Hello! I had the chance to test out a synergy combo in a game yesterday and wanted to get my thoughts and impressions out. Apologies if I seem tobounce around a vit. I'm typing this via phone. I'll edit it and format it better soon.

Here's the list.

++ Standard Army (Waiqar the Undying : Wave 0 (2017)) [200 Points] ++

+ Infantry +

Ardus Ix'Erebus [38 Points]: 1 Tray, Ardus' Fury

Reanimates [54 Points]: 3x2 Trays, Aggressive Drummer, Blighted Vexillum Bearer, File Leader, Front Line Carrion Lancer

Reanimates [54 Points]: 3x2 Trays, Aggressive Drummer, Blighted Vexillum Bearer, File Leader, Front Line Carrion Lancer

Reanimates [54 Points]: 3x2 Trays, Aggressive Drummer, Blighted Vexillum Bearer, File Leader, Front Line Carrion Lance

List Objectives:

1) Handle Oathsworn Cavalry

Oathsworn cav are very popular in my local area and i kept this in mind when thinking about ways to handle them. The Surge Mortal Strike from the Front Line Carrion Lancer is the key to this.

2) Ardus's Host of Crows

This ability is key to this list. It allows me to grab 3 trays of 3x2 reanimates with FLCL, which puts alot of pressure on the board.

Essential Ideas:

Blighted Vexillum Bearer + File Leader

This worked wonders. I played extremely reactive. Deployed all 3 blocks against the back edge, used Spd 2 Marches with turns to slowly move across the board. My opponent got fouled up on terrain with 1x block of oathsworn and a deathstar, giving me advantage of picking engagements.

Once my opponent got close enough, i just dialed in Red Attack woth Panic modifier (god I wish that was a surge) and just waited to receive charges. It was very interesting to modify the normal activation order. I WANTED to activate units with Attack dialed in while ther WERENT engaged.

1) it completely threw my opponent, who thought I had made mistakes

2) i was able to decimate units on the charge BEFORE they got to attack.

Here's the idea. Block dials in Attack. Activates whilst unengaged. Opponent charges in

1) Proc Blighted Vexillum Bearer to give that unit a Blight

2) Proc File Leader to attack the charging unit before they attack

I was able to deal enough damage on average to remove rerolls AND had the blight to remove a die. Against spearmen, the Mortal strike from the FLCL was not important, so I spent the Blight. Vs. Golems, the Surge Mortal Strike was very helpul, removing an entire tray in of itself. Vs. Oathsworn Cav, also very useful, specially against they Init 3 Atk w/ +1 Def.

Thoughts overall:

Yes. This felt smooth and solid. Gave me a solid combat presence without having a deathstar to worry about. The blocks themselves had alot of teeth againt high Defense units, but since I had 3 of them, i was okay feeding one to a Deathstar.

Don't be aggressive with Ardus. He works miracles in this list as a followup, not a combat leader.

Don't be afraid to take charges. In fact, you should be looking dor opportunities to do just that. Had an instamce in this game where one block was engaged and already fought, but received a charge at a later init and was able to proc the whole combo again against the charging unit. It was rwally satisfying to kill half a unit of Golems on the init they charged my unit to "clean it up". They floundered and did very little.

Going forward:

I swapped Aggressive Drummer for Moment of Inspiration. AD was NEVER used, and adding the white die vs. Low defense units will be very helpful. I should be able to generate a few inspiration tokens early on to 1) clear blight or 2) reproc Moment of Inspiration

That's pretty nice. Do you think that you could be mobile and fast enough with this list to engage ranged units before they chewed you up? That seems like the only weakness I could see, but not sure how bad it would be. If you pulled one of those units of reanimates, what do you think would be a good replacement?

I should have a chance to play against a ranged list today. With 3 blocks, i think i'll have a chance to get atleast 1 full strength block across the board vs. Extreme shooting pressure.

If i had to swap things, i'm not sure. Most likely a tooled up unit of Death Knights designed to handle low defense units.

Did you find you needed to carefully consider who had initiative (prority?) each round? File Leader makes me nervous because they could creep up, then do a quick, short charge before you have a chance to reveal your initiative 4 dial. I guess that's fine if they do, because you still get to attack them later, and your still reducing their attack power with the Blighted Vexillum Bearer.

I'm glad that strategy worked well!

I was i

Nitially very worried about that, but found that by stalling my own movement, my opponent aas forced to use higher iniative longer marches.

Once I got stuck in, there was really nothing I could do about it however. I was able to win the attrition war with Oathsworn cavalry. The surges getting around their high defense was key in that.

This is a cool idea, and I'm glad to hear it's getting some work done, but also surprised. Front Line Carrion Lancer struck me as being not very good because Reanimates roll 2 red, which have only a single surge each. Blighted Vexillum to guarantee the blight is really cool, but even if you're rerolling specifically for surges you'll get one less than 50% of the time. I guess I'm just curious where you were getting enough surges to find it consistently useful.

Note, swapping the drummer for moment of inspiration was going to be my first suggestion, and it does bring up their chances of getting a surge pretty considerably.

Further, with the banners being your only source of blight, once you've spend your blight on a unit you have no way to get more... unless you were disengaging? Do you think you could drop one of the three units for a pair of Combat Ingenuity archer units? With two 3x2's and terrain you should be able to protect them reasonably well, and they'd give you a massive edge in the attrition game.

Rerolling dor surges matters greatly upon your target. Spearmen/Reanimates i dont care about surges as they net the same damage result (except theyre not modified by brutal)(although converting surges into damage is always useful)

File Leader is key. Being able to neuter a block on their charge before they get to attack was key. It gave me a big edge in the attition game by making my blocks be much more resilient by removing precision/brutal.

Having the blight be removed is a stumbling block. One variation i do want to try is swapping a combat block for a battery.

I have scheduled a few game/s today with other members of the forum, and i'll be pushing this list around and will definitely update with my thoughts from those games. I'm really hoping to play into a blight spam list as well as give it another shot against the DeathStar Daqan list. I do thibk one opponent is gonna try his Hawthorne Brutal 8 Cav list again, which I think I can take on pretty well.

Ok wait. Brutal 8 How?

17 minutes ago, taylorcowbell said:

Ok wait. Brutal 8 How?

Start with two 4x1 Oathsworn, add Tempered Steel and Rank Discipline for flavor.

Haha I mean, its alot of damage, but its not brutal 8...

I thought you were literally getting brutal 8, closest I can think of is golems w hawthorne at 6

brutal 8 would indicate a 9x multiplier on damage rolled.
Gotta be mindful when using that word on these forums lol