Post: #1

So, i have to post this list in order to keep track of my progress i can make with TK in 8th. Being that last battle was a disaster and i need to get things on track.

Lits
2K

Tomb king - flail, armor, wizarding hat?
Tomb king - flail armor, 50pnt of magic armor/wardsave
liche priest - survival equipment

30 skeleton bowmen + FC + banner of flaming attacks
6 chariots + FC and banner of cursed word

4 ushabtis (fielded 2x2)
2 tomb scoprions

2 screaming skull catapults.


Now i got 125 points left. I was thinking of making a 15 strong skeleton warriors unit. Purpose would be to bunker hyrophant and negate ranks when my big block of archers are in combat, or to hold up units that try to charge my SSC. (placing of the liche priest would be troublesome, but not undo-able i guess)
OR
take a tomb prince to run along with the 6 chariots (making 5 chariots + prince) to get a lot more punching power and incanctations of move/smite on the chariots.
not shure which to choose. but i guess ill be going for the tomb prince option

Dual Tomb Kings,
High T. 1 general with wardsave (tarpit kind of) and 1 king that will act according to the lore he chooses.
Liche priest tries to stay clear from harm.
ushabti's would be my main hammer unit as 4 of them would work wonders.
big fire shooting skeleton unit! deployed 10 wide, shooting all they can see should be awesome too. also a BIG spunge unit. especially with the king(s) in it.
scorpions will harass anything that is little and anoying.
SSC will go character hunting, hoping they miss there look out sir roll and scoring a HIT! on the scatterdice.

Generally spoken, i think TK benefit a LOT from big units. small units dont cut it anymore thanks to shooting and the 2 ranks flank negating...
thats why ive got the big skeleton block and big chariot /ushis unit.
also, when casting a smiting, effects will get bigger and bigger when the unit is bigger. so thats a nice + too.
however, mass-effect units such as final transmutation will get very nasty... but thats mainly magic only... if i make a lot of small units. ill get in trouble with shooting/cc... and this way only magic... sounds good to me. what do you think?

so, opinions? tactics? flaws? please comment. this sunday, ill go into battle with the mighty tombkings once again!

Post: #2

As much as I love my Tomb Kings, I've yet to see them effective at all.

I think your chariots will be a little better now due to large units (more impact hits), but they will be a lot worse because of those same large units (more return hits & steadfast).

With your army, you've got
* 4 D6 incantation (kings)
* 1 2D6 incantations (liche)
* 1 D6 incantation (prince)

For a total 7 dice of incantations. Add to that the average of 2 dice (say 7) and it seems like a lot of dice for the magic phase. However, the two spells you get can be pretty lack-luster, and your incantations, with no level bonus are going to be dispelled very often.

The SSC can be brilliant, but with the re-rollable leadership tests in virtually every army now, they don't make things run as often as they used to. Coverage wise they have improved, the since they allow armor saves I think that it's a net loss overall.

That leaves you with 30 archers (which are still poor because they are only S3) and the 4 Usabti (which can be pretty brutal).

I'm hoping that the Scorpions see more use than last edition, due to the 4+ Look Out Sir rules, so picking out mages should be a bit easier, but I'm not convinced yet. Truthfully, I'm not interested in playing my TK under this edition. I don't enjoy losing that often..

Post: #3

Double-tapping SSC's are foul, especially now that there is no range guessing.

I'd also try more ushtabi and fewer chariots. Do you have enough points for 2 units of 3? You don't lose much in range, and you'll have much more killiness. Also, as they are constructs, they don't crumble as much on the off chance they lose, and they have relatively high Ld to fight off General Death. The downside is that you can't join the unit with characters, so you're looking at a trade-off there.

You know the movement incantation, so you'll be sure to get the critical charge in whenever you need it.

With the new TLoS rules, Casket of Souls should be pretty good too.

There are some pretty hefty lists that have come out of Oz, maybe check them out.
Have fun!

