This is the top three 40k lists for the April Warhound GT at Game Grid that took place in the USA on the 8th and 9th of April. It involved 23 players vying to be crowned champion in a 5-game tournament.
As we head into 10th edition and beyond we wanted to start providing a source for lists that are being used successfully in tournaments around the world. The size of the 40k community and the sheer number of events means we won’t be commenting, at least for now, but simply providing a resource of formatted lists you can search.
If you think you have what it takes to comment on the 40k competitive scene, why not message us on Discord to find out how you could get involved with the Woehammer Crew.
Before I jump into the Top Three 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 40k Lists
ARKS OF OMEN DETACHMENT – Faction: Traitoris Astartes – Sub-faction: Black Legion
HQ Abaddon the Despoiler (350) – Warlord – Traits: Eternal Vendetta (Aura), Merciless Overseer, Paragon of Hatred – Stratagems: Warlord Trait Dark Apostle (95) – Mark of Chaos: Undivided – 1x Dark Apostle – 2x Dark Disciple – Traits: Trusted War Leader – Prayers: Illusory Supplication – Stratagems: Aspiring Lord Master of Possession (105) – Mark of Chaos: Undivided – Psychic Powers: Mutated Invigoration, Pact of Flesh Sorcerer in Terminator Armour (125) – Mark of Chaos: Tzeentch – Force sword, Combi-melta, Chaos familiar – Psychic Powers: Gift of Chaos, Infernal Gaze, Skeins of Fate – Relics: Veilbreaker Plate – Stratagems: Gifts of Chaos
This is the Top Three AoS Lists for GT Bilbao that took place in Spain on 10th and 12th December. It involved 26 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: Lumineth Realm-lords – Great Nation: Ymetrica – Grand Strategy: Alarith Afterschock – Triumphs: Indomitable
Leaders Archmage Teclis and Celennar, Spirit of Hysh (700) Alarith Stonemage (120)* – General – Command Trait: Unyielding Toughness – Artefact: Molten Talisman – Lore of the High Peaks: Unbreakable Stoicism Avalenor, the Stoneheart King (420)*
Battleline 5 x Alarith Stoneguard (120)* – Diamondpick Hammers 10 x Alarith Stoneguard (240)** – Diamondpick Hammers – Reinforced x 1 10 x Alarith Stoneguard (240)** – Diamondpick Hammers – Reinforced x 1
Units 5 x Tree-Revenants (110)* – Allies
Endless Spells & Invocations Rune of Petrification (40)
Ed: This is typical of the kind of lists we’ve been seeing since the new Lumineth Realmlords tome. It is tricky to run properly as Teclis has a whopping 18 spells to choose from and takes up so much of your points that what’s left really has no room to make mistakes. You need to know your rules inside and out – not a list for players who take 10 mins to read their warscrolls each round! However, the versatility of Teclis coupled with the hardiness and output of his Alarith entourage can accomplish a great deal even with so few models on the board.
Avalenor is a certified beatstick, especially with his pet stonemage in tow keeping him on top bracket for as long as possible. He and Teclis have the ability to dictate the course of the battle, while the Stoneguard will do most of the actual heavy lifting. Even as Galletian Veterans, Stoneguard are hardy anvils which gain a 4+ ward against mortal wounds while contesting an objective they control and the ability to ignore rend of -1 and -2! Plus in the Expert Conquerers battalion they count as 3 per model, meaning their hold over that objective and access to their ward are extra secure. They’re not too bad on the offensive either, though certainly the support from Avalenor and Teclis is crucial.
Then there are the Tree Revenants. A cheeky little unit that can pop up in unexpected places and secure objectives without much investment. It forces your opponent to play a little defensively and deploy their forces in less than ideal positions to prevent a catastrophic backdoor teleports. Even if they don’t steal an objective or assassinate a vulnerable unit, just having them on the board can be worth it for how it changes your opponent’s behaviour in your favour. I can’t speak highly enough of these guys as a list filler for any order faction who can ally them in.
It’s a brilliant list, clearly played excellently to have reached first place. But time is running out to make use of it! With a new GHB just around the corner, and Expert Conquerors/Bounty Hunters almost certainly about to disappear will similar builds continue to reach the top of the podium?
Brett: The current Big Bad of AoS according to many threads, as always shooting is effective and controversial. The increase in range for the Leadbelchers (to 18″) means it’s a lot easier for them to stand still. Standing still now guarantees 2 shots (2D3 v 1D6), not a lot but it’s significantly more damage. Ironblasters long range shot moving to a guaranteed 4 damage at 30″ with -2 Rend and doubling the number of shots is a huge deal. Their Hail Shot (10 shots, Rend -1, D2) is effective in Unleash hell and both units are solid melee damage dealers as are their Leaders. Fittingly for Ogors they are tough (4+ save) multiwound (4W for Leadblechers and 9W for Ironblasters) models who also tank well. With multiple small units they also blunt the counter strike and limit carry over damage.
With two effective (and cheap) screens in the Gnoblars (who aren’t even GV) to keep opponents out of your hair, it’s a challenge to take apart. Only the event’s 1st place managed to do so in the 3rd round, a match up of the new tomes, with the Stoneguard coming out on top. Scoring 20 in 3 rounds it looks like Adrian might have tabled his opponents frequently, certainly a chance with this sort of shooting.
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Allegiance: Idoneth Deepkin – Enclave: Fuethan – Grand Strategy: The Creeping Gloomtide – Triumphs: Inspired
Leaders Eidolon of Mathlann, Aspect of the Sea (325)* – General – Command Trait: Endless Sea Storm – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – Lore of the Deeps: Steed of Tides Isharann Soulscryer (150)* – Universal Prayer Scripture: Curse
Battleline 20 x Namarti Reavers (340)* – Reinforced x 1 10 x Namarti Reavers (170)* 2 x Akhelian Allopexes (330)** – Razorshell Harpoon – Reinforced x 1 2 x Akhelian Allopexes (330)** – Razorshell Harpoon – Reinforced x 1 2 x Akhelian Allopexes (330)** – Razorshell Harpoon – Reinforced x 1
Endless Spells & Invocations The Burning Head (20)
Patrick: What a strange list, and yet here we are in the top 3. Fuethan opens up the ability to take Allopexes as Battleline as well as bringing in Bloodthirsty Shivers (which gain some bonus attacks if they are within a certain distance of one another). In Jordi’s Case, they have opted to take three squads of 2 without bringing any Shivers at all. Allopexes are already excellent “independent operator” units, and placing them in a Bounty Hunters battalion improves their ability to clear objectives, allowing for the slower Namarti to move in.
Speaking of Namarti, Jordi has brought 2 units, both fairly small. 30 Reavers spread across 2 units is decent if you’re pushing for a skirmish force, but the frailty of the Namarti will sting if anything focuses on them for very long. The Soulscryer’s ability to deep-strike will allow all of the Namarti to start the game off the board, which would allow for better early survival.
The final unit is an Eidolon general, bringing the Arcane Tome and Endless Sea Storm. The Eidolon innately has full re-rolls for casting, unbind, and dispelling, and Endless Sea Storm allows the ability to cast an additional spell for each successful casting attempt with a result greater than 7. The Eidolon has some solid warscroll spells, and with these upgrades he becomes a high-quality support hero that will do a lot to keep the Allopexes alive.
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Allegiance: Fyreslayers – Lodge: Greyfyrd – Grand Strategy: Master of the Forge – Triumphs: Indomitable
Leaders Auric Runesmiter (135)* – Runic Iron – Universal Prayer Scripture: Heal Auric Runeson (80)* – Ancestral War-axe – Artefact: Axe of Grimnir Battlesmith (150)* – Artefact: Nulsidian Icon Auric Flamekeeper (90)** – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – Universal Spell Lore: Ghost-mist Auric Runefather on Magmadroth (360)** – General – Command Trait: Blood of the Berzerker – Artefact: Master Rune of Unbreakable Resolve – Magmadroth Trait: Coal-heart Ancient Auric Runemaster (125)** – Artefact: Volatile Brazier – Universal Prayer Scripture: Heal
Battleline 15 x Hearthguard Berzerkers (480)*** – Poleaxes – Reinforced x 2 10 x Hearthguard Berzerkers (320)*** – Broadaxes – Reinforced x 1 10 x Vulkite Berzerkers with Fyresteel Handaxes (170)**
Brett: Straight forward enough, the foot heroes provide a 4+ ward (in Greyfyrd) and can use their prayer (heal) to get the Hearthguard close enough to charge. The triple reinforced Hearthguard averages 10 mortal wounds (MW) in addition to their normal damage. Both Hearthguard are Expert Conquerors to give some solid objective play for really elite army. This is a great way to play into the current meta and try to deal with long range shooting. The primary hammers have the option of rending or non rending weapons to manage armies like Nighthaunt and the Vulkites are a risk for melee army with their fight on death.
As always though there are trade offs, this is such a slow army that you might be better to not engage the central castle forcing them to come to your or spread. Either works giving you the chance to weaken them piecemeal. Score wise I think that lack of movement may have cost him dearly.
This is the Top Three AoS Lists for the Leicester City AoS GT that took place in the UK on 3rd and 4th December. It involved 28 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.
Pre-Tournament Analysis
I thought I’d add a bit about the meta at the event before we jump into the meat of the article. If this is popular I’ll continue doing this on future top three articles.
Ranked Players
Below shows the players already ranked in our Woehammer rankings form events before the Leicester GT.
Of the 28 players, 21 Players had already taken part in at least 1 GT before this event, with the highest ranked player (Phil Marshall) being 1st in the UK and currently 2nd in the World. Remember these rankings are based on our own handicapped rankings system explained here.
Faction Breakdown
The Leicester GT had a fairly close representation of the current meta with a few notable exceptions. No Sylvaneth armies where present despite this currently being the 2nd favourite faction with players. Like wise there was also no representation of Ogor Mawtribes or Kharadron Overlords at this event.
