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View Full Version : VC hordes viable?



chaos.minion
07-16-2010, 12:20 AM
We all know skaven and goblin hordes are good and all...just wondering if skeletons/zombies have the "stuff to be effective hordes? With the helm of commandment there seems potential, though. Thoughts and comments are welcome.

Kieranator K82
07-16-2010, 02:39 AM
I don't play VC, but I do fear the zombie. As cheap, expendable troops that get resurrected like that (tries to snap fingers), a zombie horde certainly sounds viable. A hundred zombies = massive tarpit that won't die particularly easily.

Old_Paladin
07-16-2010, 01:06 PM
I'm not sure Vampires are the best army for hoards.
Skeletons are just too expensive for too little impact (90 points per rank adds up very fast).
Ghouls aren't much better from a hoard standpoint.

Zombies are cheap enough, but have really, really bad stats. Even if you give them WS7 and ASF, they're strength 2.

It would probably be best to make them 5 wide and have 10 ranks, and use a better fighting unit (like blood dragons) to do the damage. With so many ranks, nearly no enemy will get steadfast, and zombies get d6 hits per rank when the enemy tries to flee (and so many ranks will average 30-40 hits!), you also only need to get a single zombie into contact to use this tactic.

Cruor Vault
07-16-2010, 01:56 PM
The problem with VC in this edition is that their units were pointed out with auto break fear/terror in mind. Without that all the core units are grossly over costed.

50 Empire Halberdiers fighting 50 zombies should kill them all in 2 rounds of combat! Nearly 30 of the zombies will be dead by the end of the 1st round! While only 4-5 Halberdiers will die.

Halberdiers VS. Skeletons isn't much better. About 20 Skeletons will be dead by the 1st round of combat, but only 10 Halberdiers, at the end of the second round only 10 Skeletons remain, but 35 Halberdiers are still alive! Plus that Skeleton Hoard costs nearly twice as much as the Halberdiers!

I just don't think VC hoards are going to work in anything but the most friendly, low key environments. Forget about playing Tournaments with them!

Jwolf
07-17-2010, 12:34 PM
Played against 2 units of 30 ghouls and a unit of 50 grave guard (with Drakenhoff BSB) this week. The Ghouls aren't worth much, but the grave guard (backed by Mannfred and a Light Vampire were really awful to deal with. It's hard to keep ASF off of that unit when Manny is +6 to cast (he had 2 +1 to cast and dispel items), and big ASF killing blow units are somewhat problematic to deal with.

I would agree that cheap horde units aren't very viable for Vampires, though.

Winter12
07-19-2010, 04:02 AM
I played against Vampire counts the other day with my wood elves. The vampire player tried out a zombie horde (40 strong with the plan of adding more if needed). 8 Dyrads chewed up and spat out the zombies in 3 rounds of combat and only lost a single model. Admittedly he didn't get the chance to raise up more but they were crumbling so fast he didn't really see the point. I think hordes work better with killy units (Grave guard are a better choice in Vampire counts).

Xas
07-19-2010, 02:54 PM
ghouls work because they are good from a killy POV (2A, poison) and resilent enough to be viable (revive, t4, ws3). because of the nature of hordes I see a ghoul horde as a viable counter to most other infantry hordes. you have more attacks than them, better statline than most horde-ish enemy and can be revived. since almost no horde will be able to afford a good armor save your poor strenght isnt a problem.


graveguard on the other hand are deadly if you point them at the right target and/or support with spells. potentially 30 attacks, s4/6 with killing blow both in the magic phase and in combat are definatelly something to think about. especially since you can have ws7, a +1 to hit banner (effectively hitting every non-character on 2+) and a BSB with a regeneration banner that contributes another +2 (compared to the normal trooper that would take up the slot) attacks with s4/6 killing blow.

the points cost is the only thing that can make the grave-guard horde undesirable. unless you are fighting ogres or other Mounstrous infantry your "normal" unit of 5 wide, 4-6 deep will be enough with their 11 s6 attacks to deal with the elite-troops these guys are ment to take out.

carrotcolossus
08-03-2010, 11:08 PM
I agree with what has already been said. VCs is just too darn expensive to be able to turn out hordes easily. Zombies are useless and will get chewed by any other unit it the game in a pretty short order, now that you always fight in two ranks and can always strike back. They are ok against chariots or monsters, who don't have heaps of attacks but outside of that, I wouldn't ever field them. So for a horde sized unit, you're paying 120 points for what? A really crappy unit. Clanrats are only a point more each and they would trounce a zombie unit.

Skeletons are way too costly really to be doing hordes much. Having said that, I took a unit with HW+S and they lasted pretty well (due to rolling well for armour and ward saves) against a unit of Chaos Warriors for a couple of turns.

As Xas pointed out, ghouls do the job well and I'd agree, especially against lightly armoured opponents. The lack of banner isn't so much a problem if you can really hammer them with poisoned attacks.

I cannot wait for a new VCs book so that the massive overcosting can be taken out. Fear is now only a slight advantage, well and truly compensated by their crap stats. I reckon there is a good case for 1pt zombies and I reckon Skeletons could come down to 4 points without being too cheap. Grave Guard I reckon should be 9 points (8 is just a little too cheap for heavy armour and killing blow), black knights 16 points, dire wolves 7 points, ghouls 5 points, varghulfs 125, blood knights 40 points, wraiths 35 points (Terror isn't that great either) and Black Coaches (especially give the random nature of magic) about 150 points.

KriegXXIX
08-10-2010, 01:44 PM
Not sure that the undead are too overcosted. Regular skellies are probably too expensive, but ghouls are probably alright, and grave guard belong where they are as long as the Drakenhof banner is available. The fact you can take spells that heal your units back on every caster means your troops need to be slightly more expensive. Especially in light of the fact that you only get VP's for units that get completely wiped out. The Black Coach is really good since it can easily get to full strength within a couple of turns on every game. I have seen the VC do quite well so I don't think their are any fatal flaws in their book.

magnus
08-15-2010, 07:37 AM
Not sure that the undead are too overcosted. Regular skellies are probably too expensive, but ghouls are probably alright, and grave guard belong where they are as long as the Drakenhof banner is available. The fact you can take spells that heal your units back on every caster means your troops need to be slightly more expensive. Especially in light of the fact that you only get VP's for units that get completely wiped out. The Black Coach is really good since it can easily get to full strength within a couple of turns on every game. I have seen the VC do quite well so I don't think their are any fatal flaws in their book.

I have to agree with Krieg on this. The points cost of the VC includes afew very prominent advantages. First being that all your troops are Unbreakable, second they all cause Fear. As pointed out the second advantage is not as dramatic as it once was but it is still an advantage that can shift a combat. The third has been pointed out by Krieg in that you have the only troops that can "heal". All these factors mean that though the stat line of the VC may not be dramatic, you cannot put their points on par with other races which do not hold the same advantages.

Fueldrop
11-22-2010, 05:51 AM
skeletons with spears are a viable horde provided:
1) helm of command
2) Lore of beasts (wyssan's wildform)
from the same vampire is viable, just have them with a small unit behind.
end result: 41 attacks at WS 6 (may have ASF or even ASF and re-rolls, depends on the wind) ST 4. enemy is fighting an unbreakable T 4 unit with good weapon skill. this is even better if they fail their fear check, but even swordmasters notice WS 6.

if you want a hoard that's never let me down go grave guard with regen and banner of hittyness. not much can slow it down, even if they try to tarpit you with anything non-steadfast (which i generally don't find an issue after a few rounds in combat with a ST 4 killing blow unit that hits on 2's. odd, i know, but there you are).