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View Full Version : Warhammer newbie's starter Vampire Counts army...opinions?



WillyRapier
11-17-2010, 12:25 PM
Hey guys,

I'm new to Warhammer (almost totally...always stuck with the futuristiky alien stuff before (Eldar player to the core) but an looking to expand into Fantasy along with some guys from work. I've been looking at the Vampire Counts army becuase, talking to the guys in-store, it's a powerful army only if played right (and "if you get it wrong, whoa do you get it wrong!!") I like a challenge...

My starter idea for the army, after reading the rules and army book, is as follows:

Heroes:
Necromancer, with Tomb Blade and Gambler's Armour - Army General

Vampire, with Dread Knight power, Seed of Rebirth and Channelling staff.

Core:
Skeleton Warriors unit - 20 warriors including champion, musician and standard bearer - all with spears (necromancer above is leading this unit, hence Tomb Blade)

Crypt Ghouls unit - 15 ghouls including Ghast

Crypt Ghouls unit - 15 ghouls including Ghast

Zombie Horde - 20 Zombies including musician and standard bearer

Corpse Cart - using Unholy Lodestone when there is small chance of enemy magicians, otherwise Balefire to cause them trouble

Dire Wolves - 10 wolves including Doom Wolf

Rare:
Blood Knights - 4 Blood Knights with Banner of Hellfire, lead by the Dread Knight vampire

Total: ~1250 points

General tactics:
Two-pronged advance; the core slow units, under the command of the Necromancer, move up one side of the battle-field, considerably bulky enough to draw at least some fire from the main body of the enemy army. This secton will be placed depending on the enemy deployment (if the enemy deploy first). The necromancer will do the majority of casting, keeping the surrounding units topped-up as they get whittled by fire (given a few more points, would consider taking this up to full vampire status, and using Lord of the Dead to be able to increase the skele unit above starting size).

Quick Aside - the necromancer is the general so that the skeletons, zombies et all can march using the 12"-of-the-general rule.

At the same time, the blood knights with the Vampire, and the Dire Wolves will move up the other flank of the battlefield, moving fast and aiming for the maximum amount of damage. All being vampires, and being with another vampire to boot, the Blood knights can march constantly, as can the Dire Wolves if kept in range, so this should be a pretty fast-moving strike, with enough units to multi-assault and wipe rank bonusses.

Magic tactics
With five vampires in the Blood Knights unit (and the vamp himself channelling on 5+) and the necromancer, i should get a couple of extra channelled dice per turn, hopefully dispelling at least some of the enemy spells while enabling my necromancer to keep up ION casts. I can also use ION with any of the vamps in the BK unit should they take any wounds. The Vampire will know an additional spell (probably raise dead so that i can pop up a unit of ghouls behind the enemy before charging) that can be used when necessary too...

Any thoughts/advice? As i say, i'm a new player, so please forgive any naive mistakes i've made :confused:

Mattas
01-07-2011, 02:19 PM
Looks like a pretty stable list, though there are some changes I would like to make, give the necromancer a talisman of protection if you wish to give him a save, or why not the nightshroud? if you wish to cast magic with him you cannot have an armour (vampires are exceptions).
A second change would be to put the ghouls into a single unit for a better survival rate. you might want to swap the zombies for additional skeletons too but I dont think it's a necessity, they do make great meatshields :)
well... that's about what I had to say ^^

VB the small
01-07-2011, 02:51 PM
why the hell do you have tomb blade on your necromancer? it cost 25p and he only has one S 3 WS 3 attack. so lets say you're meting a unit of normal Empire Swordsmen then your necromancer will kill 0.165 swordsmen in each round of combat and it will take around 6 rounds of combat to kill a singel enemy... well spent points? so go back and re equip your necromancer:)