new vc thoughts and how to counter

[Ichiyo1821]

So how many magic items did VC get? Bloodlines are back?

[Rabidnid]

So how many magic items did VC get? Bloodlines are back?

Nope. They have a new class of necromancer who can stop an army from crumbling if the Vamp dies, their monsters are cheap, and they have ethereal fast cav that can attack in the movement phase by passing though a unit.

Lore of fire/metal for the magical attack buff will see a lot of use, their armour saves are nothing special but they do have a magic ityem that causes attackers to always strike last with handweapons irrespective of what they are carrying.

lots of wounds and light regen for most of their bigger critters. Some of the new ethereals have flaming attacks.

[Dante valentine]

I can see lots of units of ethereal cavalry being the biggest concern! I mean, if someone turns up with two units then spells and magic items will be enough me thinks, if someone turns up with dozens of them, it could be....problematic.

I've only had a brief read through (and i do mean brief) but nothing strikes me as scary beyond measure.

I was curious as to what will happen when all the books get to 8th edition as at the moment we have access to lots of nice magic items and the like but if Dark Elves follow the trend and only have 4-8 magic items (which i can see no reason that they wouldn't) then armies containing lots of etheral be more problematic.

Anyway, thats a long way in the future me thinks! Will post more after i get another chance to read and a few games against them.

D

[Druchiinoob]

Having a look now nothing majorly scary apart from they can make some nasty lords that puts the unkillable dreadlord to shame.

[Phierlihy]

Three cheap units of ethreal fast cav dancing through your units, once in the movement phase and again in the magic phase, will decimate us. I haven't read the rumors nor seen the book but that alone will rip us apart.

[Rabidnid]

Three cheap units of ethreal fast cav dancing through your units, once in the movement phase and again in the magic phase, will decimate us. I haven't read the rumors nor seen the book but that alone will rip us apart.

They cost more than CoKs, so 3 units would be a major commitment in points. They are also fast cav so swatting them with a magic weapon character or a magic missile would be the obvious solution. Enchanted blades or sword of rhuin on a unit of archers is going to be a good fix for a lot of their list.

[Druchiinoob]

Three cheap units of ethreal fast cav dancing through your units, once in the movement phase and again in the magic phase, will decimate us. I haven't read the rumors nor seen the book but that alone will rip us apart.

They cost more than CoKs, so 3 units would be a major commitment in points. They are also fast cav so swatting them with a magic weapon character or a magic missile would be the obvious solution. Enchanted blades or sword of rhuin on a unit of archers is going to be a good fix for a lot of their list.

You are absoultly correct, I was worried about them to begin with but now im hoping my oponents take lots of units of these. (they have a max of 10 per unit) all those points are just easy pickings with some well placed spells. They also cannot march if they are not within 12" of the general. Only the general always march now. Van hells cannot be spammed anymore so easy to dispell.

[Rabidnid]

Three cheap units of ethreal fast cav dancing through your units, once in the movement phase and again in the magic phase, will decimate us. I haven't read the rumors nor seen the book but that alone will rip us apart.

They cost more than CoKs, so 3 units would be a major commitment in points. They are also fast cav so swatting them with a magic weapon character or a magic missile would be the obvious solution. Enchanted blades or sword of rhuin on a unit of archers is going to be a good fix for a lot of their list.

You are absoultly correct, I was worried about them to begin with but now im hoping my oponents take lots of units of these. (they have a max of 10 per unit) all those points are just easy pickings with some well placed spells. They also cannot march if they are not within 12" of the general. Only the general always march now. Van hells cannot be spammed anymore so easy to dispell.

I love the new book, it has a lot of character and flexibility without being broken. I friend of mine who is just starting VC nearly abandoned them because he was expecting the sort of broken crap that 40K turns out with their new books. This book is however a headache to create a good list with, but has the potential to punish a lot of standard army builds.

Playing VC should be fun again once its players get to grips with the new book.

[Dante valentine]

I agree with the 40k nonsense these days.

Just out of interest..what would people do if they were fielding Dwarfs? Those Ethereal units are going to be a nightmare! (its unlikely even with a potent hero you are going to win combats and you are buggered when they start running through you!)

D

[Aerrone]

I agree with the 40k nonsense these days.

Just out of interest..what would people do if they were fielding Dwarfs? Those Ethereal units are going to be a nightmare! (its unlikely even with a potent hero you are going to win combats and you are buggered when they start running through you!)

