[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

I think if I was playing LOB my list would look something like this: 

 

VLOZD 440 (general)

Neferata 390

20 x GG 280

20 x GG 280

3 x Black knights 330

V- lord 130

Wight king 135

1985

Although I’m not sure how long GW will allow an ethereal VLOZD with 16 wound 3+ 6++, extra attacks, hitting (chosen units) on 2’s and healing up to 6 wounds a turn… but enjoy it while it lasts! 😆 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

1 hour ago, Beliman said:

A lot of unique characters that have a subfaction keyword can only buff their own units (Brokk Grugnisson, Lyrior, Astreia, Gardus, Khorgos Khul, etc...). There are a few ones that can buff anyone, like Volturnos (Ionrach), Grinkrak (King's gitz) or Awlrach (Grieving Legion), but they are not that common and they usually are from old 3.0 books.

I think the issue with this book is that we have A LOT of unique characters and attaching them all to sub factions to me feels very restrictive. It’s pretty common and logical to make sub-faction specific characters more aligned with that sub faction, but many of the characters in this book have multiple abilities as well as spells locked into those factions, and you would have to be kind of desperate to play them out with… neferata for example has two abilities and a spell all locked into LOB. For me it would have made a lot more sense to make some of those spells or abilities attached to units thematically associated with the sub faction instead, or just not attached at all. I feel like one spell/ ability is enough, still giving you freedom to move elsewhere, but making them more potent in their aligned sub-faction. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

2 hours ago, Sception said:

Yeah, I've seen a lot of reactions dumping on the soulblight mortarchs, but they actually both look very solid to me, as does Prince Vhordrai - yes he lost the ability to hero-phase attack with another monster, but quickblood for asf that lasts till your next hero phase on a monster hero that tough, that killy, and self healing, is almost a return to the old OP gristlegore days.  Regular VLoZD also benefits significantly from the new hunger rule, and has strong and useful buffs in each of the subfactions making them exciting in that there looks to be a bunch of ways to run them that are all strong in different and unique ways.  Belladamma Volga remains a very solid double caster for her points, radubeast is a solid beatstick with a good buff attached had hasn't lost a step once you remember that he has full access to Vyrkos subfaction abilities, including traits and artefacts.  The wight kings are both better, albeit more specialized.  Necromancer is worse, but still a solid support caster with bodyguard protection and access to some excellent debuffs from the lore.  Torgillius trades the bodyguard ability for a 5++ aura which is great.  The new hero's a silver bullet, but impressive in her particular specialty, which is surprising given that most foot heroes who try to specialize in monster hunting are just bad.  Lauka Vai is decent, especially when paired with a VLoZD.

The regular vamp lord doubled down on being a support hero instead of bringing back the unit-eating blender lords of fantasy that many have wanted since AoS's release - but that was never a realistic request since that's just not how foot heroes work in AoS.  It's not how they've worked since the game was released and it isn't how they work in any other faction.  And once you accept the vamp lord as a support hero, he's actually pretty solid - +1 attack that stacks with spells and command abilities is really good, actually!  Granted, it would be better if it weren't restricted to summonables, because right now there's really only a single unit in the army worth giving that buff to, and yeah that's a problem, especially as they're also the oldest kit left in the model range and they really don't hold up next to the new skeletons.  It's unfortunate that the vampire is as much a dedicated grave guard enhancer as the wight king is, that doesn't really fit the fluff, so yeah, improvements to be made, but if you are taking grave guard then the vamp lord is still very solid.

Blood knights lost their better retreat & charge, but hit much harder with +1 rend and 2" reach.  They're maybe a bit overpriced, but they're super playable.

Honestly, the soulblight heroes in general are very impressive, even if they're not all impressive in the same ways that they used to be.  And it's narratively fitting for the faction to have high end heroes and elites at the top with a hoard of suffering peasants at the bottom of the pyramid holding them up.  But even then, the peasants aren't terrible.  Black Knights aren't the medium cav I want them to be, but they are a cheap source of fire & forget mortal wounds that will get some damage in and die early as starting grist for endless legions.  Grave guard are extremely fragile glass cannons, but you've got deployment shenanigans, excellent screens, and healing abilities to get them into combat, and once there they suck up buffs like a sponge before hitting like a train.  Zombies are a cheap tar pit that clogs the table with friendly bodies and deals a bunch of free mortal wounds to any enemy units forced to take the time to clear them.  Skeletons are slightly more expensive targets that don't do any damage at all, but are significantly harder to clear thanks to their improved self-healing ability.  Dire wolves are excellent body blockers, very fast, and can get into combat with dedicated shooty units without provoking unleash hell thanks to their 6" pile in.  Fell bats are super cheap and super fast flying chaff, and now battleline in one of the factions for what is essentially a better version of the old 5 model wolf units.  Corpse carts can buff our casters and make zombies just that extra big more dangerous to clear out.

