stormcast player getting stomped, but could be interesting anyway. I ran a fun cavalry list with 6 Desolators and 6 Dracolines, LAoCD, Heraldor, Castellant, Cogs, CP and the compulsory 15 Liberators. Game 1 vs Seraphon, Focal Points: I played against this guy on Krigsluntan too, really good guy! Our last game came down to the last priority roll, and this was no different. He had a Shadowstrike Cohort, Kroak, Cogs and Gotrek basically. I castled up to prevent the Ripperdactyls from ripping the Dracolines a new one and moved the castle up. Failed to cast Cogs. In his turn Kroak did some mortal wounds. I got priority. Failed to cast Cogs. The Dracolines ran up and charged his Skink screen while the Desolators went the other way to secure one of my own points. The Skinks are teleporting everywhere as usual and just taking all the objectives. I hate it. In his turn he did a bunch of mortals again and killed my general. Then Gotrek failed his charge and I won priority which ment the Dracolines were free to charge and kill Kroak. Then it goes downhill as Gotrek one-shots the Dracoline unit and eventually kills the Desolators. Then if he wins priority for turn 5 he will win a major, if I win he will win a minor. I roll a 1 and get a major loss. Whelp. Game 2 vs Khorne, Starstrike: He had Skarbrand, a BT who gives 6" pile-ins, Gore Pilgrims, a Skull Cannon and a Soul Grinder. He places Skarbrand in a very exposed position so I decide to turn 1 charge the Dracolines into him, because I know from experience that if he gets to hit first I will die. So I fail to cast Cogs, but go through with the plan anyway. Then I fail the 6" re-roll charge. So now my Dracolines are just standing there. Great. Skarbrand if course makes mincemeat out of them. I win priority and move the Desolators and Arcanum in. Between the two of them they manage to kill Skarbrand, the BT and 10 Blood Warriors, basically securing the flank. In his turn he does essentially nothing, the Soul Grinder even takes more wounds than it deals in combat with 5 Liberators. I win priority again and the Desolators prepare to assault his altar with all the characters around it. Unfortunately, I fail the 6" re-roll charge AGAIN. This leaves the Altar open and allows him to summon another Blood Thirster which proceeds to mop the floor with the Desolators as I fail almost every single save for three straight combat rounds. It's looking dire, but it's all about round 5 in Starstrike, and the Gryph Hound from the Castellant delivers. He charged it with 10 Blood Warriors but hit with the BT first in the phase, which let me retreat with the Hound and steal his objective, netting me a major win. Game 3 vs Stormcast, Total Commitment: Here I played against @Turragor and his Starcast list. He opened up with his mortal wound bombardment which was underwhelming, apart from that it killed my general. In my turn I managed to charge my Desolators against his Gryph Hound which he had placed ahead of his army and then pile in into the Celestant Prime, essentially slingshotting my unit using the Hound. The Desolators fail to kill the Prime, which hits and wounds all his attacks and I fail my saves, killing 2 Desolators. I get a double turn and charge my Dracolines into a Drakeswon Templar. The Dracolines whiff hard, dealing only 2 MW with their lightning attack leaving the Templar on 3 wounds left. He only gets 1 bite attack, aims it at the middle Dracoline and rolls a 6, killing half the unit so only 2 remain. At this point I just concede, there is no way I will win with only 6 hard hitting models left against two Stardrakes, one of which will attack me in his hero phase since it's Anvils. If only the general hadn't died, then both the Desolators and Dracolines would have been fully buffed, and then the Prime and Templar would have died with no casualties from me. But good game none the less! Me and @Turragor talked a bit about the nature of Stormcast being prone than other armies to whiffing. That was really true for me this tournament. We're just not reliable at all. I also didn't manage to cast Cogs a single time the entire tournament. I have been keeping track. Out of the 14 attempts across 2 tournaments I have ever made to cast Cogs I have succeeded 1 time. Once. On a spell that goes off on a 7+. That's about a 0,0003 chance of happening. Nice. I'm not bitter at all.

Won't the Hekatos be immediately brought back by the Reaper's ressurections? And the Stardrake, even if it eats the Hekatos, will just be killed by the Morteks the turn it goes in anyway.

Eyyy, it's my exakt list that I played in my second to last tournament. If you look in my posting history you will find a tournament report using this list. I would use the extra 80 points the list has gained on an additional CP. It's nice having the additional one to be able to make the run roll on the Dracolines into a 6, and with 30 points left over a triumph is highly likely as well.

Well, no, but then you don't get to shoot in the hero phase at all (you would if you cast Translocation on them first). And against some armies you need them on the board to move Aetherwings so you don't get alpha struck round 1 by Ironjawz/Slaanesh/FEC etc. But if I plan on scioning them then maybe I won't need to use the Vexillor who is otherwise mandatory. It could possibly be a thing, I'll try making a list.

