ZP- Army List General Discussion

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Onikaigo said:
So, I second DoN's explanation of it, and say no pursuit allowed for Zombie units.

Makes sense-something as slow a zombie shouldnt be able to pursue! The extra hits on the fleeing unit should be implemented instead.
 
n regards to what units can use this rule to get above their starting numbers, instead of Core, I think its should be Infantry units only.

Just an idea though.
 
uga bug said:
Onikaigo said:
So, I second DoN's explanation of it, and say no pursuit allowed for Zombie units.

Makes sense-something as slow a zombie shouldnt be able to pursue! The extra hits on the fleeing unit should be implemented instead.

Parting Shots
Zombies are notoriously lacking in agility - thus, rather than even trying to pursue, the leaders of the Zombie Pirates ensure their minions keep an extra pistol on hand to give their fleeing enemies something to remember them by.
When an enemy unit breaks and flees from combat with any infantry unit of this army, the first two ranks of the victorious unit(s) resolve a round of pistol fire against the fleeing unit.

Spoils of War
Zombie Pirates are excellent at their job. The mere realization of the resiliency of these raiders can be enough to send crews of merchant ships brawling for space in the lifeboats, leaving their precious cargo behind.
At 2000 points, one Zombie Pirates character may select a single magic item worth up to 25 points from another army's list as part of their normal item allowance. Each additional 1000 points increases the item's potential value by 25 points (but does not allow more than one to be taken).

How do these sound?
 
Parting shots should perhaps be allowed when a unit takes pistols as an option, instead of assuming all zombies have pistols.
I like the spoils of war idea however.
 
With the general direction thread locked, it leaves me to post here.

I think this project is straying too far from the established background. Far too far.

As it stands, the lineage of Luthor Harkon has been keelhauled and the zombies are mutinying. This is having a number of effects.

Firstly, the desire to be separate from the Vampire Counts list is eliminating a number of units that have strong mechanical and fictional reasons to be in the list, specifically the sea ghouls and the reduction of the siren's role to a unit. I can see this list being fielded as large blocks of zombies and nothing else.

Secondly, the mechanics seem to be focusing on "buffing" the basic zombie unit. The potential to unbalance increases with every potential "+1" that gets added. Again, this leads to a massive weighting of one unit rather than a balanced list.

I'm going to keep an eye on the change log thread, but- reluctantly- I'm backing out. It seems that the list everyone wants, isn't the list that would represent the background of the Vampire Coast.
 
With respect, xaero, I feel that you're a little too set on having this play out according to your preferences. You have good ideas that I would love to see you contribute to the project, and you entered into this pushing for ideas we'd already considered and chosen to move away from. If you feel that the direction we're heading in is not one you can get behind, then fair enough; if, however, you feel that you can share the approach the rest of us have adopted, then I would welcome any addition you would offer the project.
 
Xeromancer - unfortunately it is always the way in collaborations that others may disagree. I myself have had to back down many a time, even on my own forum! (As a discuss forum changes with the True Bloods in the relevant forum).

It would be sad for you to not contribute, as even though the theme may be a bit different that what you originally intended, it could still end up as a viable and fun list.

Personally I like the idea of it being Zombie Pirate orientated. Vampire Counts have their own army book, plus the vampire option does allow you to field a vampire captain. So at the moment I think this project is going in the right direction.
 
It seems the development of the zombie pirates list has shambled to a halt.
Come on people we need more ideas-and people to post!
 
I like what's happening here, and if no-one minds, would like to join in. I like the thoughts on having an All-Zombie army, it makes sense. The fact that it states in the Armybook of the VC is that Luthor Harkon slew the Chaos Marauder crews, so these people would be newly dead.

Now, What I am about to say may disgruntle you, but don't worry, It's not that bad.

I think we should try and take the original rules for the Vampire Pirates, and Update them, if you will.

The Dark lord mr. fluffy has a downloadable PDF file of the original WD article in his signature. If you look at it, you will see that we have pretty much made the same thing-From Scratch.

Wow, I type alot in 5 mins.

Similarities:
All Units (except the sole Lord and a hero choice) Are Zombies.
Zombies are called Deck hands, and can have handguns.
There are Bloated corpses that explode on impact
There is a big, abyssal terror type thing called a Rotting Leviathan
There is a monstrous hell-hammer cannon, which takes up a rare and a special spot, and is very deadly.

I think that we can use the rules presented there for the rules you guys have been discussing, barring the shooting phase.

It would be a lot more... Efficient if we use the rules presented here, instead of going in circles. The list will still be ours, and we will tweak the rules after playtesting, but its my High-held opinion that using the rules presented here as a Structural base will let us take leaps and bounds towards completing this.

