Scurvydog

I think a Vampire Coast army like the one from the Total War 2 expansion would sell like hotcakes. However it seems GW wants to do their own thing and not just put a specific existing culture "hat" on models, so an army of pirate undeads would probably be too on the nose these days. I thought for a long time now it would make sense for Death to have an elite army in the image of Nagash, as nothing really seemed to match him, the way stormcast matches Sigmar, Sylvaneth to Allarielle etc. So here we are with the Bonereapers and it makes all kinds of sense. AoS is in an odd place with all these remnants from the old world, which are taking root the longer they are present, but mostly seems like they are, because GW has no good answer to just get rid of them. I don't doubt GW will still just slowly phase out old world stuff, like the big list of models moving to legends recently before the release of Cities of Sigmar. I would not be surprised if the next Death soup book got rid of a bunch of older models once again, until finally disappearing completely. I strongly believe the skeleton and zombie hordes of old will at some point disappear completely, so the endgame goal would look something like this: Bonereapers Flesh Eaters Nighthaunt Zombie Abominations Soulblight It seems GW prefers their books in neat packages these days, so I could see them get rid of nearly all the older stuff and making new neat books. The Zombie book could be with Crelis Arul the lady of all flesh becoming mortarch of the Deadwalkers, bringing in all kinds of new abominations like a death clan moulder of frankenstein horrors. GW do love to make their own spin on the classic tropes. Same for soulblight, although with the way the stories have been going, it could be interesting to see them betray/break away from Nagash, with Manfred and Neferata starting their own faction (Nagash is getting a few too many mortarchs anyway). Some new soulblight knights and thralls, this could also work as the semi mortal army from Shyish, with living Thralls as the cheap battleline fodder and soulblight vampires as the elite options. The Zombie dragon kit and Vargheists sticking around but most of the rest being new. Guess the years will tell if I am right in this.

For 1k I like something like this: Allegiance: Legion of Grief - Mortal Realm: Hysh LEADERS Dreadblade Harrow (90) - General - Command Trait : Vassal of the Craven King Spirit Torment (120) - Artefact : Aetherquartz Brooch Guardian of Souls with Nightmare Lantern (140) UNITS 20 x Chainrasp Horde (160) 10 x Chainrasp Horde (80) 10 x Bladegheist Revenants (180) 10 x Bladegheist Revenants (180) TOTAL: 1000/1000 EXTRA COMMAND POINTS: 1 WOUNDS: 65 LEADERS: 3/4 BATTLELINES: 2 (2+) BEHEMOTHS: 0/2 ARTILLERY: 0/2 ARTEFACTS: 1/1 ALLIES: 0/200 There might be better lists, but this one is very mobile, got a lot of CP generation, so ideally you should be able to play reckless with the bladegheists and grind down your enemy, while keeping the dreadblade safe at all costs. It might even be more CP than needed, but with the new reroll 1 to hit from GHB19 you can never have enough! Being able to teleport around and bring bladegheist units back can be very hard to deal with, especially in a small scale game and the Bladegheists got decent mobility to get back into the fight. The 10 rasps can sit on objectives and the 20 man unit is a flexible anvil, especially if backed by the GoS. The Torment is all around good for both healing and also greatly increasing the output of the bladegheists. With his 2" range you might also be able to do some cheeky placements in combat to relatively safely poker over the gheists. Alternatively you could skip the 1 CP and trade the GoS for Reikenor, Remember he can deal auto wounds to fuel his spells to the enemy as well, so if he is in range it is 1+2d3 mortal wounds for sure if the enemy unit has 2 wounds or less per model, that can really hurt in a 1k game! He is also super mobile and can dish out some combat damage too, making him very flexible. For spells I simply recommend the -1 to saves spell, that is easy to cast and often useful.

The allegiance abilities are really lacking and the options to actually fight with many factions, mostly due to a huge powercreep in 2nd edition. Even though NH is a 2nd edition book, it appears to suffer from being first out the door. Things like Stormhosts for all factions is a stable of the 2nd edition format, which the Nighthaunt did not even get, so it feels more like a 1,5 tome at best. With incredibly expensive 1 wound models with mediocre damage output, the saving grace for the nighthaunt models is the Legion of Grief, which is basically just a more boring version of the LoN books allegiances, with less artifacts and spell options and nothing that makes it unique other than access to NH models. Access to NH models with the generic LoN gravesite rules works quite well, but mostly due to Dreadblade Harrows being the perfect general considering how gravesites work, as that model can teleport around at leasure to be where it needs to at any time. After the price increase of reapers, the Bladegheists became at least a viable an option, and bringing teleporting to gravesites to bring back units of bladegeists really hurt your opponent. Sadly the LoG only have access to 3 spells, with only 1 which could be considered decent and the artifacts are pretty poor as well. This gives the feeling of a disjointed Death faction as a whole, with strange interactions and cross use of models. It also hurts LoG that their Mortarch is a really poor choice to bring, as the general trait is wasted and you also miss out on the mentioned shenanigans of the dreadblade general.