The Top Three AoS Lists
Allegiance: Slaves to Darkness – Damned Legion: Knights of the Empty Throne – Mortal Realm: Ghur – Grand Strategy: Show of Dominance – Triumphs: Inspired
Leaders Knights of the Empty Throne Varanguard x 6 (560)* – General – Daemonforged Blade and Warpsteel Shield – Command Trait: Inescapable Doom – Artefact: Grasping Plate – Mark of Chaos: Tzeentch Knights of the Empty Throne Varanguard x 6 (560)** – Daemonforged Blade and Warpsteel Shield – Artefact: Corrupted Nullstone – Mark of Chaos: Tzeentch Chaos Sorcerer Lord (135)** – Mark of Chaos: Tzeentch – Spell: Mask of Darkness Chaos Sorcerer Lord (135)** – Mark of Chaos: Tzeentch – Spell: Mask of Darkness
Battleline 8 x Iron Golems (75)* – Mark of Chaos: Tzeentch 8 x Iron Golems (75)* – Mark of Chaos: Tzeentch 8 x Iron Golems (75)* – Mark of Chaos: Tzeentch 8 x Iron Golems (75)* – Mark of Chaos: Tzeentch
Units 1 x Mindstealer Sphiranx (95)*
Behemoths Chaos Warshrine (215)* – Mark of Chaos: Tzeentch – Prayer1: Universal Prayer Scripture: Heal
Phil Marshall: Knights of the Empty Throne – How does it work? In Knights of the Empty Throne, you are able to take Varanguard as Heroes, the first unit which is your general has Inescapable Doom and Grasping plate, meaning it can pile 6 inches and you cant retreat from this unit, the other unit has Corrupted Nullstone which is an auto unbind.
The list is designed around two units of six Varanguard with the Mark of Tzeentch which allows the re-rolls of 1s to armour saves and gives units a 5+ spell ignore. Then you’ll look to really capitalise on these mechanics with other buff pieces in the army, which include two Sorcerer lords. Sorcerer lords have a built in mechanic called Orcular Visions which gives a unit +1 to save (this ability can stack), they are also wizards so offer the ability to cast mystic shield, demonic power (re-roll all hits and wounds) and mask of darkness (teleport).
The final buff piece is the Warshrine, the prayer for Tzeentch is +1 save and a 4+ spell ignore, the only other prayer that may be used is Undivided which allows a unit to re-roll all hits and wounds. On top of this the Warshrine has an aura of 6+ ward which degrades as it takes damage. With all of these buff pieces it allows you to essentially make an unkillable unit (or two) of Varanguard. You can get +6 to your save re-rolling 1s once per game (oracular visions twice, mystic shield, Tzeentch Prayer, all out defence and finest hour), on top of this you can have a 4+ 5+ 5+ spell ignore as the Varanguard have a warscroll ability for spell ignore, mark of tzeentch grants spell ignore and then an additional spell ignore from the warshrine.
As a result there are very few things that can deal with these units once they have the buffs on, you need to be able to do mass mortal wounds in the shooting and combat phase, otherwise there is a strong likelihood that you will never do any damage to this unit. I tend to evaluate the main threats of my opponents army and see how they have deployed, if I can capatalise on getting my general into the bulk of it and keeping them locked in combat for as long as possible. The rest of the list is designed to be very hard to kill with four units of iron golems who get +1 to their save if they havent made a normal move, meaning before rend they will be a 3+ re-rolling 1s.
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Allegiance: Disciples of Tzeentch – Change Coven: Hosts Arcanum – Grand Strategy: Master of Destiny – Triumphs: Indomitable
Leaders Curseling, Eye of Tzeentch (180)* – General – Command Trait: Cult Demagogue – Lore of Fate: Arcane Suggestion Kairos Fateweaver (435) Lord of Change (400)* – Artefact: The Eternal Shroud – Universal Spell Lore: Flaming Weapon Fluxmaster, Herald of Tzeentch on Disc (170)* – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – Universal Spell Lore: Ghost-mist
Battleline 10 x Pink Horrors of Tzeentch (250)** 10 x Pink Horrors of Tzeentch (250)** 10 x Kairic Acolytes (120)**
Kieron: Ryan is the captain of Team Malta and a combination of one of the finest Tzeentch players in the world and one of the nicest people you’re ever likely to meet. Speaking to him at the event about his list writing and tactics, he explained that he’s very confident in his approach and then plays the list repeatedly – around 350 reps with the current iteration, losing very few games along the way. The only downside – headaches after each match due to the mental load of channelling the will of The Changer of Ways. Malta has a relatively small AoS scene and there’s only so many times a person can take a beat down from Ryan, no matter how charming he while doing so, and games on TTS don’t really allow for the precision of measurements that cause aforementioned headaches.
Onto the list itself and it has somewhat of a retro charm about it with two big birds: a combo that, while clearly effective in the right hands, is seen less frequently due to Kairos and the Lord of Change sharing the same warscroll spell now instead of Kairos having his own spell. The Lord of Change offers a good amount of shooting with the Rod of Sorcery and can do some work with a damage 3 Staff of Tzeentch thanks to the Flaming Weapon buff. Together, they give everything within range +1 to cast each, meaning that Ryan can afford to leave Cogs at home in favour of Horrorghast.
The list can also expect to generate over the magic number of 10 fate points a turn, meaning that 10 blue horrors should be summoned every turn. When talking to Ryan about Screamers, I explained I was excited about how fast they could go and his response was that a Fluxmaster moving 22” and then summoning 9” away is even faster!
The final little wrinkle for this list (valid for the next month or so at least) is the fact that all Ryan’s battleline are Expert Conquerors – annoying enough for the 10 Kairics to count as 30, but absolutely infuriating on the Pink Horrors that start off counting as 30, but peak at counting as 60 until the 31st wound is done to the unit, at which point it starts the slow decline back to counting as 3 and then counting as dead!
It clearly worked, with Ryan achieving the maximum possible differential on Day One, with the only loss being into the event’s eventual winner, Phil Marshall, and a tonne of 2+ re-rerolling 1s saving throws and an equally hefty amount of spell ignores and wards.
Kieron: And so on to the third placed army, piloted by the very dry Toby Resnick, including the named units “An Undercosted Priest”, “Kroak’s Ablative Wounds” and the “Raveshaper Engine”, which is like a “Realmshaper Engine” but with flashy LEDs that are operated by remote control depending on who wins priority. I almost felt sorry for the Seraphon player on the table next to us at Leicester as they jealously eyed up the craziest terrain piece you’ll ever see!
The list itself has a couple of lovely converted chariots that are really good at zipping around the board early game while one of the Engine of the Gods or the Bastiladon is double activating with one of the 5+ CP Toby generally has to play with each turn. Cogs consolidates Kroak’s absolute magical supremacy with a double miscast pretty much being the only way that Kroak fails a spell and, usually, the unbind required when a spell does go off is double figures or flat out impossible. “Big Frog Goes Ribbit Ribbit” indeed.
All the other buffs that Seraphon players can dish out are also present here, with re-rolling 1s, run and shoot, +1 to hit in addition to the normal All out Attack etc. buffs that can be added. Skinks running about the place, doing all the dirty jobs that score the points while the bigger immediate threats (particularly the resurrecting Engine of the Gods – 50% of the time, it comes back with full wounds every time) draw the enemy’s attention away.
I’m sure once Ryan had finished with the paracetamol, Toby was ready for some with the number of rules he has to keep in his head, even with more tokens than models to help him keep track. While one of the Order Battletomes from the latest Roadmap is probably another Lumineth book (maybe two!), it would be great to have a Seraphon book to combine some of these into the Warscrolls themselves and make it so players like Toby can fly their Dino Flag and not feel a bit guilty about it.
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Allegiance: Flesh-eater Courts – Grand Court: Morgaunt – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumphs: Indomitable
Leaders Abhorrant Archregent (245)** – Artefact: The Dermal Robe – Lore of Madness: Spectral Host Abhorrant Archregent (245)** – Lore of Madness: DerangedTransformation Abhorrant Ghoul King on Royal Zombie Dragon (430)* – General – Command Trait: Savage Chivalry – Artefact: Decrepit Coronet – Mount Trait: Razor-clawed – Lore of Madness: Miasmal Shroud Varghulf Courtier (160)**
Battleline 20 x Crypt Ghouls (170)* – Reinforced x 1 20 x Crypt Ghouls (170)* – Reinforced x 1 20 x Crypt Ghouls (170)* – Reinforced x 1
Units 6 x Crypt Flayers (360)* – Reinforced x 1
Endless Spells & Invocations Chalice of Ushoran (50)
Brett: Flesh eater courts is still centred around their heros and lean on their summoning and buffs to make their other units dangerous. They reward a patient player who is happy to screen the heroes and summon more models early game before striking out. 3 Abhorrants (one mounted and 2 foot) and the Varghulf at the heart of the list and maybe a little unusually 3 x 20 Crypt Ghouls. Bounty Hunters can tear through these quickly and a lot of lists have minimised them. 3 Wizards granting fly to 1 to 3 units (Spectral Host) however if they can fly (like the dragon) then granting run and charge, additional movement (Deranged Transformation) and lastly a small MW spell with the chance of affecting opposing hit and wound rolls (Miasmal Shroud).
Spectral Host on the Zombie Dragon gives up to 20″ of movement + a charge at the top of first turn if they go first. Try not to leave room for it to land near something important early game. Then there is the summoning, a Serf unit is Crypt Ghouls, Knight is 3 Crypt Flayers/Horrors and a Courtier is a Varghulf Courtier. Each Archreagent can summon 20 Serfs or 3 Knights or a Courtier every turn. The Ghoul King can only summon Courtiers. This is a command ability so forcing them to use CP can help but it is done at the end of the movement phase. The Courtiers are both mobile threat and healers rolling 6 dice and healing Serfs on a 2+ and Knights on a 5+ within 10″ (as well as themselves if they kill a model).
