Category Archives: Grieving Legion

Top Three AoS Lists for Storm of Magic GT

This is the Top Three AoS Lists for the Strom of Magic GT that took place in Preston, England on 13 and 14 August. It involved 24 players vying to be crowned champion in a 5 game tournament..

Before I jump into the Top Three AoS Lists, I wanted to remind everyone of our friendly Discord server where you can join in the conversation with the Woehammer crew and suggest articles or series for the website.

If you like what we’re doing, why not join our Patreon and help keep it going?

Also if there’s a one day or two day tournament you’d like us to cover drop us a comment on this post and we’ll have a look at it for you.

The Top Three AoS Lists

Allegiance: Stormcast Eternals
– Stormhost: Celestial Vindicators (Scions of the Storm)
– Mortal Realm: Ghur
– Grand Strategy: Draconith Defiance
– Triumphs
:
Leaders Knight-Draconis (300)
– General
– Command Trait: Battle-lust
– Artefact: Mirrorshield
– Mount Trait: Thunderous Presence
Neave Blacktalon (110)

Battleline 2 x Stormdrake Guard (340)*
– Drakerider’s Lance
2 x Stormdrake Guard (340)*
– Drakerider’s Lance
2 x Stormdrake Guard (340)*
– Drakerider’s Lance
Units
1 x Stormdrake Guard – Single (170) Behemoth
Krondspine Incarnate of Ghur (400)
– Allies
Core Battalions
*Bounty Hunters
Holy Command: Final Thunderstrike
Total: 2000 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 0 / 4
Allies: 400 / 400
Wounds: 80
Drops: 7

Brett: Prime hunters is gone and the dragons have returned. We haven’t seen a lot of Dragon lists at the top yet and they probably aren’t as bad as many people feared but they can be very hard to deal with. The army includes 2 different choices, Neave Blackthorn and Krondspine. Interestingly that just hammers how mobile this army is, Neave can ride the aetheric winds without a mount (remove her from the board and place her back 9″ from the enemy). It makes her a really good choice to take out a small important hero or jump on an uncovered objective. Everything else moves 10″ to 12″.

Army wide Luke went with the Lance on the Drakes, it’s the high damage option on the charge, they are in bounty hunters which will help them in sustained combat. They bring high durability with reasonable damage, their shooting is swingy (but if it hits, it hits), the Lance on the charge is doing 2 or 3 damage but there are only 3 attacks each, 4 on the drake. What they do well though is move fast and destroy smaller (MSU) units. The loss to Giants demonstrates this, they just don’t have the damage to drop a Gargant without a 4 drake unit. Celestial Vindicators really helps by giving exploding 6s in the combat phase.

This includes their best attack (the drake) which is 4 attacks, -2 rend and 2 damage. They want to avoid being tarpitted by big blocks of things like Bladgheist, but otherwise the unit is very durable (9 wounds on a 3+). Across the weekend most of the armies Luke faced could be picked apart down to a lot of low wound models (Dragged into the Tempest). It’s good to see the drakes flying high and Luke is to be congratulated for bringing and interesting variation.

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Allegiance: Sons of Behemat
– Tribe: Breaker Tribe (Fierce Loathing: Idiots with Flags)
– Mortal Realm: Ghur
– Grand Strategy: No Place for the Weak
– Triumphs: Inspire
Leaders JOTEK (525)*
Gatebreaker Mega-Gargant
– General
– Command Trait: Louder than Words THE DARK DESTROYER (525)*
Gatebreaker Mega-Gargant
– Artefact: Vial of Manticore Venom (Universal Artefact) BURGEON (525)
Gatebreaker Mega-Gargant
Bonded to Incarnate
– Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact)
– Universal Spell Lore: Flaming Weapon
Behemoths
THE BASTARD (400)
Krondspine Incarnate of Ghur
– Allies
Endless Spells & Invocations
The Burning Head (20) Core Battalions
*Bosses of the Stomp – Magnificent Total: 1995 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 0 / 4
Allies: 400 / 400
Wounds: 105
Drops: 4

Brett: Winning the head to head clash of Giants with Sean (3rd) but unfortunately losing 2nd round to Nighthaunt, Adam otherwise had a great tournament. Adam took the time to name everything but I’m not sure why he called Krondspine the bastard. That’s normally what opponents call him. Despite the cost of Gargants, the army manages to squeeze in an Endless Spell, the Burning Head. It’s a very cheap source of Mortal wounds potentially a way of dealing with Bastilidons (if Kroak isn’t around). Flaming weapon for an extra damage on the Flail on Burgeon and Manticore Venom for +1 to wound on The Dark Destroyer are solid ways to increase the reliability of their attacks.

