Lion Chariot Smash army 2500 (Updated with new book)

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Ghogra
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Lion Chariot Smash army 2500 (Updated with new book)

#1 Post by Ghogra »

So I have been spending a lot of time reading up on Seredain's success and strategies. I love the combined arms tactics he has been putting to task and all that reading has made me want to try something similar yet unique. My question is, can lion chariots (with one ridden by Korhil) serve the same function as the Silver helm, BSB and Prince bus. The chariots suffer from some disadvantages compared to the bus. They are slower because they lack the ability to march, cannot break steadfast because they have no ranks, and they lack the resilience that the mounted knights have. In their favor, they have impact hits, cause fear and have the easy pivot movement. I have had great luck with my lion chariots in the past but I really want to develop a solid stratagy to use them successfully. Here is the list I am looking at.

300 - Archmage with Annulian Crystal Level 4 Heavens

168 - Noble BSB, AoC, GP, GW
270 - Korhil on Lion Chariot

340 - 35 Spearman FC
295 - 20 Seaguard FC Banner of eternal flame

180 - 10 Swordmasters FC
305 - 15 White Lions, FC Banner of Sorcery
280 - 2 Lion Chariots
112 - 5 Ellyrian Reavers w/bows and Musician

200 - 2 Repeater Bolt Throwers
50 - Great Eagle

I plan to drop the Archmage into the Seaguard. I like heavens partially because not many folks are using it and I like to be different, but mostly because it gives me some good straight up damage spells and the comet helps me put pressure on gunlines. I debated long and hard about which core to use and ended up with the seaguard and spears so I can advance the anvils and still get some shooting out there. Heavens range is much more limited than other damaging lores and the seaguards bow range matches up well with the lore. (I will also admit that the new models look great and I didn't want to leave em behind).

The BSB can back up the spears and provide some punch there with a reasonable shot a surviving. That also give my center line a better shot at holding when the pressure is on.

I'll use the reavers to help screen my chariots as they set up for the flanking blow.

The lions can hunt the big stuff and the swordmasters can target the light but numerous stuff. (Much the same use that Seredain's list goes for.)

I took the Banner of Sorcery to boost my magic phase and the crystal to dampen the opponents. I have found that my magic has either been completely bust, or game winning. I have suffered many mages explosions that managed to wipe out large chunks of whatever unit he holds out in. I had considered taking the staff of solidity to help protect against that, but I don't know.

So has anyone had success with the chariot heavy army? Any comment or suggestions that can boost my output?
Last edited by Ghogra on Tue Jul 02, 2013 2:32 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Curu Olannon
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#2 Post by Curu Olannon »

I think this will be a hit-or-miss approach.

You can definitely rely more on chariots than Seredain does, for example by having 2 Lion Chariots and 1 Tiranoc Chariot instead of Dragon Princes.

However, building your entire mobility around it is probably putting too much in one type of unit. A shower of crossbow bolts can easily down a chariot, with a little luck.

If you want to do this, I suggest you keep a fighty mounted character in a knight unit. This could be 5 DP's + a cheap noble for example, or you could do the real helmbus with a prince and all. This way, you have 2 major hammers - the tandem lion chariots and your knight unit. Around this, you have a block of spears, probably a unit of lions and some support such as archers and eagles.

Oh and please drop the Sea Guard for archers. If you take 2x10 archers and field them in a 2x5 formation you lose 0 attacks, gain range and points :) I would also shave the FC off the swordmasters. List would be something like this:

Archmage
Fighty mounted noble
Grounded bsb noble

30-something spears
2x10 archers

10 swordmasters
13 WL's, FC, BoS (bsb goes here)
2 Lion Chariots
1 Tiranoc Chariot
5 Dragon Princes

1 RBT
1 Eagle

I didn't run the points here but I'm sure you can make something like this work :) Maybe you could put the noble on a chariot but that would result in the knight unit not having enough punch... Yet another idea is to have a fighty noble in a chariot and the bsb mounted in a shelmbus ;)
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Meridian
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#3 Post by Meridian »

I love the idea of going heavy on Chariots also, I want to include at least one in my armies, but I also have a thing for dragons, I just love the models, although in an effort to not be one sided I may have to steer towards more balance.

I would love to see how your list works, I would be willing to try something similar although I would probably replace the sword masters with Dragon Princes to give it a bit more mobility, and the seaguard I would just make regular archers.

Korhil on a chariot is 5str6 and 4str5 attacks. Its very scary.
Ghogra
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#4 Post by Ghogra »

Thanks for the input. I have considered swapping the seaguard for archers and really the only thing keeping me with the seaguard is the models. Not a great reason, but I digress. I could drop my BSB for a clone of Seredain's and drop one chariot for 5 Dragon Princes. Dropping the command on the Swordmasters frees up the points and leaves me with 5 extra points for the gleaming pennant on the Spears. I do feel like I lose the Chariot smash feel with only two left though, but I could convert some Lion Princes to salve my desire for lions.

