# Vampire Counts in 8th



## Warlock in Training

Looking to start WFB, I like Vampire Counts all the way. I been doing a little study of the game, but with 8th Im sure that all change. So to the experts, what works now and what doesnt anymore?


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## Shadowfire

Okay, I hate it when people come on forums and whinge on saying 'my army got nerfed' but wellllll....

-bites tongue-

The way to play this army has changed drastically...

Previous strengths of magic dominance, psychological warfare [fear/terror], lack of concern about the worst troop stats around, op wraith units, immensely tooled up characters, these things are all of the past.

Magic dominance from single die spell casts is out, but in a 1000pt army you'll get roughly double the dice to do the same thing, but your opponent with even just one L2 mage can hold you at bay. Now we need to look at the rest of the spell list and make more use of it, there's serious potential in going for uber casts of Summon Undead Horde, Curse of years and Wind of Undeath if the opponent has plenty of units. These were never really used before as the single die Invocation was so much more effective. But the ease of casting them now is quite something, though you really need to look at specialising your vampires for optimum effectiveness. All magic or all combat as a little bit of each gets you nowhere.

Psychological warfare doesn't really exist anymore. Instead in combat, your opponent may once in a while fight with WS1, not something to rely on as you can bet on a Lord (high Ld) and BSB being nearby. Though combat Vamps should really take Aura of Dark Majesty as it'll have effects of increasing the likeliness of this, favouring successful break tests and also interfering with any troops wanting to march nearby. 
Also on this vein of thought, outnumbering/outranking is gonna become a hefty issue for Vamp players, if we don't we have a stubborn enemy, not needed.

The bad troop stats is gonna be a real bugbear on all Undead players. Now that the emphasis of the game is coming back to troops making attacks, [Am actually Really glad to see this but every silver lining has it's cloud,] Skellies and Zombies are gonna shine at just how bad they are....
Ways round this.... Horde em up, even crap stats get better when you up the amount of attacks. Helm of Commandment is gonna become your favourite item, normally worn buy a magicky Vamp Lord behind your battle line. Danse Macabre gets you Always Strike First and reroll misses, a huge boost, and ofc the movement thingy but thats by the by. Other ways to get this are through Corpse Carts and Staff of damnation, though both are bound spells, you need to read how they work and see if you like.

Wraith units, though still a nifty bunch for being Ethereal and dishing out some sexy damage are no longer immensely manouvreable as Skirmish units are confined with similar LoS and movement to normal units 

The days of most of your army being in points heavy characters with token minimal size Core Units and the rest in Special/Rare are also gone.
Real attention needs to be paid to what role you want your characters to take, and how to efficiently kit them up. The 25% Lord and 25% Hero means more Lords in smaller games!! though at 205 starter you're not going to get much kit on him in a 1000pt scrap. But to not take him means only 2 characters in your army, it'll be an uphill struggle going that way.
I still see the Wight King as the best statline BSB pts can buy though. For cheap points Necromancers fill a gap and are always handy.

Let's have a look at some positive things now....:scratchhead:

Admittedly I am still finding my feet with this new Edition, the changes as a whole, I love, more emphasis on troops, armies being more manouvreable, the game has def evolved, how can we take advantage of this....

First up, there's guaranteed to be a lot more dice in the magic phase so let's get the old favorite 'Black coach' back out again. Each magic phase will see average 7 power dice, before any additionals. That pretty much guarantees an upgrade to it Every Magic phase, so by end of Turn 3 you get the all singing, Scythed, Hatred, Magic Res, Killing Blow, Ethereal, flyer, you Always wanted, maybe even earlier =)
And unless I'm very much mistaken, there's no more cannonball chariot popping!

Black Knights might also be worth another perusal, now that the 2nd rank get to attack, the charge can become a Lot more effective. Tweaking with Banner of +1 to hit, some Always hit first with re-roll magic and a character or 2, there's some serious damage potential, though have yet to put this one into effect.

