Ghoooouls

What are peoples thoughts on the big boy himself being 975... updated warscroll surely?

Yea but it has kinda been that way for while with necros and low casters having poor match ups. I think +3 with rerolls is better than the LOC ability but I'm not great at maths... average would be 10+? Probably higher with the reroll. Not sure what the LOC average is. But so far the only way I can think to get +3 is with wolf grandma and some buffs like a cart, mortis, magic scenery etc. Maybe we get an item like the claw from legions of nagash where you stay still but have an aura of +2 to cast. Who knows. I'd find it strange if there were no magic-based artefacts for sure. One of my favourite fun lists to use was arkhan, legion of sac, where he could get like +4 or 5 to cast with ease. I'll sure miss that type of army. Edit: but hey we have a lot of new toys to try so I'm sure I'll get over it.

Yeah teclis and tzeentch were the ones I was thinking, correct me if im wrong but Loc can only auto dispel dispel endless within 18, and teclis only has a single auto unbind which yes is blooming irritating, but also could be out of range or need it for a different spell if we bring a magic heavy list. Either way going magic heavy vs lumineth with teclis is a pretty bad idea and rightly so, at least we have options to get at him now and disrupt his annoying archer /spear lines easier. I actually play against all three of the factions you mention regularly, and I think if we can get +3 to cast with full rerolls that is tasty. It's already easy enough with grandma wolf and some buff units. She's definitely my favourite of the new units. There's also a hell of a lot of factions in the game, so comparing or even having the option of being slightly comparable to the top 3 magic armies around is good enough for me. I'd just like to see some magic based artefacts and traits, like FEC have.

I can only think of a couple of units I the game off the top of my head that have regular auto unbinds/dispels. An extra bonus to cast would be great with the ready easy to get buffs from carts/mortis etc. And rerolls.

Seeing as vyrkos seems to be our 'magic' subfaction, I'm hoping for some artefacts that bonus casts/unbinds/dispels as well

Remember vampire lords still have the invocation ability to heal the grave guard, so might mean he doesn't have to cast invigorating aura that much and opens up another spell option. I think grave guard are going to be pretty damn deadly now, especially in vyrkos. Vlozd with the wounds count as models for objectives was also top on my list to try out.

Yea I used that as a sort of 'best case scenario in battle' and 'worst case scenario in terms of distance'. The point is they have a huge threat range, and if your enemy comes within that range they can be great - take my example and then change the distance from 15.9 to 13.9 for example, only 2 inches closer and suddenly its incredibly easy even with scenery etc. A 115 point battleline unit with movement 4 having mortal output threat range of 16 inches is great. If they get targeted and whittled down beforehand - great - better than targeting our support heroes and heavy hitters, and the zombies can heal themselves anyway and be healed d3 per turn. That's another benefit imo is the enemy can't really just ignore them anymore and they actually pose a threat.

Zombies are on small bases. So long as you get the front rank into base-to-base then the second rank can also attack if you have them base-to-base with the front rank. That's 2 ranks easily fighting even if you only just reach their base with the 6 inch pile in. Let's say you have the battalion for +1 attack and van hels up - two very easy buffs, and are 15.9 inches away from a unit of 10-20 guys. You get a lucky run of 6 or use a command to run 6. You are now 5.9 inches away. You pile in 6 and have 2 ranks eligible to fight, assuming it was head on obviously. That is 40 attacks. Now they pile in again and get more into range. That's another 40 attacks MINIMUM with relative ease. 80 attacks with 6s doing a mortal is what like 13-14 mortals average with potential to do much more, and have other buffs etc. If the enemy unit doesn't have a ward save and is just 1 wound, that's a lot of added zombies.

Yea avengori with 3 items all 1 use only is a bit odd, im hopeful we have a table or tables of generic items that anyone can use otherwise avengori looks a bit poop on the artefact front.

How do wolves get it? I've seen a few mentions of that now.

No as they are only eligible to fight if they are within 6 inches still. That ability only adds 3 to pile in, not to eligibility. Would be funny though lol.