List would look like this:
300 - Archmage with Annulian Crystal Level 4 Heavens

190 - Noble, BsB, Barded Steed, GW, HA, Shield, Dragonhelm, Dawnstone, Amulet of Light
270 - Korhil on Lion Chariot

345 - 35 Spearman FC Gleaming Pennant
295 - 20 Seaguard FC Banner of eternal flame

150 - 10 Swordmasters
305 - 15 White Lions, FC Banner of Sorcery
140 - Lion Chariot
105 - 5 Ellyrian Reavers w/bows
150 - 5 Dragon Princes

200 - 2 Repeater Bolt Throwers
50 - Great Eagle

Total 2500
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Cerras
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#5 Post by Cerras »

Ghogra wrote:Thanks for the input. I have considered swapping the seaguard for archers and really the only thing keeping me with the seaguard is the models. Not a great reason, but I digress. I could drop my BSB for a clone of Seredain's and drop one chariot for 5 Dragon Princes. Dropping the command on the Swordmasters frees up the points and leaves me with 5 extra points for the gleaming pennant on the Spears. I do feel like I lose the Chariot smash feel with only two left though, but I could convert some Lion Princes to salve my desire for lions.

List would look like this:
300 - Archmage with Annulian Crystal Level 4 Heavens

190 - Noble, BsB, Barded Steed, GW, HA, Shield, Dragonhelm, Dawnstone, Amulet of Light
270 - Korhil on Lion Chariot

345 - 35 Spearman FC Gleaming Pennant
295 - 20 Seaguard FC Banner of eternal flame

150 - 10 Swordmasters
305 - 15 White Lions, FC Banner of Sorcery
140 - Lion Chariot
105 - 5 Ellyrian Reavers w/bows
150 - 5 Dragon Princes

200 - 2 Repeater Bolt Throwers
50 - Great Eagle

Total 2500
I think you second list is more solid, but I agree with you, it loses the Chariot Smash feeling.
Actually, if you really want the Chariot Smash effect, might I suggest something slightly contrary. Drop the elite infantry, and go full on mounted for your specials selections. Dropping the SM and WL, you get 455, that's enough for 2 more Lion Chariots AND a unit of 6 helms with enough for full command. If you're not particularly attached to the reavers, drop them to beef up your helms unit.

Then you have 3 Lion Chariots, a unit of DP, a unit of Helms. This also means your opponent won't always be trying to shoot Korhil and the lone chariot.

Drop the Spears, and add bows, the bows and seaguard serve to kill off any speed bumps your opponent will throw your way.
Or keep the spears if you want to break enemy's steadfast for your cav, but then your cav will have to wait for the spears to catch up once they've fought off the enemy's support units.

C
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Curu Olannon
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#6 Post by Curu Olannon »

You could actually drop the SM's to get a third lion chariot. Gives the army your proper feel and I don't think you'll find you're missing anything with regards to handling different threats.

I still don't like the reavers, bring another eagle and spend the rest of your points to beef <insert wanted unit> ;)
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Telepirno
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#7 Post by Telepirno »

They are slower because they lack the ability to march
Where in the rules book does it say that chariots can not march? The only movement related rule I see for chariots is that they have the swiftstride special rule for charges/fleeing/pursuit.
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#8 Post by dabber »

Page 86. Last words in the first paragraph under "split profile".
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#9 Post by Telepirno »

Thanks.
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#10 Post by cptcosmic »

my few cents:
-first post, yay!

-for me "combined arms" means being flexible. I would avoid expensive and squishy choices (yes korhil is awesome but has no ward save and the chariot he sits on is easily destroyed). more expensive units, mean less units which results in being less flexible.

-chariots are a good way to provide kills for less deadly troops like spearelves (also our cavarly after the charge or even eagles sometimes). you dont actually to have to flank with chariots. you can move your chariots along with your infantry (because they are not very fast anyway) and without any hesitation make a combined charge into the enemies face. if you move and place your units correctly during the charge the chariot will not get many return attacks, survive and maybe break the unit. the spearelves provide static combat resolution while the chariot does the kills. our deadly elite units like white lions or swordmasters usually do not need such a support and can handle stuff on their own. I would not take more then 1 lion chariot for each core unit. tiranoc chariots on the other hand are cheaper and can be used to defend your warmachines, threaten smaller soft units and the flanks thus your opponent might give them more attentation than needed (it also does not hurt that much if you loose one).