Personally am taken with a new look a Grave Guard. Before I always used as an anvil with hand weapon shield, serious lastability, which they maintain. But with 2nd rank attacks, single attack great weapon units have some serious potential. Multi attack units will only get +1 from the 2nd rank which wont greatly enhance their effectiveness, but this gives chance to double the amount of S6 being dished out. Even on hand weapon/shield, that's still a heck of a lot more killing blow potential. Not many heroes will be volunteering to face that, just on the off chance...
As always with magic enhancement for Always strike 1st, re-roll misses, even +1 to hit banner, these guys will scare opponents.

Corpse Carts around the front line will always have their place.

Dire Wolves are no longer Fast Cav, relegated to 'War Beasts', meh. A sad loss. Though Fell Bats are now much better at War Machine hunting, take a unit of 6 and see them dish out 12 attacks as they dont have to be in base contact any more.

To summise,
Army Selection needs more care with job-specific roles for Vampires needing to be optimised to fit point allowance.
The more manouvreable units in our army are now a lot less so, whilst the majority of our opponents have become more so with a better chance of marching in proximity to enemy units.
Our heavier units now look to be a little stronger and might be something we come to rely on.
Horde units look to be a must for cheaper units, eg. Zombies, though this is a double edged sword with giving opportunity for more enemy to engage.
The Magic Phase has changed severely, and though can still be a strength is not as reliable as was, and that miscast table still makes me wince. Plenty of dice and repeat casting Invocation on 2 dice with a L4 Vamp is open for wearing down dispel pools, but the option of an uber cast of Summon Horde with your last power dice is also definitely viable. I say with your last dice so you dont lose any when you miscast. And the fact you can heal up any Magic users is still a strength of the army.

These thoughts are just my initial responses to 8th Ed. I haven't gone far in my play-testing, though am relishing the challenge of looking again at the elements of the army that had gotten sidelined previously. I look forward to hearing others thoughts on the Good, the Bad, and the Dead.


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## LukeValantine

You forgot one of the best parts about the new edition for VC. Access to all the new uber powerful lores of magic (with the exception of life), and the ability to double up on the same lore. Lol imagine as you get up to a additional +5 to cast fire magics. Also we now have bare none the cheapest caster who is guaranteed to get the transformation of kadon. (I know its not a practical spell, but damn turning a 135pt vamp into a 500pt dragon even for one turn is fun). 

Also building on the idea of grave guard a 6X3 unit with the banner of the borrows (sp?), and a helm of command behind them will on average cause around 8 wounds to even T4 models. Oh also taking the ability to get +2 magic dice a turn on a suicide vamp =150pts is still a sensible investment, since it will guarantee that you will never have less then 4-5 dice at the least, and will on average still have 2 more P-dice then your opponent. Also at 1500pts we can have a caster lord with a constant +5 to cast. 

One more thing casters can now hide in the back ranks, and cast as long as they don't require LoS for their spells. (The rule is found on the border of the page in the relevant rule book entry)


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## Wolf_Lord_Skoll

LukeValantine said:


> Also we now have bare none the cheapest caster who is guaranteed to get the transformation of kadon. (I know its not a practical spell, but damn turning a 135pt vamp into a 500pt dragon even for one turn is fun).


Wrong 

I know High Elves can beat that, at 130points. Mage w/ Seerstaff of Saphery. I'd have to check the other books because I'm not sure if they can go cheaper again.

Oh, and HE Dragon gets ASF as far as I'm aware


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## Shadowfire

LukeValantine said:


> You forgot one of the best parts about the new edition for VC. Access to all the new uber powerful lores of magic (with the exception of life), and the ability to double up on the same lore. Lol imagine as you get up to a additional +5 to cast fire magics.)


True but I've experimented with other Lores in the past, particularly the old Lore of Death, for Ld mods, and found it just not as effective in the VC army I play.



