dmorley21

I got in one game this week playing with the leaked General's Handbook. I played a Nagash list (Nagash / GoS / ST / 1x30 Chainrasps/ 1x5 Hexwraiths/ 2x3 Spirit Hosts/ Cogs) against a weak OBR list on one of the new battleplans - can't say there's a ton of takeaways from that game, but here's a few: - Nighthaunt are in a really good spot. Galletian Champions make a big difference for some battleplans and especially for battle tactics, and we've got loads of great ones to bring. - Movement will be key. I think Tunnel Master will be a great bonus for us to take. - Spirit Hosts and the Cruciator are still great, but no longer necessary. I didn't take the Cruciator and never once missed it in my game. Meanwhile, I took 2x3 Spirit Hosts (with a Torment and Guardian of Souls) and never once used their bodyguard ability. - A block of 30 Chainrasps can now act as a tarpit. Without bounty hunters, I was able to bog down 20 Mortek Guard and two units of 5 Deathriders while keeping my block close to full health thanks to my recursion. - Emerald Host can be great for sniping GCs - The new realm spell has some nasty potential I'll be playing 2 or 3 games next weekend with the leaked General's Handbook as well. Not sure what my list will look like yet. There's a lot I'm looking forward to trying out, so I probably won't be using Nagash again. Has anyone else got in any games with the leaked book yet?

What’s the actual quote from Rob? A lot of times he just says stuff he hears from others and people take that as actual rumors. He’s pretty clear when he has a rumor he runs with.

I have found units of 10 to always disappoint unless it’s a smaller game or that’s all I’m running. A bigger block gets more into the combat, and is durable enough to take advantage of the various recursion abilities sprinkled throughout the army. Also, I really wouldn’t run Bladegheists outside of Scarlet Doom. Just not enough bang for your buck in my experience.

Love the look of that first army. Inspiration as I continue to plan out my repaint of my ghosts to a hunted forest theme.

I’m hoping to repaint my army and do a haunted forest basing. These schemes would be great… I wonder how they’re done and if I could pull it off.

I’ve seen people do it - Tyler Mengel has a tutorial on Scarlet Doom and Quicksilver Dead. However, I don’t plan on doing it. It’s never necessary for gameplay.

What do the first abbreviations represent? The shootcast I can see as the Krulghast does nothing against ranged shooting early in the game. I don’t think Quicksilver has enough games to be a problem yet. And to be clear, I don’t think Scarlet Doom is the same as Stormdrake. And I don’t think the nerds will be as drastic. Bladegheists at 185 most likely, Scarlet Doom going to impact hits on 6’s maybe. I don’t think that would break the subfaction at all. The other unexpected change in addition to Binds of Battle is how good Purple Sun is for Nighthaunt. The next battlescroll should drop in September, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see some light nerfs fall on Nighthaunt. And that does happen, it’s not reason to panic. That’s all I’m trying to say.

Can’t see the link on mobile it seems. I’ll have to check it out later. Stormdrake Guard got nerfed prior to release. Don’t agree it’s too early, especially with the consistent 4-1 and 5-0 results. People were more mixed prior to GHB 22. I knew a few Scarlet Doom MSU lists that competitive players were building once the battletome dropped. And blocks of 30 ghosts do not melt at all. They survive, resurrect, retreat, and delete. I haven’t gotten games against everything yet, but none of the following hammers have succeeded in lifting my 30 block of ghosts: 2 Stonehorns (1 with metal cruncher) 10 Melee Snakes 4 Fulminators in bounty hunters 30 Gutrippaz in bounty hunters 2 Mega-Gargants 2 Sharks and 20 Reavers My block of 30 is supported by a Krulghast, Torment, and Guardian. After the alpha charge, I get 3(Spirit Torment)+D6(Lady O)+D6?(GoS) back.

If that leaves and Scarlet Doom isn’t as prevalent, they’ll change them again? Even before the new GHB, people were on the Scarlet Doom hype train. There’s a problem when a really good book, with strong subfactions and strong units / internal balance only sees one unit spammed at high level play. I have 30 Bladegheists and am debating another box at some point, and the subfaction lore is my favorite. But Scarlet Doom is definitely overpowered at the moment. There’s a reason why 90% of the 4-1 and 5-0 lists are that subfaction. If you don’t think that should change, cool. A lot of Stormcast players were mad when Stormdrake Guard got nerfed too.

Usually, factions played more often have lower win rates. See Stormcast. And I’d argue Scarlet Doom has definitely proven to be overpowered. Bladegheists will probably go up in points, or the impact hits will trigger on 6s instead of 5s. As much as NH players from 2nd edition have been waiting for the book to be competitive, no book should be over a 55% win rate.

