Official Rumour Thread: New Vampire Counts Book

[HERO]

Black Coach is 97,5 slaves
Terrorgheist is 112,5
Lances on BKs are 1 slave
Mannfred still got 14 spells
Krell's armor kinda sucks, no ward, it ****s magic items, no special buffs for anyone
Mounts later

No Ghoul regeneration
Abyssal 60 slaves, Dragon 122.5 slaves
Imo Krell kinda sux, his axe is +2S, d3 wounds, ASL, W test each round for the victim
There are Rare Wraiths
No crumble immunity bubble, BSB as TK
Corpse Cart upgrades: Balefire is 7.5 slaves, -1 casting for enemies in a 24" radius, Unholy Stone is 15 slaves, can reroll a d6 for IoN results if caster is within 6"
Hellish Vigour is RR to Wound, boosted it becomes a bubble, same for Danse
Wight King is 42,5 slaves, can take AHW, 2HW, and 25 slaves magic items
Mounts: c Vampire Lord can take more or less everything, Necro Lord can take steed, cart or Abyssal, Vampire hero can take Throne, steed, infernal steed or nightmare, Necro can take steed or cart

Bard for BKs is 1.5 slaves
Vlad is S6, sword is +1S and 247.5 slaves
Isabella is 87.5 slaves

Yes, Infernal Steed is the flying horsey
BKs are 10.5 slaves
Vampires can get mundane equipment

@Valle: this is no interpretation of the rules, i'm holding the book in my hands, and it's crystal clear: IoN can only heal 1 wound per casting on units with the Vampire, Large or Ethereal characteristics, and BKs have the Vampire characteristic. I would sure love to play BKs and i would love to be able to raise 5 of them a turn, but that would be a little too much imo.

Also, if characters count as "units", they would get healed of 1 wound (if Vampires, Banshees or Wraiths) or 1d6 + level wounds (if Wight Kings or Necros), but i don't think that's the spirit of the spell, and i'm not even sure characters are "units" per se.

Now for the questions:

- recast is gone for good

- no uber banner, just Screaming and Barrows banners, plus Blood Keep for BKs

- after your general dies, you take a Ld test for every unit taking wounds as usual, then as long as you have a Vampire Lore wizard on your army, you don't have to keep checking.

So Chaos Knights who can regenerate one of their number per turn (or more if you spam) are bad how?

I wasn't gonna posts "slave costs" for mundane equipment because i thought it was a little too much, but i got some time, so there you goe:

Vampire Lord/Vampire (everything in slaves)

Magic level: 17.5/17.5(level 2 max)
AHW: 2/1.5
2HW: 5/4
Lance (if mounted): 5/4
Shield: 1.5/1
Heavy armor: 3/2
Barded Nightmare: 12/12
Infernal Steed: 15/15
Abyssal Terror: 60/-
Zombie Dragon: 122.5/-
Coven Throne: 115/115

Ghoul King got no mundane equipment, can ride a Terrorgheist for 112.5 slaves, can't take magical armours.

- BKs also have lances, Chaos Knights can't get them, right? that's S7 on the charge

- Forbidden Knowledge can't take Life; also, i kinda like the new Lores do not have "win" spells, and i wish GW FAQd all that kind of spells into something good but not game-breaking. Still, you can take Shadows and Death if you feel like it.

- Both Skeletons and Zombies are good imo, depends on your aesthetic choice i guess: zombies have ASL, but when buffed by the Corpse Cart their ASL is replaced with ASF, so it doesn't cancel it, they actually strike first; they can also house characters now, but i hate their WS 1. And btw, if you manage to cast Mindrazor on a Spearkeletons horde with rerolls from Danse, that could be funny.

Gaze: 2d6 hits S4, range 12, 9+, you can boost to range 48 at 12+

Curse: 12+, range 18, remains in play, wounds with no AS on 6+, then 5+, you know the drill... if you roll on both Magic phases i can see it being a pain, but low target number to cast means easy to dispel for your opponent

 

[Bune]

thanks for the info i like the mundane equipment on vamps.
hmm i think GG i still gonna be the way to go if you consider how fast you raise the bastards also black knights. basically like last edition. since its so hard to Heal vampire units. thankfully i have alot of GG but im gonna give every unit a try. although the hex wraiths sound like the new black.

-Bune

 

[Bune]

And Characters ARE units by the way

 

[Count Darvaleth]

Apparently we can raise the dead enemies we slay now, according to Kelly himself in a GW video in their blog.