LukeValantine said:


> Also we now have bare none the cheapest caster who is guaranteed to get the transformation of kadon. (I know its not a practical spell, but damn turning a 135pt vamp into a 500pt dragon even for one turn is fun). )


Does sound like fun :victory:



LukeValantine said:


> Oh also taking the ability to get +2 magic dice a turn on a suicide vamp =150pts is still a sensible investment, since it will guarantee that you will never have less then 4-5 dice at the least, and will on average still have 2 more P-dice then your opponent. )


Hmm, not just me that's looking aat suicide mages then =)

Been musing over a Hero Vamp with Forbidden Lore to access the new uber Magicks, particularly Lore of Metal's signature spell, Searing Doom, max power it and you can cut deep into most tooled up units, nuking a full unit of Chaos Knights in one spell, tastes good. Halve the size of a Dwarf Lord's retinue too. that'd taste Real good. 




LukeValantine said:


> One more thing casters can now hide in the back ranks, and cast as long as they don't require LoS for their spells. (The rule is found on the border of the page in the relevant rule book entry)


See I wasn't sure on this. I thought it looked viable again from my first read through, but wasn't sure. I've revisited the book since and can't see anything stating that we can't put casters in the middle of units again, but if you can actually see a rule stating we can, that'd put my mind at ease, a page number if you please. Thanks in advance


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## unixknight

I thought you'd only have LOS if you were in the first or second rank? I'm pretty sure there's no LOS if you're any farther back than that.

(Although I could be wrong, and would be quite overjoyed, actually, if I am.)


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## Cheese meister

i llike the idea of s5 ghouls dishing out a world of pain and reducing opponents s/t by d3


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## Shadowfire

As an add to previous post, a unit that I had long since discarded, due to unreliability of Frenzy has become now quite tasty.

Blood Knights

Drop a Lord in to boost Ld, and the Frenzy becomes controllable, also these guys will have extra manouvreability around the enemy, more chance of being able to march with higher Ld. All of a sudden the killing power of these gorgeous models is harnessable.

*kudos to Sethis for this one btw*:thank_you:


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## LukeValantine

To bad the corpse cart is kind unplayable these days.... Still in huge points games I would take 3 with bale fire if your facing a real magic heavy army, since you can get a 8+ to dispel if you take a maxed out caster lord.


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## LukeValantine

Sorry to double post, but I really wanted to show the unique opportunity for unique paint/modeling for VC presented by dedicated caster vamps. Here is my lore of beasts caster vamp (The paint scheme, and animal accompanying her get across the feel of her specialty). Actually I plan on doing 3-4 dedicated vamp caster representing my favorite borrowed lores(All female). Also all the necros, in my army are getting faced out for the mantic female necromancers.


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## NagashKhemmler

Wolf_Lord_Skoll said:


> Wrong
> 
> I know High Elves can beat that, at 130points. Mage w/ Seerstaff of Saphery. I'd have to check the other books because I'm not sure if they can go cheaper again.
> 
> Oh, and HE Dragon gets ASF as far as I'm aware


Nope, it doesn't. Neither do their steeds, griffons etc.


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## Sethis

He does get ASF. It specifically says that the character remains a character, and maintains all of his special rules that are not granted by equipment (he also cannot cast spells). A Vampire Lord who turns into one, for example, is still Undead, a Slann that does it is still Cold Blooded, and a Dark Elf Sorceress would still have Hatred.


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## LukeValantine

Heal-able dragons you say hmmm.


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## Wolf_Lord_Skoll

Sethis said:


> He does get ASF. It specifically says that the character remains a character, and maintains all of his special rules that are not granted by equipment (he also cannot cast spells). A Vampire Lord who turns into one, for example, is still Undead, a Slann that does it is still Cold Blooded, and a Dark Elf Sorceress would still have Hatred.