Also, since I saw the insert fluff sign below it:

The Tide of Battle
As the sea Waxes and Wanes, so too do the Vampirates! As a battle progresses, Enemy crews which thought they had repelled boarders find themselves under attack their own Dead Brethren...
At the end of combat, calculate CR as normal.
If the enemy unit wins, for each point of CR they win by the Zombie Pirate unit suffers a wound, with no armour saves allowed.
If the Zombie Pirate unit wins, for each point of CR they win by they heal / raise one wound. Models raised in this fashion are equipped in exactly the same way as the rest of the unit. If any of the command group are dead, then they must be resurrected first. If they unit has multi-wound models, this can resurrect models with only partial wounds (i.e if the models has 3 wounds, a model can be resurrected with just one wound). However before resurrecting any new models, existing models in the unit must be fully healed. Zombie Pirate characters may be healed in this fashion, however vampires characters etc cannot.


I think that the Spoils of war should be brought down to only getting 25 points worth of Stuff at 2,000 points. It doesn't make sense for a Zombie Captain to have the deadliest, and most off most religiously high-held, banner from another army.

I hope that I am not intruding on something that is supposed to be kept to the higher-ups in our forum here, and if so, I will gladly keep my rotting nose out of it.

Wow, I type alot in 5 minutes...
 
Sorry, Alexos, you'll find a lot of opposition to the use of vampires in this army list from the project leads.

I know; it doesn't fit with the background and it has increasingly less to do with pirates, but this is really the development of a 100% zombie list for Warhammer. The consensus is, though, that it's zombies they want, so I've decided to bow out and just observe from now on.

There also seems to be a move away from the White Dwarf army list as well.

Personally, I agree with you 100%, but I might be the only one who does.
 
Well, I like the idea of having less Vampires per army, as I think that alot of people rely way too much on them as is. The only thing that is really vexing me is the fact that there is very little in the way of Unit choice. When I pick an army to play, I'd like to be different from the guy next to me, but still keep to the theme.

I mean, not every VC army is based around Zombies and Skeletons, right? We've all seen our fair share (Well, at least me.) of armies centered around ghouls, or Wights, or Cavalry, and so on. I like the option of being able to make a plethora of different lists, to represent different Backround and Fluffy Ideas I come up with.

I like where this is going, and I like the rules laid down, I just think that more diversity will help out.

Now the reason I selected the WD army list.....

It provides Swivelguns, cannonades, and the artillery we will need if we want to use these guys on boats.

If we do.

You know, for a Vampire Pirates army, we haven't once talked about boats...
 
The discussion of the units included in the zombie pirate list hasn't yet completley finished, just pushed to one side as we attempt to develop units we believe will definatley appear in the final list. Thats why there may appear to be a relative lack of unit choice. Having said that though theres still a large selection, at the last round up for special choices for instance:

Carronades- A unit carrying small cannon
Cannon- Upgradable to have chain balls
Fish-men (we need a better name)- Offencive fishy folk
Coral Pirates- More a defensive unit.
Albatross- doom bringing birdy

and for rare choices:
Kraken- big squidy thing, possibly with seperate tenacles (do be develpoed later)
Sea Serpant- big snakey thing.
Ghost Ship- maybe flying and/or Ethereal (again to be discussed in more depth later
Siren- ghosly lady that lures young lads to their doom.

Thats 5 units on special choices and 4 on Rare! -although the fish-men and coral pirates have been merged into one, upgradable, unit.
The list does also have similarities to the GW zombie pirate list wit the Queen Bess, giant cannon, and the kraken/sea serpants for large monsters.
Its just about deciding the exact nature and rules of the units we've ideas for now.

In regards to boats not being discussed, they have been a number of times. As the ghost ship, and there were ideas for small row boats or something for the zombie units at one point i believe.

The whole idea of this list seems to have stopped because no-one seems to be sure on how the list is to be developed, or the exact direction of the list. We really need a summary update on all the choices to get us up to date on what the progress is! When i look back through all the posts its very confusing as to what ideas have been discussed and finished and what ones wre discussed and sort of forgotten!
 
I think that having a separate sub-thread type of list, Like an attached section, would help. We could have one for Leader units, another for Core, another for special and Rare. It would make it easier to find where you want to fit in. like, alot of people are focusing on the Zombies, so you would go to the Core choice area, and so on.

Having everything in one thread is a little confusing in itself, so at the very least, we should include links in the First Post of the Thread, that lead to where certain discussions start.

I do realise that making a section that is attached could be quite strenuos, and that I know nothing of it, but I think that, instead of one huge group, all the people with their own agendas, in one place it would be easier to have a few smaller groups to manage things more smoothly.

The moderator would start the thread, and in the first post put up a guideline as to what the unit should be like (Like for zombies, guidline, Cheap, expendable, not the best), and assign someone to the thread to keep things in check, and send the Mod a pm every now and then to show progress.

This would allow us to produce a playtestable army that works, is fluffy, and balanced in shorter time, and would exponentially increase the ground we gain in the same amount of time that a single thread could decide on one unit.


Its something that I learned in ROTC, called "Grouping development procedures" or something like that. Not trying to usurp Keldane or anything.
:thumbsup:
 
Given that I'm technically only the backup, filling in for the original Project Leader while they are unavailable, I don't think your suggestion is usurping anyone. The changes you suggest, though, are definitely above my pay grade - I'm technically not even a mod; I've just been given mod powers in respect to this specific project. Think of me as a shift supervisor.