While it is a decent list of spells in general Ironjawz get, I find it hard to create any reliable strategy around. The weirdnob no longer gets any kind of + to cast, so unless you invest heavily into him and possibly run great Whaagh and spend d6 points for +2 to cast, then you will not reliably get it of, and even then many armies out there can also shut you down. A single knight incantor can just auto unbind at the right time, and others can do the same. The Slaneesh Epitome can just reroll all spells and unbinds (what were they thinking), Nagash etc. At least with the green hand you can try to keep the shaman out of unbind range to greatly improve your chances of getting a cast of.

I agree with @Malakree that the Ironsunz CA is useful, but it does not prevent anything, it states in the rules that you use it at the END of the opponents charge phase. Basically it allows you to make your opponent think twice about engaging elements of your army, such as charging in a blob of witch aelves on your mawkrusha, but that Grunta unit nearby can suddenly join in, not only taking part in the combat, but also dividing the forces. So yea it is good, but it does not interfere with the opponents charges during the phase at all. Of course it also costs a CP to use, so that is one CP less for mighty destroyers, whaagh, +1 to hit or whatever. As one of the only abilities that allows us more movement and ability to manipulate the battlefield, I am happy we have it as an option.

It is 30, no discounts though.

Yes this is my thoughts as well. I will agree that a single Hero doing all that warchanters is doing right now IS overpowered in a vacuum, but the army itself is so lacking, this single character is the batman of the justice league. This army will stomp on a lot of armies by brute force, by just throwing damage and dice at them, for example Beastclaw raiders, beasts of chaos, std or even a melee focued stormcast army, will just get squished in most cases. It will not be fun for anyone involved. At least a book like DoK who can handily beat the same armies with no effort, has some width in the book to not take Hag nar, to maybe run with warlocks and snakes. Is Orruks better to play than before? probably, but that is not saying much, the problems have just been moved from Whaagh CP bombing to Warchanters and some will hate your army for just being a beatstick, while the same other group of players will stomp you still. I know that sounds like doom and gloom and it probably exaggerated somewhat, but unfortunately few Ironjawz games have been fun for me or my opponent and I simply hoped the new book would help with that some more.

So it is overpowered Orruks get a character to increase damage by one, while we have armies who can fight first or force others to fight last while also having access to fighting twice, after they already fought first... ok then. Slaneesh can do all this and also summon and be far more mobile. I'll eat my words if we suddenly see Orruks dominate the tournament scene, but that is not going to happen, they are good brawlers in a fair fight because of huge output, but that matters little against armies simply breaking the normal rules of the game. Fyreslayers with their battalion with rend 2 and 2 dmg infantry which can fight twice? Keeper of Secrets forcing you to fight last and beating on you twice. Flesh eaters same deal charges in and fight first and twice on the big beastie. These are the types of rules making top armies, as they not only deal a lot of damage, but also dictate the flow of battle and counters strategy. Warchanters, while super good, does none of these things. Nearly all the power of the tome is put into warchanters. Remove them and the army can't stand up to anything. Mighty destroyers is NOT the same as fight again in the combat phase. This only works when already engaged after at least 1 round of combat, maybe more if double turned, so it does not help at all in the situation you need it the most. I would be thrilled if warchanters did not give such a good buff, but with the poor quality of the book and extremely limited options and unit variety, the designer chose to just put all eggs in one basket. It will end up being just as lame as before, with games being over by turn 2 one way or the other. I do not look forward to play the new book against my friends, as the ones with very casual armies and lists will just get mowed down, unless a very deliberately take the worst setups and play bad by choice, while my friends who play competetively will still just roll over Ironjawz. Like LoN put some dire wolves in a congo line, it doesnt matter if the ardboyz do 10 or 500 damage, they still have no way to pass enemy lines, to control or counter magic heavy play, to alter the combat activations, nothing.

GW has so far been very unclear about this, for example their community team at least saw no issue with for example Legion of Grief from forbidden power using nighthaunt battalions, as long as the right models are in them and they are also allowed inside the allegiance. I'd say that is the case here. The Ironfist will need a FAQ I think unless someone got any preceding evidence to prove one thing or the other.