As a Morguant host the Serfs can return once destroyed at full strength (4+). It’s a 50% chance that you can kill a screen and achieve very little. All of this is just to build the scene, the army can afford to wait but with the ability to snipe something with either the Flayers or the Zombie Dragon. If they get their buffs off it’s possible for most of the army to reroll 1s to hit if they are close to the Serfs. And those serfs, while they don’t hit hard, can easily get to 3 attacks each making them a reasonable threat to anything with a 4+ save. They’re cheap and trade really well. Castling though means they can struggle to score well in early rounds if you don’t feed them units and tactics. Shooting obviously is a weakness as are ranged Mortal Wounds from spells (they have a lot of denies though). Stretching them out and making them react to you is a good tactic as well.
Simon lost to a Soulblight army with a lot of mobility (Blood Knights, Dire Wolves) and Grave Guard. They were able to hold Simon scoreless. The other loss was to a Seraphon Thunder Lizard with Kroak. Kroak can deny pretty much all of their magic while the Solar Engine Bastiladon tears big holes. Seraphon are a hard counter to the army and very difficult to deal with.
This is the Top Three AoS Lists for the Big Bristol Brawl that took place in the UK on 3rd and 4th December. It involved 41 players (Including our very own Danny) 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.
Pre-Tournament Analysis
I thought I’d add a bit about the meta at the event before we jump into the meat of the article. If this is popular I’ll continue doing this on future top three articles.
Ranked Players Below shows the players already ranked in our Woehammer rankings form events before the Bristol GT.
11 Players had already taken part in 1 GT before this event, with the highest ranked player (Luke Churchus) being 22nd in the UK. Remeber these rankings are based on our own handicapped rankings system explained here.
Faction Breakdown
The Bristol Brawl saw an unusually high number of Daughters, Blades of Khorne and Slaanesh armies, with all three seeing double their expected representation based on the current worldwide meta.
On the flip side of this, the tournament saw no representation from Ironjawz, Slaves, Cities, Kharadron and Big Waagh where we would have expected at least one army to be present.
Of the high win rate factions Beast of Chaos and Disciples are as expected while Ogor Mawtribes and Soulblight see a slightly higher number than compared to the meta.
The Top Three AoS Lists
Allegiance: Nighthaunt – Procession: Scarlet Doom – Grand Strategy: Show of Dominance – Triumphs: Inspired
Leaders Nagash, Supreme Lord of the Undead (955)* Spirit Torment (115)* – General – Command Trait: Ruler of the Spirit Hosts – Artefact: Lightshard of the Harvest Moon
Battleline 20 x Bladegheist Revenants (350)* – Reinforced x 1 20 x Bladegheist Revenants (350)* – Reinforced x 1 3 x Spirit Hosts (125)*
Declan: Greg has been using Nagash since AoS3 dropped, and quite a bit before that. In early AoS3, there was a period we met 3 or 4 times and he beat me every time with a Soulblight version…. here he has taken Nighthaunt instead which allows him to use the Nighthaunt alleginace abilities on the charge and back it up with Nagash’s magic dominance.
Games Workshop / Wahapedia
When they charge the Bladegheists are almost certain to roll 4+ and get one of the debuffs on the table. But the truly frightening thing is that these debuffs stack. I’m not a fan of the mechanism, but it’s the core of how Nighthaunt work and it is scary when a 10+ is rolled followed by a few 8+ (because you can always go down the table).
There’s no denying that Nagash is the centrepiece though and – although he is seen as weaker in the last update – he can still take on an army (and at 955 points he needs to). I’d love to tell you how to kill him, but the truth is I still don’t know but I imagine it’s got something to do with mortal wounds (preferably at range). It’s definitely not a Mangler Squig (last time I charged one in, I did no wounds to Nagash).
If you’ve not met him before he lives up to his role as the Lord of the Undead… with 8 spell casts, all with bonuses and the piece de la resistance… Arcane Bolt as many times as you like. (see you’ll be glad you brought the ranged mortal wounds. He’s a beast and sometimes the best thing to do is get ahead on points, stand on objectives and hope he and the Bladegheists can’t shift you. Good luck; you’ll need it!
Games Workshop / Wahapedia
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Allegiance: Fyreslayers – Lodge: Lofnir – Grand Strategy: No Place for the Weak – Triumphs: Inspired
Leaders Auric Runefather on Magmadroth (360)** – General – Command Trait: Blood of the Berzerker – Artefact: Axe of Grimnir – Magmadroth Trait: Coal-heart Ancient Battlesmith (150)** Battlesmith (150)**
Battleline Auric Runeson on Magmadroth (320)* – Ancestral War-axe – Artefact: Master Rune of Unbreakable Resolve – Magmadroth Trait: Flame-scale Youngblood Auric Runeson on Magmadroth (320)* – Ancestral War-axe – Magmadroth Trait: Lava-tongue Adult Auric Runeson on Magmadroth (320)* – Ancestral War-axe Auric Runeson on Magmadroth (320)** – Ancestral War-axe
Edit: The maximum number of Magmadroths you can take in a Lofnir list is six, not five as the comment below eludes to.
Ethan: This Lofnir list leans on heavy on the idea that more is more, taking as many magmadroths as you can fit in 2000 points. It’s obviously an effective strategy, having worked out well for Alex, with his only loss being Hagg Nar where I can only predict Morathi’s unkillable rules made for a major issue for an army so light on units.
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Army Faction: Ogor Mawtribes – Army Subfaction: Boulderhead
LEADER 1 x Kragnos (720) 1 x Frostlord on Stonehorn (445)* – General – Command Traits: Touched by the Everwinter – Artefacts: Arcane Tome – Mount Traits: Rockmane Elder – Spells: Flaming Weapon – Prayers: Heal(🎶Living on a Prayer🎵) 1 x Butcher (135)* – Cleaver – Spells: Molten Entrails
BATTLELINE 2 x Mournfang Pack (175)* – Skalg – Culling Clubs and Hackers and Ironfist 1 x Stonehorn Beastriders (310)* – Blood Vulture 2 x Mournfang Pack (175)* – Skalg – Culling Clubs and Hackers and Ironfist
CORE BATTALIONS: *Battle Regiment
TOTAL POINTS: (1960/2000)
Danny: Andy helped me out with our Ogor Tome Review – so it’s awesome and very interesting to see him go 4-1 and 3rd at this highly competitive event – WITHOUT cannons or Gnoblars. Andy has basically stuck with this tried and tested core of a Frostlord backed by Kragnos – the big(ger) man offering 3d6 charges for those sweet 3d6 MWs on the charge, along with a huge pressure piece while the Frostlord, specced out with Arcane Tome + Flaming weapon for more reliable damage and Touched by the Everwinter to also make him a priest with the ability to heal himself – or Kragnos. So he’s doing it all. Another ‘big cow’ joins the pressure party as the first battleline pick.
Two units of Mournfang fill out the tax, allowing for some excellent objective play, hardly inconsiderable damage and their new and improved resistance to shooting attacks.
Andy also included a Butcher for some utility spell casting and to babysit the mawpot, although he informed me that he regretted including him overall as he always ended up out of range to be useful and felt like wasted points overall.
Andy had a tough route to 4-1, remaining on top table most of the event, taking a big win against IDK to kick off, followed by a tough Blood Knight list, then the Kroak list that beat me, a grudge match over the ‘new’ 4x Ironblaster + leadbelcher Ogor list before finally losing to the event’s winner Greg. The amount of pressure this list can put out can clearly only be resisted by unrendable ghosts with Nagash bringing loads back and shunting fistfuls of MWs through Kragnos’ 2+ save – definitely a counter to what is otherwise clearly a list that very few armies in the game can really withstand.
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Army Faction: Daughters of Khaine – Army Subfaction: Hagg Nar – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumph: Inspired
LEADER 1 x Melusai Ironscale (115)* – General – Command Traits: Zealous Orator – Artefacts: Crown of Woe(hammer) 1 x Morathi-Khaine (680)* 1 x The Shadow Queen (680)*
BATTLELINE 10 x Witch Aelves (115)* – Hag – Death Pennant Bearer – Hornblower – Sciansá and Bladed Buckler 15 x Blood Sisters (420)* – Gorgai 10 x Blood Stalkers (360)* – Krone
ENDLESS SPELL 1 x Ravenak’s Gnashing Jaws (60)
OTHER 9 x Khainite Shadowstalkers (150)* – Shroud Queen 5 x Khinerai Heartrenders (95)* – Shryke
CORE BATTALIONS: *Battle Regiment
TOTAL POINTS: (1995/2000)
Danny: It me! First things first, I’m working on an in-depth tourney report including some deeper thinking on my list and a breakdown of the games, so for now I’ll give you the digest of HOW the list works rather than get bogged down in the why.
It’s relatively simple – a twist on the Morathi on the bowsnakes. I took 15 spears and 10 bows to lean more heavily into the reliable MWs. Witch aelves are a cheap screen and battleline pick with bladed bucklers for some hopeful clutch saves and mortal wound bouncing. I took Ironscale to make the sneks battleline and enable the run+charge for some key threat projection, but also because I wanted Hagg Nar to speed up Blood Rites, which saves me loads of CP and helps Morathi perform a lot better in early rounds (when she’s still alive!)
This event didn’t allow book battle tactics, so instead of a 2nd squad of Khinerai, I opted for Shadowstonkers, who are also just a relatively tanky and super mobile scoring piece.
Jaws rounds out the list as a spare point filler and another source of MWs against slower targets that my spear sneks might be scared or unable to get into. It’s all wrapped up in a one drop bat reg because this list really, really wants to avoid getting doubled. Of course, sometimes you come up against another 1 drop in round 5 and lose the roll-off….more on that and other exciting, brain-melting moments in my full report.
Want to say a quick but big kudos to both the organisers (Alex and Jonny) from our club, Sigmar’s Pilgrims, and to all my opponents and everyone else there – it was a hugely competitive field but the vibe was friendly and jolly as all hell – a fantastic, super hard fought event!
