Aren73

Thoughts on fitting in a Black Coach into a Blood Knight list? It doesn't seem to lose much synergy outside of Nighthaunt, it's pretty self sufficient. It is also a decent source of mortal wounds, it does MW on 6s to hit and has two abilities to give out d3 MW. It's probably not the best choice but perhaps it could be viable?

Awesome thanks! I must've missed that, haven't been here long. Was worried I was coming across as too critical. I have plenty of criticisms about the book but I have also found things I like and In excited to play them nonetheless.

I hope so, I don't want it to be in every list. It's good and a nice force multiplier and that's how it should stay. Also, a bit ago I put up a pic listing all the 3+/3+/-1 profiles in the book but it seems to be removed. Is that because of a rule of not screenshotting book contents or because it seemed negative? To be clear, I only put that up as a reference (and because I found it funny that a Wight king has the same profile as a vampire lord) and not to complain.

@Frowny You're right on and those are some quite strong interactions. The issue with the Coven Throne being the powerhouse you just mentioned is that it makes it extremely desirable. It will feature heavily in tournament lists. Which will just encourage GW to nerf it. Our book shouldn't be good because of a few strong units. I'd much rather a larger amount of units being decent than a few being really strong.

Effectively, Grave Guard and not Blood Knights or anything else are our monster hunters. They are our answer to Bastiladons (unrendable save) and Leviadons (2+ save). They have rend, high damage and Mortal Wounds. The only thing they're missing is speed.

Ahahaha this cracked me up. It's quite amazing how people keep overlooking the vargheists. They got a decent buff to their scroll and gained a useful battalion...what's not to like? I think they're arguable as good as, if not better, than Blood Knight targets for Kastelai progression buffs. EDIT: That's also what makes Kastelai good - the fact that it isn't just Blood Knights and Vampire Lords that progress but all vampires. If you run an all vampire army then some units are bound to keep those buffs.

All this reminds me of when I was running LoN with Spirit Hosts spam, to fish for mortal wounds. It did seem easier to get the spirit hosts there though, they are ethereal and were an absolute meme to bring back/heal.

Don't. Don't give me hope. It may feel like the alpha version (it sure does with all those mistakes) but it's not. It can't be. I can't deal with false hope right now

It feels like they wanted to make Avengorii unique by letting them have double the customisation that the other factions have. So they made the options half as strong to compensate...

Valid - but both units are same speed until zombies get within 6. For both you have to think of delivery in your list and getting them there. Both units are too slow to reliably hunt enemy units unless you have a solid plan for how they do so. I don't think there is necessarily an overall better option, just situationally better ones. Once the Grave Guard get there they will chew through most things, whereas zombies won't. However, getting them there is the issue. Against some enemies or scenarios either aspect will be more critical. Personally zombies just don't appeal to me so I will be taking grave guard, which by what we've just established seem to be at least on par. If you prefer Zombies then take those - they're not a bad choice either. If your list lacks damage take the GG, if however you want units that are more durable take the zoms. I don't think both units perform the exact same function, there's enough difference to not make one optimal to the other.

My bad, it's late here and I'm not putting myself across clearly. No I'm fully aware they're different options. And you're right, I thought that the great wight blades hit on 4+, instead they wound on 4+...that's not intuitive. I don't know if Zombies are more durable per point against shield Grave Guard, I can math that out tomorrow. But even shield Grave Guard I think out-damage Zombies point for point and great weapon Grave Guard certainly do. As for which I go with - no idea yet. I like the idea of shields but it would depend on what else is there in the list. I think both options are very good and have their place. What makes Grave Guard so crazy is the 2 Attacks. Zombies are 5.75 ppm, Grave Guard are 14. However Grave Guard have 2 attacks, so it's like each of those attacks is 7 points. Looking at points per attack, zombies still at 5.75, Grave Guard at 7. Sword and board you are still getting a +2 to hit, +2 to wound and a -1 rend for only 1.25 points more. Going by that, both variants of Grave Guard out-damage zombies point for point. However, with zombies you have more wounds per point and a heal ability. Grave Guard get a better save instead. It's not immediately obvious which one is better, but I'm tempted to say a unit of zombies is tougher to wipe out than the same points of Grave Guard. I guess there's the answer, written pretty incoherently due to my sleepiness. Grave Guard out-damage Zombies, Zombies out-live Grave Guard (both of those I think are true no matter the Grave Guard loadout). For me, the Grave Guard damage output is the important factor.