 

[Pietr Von Carstein]

Id say thats more of a fluff thing than a rules thing.

 

[Count Darvaleth]

I assumed so as well, but how he said it convinced me otherwise. I doubt it as we've had no rumours, but Kemmler seems to do it a lot in the fluff (as in, in the WD fluff bit before the batrep he does it again, and again, and again, and again...) so perhaps it might happen.

What I do love is how easy it is to get a level 3 wizard on the table. Cheap +3 to dispel, meaning more points can go into my Ghoul King on TG, my Varghulf, and Blood Knights, soon to be joined by Vargheists. A strike force of epic proportions.

 

[xxSLAYERxx]

hey people im not really well known here but ive got a few points to make which i believe havent been mentioned yet
First of all im a bit confused whats going on with our battalion? its not on the GW site....so that could mean that were geting some new kits (after the 14th) and even possibly a second wave with charecters? which would be really good. Also Zacharias is stil not available to buy but hasnt been removed from the site? maybe hes in the new book?
Secondly im a bit dissepointed that there are no male vampires being released ( we all like the look of pretty ladies but a male vamp would be nice ) Im a Von Carstein player myself but would like to have seen a Necrarch vamp as the artwork for them is awesome.
Also hex wraiths have strengh 5 attacks...but they have great weapons and they are mounted...which means they should only be strengh 4 as they are mounted? Unless its their special ability?
I like that the spam is gone now aswell as i will actually have to think about what im doing now, the competative builds were all the same but they were powerful builds and it got to a point where my friends didnt want to face me, so looking forward to the new lore.

 

[Pietr Von Carstein]

hey people im not really well known here but ive got a few points to make which i believe havent been mentioned yet
First of all im a bit confused whats going on with our battalion? its not on the GW site....so that could mean that were geting some new kits (after the 14th) and even possibly a second wave with charecters? which would be really good. Also Zacharias is stil not available to buy but hasnt been removed from the site? maybe hes in the new book?
Secondly im a bit dissepointed that there are no male vampires being released ( we all like the look of pretty ladies but a male vamp would be nice ) Im a Von Carstein player myself but would like to have seen a Necrarch vamp as the artwork for them is awesome.
Also hex wraiths have strengh 5 attacks...but they have great weapons and they are mounted...which means they should only be strengh 4 as they are mounted? Unless its their special ability?
I like that the spam is gone now aswell as i will actually have to think about what im doing now, the competative builds were all the same but they were powerful builds and it got to a point where my friends didnt want to face me, so looking forward to the new lore.

The batallion is getting repackaged with dire wolves replacing the zombies if Im not mistaken.
There is no second wave on the table as far as we know.
Zacharias is not in the book.
The cavalry great weapon rule of the last edition is gone. Mounted great weapon wielders get +2 strength.

 

[xxSLAYERxx]

Ah i see i see. Any news for the nw zombie kit or are we still keeping thw old zombies?

 

[Vallasch]

Something i didn't see anyone here mention yet on the Hex Wraiths, in Phil Kelly's notes on the site, they also ignore armour in it's entirety.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?prodId=prod1460004a

 

[xxSLAYERxx]

Something i didn't see anyone here mention yet on the Hex Wraiths, in Phil Kelly's notes on the site, they also ignore armour in it's entirety.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?prodId=prod1460004a

its already been mentioned

 

[N.I.B]

Phil Kelly also in the promovideo, says that the Coven Throne 'Battle of Wills' can protect it from cannons. I guess he doesn't know his own rules.

 

[Pietr Von Carstein]

Ah i see i see. Any news for the nw zombie kit or are we still keeping thw old zombies?

No new zombies in the forseeable future as far as I know.

 

[N.I.B]

At this point I don't like what I'm reading. Of course haven't read the book myself and no games played but that's not going to stop me from posting a good old-fashion whine - it looks like we're more nerfed than expected. All good stuff is gone, and we're a much slower army now, in a game that's pretty much decided in the movement phase. No Ghoulkin, no Vanhels charges, no spamming movement with Vanhels either, no Vampire march bubbles.

We gained stats overall, but characters got even more expensive than before.

Ghouls are still our best core, Zombies and Dire Wolves tied at second. Skellies for fluff games.

Our Vampire spells are nerfed, even shorter ranges than before, or harder to cast.

