Saturmorn Carvilli

My very limited experience has me strongly leaning toward ensorcelled weapons. It seems a pretty narrow band of enemy units that lances smash through that ensorcelled weapons also wouldn't. Plus, lances require a charge where ensorcelled weapons work the same no matter what. In the few games I have played, my groups of ten knights usually get stuck in combat regardless of weapon. So far, I have been pretty good at getting about seven on a single target too. The only thing I have seen lances do better is Distraction Carnifex my (also new players) opponents better than my ensorcelled weapons ones. I haven't played that many games, and I haven't done the math though.

Honestly, I don't see Slaves to Darkness as a killy faction anymore (if they ever were). I only have a few games under my belt, but I have given up trying to out kill my opponent. I think S2D are probably in the bottom 50% of killing factions in Age of Sigmar. Instead, I focus on owning territory during a game. Currently, I like running biggish blocks of Chaos Warriors (15) and Chaos Knights (10) backed up with a Leader/support unit for buffs. Then I focus on holding the 2/3s of the table I think I can capture and completely yield the other 1/3 to my opponent. Although, as I get more practice using the Ravager's Rally the Tribes ability I plan on using Warcry cultists (maybe the occasional Furies) as skirmishers in that last 1/3 of the table at least siphoning off some of my opponent's forces to hold that bit of the table. I also plan on keeping that teleport spell in my back pocket to also keep my opponent from concentrating too much of their power in any one spot on the table.

The above photo is from my first game. I will totally own the spreading out my forces too much as well as not understanding I didn't need at least 3 Battleline units (hence the two groups of five Chaos Warriors). It didn't help that the OBR player made an 11" charge onto my knights and won the double turn. I managed to cause 3 wounds to the Mortek Guard but the hero (Boneshaper I believe) raised them back up. @JackStreicher I don't know about hard to play. Of course, most of the players in my area are nearly as new to Age of Sigmar as I am. So I am probably not playing against the most optimized armies...yet. Still, I see my Slaves to Darkness army as being mostly about solid fundamentals of rank and flank style games. Funny enough AoS requires more effort with frontage since you have to physically get the models in fight distance rather than a block of troops just causes X amount of attacks. Too bad it doesn't really reward flanking other than a few more attacks and/or encirclement. I will agree that the army kinda feels like it assumes you are just getting buffs for the points paid on everything. For the most part that is easy enough to get on units that need them. Sometimes there still are not enough buffs to always go around, and in the case of spells casting, failure is always there. Plus, it requires a fair number of support units which may or may not be the weak spots in your army.

Honestly, my first game of Age of Sigmar I don't think there was anything that could be done to win given the forces involved, the battleplan and the point limit. Battletome-less Slaves to Darkness vs. Ossiarch Bonereapers at 500 points in a 1 wound = 1 victory point game could only be won by excellent positioning on the S2D player, poor positioning on the OSB player as well as much better than average dice rolls for the S2D and much worst than average rolls by the OBR. I don't think that is the case now that Slaves to Darkness have a battletome, playing more than kill point missions and 1000+ point games. Just the same, I do think head to head OBR (as well as a number of other factions) will out kill Slaves to Darkness. Or at least a Chaos Warrior/Knight heavy army like mine. Warriors and Knights are pretty tough but they don't have the damage output without buffs like Daemonic Power, Spurred by the Gods or Warshrine.