This is the Top Three AoS Lists for Immortal Masquerade that took place in USA on 12th and 13th November. It involved 22 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
List 1
Army Faction: Ossiarch Bonereapers – Subfaction: Petrifex Elite – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumph: Bloodthirsty
LEADERS Arkhan the Black (340)** Mortisan Soulmason (115)** – Artefacts of Power: Soul Reservoir – Spells: Drain Vitality Liege-Kavalos (170)** – General – Command Traits: Mighty Archaeossian – Artefacts of Power: Godbone Armour
ENDLESS SPELLS & INVOCATIONS 1 x Bone-tithe Shrieker (50) 1 x Umbral Spellportal (80)
CORE BATTALIONS *Battle Regiment **Bounty Hunters
TOTAL POINTS: 1985/2000
Danny: OBR feel slightly like the faction that 3e forgot, with their weird version of command points and panoply of 2e style re-rolls. The army can definitely blend though – and recent points drops have given them even more list flexibility. Their main weakness is their red matchups are very red – something a two list format can massively help ameliorate.
Michael has a core of Deathriders in both lists – fast, relatively tanky if not particularly killy battleline that represent the ‘best’ objective grabbers the super slow Bonereapers have. The first list goes with two reinforced bone pone blobs backed up by the ever reliable MSU Mortek with their re-roll saves in Petrifex always making them difficult to shift. Arkhan, the currently favoured OBR utility hero rounds out the tried and tested core. This first list also bungs in a Mortek Crawler – they’re super swingy (pun intended) but do offer one long range piece with spike potential that helps try and deal with those pesky backline support heroes this faction has otherwise no way of interacting with.
List 2, meanwhile, is wild – primarily for the simple fact it contains Nagash!! The bone daddy himself is in need of some modernisation, but he’s still a super potent spellcaster. The main reason you don’t see much of him is his lack of ward save makes him super vulnerable to good ranged threats – something again the two list format allows Michael to make a good guess about the chances of facing such threats before choosing the list.
And WITHOUT good ranged firepower, Nagash can be a MW powerhouse able to keep bringing models back.
A fantastic result for an under-appreciated faction who are nonetheless slowly gathering a cult following. Still a shame Nagash is too unreliable to bring to a solo-list tourney – but in the meantime, great to see him put in a successful appearance!
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List 1
Allegiance: Big Waaagh! – Grand Strategy: No Place for the Weak – Triumphs: Inspired
Leaders Gordrakk the Fist of Gork (540) Gobsprakk, The Mouth of Mork (260) Swampcalla Shaman with Pot-grot (105)** – Lore of the Swamp: Sneaky Miasma Orruk Warchanter (115)*** – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – Warbeat: Fixin’ Beat – Lore of the Weird: Da Great Big Green Hand of Gork Wurrgog Prophet (170)** – Artefact: Glowin’ Tattooz – Lore of the Savage Beast: Gorkamorka’s War Cry Killaboss on Corpse-Rippa Vulcha (220)** – General – Command Trait: Supa Sneaky – Mount Trait: Fast ‘Un
Battleline 5 x Orruk Ardboys (85)* 5 x Orruk Ardboys (85)* 5 x Orruk Ardboys (85)*
Other Units Beast-skewer Killbow (110)*** Beast-skewer Killbow (110)*** Beast-skewer Killbow (110)***
Allegiance: Ironjawz – Warclan: Ironsunz – Grand Strategy: No Place for the Weak – Triumphs: Indomitable
Leaders Kragnos, The End of Empires (720) Orruk Warchanter (115)* – Warbeat: Fixin’ Beat Megaboss on Maw-Krusha (480)* – General – Boss Choppa and Rip-tooth fist – Command Trait: Touched by the Waaagh! – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – Mount Trait: Smelly ‘Un – Lore of the Weird: Bash ‘Em Ladz
Battleline 5 x Orruk Ardboys (85)* 5 x Orruk Ardboys (85)* 5 x Orruk Ardboys (85)*
Declan: Bringing 2 lists to a tournament is a great way to have a little more fun… but normally players either bring 1, or make very small changes… not so Rob with his Big Waaagh lists – they are completely different. I really like the idea of taking a shooting list and a charging list and then choosing which one would be best – and Rob clearly chose well.
The 2nd list is simple and straight forward, but three monsters are a great idea – Kragnos; Big Waaagh; Rogue Idol… all charging 3D6″ and smashing face. Big Waaagh aren’t always best of a turn 1 charge but these three may change all that.
The 1st list is much more techy; with lots of shooting and Gobsrakk. But the genius here is Gordrakk – what a brave play. He’s not seen as the best unit in the Orruk Warclans list, but it’s great to see him having an outing.
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Army Faction: Stormcast Eternals – Army Type: Stormkeep – Subfaction: Celestial Warbringers – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumph: Inspired
LEADERS Lord-Celestant on Stardrake (500)* – General – Command Traits: Master of the Celestial Menagerie – Stormbound Blade – Artefacts of Power: Arcane Tome – Mount Traits: Celestial Instincts – Spells: Flaming Weapon Yndrasta (280)* Averon Stormsire (230)* – Spells: Thundershock
OTHER Stormsire’s Cursebreakers (230) Castigators (210)* Castigators (210)*
ENDLESS SPELLS & INVOCATIONS 1 x Everblaze Comet (90) 1 x Geminids of Uhl-Gysh (40)
CORE BATTALIONS *Battle Regiment
TOTAL POINTS: 1995/2000
Brett: Smaller tournaments are a great place to see some really different lists like this. We don’t see Sequitors or Castigators a lot and here is a list with all of the Sacrosants. The Sacrosant chamber was introduced in 2nd Edition as the casters of the Stormcast, with Sequitors, Castigators, Stormsire and a Stardrake this is a full chamber in action. Thematic. Even though it’s the casting chamber there are only 3 casts in the list but that’s enough for the Everblaze and the Geminids. Everblaze has been popular recently for decent MW at a distance and Geminids are amoung the best of the Malign Sorcery Spells. The Stardrake offers one of the few casting buffs that Stormcast can receive.
Sequitors spell abilities are limited to choosing between exploding 6s or a 5+ ward. Castigators can do the same and either give themselves +1 to hit or increased rend. But they are still using random (D3) shots which is not ideal. Interesting but the damage here is the Stardrake and Yndrasta. This is really more of a durable list, Stormkeep and Celestial Warbringers compliment that approach. But it is a slow moving list which seems to have affected scoring. Both of Paul’s loses (to first and second) were to lists that mixed durable and fast units. Fantastic to see an alternative take on Stormcast.
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Allegiance: Cities of Sigmar – City: Living City – Mortal Realm: Ghyran – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumphs: Bloodthirsty
Leaders Nomad Prince (110)** – General – Command Trait: Ironoak Artisan – Artefact: Spear of the Hunt Anointed (110)** – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – City Role: General’s Adjutant – Lore of Leaves: Ironoak Skin Drycha Hamadreth (335)**
Battleline 5 x Sisters of the Thorn (130)** – Lore of Leaves: Cage of Thorns 10 x Sisters of the Watch (180)*** 10 x Sisters of the Watch (180)***
Units 20 x Phoenix Guard (350)* – Reinforced x 1 10 x Vigilors (340)* – Reinforced x 1 2 x Dracothian Guard Fulminators (230)*
Endless Spells & Invocations The Burning Head (20)
Declan: Only one list for Matt, but it’s an interesting one – I’m not actually sure how it works. I assume the Pheonix Guard are the anvil (4+ ward save), and the Vigilors provide the hammer with the Fulminators being able to pick off a key unit or clear a screen or two. The battleline are interesting, with some reasonable range, but definitely fishing for 6s.
Matt has taken Dyrcha as well for some much needed punch, but this is definitely not a list you’ll see too often and that’s probably its strength… I wouldn’t really know what to do or what to target first. A strength of ‘off-meta’ lists.
This is the Top Three AoS Lists for the TCC: Age of Sigmar 2 Day Event that took place in Australia on 12th and 13th November. 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
Army Faction: Maggotkin of Nurgle – Army Subfaction: Drowned Men – Grand strategy: Blessed Desecration
LEADER 1 x Lord of Afflictions (230)* – General – Command Traits: Overpowering Stench – Dolorous Tocsin – Artefacts: The Splithorn Helm 1 x Be’lakor (360)*
BATTLELINE 2 x Pusgoyle Blightlords (250)* – Dolorous Tocsin 2 x Pusgoyle Blightlords (250)* – Dolorous Tocsin 2 x Pusgoyle Blightlords (250)* 4 x Pusgoyle Blightlords (500)* 10 x Plaguebearers (150)*
TERRAIN 1 x Feculent Gnarlmaw (0)
CORE BATTALIONS *Battle Regiment
TOTAL POINTS: (1995/2000)
Danny: Maggotkin are still good after the flies went up a few points, who’d a thunk it! We got drowned men here for the pre-game move with 10 flies, and a cheeky Be’Lakor to stop your main thing from doing whatever it does that MIGHT kill some flies for a turn (or two if they give away/lose the double).
Oppressive pinning list and attrition through disease points is the name of the game here. Be’Lakor is a cheeky inclusion but makes plenty of sense, given it’s a nightmare to claw back points from fly spam – and let’s be honest, it’s still fly spam – after a turn of your biggest piece sitting on their arse.
We’ll see how it goes – initial feelings are Drowned Men, not the price of flies, is the real problem. But in the meantime, gratz to Thomas for rolling with the punches and taking down some tough armies along the way.
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Allegiance: Sylvaneth – Glade: Heartwood – Mortal Realm: Ghyran – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumphs:
LEADERS Alarielle the Everqueen (840)* Spirit of Durthu (370)* – General – Command Trait: Gnarled Warrior – Artefact: Greenwood Gladius
UNITS 5 x Tree-Revenants (110)* 5 x Tree-Revenants (110)* 5 x Tree-Revenants (110)* 6 x Spiterider Lancers (420)* – Reinforced x 1 Spiteswarm Hive (40) *Battle Regiment
Ethan:One of the real pillars of Sylvaneth currently is Alarielle + good stuff and this list fits it to a Tree (Sorry). Alarielle is a large, fast and durable beatstick that comes back after you deal with her the first time. Her durability is well supported by Durthu as a backup, teleporting spiteswarm recipient, using his warscroll teleport and the additional +3′ to charges to gain consistency on this hammer. Combined with gnarled warrior, durthu becomes quite durable making the 90 wounds of the list slightly misleading. Throw in 15-20 summoned wounds from alarielle and you’ve got quite the beefy core with which to gain board control and threaten across objectives.