Nice writeup, much apprecaited for reference. A small correction: Brutish Cunning trait is once per battle round and not once per battle, so it is really really good

That is basically what happened, saying warchanters i overpowered based on that battle report is the kind of attitude creating problems for this game. The Slaneesh player has all the tools to deal with the Ironjawz but chose to just parade forth and get engaged by ardboyz on all fronts. No effort to deal with the warchanters either. I play against people with this mentality as well who just scream OP because if the raw damage output a model or unit CAN output when supported, while they expect to win with no effort but just moving models forward and roll dice. If you just move forward with your squishy but mobile and tactically diverse army to just brawl with Ironjawz, then you already lost and deserve to lose. Smart players will screen their units against all the Ironjawz battlelines, and find ways to deny them their buffs, then they have nothing. Anything with good shooting or magic will also be a gatekeeper, just pick of the warchanters and Ironjawz have nothing, all the power comes from them. I am not saying the damage output cant be great, but the army still have no tactical options worth talking about compared to so many other of the top armies right now. Skaven will just shoot down warchanters and screen the intial wave of orruks. DoK can actually brawl with them but are better at the objective game. LoN can just put screens in the way, if they explode just bring back the unit for 1 CP it doesnt matter, Ironjawz have no way to reach any important character, the only flyer can easily be denied landing anywhere important. A Good Idoneth player will wait to get first strike, should be easy to plan for with the low movement of Ironjawz if you dont trigger too many MaH. Ironjawz is the rolling rock from Crash Bandicoot, if it hits you yea you die, but it is not all that hard to avoid that.

I would much rather get +1 damage from mean un mount trait and get ignax for all around 4+ mortal wound resist. Unless you run a Clan and no battalions, then it could be worth considering since you will not be able to take any other artifact than the forced ones, but that depends on your meta as well.

Remember +1 to hit is done in the combat phase now, so you cant give them +1 unless a megaboss is close enough, you could go Gordrakk though and a Gorefist as well, move gruntas up 18", use MD on gordrakk if needed and move up to 24" and teleport a blob of ardboyz, you now got an entire angry force in the face of the opponent right away. Use Gordrakk CP to buff all units with +1 hit and watch smashin and bashin do its job.

That is true, make the boss a Grunta boss then, stay outside 12, then move in 9 and enjoy +2 to charge. 6 gruntas with spears buffed by a warchanter avarages 28 damage and 3 mortal wounds on the charge against 4+ save models. that will make a mess out of anything if you can get them all into combat.

With mighty destroyers your MK got a 24" move potential minimum, so if you get hit by a purple sun you got outplayed Metal rippers was also just for the overkill, by all means grab the ignax scales for some added protection, that is still probably one of the best choices.

Bloodtoofs trait is +2 to the Whaagh count, which might make it a bit more likely to get 2 instead of 1 more attack ONCE per battle, that is an awful trait. You also need a realmgate still, I cant believe they kept that in. The +1 run and charge is decently useful, but everything else is rather bad. It is mildly humorous to use with a Brutefist though, have a unit with the boss of 15 brutes with hackas, use the artifact to ensure they teleport, then use the free mighty destroyers from the brute boss to move, you should now be within 5" and you get +2 to charge. Make sure to buff these guys with a warchanter first. Now your enemy has the ultimate angry mob in their face turn 1

All Greenskinz are out of matched play at least, so no cheese there in any setting that matters, you can of course use legends for friendly games, thats why the legends "system" is even there. But playing a friendly game in order to access outdated warscroll cheese is not friendly

Core rules is named characters can only not receive command traits and artifacts. Mount trait rules state Heroes on a Maw-Krusha can take a mount trait and bla bla 1 additional per warscroll battalion. Gordrakks warscroll states under mount "Gordrakk's Maw-Krusha, Bigteef blablabla. It of course also has the Maw-Krusha keyword. Based on all this, it is quite clear that Gordrakk rides a Maw-Krusha, and as no rules mention named characters can not take mount traits, I don't think there is a case for him not being able to take mount traits. In addition you can check the official warscroll builder for Stormcasts who has a bunch of named characters on mounts, they can not take traits or artifacts but they can take mount traits there. Ironjawz Whaagh is once per battle. I believe all old greenskinz are now legends models, so not permitted in matched play.

Yea that list will run over someone somewhere for sure. Quite one note, but just 3 gruntas charging in with a warchanter buff is a threat to anything and against a unit of 6 with hackas who get a good charge, just about anything will die from that. Only real problem will be to get the rest of the army to catch up, if they need to...