 

I don't like the big chariots (mortis engine might be ok with a points drop), or the unridden monsters, or the generic vengorian, or the vargheists.  But in a book this big there's going to be some duds, and even setting those aside the army has more than enough for multiple effective builds, including builds that make good use of a lot of the units that are getting dumped on in some of the community reactions.

 

Aside from my distaste for the mortarchs and many other gripes, I find myself agreeing with the majority of this 😅

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

2 hours ago, RocketPropelledGrenade said:

On the idea that Grave Guard are the only summonable unit worth buffing--I think a big block of 20-30 Deathrattle Skeletons will probably do a surprising amount of damage over the course of a game. They'll be lackluster turn to turn most of the time, but small bases mean a lot of attacks, and no one is going to want to waste All Out Defense against them if there's other combats. So they'll do consistent chip damage while being largely immune to the same. A Vampire Lord of Wight King can definitely speed that up when you run out of Grave Guard or something mucks up your positioning options.

Similarly, Black Knights may not have good attacks, but Crimson Feast gives them an extra 2 attacks a model, which lets them win chaff-on-chaff fights much more easily and thus sweep deck-chair-sitters off objectives or clear charge lanes for your bigger hitters.

Would I take a Vampire Lord just to buff those units? No. Would I expect to find situations over the course of an event where those are worthwhile uses of the ability? Quite possibly!

Re deathrattle that was my thinking too. If you are including (what may well become quite a standard package of) GG/ vamp lord/ WK in your army then it makes a lot of sense to use deathrattle as chaf, because they can also benefit from those buffs in a pinch. Things never go perfectly to plan, so having a fall back is always nice. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

17 minutes ago, Gery81 said:

This to me is one of the best changes in the book. I always hated the idea of Mannfred leading LoB grave guard, or Kastelai blood knights, while the actual faction leaders not making the cut. Maybe I am just too much of a narrative minded player

Haha not at all, everyone’s approach is equally valid. There’s certain units I would just never include in an army because I can’t handle the aesthetics 🤓

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

24 minutes ago, RocketPropelledGrenade said:

@TechnoVampire No need to apologize or feel bad for not liking something in a game. Your tastes are valid, and any pushback I've given has been an attempt to find a silver lining you would appreciate, not to suggest you are wrong! I hope you can get some joy out of it by putting it on the table and trying it out, and if not, I hope you find an alternative that works for you.

Thanks yeah, I’m sure I will and I appreciate it as well, as it’s helpful to hear perspectives that challenge or differ from our own. The book is far from terrible, and like you say, I think with time I’ll find what works 😊

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

@RocketPropelledGrenade @MotherGoose I wish I could share you guys enthusiasm for the new book. I feel like I’ve expressed my gripes so won’t do so in detail again. There are so many subjective elements that it’s impossibly to please everyone, but I’m glad there seem to be many aspects that people are excited about. Hopefully I’ll come to share some of that enthusiasm with time. I wonder if maybe SBGL players are a bit too fair minded haha. I feel like a lot of other armies have some standout power combos/ mechanics and as long as they’re not game breaking that’s kind of ok. Broken auto picks obviously aren’t fun, but for me personally having a hard to deal with teleport ability, or a spell that allows you to provide a scary turn 1 threat isn’t overly problematic, and for me this book just feels a bit flat. The Mortarchs with locked in sub-faction abilities are a big miss for me, which is a real shame as I want access to lore of the deathmages (necro is an ok cheap option I’m aware, but his mobility is bad)… If I ran LOB I would definitely include neferata though. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

Here’s what I’m thinking as a mixture of fast/ hard hitting/ summonable with some stackable buffs in Kastelai:

Vhordrai: (470)

3 x 5 blood knight (690)

1 x 20 GG (280)

Wight king - general - deep strike with GG (135)

Vampire lord (130)

Necro (90)

1 x 20 deathrattle skeleton (170)

1965

(or replace the necro and death rattle with another 20 GG or dire wolves)

(legion of blood with VLOZD is also tempting) 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

20 minutes ago, Leshoyadut said:

I'm pretty set on LoB, yeah. Though a problem with this suggestion is that my WK list doesn't have the points for changing it to mounted. I'm also actually into the exploding 6s it gives to my bone boys and don't really like any of the LoB CTs, anyways. They're all very specific and finicky. Part of me thinks Battle-Lust on the WK to re-roll runs so he stays in range of the GG is the best choice there, tbh. The subfaction bonuses, heroic actions and artefacts can all work with everything else just fine, so I'm not terribly fussy about the identity of my general in LoB.

