I was wondering how people are maximising Mortal Strikes. I ask as I see this as one viable pathway for building Waiqar lists which specialise in hero, upgrade figure and high armour value unit killing. These kind of builds wouldn't be great at removing large blocks of infantry as they are not tooled to remove large numbers of 1/1 trays.

As I can tell here's what works so far:

• Fortuna's Dice - allows selection of Mortal Strike facing
• Carrion Crawler's surge ability
• Front Line Carrion Crawler's surge ability
• Ardus' special to get Carrion Crawler's surge ability
• Death Caller - not strictly Mortal Strike but it bypasses armour

Any other ideas?

Carrion Lancers attacking blighted targets is probably the best way to get lots of them. Requires some setup, but notably they attack and archers shoot at initiative 5, so if you can get the engagement right you can have archers apply blight and then immediately take advantage of it, preferably before your target gets to attack.

Deathcaller is definitely great for doing wounds at range on exactly the target you want, but doesn't have the same ability to drop so many at once.

@Bhelliom how is deathcaller the 'target you want'? It causes wounds to be suffered by a unit, subject to normal rules. So it works on heroes and siege, but again footsoldiers not so much.

I've been wanting to try a jazzed up eagle banner charge, for kicks. Decidedly not waiqur though.

What about Fallen Hero + Reaping Blades for the 2 red die?

I keep wondering if Heraldic Surcoats is worth it on your big block of Reanimates with the Front Line Carrion Lancer, because then the archers can fire at the engaged enemy to blight it without worrying about morale tests, but I suppose Steadfast already adds enough insurance. Five points seems steep for Heraldic Surcoats.

1 hour ago, Darthain said:

@Bhelliom how is deathcaller the 'target you want'? It causes wounds to be suffered by a unit, subject to normal rules. So it works on heroes and siege, but again footsoldiers not so much.

I've been wanting to try a jazzed up eagle banner charge, for kicks. Decidedly not waiqur though.

Sorry, I was talking about your ability to 'reach out and touch' a target at range, not needing to get into melee in order to deliver the mortal wounds. You're definitely right that it's no good against figure upgrades, but it's harder to avoid than a unit of Carrion Lancers for things like Hawthorne with Shield of Margath. Eagle Banner is pretty cool, though really wants Hawthorne to get good use out of.

1 hour ago, Budgernaut said:

I keep wondering if Heraldic Surcoats is worth it on your big block of Reanimates with the Front Line Carrion Lancer, because then the archers can fire at the engaged enemy to blight it without worrying about morale tests, but I suppose Steadfast already adds enough insurance. Five points seems steep for Heraldic Surcoats.

Cool idea, but Heraldic Surcoats is "to a minimum of 1" so unless you have a bunch of panic tokens it has very little to offer in this case. My experience has been that the morale check from firing into combat almost never has much of an effect on the game.

1 hour ago, Bhelliom said:

Sorry, I was talking about your ability to 'reach out and touch' a target at range, not needing to get into melee in order to deliver the mortal wounds. You're definitely right that it's no good against figure upgrades, but it's harder to avoid than a unit of Carrion Lancers for things like Hawthorne with Shield of Margath. Eagle Banner is pretty cool, though really wants Hawthorne to get good use out of.

Yeah people started running deathcaller deathstars of reanimates with SCLs and simultaneous orders fronting them to blight then wound. I started running Fortunas dice Kari and sniping deathcallers It is an efficient delivery system, surely.

Big fan of Fortuna's Kari, though I'm like a tiny bit resentful of the points she takes up because I love including her so much. It is a strange feeling.

I think we should include the death knights in this discussion as they can dial in a mortal strike for their melee attack at ini 4. With up to 3+2 speed and RRB attack dice, they can kill both heroes and golems as well as large junks of infantry. Also, they can use an artefact. So one could give them fortunas dice to guarantee an precision symbol on the blue die and kill infantry upgrades with the mortal strike from the dial.

Two reds is also a great candidate for Reaping Blade!

On 7/30/2017 at 11:56 PM, Chaoticus said:

I think we should include the death knights in this discussion as they can dial in a mortal strike for their melee attack at ini 4. With up to 3+2 speed and RRB attack dice, they can kill both heroes and golems as well as large junks of infantry. Also, they can use an artefact. So one could give them fortunas dice to guarantee an precision symbol on the blue die and kill infantry upgrades with the mortal strike from the dial.

And if the french leak/preview is not a just a clever photoshop they will be able to give the target a condition that will deal it 2 wounds before each End Phase.

Worms (2x2 unit) + archers with combat ingenuity, I've been able to do 4 wounds in a hero, kill 6 horses in one hit. A panic is not that bad usually because of shooting a unit engaged.

17 hours ago, Polda said:

And if the french leak/preview is not a just a clever photoshop they will be able to give the target a condition that will deal it 2 wounds before each End Phase.

Any chance of a translation?

1 hour ago, Thornoo1 said:

Any chance of a translation?

Gauntlet of Obcasium Melee: Exhaust this card to apply the "Death's Embrace " condition to the defender.
Death's Embrace: Before each End phase, this unit suffers [Stable Rune] wounds.

43 minutes ago, Polda said:

Gauntlet of Obcasium Melee: Exhaust this card to apply the "Death's Embrace " condition to the defender.
Death's Embrace: Before each End phase, this unit suffers [Stable Rune] wounds.

And is it permanent (the condition) with no possibility to remove? if not is a death sentence.

20 minutes ago, Hijodecain said:

And is it permanent (the condition) with no possibility to remove? if not is a death sentence.

Nobody knows at the moment. There might be a piece of text in the Death Knights insert that classifies it as a Bane. Who knows?