Except no Dragon for the Slann  

Immune to Non-Magic Attack Dragons may have been considered a little too over the top


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## Sethis

Speaking hypothetically


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## Shadowfire

For those still experimenting around magick heavy Undead, a few thoughts...

The souped up Vamp Lord is a must pretty much as he will be doing most casting, get him to L3 at least pref L4 for the + mods on each cast.
Have seen some more usage of Necro coming in, both a little experimental.

1st type is for single die casts on Invocation.

If you want to hang on to the old style of casting, you'll prob never single die cast with your Lord as the possibility of failure just empties out your magick phase from other spell usage. With a single spell Necro however, there is nothing to lose. Kept at basic cost with one spell, you can repeat roll 3+ to get Invocation off, if you fail you switch to another Necro and do again, or switch to Vamp Lord with 2 dice. Necro's are dirt cheap, but can hammer out repeat casts to suck dispel dice out. Bare in mind though if facing Dwarves or any army with a L2 wizard, they will have +2 dispel, so this is only a tactic to suck dispel dice rather than to rely on to rebuild an army. The odd spell will get cast, but effects are negligible.

2nd type is suicide mages

If you want to make sure of getting a Danse cast at a crucial point, take a Necro with the spell, add a power scroll, (new common magic item,) and dump in a unit of skellies, not near anything valuable.
The idea runs that at that crucial point you use 6 power dice and the scroll, and go for the irresistible/miscast.
Result: Necro and a few skellies get slapped, you get the crucial ASF + Hatred at crucial point in game with minimal risk to anything of worth. Just try it out
:wink:


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## Fades

Trickster's Shard and spam IoN. Every spell from that character dispelled cause a wound on the wizard used to dispell. (Means he would probably use a minor wizard for dispelling that round for 25 points).

Might work? Think i'll give it a try one day.

The only problem is that you need to use Trickster's Shard before you roll for dices. So, pretty random, but we get the most use of it since we can roll a spell more than once.


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## rodmillard

What are people looking at for character builds? I'm torn between running multiple "battlemage" vamps (Avatar of Death & Dark Acolyte) or specialising individual vamps for specific tasks.

One trick I'm considering is to give my general forbidden lore (shadow) and make use of the school ability to swap places with a tooled combat vamp if he gets into trouble. Might keep him (and therefore the army) alive a little longer, as well as being a nasty surprise for enemy mage hunters...

EDIT: I would prefer to run vamps only, rather than using necros or wight kings. More aesthetics than anything else, but I am going for a blood dragon theme using a mix of mantic/LOTR models.


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## Shadowfire

'Battlemage' sounds intersting, how do you find they work?

Personally I'm a lot more for speciallising for specific roles.

Reason for this being, characters in combat are now a lot more vulnerable, (extra rank of attackers able to target even after you've dished out your kills, to combat this corner placement can limit the incoming but that's still a minimum of 4 able to target) so if they aren't kitted out with good defence, they die too easy.

Also, Lore of Death can be renamed Lore of Assassination, it is a true vampire killer. Most spells can pick out a character and nuke him. Though this is also a viable tactic in our arsenal with 'Forbidden Lore'.
On that note, a little word on suicide mages, a Vampire L1, + Forbidden Lore, +Power Scroll adds up to a good few points but can auto use Signature spell in Lore of Metal. This one spell has awesome potential when used on max power. First turn usage I find has the best impact.

Put the vamp in a unit of expendable/massive skellies.