But it's just something I'm looking to experiment with, and I can iterate on it after trying it out. That's what Tabletop Simulator is for, after all.

Ethereal VLOZD with extra attacks hitting on 2’s feels too good to pass up for your list. Also GG with exploding 6’s hitting on 2’s will be scary in combat. 
 

LOB feels like the most obviously good sub faction initially.

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

1 hour ago, RocketPropelledGrenade said:

30 Grave Guard is tempting, especially with the ease of stacking buffs on them now, but that requires a Wight King as your general to unlock them as battleline. Not normally a bad thing--I think Wight Kings are great in the new book, and a general who can return to the field after being slain is awesome! However, Legion of Blood is not where I would do it, as all the LoB command traits depend on the affected unit being within 3" of the General, and the VLoZD is more mobile and on a bigger base.

It might work with a universal enhancement command trait, but historically the only one of those people have taken is Master of Magic, and I don't see that as being a good choice after the Arcane Tome nerf (or even before--Wight Kings could never access SBGL spell lores anyways, and they wouldn't get LoB bonuses to cast either way). I could maaaaaaybe see the one that gives CP on a 5+, because while we don't pay for Crimson Feast and so on any more, the new Heroic Actions could eat into our potential CP economy. But the 5+ doesn't seem worth it.

If you were determined to stick with Legion of Blood for a 30-block of Grave Guard, I'd probably go with the mounted Wight King for the slightly larger base and the much better mobility, for the synergy with LoB conditional battleline, and for his higher wound availability both normally and immediately post-recursion. But I'd probably run it either in Vrykos, LoN, or Kastelai. Yes, Kastelai! Sounds kinda crazy, but the mounted wight king and a Black Knight escort could keep pace with your Blood Knights, and the 30 block can deep strike. Take Prince Vhordrai for managing buffs on however many Blood Knights units you can still fit in (quick mental math says about 4x5?), and it might be good.

That’s very similar to my old list, but with Mannfred for buffing and screening GG. It hit super hard but crumbled to shooting. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

13 minutes ago, Leshoyadut said:

With how many wizards we have in the army, it was generally pretty easy to get one of them to cast it, especially with the bonus it got from having heroes (which we also had a plethora of, even before Cursed City). I ended up using it a couple times a game on average. But with access to easier and more consistent Endless Legions recursion, I don't think I'll miss it a great deal, especially with Deathly Invocation now healing straight up 4 wounds inside of gravesites. Our other options are more consistent and bigger than they were, so I don't think we'll need Invigorating Aura anymore.

Now, for where I'm at, these are the two lists I'm kinda initially thinking of. I have most of the models for them both, I just need to assemble and paint (basically where I've been at for a long time already).

  Hide contents

Legion of Blood for both

Neferata (390)

VLOZD (440)

Vampire Lord (130)

Wight King (135)
General

3x Deathrattle Skeletons (255)

1x Black Knights (110)

1x Black Knights (110)

3x Grave Guard (420)

1990/2000
120 wounds

OR

Neferata (390)

VLOZD (440)

Vampire Lord (130)

Mortis Engine (230)

3x Deathrattle Skeletons (255)

1x Black Knights (110)

1x Black Knights (110)

2x Grave Guard (280)

1945/2000

117 wounds

I really do like the 30 Grave Guard pile, that was something I enjoyed early on after the 2e book released. With shields now changing the save instead of giving +1 to saves, I think they're in a better place, but the 2" reach with great weapons is hard to pass up on a 30 block. Even with just 20 of them, fighting three ranks deep sounds preeeeeeeeetty good. Mortis Engines also seem pretty neat, and I think it would fit well into this grindy setup.

I also want to do a more Black Knight heavy list at some point, but I just miss my hordes of chaff and want to do something with them first.

I like both these lists and I think they could be potent. If I could be bothered painting that many skeletons, this is the direction I would go in the new book. I think VLOZD in LOB looks very strong and stacking buffs on GG has the highest potential output achievable. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

I just realised that invigorating aura has been removed from the book, I rarely used it before, but with a keener focus on summonable units and recursion will people be missing it? I always thought it looked pretty strong. 