Yep, all that stats I’ve seen have NH as a top 5 army and even above 55% since the new GHB. We should expect points increases and/or a nerf in the next battlescroll.

Usually release years are slow for the edition that gets released after the big summer release. I’d expect multiple big releases for AoS next year and almost all of the armies to get their update for 3rd edition.

Looking at some results, I think I counted 6 NH lists that went 4-1 or 5-0 at events this weekend. All Scarlet Doom or Quicksilver Dead. Two Nagash lists! Most can be found in this show:

This last weekend, two Scarlet Doom lists went 4-1, placing 2nd and 6th. Two other NH lists went 3-2. That’s from the tournaments that were reported on the stats show by The Honest Wargamer. I know Ronya likes Grieving Legion a lot, while Mike Wilson (one of the 3-2 finishes) and Tom Lyons are high on Emerald Host. It will take time for the meta to settle, but I expect NH will be an upper mid to top tier army now at the tournament scene.

You’ll want to stack on some rend. A Purple Sun and stacking charges will wreck them. A Krulghast will help against their multi-damage.

I don't feel like it's been that slow for AoS, considering it's been more of a 40k year. We've gotten 6 new battletomes with 4 more on the way, a General's Handbook, and a fluff/narrative Thondia book. We've gotten 7 new heroes with at least 4 more on the way (and likely 6), 3 new kits (one that is a multi-unit kit), and the Incarnate and terrain. Maybe it's been slow if you're just into the hobby side of things, but for gameplay it's been great and constantly changing.

Terminexus had its range booster back to the previous amount. So that’s fun.

Lots of good mentions here. As a Nighthaunt player, just want to say Hexwraiths as they look so different compared to the rest of the range.

It literally just happened to Nighthaunt. Craventhrone Guard, Spirit Torment, and Scriptor Mortis all changed slightly. Also related, people were really down on Bladegheists. Then boom, they get a subfaction where they do impact hits.

So right now, RAW, you can have one unit - even one model left from the unit, stand directly in the middle of the battlefield and get the the GS. If the FAQ changes that so that a unit can only claim one quarter, it’s worse.

I don't feel like blog posts get as many hits, so this is going to be a long post to kind of get my thoughts in order about the stock up stuff for Nighthaunt in this season of the GHB. This is based on my limited experience with the new GHB and conversations with others who have experience. Also - I really don't think any of our units got worse. There's some sidegrades (Reapers now fear bounty hunters and in the right subfaction, Harridans and Bladegheists fight in two ranks; however Reapers are more versatile, and work great in either of the new battalions). So, this is purely a stock up list. Stock Up: Quicksilver Dead/Scarlet Doom/Emerald Host See previous post Nagash Longstrikes and Alpha striking Stormdrake Guard are gone. The leaves Morathi and the Bowsnakes as the only true threat to Nagash IMO. On top of that, Chronomantic Cogs (even if it gets adjusted to just affect one wizard) means you're no longer worried about miscasts. Oh, and opposing units can't ignore his monstrous actions. And there's several juicy generic endless spells. And our cheapest batteline (Chainrasps) got a lot better IMO. Is he worth his points? Probably not, but he's a whole lot better now. Lady Olynder Chronomantic Cogs. Two casts that can now be re-rolled? Makes her warscroll spell more likely to get off (before unbinds) than not. Guardian of Souls Largely because of Purple Sun of Shyish. Such a great spell addition for Nighthaunt now. The Guardian can get Master of Magic, Cogs, or the artefact that auto-casts it. I doubt I'll run a NH list without Purple Sun. Cairn Wraith/Lord Executioner/KoSoES Give any of these Arcane Tome and use Lauchon to get them into something really juicy. Reikenor Purple Sun of Shyish. Chronomantic Cogs. Prismatic Pallisade. There's a lot of good endless spells now that you want to cast. Krulghast Bounty hunters exists. Chainrasps These. Are. So. Good. Now. You can run them as MSU and deepstrike two units of them to get 3 points for Barge Through the Enemy Lines. And then they'll likely nab you Desecrate their Lands as well. You can run them in blocks of 30 in a castle. They should be at -1 to wound on a 5+/5+. That will take a monumental effort to lift - even for bounty hunters. Bring a Purple Sun and plant it next to them and they'll always be at rend -1. And they're our best buy at 11 points a wound. Also - they want to be Expert Conquerors to steal objectives or really hold them down. An MSU block of them will count as 30 and be able to snipe objectives. A block of 30 will be 90. Honestly, they're great. I just traded for 30 of theses so that I now have 40 and am debating getting 20 more. Bladegheists/Harridans I lumped these together as they got better in the same way. They can fight in two ranks in their subfactions. Each has merit. I like SD for the lore, and think QSD is better in the current competitive meta. They also each make for great bounty hunters or expert conquerors in their subfactions. Terminexus Cogs makes it easier to cast. Wait and see: FAQ will be needed, but right now Awlrach, Fight or Flight and the Black Coach both look solid. Awlrach because currently the one GS that requires you to have a GV unit in all four quadrants - Awlrach could just teleport them there turn 5. Fight or Flight if it means you still get the GS if tabled. The Black Coach is a free battle tactic, when they are a lot more difficult now, as long as army specific battle tactics remain.