Have him opposite a nasty enemy unit, ie. Hydra, Heavy Cav etc

1st magic turn, you need at least six dice from winds of magic, once you've used whatever other power dice you can but are down to your last 6, you use all 6 on him to cast the spell, max power with the power scroll.
Any roll of a double = irresistible force (+miscast, which is why it's your last spell in a unit of cheap skellies)
Effect = 2d6 hevy Cav kills on 2+ or Hydra gets 2d6 wounds on 4+ (note no armour save and counts as flaming)

Admittedly this is a bigger points cost than Empire equiv, and MathHammer may say well, points used vs points killed isn't that efficient.
But the heavy nuking of a prominent enemy unit on the 1st turn really puts your opponent in a spin.
Admittedly, was you use this more than once you'll find counters coming into play, but whilst it's new and lasts it's bloody good fun =)

Also, 2k + check out Count Mannfred for uber spell casting, Isabella is a nice little healer for novelty value, and the uber mounted combat Lord with dreadlance (auto hit) red fury (extra attack for each initial wound) and Nightshroud (enemy lose all charging bonus, lose ASF and have I1) is a fairly sic combo

Play them, experiment with them, let me know what you think [make them better]

Enjoy


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## Fades

Shadowfire said:


> On that note, a little word on suicide mages, a Vampire L1, + Forbidden Lore, +Power Scroll adds up to a good few points but can auto use Signature spell in Lore of Metal. This one spell has awesome potential when used on max power. First turn usage I find has the best impact.
> 
> Put the vamp in a unit of expendable/massive skellies.
> 
> Have him opposite a nasty enemy unit, ie. Hydra, Heavy Cav etc
> 
> 1st magic turn, you need at least six dice from winds of magic, once you've used whatever other power dice you can but are down to your last 6, you use all 6 on him to cast the spell, max power with the power scroll.
> Any roll of a double = irresistible force (+miscast, which is why it's your last spell in a unit of cheap skellies)
> Effect = 2d6 hevy Cav kills on 2+ or Hydra gets 2d6 wounds on 4+ (note no armour save and counts as flaming)


I like your idea. Will play this out in my army and see how it goes.


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## Vaz

Wolf_Lord_Skoll said:


> Except no Dragon for the Slann
> 
> Immune to Non-Magic Attack Dragons may have been considered a little too over the top


Bit late, but why not, exactly?

Nothing in the July FAQ.


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## Tim/Steve

The FAQ says that the Slaan cant cast transformation of Kadon at all... so no dragon slaan. I guess the reasoning behind the ruling is that its on a 'mount' of sorts so isnt really infantry... but the reasoning behind the reasoning (if you follow) is likely to be that immune to non-magical weapon greater dragons would just be stupidly powerful (so the game revolves solely around the winds of magic roll and if you can dispel the dragon).

I would copy and paste the relevant section, but I've only just reformatted and I havent yet got adobe back on my computer... and after midnight isnt the time to start looking for it


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## Vaz

What about Red Fury Ethereal Vampire Dragons then?

Herald of Tzeentch with Master of Sorcery?
5+ Ward Dragon?

ASF Archmage Dragon?

mat Ward needs a rocket up his arse. What knob in his right mind thought that making a particular spell completely unusable BEFORE any other factors were thrown in which made it unusable through choice?


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## Sethis

Vaz said:


> What about Red Fury Ethereal Vampire Dragons then?


Oh, shit. :shok:

Can a mod delete this thread please, so that people never find out about the sickening overpoweredness of the above combo? Please?


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## Putch.

that cant be legal..good lord. Well I'm suddenly much more afraid of VC. Anyone else care to hazard a guess as to the next build taking over your local metagame?


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## Tim/Steve

Not really- it means that the vampire has to have taken beasts... which isnt the scariest lore out there, has to roll a lot of dice at the spell so might get a miscast or you can just scroll it so itsnt too reliable and unless you are a lv4 6 dice should average a fail to cast the higher level spell (lower is just too easy to dispel).

It would be funny to see, but if someone did it to me then howver many power dice I get in my next turn would probably all go into dispelling it (dispel with 10 dice... should get rid of it)... and then you can do it again in the VC magic phase. SO to get into combat the vamp either has to charge then try to get the spell off or cast the spell and survive through 2 magic phases, when the opponent can dispel in both of them.