Seems like the caster lord with Shadow is going to be the competitive build. The only reason I've played with Vampire lore in 8th ed so far, has been Vanhels. And now it's gone (the part that matters), which means Shadow is better.

Grave Guards with Great Weapons aren't really viable without Helm or reg to keep them on their feet. HW/SH Graveguards have good synergy with Shadow though.

I have my hopes up that we will be able to afford an aggressively tooled VC lord on horse (but Jesus what Dreadknight gives you for 25 points today sets you back 43 points next week) with a lvl 4 Necro lord in his bunker to take over when he dies.

2-3 min-sized units of Fell Bats seems like an auto-include.

Crypt Horrors can be viable, not sure about Mortis Engine though.

Ah. I hope I'm wrong about this being a big nerf, the coming month of play tests will show.

 

[Grish]

and we're a much slower army now, in a game that's pretty much decided in the movement phase. No Ghoulkin, no Vanhels charges, no spamming movement with Vanhels either, no Vampire march bubbles.

Our core blocks are definitely slower, but it looks like we have more options for fast flankers around the side, with Direwolves, Hexwraiths, Varghulfs, Vargheists (sp?), Fellbats...
Is no charging with Van Hel's confirmed? I think it's likely given
it's a lvl1 spell, but I have not heard a for certain yet. This will hurt us somewhat, but I'm hopeful the dynamics of other aspects of the army being fast will make for a more planned approach. I think we'll be different, but not necessarily slow. Also, every vampire will have access to VHD if they want it.

Other options we'll have for increased movement is Fellbats with Summon Creatures of the Night, and Raise Dead. The Raise Dead is much stronger due to stronger Zombie stats, so I'm hopeful there as well.

Overall, we'll play differently, but I don't see a huge hit to our movement.

We gained stats overall, but characters got even more expensive than before.

Agree. More customization it seems, so having a Vampire tooled for a specific purpose should be close to the same points I'm guessing.

Ghouls are still our best core, Zombies and Dire Wolves tied at second. Skellies for fluff games.

I personally am hoping this is not the case. Can ghouls be affected by IoN? I know Zombies and Skeletons can so this may not be a true statement; my gut tells me an army without ghouls will be viable and effective with the points allocated to other core units (bats/wolves). Blocks to win combat would be Grave Guard and Ghouls, but I could see Zombies being used to hold up opponents and not give away too much CR depending on the foe.

Our Vampire spells are nerfed, even shorter ranges than before, or harder to cast.

IoN is much better in my opinion. Can't spam it, but the effect of the spell itself is awesome.

Seems like the caster lord with Shadow is going to be the competitive build. The only reason I've played with Vampire lore in 8th ed so far, has been Vanhels. And now it's gone (the part that matters), which means Shadow is better.

A fighting Vampire character looks ok. Still has the same flaws, and am I mistaken or do they have access to worse protection this time around? Still, for 40pts, it looks like they can get WS9, ASF, and reroll misses against most foes. Good protection in challenges. Also, red fury can be combined with a conventional Great Weapon allowing for points to be spent on protection. Good for hero level vampires.

Grave Guards with Great Weapons aren't really viable without Helm or reg to keep them on their feet. HW/SH Graveguards have good synergy with Shadow though.

Could be true here. In my gaming environment, just a largish block of Grave Guards w. Great Weapons and Banner of the Barrows was hard enough. With access to IoN they could grind most opponents down. I think they'll still be very hard this edition, and extremely viable. Regen banner was what, 230pts? Around there. I'm sure with all the new units you can find something else to spend that on that will be effective.

I have my hopes up that we will be able to afford an aggressively tooled VC lord on horse (but Jesus what Dreadknight gives you for 25 points today sets you back 43 points next week) with a lvl 4 Necro lord in his bunker to take over when he dies.

Dread Knight was awesome for what it gave you. Super cheap. 2+AS, lance, WS3, S4 mount... too cheap even.

Overall nerf or not, I am still much more excited about this than our current army. I just want to be able to have a number of options to field different lists. 6th ed. Vampires weren't that strong on the scene, but were a blast to play. With all the changes coming, I think we'll see all kinds of lists and approaches. Too early to tell for sure, but I'm crossing my fingers for a list that takes skill and finesse to pull off a win.

 

[Sanai]

10 pts per model, no armour save, and possibly not undead/not raisable. Also, ghouls dont seem to be raisable past their starting numbers, not to mention they cannot get standards, musicians or magic standards. Im sticking with skeletons.