-you archmage does not have the talisam of preservation? why? [-X

-I would exchange the seaguard for archers with flaming banner. while the seaguard can do alot of different things, they cannot do everything at once, are expensive and only have 24 inch range. in my opinion archers with flaming banner are the most effective core unit that can perform alot of different tasks from "safe" distance: negate regeneration for your bolt thrower, shot stuff in buildings, get rid of annyoing small stuff and if large enough defend your archmage. my archers usually survive till the end because they get ignored and are large enough to atleast stand one round of combat till support arrives.

-I would atleast take 2 eagles because of obvious reasons.
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#11 Post by KJSparkz »

I use either Korhil on Lion chariot and a Lion Chariot,or 2 lion Chariots in most of my lists and have to say I find them invaluable especially against small elite units with a good AS.

Korhil by himself can be enough against a small elite unit if fighting a challenge.He will usually max out on overkill and adding impact hits and charge,flank/Rear bonus will result in holding up the opposition til help arrives.in conjunction with another chariot its just as good and when combined with a unit of DPs can be devastating allowing for over run into new opponents in a single round. Works even better if one or more are magically buffed.

Have considered building a Chrace themed army at 3k with 8 Lion Chariots and Korhil on Lion Chariot but thats for when I win the Lottery LOL.
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Ghogra
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#12 Post by Ghogra »

@Cerras and Curu Olannon - Your ideas are intriguing, but would I be hurting myself to lose most of my battle line by dropping either the swordmasters and/or the white lions? Especially if I lose the Seaguard for Archers. That would leave me with just on or two ranked combat units and the chariots cannot break steadfast by them selves. I like the thought, but I am not sure how much it would hurt. I also bounce back and forth on the reavers. I have them in there to be the screening force for the chariots. An extra eagle could do that, but I lose the width of the reavers. Thoughts?

@cptcosmic - Welcome to the forums! I know the chariots are fairly easy to kill but my intention here with this conversation is to develop a strategy to allow chariots to be the focal point of the army. As it stands now I have been pretty successful with using the chariot to support my spears and even my elite infantry. I also have had surprising success with a single chariot taking on some hard infantry by itself. I am looking for methods to further that success. I think all your suggestions are solid ideas that bring the army back in line with the "standard" army design. I am attempting to diverge from the norm in a manner similar to Seredain's Cavalry Prince but with chariots. Any thoughts with those ideas in mind?

@KJSparkz - My list is pretty heavily Chrace themed already. I would love to throw 8 lion chariots at an enemy. I don't know how effective it would be but it sure would look awesome. And really on the price scale chariots are pretty affordable. I just picked up korhil so I haven't had a chance to try him out, but I'll be doing that this weekend.
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Cerras
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#13 Post by Cerras »

Ghogra wrote:@Cerras and Curu Olannon - Your ideas are intriguing, but would I be hurting myself to lose most of my battle line by dropping either the swordmasters and/or the white lions? Especially if I lose the Seaguard for Archers. That would leave me with just on or two ranked combat units and the chariots cannot break steadfast by them selves. I like the thought, but I am not sure how much it would hurt. I also bounce back and forth on the reavers. I have them in there to be the screening force for the chariots. An extra eagle could do that, but I lose the width of the reavers. Thoughts?
I didn't suggest dropping the Seaguard.
The SM's won't be providing too much of a rank bonus, there's only 10, so if you lost 1 they're not going to be much use on ranks.
You could lose the SM's for another Lion Chariot in your 2nd lest.

However the question is do you want to take the fight to the enemy or use your chariots as counter charge once they hit your line?
If you want to take the fight to the enemy, I think cavalry+chariot combo will better serve against small or medium sized blocks of enemy then chariot+elite infantry (I'm assuming the enemy will have some shooting). The main reason being the chariots will have to wait for the foot troops to catch up, since you won't be committing them all on their own against the enemy's main battle line. With Cavalry, even if you run just 5 man cavalry units, when you hit the enemy unit in tandem with a chariot, you share the frontage of the enemy between the two units. That means the attack backs against your chariot is greatly reduced, not to mention the additional casualties the cavalry will inflict.
Of course this leaves large infantry blocks, which you can avoid with your fast elements while you wait for your spear and seaguard blocks to engage before getting some rare or flank charges in. Your core to break enemy's steadfast, your fast elements for the punch.

C
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#14 Post by Ghogra »

I think you hit the nail on the head Cerras. I really need to decide if I am going to take the fight to the enemy or make the counter charge. My original army designs were based around pushing forward with a line of infantry supported by chariots. I had little shooting because I didn't want to hold myself back. As my list ideas developed I found myself taking more and more combined arms approach in terms of list design, but still clinging to the stratagy of taking the fight to the enemy.

I like the idea of forcing my opponent to come to me and then launching my crippling counterattack. I think I have plenty of pieces in place for this. The seaguard work well in this format, so does the Heavens magic (comets are great for forcing your opponent to leave his deployment zone) and the boost to my shooting phase with the repeaters. What I don't want to fall into though is a gunline. I played dwarves just long enough to know that gunlines were boring (not saying that dwarves only do gunlines, just that they are really good at it).