@MalakreeIronjawz Whaagh is not bad like I first thought due to looking at it wrong, it still is 100% sure to get 1 attack to everyone within 18", it is still a fantastic command ability you will want to use every game, even if it is only once. It can now also be used in any combat phase as well. This meshes with warchanters +1 dmg which works until next hero phase, so you are just as dangerous to charge now, while before we were mild lambs in the opponents combat phases. The base command traits are amazing, Brutush Cunning is 1 free might destroyers each battle round, how can you call the ironsunz 1 CP trait top tier, while saying this is bad? This should basically be 1 CP per turn. Add Ironclad to the list, having a 2+ save mawkrusha is a hell of a lot more terrifying. I will agree the Ironsunz command ability can be nice to have, as it gives more defensive options, but still situational and the -1 to hit in the first round can easily end up being near pointless. Choppas warclan has the most interesting command ability, although it can not be used on gore gruntas, which is the missiles I plan to use with warchanters... but still good. The artifact is horrible, but in many cases they wil get rerolls to charge and rather easy access to +2 bravery aura from forced trait at least. This should be the weirdnob clan, but you will be unable to take the trait and artifacts which could make the weirdnob actually good, sad. I have little doubt the strongest 2k lists will be great whaagh lists, with Gordrakk and at least 2 warchanters, with Ironfist being the common battalion which is more or less a free CP each round and should be useable even though you are not Ironjawz allegiance. Grab a weirdnob too, give him visions artifact and green hand to be able to teleport units. Give a chanter the other artifact with the brooch. After that a healthy mix of units I feel would be best, I would never not take Gruntas.

No 1 in 5 can carry either a banner or glyph, you can only have both in a 10 man group or more

Everything is quite easy to see in Dark Artisans review on YT. Brutish Cunning for allows the general to use mighty destroyers free each battle round, same for bestial charisma just for inspiring presence. Both Megaboss anmd Weirdnob shaman traits are quite good, making the Clans a hard sell. It's a shame making the Weirdnob the general removes mighty whaagh as the bursting with power trait is so good (know one more spell and cast one more spell). They can do it as the Choppa Clan but that is from the forced artifact and the trait is bad as well, making it rather pointless.

They are not in a good spot for higher competetive play. They will crumble is most cases against top tier army lists, but might get a lucky win here and there depending often on wave of terror rolls. The NH book is the only 2.0 book to have no variety through "stormhosts" which could have gone a long way in giving them some flavor, as it is now all the troops are so samey and most games play the same with them. They are extremely expensive per wound, depending on their often 4+ ethereal saves and frankly lackluster healing. They have some decent spells, but no good casters with bonuses that matter except 1 named character, which results in many spells failing and getting unbound by better wizards. They also have great difficulty getting through armor, as nearly noone has rend 2 and your overall damage output is in generel unimpressive unless you get wave of terror charges. They main strength is being relatively fast and flying, so you really want to play smart and play to the objectives at all times, as a straight up brawl will often be a lost cause.

From a fluff perspective I would have preferred Brutes to be the expensive units and vastly more elite, something like 200 pts for 5 and 4 wounds each with more damage and rend 2 on the gore choppa and maybe boss weapons, but that is not what we got unfortunately. In a perfect green world ardboyz would be the chaff of Ironjawz and even more expendable to sit on objectives and be meatshields. Right now all the units are simply too close in function and output, for an army with only 3 different non hero units, that is plain silly they are so much alike. They are so close now that the internal balance could be said to be good, but that is not really a design achievement when keeping them so alike and providing no interesting warscroll rules to really differentiate their combat roles, a shame.

Points matter a lot though, Ardboyz got a lot going for them no doubt but dont rule ardboyz out. Lets compare 10 brutes for 280 vs 15 ardboyz for 270. Same wound count, ardboys got a bit more staying power from up to 6 guys with shields, which on average should save you 2 wounds more. Ardboyz got +2 charge and +2 bravery and -1 bravery drums and banners, this is the big deal. Damage output however 10 Brutes against 4+ save models will average 12,74 damage, while 15 ardboys will average 9,48. Against models with 4+ wound profiles Brutes average goes up to 16,3, closing in on nearly doube the output of the ardboyz for only 10 pts more. This assumes all models can attack, Brutes can also get the gore hackas for 2" reach but average damage drops to 10.67 however it is way more realistic to get them all to actually attack in more situations if you run with the 10. Same could be said for 5 brutes vs 10 ardboyz units, it is most likely easier to get the brutes to all attack. You cant go completely wrong with either, especially if you run Choppas clan with the mandatory +2 bravery aura, the Brutes bravery will have less of an impact. If you face armies with a decent amount of units with 4 or more wound models, then Brutes will quickly become much more dangerous and/or free up warchanters and megaboss abilities and CP for other things than giving +1 hit buffs.