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## Sethis

Tim/Steve said:


> Not really- it means that the vampire has to have taken beasts... which isnt the scariest lore out there


Beasts is fine for VCs... Vampires with +3 Attacks and +3 S are almost as scary as the dragon! Access to a Bolt Thrower, T5 Ghouls or -1 to hit in combat doesn't hurt either! It's a solid Lore for them. Not as tailored as it could be, but given that you have to write it in your army list before knowing who you're fighting, I would consider taking it.



Tim/Steve said:


> has to roll a lot of dice at the spell so might get a miscast


The only real nasty result is reducing the caster level by D3. They ignore the S10 hit on them because they're Ethereal and Miscasts do not count as Magic attacks or spells (See the Rulebook FAQ). Even if they get the template, they're not going to be upset over losing some skeletons or whatever.



Tim/Steve said:


> or you can just scroll it


If you take a scroll, and haven't used it previously in the game. And even then you only stop it for one turn.



Tim/Steve said:


> so itsnt too reliable and unless you are a lv4 6 dice should average a fail to cast the higher level spell (lower is just too easy to dispel).


In VC armies, you'd better have an _extremely_ good reason for your general to not be a Level 4... probably with bonuses to cast.



Tim/Steve said:


> It would be funny to see, but if someone did it to me then however many power dice I get in my next turn would probably all go into dispelling it (dispel with 10 dice... should get rid of it)


It's an Augment... not Remains in Play. Afaik you can't dispel those using power dice in your turn. Even if you can, he just shut down your offensive magic entirely by forcing you to use 6 dice (the maximum, and even then you might easily fail) to react to him.

Yes it's not insta-win, but provided he doesn't charge ranked units by himself or anyone with Magical Attacks, he's not going to die. Even if he's not a Dragon he's good enough in combat to kill 1-2 Knights or other elite choices and take no damage back - winning the combat until he can get the spell off again.

Feedback scroll doesn't even help because the wounds caused by that aren't magical either. Hmm.


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## Vaz

ToK is RiP, though. It's still an augment spell though - much like Cascading fire Cloak and Flesh to Stone.

Incidentally - the dragon gets a Breath Weapon doesn't he? Does that mean that if you continually end the spell before your magic phase, recast it, you can then use the Breath Weapon again?

If the reason Slann can't take it is because they'd become too powerful (Funnily enough, can only be harmed by magical attacks, 4+ Ranged Ward Save, MR3 (2+ Ward versus Magic), and Regeneration 4+ means that your opponent basically has to hit you with S5+ Melee Magical Flaming attacks, giving you a 4+ Armour Save).

Empire have the best defence against that. A Wizard Lord of Life with VHS, Gold Sigil Sword, and Arabyan Carpet. Throne of Vines, Flesh to Stone. Characters are still characters when transformed - challenge worthy. And due to their size, they cannot exactly be easily be moved back, and tbh you're sorted.

8 WS8 S8 I10 Attacks? Hell to yes, goodbye dragon. If the Dragon doesn't accept, you've secured your victory. If not, you've wasted one of the Dragons turns by putting it in the back of a unit - which I think is more than worthy of countering an Ethereal Red Fury Great Fire Dragon.

As to other potentially damaging attacks - Red Fury Mountain Chimera? 48 Potential Attacks, here I come =).


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## Sethis

Ah, I thought all Augments only lasted til your next turn.

Yes, you can use the breath weapon, drop out of being a dragon, then recast and use it again.

Not every race has the Speculum, and not every empire army will have it either. Anyone without it is going to have serious trouble dealing with it. Challenging it with unit champions buys you a turn, but it'll still eat everything else once he goes down. Like I said before, not auto-win, but extremely good.


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## space cowboy

I know I am a little lat eto the thread, but after having played some games with the Vampire Counts, I have to say that I see no reason to not take Count Mannfred. He is by far the most points efficient caster with MotBA and 2 full lores. Just those would make him worth the points, but then he can take 2 Arcane Items as well as being a Lord of the Dead and the thing that does the same but to beasts.