This was a three player game of Slaves to Darkness (me) vs. Nighthaunts (the most experienced player) and Gloomspite Gitz (the best painted models army). I had 2000 points, They each had 1000 points. The battleplan was Places of Arcane Power which was selected based on the battleplan name more than anything and it didn't appear to favor any particular army as far as I could tell. My Army: Ravagers, All with Mark of Chaos Undivided Leaders: Chaos Lord of Karkadrak, Sorcerer Lord x2 Battleline: 15 Chaos Warriors (Hand Weapon and Shield)x2, 10 Chaos Knights x2 (one with ensorcelled weapons, one with lances) Other: Chaos Spawn x2, Realmscrouge Rupture Rally the Tribes: Iron Golems, Untamed Beasts As a pretty new player, this is more of an army of what I have over what I would want. I don't even have enough cultists to make use of Rally the Tribes each round unless one or both of my Warcry teams are destroyed. My Opponents Armies: I can't say for certain as I am still too new to know much outside own stuff. The Nighthaunt player had 5 heroes characters giving them plenty of units to capture objectives. They also had at least two groups of battleline ghosts. As for the Gloomspite Gitz player, they favored a troll heavy army with with unit of squigs and a goblin wizard of some sort. The Battlefield The table was covered with my Warcry terrain as well as an Alter of Skulls (no special rules used) and the FLGS Chaos terrain piece that looks really awesome. The objectives are Chaos Space Marine Banners on 28mm bases. You can see my left flank (Tzeentch) and center objectives (Khorne) in the above photos with their all gray circular bases. Not pictures is the Slaanesh one atop the Warcry terrain at the upper center of the above photo. The story for this battle was my army: The Defenders of the Mortal Realms were protecting a unholy sites from trolls that had decided to make a home here. At the same time Nagash's forces had sent some Nighthaunts to scout out the area for an impeding invasion. These Nighthaunts also might have had a special connection to this place as the Chaos banners were placed on ancient burial grounds. Round 1 The Nighthaunt/Gloomspite Gitz players chose territories but I managed to pick who had first turn. I let my opponents go first since I wouldn't be able to reach anything if I went first and want be in good position for a double turn. Since I only had three units that could capture/hold objectives, I completely abandoned the Slaanesh objective. IN retrospect, I probably should have used my cultists to harass my opponents to draw more of their forces away to defend it. The Nighthaunt player went to take the Tzeentch objective while screening their rear. Meanwhile the Gitz player sent a portion of their force toward the Khorne objective and a smaller group at the Slaanesh objective. I moved my knights with the idea of charging this round. My Chaos Lord ran to be in better position to take the Tzeentch objective and provide better aura coverage next round. My lance knights failed their charged even after the re-roll, but my ensorcelled weapon knights got stuck in with the nighthaunt troops and squigs. I probably should have focused attack the ghosts more, but I didn't know they had so much healing potential. Besides I removed more squigs from battleshock (with 3-4+ Mortal Wounds at me when they ran) than actual damage. My Warriors and Sorcerers ran to capture the Khorne objective. I sandwiched my Sorcerers within my Warriors to prevent easy access to any would be assassins. Round 2 I managed the double turn in Round 2 going first. This round I did get my endless spell to go off which hit three of Nighthaunt mounted heroes and the Gitz wizard. Unfortunately, I did less than average damage with it. My Warriors and Sorcerer positioned around the Khorne objective to make it a challenge to shift them for at least a couple of rounds. My Chaos Spawn did reach a group of trolls but barely scratched them and were destroyed in the process. My Lance Knights connected with the ghost troops but my other knights killed so many that they were out of range again before they attacked. My Chaos Warrior positioned himself on the Tzeentch objective and didn't move the rest of the game. The Nighthaunt player sent one of his mounted heroes toward the Slaanesh objective but was a couple of inches short of grabbing it. The other two fought my Chaos Lord where one fell and everyone at the table learned how dangerous the Chaos Lord on Karkadrak could be. I got the +5 FNP Eye of the Gods buff. The Gitz player encircled my Warriors but wasn't yet in a good position to bring the roughly hewn stone hammer down on them. Score: S2D: 2, NH/GG: 0 Round 3: This time the Nighthaunts and Gitz managed the double turn. Unfornately for the Nighthaunts player, his forces were kinda floundering. He as chipping away at my ensorcelled weapon knights and getting ghosts back, but I did manage to completely remove one group of them and the remaining ghosts just weren't removing my knights fast enough to be of any use later. Pretty much the same story with the Gitz. The trolls were really starting to clear out my Warriors (I think he got 12 of them this round), but it was too late in the game to clear a path to my Sorcerers. The Gitz also teleported that big violet painted troll to face my Chaos Lord. On my turn, my Warriors simple weathered more attacks but held their ground. Same with the ensorcelled weapons knights who were pretty gassed out at this point but had done their job. My lance Knights made a 180 and charged the teleported troll and the mounted ghost who was still in combat with my Chaos Lord. None of which could actually generate enough attacks to kill the phantom horseman. The troll on the otherhand, was down to 3 wounds after the lance charge. Score: S2D: 4, NH/GG: 1 Round 4: The Nighthaunts and Gitz player won initiative. They killed the last of my ensorcelled knights and both of my cultists as well as a few number of my lance Knights. My Warriors were down to a handful but either Sorcerer Lord only had minor damage. The big troll and the mounted ghost attacking my Chaos Lord was removed (I forgot to roll on the Eye of the Gods table). After their turn, talk of ending came up and I suggested we could stop here as I wasn't going to lose the Tzeentch objective for the rest of the game, they weren't going to lose the Slaanesh objective and it was agreed that I probably wouldn't lose the Khorne objective and even if I did, they didn't have a hero that could take this round. Hypothetical Score: S2D: 5-6, NH/GG: 2 Round 5: Hypothetical Score: S2D: 6-7, NH/GG: 3-4 After Actions: This was the first game of Age of Sigmar I had a lot of fun playing. I feel a little bad for the Nighthaunt player as they probably felt a little restricted having an allied player as well as having most of their battleline forces unable to do much. The Gitz player said this was also the most fun they had playing Age of Sigmar as previous games his trolls never got to do anything. I did state that I would have rather been the one that destroyed their armies and lost than get my army beat up and won. However, I just don't think that is what my army does. They just don't have much damage output. I like the Chaos Lord on Karkadrak and the Sorcerers are auto-inlcudes in my armies. The two blocks of 15 Warriors are also a staple. I like the Knights with ensorcelled weapons but the Lance Knights don't really work out well. The Chaos Spawn were also pretty bad. I could say the same for the Warcry Cultists, but I didn't pay any points for them and because of that never really had a plan for them. So probably more my fault than anything. I got more work out the Realmscourge Rupture than I can ever expect, but it still was kinda underwhelming. I now have a foot Chaos Lord that will be in place of the Chaos Spawn. I also think I should finally build by Varanguard to replace the Lance Knights. If and when I buy more for this army, I think I want some more Warcry Cultists (I know Marauders are better, I like the Warcry models more) and probably a Warshrine. I might also consider a Manticore hero too.