So I know I want to accomplish the following:
- Put enough pressure on an opponent to force them into my line
- Use chariots to provide a solid counter attack
- Not be a gunline

I think I am starting to better identify what I want to do, now I just need to figure out how to get there. Thanks for the input Cerras. Keep it coming :D
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#15 Post by dabber »

Ghogra wrote:So I know I want to accomplish the following:
- Put enough pressure on an opponent to force them into my line
- Use chariots to provide a solid counter attack
- Not be a gunline
I thank you for putting it in those terms. That is very much what I want to do, although replace chariots with Swordmasters or Dragon Princes. I have not figured out how to make a list I'm happy with though.
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#16 Post by Seredain »

This is a great theme, Ghogra!

The distinction that you and Cerras have made here is useful for giving you some clear idea about how you want to play your army. In any case, your chariots will want to be supplementary to another unit. Ranked up spear units are also natural companions for chariots, while medium-sized elite units will also work. Ultimately the point is that any unit with some ranks is better than none. While chariots get you kills, you need a couple of ranks to run alongside them to win you the break. Providing no ranks themselves, chariots alone won't work well against units which will have even 1 full rank left at the end of combat. IN this sense your list maybe lacks a bit of direction - there are lots of killy units but it's not yet clear how they'll work together.

So, to your aims:

If you want to encourage the enemy to come to you, you want some shooting and you've sorted that nicely: the repeaters and seaguard give you a decent phase (especially with Heavens lore), while the seaguard work well in units of 20 like yours. I'd keep the spears - a strong (but cheap) steadfast unit like this is exactly the sort of anchor you attacking element can pivot around. They're also the cheapest ranks you'll get and, as discussed, ranked units are essential companions for chariots. I also like the elite infantry units - they provide nice little platforms of static combat ability around which your chariots can work, while also providing more opportunities for combined-charges, either with your chariots or with your core blocks.

If you want to lead a strong & fast counter attack from this base, a block of 9 silver helms riding with your BSB will be excellent at charging alongside the lion chariots. It provides two full ranks to help break steadfast once your chariot has got all those kills, gets a lot of kills itself (ASF is golden for knights), is durable and, as such, provides the mounted noble with much better cover from enemy missiles and spells- 5 DPs won't cover him for very long at all!

If you're going to rely on chariots alone, you'll have no spare ranks to help break enemy units in combat (they'll crush little support units, of course). They're better used, therefore, for fighting alongside bigger infantry units or a bigger block of knights like the 10 BSB helms. Which of these you go for (more infantry or more knights) is your big choice, I think. In any case, I think your list will benefit from more troops more than it will from Korhil. I'd lose him and the reavers, replace him with a normal lion chariot (that's 2 in one list - pretty potent) and spend the spare points on beefing up your counter-attack's leading units. If you don't feel two chariots is enough, the most comparable unit to swap out for a third would be the dragon princes. This would give you a list that'd look something like this:

Archmage- Annulian Crystal- 300
Noble BSB- Barded Steed, GW, HA, Shield, Dragonhelm, Dawnstone, Amulet of Light- 190

35 Spearelves- FC 340
20 Seaguard- FC, Flaming Banner- 295

14 White Lions- FC, Ironcurse Icon, Banner of Sorcery- 295
10 Swordmasters- Bladelord- 162
9 Silver Helms- FC- 247 (I don't normally take standards on knights, but chariots don't have flags so it's useful in this list)
Lion Chariot- 140
Lion Chariot- 140
Lion Chariot- 140

2 Repeaters- 200
1 Eagle- 50

2499 Points

So, you have a strong steadfast infantry base for holding flanks or breaking ranks, good missile fire (plus Heavens spells), a flexible force of elite infantry to work in support of a fast attack or in forming the fighting element of your defence (the little SM detachment provides some lovely options), a large block of knights to cover your BSB and lead the charge and 3 lion chariots to provide deadly combinations with all of your other units. With this list you can go full-on attack very well indeed (3 lion chariots and the helm block hitting a single flank? Blimey), or you can position your chariots behind your infantry and cavalry before bringing them out on turn 2 or 3 and unleashing a glorious counter-charge, led by your mounted noble and his bodyguard. Ace. Against shooty opponents, you have the eagle, the more resistant block of knights and, all round, excellent target saturation. A dedicated charge against a chosen part of the enemy army will punch it hard even if you lose models on the way in. Heavens lore helps against static shooty deployments. Of course, while your chariots are exposed, your elites will likely be left unnoticed, while your knights can close quickly. The ranks of spears can shelter and add crucial weight to the attack in its later stages.

