Post: #1

Hi,

I just had a nice battle against Warriors of Chaos. It was quite funny and interesting, as both me and my friend had not played for ages so I thought I could write a bit about it. It was our first battle on 8 ed. rules and also first with the new VC. We didn't have any errata, and consulted the BRB over and over again, because of our poor knowledge of 8 ed. and little time to prepare better for the battle.

VC:
- Strigoi lord with Red fury, quickblood, ogre blade, potion of foolhardiness and dragonbane gem. Mlvl 1, lore of vampires.
- Vampire BSB with Red fury, talisman of preservation, heavy armour, shield, mounted on a barded nightmare and armed with a lance. Mlvl 1, lore of vampires.
- Necromancer with Master of the dead and Book of arkhan. Mlvl 2, LoV.
- 9 black knights, full command group and Banner of the barrows.
- 29 skeletons with full command and Banner of swiftness.
- 20 zombies, fcg
- 20 zombies, fcg again
- 52 zombies, fcg as above

Chaos:
- Chaos lord of Tzeentch on disc, with acid ichor, sword of might, crown of command, talisman of preservation, chaos armour, shield.
- Chaos sorcerer on a barded horse, chaos armour. He had the infernal puppet, biting blade and bloodcurdling roar. Mlvl 2, lore of fire.
- 5 chaos knights of Khorne, musician
- 5 chaos knights of Khorne, musician
- 20 chaos warriors of Khorne, full command group, chaos armour, halberds, Banner of eternal flame
- 30 marauders of chaos, fcg, great weapons, no armour whatsoever

Terrain:
The battle took place on 48"x72" table where we placed 5 terrain pieces using partly the BRB rules and partly our own. There were 2 hills, 2 forests and 1 magic circle, all placed more or less randomly.
The magic circle was slighlty scattered towards my left flank but still close to the centre, one forest was in the middle of my left flank inside the deployment zone, one hill was in the right corner of my deployment zone. Both the other hill and the other forest were on my far right flank, close to chaos deployment zone and the table edges.

We played the classic pitched battle scenario for the sake of simplicity.

Spells:
I rolled gaze of nagash and curse of years on my necro, but since only he could summon more skeletons, I swapped the gaze for IoN.
Strigoi lord rolled hellish vigour, but I thought he could be better off with IoN, so he ended up with it.
Vampire BSB rolled raise dead, but again I swapped it for IoN.

Chaos sorcerer using fire rolled for flaming sword and flame storm, but he swapped the sword for the fireball.

I rolled off better for both deployment, choosing table sides and going first.

I will describe the battlefield from my point of view after we deployed. The magic circle random placement had big impact on the layout of our forces. In conjuction with other terrain pieces, it forced chaos player to squeeze his hordes in a passage where they could not use their strength to the fullest. My deployment area was wider, but still we deployed rather in a line, opposite to each other.

My forces were (from my left flank): 20 zombies, 52 zombies (horde), 30 skeletons (horde), 9 black knights, and the other 20 zombies were placed behind, in the middle between 52 zombies and 30 skeletons. My general joined with skeletons, while BSB rode with the knights and the necromancer took his place in the 20 zombies that were put behind the main line.

Chaos forces (from my left flank): 5 knights, chaos lord on disc, and 30 marauders behind the two units, then 20 chaos warriors with the sorcerer, and then 5 knights.

Turn 1 (VC):
Nothing at the start of turn. Then no charge declarations, just movements. I was surprised with the powerful and ultramobile chaos lord. Following my first thought to cover his possible landing places with my charge ranges, I just moved everything but the cavalry 2 inches to the left. Wight cavalry silently wheeled forward and left to improve their charge arcs and protect the right flank. Magic phase was cool, I raised 36 zombies total with just 2 castings and a few skellies as well

Turn 1 (WoC):
Nothing at the start of turn, no charge declarations. Lord took a long flying march in front of his army line to land in the forest on my right, and threaten my right flank. Needless to say, he was unscathed by the trees. All other forces moved about 4-7 inches loosely forward towards my units. Magic phase saw the flame storm large template cast with 5 dice, and many poor zombies died to it. One wight was fried by a fireball. I sighed with relief.

Turn 2 (VC):
Nothing at the start of turn. I was afraid of the chaos knights creating a trap altogether with their lord, and trying to lure me into it. I judged that waiting for them to charge me and dictate my movement will not be good, and decided to charge them with my cavalry (and BSB inside). Luckily, they managed to reach the target and I hoped to break chaos line and come out of the dreadful lord charge arc. No more charges, further movements saw my 52 zombies advancing to the chaos knights on my left flank with full speed and a slight wheel, the skeletons used their extra movement to come 10 inches towards chaos warriors, and 20 zombies with the necro advanced steadily behind, looking through the gap between 52 zombies and the skeletons. The other 20 zombies did not have good position to manouver and they were left behind, reforming to guard the rear of the big zombie unit. Magic phase was insane. I summoned a dozen of zombies and a few skeletons to the units in the centre. Then my opponent dispelled vanhels from the book, and I had many dice, but little to do with them. No IoN-able target for BSB, no other spells, so I decided to cast the curse of years on the main chaos warrior unit. Using 5 dice I practically forced total power and the miscast roll. Which was of course the worst possible roll. 4 chaos warriors died to the curse, but the necro as well. Oh, and a dozen of zombies were destroyed in the explosion. I love the magic phase. Close combat: my BSB lance was made of rubber. Despite 4 attacks with Red fury I only managed to kill 2 knights, and he greeted me with 9 S5 attacks that hit mercilessly my vampire. Only thanks to his good armor and ward he survived with 1 wound left. Wights killed one more chaos knight, they did not pass the break test at -4, lost the frenzy and fled, but I pursued and destroyed them, riding 11 inches deep behind chaos battleline.