Tree revs fill out the middle to complete battle tactics well but the more interesting unit here is the Spiterider Lancers. At 1 damage some people question their staying power after Bounty Hunters rotates but Mitch must think they don’t need the help, taking them in a battle regiment – absolutely key with this kind of list – controlling game flow is invaluable without durable anvils or notable shooting. The Spiteriders always strike first on the charge, allowing for some flexibility with Strike and Fade and giving the Matt a chance to make an educated call about whether he needs to make like a tree (Sorry, Sorry) before a reprisal happens or whether he can use his successive activations to clear an area and hold it safely.
I can see this list being quite swingy in some matchups, Alarielle is notoriously weak to MWs and shooting, but Matt has obviously piloted it well to a 4-1, only losing in the final game to a Maggotkin list. Perhaps Alarielle’s reputation of being pillowfisted coming to the fore against the extremely durable Nurgle units, though he has taken out great competition along the way with Snakes, Ogors, Rats and Bravery bombs under his belt. Well done Matt!
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Allegiance: Daughters of Khaine – Temple: Zainthar Kai – Grand Strategy: Bloodthirsty Zealots – Triumphs:
Leaders Bloodwrack Medusa (130)** – Artefact: Shadow Stone – Lore of Shadows: Mindrazor Slaughter Queen on Cauldron of Blood (315)** – General – Command Trait: Zealous Orator – Artefact: Crown of Woe – Prayer: Sacrament of Blood Hag Queen (110)** – Prayer: Blessing of Khaine Anointed on Frostheart Phoenix (315)** – Allies
Battleline 10 x Blood Stalkers (360) – Reinforced x 1 15 x Blood Sisters (420)* – Reinforced x 2 10 x Witch Aelves (115)* – Pairs of Sacrificial Knives
Units 5 x Khinerai Heartrenders (95)** 5 x Khinerai Heartrenders (95)**
Danny: If you don’t take Spinedog, you probably take…. double takes a Frostheart on Phoenix allied in!? That’s some interesting tech – it’s not inconsiderably killy but I think the idea behind it is a mobile platform for a 9″ aura of -1 to wound in melee, which will obviously go a long way to keeping a fragile army like DoK alive. Combine that with the 12″ Heart of Fury aura for -1 damage, and a Cauldron of Blood for +1 save within 18″ and Blessing on Khaine prayer on the Hag Queen for re-roll ward saves and, funnily enough, you just make the glassiest of cannons into something resembling a…porcelain cannon! Hell, maybe even a solid oak cannon.
The rest of the list is normal enough – a nice big 15 blob of Blood Sisters for putting out eye-watering mortals after they fight, and the obligatory 2x Khinerai for battle tactic scoring. But love to see the Frostheart tech for a really interesting alternative to the tankiness Morathi brings (to herself) – instead spreading it over a key unit or two.
On the way to 3rd. Liam lost only to the winner, and managed to beat out Fangs of Sotek, SCE and Slaves, who can all put some serious melee hurt, so the list clearly performed. Kudos!
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Allegiance: Kruleboyz – Warclan: Big Yellers – Grand Strategy: Demonstration of Strength – Triumphs:
Leaders Breaka-Boss on Mirebrute Troggoth (180) – Mount Trait: Fast ‘Un Killaboss on Great Gnashtoof (150) – General – Command Trait: Supa Sneaky Murknob with Belcha-banna (95) – Artefact: Mork’s Eye Pebble
Battleline 10 x Gutrippaz (160)** 10 x Hobgrot Slittaz (80) 10 x Gutrippaz (160)** 10 x Hobgrot Slittaz (80) 3 x Man-skewer Boltboyz (120) 3 x Man-skewer Boltboyz (120) 3 x Man-skewer Boltboyz (120) 3 x Man-skewer Boltboyz (120) 3 x Man-skewer Boltboyz (120)* 3 x Man-skewer Boltboyz (120)* 3 x Man-skewer Boltboyz (120)* 3 x Man-skewer Boltboyz (120) 20 x Shootas (120)**
Kieron: So, with the new Battlescroll buffs and the existing staples for almost all Kruleboyz lists, we’d be expecting Joel to write a list to make the most of these, yeah…well, maybe not! With most Kruleboyz lists focusing on some degree of castle, Joel decided to go all Realmstone Cache with his Boltboyz and spray them all over the battlefield.
There’s some logic to this though as Big Yellers means the Boltboyz are battleline, making Demonstration of Strength a solid Grand Strategy choice as you need to kill 11 of the 13 battleline units to prevent it. Big Yellers also get to re-roll one of the hit rolls in the first battle round. Combined with the extra shot from the Boltboy Boss that’s 32 shots, re-rolling 8 of them.
The Mirebrute is probably thrown forward with Supa Sneaky and then opponent has to take first turn to kill it (though with Noisy Racket for -1 to wound, Best Day Ever for +1 to save and then All out Defense) that might not be as easy as you think OR give the turn away and have the Breakaboss rampage through your lines.
All in all, a really interesting take on Kruleboyz that Joel clearly played extremely well in some very tricky matchups.
This is the Top Three AoS Lists for the Shakespeare Invitational that took place in the UK on 29th and 30th October. It involved 32 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: Hammers of Sigmar (Stormkeep) – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumphs:
Leaders Lord-Celestant on Stardrake (500)* – General – Celestine Hammer – Command Trait: Master of Magic – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – Mount Trait: Celestial Instincts – Spell: Celestial Blades Celestant-Prime, Hammer of Sigmar (325)* Slann Starmaster (265)* – Allies
Battleline 5 x Liberators (115)* – Heavens-wrought Weapon and Shield 5 x Liberators (115)* – Heavens-wrought Weapon and Shield 4 x Dracothian Guard Fulminators (460)* – Reinforced x 1
Peter: Owen is one of those players that places consistently well, as proven by the Woehammer player rankings where Owen now sits 10th Worldwide.
Here we’ve got two big hammers in the form of the Lord-Celestant on Stardrake and Celestant-Prime. The latter of which can twiddle his thumbs in reserve until you need him. An allied Slann Starmaster who’s purpose is to dominate the magic phase with its ability to cast three spells and unbind three spells (from anywhere on the table).
What better to protect 1,090 points of heroes than two units of Liberators and some Dracothian Guard Fulminators. The Fulminators can kick out an average of 48 damage before saves which, I might add, are all at rend -2 AND thats without the Lord-Celestant giving them +1 to wound rolls through Celestial Blades….. On top of that each model in the unit (6), has a 50% chance of causing D3 mortals to units within 12″. My assumption is for the Liberators to cap objectives who, because the army is Stormkeep, count as three models each on an objective AND have a 6+ near an objective thanks to being Hammers of Sigmar. Meanwhile the Fulminators ride around smashing face.
The unit of Farstriders can be quite nifty at taking far flung objectives or setting up elsewhere on the battlefield to harass the enemy backlines with chip damage.
We’ll down to Owen for going 5-0!
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Allegiance: Lumineth Realm-lords – Great Nation: Ymetrica – Grand Strategy: Alarith Aftershock
Leaders Alarith Stonemage (120) – General – Command Trait: Unyielding Toughness – Lore of the High Peaks: Unbreakable Stoicism – Lore of the High Peaks: Living Fissure Alarith Stonemage (120) – Artefact: Molten Talisman – Lore of the High Peaks: Unbreakable Stoicism – Lore of the High Peaks: Living Fissure Avalenor, the Stoneheart King (420)*** Scinari Calligrave (115)*** – Lore of Hysh: Speed of Hysh – Lore of Hysh: Protection of Hysh Scinari Calligrave (115)*** – Lore of Hysh: Speed of Hysh – Lore of Hysh: Protection of Hysh
Battleline 15 x Alarith Stoneguard (360)* – Reinforced x 2 10 x Alarith Stoneguard (240)** – Reinforced x 1 10 x Alarith Stoneguard (240)** – Reinforced x 1 5 x Tree-Revenants (110)* 5 x Tree-Revenants (110)*
Endless Spells & Invocations The Burning Head (20) Lauchon the Soulseeker (30)
Ed: The Alarith models got some tasty buffs in the new Lumineth tome, so it’s not suprising to see a list that leans heavily into those units do well. In the Ymetrica subfaction everything except the Calligraves and the Tree-Revenents ignore rend of -1 or -2 and since Stoneguard and Avalenor have save characteristics of 4+ and 3+ respectively, they can be tough nuts to crack. They hit pretty hard too and synergize well together too, a wonderful way to build an army if you fancy dipping your toe into those crystal clear Hyshian waters. The Stonemages add crucial support to this list, allowing Avalenor to fight on his top bracket regardless of wounds taken and adding rend to the Stoneguard’s weapons. Having two of them just means that Matthew can spread those buffs around where they are most needed.
“Don’t leave the objective unattended…”
The allied Tree-Revenants are something I’ve been seeing in a lot of lists now that Sylvaneth are a valid ally. As Galetian Veterans who can teleport and pile-in 6″ they make up for the slow pace of all those Stoneguard and open up a lot of creative objective play. By putting them in Expert conquerors Matthew has 2 adaptive units great for taking advantage of poor positioning and seizing control of objectives without putting his heavy hitters out of position. It’s a great investment for now, but it remains to be seen how valuable they will be when the next GHB drops and the focus moves away from battleline infantry.