D

I think people are making too big a deal out of the VC Ethereal units. They all cap out at 10 models max and have no banners. They're also all really expensive per model so the larger the unit(s) are, the easier the rest of the army is to deal with. Sacrifice something to tie up larger ethereal units (you should be able to retain steadfast for a while if taking on the ethereal unit solo) and crush the rest of the army.

One or two magic missiles will whittle most ethereal units down to a managable size quickly.

For Dwarves, doesn't the anvil have a direct damage option? Besides that, runed grudge throwers (so their attacks are magical) should be pretty effective. Runed cannons and bolt throwers can also be effective.

The only VC ethereal unit that can move through other units are the Hexwraiths and they're arguably the easiest ones to deal with (only 1W each and 1A each, not including steed). Hit these guys in the flank with a ranked unit and they're done for.

VC players can't make any of their vampires ethereal anymore, so those will be hanging out in non-ethereal units. Crush those, the general (and all other Lore of the Vampires wizards in the army) and the ethereal units will crumble away.

[Rabidnid]

Just out of interest..what would people do if they were fielding Dwarfs? Those Ethereal units are going to be a nightmare! D

You're missing the obvious. They're Dwaves, who cares if they can't handle the new VC army. It will just give them something else to whine about.

[Geist]

Well look at that. My forecast of new VC are not to worrie about seems to be correct. I am very sad by the majority fear mongers and wolf screamers that poked up in this thread. Druchii, man up nut up and no more toiling of doom until you have hard fact in your grubby mitts.

[Malmorte]

you can read about hte new VC book here http://lkhero.blogspot.com/2012/01/8th- ... eview.html

and here http://www.vampirecounts.net/Thread-So- ... e-new-book

just my 2 cents worth...
from Lords downward....I think they can make ferocious a vampire lord with a magic weapon (eg ogre blade and talisman of preservation), vampiric powers such as quick blood(ASF) and of course red fury that will be able to tear through just about anything in an instant.
Ghoul king also looks nasty. Wight kings and vampires as heroes are still solid.

Core.
Zombies are still a good tarpit, but I think the new, cheaper skellies outperform them. Crypt ghouls are as before.
dire wolves have +1 s on the charge agains and count as core.

Specials
Grave Guard-one more point than a crypt ghouls, still have banner of the barrows, S4 T4, hvy and a shield and keep KB. Solid, but no more drakenhoff banner so not broken!

Hexwraiths, expensive, but a nifty ability, S5 magical/flaming from each one will spell doom for CoK or Hydras, but a Lifetaker or magic missile will kill them off !

Black Knights....much cheaper, as old and barding and lances are upgrage now.

Spirit Hosts-cheaper !

Vargeists and Crypt Ghasts are tough. like ogres on steroids.

Rare
Varghulf-a bit cheaper
black coach-same, chepaer, so can still cause problems
terrogheist-as before...that shriek that has no S value will hamburger and pendant characters on their own ie on pegasus ! But Rxbs will put the beast down !
Blood Knights...heres a slight worry...cheaper, and with 5 initiative, meaning they will swing and when they do, things will die, and still have the banner of blood keep !

Magic-again, they have similar spells, but no necromancy BS of cast the same thing twice....vanhels has been nerfed. Invocation of Neh works on cavalry nicely as well now.
And, a good spread of vapiric powers.

All in all, I think they are a solid book, good but not broken, and worthy opponent. A good Vamp lord, core skellies, a block of GG, and some Black knights or Bloodknights or hexwraiths, and a black coach and terrogeist and they have a fearful army !

[Setomidor]

I'm playing both VC and DE and had a run with my VC army a few days ago.

Some learning points;

• Hexwraiths are almost unplayable if they get outside 12" from the general. 8" move is too short to walk through units, as they have a 2" base and need to end up 1" apart from all enemies they have to start within 5" of the furthermost edge with the entire unit.
• I played the Lord mentioned above with Red Fury, Quickblood, Ogre blade, 4++, etc. Yes he'll kill a lot, but he's also roughly 450 pts if mounted and lvl 1. That means you can't have any other Lords at 2500 pts, so you have to upgrade him to a Lvl 4 if you want any higher level mage and then you have a 550 pt wizard with the potential to miscast.
• General has to take Lore of Vampires which is very biased towards the shambling-horde-with-buffs approach. Only Gaze of Nagash as missile, and Nr 6 spell is total crap.
• VC generals have no means of protecting against killing blow apart from 4++ items. Hello Cauldron.
• Master Necros are cheap high wizards but only have LD of 8 and are easily sniped. I'm expecting to see more of those than fighty lords due to the points cost.
• The general is pivotal to VC armies. The 12" march bubble is a lot worse than you'd think, because if you have a mounted fighty lord and charge with him you'll leave the rest of the army behind (since you move before they do and the 12" range is measured at the start of the move for each unit)
• Invocation cannot heal characters or mounts, only the lore attribute can.
• Spirit Hosts are 1+ units for 45 pts, you'll always see three of these.