In order: The thing I forgot to mention about Emerald Host, is that it's the pick if you want to go for a spellcasting bubble most likely. Nagash got buffed (more on that later), Purple Sun exists, and the Terminexus became easier to cast (due to Cogs). I think that's the reason it's a slight bump. Blobs of 30 are more difficult, but not impossible to fit in the Cruciator/Torment/Guardian bubble. Easy to do when playing defensive or being mindful of your pile ins. I also recommend charging the heroes in to trigger more WoT stuff if you play them offensively. I think Grieving Legion suffers from more teleports becoming available, from Bounty Hunters, and from the Incarnate existing as an ally that could give the same benefit. I don't think two Cruciators are necessary with Spirit Hosts existing, but two aren't bad. Just keep in mind they do nothing in the mirror match. Due to that, I always put an artefact on mine. Hexwraiths. They're great. So versatile. Chaff. Pinning units. Objective grabbers. Additional WoT triggers. I'd only put them in Bounty Hunters if there's extra space in the battalion slots or if you're running a Hexwraith spam list. I'll always bring a unit of them.

My thoughts: Grieving Legion - Stock Down You're going to use GV units to activate the subfaction ability to try to pin units. Unfortunately, bounty hunters will now blow up your pinning units unless you make a major investment. And even then, they'll get blown up more quickly. Still viable as an alpha pinning option - especially for some of the battleplans, but I'd say it's our weakest now. Emerald Host - Stock Slightly Up Opens up more versatility with the ability to keep both Bladegheists and Harridans as non-GV bounty hunters. About the same overall though. Scarlet Doom - Stock Up Bladegheist Revenants are bonkers now. I get that they can be bounty hunted, but honestly we've got ways to mitigate that. Quicksilver Dead - Stock Way Up Nurgle is the top tier army atm IMO, and this army hard counters them. It also is pretty good against DoK, LRL, Skaven, Hammers of Sigmar Stormcast, Hallowed Knights Stormcast, other Nighthaunt, Fyreslayers, and Monster Trucks Beastclaw Raiders. Plus all the random heroes that get ward saves or Death armies. And I probably forgot something. Anyway, now your Harridans fight in two ranks, just pouring out attacks. So low save armies or armies relying on wards will just melt. And you have access to Purple Sun of Shyish, giving your Harridans another way to get rend. Just ace. As for how to play in the new meta - I think you'll want MSU or blocks of 30 for your troops. Blocks of 20 seem like the perfect bounty hunter target, whereas a block of 30 will be a monumental task for your opponent to lift, even with their best bounty hunter hammers. EDIT: Got my first game in yesterday (Olynder / Guardian of Souls (general/auto cast) / Krulgahst (arcane tome) / Spirit Torment / 1x3 Spirit Hosts / 2x10 Chainrasps / 1x5 Hexwraiths / 1x30 Bladegheists/1x4 Myrmourns) playing The Prize of Galletia against OBR (Katakros / 2 wizard heroes / 2 x 20 Mortek / 1 x 6 Stalkers / 1 x 5 Deathriders / Catalpult). My opponent conceded at the bottom of 3 as I was up 15-5 at that point and my opponent had his catapult, Katakros, and 5 Mortek left while I hadn't lost a single unit and had minimal losses at that point. Everything put in some work, but the Chainrasps deep stirking for an extra victory point to nap two battle tactics (the new savage spearhead one and then the grab an opponent's terrain) was really clutch.

Reapers didn’t actually change… Coach used Warscroll Builder, which was wrong.

Avoid Quicksilver Dead? Gotta disagree with that. Nurgle, Nighthaunt mirror matches, DoK are all going to be relevant. Maybe even Fyreslayers and probably other Death armies. Really think it’s being slept on as a subfaction.