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Allegiance: Lumineth Realm-lords – Great Nation: Ymetrica – Grand Strategy: Alarith Afterschock – Triumphs: Inspired
Leaders Avalenor, the Stoneheart King (420) The Light of Eltharion (240) Archmage Teclis and Celennar, Spirit of Hysh (700)** Alarith Stonemage (120)** – General – Command Trait: Tectonically Attuned – Artefact: Molten Talisman – Lore of the High Peaks: Unbreakable Stoicism Scinari Calligrave (115)** – Artefact: Silver Wand – Lore of Hysh: Speed of Hysh
Battleline 5 x Alarith Stoneguard (120)* – Stone Mallets 5 x Alarith Stoneguard (120)* – Stone Mallets 5 x Alarith Stoneguard (120)* – Stone Mallets
Endless Spells & Invocations Rune of Petrification (40)
Ed: Herohammer at it’s best! A whopping 1,595 points of Shanee’s list is made up of heroes, with only 360 points allocated for the mandatory 3 units of battleline. Like Matthew, Shanee has gone for Stoneguard in Ymetrica for her infantry units meaning they are extremely defence anvils with decent output. However, to go 4W/1L with such a spartan list attests to Shanee’s skill as a player. There isn’t a lot of room for error when one mistake can cost you a quarter of your list or deny you crucial victory points with so few models on the board to play the objectives. I would love to have watched over her shoulder during one or two of her games and see her approach.
Teclis obviously provides some of the best magic power in the game, providing a 5+ ward save and a variety of utility options that can change to suit your match up. Also, between his Searing Storm of White Light warscroll spell and the Rune of Petrification this list features a lot of multi-target mortal wound output which will tear through multiple small units or anything without a ward save. Avalenor and Eltharion provides a pair of powerful beat-sticks to clean up anything unlucky enough to find itself stuck to the Stoneguard anvils. Finally the Stonemage and Calligrave are support pieces which synergize well with the rest of the list. While the stonemage keeps Avelenor fighting at his best in tough times, the Calligrave is the perfect steward to sit in the Shrine Luminor in the early game dispensing free command points and casting/unbinding rerolls from atop his floating assault waterfall. Fantasy games are weird.
Drive this floating rock closer, I want to hit them with my stave!
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Allegiance: Khorne – Slaughterhost: Reapers of Vengeance – Grand Strategy: No Place for the Weak – Triumphs: Inspired
Leaders Be’Lakor, the Dark Master (360) – Allies Skarbrand (380) Bloodsecrator (125)** Bloodthirster of Insensate Rage (280)** – Artefact: Khartoth the Bloodhunger Bloodthirster of Unfettered Fury (295) – General – Command Trait: Mage Eater – Artefact: Skullshard Mantle Slaughterpriest (100)** – Prayer: Blood Sacrifice
Battleline 5 x Flesh Hounds (105)* 5 x Flesh Hounds (105)* 5 x Flesh Hounds (105)** 10 x Bloodreavers (80)* – Reaver Blades
Kieron: After getting absolutely demolished by a Boomthirster in a recent game, part of my therapy is to write up the feedback from this wildcard list! This list includes a trio of Bloodthirsters: a Boomthirster that does 4 mortal wounds as AoE damage on each 6 to wound; the angriest Bloodthirster there is, Skarbrand, who will also do a ton of mortal wounds on top of 9 damage 3 attacks; then a third Bloodthirster who allows Daemon units to fight from 6″ away, which synergises well with the Reaper of Vengeance sub-faction Command Ability to fight twice.
Put this all together and you can auto-run the Boomthirster 16″ and then pile in 6″, avoiding Unleash Hell, do up to 20 mortal wounds to all enemy units within 8″…pile in up to another 6″ and then do it again. And all of those mortal wounds are in addition to the D6 damage from the Great Axe of Khorne. Then Skarbrand can attack if there’s anything left alive on the board by this point as the Daemon Weapon Khartoth the Bloodhunger allows the bearer to activate out of sequence at the start of the command phase on a 4+. It is at this point that you give your by now weeping opponent the choice of who to fight with next.
There’s also a Bloodsecrator to give each of those angry red monsters an extra attack and make casting more difficult. The Hexgorger Skulls complement making depending on magic against Khorne a risky business by subtracting 2 from all casts and potentially wiping a spell from a wizard’s mind if not killing them outright. It’s also a prayer, so unless you also have a priest, the only way to get rid of it is to detonate it with one of your casters.
The list also has ready access to the Barge Through Enemy Lines bonus point with its speedy Flesh Hounds and access to summoning through Blood Tithe points and to cap everything else of there is Be’Lakor poised and ready to shut down a unit at a key moment where a battle tactic is at stake.
If an opponent can take out the AoE mortal wound threat early on, they can probably cope with the other threats and the list lost to two Stormcast Eternals lists that had the tools to do exactly that. If not…more Blood for the Blood God!
This is the Top Three AoS Lists for the South Coast Series Southampton that took place in the UK on 22nd and 23rd October. It involved 23 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: Hallowed Knights (Scions of the Storm) – Grand Strategy: No Place for the Weak – Triumphs: Inspired
Leaders Gardus Steel Soul (150)* Knight-Draconis (300)* – General – Command Trait: Master of Magic – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – Mount Trait: Thunderous Presence – Spell: Thundershock – Bonding: Krondspine Incarnate
Battleline 5 x Liberators (115)* – Heavens-wrought Weapon and Shield – 1x Grandweapons 4 x Stormdrake Guard (680)* – Drakerider’s Lance – Reinforced x 1 2 x Stormdrake Guard (340)* – Drakerider’s Lance
Behemoths Krondspine Incarnate of Ghur (400)* – Allies
Core Battalions *Battle Regiment
Additional Enhancements Holy Command: Call for Aid
Brett: Almost all of the dragons list with a Krondspine. Mobility and some decent punch, I like how Matt has dangled the MSU Liberators there just so you can kill something easily. That he can summon on to an objective or block a point with Call for Aid (return the Liberators once slain). Gardus for his 5+ ward, most likely near the 4 Stormdrakes, Knight Draconis so the Drakes are battle line. Hallowed Knights giving a 50/50 fight on death. This list can control a lot of the board, a 4 man drake unit can span 20″. The drakes can move 12″ and shoot 12″ making first turn priority important. He can dangle the Krondspine as a target and engage at will. The Knight Draconis is likely to stay close to the big drake unit as well for Thundershock to control the charge phase.
Depending on match up and mission going first might even be an advantage with this list, Blaze of Glory and fight on death is going to punish any successful attacks on the drakes. As the only 5/0 and with really high scores Matt tabled a number of his opponents. And that’s what this list really needs to do, in the early turns remove as many hammers as possible then clean up. The drake’s 9 wounds and profile make them very hard to shift. For opponents, what do you go after? None of his opponents had a lot of shooting or ranged shooting with MWs, the first list with drakes had pairs matching into the 4 drake unit. Hint – that doesn’t work well even with teleports.
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Allegiance: Nighthaunt – Procession: Emerald Host – Grand Strategy: Dismantle the Brave – Triumphs:
Leaders Krulghast Cruciator (150)** – General – Command Trait: Cloaked in Shadow – Artefact: Beacon of Nagashizzar Lady Olynder, Mortarch of Grief (340)** – Lore of the Underworlds: Seal of Shyish Spirit Torment (115)** – Artefact: Lightshard of the Harvest Moon
Battleline 10 x Chainrasps (110)*** 10 x Chainrasps (110)*** 5 x Hexwraiths (160) 5 x Hexwraiths (160) 5 x Hexwraiths (160) 10 x Grimghast Reapers (160)* 10 x Grimghast Reapers (160)* 10 x Grimghast Reapers (160)* 3 x Spirit Hosts (125)***
Brett: Nice to see Emerald Host back (and not Scarlet Doom) which means a few changes to the unit list. Emerald host slowly withers the opponent. This list plays into that, lots of units which take longer to clear (big hitting units don’t carry over their damage as far). Then Lady Olynder can once per battle brings back D6 models in every unit (they are all summonable). The Beacon also returns 1 model to each summonable unit (all of these). That will let the army stick around longer and score more. Mortalis Terminexus plays really well into this strategy as well (either heal or mortal wounds). There is still the Spirit Torment to help a unit that is being pressured and Krulghast for the damage debuff.
It’s great to see something different from Nighthaunt. Lots of options here with great speed from the Hexwraiths. It’s weakness is probably into something durable that does a lot of damage or the first round list he ran into. It would have removed a minimum of 2 units a turn and the Grimghasts are good, but not likely to kill Fulminators. Lady Olynder is vulnerable to long range shooting as well.
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Army Faction: Ossiarch Bonereapers – Army Subfaction: Petrifex Elite – Grand Strategy: No Place for the Weak – Triumphs: Inspired
LEADER 1 x Arkhan the Black (340)** – Spells: Protection of Nagash 1 x Liege-Kavalos (170)** – General – Command Traits: Mighty Archaeossian – Artefacts: Godbone Armour
BATTLELINE 20 x Mortek Guard (280)* – Mortek Hekatos – 2 x Necrophoros – Nadirite Blade and Shield 20 x Mortek Guard (280)* – Mortek Hekatos – 2 x Necrophoros – Nadirite Blade and Shield 20 x Mortek Guard (280)* – Necrophoros – Mortek Hekatos – Nadirite Blade and Shield 5 x Kavalos Deathriders (190)** – Mortek Hekatos – Necrophoros – Nadirite Spear and Shield
ENDLESS SPELL 1 x Nightmare Predator (60)
TERRAIN 1 x Bone-tithe Nexus (0)
OTHER 3 x Necropolis Stalkers (175)** – Dread Falchions 3 x Necropolis Stalkers (175)** – Dread Falchions
Brett: Arkhan and 3 x 20 blocks of Mortek. Need to say more? They aren’t going to go far but you aren’t going to shift them either. Deathriders and Necropolis Stalkers give a little more manoeuvrable but this is an army that is going to spread out slowly and dare you to charge. And that works (see Ironjawz above). Beasts of Chaos overwhelmed them through a combination of strong rend and bodies (including summoning). The first round draw is more interesting, the Tzeentch list is essentially Horrors and Flamers, hard to kill and a lot of shooting. But they’d have to come into range (charges) and it had less bodies than this list. The ability to control more of the board and force your opponent into an unfavourable match up is the way this list grinds out wins.