 

[Zephyr]

I'm getting happier with headstrong little me with every rule that becomes confirmed. I always went with fluff armies and never tailored it to include the strongest builds.
Ghouls were the best things last edition but from what I'm hearing people with all ghoul armies are definitely effed now.
Always kept big blocks close to the general and didn't rely on other vamp units for marching...I'm weird like that and I actually didn't do that bad until 8th edition reared its head.

It's not the new book that will nerf us, 8th edition has done that to us already and looking at other army books from 7th I can see why people are negative if they make comparisons.
But look at the other 8th edition books. They are "crap" with OK being the best out of them all so far but that's not so hard seeing what they had to work with before. I think TK players for instance have a lot more to whine about than us. I don't think it is a stretch to see upcoming books equally "nerfed", if not THEN I will pick up my flag and barricade GW HQ.

In order to survive 8th edition you got these ridiculous mono-builds with some armies, especially VC, and it was really annoying. I'm hoping to see more diversity this time around with more and more books geared towards this new edition.
My only dislike is all the new monsters and big stuff to get things going but hopefully this will balance out as well as the other army books come forward. We shouldn't be needing those just to survive.

What it comes down to; my gripe is not with the new army book which isn't that bad but with the edition in which we use it.

 

[Sanai]

I think alot of people are going to be fiercely denying that ghouls are no longer a no brainer for a while simply because they all invested alot in ghouls. That is another reason why I choose my armies based on fluff/what I like aesthetically- the aesthetics/fluff will stay, but rules/power is a thing that fluctuates with every book/edition, so an army built purely based on what wins games is going to lose that value for you when things change.

 

[Tim]

Been following the news from my holiday location and can't wait to get back and play some games with the new army book.
I always had a mixed force with ghouls and skeletons so I'm going to like that I can field more skeletons and have some points to spare for a unit zombies or dire wolves.
I'm planning on building my own mortis engine, the model is great and all but a bit over the top for my taste, also it will be impossible to fit or carry around without everything breaking off. And I need to travel to get a game.
I have some old metal model of a throne with a lich on it and going to base it around that. I have some idea's and when i'm back home going to see if it's all going to fit. I also was considering of converting the kit itself but for a 45 euro kit and hacking it apart doesn't feel right, although will check ebay for the ethereal horses of the kit.

Also going to enjoy converting the bk/hexwraight kit, those scythes need work, and my old bk going to need lances, they look a lot better then those spears.
The horror/varg kit looks interesting, I hope it will be possible to magnetize the arms so can make both options, out of one kit.

I guess the loss of those legendary magic items for vc will be felt, but all those new toys and the comeback of the zombie can make some new interesting games, also imho the mortis engine makes up for the loss of the regen bsb, it has equivalent cost and function. Split of between combat vamp or necromancer also helps a little for the loss of the helm, although just a little.
I won't miss spamming the same spells over and over since it always failed for me, pro skills in rolling 1's .
To me things look fairly balanced, but I don't play tournaments and just play my friends in fun and friendly games.
The return of some of my favorite characters is also great news and will be happy to field them once a while.

 

[xxSLAYERxx]

YHh my army is based on fluff but i had skeletons and ghouls, and i did manage to balance it out and still have a really kick ass army. Skeletons are really not that bad in my opinion, they can hold the line if they have to whilst all ur other stuff causes havoc, im going to love the new hex wraiths unit of 10 defo :konrad:

 

[Sanai]

Yeah, use them skellies to hold the line while the Hex wraiths strafe back and forth across the enemy.

 

[Mr Saturday]

Yeah, use them skellies to hold the line while the Hex wraiths strafe back and forth across the enemy.

Do hexwraiths cause terror? If so, does the enemy take terror tests when you strafe? If so, that's monumental.

 

[Forgotten Heretic]

Yeah, use them skellies to hold the line while the Hex wraiths strafe back and forth across the enemy.

Do hexwraiths cause terror? If so, does the enemy take terror tests when you strafe? If so, that's monumental.

also can they pass through a unit thats already in combat? i doubt it, but it would be nice

 

[xxSLAYERxx]

Yeah, use them skellies to hold the line while the Hex wraiths strafe back and forth across the enemy.

Do hexwraiths cause terror? If so, does the enemy take terror tests when you strafe? If so, that's monumental.

thye should do as cairn wraiths cause terror

 

[TMS]

thye should do as cairn wraiths cause terror

Yep, it's even up on the GW site.