Hello, I have been in involved in tabletop games on and off of decades starting with D&D. I played so much D&D when I was younger that even now I am still burned out on Tolkien/Gygax fantasy. So when I started playing miniatures war games (as playing TTRPGs became tougher and tougher to keep groups together) I kept a good distance from anything fantasy. I started miniatures war gaming with Dust Warfare transitioning into Dust Tactics Battlefield with the gaming group I was playing with made the rules switch. However, when Battlefront and the game creator Kickstarter dispute came to a head and they parted ways, so too did my gaming group trying a couple of games of Dust 1947. The group started playing Warmachine which is still too much generic fantasy for me. I started playing Bolt Action and other historical games no earlier than the black powder era. I played historicals (mostly Bolt Action) until a little into Bolt Action 2nd edition. I didn't really care for the addition of templates (Dust Battlefield had me dislike them) as well as a few other changes and lack of changes elsewhere. So that combined with the announcement of 8th edition Warhammer 40k pretty much ended the player base locally for me. I had played a little of 7th edition 40k but mostly Heralds of Ruin Kill Team. Which I will maintain that 7th edition 40k works fine for a small skirmish game but has too much going on to bother with at even platoon level. I also played a little bit of 8th edition but took a break until the introduction of the latest Kill Team. It was Kill Team that really brought me back to miniatures war gaming. I started really playing it regularly in November of 2018 and still consider it my primary game as I play it pretty much every week. It was from my Kill Team group that I learned more about Age of Sigmar. I had heard the often repeated stuff (points, silly rules, etc.) but never really gave it any mind since it was fantasy. The more I heard about the setting the more I liked the idea of it. So that combined with me playing and enjoying 5th ed D&D, a escalation league starting up and new Slaves to Darkness stuff, I started playing Age of Sigmar. TL;DR Hi. Unfortunately, the escalation league was a bit of a nightmare for me. My first game was against Bonereapers in a 500 point kill point game where all I had were the warscrolls that came with the build instructions. I lost some 0-40. More than half the games in the league didn't happen and those that did were anti-fun. Because I really like the potential of the lore, I was determined to either like Age of Sigmar's game or absolutely despise it. Recently, I had my first fun game of Age of Sigmar (the above photo). It was a 2000pts game of S2D (me) vs. 1000pts Nighthaunt and 1000pts Gloomspite Gitz three player game. The battleplan was Places of Arcane Power. I managed to win by playing to the mission and making use of the toughness of my army to just sit on two objectives and let my opponents wear away and my units. I like to say that I won but would have preferred to been where the losing armies where. What I mean by this, is that my army was on its last legs at the end of the game while my opponents armies still had a lot fight in them. As a player I tend to like to destroy opposing armies over winning. I just don't think that is how my Slaves to Darkness army is going to work.