The best thing about all the chariots is that they'll form a potentially fatal combination with literally any other combat unit you've placed on the board. Every unit drop you make (spears, seaguard, knights, elites), will have your opponent thinking: 'if that unit teams up with one of those chariots, I'm in trouble'. Deploying against your combined-arms chariot host will be stressful indeed. :)
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#17 Post by jwg20 »

Seredain covered most of what I was going to say and then some (as usual), but one thing not mentioned is how Lion Chariots fare in solo roles. While in most instances, Lion Chariots need support to break ranks, but not always. In my games against Chaos (one of my most common opponents), my Lion Chariots have had a field-day breaking small unit of Chaos Knights. Lion Chariots, more so than any other unit I feel, are deadly against heavy cav. So much so, that my opponent has stopped fielding units of only 5 chaos knights (he now fields minimum of 10 per unit, which requires two lion chariots to reduce to below one rank unfortunately). Using your "helm bus" along with 3 chariots can easily take out a flank: chariots target small units of cav, and the helms and one chariot engage the largest unit.

Also, Lion Chariots are great at holding the opponent up. As stated, they will not break large units in one turn. But by winning combat, they can hold up the opponent, which sometimes can be gold especially against offensive armies like chaos. For example, in one battle, my enemy had a unit of 40 marauders rolling up the flank of his main line (rank support for his chosen). I charged my two chariots into their flank. No, they did not break, but his battle line, who could not waste turns to reform and help them due to the damage they were taking from shooting and magic were forced to keep advancing, leaving one of their rank support units behind. My helms and Dragon Princes, then, after dealing with the cav on that flank, turned and charged into the marauders' rear (now flank, after reforming) and sent them running. I lost one of my 2 chariots in the prolonged combat (but the chariots still dished out as bad as they got due to the high strength of their attacks), but the more important thing is that I held up one of his most important support units, which allowed my spears and White Lions of my main battle line to easily deal with most of his infantry, and allowed one of my units of spears engaged with his chosen to withstand a few turns of combat with them in time for my cavalry to reach and charge their rear. The battle ended in a massacre, as the only unit he wiped out was one chariot while he had nothing left.

So just because chariots don't send units running by themselves, they can still do valuable things alone in the right situations.
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Seredain
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#18 Post by Seredain »

jwg20 wrote:So just because chariots don't send units running by themselves, they can still do valuable things alone in the right situations.
Jwg- thanks, this is an important point. LC's are themselves very flexible support units (albeit powerful ones), bringing all the usual benefits in counter-support and extra deployment drops.

Your pinning of the marauder horde was nice. :)
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Ghogra
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#19 Post by Ghogra »

I had a chance to play a couple games over the weekend, but I don't have all the models for the full 2500 point army (and I have no cavalry except 5 reavers). I played 2000 points and here is the list I ended up with for the second game (the first was more, here are the models I have lets see what happens, the second I actually tried to build the chariot smash army with a few proxies.)

Archmage Annullian Crystal, 4+ ward save thingy, level 4
Korhil (not on chariot)

25 Seaguard FC banner of eternal flame
13 Archers

12 White Lions FC Banner of Sorcery
10 Swordmasters FC
3 Lion Chariots (two of these looked suspiciously like goblin wolf chariots, those sneaky gits)

Repeater Bolt Thrower
Eagle

My opponent's wood elves looked something like this

Archmage level 4, Dispel Scroll, Life
Eagle mounted noble with hail of doom arrow

4x 10 Archers
2x 6 treekin

Treeman

We played the battle for the pass. After our first game my opponent decided to leave his horde of spear/staff elves at home and break out the blocks of treekin and a ton of archers. He began by deploying deep with his archers, thinking he could bunker down and wait for me to walk into his clouds of arrows. Unfortunately for him I out ranged him with the combo of the repeater and the heavens lore magic. So I successfully forced him to come to me. I will say that I struggled with deployment, I felt the squeeze of the short width on the deployment zone and I was hampered by some buildings in my way. My line was a "cup o' death" with the white lions on the left, the swords on the right and the archers and seaguard holding the center. Korhil beefed up the seaguard and the archmage bunkered in the archers. I hid the chariots behind the line so they could be semi protected until they were needed for the counter charge.

The first few turns went very well for me as I blasted his mage's archer unit into pieces with lightning and volleys from the repeater. In hindsight I should have used that firepower to put some hurt on the advancing treekin (those guys are wicked hard), but I really wanted to eliminate his mage, a feat I would not accomplish all game. When his treeman came within striking distance I charged it with the swords and two of the chariots. The swords failed the charge but the two chariots hit home... and were smashed to pieces by the brutish thing (can that thing really stand and shoot with a artillary die worth of high strength attacks that don't need to roll to hit?). I did manage to put a couple of wounds on him though and lasted through the first combat phase, breaking in his instead. My swords were then blocked by his noble eagle but I had clear line of fire for the flaming arrows of the seaguard. I managed to put 2 more wounds into it with (thank you flammable) those shots and my seaguard braced for the inevitable charge next turn. I was thankful, though, that his treeman blocked up the second unit of treekin from being able to get stuck into the fray.