I mean, they are not specifically mentioned in the FAQ, but I would presume that they wouldn't get their "don't move" bonus either as Longstrikes now don't, and their bonus is 3 extra shots per Raptor.

Man, that really sucks for me. Longstrikes lose 6" of range with this FAQ, but my Hurricane Raptors lose 33% of their damage in the hero phase and 17% damage output over all.

I like Battle for the Pass, since the increased distance between the armies make turn one charges unlikely and less impactful, and early double turns less impactful too. I also like Duality of Death. I basically like all the "weird" deployment zone ones.

I also played at Krigsluntan, I ended up at 18th place out of 92 and was the best performing Stormcast player. But that's also because I didn't face the most cheesy lists either. I'll write up a small tournament report here. I played the following list: Allegiance: Stormcast Eternals- Stormhost: Anvils of the HeldenhammerMortal Realm: AqshyLeadersLord-Castellant (120)- General- Trait: Deathly Aura- Artefact: SoulthiefLord-Relictor (100)- Prayer: TranslocationKnight-Incantor (140)- Spell: Celestial BladesKnight-Vexillor (120)- Pennant of the StormbringerBattleline5 x Liberators (100)- Warhammer & Shield- 1x Grandhammers5 x Liberators (100)- Warhammer & Shield- 1x Grandhammers5 x Liberators (100)- Warhammer & Shield- 1x GrandhammersUnits3 x Aetherwings (50)3 x Aetherwings (50)3 x Aetherwings (50)6 x Desolators (600)9 x Vanguard-Raptors with Hurricane Crossbows (420)Endless Spells / Terrain / CPsExtra Command Point (50) Match 1 vs Skaven: Focal Points. He played 80 Plague Monks, 60 Clanrats, 3 Ratling Guns, a Screaming Bell, a Plague Furnace, 15 Acolytes and an Arch Warlock. He made a big mistake in his deployment, putting the Acolytes inside a big piece of Overgrown terrain. This ment I couldn't shoot at them, but I went up next to the terrainpiece with my Desolators, meaning his Acolytes couldn't get within 1" of them, and thus couldn't shoot themselves. The Hurricanes melted a Monk unit, and then he charged my Desolators with a Clanrat unit, so I could pile into his Acolytes with them. They died. The Acolytes that is. Then it was just clean-up. I lost 3 Aetherwings and won a Major and scoring all secondaries (which were 4 agendas in all games). Match 2 vs Tzeentch: Starstrike. The loathed Changehost with I hate playing against. He alpha-struck my army with a bunch of spells round 1, in my turn I achieved both my secondaries and then conceded. I was not going to win that stuff, and I don't want to play against Changehost anymore. Lovely bloke though! Major loss but with achieved secondaries. Match 3 vs Seraphon: Battle for the Pass. Thunderquake Cohort list with Lord Kroak. One of the tightest games I ever fought, but it was only close because I played like a human garbage can. I got first turn, failed Translocation and didn't want to use the banner yet so I did nothing. He moved up and did like 1 wound to a Desolator. He then took the double turn and managed to kill a Desolator. Not a very good double turn. Then I moved up and charged into his Dinosaur castle, killing the Astrolith Bearer. Then I got the double and shot his Engine of the Gods to pieces, which enabled me to kill the Bastiladons. Here I made the game-ending error, forgetting to pile in my Desolators into his home objective, so I missed 4 points. He then teleported Kroak behind my objective and took it with summoned skinks. Then a bunch of failed dice rolls happened for me, which allowed him to take my point again in round 4. Then it came down to the initiative roll for round 5, the one who wins the roll will win the game. I lost it, and lost the game. I damn will remember pile-ins to take objectives from now on. Match 4 vs Ogor Mawtribes: Blood and Glory. Thunderbellies list with three Stonehorns of different varietys and 12 Mournfangs. He took first turn and moved up, in my turn I built a fortress of Liberators and Aetherwings around my Hurricanes and Desolators. I shot 3 Mournfangs to death with the Hurricanes. He got initiative but had to fight birds and Liberators and nothing juicy. In my turn I killed his Frostlord, Huskard and Mournfangs with double Heldenhammer CAs and regular shooting/fighting. Then I got the double and reduced his army down to 2 models, at which point he conceded. Max win for me. Match 5 vs Gloomspite Gits: Total Conquest. 120 Stabbas, 3 Shamans, Skragrott, an Arachnarok and a Mangler Squig Loonboss. I got to go first and killed half a Stabba unit with the Hurricanes since it was out of range of his Loonshrine and he had no CP, so they were not battleshock immune. In his turn he magiced two Hurricanes away and fought birds and Libs with his two monsters. I won initiative and killed both monsters with the remaining Hurricanes, and charging the Desolators into a 60-man Stabba unit standing by his Loonshrine. It took them 5 combat rounds with the -1 to hit from the netters, but they killed them to a man eventually and took one of his points. He then got a double turn and killed all my Hurricanes, and taking one of my points. But I had held that point one turn longer, and basically all his stuff was dead. So I was leading by a point he would never get, so he conceded. Major victory with 3 secondaries scored for me. It went very well I think, and will hopefully spark some discussion about the merits of Hurricane Raptors. The Hurricanes are technically better than Longstrikes against all targets (apart from 2+ save) and are HUGELY better against horde units. Their shorter range means they are not good at sniping heroes since a good player can just deploy a screen >9" away from their hero, and now I can't shoot them. But they are better at shooting down regular old units than the Longstrikes are, and if all your units are dead what are you going to buff with your heroes? Longstrikes will probably be nerfed to, but Hurricanes will probably not, so Hurricanes will probably be the next meta-pick for Stormcast. They are also extraordinarily good at killing Gotrek. The Desolators are just flat out better than Evocators are too. Of course the Evocators are cheaper, but with the points that the cheaper Hurricanes open up, Desolators are the better choice. They can take a beating, they are faster and their MW output is ranged. They were the definitive MVP of the list. For instance, vs Gloomspite a unit of Evocators could never have destroyed that 60-man Stabba unit, since they can actually be killed by the Stabbas. My 2+ reroll 1 save Desolators literally cannot be killed by no-rend attacks, and could thus wade happily though Stabbas and Plague Monks alike. The Vexillor is unfortunately mandatory if you run Hurricanes. If you fail Translocation the Hurricanes can't shoot round 1, so the Vexillor is there to teleport them in the end of the movement phase so they can at least shoot in the shooting phase. If I didn't have to take him I would rather take an Azyros, but I can't unfortunately. As a side-note, the event was won by a Syll'Eske host list which generated a gorillion depravity points. He literally had 163 depravity in his last game apparently. That ****** has to be nuked from orbit by the rules team, what were they thinking?

