500 pt. blues

[Vlad the implier]

Well I just started Vc very recently and I've been getting slaughtered by my friends new Bratonian army. Hes uses a Pegasuse hero(don't remember real name) with 2 units of knights of the realm and 1 five man unit of knight errants where I use mostly 2 fifteen man skeleton squads, a naked corpse cart, and a vampire with the flayed hauberk. Like i said in the subject this is only 500 pt. friendly game but it is hard for me to do much damage with my skeletons against those armoured death knights. Do you guys have any advise on how to fight of these knights off?

 

[Jacques Dauger De Cavoye]

well in a 500 points match your gonna be hard pressed to beat his bret force. Skeletons are their for their static CR, and even then your fifteen man unit won't accomplish that very well. Anything with a good armor save is just gonna shrug off your Skellies str 3 attacks. You could possibly kill a few if you rolled well with death magic on your vampire, but other than that I don't see how your going to kill off cavalry o_o Your best bet is to go with a bit higher points cost game. Even at 750 you could start fielding some grave guard w/GW to add some actual killing power to your force. When you hit 1000 you could field some rare choices capable of killing those cavalry. To be honest VC just don't do so well in small point matches, are "horde" units are more expensive then they really are, and theirs not much of a way around it. Just keep building your army up and you will be able to stomp a cavalry force in no time

Cavoye

 

[Vlad the implier]

All right its not me that's stuck with the only doing 500 pt. game its the Bret friend that's stopping me from going higher points. So i'm really up a creek right now then huh. Oh well thanks for the advice anyway. But if anyone else has any advice I would appreciate it.

 

[Grish]

The 25% limit really hurts you as you cannot get much on your Vampire. I'd take a Summon power at this level, and keep him in a bunker. Scrap the Corpse Cart.

Take something like:

Vampire: Summon Ghouls = 115pts
2 x 10 Ghouls = 160 pts
18 Grave Guard = 234 pts
-Great Weapons

Put your formation like so:
(g is ghouls, G=Grave Guard, V=Vampire)

ggggg___GGGGGGG
ggggg___GGGGGGG
__________GGGG_
____ggVgg
____ggggg

Deploy as far back as you can. Hide the Vampire from Combat, use his Summon power to boost up the number of ghouls on the front unit. With a +2 to cast, that should really make things hard on him as it sounds like he'll have a +0 to dispel. Your Grave Guard are 18 strong, so hopefully can take a charge from Knights. Ghouls will have a hard time punching through their 1+ armour save, but after the charge they'll only be S3 (S4 for inner circle knights which he shouldn't have too many of). If you deploy well away from him, hopefully you can get up to 2-3 turns of summoning more ghouls.

It's the only strategy I can think of; the Grave Guard is the only unit with a high enough S to punch through knights.

 

[autti]

My initial thought, as it usually is on low point games, was a vampire with ability to raise unit beyond its starting size. However, I highly doubt you get 2-3 rounds of unbothered summoning from an army consisting entirely of mounted units. The unpredictable winds of magic make this tactic a risky one too.

Second thing to come in mind was ethereal units, but as the only option available are the costly spirit hosts, there's not much point, since their low strength has hard time to pass the armour save of the knights.

I'm not aware what kind of guy this pegasus riding hero is (sounds like a total douche to me ), but I'd imagine that with the fly rule he's behind your battle line, harrassing your vampire in no time.

I would probably try something very similar to Grish's plan: take a vamp with ward save, get as many GG with GW as possible and spent the rest on ghould. Put the vamp with GG and divide the sacrificial ghouls in two units, which protect the GG unit from flank charges. Then cross my fingers and hope the GG can stand against cavalry charge.

 

[whtdwrf11]

Are you letting him ignore the fact Bretonnian armies are required to field a BSB still according to their army book because he can't legally field that paladin alongside the BSB because it goes over the 25% hero amount so he has to field a lord on foot as a general.

It would be helpful to know his exact list since right now with just the hero given a Pegasus a lance and shield two units of five knights of the realm and a unit of five knight errant all with full command has him 25 points over unless he doesn't include standards and musicians at all then he's at least under the 500 points but with an illegal list because of no BSB.

 

[Vlad the implier]

They faqed that so hes isn't required to have a battle standard bearer and i think he only takes the champion and standard on his knight squads. Also whats really better combat vamp in low points or wizard vamp? For combat i was thinking like a dreadknight vampire S7 on the charge could really do some damage considering he -4 to his the knights save and he'll be hitting on 3+ and will be wounding 2+ on the charge and 3+ later in combat. Considering that his units will consists of 5 would mean that i could by chance kill about 2 knights. And that's without his squads backup. Has anyone tried this i mean it seems to be look good on paper but I don't know. Would love to here what you guy have to say about this.

 

[whtdwrf11]

Actually no they didn't FAQ that requirement away because it still has the requirement on page 67 in the Bretonnian army book.