On the other flank the white lions lost a couple of their number to some long range arrows, despite the cover of a strangely normal forest and awaited the arrival of the other block of treekin. I managed a combo charge of the white lions, the third chariot, and the eagle to the flank in turn 3. I managed to kill 4 of the 6 but lost all but three of the white lions with the return attacks and stomps. He broke but I failed to run him down. That would spell my doom later on.

His treeman charged my seaguard and Korhil proved his lumberjack skills by chopping down the tree with his flaming axes.

I foolishly garrisoned the chapel in front of the treekin with the swordmasters in order to give myself some room to get the seaguard ready for the fight. In the magic phase (which I had been dominating the whole game) my archmage put another wound back on his mage with a thunderbolt, then miscast a big comet aimed at his archer bunkers. He exploded in vortex of arcane energies taking most of his archers with him into the nether. The rest broke and ran. This was the turning point of the game. His mage, now free from the constrictions of my Annulian crystal and +5 to dispel began to regrow everything I had destroyed. That unit of 2 treekin I couldn't run down rallied and was boosted back to 4 models which crushed the remaining white lions and broke the chariot. The other unit of treekin was boosted to tough 7 and assaulted the swordmasters in the chapel crushing them with no wounds in return. Korhil and his seaguard prepared to weather the storm of super resilient treekin but got dwellered into oblivion (25 models reduced to 5 with one casting, even the dice abandoned me after my archmage went up in smoke).

That was how the battle ended, I had 5 seaguard, 4 archers, and a repeater left. Massive victory in the wood elves favor. Oh, and that irresistible force comet... we are still waiting for it to land.

Overall it was a fun game and I learned a few things from it. First, treekin are disgustingly hard to take out. Flaming attacks are great against these guys though. Second, I really missed having some speed in the army. I didn't take any reavers and without them or any helms/princes I felt very static. I also need to work on my deployment skills and get better at looking ahead to predict maneuvers a turn or two in advance. I am a long time 40k player with a great win record there, but fantasy plays out so differently I need to relearn my thought processes.
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Ghogra
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#20 Post by Ghogra »

@ Seredain - First, thanks for all the advice! Since reading your input I spent a lot of time contemplating the challenge of building the chariot smash army using infantry instead of the cavalry. I came up with what I think are some solid ideas, but I think the cavalry is the stronger way to go. I will toss the list out here for some input, but after the battle above I am leaning towards the helm bus more and more.

Archmage level 4, Dispel Scroll (heavens)
Korhil

35 Spearman FC
20 Seaguard FC Banner of Eternal Flame

10 Swordmasters
14 White Lions, FC Ironcurse Icon
3 Lion Chariots
20 Phoenix Guard FC Banner of Sorcery

2 Repeater Bolt Throwers
1 Eagle

2500 points

The idea was to use the magic, the repeaters and seaguard archery to push enemies into the blocks of spears/seaguard and Phoenix guard then counter attack with the chariots and elite infantry. I am now afraid that the army doesn't have enough mobility to put threats out there and to get the combined charges it needs to be truly successful. I might consider buffing up the seaguard and dropping the spears for more archers so that I can keep up a stronger ranged presence, but it is starting to feel more like a gunline (bowline?) then I want it to.

@jwg20 - I have had great success with lone chariots doing great things. My first time putting a lion chariot on the table I paired it up with a large block of spears buffed with Wyssan's wild form defending a blessed bulwark against a 10 or 12 block of khorne warriors hexed with the curse of anraheir. I figured with all these cards in my favor the spears could take the charge and either win or hold long enough for the chariot to counter charge in the following turn. Yeah... the dice failed me and the spears gotten eaten for breakfast which allowed the warriors to overrun right into the chariot. The chariot, without the benefit of impact hits, stuck it out in close combat for three rounds and eventually broke and overran the berserk warriors.
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#21 Post by Ghogra »

Pulling a bit of threadomancy here, but I have been unable to game much for a while and I am trying to get back in by heading to my first Fantasy tournament ever this weekend. I have been refining my Chariot Smash army over the past few months, and wanted to get a little feed back on the new design. I decided to resurrect my army thread to help define what I am trying to do.