Brett: Not a particularly techy list, Ironjawz with a Mawcrusha and Rogue Idol, 2 Warchanters and a mix of 12 gore-gruntas and ardboyz. In true orcish style, it either went off like a frog in a sock or didn’t quite get over the bar. Ironjawz struggle against armies that can bury them or screen them with cheap bodies, the pigs damage isn’t as prodigious as you might like. If you can feed screens to the Mawcrusha and Idol and pepper them with MWs as both of the Chaos lists did here you have a good chance. Still not an easy list to play against, particularly with how quickly the Idol can reach you, priority is key here. With only one Mawcrusha Matt hasn’t had to worry about giving himself another artefact. Interesting way Matt’s mixed tanky (Hulking Brute) and damage (Mean ‘Un) on the Mawcrusha.
This is still a solid Orruk list that can take a tournament (or close to) depending on the day and opponents.
This is the Top Three AoS Lists for Hammerfest 2022 Grand Tournament that took place in Texas, USA on the 17th and 18th September. It involved 88 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: Sylvaneth – Glade: Harvestboon – Season: The Dwindling – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumphs: Inspired
Leaders Warsong Revenant (305)* – General – Command Trait: Spellsinger – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – Lore of the Deepwood: Treesong – Bonded to Incarnate
Battleline 5 x Tree-Revenants (110)* 5 x Tree-Revenants (110)* 6 x Spiterider Lancers (420)** – Reinforced x 1 6 x Spiterider Lancers (420)** – Reinforced x 1
Units 5 x Skaeth’s Wild Hunt (110)* – Lore of the Deepwood: Verdurous Harmony
Behemoths Krondspine Incarnate of Ghur (400)* – Allies
Danny: A big win for Sylvaneth at a time they’ve still got something to prove on the competitive circuit! Some patterns are beginning to emerge for the evil trees – Warsong Revenant is rooted in place, and Skaeth’s Wild Hunt (a good value and mobile wizard+retinue with a tasty +1 to wound spell) have come out of retirement – if you can find them!
Zach here however eschews evilest single tree Durthu for 2x 6 Spiteriders, again slightly unusual given the tanky and self-healing Revenants were seeking the position of ‘meta bug cavalry’. It makes sense though – Spiterider Lancer’s 14″ movement and fight first on the charge allows for a devastating weight of rend 2 attacks. In Harvestboon they gain a 12″ pre-game move too, which is huge for establishing board control or setting up the alpha.
With the usual brace of Tree revs for teleport based scoring and the unfortunately ubiquitous Spinedog to pin stuff in place while the Warsong bombs you with MWs, this is a potent list that took down some very challenging armies en route to first. I think even with the Spinedog nerfed into oblivion (or, at least, a shallow hole) it’s still a capable core – kudos to Zach for leafing with gold!
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Army Faction: Legion of the First Prince – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumphs: Inspired
LEADER 1 x Kairos Fateweaver (435)* – Spells: The Master’s Command 1 x Bloodthirster of Insensate Rage (280)** – General – Command Traits: Ruinous Aura – Artefacts: Armour of the Pact 1 x Slaves to Darkness Daemon Prince (210)** – Hellforged Sword and Malefic Talons – Mark of Chaos: Khorne 1 x The Contorted Epitome (245)** – Artefacts: Fourfold Blade – Spells: Flaming Weapon, The Master’s Command – Bonding: Krondspine Incarnate of Ghur
BATTLELINE 5 x Flesh Hounds (105)* – Gore Hound – Burning Roar 10 x Bloodletters (110)* – Gore-drenched Icon Bearer – Hornblower – Bloodreaper 5 x Flesh Hounds (105)*
BEHEMOTH 1 x Krondspine Incarnate of Ghur (400)*
ENDLESS SPELL 1 x Umbral Spellportal (70) 1 x Chronomantic Cogs (40)
Danny: Legion are enjoying a bit of a twilight resurgence since their nerf – although ‘rumour’ (i.e. leaks) have it that their current format will drastically change in the new year.
In the meantime, this is a still-excellent version of the army that employs the favoured combo of Kairos (for spellz!) a Bloodthirster (for many MWs in an 8″ aura on 6s!) and a Daemon Prince – who until the new Slaves book is still rocking Blood Slick Ground for that really quite sweet halves-charges aura. Flesh hounds provide great value screening and utility – their free unbind/dispel attempt is an added bonus – aaaaaaaaand of course there’s a Krondspine for even more of that sweet, sweet control.
You may also notice there’s no Be’lakor in this list – I guess he’s learned to delegate? Taking down DoT, Nurgle, NH and the board control of SBGL is no mean feat so big up to Matt for this swan song – this list is not long for this world.
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Allegiance: Sylvaneth – Glade: Heartwood (The Burgeoning) – Mortal Realm: Ghyran – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumphs: Indomitable
Leaders Alarielle the Everqueen (840)* Arch-Revenant (120)* – General – Command Trait: Warsinger – Artefact: Seed of Rebirth
Battleline 6 x Kurnoth Hunters with Kurnoth Scythes (500)* – Reinforced x 1 3 x Kurnoth Hunters with Kurnoth Greatbows (230)* 3 x Kurnoth Hunters with Kurnoth Greatbows (230)*
Danny: These successful Sylvaneth lists are sprouting up everywhere eh? And this one brings big ol’ thunder thighs herself! She’s backed up by the obviously strong combo of 2×3 Kurnoth bows backed up by Arch-Rev for +1 to wound even to their shooting – and in Heartwood they’ll also be naturally at +1 to hit three chosen targets meaning you don’t lose out by splitting the squads as AoA isn’t necessary. A big blob of Scythes absolutely blend and survive most attacks before getting a model or two back from Rally or the Verdurous Harmony spell.
That’s it really – a hugely tough and killy Kurnoth core escorting Alarielle for all sorts of spell casting and utility, screening and turning terrain into Overgrown for teleporting shenanigans. I’m happy to see a list with her in do well as, personally I think they did her scroll dirty but she deserves to be seen on top tables.
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Allegiance: Kruleboyz – Warclan: Big Yellers – Grand Strategy: Waaagh! – Triumphs: Indomitable
Leaders Gobsprakk, The Mouth of Mork (280) Killaboss with Stab-grot (110)* – Artefact: Mork’s Eye Pebble Swampcalla Shaman with Pot-grot (105)* – Lore of the Swamp: Choking Mist Snatchaboss on Sludgeraker Beast (315)* – General – Command Trait: Egomaniak – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – Mount Trait: Smelly ‘Un – Lore of the Swamp: Sneaky Miasma
Battleline 20 x Gutrippaz (360)** – Reinforced x 1 20 x Gutrippaz (360)** – Reinforced x 1 10 x Hobgrot Slittaz (80)** 9 x Man-skewer Boltboyz (360)* – Reinforced x 2
Danny: Those plucky Kruleboyz! Sitting pretty in the bottom 3 of win-rates, going 4-1 – meaning it was actually in a tournament winning position – and losing only to Sylvaneth who an army like this just can’t really interact with at all is really impressive and cool to see.
James here opts not to use the recently buffed Grinnin’ Blades to go all in (ish) on Boltboyz in Big Yellerz – bringing a big blob of 9 which really should punch through an awful lot of targets in the game. They’re commanded by no less than Gobsprakk himself – an ever-controversial pick who can nevertheless play mind games with enemy casters and generally fly around issuing double-commands to stuff and casting from the actually great Kboyz lore.
Wonderfully, he’s joined by the humble Killaboss on FOOT (not to mention his trust stab-grot, the real MVP of any list) – presumably a budget way to access All Part of Da Plan – to essentially make the 2x 20 blobs of Gutrippaz immune to battleshock. The shaman and Sludgeraker round off the ‘fishing for 5s/6s’ synergy package, with the latter rocking Egomaniak (essentially turning the hobgrotz into ablative bodyguard wards) making it super durable, with Arcane Tome and Sneaky Miasma for casting a hero-phase move on himself.
It’s a lovely list that can put out an eye-watering number of MWs up close and actually packs some real board control chops. It’s got overlapping synergies and plenty of movement options, and about as much durability as Kboyz can manage. Real big up to James for coming so close – can’t wait to see what he does with the faction after the Battlescroll!
P.s. according to the new Woehammer scoring metrics that take army win-rate into account, this was the winning list of the event!
This is the Top Three AoS Lists for the Salt Lake Open 2022 that took place in the USA on 20th and 21st August. It involved 33 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
Army Faction: Fyreslayers – Subfaction: Greyfyrd – Grand Strategy: Masters of the Forge – Triumph: Inspired
LEADERS Auric Runefather (125)** – General – Command Traits: Spirit of Grimnir – Artefacts of Power: The Daemon Slayer Battlesmith (150)** – Artefacts of Power: Nulsidian Icon Auric Runeson (80)** – Ancestral War-axe – Artefacts of Power: Axe of Grimnir Auric Flamekeeper (90)**** – Artefacts of Power: Draught of Magmalt Ale Auric Runemaster (125)**** – Artefacts of Power: Volatile Brazier – Prayers: Heal Auric Runesmiter (135)**** – Forge Key – Prayers: Prayer Of Ash
BATTLELINE Hearthguard Berzerkers (320)* – Karl – Berzerker Broadaxe Hearthguard Berzerkers (320)* – Karl – Flamestrike Poleaxe Vulkite Berzerkers with Bladed Slingshields (160)*** – Fyresteel War-pick and Bladed Slingshield Vulkite Berzerkers with Fyresteel Handaxes (170)***
OTHER Auric Hearthguard (250)**
ENDLESS SPELLS & INVOCATIONS 1 x Molten Infernoth (40)
Ethan: Holy moly what a collection of lists this tournament presents! In the vein of Bill Souza this list uses many battalions in order to stack up bonus enhancements and abilities but that is where the comparison ends. Fyreslayers are uniquely suited to taking high drop lists in that they, unlike most armies, don’t care about taking first and can weather an enemy double turn thanks to their durability. This opens up a broad cadre of list building options with the sheer number of heroes present here not reasonable for those armies relying on Battle Regiment to have play.
