• It's time once again to ferret out those murderous vampires in a new VAU - Vampires Amongst Us. A cross between Cluedo and a roleplay, sometimes gory and often hilarious! Find out more and sign-up! here.

wuffingas saxon

Skeleton
Apr 16, 2009
57
East Anglia, UK
In the words of the discredited Glam rocker Gary Glitter "Its good to be back, so good to be back".

After a while away from VC playing various other armies I have decided to return to the undead for 2015. I have barely used VC in 8th but ran them fairly heavily in 7th. I am not desperately interested in a ET legion and am looking to stick with the vamp theme. I am an occasional tourney player but far from WAAC. What I need to do is make my old 7th ed fit for purpose for 8th (just as 9th beckons!!)

My box-o-tricks looks like this;

Characters

3 x mounted vamps
1 x Mounted WK (can be BSB)
1 x mounted vamp BSB
2x Vamps on foot (unpainted)
1x WK bsb on foot
1 x Vamp on zombie dragon (50x50 base) (oh yeah!)


Troops

Dogs x 5
Zombies x c80
Ghouls x30
'Ghulf x1
Hexwraiths x10 (recent acquisition)
BKs x 19
Bloodknights x 5
skeles x 48
Black coach
Corpse cart
Spirit host x6
GG x 30

10 infantry generic fillers
3 cav generic fillers

New Toys on the desk

Crypt Horrors x6
vargheist x6



My previous builds were (as you can probably guess) pretty cav heavy. It is Mousillion themed and also functioned as a Bret army. As a result I would like to keep some cav units in thematically but I am not wedded to BK bus + blender lord build.

So here are my queries;

1. What else (if anything) do I need to pick up for a decent 8th build
2. Since 7th there seems to have been a shift from ghouls to skeles. Is the current thinking that they represent better "core tax"?
3. What would be a good "beginner build" so that I can start to relearn the army.
4. Which of the above should I plan to leave in their boxes!?
5. Any general wisdom to a returning player?


I know that one piece of advice is going to be "pick what you like the look of" and I am with you there but I still want to be able to give the guys at the club a bit of a game while I relearn rather than leave them at turn 3 while I clear away all my toys and they wander off with a massacre and a short evening!

Thanks in advance for your thoughts chaps! I hope to post my progress (or lack of it) here kicking off this Friday with 2.4k against Empire.
 
Last edited:
Nov 13, 2013
927
Vancouver, Canada
8th VC basically has three competitive builds.

1) Vampires on Horses
Vampire Lord in with black knights. BK generally have the movement banner, VL generally has ogre blade, tal of pres, other trickster's shard, quickblood, red fury (S7 and ASF rerolls for maximum hit potential, S7 to wound most things on 2s and punch through armour, OTS to get past ward saves, red fury to get extra attacks).

He's typically paired with a wight king BSB with the Nightshroud, to guarantee rerolls and take the teeth out of anything that could threaten the VL.

Before people added extra hurt to the bus by adding red fury hero vampires with lances/etc. However they're kind of fragile for their points. Now with 50-50% lords being FAQ'ed you can just add a second vampire lord.

2) Vampires on Foot
Same as before, but your vampires lose their horses and go in a big unit of skeletons. They're cheap, raise easily, have parry saves, command, and want to be run 5-wide to minimize losses for CR purposes.

Compared to mounted vampires this is a much less agile build, and the vampires are more vulnerable (characters on monsters, or that are monsters, will get into challenges with them and stomp them to death...also base 4+ save rather than 2+).

However they're also anchored in the centre of your lines, so you get better use of core.

3) Crypt horrors and master necros
Double master necro on vampires, a pair of mortis engines, and two big bricks of crypt horrors make up this army. Less of a "punch your opponent in the dick" style of army and more of a "lock them up with units that just won't die and grind them away with mortis engines." It's cool if used well, and if you're running zombies those units will grow to be absolutely massive. Just make sure you have a good system for doign it (i.e. zombies on regiment bases of 4 models, or magnetized strips of 5 models).