My goals with this army are
- Put enough pressure on an opponent to force them into my line
- Use chariots to provide a solid counter attack
- Not be a gunline (or bowline as the case may be)

The list:

Archmage, Level 4, Staff of Solidity (Heavens) - 280
Noble BSB, GW AoC Dawnstone - 168
Mage, lvl 2, dispel scroll (high) - 155

30 Seaguard FC - 415
10 Archers - 110
10 Archers - 110

12 Sword Masters, Bladelord - 192
10 White Lions, FC Banner of Eternal Flame - 190
2 Lion Chariot - 280
10 Dragon Princes, FC, BoS - 400

1 Bolt Thrower - 100
2 Eagle - 100

Thoughts? Comments? This is my first tournament and I don't think I will know anyone at the venue, so I am a little nervous.
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#22 Post by dabber »

The 400 point cavalry unit does not seem to fit. You have nothing else that moves and fights well, yet you don't want to risk them away from the BSB, or to risk losing the Banner of Sorcery.
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#23 Post by korhian the 28th »

dabber wrote:The 400 point cavalry unit does not seem to fit. You have nothing else that moves and fights well, yet you don't want to risk them away from the BSB, or to risk losing the Banner of Sorcery.
+1

use the pts to make the wl unit bigger 10 is to small to do a thing....
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#24 Post by Ghogra »

The Dragon Princes give me a mobile hammer. They also are a fairly resilient unit and currently the only place I have I can put the banner. I have played around with taking them out, but without them I concede the movement phase almost entirely to my opponent. I use the DPs instead of helms because they can hit things hard enough on their own even without a cavalry prince or mounted BSB. If I dropped them what could I replace them with that would give me a home for the banner (something I hesitate to live without) and a mobile hammer?

The small White Lion unit is used as a monster hunter and general work horse unit. Being small they don't attract a lot of attention but can still put the hurt on regen beasties or combo charge a tougher unit with a chariot.
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#25 Post by Prince of Spires »

I don't think you have to lose all the DPs. However, 10 is a big number and the points run up quite fast. If you reduce them to 7 and drop the champ you gain something like 110 pts. And because back ranks only get 1 attack, you don't lose a lot of hitting power from this unit.

This lets you increase the WL to 14 and still leaves 50 points for something else. What you then could also do is drop 2 SM, change their champion to a musician and you suddenly have 86 points left over which gets you a tyranoc chariot (alternatively, you could just take 12 WL, instead of 14 and do the same). If my math is correct of course

This would make your list:

Archmage, Level 4, Staff of Solidity (Heavens) - 280
Noble BSB, GW AoC Dawnstone - 168
Mage, lvl 2, dispel scroll (high) - 155

30 Seaguard FC - 415
10 Archers - 110
10 Archers - 110

12 Sword Masters, mus
12 White Lions, FC Banner of Eternal Flame
2 Lion Chariot - 280
Tyranoc chariot
7 Dragon Princes, mus + banner, BoS

1 Bolt Thrower - 100
2 Eagle - 100

This list has more mobile hitting power and a slightly stronger infantry base.

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Ghogra
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#26 Post by Ghogra »

I like your thoughts Rod. After the earlier comments I played with the list a bit and came up with something similar.

Archmage, Level 4, Staff of Solidity (Heavens) - 280
Noble BSB, GW AoC Dawnstone - 168
Mage, Level 1, dispel scroll (high) - 120

30 Seaguard FC - 415
10 Archers - 110
10 Archers - 110

14 Sword Masters, FC, Banner of Sorcery - 290
12 White Lions, FC Banner of Eternal Flame - 220
2 Lion Chariot - 280
5 Dragon Princes, Musician - 160
Tiranoc Chariot - 85
5 Ellyrion Reavers, Bows, Musician - 112

1 Bolt Thrower - 100
1 Eagle - 50

Total 2500

I pick up the Reavers and Tiranoc Chariot (bringing me to 3 chariots, which I like) and boost the elite infantry base. I keep a few princes to provide a mobile hammer. I did drop one eagle, though I think the Reavers can fill that role. They may not be as point efficient as the Eagle, but they have some advantages (and look pretty good.)

Thoughts?
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500

#27 Post by Ghogra »

Well I finally get to try out a game with the new book so I thought I would bring my old army blog back to like and post my updated list. So to start out my goals with this list are as follows:

- Put enough pressure on an opponent to force them into my line
- Use chariots to provide a solid counter attack
- Not be a gunline (or bowline as the case may be)

I really wanted to try out a griffon noble for this list but I struggle with how to make him an effective part of the list. While I like him and he fits well thematically in the list he does take a chunk of points that make me feel a little light in the infantry portions of the list. Anyway here is the list, tear it up and give me some thoughts.