Also thanks to all those that made suggestions for list building ideas that might more fit my play style. I have some old dire wolves painted, and 20 deathrattle skeletons (love the new models, wish GG had something similar), so I’ll see what I can cobble together. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

3 hours ago, JackStreicher said:

Although I had a very negative opinion on the book at first I have changed my mind. I see a lot of opportunity waiting to ne explored.
 

If I can use my Vampires to some success I‘ll be happy (I‘ll be testing Mannfred an Belladama + Blood Knights)

Interesting. What sub faction will you be taking, and what role do you see Mannfred fulfilling? For me he was such a good support piece in the old book, and a deathmage caster. He was one of my favourite units. Now I’m struggling to see what role he fills or support he provides. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

Thanks community for being there during this troubling time (kidding), but I do appreciate the advice or thoughts. 

I think playing a fairly off meta spam list like I do always runs a heavy risk of a new book or GHB completely throwing thing off, but considering that my list/ style is actually still fairly in tact, although clearly not the focus… I was going to say that I wish GW had decided to include at least one allegiance ability for vamps/ non-summonable units, opening things up a bit, but there is 6+ ward and effectively the hunger is an allegiance ability, just written on warsrcolls. 

I think GW has made a mistake by locking so many abilities to sub-factions, seriously limiting build options, but I also understand the need for focus… I’m just not sure that’s a very fun way of achieving it. 

I think I’ll probably be quite jealous of the new FEC book when it comes out, but I currently don’t have the time, energy or funds to pick up a whole new army. I’ll probably continue playing Kastelai for now and see how it goes. Someone’s gotta do it 🤘

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

2 hours ago, Malakithe said:

Right? I love the bloodsucking cruise missile. Cheap, fighty, vampire

 

To me all Death factions are attrition based. Pick your flavor of summonable returning stuff. That hasnt changed since AoS has existed. Now you dont have to go that route and you could go for the more elite style of lists but ultimately thats not what Death has ever been about...

Slow ever advancing lines of bodies that get back up when they fall controlled by their overlords. Thats Death. 

Except for nighthaunt, FEC and by the looks of it new OBR 😜

but yeah, that army should exist somewhere in death, and it looks like SBGL is the place it will be for the foreseeable. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

1 hour ago, Leshoyadut said:

It's once per turn, not once per round. It's every movement phase.

Personally, yeah. I'm hyped about these things. I also love how the new Hunger gives our big heroes a ton more staying power in a combat. Even helps Vargheists (who now get it) and Blood Knights. More reliable regen through Deathly Invocation is great, too.

Thanks for correcting me.

I’m glad you are happy with the new book. I genuinely hope most people feel the same way you do.

I don’t want to spread negativity, I think I’m just coming to the realisation that despite loving vampires and dead stuff thematically and aesthetics, mechanically SBGL might not be the right faction for me. 

I think the new book will probably do better competitively. The summoning is much more consistent and if you love hordes of dead stuff coming back this is a great book. If you’re like me and you are more drawn to offensive play, and buffing the vampire side of things, then I think things are a little more tricky. It feels like the primary role of vampires in this book is as necromancer/ support characters and not fighters. 

Blood knights/ Varghiests/ Trueblades are a thing, but I’m not sure kastelai has much of a place in the book, as the more you lean into the sub faction allegiance ability’s the more you ignore the overall faction abilities which feels dissonant. 

Aigain, I don’t want to diminish anyone else’s hype for the new book at all. I’m just trying to figure out if/ how I can still enjoy it. It’s still early days and I may well just be overly disappointed initially and need time to figure it out a bit. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

When considering the SBGL allegiance ability’s it becomes quite obvious that this is an army purely based on slowly bringing back summonable models and grinding down the opponent:

bring back one summonable (chaff) unit that’s been destroyed at half strength once per battle round on a 4+ or a 3+.  

Bring summonable units out the grave instead of starting on the board. 

Return 3 or 4 models to a summonable unit up to 3 times per turn. 

Army wide 6+ ward.

are these interesting or exciting?

 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

3 hours ago, FeralMulan said:

 - Lack of Identity. Using either the Hedonites, the Gitz or the Slaves books, every subfaction feels like it has a clear purpose. Relics/Trait support a specific playstyle that players can gravitate to. We... don't really have that outside of Avengorii. LoB feels like the herohammer faction but lacks proper buffs for the Vampires. Vyrkos is perhaps the horde faction? But buffing the horde's damage outside of Graveguard is still clunky and lacklustre.

 - Lack of Combos. Nothing stands out as "ohh, I can' wait to use this artefact/trait". I don't want broken combos, but most of it does very much feel like baseline stats and good luck with the rest.

