Dark Elf magic and which lores are useful.

[Svarthofthi]

In this thread, I ask you, my fellow Druchii, what magic you'd use against the other armies. If we're speaking frankly, what you think the most useful lores are against every race. This will be fun, I promise.

[Rabidnid]

I use dark almost exclusively, simply because it has no bad spells. Metal had spells which are potentially more useful, but a poor roll can leave you mage with one useful spell that only inflicts a single wound per turn.

Fire is all strength 4 flaming ranged attacks. Cute but not always useful.

Death is only good against non ItP armies as half of its spells are moral spells. With the number of ItP armies around, it dosen't see much use any more.

[Dalamar]

Dark is the most useful one against everyone.

The other lores have enemy specific spells.
Steam Tank? - Metal
Heavy Cav with S4/T4? - Metal
Low I big monsters? - Shadow
Stupid amount of regeneration? - Fire (metal if combined with high AS)

Death is meh.

[Bounce]

Dark is definitly the best.
Good range, good amounts of damage coupled with extra psycological effects and a nice spread of casting values.

[Dyvim tvar]

This has been discussed a few times before. I agree with the others that if you had to choose 1 lore without knowing what army you are facing, Dark would be the one to take. Shadow, Death, and Metal are too situational in that their best spells are useless against certain opponents or army types:

Metal = Spirit of the Forge worthless against low/no armor (Daemons)
Doom and Darkness = Doesn't work against Immune to Psych
Pit of Shades = crap against high Initiative

Fire doesn't have this problem, but the spell list as a whole is inferior to Dark.

[Svarthofthi]

Being new and full of hope I like to think there is a spell for all situations.

High toughness, low initiative and visa versa. Really unit blocks are usually easy enough to handle but its that heavy cavalry that scares me, killing them is a top priority to render their maneuverability dead in the water.

[Dalamar]

If heavy cavalry is your main target for spells then Black Horror will work wonders (if they're S3), Soul Stealer will kill a few and heal your wizard (if they're T3), while Rule of Burning Iron and Spirit of the Forge will just melt them to the ground.

[Calisson]

I play usually against Brets, Dwarfs, Gobbos, HE.
I play much less often against Empire & Lizzies.
I never play against any other race.

Dark Lore never deceived me against any foe. I have a tendency to take it all the time, at least with one level 2.
Metal Lore is great against Dwarfs & Brets & Empire, possibly HE, although Dark Lore spell#1 would have sometimes been better.
I like Fire Lore which is the most aggressive although it is often less powerful than Dark (and some HE are immune to it). I would take it against any foe.
I tried Shadow Lore but I have always been deceived.
I never play Death Lore because I don' really know how to use it.

[Crawd]

Spirit of the Forge is awesome against Treeman

[Zenith]

I regualry fight Warriors of chaos,

and their knights are their worst threat.

Spirit of the forge is theirs.
I cant say how many times the lore of metal saved my ass. Ofcourse i need a lvl 2 dark mage , to magic missile their screens away

[Svarthofthi]

I hear high elves can equip their wizards in such a way where they can take any spell they like from the lores available.

Is there any such way to do that for the Druchii? I don't like to leave too many things to chance and unfortunately it would appear magic is completely unpredictable.

[Rabidnid]

Is there any such way to do that for the Druchii? I don't like to leave too many things to chance and unfortunately it would appear magic is completely unpredictable.

No.

That is a widely expressed falacy. Magic is complex and winning the magic phase requires thought. Basically miscasts are not the end of the world, and having a lot more magic than your opponent has defence is a good way to dominate the game. Spell selection is the only real variable, which is why I stick to Dark. All of its spells are useful and can do an array of damage to a variety of targets while ignoring things like ItP.

I while ago I played a 1250 point game versus WoC. I took metal on the girl with ToF and Dark on the girl with Familiar. For metal I rolled 1, 2 & 3. which left her with one useful spell. The girl with dark rolled 3 and 4, and amused herself by blowing hounds, sporn and marauders to bits, while casting word of pain on his chaos knights and warrors to mess up their charges.

[Svarthofthi]

Haha, sorry I misspoke. What I meant to say is that spell selection is unpredictable, not the whole phase itself. That's just a play on percentages among other things. A lot of people have been saying that they stick with dark magic because its selection is good which I can see why.

My point was is that selection if you pick a lore outside of dark will leave you reeling at some points and has the possibility of draining the usefulness out of your magic phase.

I watched a friend of mine playing his HEs and he had his wizard stacked with an item that allowed him to pick a spell "Vaul's Unmaking" or something of the kind. Stripped his opponent's hero's magic items to nothing and you can probably guess where it went from there for his hero. Anyhow, something you can solidly rely on with magic selection is awesome.

[Lakissov]

Well, I also agree that Dark is the best. However, there are two armies, against which Metal is better: WoC, and any vampire army with Black Knight Drakenhoff Deathstar. It goes like this: you cast spirit of the forge, and oops - the opponent's most powerful unit is gone. With vampires it's more easy, as they usually don't have scrolls, so just cast it on 4-5 dice, and they are unlikely to dispel. With chaos, they usually do have 1-2 scrolls on their mages, so you'll have to make them use those first.

[Greatescape_13]

I'm a fan of Death supplementing a shooting army. Doom and Darkness has a low casting cost, and can wreak havok when paired with a 25% panic test from some decent shooting of crossbows and RBT. The rest of the lore has plenty of magic missiles, so even with an unlucky couple of spells it's still useful.

Cheers.

[Dalamar]

It's also totally ineffective against the hardest armies out there - Vampires and Daemons. They're immune to Doom and Darkness.

[Dyvim tvar]

However, there are two armies, against which Metal is better: WoC, and any vampire army with Black Knight Drakenhoff Deathstar.

In addition to the above, Metal is a great choice against Bretonnians.

[Dalamar]

Dark is better against bretonnians, both Soulstealer and Black Horror don't allow for armour save and keep their ward at nice low 6+ while rule of burning iron and spirit of the forge raises it to 5+

Bretonnians have S3 for the most part so Black Horror works very nice, and T3 as well, so Soulstealer isn't too gimped.

While at the same time you can pick out damsels with Bladewind which none of the metal spells can do (you need to be able to see your target to cast rule of burning iron, and even then it's crap S2)

[Lakissov]

To my mind, the best lore against Brets would be the one that helps best against Pegasus knights. So, it's probably Dark (all spells except Chillwind and Bladewind are ok against them). The rest of the bretonnian army never posed any problem for me, somehow.

[Dalamar]

What's wrong with bladewind against them? Pegasus knights have inferior armour save so bladewind can easily take one or two down.

[Rabidnid]

Death and metal are both poor choices because so many of their spells are worthless versus some opponents. With Metal 1, 4 & 6 as really useful spells, 5 as a nice spell, 2 is situational, but usualy a waste, and 3 is practically worthless. Really though, you are using the lore for 1 & 6, which is just too hit and miss for me. You might have to vary your tactics based on the spells you get Dark, but all of those spells are useful against anybody.

[Svarthofthi]

Seems to be if you went magic heavy if you were going to pick a half-useless lore you make your level 4 pick it, then give your 2's the dark magic sweetness.

[Elsu]

Hi, i am suprised that nobody has posted the following topic yet:

http://www.druchii.net/viewtopic.php?t=58118

I never read a more helpful topic!

[Svarthofthi]

That is, indeed, a very helpful topic! Of which I have read, to me this is mostly shooting the breeze and seeing what people think.

[Hekarti_capri]

Lore of Fire against Vampires. Super destructive and the only Lore that prevents regeneration.