Archmage, level 4 Book (with archers)

Noble on fully upgraded griffon, Starlance, Crown, Dragon Armor, Enchanted Shield
Noble BSB, Heavy Armor, Lion Cloak, Sword of Might, Shield of Merwyrm (With spears)

35 Spears, FC, Standard of Discipline
5 Reavers bows and spears, musician
14 Archers, Musician, Standard

Lion Chariot
Lion Chariot
Tiranoc Chariot
18 White Lions FC, World Dragon
5 Dragon Princes, FC, Banner of Flame

Bolt Thrower
Bolt Thrower
10 Sisters of Avelorn
Eagle
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Ghogra
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500 (Updated with new book)

#28 Post by Ghogra »

I tried my first game with the new book. I ran the army above with a few adjustments. I dropped the BSB for Korhil and put the battle standard on my griffon noble. This also cost me the tiranoc chariot in favor of one extra dragon prince. My opponent ran a strange WoC list something like this:
Valkia
Sorcerer Lord with familiar tzeench
Wulfrik
10 warriors with shields Tzeench blasted standard
10 warriors with shields Tzeench
20 marauders with shields tzeench (ambushed with Wulfrik)
6 ogres with 2 weapons, nurgle
4 ogres great weapons, nurgle
5 knights khorne
chariot khorne
Hellcannon

We played a battle for the pass, with him getting the first turn. After advancing across the whole front he blasted my reavers off the map with magic then watched his cannon go BOOM with its first shot at a bolt thrower, which it promptly failed to wound. On the left flank I stalled out his great weapon ogres with an eagle, allowing me to set up a triple charge of my two chariots and the griffon in the next turn. This charge really gave me the Lion Chariot Smash feel I wanted. The chariots pulled out 9 impact hits and the rest was history. I wiped out the ogres despite his -1 to hit aura. They then overran past the other unit of ogres which allowed them to turn around to charge them in the following turn, which had similar results.

In the center, his chariot and one unit of warriors moved down the center to meet my white lions who guarded the entrance to a watchtower that my sisters had taken over. His combo charge failed and only the chariot made it in to the lions. They tore it apart and overran into the warriors. That fight was much more of a slugging match than I thought it would be though. The lions came out on top but with those pesky 5+ parry saves his warriors were hard to put down. By the end of that fight I was left with only 3 lions. His other unit of warriors, the ones with the blasted standard got arrowed to death due to the fickle fates of tzeench (he rolled a one on his banner).

On the right flank I charged my Princes into his knights after dropping one of them with a bolt. I tipped the scales in my favor with a Curse of the midnight wind and a blizzard on those knights, both of which he failed to dispel. He fears the comet too much so saved a bunch of dice to stop a spell I didn't need to cast. His knights took three of mine with them but they died and my princes were able to overrun into Valkia. She turned out to be a much harder target then I expected. -1 attack and -1 strength against her is rough. I ended up bringing the Griffon over to help out, but got the BSB killed for his troubles. After several rounds of combat (with valkia magically debuffed most of the time) I finally killed her with a very lucky strength 2 attack from the last remaining dragon prince.

In the backfield my spears were able to reform and take on the ambushing Wulfrik and marauders. Korhil managed to get a wound in on Wolfrik but got killed in the process. Through sheer weight of numbers the spears finally won out in the end but it was a grinding battle of attrition.

What I learned:
* White lions don't hit nearly as hard as they used to. I was expecting them to lose a little bit of power, but they seemed softer than I anticipated.
* Korhil looks cool on a shelf... he is too soft to hold up on the table. I want to like him, just can't find a way to make him useful.
* Lion chariots are still rock solid. They have enough impact and high strength attacks to make them turn a combat. They worked beautifully in the pair and with them being stubborn I was fairly sure they could hold whatever they faced for some time.
* Not sold on the griffon. I just don't know how to use him effectively. I did forget the thunderstomp attacks so that might be the difference, but I need to get some advice on this piece's use.

My opponents list seemed... soft. He ran small units with a lack of hitting power and hid his big heavy hitting flyer (valkia) behind his knights. He is far too afraid of my ranged attacks.
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500 (Updated with new book)

#29 Post by Domine Nox »

I haven't used Korhil myself, but I don't see how he's that soft. 3+ save vs shooting 4+ save in close combat. Strength 6 killing blow who doesn't ASL so gets re-rolls to hit. And he negates the poison rule. He seems pretty beast. And if you like Lion Chariots you could always put him in one.
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Re: Lion Chariot Smash army 2500 (Updated with new book)

#30 Post by Ghogra »

He did get torn up like a wet paper bag in a duel with Wulfrik. I guess the fight could have gone the other way with a lucky killing blow, but he just felt too easy to kill. 4+ save in close combat with tough 3 doesn't leave him standing long against a stiff breeze. I really want to like him its just tough. Long ago I tried him out in the chariot, but then he became a bigger target and was easier to pick out with cannons and the like. In a unit he, provides stubborn (as long as he is alive) and is a little more protected. Maybe I just need to give him some more times out on the field. Thanks for the feedback!
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