Getting into the list itself, this Greyfyrd army runs a large contingent of cheap foot heroes, using a combination of the subfaction and battalions to outfit the heroes with a selection of the Fyreslayers’ rather stacked artefact list. Prayers are made more consistent, damage output is improved and items like the Nulsidian icon provide spell ignores in a meta still often visited by Nagash’s Favourite Sphere. At 1965 points this list will often get its triumph and the selection of inspired helps to ensure the large units of troops aren’t losing more than they need to to battleshock. The hero selection here gives this lists an absolute keyring of tools ranging from forgekeys and latchkey grandaxes to the extra CP of the Runemaster and the deepstrike of the Runesmiter. Of particular note is the Flamekeeper, the hero released with the Fyreslayers’ recent FOMO box, which doesn’t often see play in the tournament scene. With such large units of foot troops, his abilities – which are activated at the start of the combat phase whenever 6 models have died near the Flamekeeper since the previous turn – are going off with alarming frequency to provide powerful effects such as: – 6+ ward (meh) – Fight on death (alright) – Charge, including during the enemy turn (!!!!!!!) – +1 damage (still !!! but less so)
The rest of the list is still exciting (when was the last time anyone saw Auric Hearthguard?) but less in-depth than the heroes. Auric hearthguard deepstrike with the runesmiter and shoot quite well while the remainder of the army racks up objective scoring with difficult to shift statlines and wound characteristics. Putting these in Expert Conquerors and Bounty Hunters is a nice bonus in a list that already has drops to high heaven and the list is capped off with the Molten Infernoth, which gives the list an easy way to achieve its Grand Strategy. The notable bonus of the infernoth over other options is that you aren’t obligated to move it meaning, as the game is coming to a close, you can elect to not attempt a move and thus eliminate the chance of rolling it off the board with hot dice.
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Army Faction: Stormcast Eternals – Army Type: Scions of the Storm – Army Subfaction: Celestial Warbringers – Grand Strategy: Take What’s Theirs – Triumphs: Inspired – Holy Command: Thunderbolt Volley
LEADER 1 x Lord-Relictor (145)* – General – Command Traits: Master of Magic – Artefacts: Arcane Tome – Spells: Thundershock – Prayers: Translocation 1 x Knight-Vexillor (120)* – Meteoric Standard 1 x Knight-Vexillor (120)* – Meteoric Standard 1 x Knight-Vexillor (120)** – Meteoric Standard 1 x Knight-Vexillor (120)** – Meteoric Standard 1 x Knight-Vexillor (120)** – Meteoric Standard
BATTLELINE 5 x Judicators with Skybolt Bows (200)** – Judicator-Prime 5 x Judicators with Skybolt Bows (200)** – Judicator-Prime 5 x Judicators with Skybolt Bows (200)** – Judicator-Prime
ENDLESS SPELL 1 x Everblaze Comet (90)
OTHER 3 x Annihilators (200)* – Annihilator-Prime 3 x Annihilators (200)* – Annihilator-Prime 1 x Stormstrike Chariot (165)* – Stormstrike Axe and Tempestuous Spear
Ethan: I mentioned it in the Fyreslayers but my goodness we’re in funkytown. The subfaction here is largely irrelevant but useful for re-rolling a save?
Now we’ve got that out of the way, let’s get to the fun bit. The completely normal general here is a translocating Lord-Relictor and that’s where our dose of normal ends. Five Knight Vexillors. Count ’em. Five. For those not in the know (and who would be?) the Knight-Vexillor is the little Stormcast bloke with a banner. His ability? Do d3 wounds to everything within 6″ of a point anywhere on the board. So that’s 5d3 Mortals, averaging around 8-10 mortals to everything in range. This is then topped off with the Everblaze Comet which does d3, or d6, Mortals within a large area at a 36″ range. What a combo. In a double battle-regiment this list comes in at 2-drop, being one of the few lists that is likely to take the first turn, hitting anything remotely resembling a castle like, well, a storm? (I’m so sorry).
The rest of the list backs up this combination with tools to turn this opening blow into a knockout with a stormstrike chariot thundering around the board (I’ve moved past shame) while the Annihilators and their 2+ save come crashing into the opponents lines and punch a hole while tying things up for the judicators to rain down a squall of shots (we’re still going).
The only loss for this list was against Gargants and honestly, that tracks, considering how the list functions. While the list does incredible damage spread across a huge number of units, it would struggle to deal the concentrated pain required to take down wound-dense Sons of Behemat. What a list. Noe Aquino should be absolutely thrilled with this exciting result.
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Army Faction: Ogor Mawtribes – Army Subfaction: Bloodgullet – Grand Strategy: No Place for the Weak – Triumphs: Bloodthirsty
LEADER 1 x Huskard on Thundertusk (335) – General – Command Traits: ‘Nice Drop of the Red Stuff!’ – Blood Vulture – Artefacts: Skullshards of Dragaar – Prayers: Pulverising Hailstorm 1 x Frostlord on Stonehorn (430)* – Artefacts: Splatter-cleaver – Mount Traits: Metalcruncher 1 x Hrothgorn (170)* 1 x Butcher (135)** – Tenderiser – Spells: Ribcracker, Molten Entrails 1 x Frostlord on Stonehorn (430)** 1 x Slaughtermaster (140)** – Spells: Ribcracker, Greasy Deluge
BATTLELINE 3 x Icefall Yhetees (120)* 3 x Icefall Yhetees (120)* 3 x Icefall Yhetees (120)*
Peter: I’m starting this with a caveat! None of us know anything about Ogors…. Mind you we still get some of the comments wrong on lists we do know about so….
We have three characters on Stonehorns or Thundertusks who have a threat distance of 24″ (average 19″). These boys are tough with 13 wounds each, a 3+ save AND a 5+ ward. The Frostlords on Stonehorns can kick out an average of 18 damage before saves if they get a charge in.
The Huskard has the Blood Vulture which allows him to cause a free mortal each turn on any enemy unit within 24″. On top of this he has a tasty missile weapon which on its top bracket will roll 12 dice and will cause mortal wounds on 6’s (if the unit is less than 10 models), 5+ if the target had 10+ models or 4+ if it has 20+ models. He also has a command ability which allows other Beastclaw Raider (those Stonehorns) units within 12″ to re-roll their charges.
Hrothgorn and the Mantrappers are a clever inclusion for objective capturing and battle tactics as they can be set up in reserve and bought on in a friendly turn anywhere on the board more than 9″ from the enemy.
The Yhetees, while not great at dishing out damage can run and charge if they’re with 16″ of a Thundertusk when they do so. They also have the annoying ability to pile in from 6″ away instead of the usual 3″.
Both the Butcher and Slaughtermaster know additional spells thanks to their Bloodgullet allegiance and both have Ribcracker which deducts 1 from a an enemy units save. Molten entrails allows a Ogor Monster to add 1 to the damage of their mounts attacks (great on the Stonehorns), while Greasy Deluge forces an enemy unit to deduct 1 from their attacks.
Sprinkle in things like the Splatter-Cleaver which allows you to heal nearby Ogor units D3 wounds if you were successful with any of that models attacks. And a Nice Drop of the Red Stuff which is a command ability that allows units within 12″ of the general an additional 3″ pile in (9″ pile in for Yhetees).
All of this adds up to a tough and hard hitting army
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Allegiance: Khorne – Slaughterhost: Baleful Lords (Host of Chaos) – Mortal Realm: Ghur – Grand Strategy: Show of Dominance – Triumphs: Bloodthirsty
Leaders Bloodstoker (80)**** – Artefact: Talisman of Burning Blood Bloodstoker (80)**** Bloodsecrator (125)*** – General – Command Trait: Thirst for Carnage – Artefact: Black Brass Crown Skarbrand (380)*** Valkia the Bloody (135)*** Slaughterpriest (100)**** – Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact) – Universal Spell Lore: Ghost-mist – Prayer: Blood Sacrifice
Battleline 10 x Bloodreavers (80)** – Meatripper Axes 10 x Bloodreavers (80)** – Meatripper Axes 10 x Bloodreavers (80)** – Meatripper Axes
Units 5 x Wrathmongers (145)* 1 x Chaos Chariots (100)*** – Greatblades – Mark of Chaos: Khorne 1 x Chaos Chariots (100)**** – Greatblades – Mark of Chaos: Khorne 4 x Khagra’s Ravagers (125)* – Spell1: Universal Spell Lore: Flaming Weapon – Allies 9 x Untamed Beasts (70)*** – Allies 9 x Untamed Beasts (70)**** – Allies
Ethan: I’m going to coin this list the “Skarbrand launcher”. A multitude of battalions provide a slew of artefacts to this list, mitigated by the untamed beasts’ pregame move ensuring that objectives are contested from word go. The Baleful lords subfaction is usually utilised by “Oops, All Bloodthirsters” builds, however this list has eschewed such choices in favour of a hectic collection of units which all seem to be built around the uniting goal of “Skarbrand runs and charges at anything on the board”.
In the Heroes section, the arcane tome and ghost-mist, in combination with the prismatic palisade create powerful counterplay against shooting lists, ensuring the army’s lack of ranged options aren’t punished before it has a chance to walk up and beat you to a bloody pulp. The combination of Bloodsecrator, Wrathmongers and Valkia ensure that the Reavers punch above their very cheap cost and, with the benefit of additional attacks, the chaos chariots become a threat, aided by their incredible movement to be a scary prospect across the board. Bloodstokers double down on the theme handing out more movement bonuses to their willing whipees. The keyword for this list is mobility and it has it in spades. Castle build? This is the trebutchet, and the keystone boulder is a running and charging Skarbrand, enough to put fear into the heart of even the most seasoned Living Cities player.
Now, let’s talk about the Jabberslythe. I don’t quite get it? For 150 points, Sean knows something I don’t. It can make a high-output unit absolutely self destruct with self inflicted mortals or kill something that is killing it, Magmadroth style, but I’ll be real with y’all: I’m not sure what this does in the list. That said, it’s a very cool inclusion and provides a wonderful end point for a top 3 article discussing some of the most thrillingly different lists I’ve seen in the last few years. AoS is feeling spicy right now for the Johnnys of the world, with the GHB’s maturation proving that initial overreactions to Bounty Hunters were exactly that. Exciting times!