The first paragraph under army battle standard says the army must include one paladin who must be upgraded to an army battle standard at no additional cost.

He's only 74 points but is still required according to the army book even if page 64 and 65 are now ignored because nothing on page 67 was FAQed away kind of like how Bretonnian armies can still only use one unit of Pegasus knights unless they have a lord mounted on Pegasus and grail relique since they never got their limit removed by the FAQ now you can waive that requirement for him if you would like to do so otherwise it's still there.

As for fighting vampire or caster vampire I personally prefer to use a fighting vampire but you have to be able to hold his knights and hero up so you have enough time for your vampire to even charge because Bretonnian knights aren't slowed down by their mounts barding like other cavalry.

 

[Sception]

Just like only skells, ghouls, and zombies count for core minimums in our army. Yeah, the 'choosing your army' page was (mostly) errata'd away, but it the requirement is still listed on other pages in the book.

 

[Dan_Lee]

You could try out the new banshee or cairn wraith heroes in the latest white dwarf. He's going to struggle to have enough magic in such a small game to actually hurt them.

Keep a banshee hidden behind your skeletons then move round the side and start screaming the knights once they're locked in combat with the skeletons.

 

[Grish]

@Dan: He can't afford it. He has 25% of his army allocated to his Heroes, one of which must be a vampire. So he has to take a Vampire with at most 25pts of gear on him.

He can't afford and rare's at this point level either, as none cost 125pts or less.

Once you survive his charge, you'll win a grinding fight. They won't have a high enough S to generate any significant combat Res after the charge. That is why using a summon power is important.

Note that he has no shooting, no magic. You could have one unit of 15 ghouls + champ, Vamp w. Summon power, leaving you with 257pts to spend on Graveguard. That would give you a bigger unit of 19, which leaves 6 pts left over (maybe get a 5pt magic item on your Vamp). Because he has no shooting or magic, you could keep your vamp relatively safe outside of a unit, and just boost away. I do not think Dread Knight is the way to go. If he has no magic, your +2 to casting will allow many successful casts, giving you an extra 7 ghouls a turn likely. If you survive the charges, you should be fine.

 

[Dan_Lee]

I hadn't stopped to think the points through. I guess accessing ethereal units in such a small game would be a bit over the top.

 

[Vlad the implier]

Maybe im reading this wrong it but its just a paladin on a Pegasus so hes has his hero meets his points limit.

So really I just need to hold out after the charge to do some damage. I don't have the newest whitedwarf so even if i could take it I would be able to.

 

[whtdwrf11]

Except his list is not legal for 500 points unless you waive the fact his army book specifically says on page 67 that he is required to have a BSB so he wouldn't even be able to field that hero on pegasus as his general and would need to field a lord on foot for his general instead alongside the required BSB hence why it's so hard for Bretonnians to make lists at 500 points same goes for VC with the forced having to have a vampire.

But yes basically you just have to be able to survive the charge because after that there only S3 when they swing at you maybe if you could find some points you could field something fast to at least slow down one of his units and concentrate on the rest of the army.

 

[Vlad the implier]

So were both up the creek really without a paddle. Hm im going to need to inform him on this conundrum with his hero chooses. This won't be to fun.

 

[whtdwrf11]

Well how much other models does he have or is that it because it might be possible to get up to 750 points so that also gives you more room to play with as well which might make it a lot more balanced because with that pegasus mounted paladin that's giving him an advantage on speed along with an all mounted list making it hard to do anything with the core were allowed.

Also to be honest it wouldn't have been a problem if he hadn't managed to miss the fact the BSB is still required unless he was relying on the FAQ alone which mentioned the required BSB and those pages were told to be ignored which would lead to thinking there isn't one required anymore unless you miss the mention of it on page 67 in their army book.

 

[Grish]

There's old optional rules for Warbands at 500pts. It was created for 6th edition, but some of the ideas could prove useful.

These just sound like games between friends, so I wouldn't be too stuck on rules designed for 2000pts.

 

[whtdwrf11]

Yeah Grish has a point that's why I put forward the mention of just waiving off the fact his book says he's required to field a BSB for friendly games the object of it should be fun for sure at least I think so.

The warband rules are nice even if they are outdated because it actually lets you ignore some of the rules for the game even if it was made for 6th edition like mentioned.

 

[Dave Gee]

Hi Vlad. Since you are only playing for fun then you don't need to have equal points armies. There are scenarios where you can outnumber your opponent (the old Last Stand springs to mind). You could also use terrain to help you - ghost fences and such. You need to discuss it with your friend as 500 point Bretts vs VC is only going to end one way in the vast majority of your games.

 

[Sception]

Offer a trade: he doesn't have to take a battle standard, you don't have to use a vampire as your general, or can fill core points with core options other then skellies/zomeies/ghouls, or both. Things will work better then.