Post: #4

Hej there fodderboy.
i dont understand your sentence
"There are some pretty hefty lists that have come out of Oz, maybe check them out."

As for the ushabtis vs chariots. the main reason i start playing TKs would be the chariots. it would be a big de-motivater to play them chariotless... i need at least 4 but better would like 2x3 at least! only 240 points you get some decent impacthits. 3d3 S4 impacts with 9 wounds. I think these days we shouldnt see them as a game winner, but more as a really large single boar chariot or something :P

also, i upped the magic a bit with 2 liches and some bound spells... should work more in my favour in the magicphase

So this being said, this brings me to THE LIST!

-Tomb king
-Scorp armor
-spear of antharak
-collar of shapesh
-shield
(classic build, pretty awesome. should be real cool to convert... "300" style)

Tomb King
-great weapon
-glittering scales
(decent guy i think, for his points and abilitys. kind of suicidal since hes the only one with a real high strenght. His role would be to get in contact with ogres, they have lower WS, so needing 5's to hit while he should slay them quite easy)

Liche priest (hierophant)
enkhils kanopi
Ironcurse icon

Liche priest
Hieretic jar
ring of ruin
offensive caster

30 Bowmen
Full command
banner of undying legion

24 tomb guards
Full command

3 chariots
3 chariots
2 tomb scorpions
1 screaming skull catapult


So, i got 111 points left
here are some options im considering
- squeezing in a bonegiant for a tomb scorp and cutting on the magic items of the liches. Or leaving out the second king, though hes pretty awesome. Or leaving out a unit of chariots and bumping the other unit to 4 chariots
- putting in another screaming skuller (though im not fond of using 2...)
- putting in some swarms, tunneling could be nice.

I dont really have a plan yet with this army :/ since i dont know the rules that well yet. but i need something solid to learn TKs in 8th edit...

so the real question would be, what to add?
- bone giant
- swarms
- screaming skull catapult

Im opting for the bonegiant myself. high T/S/W and not to forget, thunderstomp! whereas swarms and skullpult dont really add to my army since i got loads of S3 attacks...

Also, switched out the ushis for the Tomb guards since i need some place to put my general/other tomb king and liches. otherwise all the characters would be in a 30 man big skeleton bowmen unit :/

pleasy discus a bit, you know, so i can go and buy a ridiculous amount of models to build a custom bone giant and some awesome tombguards and play with them! (yes,... the little kid inside me is taking over)

please help!

Post: #5

I'd also go with the Bone Giant - you need something to do some heavy lifting, especially now you've lost the Ushabtis.

Another point of note - if you're struggling for places to put all of your characters in units, try and squeeze points for a Chariot for one of the TK's

Post: #6

I'll admit to not having played Tomb Kings myself, but have watched a few games my brother has played with them, and so am just going to throw in my 2c.

- A High Lich Priest is really handy, +2 dispell levels and he can still cast 2x incarnations (so same as 2x lich priests for only a little more points)

- Ushapti are game breaking units. Tomb Scorpions are too, but ideally you'd want to have both in your army if you can manage it. As you need something for your opponent to be scared of, and Ushapti pack a nasty punch. Remember, if you go 3 wide, the second rank is getting 3x supporting attacks per model!! Units of 6 Ushapti are brutal!! Most games I've seen my brother play, these are what won him the game (The other games it was his tomb scorpions(GG Killing Blow on my Vamp Lord from Scorpion lol))

- Casket of Souls is handy too, seems it almost never goes off, but everyone saves 2-3 dispell dice for it. Which then means that all of your other spells go off. Some opponents even try to kill it, which is usually just a waste of time from what I've seen.

- Chariots don't seem that useful compared to Light Cav. As their charges aren't particularly devastating, they aren't getting as many shots off per turn, and they can't negate rank bonuses. Also they are easy targets to kill. They do look cool though I'll give them that.

Anywho, just a few things to think on, as with any army list, it's often not about the good things you want to put in, but the good things you need to sacrifice in order to get them in. And 2000 points fills up pretty quickly.