mcpolle wrote:Also comes down to the people I play, one of them being an avid Empire player, so not having an answer to his Stank, and cannons, and mortars, kinda sucks.
Polle, the war machines I'm not worried about, but the Stank really will be a test of my 'all comers' credentials- the campaign's empire player is fielding one. It may be that I put a couple of early wounds on it and render it redundant, nut I'll have to keep my fingers crossed...
Glad you're finding the thread useful- run a few tests in building an all-comers list and see what you can come up with, eh? It's almost as much fun as it is deeply, deeply frustrating.
Bolt Thrower wrote:I'm going to try out a mage-knight bus next time out.
Prince - Helm of Fortune, Talisman of Endurance, Radiant Gem (Beasts), Dragon Armour, Barded Steed and Great Weapon.
BSB - Dragonhelm, Dawnstone, Heavy Armour, Barded Steed and Great Weapon.
Taking signature spell in the lore of Beasts, will make these guys hit like a freight train. S7 attacks from the Prince and BSB, S6 from the helms and S4 horses? Sure, I'll take that. Not to mention T4. Coupled with a Shadow Archmage, it will put a lot of pressure on the dispel dice. Hmmm, do you let Wyssan's go thru and get crushed by cav, or do you let Mindrazor thru and get crushed by spears? I'm happy either way.
BT that's brutal, haha. Very cool and really good kit on the prince. Bear in mind that, in order to force that nasty dispel choice, you'll need both the spears and the knights to have made successful charges that turn. If the knights get into combat earlier, as is likely, be prepared for them to live without the buff until the spears also make it in. On the other hand, casting miasma could force a difficult dispel choice in the meantime: no-one wants to be hitting your characters and helms on only a 5+... Good build.
I'm guessing that the only reason you haven't taken Guardian Phoenix on the prince is that you've given it to your archmage?
~Milliardo~ wrote:Against common troops, a block of 2x7 lions and chariot puts out around 20 - 25 wounds, and look far more fragile than they actually are, which I find is important - it gives some people just enough incentive to actually think they can win with their huge block of 30 - 40 infantry, and wind up with only 5 return attacks.
...
Its weakness is definitely gun-lines with cannons, but I find at 2k you really have to pick your poison...
Nice list, Milliardo. I completely agree that the two units of lions are the way to go, there. It's funny isn't it, how players often assume their 40-man block is going to stick around forever, without thinking that its wide frontage means we can throw an enormous number of attacks into it and completely ruin it before it gets to strike? Your chariots are gold-dust for your infantry in that respect. Yeah, I can see how gunlines would be a problem: at least you don't have that big single white lion unit making such a juicy target: it's quite hard hitting 2-rank units with machines. Best course of action, I guess, is to just get up in their face and keep regrowing things! You'll have to watch out for enemy magic, too, but that's true for most lists these days.
If you can, give 2.5K a go - the extra points provide a great opportunity to maximise your strengths and (especially), minimise your weaknesses.
Mikael.K wrote:This topic has gotten me to rethink the cavaly role in army lists, both VC and HE. Vamps could do the silver helm thing with black knights and their lords are awesome fighters too
.
Your earlier posts has also made me consider RBT´s and archers in 8th edition, both of which has been considered sup par choices. Now you´ve done the same with cavalry
. Great to see that I can still use those silver helms I have lying around.
Cheers, Mikael - that's good to hear! I'm no VC expert but I see no reason why black knights couldn't make an excellent bus with a powerful vampire. You'd have to ponder whether getting your general that involved is worth the risk of him dying and crumbling your army, though. Maybe a Thrall with a Wight BSB?
I will say that I think High Elf heavy cavalry has a massive advantage over that of other races because we re-roll missed hits. It can't be over-stressed that the fact we no longer suffer from rubber lance syndrome makes our cavalry (uniquely in the game), something that lance-wielding cavalry has never been - reliable. For units which mostly rely on breaking or crippling their targets on the charge, ASF is so incredibly useful and makes, I would suggest, High Elf cavalry buses some of the best in the game (along with their speed and the high leadership needed for marching and free reforms). Dark Elf cold one buses will get the re-roll from hatred, so they're powerful too, but our ASF high-strength characters can tip that match-up in our favour.
Mikael.K wrote:Another question, how would you translate your current 2500pts list into a 2000pts list?
That's a tough one which, frankly, I've tried to avoid! The basic point is that, firstly, I have to lose one of my lord choices and that, of course, limits the tactical possibilities open to me a great deal. If I were building a 2K list from scratch, I don't yet know what I'd take exactly but, if I were trying to build a 2K Cavalry Prince list, it might look something like this:
2000 point Cavalry Prince List
Prince - Barded Steed, Dragon Armour, Shield, Giant Blade, Helm of Fortune, Talisman of Loec - 281
Battle Standard Bearer - Barded Steed, Lance, Dragon Armour, Shield, Radiant Gem, Luckstone, High Magic - 188
Lvl 1 Mage - Lore of Shadow, Dispel Scroll, Dragonbane Gem - 125
30 Spearelves- Full Command, Gleaming Pennant - 300
18 Archers, Musician - 203
12 Swordmasters- Bladelord - 192
10 White Lions- Guardian, Standard, Banner of Eternal Flame - 184
8 Silver Helms- Musician, Shields - 192
1 Tiranoc Chariot - 85
2 Repeater Bolt Throwers - 200
1 Eagle - 50
2000 points
So, I keep the fighting prince and the shape and style of his army remains the same, with the loss of the dragon princes being the only significant change in the unit line-up. Loss of the archmage is made up for by the fact that I now have two low level casters including a dispel scroll and access to drain magic: good magic defence for a prince list. As for casting spells, I'll have three (not bad on average dice), and the default Shadow and High spells are both excellent for their casting cost- the former is amazingly flexible (and useful for aiding the knights with its long range), while the latter can make my tank even harder. The fact that they're both of such a low casting value should lower the impact of my mages being only level 1. The BsB is obviously not as hard as he was, but the changes to him are probably necessary to keep the list balanced. Besides, the prince is correspondingly more powerful at these reduced points levels.
The down sides? The silver helm tank is worth as many points as it was in the 2.5K list, so it's going to be a bigger target for enemy spells. That's basically the reason I've gone for magic defence over trying to manufacture an aggressive phase out of a single Level 2 mage (Banner of Sorcery, Seerstaff). I've also spent a lot in characters. There's a good argument here for taking out the BSB altogether and going for a more powerful mage whilst spending the rest on more troops, though I'd have to think about it. I do like the spell selection granted by the BSB and the Level 1 - I think it could be nicely workable.
It's an interesting experiment, anyway. If the time comes where I have to fight someone at 2000 points, I'll give it a try.