A 30 max, cheap unit that you can buff the saves for, has effectively a 4+ save after save after save and you can heal...that comes back at half strength after being killed. I like them for objective holding.

The buff is also usable for all units and lasts through your opponent's turn. It is truly golden, amazing ability. But yes, you pay a lot for it. An extra spellcaster is always nice though and the throne could do some damage here and there. It's like taking the Necromancer for the Vanhel's, you buy the unit for more or less one ability, up to you whether it is justified in your list.

For Grave Guard, the Mortal Wounds are a nice strong ability however a good chunk of their damage comes from normal damage too. Great weapons are great There isn't really an enemy type Grave Guard don't want to go into, they produce plenty of mortal wounds against heavily armoured/ethereal enemies and also hit hard enough normally that large units of chaff don't want to be anywhere near them. For zombies however, enemy hordes don't really care about them and will likely out-damage the zombies. Sure you get a few MW through, but the enemy horde will deal way more through normal damage. In terms of durability, it's difficult to compare the zombie heal to a normal save so I won't - that requires deeper analysis and I don't want to jump to conclusions. Still, a 4+ save isn't bad for sword and board Grave Guard. On Battleline options you've got me beat for sure. However, as a final upside to Grave Guard you get the buff effect where any buff put on Grave Guard will be more valuable than one put on zombies. +1 to Hit and +1 to Wound are much nicer on a -1 Rend, 2 Damage weapon than a - Rend and 1 Damage one. Likewise, buffs to saves go much further when they're protecting a higher damage dealing unit. In essence, when you buff Grave Guard you are augmenting a larger amount of points. Zombies are a MW machine and a self-healing tarpit. Grave Guard are a MW machine and a blender unit, plus a somewhat tough to kill bruiser unit. Oh, a fun side note, Grave Guard deal more MW with their swords than great weapons I find that quite funny.

On the topic of competitive factions, I actually see Vyrkos and not Kastelai as the go to. Kastelai embodies the "win more" theme, where if you are doing well anyway, you'll do better. If you are killing enemy units, then your units get stronger. But if you're already killing enemy units then giving you help to kill more enemy units isn't the largest buff you could get. I do really like the faction though and I think there could be a way of playing it to make it strong. What it really wants is some way of killing units outside of combat. Whereas Vyrkos - they buff our perhaps best unit in the book (Grave Guard) with a straight up, simple, +1 to wound. On top of that you reroll casts - something every vampire army enjoys and factors well with the locus of shyish. Vyrkos isn't gimmicky or situational, you just get a reliable buff that you'll use from the start to the end of the game. Kastelai on the other hand, is more fun.

This. And while Sception gets this question from the left I'll attack it from the right. Non-named vampire lords are boring. They are really, truly, awfully bland. They have a generic moderate damage output, a low level spellcasting ability and...I guess they have the hunger. They don't have any further customisation options, aside from an artefact and a command trait. They don't really do any fun, cool, flavourful lore stuff. Why should they? Well, they are the face of our faction. Soulblight Gravelords, it's Vampire Lords. Vampire Lords the faction. And yet in said faction, Vampire Lords are on par with Wight Kings and Fell Bats as the most boring and bland unit in the book. Wouldn't it have been cool if you could give them a vampiric power, for example to fly and move 10" (Flying Horror) or to strike first in combat, or -1 Bravery for enemy units within 6", or to cast one more spell, +1 to casting, give rerolls of hits of 1 to units around them etc. It is so easy to come up with a fun and flavourful list of medium power customisations which would have really helped these guys stand out. Sounds broken? A small points hike would have easily fixed that, though for 140pts and their current profile, I actually don't think it's too much. My issue is that it's such an easy, obvious, previously explored thing to do. It instantly adds flavour. It helps with list building. It's there for other factions in the form of mount traits. So why not? We are playing the Vampire Lords faction....and yet I for one don't feel enthused to field a Vampire Lord.