Beating Seraphon and Fyreslayers as well as a near mirror match confirms the approach. His single loss was to the ultimate 7th (see below) which combines NH heroes with large battle line units. Those Grimghast are capable of demoting a Incarnate or Gargant (into the grave). This is a really well considered list and plays well into the meta with the one issue around scoring, I discuss that more below.

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Allegiance: Sons of Behemat
– Tribe: Breaker Tribe (Fierce Loathing: Idiots with Flags)
– Grand Strategy: Stomping Order
– Triumphs: Inspired

Leaders
Gatebreaker Mega-Gargant (525)*
– General
– Command Trait: Louder than Words
– Artefact: The Great Wrecka
Gatebreaker Mega-Gargant (525)*
– Artefact: Vial of Manticore Venom (Universal Artefact)
Kraken-eater Mega-Gargant (490)*

Battleline

Behemoths
Krondspine Incarnate of Ghur (400)
– Allies

Core Battalions
*Bosses of the Stomp – Magnificent
Additional Enhancements
Artefact

Total: 1940 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 0 / 4
Allies: 400 / 400
Wounds: 105
Drops: 4

Brett: This is the army that brought down both 1st but lost to 2nd finishing 3rd. That’s down to scoring and highlights one of the issues for Gargants in AoS 3.1 – Battle Tactics. Their book ones are average and really depend on the map and the opponent; forcing them to rely on the season Battle Tactics and they are harder to achieve. Complementary trait and artefact on the General granting more attacks and mortal wounds on 6s. Manticore venom (+1 to wound) is a another good call, the Gatebreaker’s Flail has 10 attacks with flat damage 3 on his top profile.

Across the event the army presented a damage check which a lot of the newer style MSU/Bounty Hunter armies fail and did. Sean didn’t score strongly but only lost to a similar list to his down to the Krondspine. The most significant difference was Flaming Weapon on a Gatebreaker. And no Kraken-eater. Great to see the stomping boys back and performing well. It would be interesting to know if these results will affect the local meta.

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Allegiance: Nighthaunt
– Procession: Grieving Legion
– Mortal Realm: Ghur
– Grand Strategy: Show of Dominance
– Triumphs: Inspired
Lady Olynder, Mortarch of Grief (340)*
– Lore of the Underworlds: Shademist
Krulghast Cruciator (150)*
– General
– Command Trait: Master of Magic
– Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact)
– Lore of the Underworlds: Seal of Shyish
Reikenor the Grimhailer (190)*
– Lore of the Underworlds: Spirit Drain

Battleline
30 x Grimghast Reapers (480)*
– Reinforced x 2
20 x Chainrasps (220)*
– Reinforced x 1
20 x Chainrasps (220)*
– Reinforced x 1
5 x Hexwraiths (160)*

Units
4 x Myrmourn Banshees (105)*
Endless Spells & Invocations
Chronomantic Cogs (40)
Purple Sun of Shyish (70)

Core Battalions
*Battle Regiment

Total: 1975 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 4 / 4

Brett: Dan’s Nighthaunt (NH) army is a bit different to a lot of the NH armies we are seeing. He’s brought some of the bigger heroes and leaning into them for their special abilities. Still have big blocks of ghosts and the Purple Sun, the procession is unusual. Grieving Legion prevents opponents from retreating. It’s great if you can absorb their attacks and replace lost models but for NH that means Guardian of Souls and Spirit Torment normally. Lady Olynder has a really powerful ability to replace D6 models in every Summonable NH unit but it’s once per game. All of the troop units count.

Acrane tome on Krulghast to increase his utility along with Master of Magic, it’s a good play with an otherwise unbuffed caster but makes Cogs a little redundant. Could Geminids or Ravenak’s Gnashing Jaws been better? Reiknor can reliably get the Purple Sun out with the ability to add 3 to casting rolls. Late game that might be less reliable if he’s taken damage. All up 4 casts and good combat potential in the heroes but you don’t really want any of them in combat, particularly early in the battle. Their value is in their abilities, and with 7 wounds and a 4+ save (and either a 4+ or 6+ ward) they are potentially vulnerable to anything with a high number of attacks (since rend isn’t a thing).