3 hours ago, FeralMulan said:

Change is cool, but this amount of change for what is a technical horde army is going to frustrate many players and hobbiests alike. 

These are my biggest complaints. I’m trying to find the positives and aspects of the book that excite me, but a lot of it feels like change for the sake of change, without much focus, or unique identity in the same way that other new books have. 

I’m not interested in overall power level, I just want to get excited about certain pairings, builds and combos, using rules that embody the themes of the army, but initially the options feel somewhat restricted. 

I have a a bit of niche perspective however, because I’m not interested in playing with hordes of chaff, preferring hard hitting, alpha style lists. I’m aware there’s probably a lot of stuff going on in the book that will come to light with play and through community discovery, but very little is wowing or overly exciting me initially. 

new hunger is good and I like -2 rend on blood knights. 

… maybe I’m just playing the wrong faction. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

Would 2” reach allow blood knights to attack in 2 ranks? 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

12 minutes ago, Gery81 said:

Yeah, while that is great, one of them is most likely the extra move. I think that is kind of a miss, it should have been an extra rend, or +1 to wound or something. That would make those Blood Knights real scary. 

And yes, the Shifting keep should have been a Battle trait, replacing one of the "actions", and the WT should have been the once/game power up...

That’s true. The +1 movement is a token gesture that will rarely impact games. Something combat orientated would have been much more valuable, and even the old +2 to run and charge was significantly better.

they’ve given and taken away, but GW seems to now be averse to allowing SBGL units to hit hard. 

I missed what you meant by “WT”?

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

9 minutes ago, Gery81 said:

Probably the sins of the previous edition. That said, I don't mind that LoB focuses more on the Vampire heroes, while Kastelai focuses more on Blood Knights, and other non-hero vampires. It feels like the trick will be to use Vhrodrai's ability to spread the love, and power up more than one unit at once. Also, I didn't realize that you only have to kill one model with the appropriate wound characteristic to get the buff, not the whole unit (according to goonhammer review), which makes very easy to get those buffs.

Ok yeah, the model thing completely went over my head, as I was just going off the old rules. That’s a subtle but significant improvement to the ability. Thanks for pointing that out. It’s cheered me up a bit 🤓

it also means you could charge into two separate units and if you kill just one model from each, you will gain multiple buffs in one round of combat. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

59 minutes ago, Gery81 said:

VLOZD in LoB looks scary enough for me. Take 2 and Neferata with them, take the cloak and doomed minions on the general, and take Vile transference on one of them. They will have 8 rend 3 damage 3 attacks, and another 8 rend 1 damage 2 attacks, that will hit on 2s against your opponent big scary (as long as it is not a monster), Vile transference and Neferata is there to give those monsters a pause, and they are not that trivial to remove from the field either. If you really want to, you can take Purple sun too. Oh, and their no inspiring presence rule do extra damage too. Gives roughly 700 points to fill with whatever else you think you need, probably chaff to clog up the board, and stuff that do battletactics. 

It confuses me that they built this tech into legion of blood as opposed to Kastelai, when Kastelai is supposed to be the faction of martial excellence and the VLOZD is the epitome of the sub-faction. The Kastelai command traits and artefacts are underwhelming. The best command traits are one that gives you the previous allegiance ability allowing you to deep strike, or a copy of the old one giving re-roll charges. The best artefact (fragment of the keep) is a nerfed version of the previous one. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

I really wish they’d decided to allow the Kastelia buffs to apply to mounts, allowing the dragons to become scary hammer units, but taking some degree of effort. It would have really appealed to people like me who love the death lore and aesthetic, but want to play a hard hitting army as opposed to grinding down your opponent with endless hordes. 
 

… although I suppose if I’m being objective blood knights hit harder now and dragons survive longer, allowing them to deal more damage over the course of the game, so effectively that is a damage improvement.

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

3 minutes ago, Tizianolol said:

Ye on kastelai. Thx a lot , basically if I got 3 unit of bk i can have on each of them +1 attacks and +1 damage . So the only restriction is i cant get same ability more then once in the same unit right?:) thx a lot

That’s right yeah, and if you use Vhordrai he can duplicate them once per turn to another unit in 24” so you should be able to build them up quickly. 

[AoS3 - Soulblight Gravelord Discussion]

58 minutes ago, Tizianolol said:

Wait can I give +1 attacks and +1 damage on a unit of BK ? Or I have to chose only 1 buff now?

Yeah you can, the +1 attacks replaced the +1 wounds buff. You can get all the buffs once each, so you can give blood knights +1 attack and +1 damage if you get both.