So what am I planning for my Dark Elves?

• Cauldron for 5+ Ward or Killing blow is a must.
• Assassin with Manbane Rending Stars standing in spears with Flaming banner is looking real good (they're mundane eq. and so benefit from Flaming). Will be a great asset in taking down Terrorgheists / Vargulf / Vargheist / Crypt Horrors / Mortis Engines, and if opponent doesn't pick Gaze then he can roam freely after Terrorgheists / Banshees are gone. Don't forget that an assassin in any unit makes them stubborn if within the Cauldron range.
• Death lvl 4 is tempting to snipe those Master Necros, Banshees, Terrorgheists, etc. Purple Sun is great too. Lifetaker / Darkstar Cloak / Pendant is what I'm looking at.
• Looking at a Lvl 2 Fire with Ruby Ring and Tomb of Furion. Good chance to get Flaming Sword or Flame Cage, in addition to double fire balls.
• Troop wise pretty standard, in my case that means a huge unit of Executioners backed up by shades / harpies / spears / crossbows / hydra. I also would like a small unit of Witch Elves, who are points efficient against VC.

[Gastronauticon]

Setomidor: Good post. Will make sure to keep this in mind.

If 4+ ward is the best they can get, then Cadaverous Carcass is gone, right? Cauldron is indeed a must of so. How huge is your huge Exec unit? Might consider one of those given that there is a lot of stuff out there handing out ASL these days.

[Setomidor]

Yeah, without being too negative I'd say that most of the VC specific items are merely curiosities. There are two bound spells, Banner of Barrows / Screaming banner and Nightshroud which are fine, but other than that I wouldn't take any. Almost true also for Vampiric Powers, come to think of it :) Red Fury and ASF powers are nice, and you can also build a Fear-bomb, but other than that, meh.

I like to bring 40 Execs backed by Cauldron. Musician is a must of course, but banner and Champion can probably be left home.

I'm surprised I don't recognize your nickname, since we both seem to be from Umeå. :)

Edit: Aha, I do recognize your Witches however, hi!

[Phierlihy]

I watched a game last night in which three blocks of 30 zombies hit the Dark Elf lines. One unit got hit with Witch Elves, took 19 casualties which would have been worse if they hadn't had regen, and the next phase was back up to 31 models. Engines kicked in along with a few screaming banshees kicked in and ASF zombies finished it off. One of the other blocks actually get squished after four rounds of fighting and the Vampire Count said "you just earned 132 victory points!" I'm not crying broken but this is a possible tier 1 book.

New beautiful models, fun rules, exciting characters - what's not to love?

[Setomidor]

phierlihy; I suppose he had dual Mortis Engine support for 5+ Regen and some AOE effects? Why did he allow them to get that close?

Actually, I've also been looking at a dual Engine army and the Engines alone will wreck Elves if left unharmed. However, they're 5W T5 regen and Large target and at least one of them should be shot down before reaching combat unless the VC player goes first and successfully triggers a full advance using AOE Van Hels.

The engines are actually the prime reason I think that flaming Rending Stars is the way to go for DE, an Assassin should reliably inflict two wounds on a Mortis Engine per turn, also removing regen to make it considerably more easy to shoot down.

[Dangerous Beans]

Great posts Setomidor - thanks for the input, keep us apace of any other findings/tips you discover. I indeed had a flick through the book for a short while on sunday and quite enjoy the variety - the fear bomb trick looks quite nasty particularly as it can be repeated in other units with a vampire leading them. I am intrigued though as to how a vamps player would be dumb enough to let one of our infantry units (with hidden assassin) read his engines without blocking its advance?

That said, the crucial point with vamps has always been: kill the casters - sure zombies will be sick when theyre recovered by 2D6+4 and gaining ASF (corpse cart?), so snipe off their casters: death lore will become a fairly nasty tool as Purple Sun OBLITERATES so many of their units, combined with crossbow fire to finish off these enemies and even dark magic with its soul stealer/black horror spells we should stand a good chance of killing their units off wholesale: critical when youre trying to ensure none of the buggers get back up!

Oh and flaming witches should be pretty fun haha!!