Things you should buy:

Terrorgheists are a big win in this book. I'm also a huge fan of vargheists, and like running two units of 4 of them. They're tricky to use, but oh so wonderful when you figure them out (trick: never fight anything in the front with them).


Skeletons are, IMHO, the best core unit in our book outside of direwolves. I say this purely because they're the cheapest way to get access to high SCR and a champion. I've killed so much stuff with skeletons it's ridiculous, entirely on the back of the SCR that they add.

For instance, in my last game they killed a ~300 point chaos lord. He was equipped with a great weapon and a 1+RR 3++, which tanked my vampire lords until they ground them to death. But then my skeletons charged into him, the champion challenged, the lord's horse kicked him to death before he could swing, and I beat him by charge+3 ranks+standard to 1 wound. LD5 break check without a reroll and he failed and I ran him down.
 

wuffingas saxon

Skeleton
Apr 16, 2009
57
East Anglia, UK
Cheers PRNoD, I had my list done for Friday before posting which does, indeed , contain some of your suggestions;

Lord L4 HA, Ogre blade, ench sh, tali of pres, quickblood, red fury, nightmare
WK, steed, sword of anti heroes,dragonhelm
Thrall, L2, Book of Arkhan, Red fury, charmed shield, sw of striking

All the above go in the bus. Ideally I would squeeze in another character for a full character wall but that is tight points wise.

Necro L2, scroll (in skele bunker)

Varghulf

5 Hexwraiths

9 BKs, barding, banner of the barrows

2 single spirit hosts


Core are where I am struggling a bit more. At the moment I have

35 skeles HWS and screaming banner (run deep)

31 Ghouls (run horde)

5 dogs with champ.


bit I have 3 problems, first it seems a very small army for VC although thats not such a bad thing from a movement and healing point of view, second it is highly "eggs in one basket" and third, on a similar note, I only have one unit that can really do any damage and that is vulnerable if it cannot wipe out an enemy on the charge or cause it to break.


I hear what you say about TG. These seem nailed on in VC lists at any touney I go to. Do you need to be running the scream list to make the best of them? Is it the anti armour that seems to make them a 1+? I am wondering how to fit them in my bret theme....
 

TMS

Moderator
Staff member
True Blood
Nov 26, 2008
4,662
Sweden
Hello @wuffingas saxon, good to see you back here. :)

If you have the models I'd suggest that you get another small bunker of zombies or skeletons to put the necromancer in. You'll want the brick of skellies in combat where they can help the rest of your army and you'll be sending the necromancer to certain death along with them.

And you should be able to fit in a terrorgheist just fine, I think. If your lord is supposed to appear bretonnian-esque it's not much of a stretch to say that he slays monsters left and right, but unlike regular brets he then reanimates his trophies and keep them as pets. :vampire2:
 
Nov 13, 2013
927
Vancouver, Canada
Cheers PRNoD, I had my list done for Friday before posting which does, indeed , contain some of your suggestions;

Lord L4 HA, Ogre blade, ench sh, tali of pres, quickblood, red fury, nightmare
Solid build. I'm quite partial to the Other Trickster's Shard, as the VL's main defense is that he murders most things before they can hurt him. Ward saves are the bane of Red Fury, and OTS helps that. 2+ save is fine.
WK, steed, sword of anti heroes,dragonhelm
WK really needs the nightshroud. It knocks ASF off whatever the VL is fighting as well as any strength bonus that might threaten him. It's basically necessary in any list with a VL.
Thrall, L2, Book of Arkhan, Red fury, charmed shield, sw of striking
I'd consider giving him dawnstone and book of arkhan instead, and just a lance for weapons. Run him in the front rank to push the WK to the second rank, so that he can make way wherever he's needed to take the teeth out of something mean.

All the above go in the bus. Ideally I would squeeze in another character for a full character wall but that is tight points wise.

Necro L2, scroll (in skele bunker)

Varghulf

5 Hexwraiths

9 BKs, barding, banner of the barrows

2 single spirit hosts


Core are where I am struggling a bit more. At the moment I have

35 skeles HWS and screaming banner (run deep)
Drop screaming banner for more bodies. It's not that great.

