Post: #1

Well, this weekend I faced my friend’s lizardmen with the vampire counts I borrowed (ironically from him). I wanted to try the general feel of the army to see if there was a chance I might want one when the new book comes out in january. So here follows the battle report for my very first match with vampires.

Vampire counts

Lords
Vampire lord
- Forbidden lore
- Master of the dark arts
- Summon Ghouls
- Cadaverous curiass
- Black periapth
- crown of commandment (which I forgot for the entire battle!)
- helm of the damned (the 4+ WS thingy)

Heroes
Necromancer
- Van halls

Wight king
- Dragonhelm
- Sword of kings

Wight king
- BSB (Drakken)

Core
30 Skeletons
- Full command
- Hand weapon

29 Ghouls
- Ghast

19 Skeletons
- Full command
- Lichbone banner

Special
23 Grave guard
- Full command
- Banner of the barrows
- Great weapons

Rare

Varghulf

Terrorgheist

Black Choach

Lizardmen (Roughly)
Lords
Slaan
- Focused rumination
- Lore of fire
- Ixti grub

Oldblood
- Sword of bloodshed
- Maiming shield

Heroes
Scar veteran
- Great weapon

Scar veteran
- Additional hand weapon

Scar veteran
- Hand weapon and shield

Core
20 saurus warriors
- Full command

24 skinks containing 3 kroxigors

10 skink skirmishers

10 skink skirmishers

Special
20 temple guard
- Full command
- Razor banner

3 terradons

Rare

2 salmanders

2 Razordons

Deployment.

Lizardmen.

(From right to left)
Razordons, skink skirmishers, block of saurus with scar veteran with shield, the temple guard containing the slaan, a scar veteran with great weapon and the oldblood. Next came the skink unit with kroxigors, then the salamanders, another unit of skink skirmishers, and a unit of terradons behind them.

Vampire counts.

(From right to left)
I deployed my army in a straight line, having a plan for how to move them about. First the black coach, then the ghouls with the necromancer among them. Then came the Grave guards with the two wight kings, then the small unit of skeletons containing my vampire lord, followed by the larger skeleton unit, and after that rounded up by the varghulf and terrorgheist side by side.

Turn 1
Lizardmen.

Movement

The Lizardmen won the rolloff and went first. Movement phase was a simple matter of moving everything forward by a margin, with some fiddling about with the skinks.

Magic

The slaan cast the burning cage that makes me take damage if I move on my ghouls, I allowed that to pass since it did not hinder my plans overly much. He then attempted to cast firestorm on my grave guard, which I dispelled.

Vampire counts

Movement

The Varghulf and terrorgheist both flew forward, putting the bat in range to the skinks. The large block of skeletons, and grave guard moved forward and inward, closing of the small skeleton bunker to the view of the enemy. The ghouls remained where they were, due to the spell. My black coach moved slightly forward to put itself in charge range of the skink skirmishers.

Magic

I cast summon ghouls three times on the ghouls, raising some 8 of them. This I followed with attempting to cast pit of shades on his temple guard unit. He failed to dispel this, but it overshot his slaan, killing only 4 temple guard.

Shooting

My Terrorgheist screamed at the skink skirmishers, killing of all but 2 of them.

Turn 2

Lizardmen

Movement

Once again he ran his armies forward, putting his razordons in line to fire at my terrorgheist, and his skink skirmishers to fire at my terrorgheist and black coach. His Terradons moved over my choach, dropping rocks on it, but failing to wound it. These then set themselves, ready to flank my ghoul unit once the skink regiment did.

Magic

The black choach finished absorbing all the magic it could by now. He cast the flaming skull, attempting to kill some of my grave guard. He managed to kill two of them, and two of the skeletons in the vampires bunker behind, but also burned the skull of his own temple guard champion, which I found rather funny. He then cast burning cloak on his own unit of temple guard, and attempted to cast firestorm on my grave guard again, but I dispelled it.

Shooting

His razordons took aim at my terrorgheist, and despite getting of an impressive number of shots (18) he only managed to wound it once. His skirmishers attempt at the same with the terrorgheist and the coach resulted in nothing substantial.

Vampire counts

Movement

Doing something rather stupid, I charged the small unit of skink skirmishers with my coach. The ghouls now free of the spell, moved forward and to the left, closing the battle line in front of my skeleton bunker. My grave guard shifted to accept the charge of the temple guard, and the large skeleton unit prepared to get moved down by the incoming saurus. The terrorgheist and varghulf went their separate ways, the terrorgheist flying over the saurus unit to land behind the temple guard, the varghulf hanging back to flank or rear charge the saurus once it charged my skeletons.