Turn 2 (WoC):
The main unit of warriors decided to charge my skeletons with the general, and the other chaos knights declared to charge the same target. Luckily, the warriors failed the charge by a tiny margin, while the frenzied knights proudly completed theirs. These moves theoretically opened some space for the marauders to come to my units (zombies! yay), but they thought it would be better to engage my pursuing cavalry, and reformed to face the wights' left flank. Chaos lord pivoted to watch the backs of wight cavalry from his forest hideout. Chaos sorcerer, who was going with warriors, cast the flame storm successfully, and killed some zombies when the template scattered and his magic missile hit and burned even more zombies in the big unit (only one he could see). He also shouted at the zombies (shooting) but failed to cause anymore casualties. The ensuing close combat saw my Strigoi killing all knights of Khorne due to Red fury, though I forgot to drink my magic potion!

Turn 3 (VC):
I forgot to drink my magic potion which could have granted my an additional attack for the lord. I declared to charge the marauders with my big unit of zombies, but fell short by merely half an inch, so only moved forward by 4. Skeleton unit successfully charged the warriors. 20 zombies continued to watch the backs of their comrades in the big unit, while the 20 zombies who previously accompanied the mad necromancer reformed to be able to do the same for the skeleton unit. There was little chance my cavalry could survive against 30 marauders with great twohanders, so I turned my tail and wheeled, marching as far away from them as I could. Again, this move took them out of the chaos lord arc of sight which I could only cherish.
Magic phase was rather uninteresting. My opponent dispelled everything I threw at him. And these were still just body parts for zombies... During the fight, I challenged khorne warriors with the skeleton champion to let my general fight R&F. Only a handful of warriors died, but noone hurt my lord. Of course skeleton champion was hacked to pieces as were a dozen of normal skellies. I lost the combat by 4.

Turn 3 (WoC):
I forgot to drink my magic potion... The marauders tried to charge the cavalry but were far from reaching them. The invincible chaos lord forgot to charge the wights as well. Magic phase was uneventful due to lack of viable targets, and the same with shooting (or shouting) phase. During the close combat I scored the few so much needed kills among the warriors, though my lord had to slash the champion in two (or in four) with his blade, rather than the sorcerer or his favourite R&F. A few skeletons died to warriors, but in the end it was a draw this time, mainly due to overkill.


Then we had to end the battle, because it took us too much time already, but it was a great game after all!

Casualties:
2 units of 5 khorne knights each
half+1 of the unit of khorne warriors

VC lost just the necromancer due to the miscast, but besides that only some zombies and skeletons, and 1 wight, and no unit below half of the starting number.

Victory for VC. But I guess we made some small errors and forgot things here and there, which could lead to a totally different outcome! An we played just not fast and long (just 3 turns) enough.

Conclusions from the battle:
- zombies scare away by their numbers and tarpitting ability
- skeletons are much harder to heal
- it is not good to swap interesting spells for IoN on all chars
- if the roll for the winds of magic is good, you need many casters and spells to use these dice, and your opponent will dispel everything cast by one wizard
- it hurts that the curse of years cannot be attempted at a higher casting level for better effects
- you don't need to bring big zombie units to the table, 40 is more than enough for start
- horde is not so good for zombies or skeletons unless they are buffed up by spells
- my opponent did not want to charge zombies at all, zombies haven't reached any target, and the big units did not score any wounds, so maybe I would be better off with a greater number of smaller units, because I could do more during the movement phase, better guard skeleton flanks, not that I lost something because of this, but skellies were in danger all the time, and another unit of 20 zombies could protect them - receive a possible flank charge and tarpit
- I had horde on 52 zombies and 29 skeletons, skeletons killed 1 chaos warrior and there were 18 left at the end, so next time either this unit should be bigger for horde, or give up this formation
- I took skellies mainly for the champion and with good results, so maybe it would be good to still field one unit


Please comment if you wish.

BR,
Veland

Post: #2

I run 80 zombies in horde form. I see it that if you lose combat by a lot, you are taking more casualties. Making your tarpitty-ness less successful. More attacks (horde formation) grants you the chances to get more wounds and prevent taking more casualties from instability. Now, if you get your unit knocked below, lets say, 35 models, you should reform to go deep in ranks to get more static combat res. So for what your are saying, small units of zombies less than lets say 60-70ish, need to be in deep ranks, you are correct. But large units of zombies for example, 80 models (only costs 250 pts with standard and mus.) should be in horde form to grant them chances to add extra combat res from attacks. Yes, you aren't res'ing as many models per turn because you aren't targeting 3 different units, but like you said with your spells. It is better to take variety than 3 of the same spell.

Post: #3

Nice report .
Shame the game didn't go on until completion but congratulations on the victory anyway.

I'm glad zombies are making a bit of a comeback this edition. Last edition they were less than useless for their points.