31 Ghouls (run horde)
Skeletons are better than ghouls IMHO. Ghouls are a bit too expensive when they're not run in the abovementioned double MN+ME build.

5 dogs with champ.
Drop the champ, and get 10-15 more of them.


bit I have 3 problems, first it seems a very small army for VC although thats not such a bad thing from a movement and healing point of view, second it is highly "eggs in one basket" and third, on a similar note, I only have one unit that can really do any damage and that is vulnerable if it cannot wipe out an enemy on the charge or cause it to break.

Needs terrorgheist(s) to knock out nasty things the bus is fighting. Also to take stress off it. Varghulfs are cool but really don't have squat on a terrorgheist outside of a comp environment.


I hear what you say about TG. These seem nailed on in VC lists at any touney I go to. Do you need to be running the scream list to make the best of them? Is it the anti armour that seems to make them a 1+? I am wondering how to fit them in my bret theme....
No. I only take one. They get hammered on comp but for good reason. Run alongside a bunch of levels of LoV and they're super easy to heal back up.

It's not so much the anti-armour that makes them great as the ability to "fix" things. The BK bus hits like a truck but it's actually much more fragile than you'd think. There are many ways to mitigate a VL (ward saves, notably), and once you've done that just stack SCR against the bus and grind it away. Terrorgheist fixes that by screaming off the things holding up the VL, or the bus, or anything else that might be bothering you.


It's also a huge fire magnet. Every cannonball, stonethrower rock, and most spells will be directed at the TG until he dies. And if he doesn't die then all those spells you were going to cast anyways have the added bonus of healing him back up.

Theyre dead points in many matchups, where there's no high points-per-wound density models that they love screaming at, or lots of cannons / poisoned shooting to take them off easily, so I only like running one. But when your opponent can't deal with them they'll wreak havoc.
 

wuffingas saxon

Skeleton
Apr 16, 2009
57
East Anglia, UK
Thanks for the feedback guys.

I have dropped the ghouls for now although I am not sure they will stay gone. A minimum 29 poison attacks (against 5 wide infantry) from T4 unbreakable troops seems a good deal for the points but I bow to your wisdom. I will report back!

I now have 2 units of skelebobs (one 0f 40 another of 39- I will be using GG to proxy) together with a little bunker of 21 Zombies with muso for the necro to hide in. I have kept the banner for now as I would like to try it out for myself, not disbelieving you in any way but I just like the sound of it. I kind of wonder how these guys avoid bleeding SCR into any combat they are involved in- Do they really take less than 6w per turn?- and so am yet to work out how I am going to use them beyond tarpitting but I am hoping all will become clear!

I have popped NIghtshroud on the WK and given him a mundane lance. I think I will try your baby vamp build although I am nervous about a 3 up on such an important character.

Unfortunately all of this leaves me 13pts over! As it is a friendly I dont think my opponent will mind and it will at least let me test out how the big boys swing while I jiggle the list for next time. I love my 'gulf (mainly the model) but he and hexwraiths may have to go if I am to make room for a terrorgeist.

What would you think the minimum size for a BK bus in this sort of build. I cannot see it being viable under 9 which gives 2 ablative wounds before it cannot break steadfast.

I am also itching to try out the horrors and vargeists so much fun is yet to be had!!
 

wuffingas saxon

Skeleton
Apr 16, 2009
57
East Anglia, UK
...also, help me out here; santa brought me 3 skin wolves which I was planning to use as crypt horrors. CH do not seem to get much love so should I use then on 50x50 to go into direwolf units as "fillers". I think they would look pretty cool but it is a question of where they will get most use- no point having a cool model that never comes out of the case after all!
 

