Which Mortarch?

[ztlambe]

So I've been playing AOS, and having a great time starting a new undead force. (Please keep arguments about the system in other threads). I recently picked up the mortarch box and am excited to build my first 'death panther' hero. But I'm not sure which to do!

Arkhans spell seems absolutely brutal, and the plus to cast makes summoning a breeze but he loses a lot of his combat ability for it.

Manny has some real OOMPH with his fancy sword (especially if you game in a basement haha). And his armor seems really cool as in my experience these big guys are suffering 2-3 wounds every turn, so cutting that down is massive.

Now Nef seems like she just can clean some house, I don't put TOO much faith in the hero killing ability but the ability for free vamp lords can be crazy. The -1 to hit Aura however just seems almost too good to be true.

Do you guys have a favorite? A cool moment using one? A recommendation on which to build? As far as my collectoin goes I have a bunch of 'everything skeleton' and have picked up 4 boxes of those Morghasts ( I love those death angels).

Thanks!

 

[Seneschal]

Hello and welcome to the forum!

It really depends on what else you are fielding. Synergy is key.
I personally prefer Neferata as she is a force to be reckoned with in close combat. Pop Mystic Shield and go to town! I'm more of an offensive style player now so I favor her. Defense is great, absolutely, I am not writing off Mannfred but I do prefer Nef.
Do you want to focus on summoning or combat? I feel summoning is good enough as it is so I lean toward favoring combat effectiveness.

 

[Kallypso]

If you want a combat monster and an offensive approach take Neferata

If you want magic dominance, summoning and a more defensive approach take Arkhan

Sadly i think Mannfred is the weakest of the 3 in AoS (in comparison to the monster he was in The End Time)

He can defend is own in combat but i really miss the punch Neferata gets with all his combat abilities (dagger of jet, dark mist and twilight's allure) and also neferata can spam Vamp Lord by killing heroes

his magic isn't has strong as Arkhan. i really prefer curse of year over wind of death and Arkhan as more bonus to cast/unbind. Also is sword of unholy power bonus only apply to his first cast or unbind roll (and +1 isn't that dominant)

Fluff wise Mannfred should have been the magic monster with great bonus to cast and a really good magic spell while Arkhan should have had more bonus to summon and less magic dominance. but this is only my opinion

 

[Banat]

He IS the youngest of the three, so its kind of reasonable, even if he is meant to be a genius. I think he's meant to be a halfway house between Arkhan and Neferata, although his magic abilities aren't amazing.

 

[Cela Shyish]

Although Mannfred appears the most durable and his attacks all do multiple damage which is good for reaping through hordes unlike neferata who specialises in taking out characters or multi-wound models. Also Mannfred's bubble command ability is very effective at boosting your side's damage output over a large area whereas Neferata debuffs nearby enemies. Also in combat Neferata will likely lose her bubble size quicker than Mannfred will in combat due to his armour staving off a wound per turn.

I personally made Arkhan because I like his fluff and over obsession and loyalty to Nagash. I haven't had chance to try him in AoS yet so I can't really add much to this conversation except for the points on Mannfred not being the worst.

 

[Banat]

Very nice and well picked up on the subtleties between manny and nef!

 

[ztlambe]

Well I found you could magnatize the chair so done and done I built all 3. Played Arkhan for the first time (actually in a 3 way free for all with Mannifred on one of the other teams). But man... I gotta say that spell of Arkhans is so so awesome. I wiped out 3 units completely just by aging them, all while summoning stuff super easy (+3 for him, +1 for a Morghast, +1 for a terrain peice, snake eyes gets me 2 more Morghasts! haha). And I had a necro mancer running around just casting arcane shield on him to keep him safe all game.

At the same time, I was very unimpressed by Mannifred. Yeah the guy could kill some things but I found the +4-5ish on the summoning just made my stuff so consistent. I could summon a terrorghest on a 5! I mean thats nuts.

 

[Banat]

And precisely because its so nuts might be a reason to play Mannfred, that is if you want to tone down/adjust your playing to match your opponent.

Because guess what, you don't need points to balance out games! SHOCK HORROR. lol

 

[Cela Shyish]

@Banat does have a point, although I saw a post where mannfred alone tabled an entire sigmarite starter set army. So I stand by reseving named characters for larger games, otherwise they can just wreck an opponent. Most of the super one sided games I've seen have either involved 1 or more named characters on one side or had significant tactics on one side. This is especially true with ET characters. Its not really a fair option before larger games

 

[Banat]

If you want to tone your play down even more then use Mannfreds model and call him mannfred but use the vampire lord on abyssal terror warscroll.