Magic

Once again casting invocation on the ghouls, raising another 5 of them, and then bringing the grave guard back to full strength. Attempted to cast pit of shades on his temple guard, but he dispelled it.

Shooting

The terrorgheist verbally abused the temple guard, resulting in five of them shoving of in a huff.

Combat

Well, my oh so powerfull but wrongly placed black choach turned 8 of the skinks into mush and chased the other down, ending up outside the board unfortunately enough.

Turn 3

Lizardmen

Movement

It was time to get stuck in. His temple guard charged my grave guard, while his skinks/kroxigors and terradons charged my ghoul unit. His salamanders moved behind his temple guard, angling for a shot at my unengaged skeleton unit. His two remaining skink skirmishers and razordons continued to follow my terrorgheist around.

Magic

He cast the flaming cloak on his temple guard, attempted to cast the flaming sword of rhuin on his skinks and flame storm on the temple guard, but I dispelled them both.

Shooting

His Razordon put another wound on my terrorgheist, and his salamanders flamed away at my skeletons, felling about a dozen.

Combat

Skinks vs Ghouls
This combat turned out to be quite a disappointment. The skinks, scar veteran, kroxigors and terradons lashed out, felling 12 ghouls, and the ghouls in turn only managed to kill a single terradon and two skinks, making them crumble by another 11.

Temple guard vs grave guard
This turned out to be far more fun. My wight king shouted a challenge, and he accepted with the great weapon wielding scar veteran. The scar veteran wounded the wight king twice, and the king in turn managed nothing substantial (I forgot about his darn regeneration). The temple guard and oldblood had less luck though, and only three grave guard fell to them. In turn, my BSB and grave guard lashed out, killing a full 7 of the enemy. I won combat, but he was stubborn.

Vampire counts

Movement

My Terrorgheist charged the salamanders. My black choach failed to return to the battle since my sorry ass forgot him. The varghulf fiddled a little to give himself a rear charge on the saurus charging my skeletons next turn.

Magic

This turn I spent all my power dice raising some skeletons, but mostly ghouls back up again. 6 skeletons returned, along with 11 ghouls.

Shooting

My terrorgheist killed of a salamander and two skinks with some death metal.

Combat

My terrorgheist finished of the salamanders.

Skinks vs ghouls
Another terradon fell, along with three skinks. In return, 9 of my ghouls were turned to dust. I cumbled by another vast amount, leaving some 10 ghouls remaining in all.

Grave guard vs temple guard
This went better. In the challenge, his scar veteran finished of my wight king. However, my grave guard continued to perform exemplary and cut down another 6 temple guard, while only 2 fell in return. His stubborn test still held though.

Round 4

Lizardmen

Movement.

His saurus charged my skeleton warriors.

Magic

The slaan cast flame storm, killing two grave guard and five skeletons in my small bunker. The rest I dispelled.

Shooting.

Nothing really.

Combat.

His skink unit finished of my ghouls, and angled to face my small skeleton bunker. However, my grave guard cut down the last of the temple guard, and without the stubborn temple guard left, the slaan, old blood and scar veteran broke and ran. The Slaan was the army BSB, and so fell at once. The other two got away however.
The saurus did exceptionally poorly versus my skeletons, most of which had to do with me rolling two sixes in armor saves, and then another 5 sixes in parry saves. Two saurus were cut down, and I only crumbled by 7.

Vampire counts

Movement.

The varghulf charged the Saurus warriors. My terrorgheist flew over the skink unit, preparing to hit them from behind, along with the choach who re-entered the battle at this time.

Magic.

With the slaan dead I was looking forward to dominating this phase. I raised some 8 skeletons back up and then did something very silly. I cast pit of shades on the engaged saurus warriors. I figured that at worst I might loose some skeletons along with the saurus. Nope. Its scattered straight in the face of my own varghulf, killing him along with a meesely 4 saurus.

Shooting

The terrorgheist screamed at the skinks, killing 5.

Combat

The Saurus finished the skeletons and turned to face my grave guard.

At this point we ran out of time, but we both agreed that it ended in a victory for the vampire counts!
Mistakes I made come down to four things: Forgot helm of commandment! With it my ghouls would have thrashed the skinks, since everything in the unit except the scar veteran would have hit me on 5’s. Killing my own varghulf, nuff’ said. Letting the black choach get distracted by skinks, which could not hurt it, or anything else on that flank as it turned out. Again, that would have helped my ghouls stay alive. Not using the lore of shadow to its full potential during the battle. The only two spells I used during the entire battle was invocation and pit of shades.
In conclusion: If the new book and models look anywhere near decent come january, I am definitely getting my own army of vampires!