Dealing with Banner of the World Dragon Deathstar

[Tamodan Varison]

Will BotWD change the metagame? Not in ETC, as you have armies capable of dealing with it regardless. In normal tournaments, I will swap my Ogre Blade for a Lance. Every army will make sure they have at least one thing capable of dealing with the deathstar. For some armies, this is something that never has magic attacks regardless, for instance, Wood Elf archers in a WE army, Organ Guns in a Dwarf army. But for Vampires for instance, it's the VL lord, for DE the Pendant Lord. They can have magical attacks, but in an optimal list, they won't any more. A good list will still have the tools to deal with Ethereals, but he will have less, as an optimal list will also sport something to deal with a 2+WS with magical attacks. This means that your opponent will have less tools to deal with your Ethereals, which makes it easier for the rest of your army to deal with those tools in turn

 

[bobajelly]

Our strengths are CC and magic. HE now have a stronger CC overall and a stronger magical defense. I agree with Crass regarding the role the banner plays. It fills a hole in the HE list. It effectively makes the unit immune to attempts to damage it magically from most sources (not certain spells previously discussed - dwellers, fin. transmute, etc). This sucks for our characters.

Proposed solutions: (some already suggested)
1. Chaffing/Slowing: Miasma down its movement and block walk between worlds (works great even with drain magic, because it takes effect before drain magic can be used)or flank with spirit host/zombies (this works. tried it already - won battle using '3'(below)).
2. Fighting: (all imperfect solutions) Hex unit with withering (drain magic defends his unit amazingly and blocks out support magic like a b**** btw), support Crypt ghouls/horrors with corpse cart and smile. Screaming is NOT an option. If they take BSB with flaming banner and BotWD on unit or visa versa, this won't work.
Fear bombing could work (effectivly halving number of wounds sustained from the WL/SM deathstar)
3. Ignore: Refer to 1 and isolate the unit; engage once the rest of the army has died.

If we had war marchines the banner would be significantly weaker. Mortars and flame cannons will make the bus cry.

Lets hope we retrospectively get given skeleton arhcers/crossbowmen :tongue:

 

[HERO]

lol, I can't believe this thread has gone on 13 pages :>

I'm glad I play High Elves AND Vampire Counts. Everyone and their mother is bandwagoning High Elves right and and this gives me a perfect opportunity to beat some bandwagoner ass.

Check out what I've been doing:
http://lkhero.blogspot.com/2013/05/high-elves-another-perspective.html

I also hold 2 more wins since the last time and most of them and those were vs. infantry-based BotWD lists; including one with White Lions and one with PG. PG is just a grindfest which you'll eventually win. White Lions threaten a lot more units (Terror, Knights bus, even your Lords), but suffers so hard against tarpits and Ghouls especially. Points for points, they lose to Ghouls.

I actually see VC as a hard matchup for HE. HE doesn't do well vs. attrition, and do worse when they invest a lot of points in one unit while you just focus on everything else. Unlike DE, we actually pay for our units and thus if we over-invest in one, the others are not as solid. Oh, that Dragon Prince unit has the banner? I'll just scream at the Silver Helms. Nothing has changed except for the fact you know exactly what he's packing. And we all know that knowledge is power.

 

[xFallenx]

Great insight in that link, thanks for sharing. You're absolutely right that HE's are all about mixed/combined arms. The HE's provide the best opportunity to run a classic army. HE's strong cav, infantry, ranged & magic provide a symbiotic relationship capable of some seriously strong "All comers" style lists.

 

[Kindred]

There is no dealing with this directly (it's banned in most tournaments for a reason!)
I recently had a game against a deathstar, 40 white lions with the ever queen and BotWD. Ouch! They evaporated anything they came near and shrugged off any and all attacks (2+ ward vs. all my characters and my banshee screams), 4+ against everything else (ever queen aura + high magic casting), 40 str 6 attacks hitting on 3s and usually striking first. Between that and stubborn, they were invincible, unbreakable and a sure death to anything they touched.
But i still won! I redirected them round after round with dire wolves, and once I was out of dogs I threw endless zombies at them (120 of which they chopped through by the end). In the meantime, by blender-lord and his BK bus steamrolled half his army, while the TGs screamed down the other half. I ran out the clock, and even though my losses to the deathstar were heavy, he lost everything BUT the deathstar, and so the tally gave the game to me in the end.
So don't fight them, EVER. Redirect and tarpit, kill the rest of his army, and run out the clock.

 

[Ded dice]

In my experience a black knight bus with, blender lord great weapon backed up with 2 baby vamps. One with night shroud, lord with begulie ( I have found book of arkhan essential with this) is quite capable of shredding half the unit before it even strikes. I find Phoenix guard way more annoying IMHO.

 

[Ded dice]

Oh yea if the ever queen is there then don't fight them, horrible unit that one.

 

[Ripper]

Feed it dogs and Zombies and remind your opponent that a 6 year old can win with that list.

 

[Hanblack Nagash]

Feed it dogs and Zombies and remind your opponent that a 6 year old can win with that list.

... after he loses. That fixes that

 

[heldantes]

Yeah my group of friends went crazy when we first thought about the potential of the BotWD with White Lions, but after a few games realised it was a great item, but not game breaking.

A VL with a lance, nightshroud, red fury and quick blood makes quick work of them and with a 1+/4++ has never been killed for me.

It is annoying seeing miscasts have no/little effect though.

None of us use Daemons though so not sure about that one.