Now, I owe everyone an apology for the recent neglect. Suffice to say that as the school year drew to a close and my birthday came and went, I experienced a bit of a rush on my time, and I allowed this project to fall to the wayside. This is not without its benefit, however, as it means we now have confirmations on elements of Eighth Edition to work with.

Uga definitely has the right of it. As it stands, the only units that have been given their own thread for discussion are the Siren and the Zombie Pirates themselves; there are still a slew of other options waiting in the wings for their chance in the sun.

Concerning using the White Dwarf list as a starting point, there is actually a thread dedicated to that specific purpose already present in this section. I believe - and this is purely from memory - that the general consensus was 'Magic items good but insufficient in number; deck droppers disliked but some sort of flying unit wanted; Luthor Harkon should remain but should not be mandatory'. Oh, and that Queen Bess was something to keep.

Uga is also right about the discussion of boats. My personal stance is landing craft yes, giant flying ghost ship no, and solely because I would want said ghost ship to be an accurately scaled ship in relation to the zombies and personally believe that that would make it too big to be viable on the tabletop. Wrecks/Landing Craft have been discussed as this list's rough equivalent to corpse carts, and therefore are considered part of the Core choices section - thread is here if you'd like to discuss them. Ghost Ship has been discussed as a Rare choice, though the exact roll played (phasing/ethereal transport, source of ghostly bombardment, etc) and whether or not we should include it is something we all seem to have differing opinions on - discussion for it is in this thread here.

Edit: Glad to see some life in here again!
 
I've got a few points, and am posting them here as i Don't know where else to put them!

Firstly i have one slight issue with the current development of this list. A large proportion of the units we are designing seem to have a supportive role; wrecks, banshees, bloated corpses, queen bess, possibly albatross. There are currently no 'solid' units. Even with the vast customisation available our Zombie pirates are still zombies-we have no solid combat units.
I know DoN, or someone, came up with the good idea of barnacle people, similar to the Davey Jones fish people in pirates of the Caribbean. Even if that unit is implemented is the zombie pirate list just going to be too weak at the end of it? If we're not careful the lsit will turn out liek the Wood elves-weak and takes a lot of skill to play, with little variations in list structure!

Secondly I think we need to start adding fluff to some of the units we have thought of. Theres nothing quite like a good bit of fluff :vampire3:
 
I think that having a unit that is harder is needed, and so I have an idea:

Ambulls.

I'm not sure for which game this was for, but I think it was for Fantasy. It was a giant crab person that had four arms. It looked like the old Genestealer models, but its head was more buggish. I think that we could use Crab People in our army.

I was thinking something that would represent a Varghulf. They would have been Vamps that fell out of their boats and were trapped underwater, slowly going insane until they turn into the crabs and animal life that surrounds them, and now stalk the seven seas, hunting for people to feed on.
 
Disciple of Nagash said:
To clarify Keldane's idea and to answer Oni's, I think it should work thus (replace's the crumbling rule)

The Tide of Battle
Insert fluff
At the end of combat, calculate CR as normal.
If the enemy unit wins, for each point of CR they win by the Zombie Pirate unit suffers a wound, with no armour saves allowed.
If the Zombie Pirate unit wins, for each point of CR they win by they heal / raise one wound. Models raised in this fashion are equipped in exactly the same way as the rest of the unit. If any of the command group are dead, then they must be resurrected first. If they unit has multi-wound models, this can resurrect models with only partial wounds (i.e if the models has 3 wounds, a model can be resurrected with just one wound). However before resurrecting any new models, existing models in the unit must be fully healed. Zombie Pirate characters may be healed in this fashion, however vampires characters etc cannot.




I like this idea but I think it's a little too inconsistent (and therefore complicated). I propose this as an alternative:

Zombie Pirates have the 'Unstable' special rule and are affected by 'Call of the Sea'

Call of the Sea
No real Pirate can resist the call of his only true mistress. From the greenest sea whelp (and they are most certainly green in this case) to the most seasoned veteran of the waves, when the winds are blowing favourably not one of them can resist the call of the distant horizon. It lulls them with promises of adventures not yet had, of foreign lands not yet explored and of treasures not yet discovered. As such, even the weariest (and frequently dead) storm riding miscreants find themselves suddenly refreshed and once again ready to conquer whatever lies ahead of them

Sailors are a superstitious lot by nature; pirates even more so. Often given to a strong belief in the magical mysteries of the seas and the winds by which they are governed, members of this foul company will respond to a force unknown and unseen by those bound to a mundane life on land. To represent this, whenever an infantry unit in the army wins a combat by any margin it immediately adds D6+1 wounds worth of models back into it's ranks (beginning with command models); this can take the unit above it's starting numbers as the Call is sometimes strong enough to enchant even those members of the enemy forces who have just taken a trip down to Davy Jones' locker.

Models of any other unit type only ever regain D3+1 wounds and cannot be taken above their starting unit size or number of wounds. For characters that have joined units, one wound per resolved combat may be allocated onto any one character within a unit that has just won a combat (this can be in lieu of command models). Characters on their own may only ever regain a single wound in this manner.

I think this format simplifies things and is fairly balanced. What do you think?
 

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