Anyone else find Avengorii weird? I got the impression that they seek out mighty monsters to fight: "they seek out the largest, most worthy brutes in Ghur to feed on" - WC and "Vampires of the Avengorii dynasty seek to slake their thirst on the very largest and strongest prey" - WC And yet they are the subfaction that is weakest against monsters? Losing their -1 to wound I would have thought they'd have something a bit more akin to the Kastelai one...where if they "feed on the strongest prey" they level up, just like Kastelai. But no...

Another good thing about the book: It really challenges you to build a strong list. Nothing is that obvious and list building has some meat to it. You may laugh but funnily enough I do actually enjoy playing underdog factions that have it a bit uphill and the list building isn't obvious/broken. I'm warming to it. (Just don't talk to me about the generic vampire lord or "vampire powers" or customisation options or flavour as I don't think I can stop being salty about those)

Someone help me see the value in the Shifting Keep ability. Why would I want to chuck a unit or two of blood knights in the enemy back lines when they are unlikely to make the charge? I can't even give them a character to let them reroll charges. Perhaps a 10-15 man unit that expects to lose some models before they fight...but just seems a bit wasteful. If we could chuck over a VLoZD or Vhordrai that'd be a different matter.

Completely unrelated but I love your username @FeralMulan. Would go really well on a female Vengorian Lord.

Nah that's going a bit too far. The units I see as good or decent would be: Grave Guard Zombies Coven Throne Vargheists Blood Knights Vengorian Lord Lauka Corpse Carts Mannfred Vhordrai There might be more, I need more time with the book. There are plenty of decent options. There are also plenty of disappointing options too, it's a mixed bag in general. Ah I'd have to get rid of something though, perhaps a unit of Vargheists and make the GG into skellies? I think Fellwing Flock is decent - it helps Vargheists hit that much harder without too much of a tax. Solid battalion, I hope we get to use it for longer than a few months

How does this look? This is a list I'd be excited to play, though I can already see that it's lacking in the rend/mortal wound department. Kastelai List 5 Blood Knights 195 5 Blood Knights 195 5 Blood Knights 195 6 Vargheists 310 Vengorian Lord 280 20 Grave Guard with shields 280 3 Fell Bats 75 3 Fell Bats 75 3 Vargheists 155 3 Vargheists 155 Fellwing Flock 80 Rousing Commander Amaranthine Orb Fragment of the Keep 1995

And another positive (I'm on a roll here ) Vengorian Lords and Lauka are good. I was worried they wouldn't be, but they are. The rend worsening aura is great, the damage output for their points is good, they have interesting abilities and spells. I'm tempted to run two, or one of each!

I definitely like this take on zombies. In WHFB I never took them, I just saw nothing interesting there. Now they are a different kind of threat other than just being a tarpit.

I am onboard with a large amount of this, in general I agree. And please don't get me wrong I don't want to crucify one dude. I am just of the opinion that a chunk of the responsibility is nonetheless on the author(s), I don't want to just wave my hand and say "they did the best job they could have done". BUT As others have said, I really have added enough negativity to this thread, I've criticised enough. So, on a more positive note: The battalion with Vargheists and Fell Bats is fun and usable! The bats are a cheap, objective grabbing tax and the Vargheists for sure benefit from the buff! It's nice to see