 

[Aaron Stern]

@ heldantes:

Hello, I've been reading these boards for a little while now but this is the first time I've posted. Against 35 sword masters with botwd I tried a 450 pt VL without a magic weapon in a blackknight bus. They did ok as I had a flank charge but as soon as his unit reformed to face my unit I lost my VL due to combat resolution wounds so my 2+/4++ didn't keep him alive. Do you have a way around this issue?

 

[Mr. West]

*snip*

Congratulations, on resurrecting a withered old thread that has been dead for over a year. :skull:

 

[heldantes]

Due to my group of friends not having daemons of chaos or another vampire counts army, my black knight bus used the fear bomb combination (aura of dark majesty, screaming banner, fear incarnate, and also terror).

Against elves this nearly always succeeded in causing fear, at least in either my cc or his. Also, by issuing a challenge plus having a 1+/4++ vampire lord, 1+ vampire with enchanted shield and 2+ vampire in the front (with 2++ for one wound due to charmed shield) it meant a lot of attacks ended doing very little and only a few could target the unit itself meaning less combat resolution for the elves. Meanwhile, 8 attacks with the vampires, 5 with the Lord (attacks and red fury) means you'd have to be the unluckiest man alive not to win combat, even if fear failed.

That's in my experience (three wins against 2500 HE army, where in all three games my bus ended up in combat with either a huge block of white lions, phoenix guard (other tricksters is a must) or both).

All three games left a bad taste in both our mouths though due to how over powered it seemed and so have stopped using it. However, give all those combinations together a go and see what happens.

I would add that at 2k points and lower you're unable to bring it all together and the effectiveness is lost.

 

[midean]

@ heldantes:

Hello, I've been reading these boards for a little while now but this is the first time I've posted. Against 35 sword masters with botwd I tried a 450 pt VL without a magic weapon in a blackknight bus. They did ok as I had a flank charge but as soon as his unit reformed to face my unit I lost my VL due to combat resolution wounds so my 2+/4++ didn't keep him alive. Do you have a way around this issue?

Run your bus in a lance formation and use characters that are hard to kill. You really don't rely on ranks and it limits CR as they can't attack R&F. I put the Nightshroud on a WK in the middle and my Lord on one side and a hero vamp on the other so it really limits the S on the first row in contact. It's really hard to wound characters at T5 and a 1+ armor save when you can't get any S bonuses.

 

[Mc1gamer]

/\ I like this one.

 

[Yorga]

@ heldantes:

Hello, I've been reading these boards for a little while now but this is the first time I've posted. Against 35 sword masters with botwd I tried a 450 pt VL without a magic weapon in a blackknight bus. They did ok as I had a flank charge but as soon as his unit reformed to face my unit I lost my VL due to combat resolution wounds so my 2+/4++ didn't keep him alive. Do you have a way around this issue?

Run your bus in a lance formation and use characters that are hard to kill. You really don't rely on ranks and it limits CR as they can't attack R&F. I put the Nightshroud on a WK in the middle and my Lord on one side and a hero vamp on the other so it really limits the S on the first row in contact. It's really hard to wound characters at T5 and a 1+ armor save when you can't get any S bonuses.

And the Vamp Lord, Wight King and other vamp don't really need magic weapons. With Red Fury they should kill a lot of elves.

 

[Alabaster427]

I don't see why you couldn't take a Terrorgheist (or two or three (the third being a mount)) since the breath weapon isn't magical. Otherwise, The Cursed Book could easily weaken them for close combat since it only casts hexes. I feel like a unit of Grave Guard would do rather well, especially if there is a Corpse Cart Nearby.

 

[heldantes]

I think at the bottom of the death shriek description in the ab it says it is a magical attack.

 

[Adam_Barrow]

Screams = magical, yes.

 

[Mc1gamer]

It says it in the book, it was I think also posted in an FAQ. Terrorbat screams are as effective against the BOTWD as any other magical damage attack. Its uber risky and better used on other elements of the HE army that will get liquefied much easier.

 

[Chanceller]

well, hail friends, i visit this forum for a while, but never post anything.... im´brazilian boy, and my english is so bad. sorry for this.

i hope that understand me.

y play a lot versus this maggic banner in our tournaments, and this is my recipie:

1) i used a SGK, whit OTS, red fury and WK whit nighshroud. challenge every moment i can to avoid atacks vs my general and he goes in a unit whit 55+ skellies whit shield and spear, whit warbanner or that banner whit armour piercing.

remember, poison of SGK and no magical sword takes no ward save for the HE banner and a lot of skellies and warbanner gives you a lot of statical combat resolution i guess a 5 (3 ranks + 1charge +1 banner) and probab. + 5 of the lord. in this manner you have 10 in combat resolution, and your skellies can do 2 or maybe 3 wounds in the op. units.

2) just avoid this unit. why? remember, in most battles you need just 100+ victory points to win the game, this unit have a large price, and in the most case costs to your opp. 600+ points. doesn't matters how the game point's (1500, 2500, 3000) just avoid and zip out the rest of you conrade army, win the game and let him alone in the table whit an assface and his deathstar of doom tha doens´t win a game!!!! (this is the best!!!)

 

[najo]

BotWD is overrated. Take lances and great weapons and make short work of elves. Even daemons have tools. Death, nurgle, shadow and Slaanesh are the best lores for dealing with it and daemons mobility and offensive power is good enough that you can flank, redirect, pin out grind the damn unit fairly easily.