This is the top three AoS lists for the US Open Tacoma that took place in the US between the 19th and 21st of July. It saw 84 players vying to be crowned champion in a 5-game tournament.
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The Top Three AoS Lists
Soulblight Gravelords
Deathstench Drove
2000 Points
Drops: 3
Spell Lore – Lore of Undeath
Manifestation Lore – Morbid Conjuration
Regiments
General’s Regiment
Mannfred von Carstein, Mortarch of Night (410 Points)
• General
Black Knights (320 Points)
• Reinforced
Grave Guard (300 Points)
• Reinforced
Regiment 1
Belladamma Volga, First of the Vyrkos (230 Points)
Dire Wolves (140 Points)
Dire Wolves (140 Points)
Torgillius the Chamberlain (180 Points)
Regiment 2
Necromancer (140 Points)
• Lash of the Sire
• Orb of Enchantment
Dire Wolves (140 Points)
Connor Irwin: Thomas Guan’s excellent showing at Tacoma is a testament to generalship first, but also the versatility of the Soulblight Gravelords toolbox. This list is all about using mobility and table control to create bad matchups and efficient exchanges, all while scoring tactics reliably. The choice of Deathstench Drove formation leans fully into that plan, allowing for mortal damage and repositioning of direwolves at the end of *every turn*.
Starting from the bottom, the necromancer is a cheapish wizard with an outsized impact, Lash of the Sire adds mobility at the start of Soulblight turns and the Orb of Enchantment artefact provides another way to mess with combat activation. That last point couples nicely with giving double activation to a nearby unit. He’s surprisingly difficult to dislodge despite his meager health and save thanks to the bodyguard ward he enjoys, so what you think is an easy lift might turn into a big mistake.
Belladama and Torgillius leading three units of direwolves is the unbeating heart of this list. The wolves have the speed and footprint to be where they’re needed and exclude enemies from objectives even if they can’t contest them effectively due to the Beast ability. Bella’s warscroll spell mitigates that control problem and adds punch, but the fact that wolves require a concerted effort to lift all 20 wounds and avoid anti-infantry weapon effects makes them a surprisingly durable chaff unit. Belladama enjoys the same bodyguard ward as the necromancer, but has a far better health and save profile, and sports two wizard power to boot. Torgilllius contributes an extra round of evocation healing, an oddly strong shooting profile, and a powerful debuff spell, feeding into the wolves and other eligible units and adding yet more durability. Expect to see this package on a lot of lists.
At the top of the list there’s Mannfred and his hammers. No slouch in combat himself and able to win the activation game on 3+, this lets his other abilities shine: Reploying a unit into combat and adding attacks to nearby units if he kills models. For example, this allows him to neuter a charging hammer by redeploying a disposable unit of wolves up into them, forcing a savee opponent to have to settle for longer charges they might fail. It’s hauntingly similar to murderlust at the bargain price of one command point. Brutal. Add to that a countercharge threat from Mannfred or one of his cohort hammers and you’re in business.
Not to go unmentioned, grave guard, even with their reduced damage potential, pack a punch with crit mortals on a ludicrous number of attacks. Add to that another 5+ ward to infantry heroes like Torgillius or the necromancer and the value is very high.
Finally we come to Black Knights. 30 health worth of mobile punching power that benefits from most of the tech this list has to offer. Hard to understate how much of a glow-up this unit has received in 4th edition so it’s nice to see them immediately making an impact. They’re the perfect unit to pair with Mannfred when he needs to reach out and crush someone.
Ah, the morbid manifestation lore. This list includes 6 casts, with only two of them reserved for powerful warscroll spells, so you can guess what’s going to be coming out every hero phase possible. Not that the other spells are slouches, but the purple sun gives Soulblight a particular edge due to the lackluster attack profiles that wolves and black knights have.
This was an excellently planned and piloted list, showing the world that Soulblight Gravelords are still a force to be reckoned with.
Grand Alliance Death
Nighthaunt
Death Stalkers
2000 Points Limit
Drops: 2
Spell Lore – Lore of the Underworlds
Manifestation Lore – Morbid Conjuration
Regiments
General’s Regiment
Reikenor the Grimhailer (210)
• General
Bladegheist Revenants (300)
• Reinforced
Craventhrone Guard (200)
• Reinforced
Dreadscythe Harridans (150)
Hexwraiths (320)
• Reinforced
Regiment 1
Knight of Shrouds on Ethereal Steed (180)
• Ruler of the Spectral Hosts
• Lightshard of the Harvest Moon
Dreadblade Harrows (160)
Dreadblade Harrows (160)
Hexwraiths (320)
• Reinforced
Fittsy: This is one of the first big placings for NH and has secured Mason infamy as one of the first to leverage the strengths of Nighthaunts current faction strength.
He only lost to Tom Guan (one of the best players in the world) by a narrow margin to a strong SBGL list, 42-40.
This list has been named the Daryl Braithwaite list by AoS Coach after the song Horses, which is an Australian classic. You can go and listen to it here while you read the rest of this commentary:
This list is really focussed on the Hexwraiths and Harrows which are 2 of the strongest warscrolls available right now and from the Nighthaunt perspective they’re very well costed (and everyone else is asking why they’re so cheap). Harrows will guarantee tactics for you without committing other elements of your army, allowing you to make choices that will help you win the game over 5 turns. They’re also unrivalled for stealing objectives and blocking opponents’ tactics due to their ability to teleport in both your and the opponent’s movement phases!