Sception

Master Necromancer
True Blood
Sep 23, 2009
2,714
Crypt horrors are actually quite good as anvils or especially cannonball catchers for big things like mortis engines or, say, nagash. But they want to run in units of 6 to 8 or so, three isn't really enough to run them. So unless you have any expectation of picking up 1 to 2 more sets of those wolves, then yeah, they're probably better as dire wolf fillers.
 

wuffingas saxon

Skeleton
Apr 16, 2009
57
East Anglia, UK
Cheers Malisteen, 3 was 6 as I was basing them in a diaroma, but I am starting to think that they (werewolves) may get more use in with the direwolves. I have just rummaged in my bitzbox and have realised that I actually have 10 DW, so by dropping the skinwolves onto 50 x 50 I can have 3 units of 5 which seems, from what I have read on here, to be a pretty good use of our core tax. The diaroma will hopefully be useable for my "vargheists" when the arrive.
 

wuffingas saxon

Skeleton
Apr 16, 2009
57
East Anglia, UK
So, somewhat belatedly, here is what happened on Friday: First my clubmate thought that I was bringing OK, had forgotten to make up his empire list so brought along VC instead! Furthermore his list had a great deal of similarity to my own!!

All in all in was not the best acid test for me but it was helpful to play against someone more up to date than me with VC.

What I learned;

1. Loving the big deep skele units. one held up his blender lord and mini vamp + Varghulf long enough for me to get my own gulf in, kill his and pop his baby vamp on CR! Another helped see off his ghouls. What is unclear of course is how well they would perform against blocks of more effective troops.
2. Don't run 'gulfs (or any monster I suspect) into Zombies. He did. It stuck all game!
3. Hexwraiths can be epic. These did a real number on his Blackknight bus killing everything except the characters and Champ just by flying over them. put 3 wonds on his second gulf too so my own could finish it off. I doubt this would be repreated against another player who would have offed them with magic missiles etc.
4. Not getting the direwolf love yet. I prefered the spirit hosts in the job of redirection (not that I have ever been ever so good at that bit of the game anyway)
5. One killy unit still feels very exposed. I need another threat or a better player will just throw everything at my bus.
6. Still love the Vargulf! He is just too pricey when compared to the TG I guess.

I came out of the game with a decent win but I still want to run the list again against a few other armies to see how it rolls before I start changing things. Hexwraiths are currently on my "swap out" list despite their excellent performance but no other obvious candidates yet.
 

Patrunkenphat7

Grave Guard
Mar 4, 2014
226
Spirit Hosts are great, but the reason why Dire Wolves are insanely awesome chaff/redirectors are:
1. Vanguard
2. Movement 9

But most importantly - they are core! Our core is really only useful for tarpitting, chaffing, and redirecting. Since we have 25% to spend on this, you really want to spend minimal points on chaff in your other sections because your killing potential starts to dwindle.
 

Sception

Master Necromancer
True Blood
Sep 23, 2009
2,714
We can infantry bus w/ core as well. A blender lord puts out enough hurt to make up for lost combat res from a skeleton bus, taking advantage of the ranks to break steadfast. Especially if you block off a bit more of the front rank with a couple extra characters - cheap wight kings, ethereal wraiths or banshees, additional killiness from more vamps, or whatever.

And undead legions can cav bus with core skeleton cav, or take a meaningful ranged offence in the form of a big skeleton archer block if you pay for khalida to supplement them.

And if your regular opponents aren't always heavily armored, ghouls can be a meaningful melee block with even a little bit of character or magic support.

I really feel that our core options, while, yes, comparatively weak, as fits the fluff of the faction, are still somewhat underrated.
 

Patrunkenphat7

Grave Guard
Mar 4, 2014
226
Yeah our core is definitely not "bad" per se, but the fact that it is so poor at actual killing means that the other 75% of our army is precious because we need to use it as much as possible to deal damage. If you go up against something like WoC, 100% of their army is good at killing and wiping out our points. That isn't to say that you shouldn't take a Spirit Host or two, but getting chaff points out of the core allowance is nice.
 

najo

Mortarch of the Dark Soul
True Blood
Dec 23, 2012
2,046
Oregon
I think there's a Vampire Handbook around here too. Might be worth checking out ;)
 

About us

  • Our community has been around for many years and pride ourselves on offering unbiased, critical discussion among people of all different backgrounds. We are working every day to make sure our community is one of the best.

Quick Navigation

User Menu