Im torn... definitely the tome (obviously)... but I need so much stuff for the armies I want to run and I'll likely spread out my order over the coming months so I don't overwhelm myself with gluing/painting. Also gonna cost a lot lol. Off the top of my head I 100% want: Multiple zombie boxes (2 minimum) Blood knights (possible multiple but I already have a cool converted unit from chaos knights) Skeletons (to run as grave guard) 2x dire wolf boxes Grandma wolf Radukar Lauka Vai Mounted wight That's just minimum/off the top of my head, I'm sure there will be more. That's on top of my current 2 or 3k of legions of nagash lol. I can't afford all that in one lot haha.

The speed of zombies really comes from their lack of need to charge... imagine you have 20 grave guard 14 inches from the enemy, they move 4 inches and then need a 10 inch charge. Put zombies in the same situation and you can run them (use command to guarantee 6 if needed) but for this example let's say you run 6, so they move 10 inches - this puts them 4 inches from the enemy, during combat they can pile in because they are within 6 inches for their rule. They could be crazy fast with lucky rolls like that, makes it hard for the enemy to stay safe, and small support heroes are at a big risk and must stay further away from their chaff etc.

Can someone explain the skeleton rule? What does 'they come back on 4+ when selected to fight' mean? Anything that has died gets to roll a 4+ or you roll a single 4+ and all the dead ones come back? Cheers.

Im really digging a lot of the new stuff. The one thing that is quite a blow is that we can now only heal each summonable unit 1d3 max. Beforehand if you had graves nearby and heroes it was easy to bring back like 5d3 skeletons per turn. I guess on the plus side, zombies have a much better mechanic to generate returning models themselves. Huge amount of different options to go with. They are all going to play relatively differently to what I'm used to but I'm very excited.

Now imagine you're an ironjaws player lol. He has always been one of my favourite lords in warhammer since the fantasy days, was just hoping for some cool rules to make him useful, not troll rules. Either way I'm still gonna use him lol.

This is why I say it's lame and trolly, he is immune to combat now. What some armies will have to ignore him entirely.

Just trolly and a lame rule in my opinion. Kinda disappointed but I'll still try him, just gonna be NPE for certain armies.

Whilst I would love this I'm not sure if they could quite easily be a bit tooooo strong with retreat and charge, but I'm happy either way

Yup, there are two options for a normal move if you are in combat, you remain stationary, or you retreat. Still, the ability is great, especially paired with the vhordrai dynasty thing where they can get +2 to run - roll a 6 or use a command point and that's 18 inch retreat doing d3 mortals to units they pass over.

For riders of ruin to trigger, you must start your move within 3 inches of an enemy unit. This means they cannot move over other models as if they can fly normally, unless they do the special riders of ruin retreat out of combat ability. *if this unit is within 3 inches of an enemy unit, it can make a normal move....... if it does so, it can pass over models with a wounds characteristic of 3 or less as if it can fly....* So if they do not start within 3 of an enemy unit, they can't do riders of ruin.

Higher rend wouldn't have helped vs the basti anyway. Its always been magic and other mortals that are good for that - which I'm sure we will have plenty of with two spell lores and tons of casters.

Charge bonus changed from D3 to flat 2, save profile increased rather than +1 to their save is big, 2+ save in cover, ways of making them ethereal etc. Fly over units when they retreat and do d3 mortals to ALL the units they move over, on top of the horses getting an extra attack, the hunger healing d3 instead of 1 and all the other possible rules. It's going to be relatively easy to get blood knights to damage 3 and/or 4 wounds each with +2 to run and charge (riders of ruin running/flying 18 inches over enemies and doing d3 to them all will be awesome), combine that with the 3+ save and healing d3 they are amazing. Remember we are also yet to see other allegiance stuff, and the abilities they get from killing things is for ALL vampires, not just blood knights.

Yea they can't retreat and charge still

Also these prices don't usually directly convert, as costs in certain countries are higher and lower.