This leaves the rest of the army to pin and harry the opponent. This is what the Hexwraiths are excellent at, especially in Death Stalkers allowing them to run and charge or retreat and charge. The Hexwraiths are fast, tanky, and can throw a bit of damage out, potentially sniping softer units if the opponent can’t protect them.
Reikenor brings a good caster to get the Morbid Conjurations out and can really put some serious damage onto wizards and priests, plus he’s fast, which suits this list really well. With only Reik, this leaves this list with less casting than other strong armies currently, but it looks like this concession is really working for Mason.
The KoSoS is roving around buffing the horses and adding an extra attack once a game in a 12” bubble as well as bringing back an entire unit with the Heroic Trait… bringing back 15 wounds of Hexwraiths can be vicious but it’s also valuable on the Harridans if they’ve been thrown into a combat to do some damage on a tanky unit but have been wiped in return.
The Craventhrone Guard an interesting choice, especially in a reinforced unit… it does help to force opponents to think about protecting squishy heroes with their ability to shoot at units which aren’t visible and ignoring minuses to hit. They synergise well in this list, helping to proc the Dreadscythe Harridans buff against wounded units.
Two drops gives you a good chance to make the decision of who is taking the first turn. It potentially allows you to choose to take the double with an army like this, which can hit hard into the targets you want to with this highly mobile army.
Even if we expect to see points increases, Mason himself has mentioned dropping the Harrows, but there are some other options there too to change this list slightly whilst still maintaining its power.
You can hear more from Mason himself from 2:00:00 here:
Grand Alliance Order
Seraphon
Shadowstrike Starhost
2000 Points Limit
Drops: 2
Spell Lore – Lore of Celestial Manipulation
Manifestation Lore – Morbid Conjuration
Regiments
General’s Regiment
Slann Starmaster (280)
• General
• Coatl Familiar
Aggradon Lancers (420)
• Reinforced
Saurus Guard (110)
Saurus Warriors (340)
• Reinforced
Regiment 1
Skink Starseer (150)
• Beastmaster
Raptadon Chargers (280)
• Reinforced
Raptadon Chargers (280)
• Reinforced
Raptadon Chargers (140)
Faction Terrain
Realmshaper Engine
Gerald Warren: Brice Koppin’s list pushes heavily into the mobility aspects available to Seraphon. Shadowstrike Starhost allows for up to three SKINK INFANTRY or SKINK CAVALRY, in this case the Raptadon Chargers and Skink Starseer, to move D6″ in your shooting phase. This allows for additional movement after an opponent redeploy and could also be used to force a covering fire into a unit of your choosing. Additionally, their is no restriction that would not allow units that ran to benefit from this battle formation. Beastmaster also adds 2″ to the Move characteristic of the cavalry units in this list, as long as they are wholly within 12″ of the Starseer. This is a Passive bonus, meaning it would also apply to a retreats and the movement ability from Shadowstike Starhost. Another 2″ of movement can be gained if the Sotek the Deliverer Asterism is chosen during the Deployment phase. Couple all of these movement bonuses with the Celestial Manipulation Lore spell Speed of Haunchi, which allows a unit to Run and still Shoot and/or Charge and a unit of Raptadon Chargers could move up to 28″ before making a charge!
The list can also maximize use of Itzl the Tamer for Crit (2 Hits) on the Raptadon and Aggradon Companions. Both cavalry unit types gain an additional point of damage on the charge, which paired with exploding sixes to hit on the companions can quickly ramp up the damage of these units in the following combat phase. Target priority is of great importance for the Chargers as their 3 health and 5+ save can make them a bit less durable then their Aggradon Lancer counterparts, but into low save and/or low health units, they can readily dispatch the unit or disable it to the point of not being destroyed in the return combat.
Seraphon still capitalizes on spell casting as the Slann Starmaster is natively +1 to cast rolls and can use its warscroll spell to give the Skink Starseer +1 to cast rolls as well. Paired with a Place of Power and Tepok the Seer, both Wizards in this army.
could be +3 on their cast, though this is not likely optimal for the list. Even with a +1 to cast rolls on both Wizards, the reduction of bonuses to unbind in 4th Edition means that the 5 total casts per hero phase are more likely to succeed. The Coatl Familiar Artefact of Power additionally increases this chance for one spell cast per game, adding a D6 to cast roll for the Slann, offering a potential for locking in a critical spell cast. This continues to amplify the movement this list wants to play into with Speed of Haunchi, as mentioned above. Lore of Celestial Manipulation also has a spell to reduce the rend of melee weapons on an enemy unit, which can help your cavalry last much longer in combat, though it’s 12″ range has to be accounted for. For damage output, Comet’s Call (a “horde breaker” spell) can put a fair amount of mortal damage into a unit with 10+ models, increasing the chance that a Cavalry unit can finish the job. The Morbid Conjuration Manifestations only further increase the ability to reduce movement counterplay, output more damage, and reduce enemy unit save rolls.
Finally, the list makes good use of recursion abilities offered by the Slann and the Rally ability. The Slann allows you to roll a D6 in each of your Hero Phases that on a 4+ allows for the return of a destroyed unit at half strength, rounding up. This is potentially 5 chances to return 2-3 Raptadon Chargers, 3 Aggradon Lancers, or 10 Warriors. With all of the infantry and cavalry units in this list having Musicians, Rally is fairly efficient at bringing back destroyed models, though less so with the Aggradon Lancers.
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Final Tournament Placings
