This is the top three AoS lists for Resurgence that took place in the Philippines on the 7th of October. It saw 10 players vying to be crowned champion in a 3-game tournament.
We’re very lucky to have gotten to know the Wartilyo crew quite well since their GT we covered back in May. When Lance reached out about producing a Top Three for a recent one dayer in the Philippines, I jumped at the chance. Thanks to Lance for sending the information through and to the players for sending their list writeups!
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The Top Three AoS Lists
Heneral Custard: The list started out as a copy of Liam Kavanaugh’s list from Gymhammer last July, but tweaked to my playstyle. I swapped out Chainrasps for bigger chunks of Spirit Hosts to act as a more imposing anvil, fit in a second Guardian of Souls to spread around the +1 to wound aura (and to attempt Merciless Blizzards), and put Pendant of the Fellwind on the Krulghast because I like them sticking with the Spirit Hosts. The points drop was also a big help, and with an odd 80 points, Craventhrone Guard could accomplish skirmishing, activating Harridans, and completing the odd Surround and Destroy.
Spirit Hosts with the coherency change plus Hoarfrost have been a really fun way to play them. Coupled with the +1 to Hit and +1 to Wound auras, they’re surprisingly dangerous. Suddenly, they aren’t just batteries for Kurdoss or the Krulghast to fulfill Led into the Maelstrom; they do catch people off guard with their damage output. The 1-inch range proved to be a problem, but this is coming from someone who used to run 9 of them in a unit during the last season as Galletian Veterans. Regardless, when they survive the melee, they’re some of best targets for Bait and Trap, and then immediately Harridans can clean up.
Speaking of Kurdoss, he’s just fun to throw into the fray. I often forget that he steals command points, because all I want to do is throw him at a problem and see if he can go the distance.
I wanted to get more use out of the Banshees anti-magic effect, but I think many Nighthaunt players agree with me that there is a certain joy in telling people what the attack profile is. Depending on the match-up, they either made for good counter charging or just being happy little screens.
All in all, Nighthaunt’s current strength feel like their ability to accomplish battle tactics. With the points drop, most of everyone’s favorite tools are viable, and after seeing a list that was all Bladegheist Revenants, I think the ghosts are going to be alright.
Commentary by Basa Mogul
Primary idea of the army:
1) Go for magical dominance + blocks of hardy tarpits making way for kroak to blast away
The primary idea of my army is to just step on the objectives and defend them by going for magical dominance in the form of buffs, debuffs, mortal wounds, and unbinding while supporting it with blocks of saurus. The slann is built as a support unit that can turn into a melee warrior (although it didn’t come up because the saurus always survived). The starpriests are also support units that can use merciless blizzards when the situation calls for it. Kroak’s role is to really maximize the magic denial and area denial. One of the main features of the army is the Wizard-finder 20-man spear saurus block that can have a maximum profile of 2″ 40/60A 2s 2s -2 1. Last note, 4+ bites from saurus blocks are no joke.
Notable match-up comments
Khorne: The bloodthirster & skullcrusher is damage ok vs saurus, but bloodletters are painful. I will just let them try to do their 5+ spell ignores vs Kroak blasts.
OBR – Nagash: I will try stay away 30in from him, and just buff the team since the rest of the army not too painful. Main goal is to try and wizard-find nagash, and try to dish-out celestial deliverance via arcane vassal while being out of unbind range.
Behemat – I will just tarpit, and then blast with kroak.
Soulblight – I will just stand-on the gravesites, try to counter all spells, and try to do snipe damage on the heroes with kroak.
Nighthaunt – I will overwhelm them with the amount of attack dice to roll. Since they are using MSU, I think kroak will do well against them.
Stormcast – I will try to hide the heroes behind battle line, and protect kroak with all the buffs, if needed.