Check out my list on the previous page, it has a similiar idea going on. It would be interesting to hear your thoughts on it.

This is the new list I'm considering for an upcoming Grand Tournament. It's a special snowflake variation of Anvilstrike, since I love cavalry and I like the feel of the Hurricane Raptors (it's basically a light machinegun crossbow, how cool isn't that?!). Allegiance: Stormcast Eternals- Stormhost: Anvils of the HeldenhammerLeadersLord-Castellant (120)- General- Trait: Deathly AuraLord-Relictor (100)- Artefact: Soulthief- Prayer: TranslocationKnight-Incantor (140)- Spell: Celestial BladesKnight-Vexillor (120)- Pennant of the StormbringerBattleline5 x Liberators (100)- Warhammer & Shield- 1x Grandhammers5 x Liberators (100)- Warhammer & Shield- 1x Grandhammers5 x Liberators (100)- Warhammer & Shield- 1x GrandhammersUnits3 x Aetherwings (50)3 x Aetherwings (50)3 x Aetherwings (50)9 x Vanguard-Raptors with Hurricane Crossbows (420)6 x Desolators (600)Endless Spells / Terrain / CPsExtra Command Point (50)Total: 2000 / 2000Extra Command Points: 1Allies: 0 / 400Wounds: 117 Issues that I see is that if Translocation fails you will not be able to shoot with the Hurricanes in your first hero phase. Longstrikes can usually fire into some screens or something at least if the prayer fails. If Translocation fails the Vexillor can at least make sure you can fire at full effect in the shooting phase, which is important. You can also maybe use the Volley Fire CA in this case, since you didn't use any CP in the first hero phase. The Desolators are a juicy unit as well. They're twice as fast as the usual 10-man Evocator unit and fights a lot harder, and can take a serious beating with the Lantern from the Castellant. There is also not any room for an Azyros, which kinda sucks. Also no fast or tanky heroes, so hero-scoring scenarios will be harder than what I'm used to. What do you think? 3-2? 4-1? Worse? Any obvious ways to refine that I'm missing?

People tend to take first turn to get on the objectives first, giving them a lead. I agree that this is probably not the wisest thing to do against my list, but many people, even highly competitive and highly ranked tournament players, tend to have a gameplan in mind that they stick to on autopilot. And it often involves going first. If they give me first turn (which happened 3 times out of the 5 games) I often hold the Evocators back for a turn and not do a suicide run into their screens. Unless the opponent has units which is similarily fast and destructive in close combat this usually works out. I mean, if I stay back on my first turn, what are they gonna do? Stay back as well and potentially waste a double turn? They will move up and take objectives and pray that they win initiative, which is from a pure statistical standpoint not the correct move to do. If they don't win initiative their screens will probably be dead from Ballista fire and their belly is now open to the cat pounce. Whatever your opponent does with deciding who goes first it often plays right into your hands either way. @PJetski Yeah it's a shame that people get stuck on the same ideas, but that's the meta I guess. There is always room for innovation in places where people aren't looking. I've been playing Dracolines exclusively for half a year now, and I looove it. I do have another new list for a massive GT in mind though since I like variation. I'll post it for feedback later.