[Setomidor]

I am intrigued though as to how a vamps player would be dumb enough to let one of our infantry units (with hidden assassin) read his engines without blocking its advance?

The engines powers are actually quite short ranged; the regen and damage aura is 2D6 + turn number, and the Banshee vail is 8". Hopefully, this will force the engines to advance close enough to be killable.

That said, the crucial point with vamps has always been: kill the casters

Totally agree, the necros has to go -- and fast. Dark Lore could be very nice indeed, too bad Chillwind doesn't work on Banshees.

One more detail is that the only way to combine Dual Mortis Engines with a Terrorgheist below 2660 pts is using either one Engine as a Necro mount or the TG as a Ghoul king mount (unlikely). If necro is mounted on Mortis, the Necro should be exposed for ranged attacks and since mounts cannot be healed reliably, it makes the engine easier to kill.

On that subject, reading the ETC forum on war hammer.org.uk people seems convinced that Dark Elf armies with Dark + Shadow Death lore (one Lvl4 each) is the way to go, to the point that they're considering restrictions on dual Lvl 4s. Can anybody enlighten me as to why this is so good? :)

[Dangerous Beans]

The engines powers are actually quite short ranged; the regen and damage aura is 2D6 + turn number, and the Banshee vail is 8". Hopefully, this will force the engines to advance close enough to be killable.

I personally think lobbing a purple sun over the thing - preferably into the rest of their army, is the best trick Although saying that am I correct to remember that it is only Ld5? So even the basic Death spell could hurt, or lobbing fireballs repeatedly at it could do a little damage too...

In fact - throw a fireball (2d6 version so ya don't waste all your dice) to rid the regen (likely only 1 or 2 wounds) and then Spirit Leech whatever is left

edit: can you link or PM me the ETC druchii discussion about dark/shadow/death - sounds like it could be a viable topic to be brought to light here: dual level 4s seems a little excessive at 2400pts though hey?!

[Phierlihy]

The other issue when dealing with Vampire Counts are there are no half measures. When you must kill something, you have to do it in one turn. Otherwise it will just be healed back up the following turn.

Yes, in the game I referred to there were two engines. Between Master of the Black Arts and the Black Peridot, magic was just ugly...

[Ichiyo1821]

Well it's been that way against VC. That is my motto when fighting them. If you are going after a VC unit, hero, don't still till it's dead to the man. you don't leave 5 or 7 models left, you wipe em out in one fell swoop. That's the part about them. Once you've managed to killing their units one at a time in the most efficient way possible things become so much easier.

[Setomidor]

Dangerous Beans; I've tried to ask why they think that combo is so good (find link below), but so far I haven't got a real answer; just something a long the lines of "it's the best option at the moment".

All this based on a single Italian Dark Elf player who did really well (scored 104 out of 120 BP) with this list. I can see it working better in t the ETC though, as it probably kills a lot of other Dark Elf lists.

I've actually been thinking about this combo quite a bit and to some extent it makes sense; the Shadow lore is quite weak in the initial turns of the game because of the limited range. It's game winning in later parts of the game when combat has begun, and Pit of Shades is of course nice to stop other peoples Hydras.

Dark Magic on the other hand is very good early on, Blade Wind can inflict wounds on enemy casters, chill wind can stop shooting, Doom bolt can inflict some wounds etc. The low casting values and a Lvl 4 means you can go though all four spells almost using one die each. If you roll poorly, use the dagger. If the enemy Lvl 4 tries to dispel an fails -> no more dispelling for him!

I can see two very nice combos too; -S and then Black Horror is nasty. -T and then Steal Soul is equally nasty. Strenght 2 hits with no armor save is quite dangerous if you only got T1!

I'm actually considering playing the exact same army tomorrow against a friend of mine.


http://warhammer.org.uk/phpBB/viewtopic ... 5&start=90

[Dangerous Beans]

Has anyone else had any games against the new Vamps yet? Fancy reporting your findings in the battle reports forum? I find you can learn more by writing things up in some detail on there - even more so if you can provide photos/diagrams

@ Sentomidor: Yeah indeed - they're not exactly giving you any helpful comments on that thread are they? Seems quite patronising frankly - what muppets! I'll have a read through the whole 4 pages in the next while...

edit: much of what I'm reading feels somewhat like unnecessary whining by players who felt they should have placed better than they did! Sorry if that seems a little harsh.

I wrote an article for the draich some time ago about what lore combos and spells work with one another (spent a bloody age doing it too!)

The link for which is HEREif you were interested To be honest though it really comes into its own in Storm of Magic games when you have far more power dice to play with