BJ Recio: I started the list out with Nagash – the event poster had Nagash sitting on a throne, and as it happened my Nagash was also kit bashed to sit on a throne, so I felt it was fate heh. On a serious note though, what made Nagash worth the 900 points for me was less the 8 spells casting (it’s strong but not that central, I can afford to miscast), but rather the unlimited unbind attempts at +3 roll. That counters the Magical Dominance and Magical mayhem BTs so it seemed like the way to go with the list is battle tactic denial.
There wasn’t a lot of room for OBR units so the bonus command points were not as plentiful, which meant putting in liege kavalos for the free command per turn. Earlier versions of my list used the boneshaper as the general, but Diversionary Tactics didn’t work so well with it because mortisans are slow and hard to position. And I really wanted that command trait to make Bait and Trap and Led Into the Maelstrom hard for my opponent, so I made LK my general.
Battleline-wise, the spear mortek guard with harvester formed the core of my castle, the sword mortek guard was there to grab faraway objectives and force my opponent to split, and the kavalos deathriders were there for my round 1 battle tactic. They’re all expendable because Nagash brings them back half-strength anyway, and I was crematorians so I wanted them to die to deal mortal wounds.
I should note that while the harvester has been nerfed to the ground, it’s 160 points now which for a monster is not bad. The fact that it brings some mortek guard back is more of a bonus than a feature. And since Nagash is there, my opponents tend to think of the harvester as low priority.
Since I did not make my mortisan the general, I couldn’t use Spellcasting Savant as my GS. I went for Overshadow instead, which sucked against Seraphon and their super tough battleline. I anticipated Seraphon to be my weakest matchup overall, since they have bonuses to casting that weakened the point of Nagash’s +3 to unbind rolls. Then I matched against him at random battleplan 1 so I was off my game from the start. I was slightly ahead of him in points but had no chance on my GS. In the future I should consider another GS – maybe Control the Nexus? Still hard.
I did well against other matchups. I knew SBGL is all over right now with hordes of zombies, but between gravetide and the boneshaper’s warscroll spell, plus my harvester-protected mortek guard, I knew I could outlast and wipe those hordes and use the Soul Release spell to force their re-summons to deploy very out of place. Meanwhile, the mirror versus OBR went well because I just tarpitted his Katakros with deathriders buffed by Nagash spells and outscored him by denying BTs and smashing Nagash against his spellcasting savant general.
Joshua Manalansan: First off, credit for the list and its playstyle goes entirely to Jarod Brown– THE top performing Lumineth Realm-lords player who has pioneered and piloted this list to a 5-0 and 4-1 finish. Much more than that, he has been a mentor to countless players in the Lumineth Discord and is the go-to person for all things Lumineth.
Standouts for this list include Rune of Senthoi, Eltharion, Sevireth, Ellania and Ellathor, double Dawnriders, and double-reinforced Bladelords.
With Rune, Enlightener unbinds on a +4 with the Scinari heroes and Zaitrec. This can be powered up even further with the Optimal Focus realm rule giving another cast and unbind if you go second in the round. Eltharion has one of the best points-to-damage ratios not just in the Lumineth book, but in all of AoS. The twins function as half Enlightener and half Eltharion, growing stronger as the game goes on and getting the bodyguard interaction with the Bladelords. Sevireth just crushes the meta by assassinating Andtorian Locuses, going to the sides of the battlefield, and smashing opponent terrain. Dawnriders are the Swiss army knife of this list. Scores easy points, moves up the board to cast Overwhelming Heat, and provides Speed of Hysh for units that go deep. Bladelords provide the bodyguard rule for our Scinari units and ensures Spellcasting Savant. With Perfect Strike, they will on average deal 9 mortal wounds to whatever they touch.
This list utilizes the Andtorian Acolytes battalion and has overall better usage of primal dice compared to Teclis-based lists. Along with how common Locuses are, the changes to “Look Out, Sir!” and the Sentinel point increase, this list might just be the best way for Lumineth players to tackle the current GHB!
Final Tournament Placings
To view all of the results for the tournament please follow the link below to Best Coast Pairings
https://www.bestcoastpairings.com/event/9H785JMGLU