Also the Black Coach is a bad-ass now. I know it can sap your own power dice, but it gets big fast and can really mess up your opponent.


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## Orochi

Vaz said:


> What about Red Fury Ethereal Vampire Dragons then?


Stick Immortal hunger (or is it internal hatred) ontop of that and you'll have more attacks coming from that dragon than reality can cope with.


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## Vaz

Don't have the book on me, but is Ethereal not 50pts?


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## Orochi

Yup yu're right, I thought it was 25 aswell. But it's 50. I withdraw my comment :/


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## clever handle

To be fair, Ethereal is 50, Forbidden lore is 35 and Infinite hatred is 25. You can't put all three on a single vampire lord.

The best way I've seen to run a suicide casting vampire is to give another vampire ghoulkin, take the forbidden lore with the uber-death spell of your choice (purple sun is really the best choice against all but elves / WOC) and throw the talisman of lycani on your vampire with a power scroll (post irony alert: I don't know how much the power scroll is... less than 40?)

This way you can take your 8" march move before the game, then the vampire can leap 18" out of the unit for a total of 26" of movement turn one. This should put you amongst or behind the enemy lines (hopefully between to get some protection from war machines...) & you can then send the turbo-charged purple sun down the line. Of course, you can place the purple sun template anywhere in LOS, so you don't really need the talisman / ghoulkin combo - but this allows you to stand right next to as many enemy models as you can while you roll on that miscast table...

I just noticed that since the miscast damage is not classified as "magical" the ethereal vampire lord becomes a stupendous caster! That S10 (or whatever) hit is completely ignored - unless you roll 2-4 & then get sucked into the warp...


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## Shadowfire

Oooh, really liking the look of this suicide vamp, Purple Sun 1st turn with follow up Black Knight/Blood Knight/Black Coach charges, Wraiths too even on turn 2 should wreak absolute havoc on most battle lines. :grin:

And I think I have just the tournie coming up to try it out on...


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## Durzod

Another thing about this tactic: on the off chance you roll a misfire on the Purple Sun, you're still going to affect the enemy. Talk about your win/win!


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## clever handle

So my question regarding vampires in 8th is how do we beat down those hard blocks other armies are able to field?


I've had a 2250pt game where a turn one purple sun was able to demolish fully 1/3 of my opponents ogre army before he had a chance to move. The remaining ironguts (three of them. and his tyrant) were MORE than a match for my hammer of 24 graveguard w/ greatweapons & barrows AND my fighty vampire lord with the sword of strife (+2 attacks), infinite hatred, beguile & walking death (+1 combat res). 

That's right - 4 ogres held off my brick of GG. 4 wide ogres allows (in theory) 12 20mm bases to line up to fight, I had 6 wide, giving me 12 s6 attacks hitting on 3's AND the vampire with 6 s5 attacks hitting on 3's rerollable, including static combat res (ranks, sticks, walking death, charge) and I was still unable to break them - several sub-par magic phases later actually saw my brick crumble until my lord died (incidentaly, no ward / regen saves vs crumble sucks ass)


I've had a similar situation occur fighting halberd using warriors. a 12 brick (was a 24, curse of years is my best friend...) of frenzied, slaaeneshi chaos warriors c/w halberds managed to make an astounding overrun charge & hit my general's bunker taking me completely by surprise... well, on my next turn I magiced in every single unit I could to help my poor boneboys out.