The rest of the list includes all of the good things – Grimghast x 30 (89 attacks) and 2 x 20 Chainrasps – playing into Grieving Legion’s ability. Hexwraiths for mobility, objective stealing and screening and Banshees for their spell deny and annoying attacks. A really good army and a slight change, it passed the DPS check (Gargants) only losing to an army with a lot of Magmadroths and a heavy shooting Cities list. The Cities army had some very nasty elements. Good to see something a little different and a solid performance with a 3/2.

Final Tournament Placings

Top Three AoS Lists for World tSports Champions

This is the Top Three AoS Lists for World tSports Champions that took place in Nottingham, USA on 2nd and 3rd July. It involved 16 players from the world over, vying to be crowned champion in a 5 game tournament.

This tournament was organised by the fantastic guys at Honest Wargamer.

Before I jump into the Top Three AoS Lists, I wanted to remind everyone of our friendly Discord server where you can join in the conversation with the Woehammer crew and suggest articles or series for the website.

If you like what we’re doing, why not join our Patreon and help keep it going?

Also if there’s a one day or two day tournament you’d like us to cover drop us a comment on this post and we’ll have a look at it for you.

The Top Three AoS Lists

Top Three AoS Lists - 1st Place, Maggotkin of Nurgle

Declan: Ronya qualified for the World Tsports Event by using Nighthaunt – exclusively – getting incredible results with what was considered to be a weaker army. So during Worlds she took the same army… but with a new book!

I watched the final of Ronya against Mike and she played very well, with the Nighthaunt now being great in the hands of an expert. I have played against the new book once, and it is very good. If you don’t kill whole units, they quickly come back, can retreat and charge and give debuffs on the charge – including -1 to hit, -1 save, and strike last. If you are charged by multiple units these really stack up quickly.

Nighthaunt still have their ward save as well, so if these spike you can fail to kill them… over attack and charge with everything!

Congratulations to Ronya, it was great watching her play with an army she’s used all year. I wonder if she’ll stick with them into GHB22 or take the opportunity to try something new.

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Declan: Mike finished the season as the top ranked player with all 6 of his qualifying results coming as Seraphon with 4 5-0s! But for Worlds he’s pivoted effortless to IdK and did exceptionally well to qualify despite losing his first game in the group. Qualifying on tie-break for the top 4 bracket, he then beat Beasts before being beaten by Ronya’s Nighthaunt.

Mike has gone for a Battle Regiment to get 1 drop and chose who goes first or second, allowing him to set-up for a double turn or get an alpha-strike in. His army has a bit of everything including some shooting, striking first in the third turn, and an Akhelian King who is 40 points cheaper than a Loonboss on Mangler Squig — wow… what value!

IdK are not easy to play with as they are glass cannons, but they are very strong cannons – be careful of charging in turn 3! Well done to Mike as well, top ranked player in GHB21 and 2nd at Worlds. What a year for him.

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Top Three AoS Lists - 3rd place, Legion of the First Prince

Declan: Ah Beasts of Chaos – a perfect example of what can happen to a low ranked army if it gets a good white dwarf article / update. And Beasts did! Massive rend, good summoning, and lots and lots of Dragon Ogres! I watched Ole’s game against the Thunder Lizards on the Saturday and it was great to see how he dealt with the Seraphon – swamping the objectives and summoning Chimeras to finish people off.

Ole is a player who switches armies around, and it is no surprise to see him doing well with a different army!

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14th Place, Blades of Khorne

Declan: 4-1 at the Worlds. Well done to Phil with Slaves to Darkness. Sure it is Archaon in a Host of the Everchosen list. Varanguard are great support units for Archaon, but it is the big guy who does the heavy lifting here. Able to auto-kill other models into his sword, fight twice, and with immense movement. I have managed to kill him before, but my normal approach is to ignore him — not an easy method.

It’s great to see variety at the Worlds and one of the main characters of Age of Sigmar making an appearance.

Final Tournament Placings