Now, with his 6-wide front he was able to pull 25 (3x6+1 + 1x6)attacks hitting on 3's and wounding on 2's into my skeletal block - scary... so I thought I'd put a couple of flank charges in (ended up with 1 skelly block in one flank) and tried for the rear - the aformentioned graveguard unit hit his block in the rear. I thought that in theory this was tactically sound but in practice, it only increased his volume of attacks!

the player completely ignored the unit to the flank and istead threw his full allowance of attacks forwards from the front rank (3x6+1 for 19) AND THEN threw a further 18 attacks into my graveguard - hitting AND KILLING on 3's there...

so, I hope my two examples serve to illustrate my point - with no shooting to rely on, and a fickle magic phase, how can a VC player reasonably hope to stop these fighty units? Simply using the good ol' zombie tarpit doesn't work as there's no WAY you'll be able to summon enough to keep a hard unit locked in combat (without completely neglecting the rest of your army) and well, those zombies aren't actually going to kill anything are they?


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## Orochi

Your best bet is still to Deathstar with Bloodknights and a vampire lord.

Vampire lord w/Red fury, Immortal hunger (the re-roll to hit one), the power that casues terror, Blooddrinker, Helmet that gives you a 4+ ward and the Bloody hauberk riding a barded nightmare.
(or the dreadlance lord build)
5 Bloodknights, FC, standard of blood keep and sword of might.

That unit wont be dying anytime soon. Just make sure you keep them safe from spells.


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## Aramoro

The problem I have with that Lord, other than the fact you have 120pts on items on him, is that he costs 445 points. Then you have the 415pts on Blood Knights after that. That's 860 pts for 6 Models. It's just too big a points sink to be gambled away on a bad magic phase. 

Aramoro


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## clever handle

Aramoro, VC Lords basically HAVE to cost that much. If you build him as a dedicated caster you NEED to give him the full acoutriment of powers and equipment to guarantee he's a casting beast, this means adding the full 200points of upgrades + the 50 point casty bit. And if you build him as a fighty lord you NEED to ensure he's killy enough to accomplish his task while at the same time being protected. This hasn't changed since last edition. At 2250 you _COULD_ run two vampire lords with 75points of upgrades each but the two together wont be as effective as that single 450point lord

Orochi, the problems with that build are:

1) WOC are I5 meaning they'll slaughter your blood knights before they get the chance to use their lances, many of the heavy hitters are in the same boat (sword masters / black guard etc)
2) As Aramoro said, that is one expensive (and small) deathstar that could easily be destroyed by a single spell that gets through

3) As you're only 6-models strong you will almost always be charging a unit that is steadfast - I don't care how many wounds you are able to put on a unit, but when they're steadfast & have a characters leadership with a banner they're not going anywhere.

4) the dreadlance is a huge POS now. 60 points for an autohit lance you ONLY use on the turn you charge? no thank you.

My gaming group has recommended using wraiths as a solid hammer and from what I've seen I'm inclined to agree. If I throw that 25pt character upgrade in I know have access to shooting AND have a model to take the challenge in case I'm up against a unit with magical weapons. I think that a 525 point deathstar of (9) Cairn Wraiths & a Banshee would be more effective than the 800 point knights. I used to refuse to field wraiths because they were so powerful but now they seem to be almost necessary to ensure I'm able to get a decent amount of attacks...

It has also been suggested that Shadow would be a better lore than Death for vampires, but I haven't had much luck... Death seems to work well since I can have one vampire attempt to overload and get a big spell of irresistably throwing up to 6 dice at it, THEN using the dice generated by the wounds inflicted I am able to cast my necromacy spells until I'm running low on dice again, only to cast another Death spell, rinse repeat until I fail to cast....

The benefits of shadow I guess are that I should be able to cause my opponents to be worse fighters than I am - reducing the S of those warriors or ironguts would go a long way to keeping my skeletons alive but the synergy with the rest of my casting isn't there. Of course it would be neat to have a casty vampire who finds herself in trouble automatically switch places with my Wight BSB... (note: if a character is in a challenge when using the teleport granted due to shadow, does the model who replaces them enter the challenge in their stead or is the challenge ended?)

Incedentally, another powerful unit I've struggled to topple in combat is the temple guard... with the slaan in there they become almost immune to magical attacks as well further straining a VC players already weak combat prowess.


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