So I got around to building some more wraiths out of GW spirit hosts. Here are some of them for those interested:

I now have 9 trays of them and have decided that the best way to get a lot of practice with them is to run a very wraith heavy army. This is what I ran in my last game:

Ardus IxErebus [37] 1x1
Ardus Fury [1]
Total Unit Cost: 38

Wraiths [24] 3x1
Trumpets [2]
Raven Tabards [2]
Total Unit Cost: 28

Wraiths [24] 3x1
Trumpets [2]
Raven Tabards [2]
Total Unit Cost: 28

Wraiths [24] 3x1
Trumpets [2]
Raven Tabards [2]
Total Unit Cost: 28

Reanimate Archers [18] 2x1
Combat Ingenuity [6]
Total Unit Cost: 24

Reanimate Archers [18] 2x1
Combat Ingenuity [6]
Total Unit Cost: 24

Carrion Lancers [15] 1x1
Total Unit Cost: 15

Carrion Lancers [15] 1x1
Total Unit Cost: 15

Total: 200 pts

While I think this was probably too many wraiths, holy crap was it fun to play! With Raven Tabards and Trumpets they can make really early, really sharp turns, making them a nightmare for almost anything to deal with. Here are some examples:

Kinda hard to see the dials, but the ability to make a sharp turn 1 at initiative 2 makes your opponent have to make a tough call. My opponent didn't see this maneuver coming the first time I used it and I got an easy flank the next round. Even if he does see it coming...

They still have to consider this charge which can happen at init 3 and covers a distance of 3. If the opponent has initiative you can even just crash into him with a normal init 2 turn without the charge to cancel their potential charge. There are a lot of head games here.

Here is another situation that came up. I was able to dial in a march-turn 2 at init 3 and pass through a unit I was squaring off with to get into some crossbowmen before they could shoot. Note that this can also be done as a charge at init 5, covering a distance of 4, countering the shot from an open archer unit when you have initiative. Also note that the Wraiths connect with their corner exactly in the middle of their original position. I thought that was interesting and will be using it as a frame of reference in future games when determining if I can make a maneuver work.

This situation didn't come up during the game but I did get a ton of use out of the turn 2 template. In practice I believe you can line up slightly to the side of a ranged unit like these crossbowmen and then bank out of their shooting LOS, as well as out of line with their blockers. With both Raven Tabards and Trumpets this move is at an incredibly fast init 3, meaning not much will be able to catch you before you pull it off. This has the added benefit of lining up a potential flank next round.

Here is a turn three move or charge that can be done at inits 5 or 6. Note that there is a big space covered there and you could conceivably get around medium sized units and terrain. Others on the forum have noted the distance covered by turning maneuvers with wide units and I think this illustrates it's value nicely. A charge 4 would not have covered this gap which is about 5, and just shorter than the whole ranged ruler.

A few takeaways I had from this experience:

First, Ardus' Host of Crows passive went up in value significantly in my perception. This unit (3x1 of Wraiths with Raven Tabards and optionally Trumpets) does not exist without him. The 2x2 is the only formation that naturally can have a banner upgrade. However, it is too deep to pass through a lot of things and not wide enough to cover some of these distances. If this unit is as good as I think it is, bringing Ardus will be viable in competitive Waiqar lists...

Second, wraiths are even more fun than I already thought! I have been playing with wraiths since Dec, but never in this set up, and never this many. Additionally, there were multiple games in which I just misjudged distances and didn't make the maneuvers that I thought I could. It turns out I just needed practice with them. These three units though were flying around the board like I was playing x-wing. One got a huge flank on a 3x2 of spearmen on the opponents side of the board and decimated them. Then it turned around and back tracked all the way back to my deployment in two turns, just in time to protect a unit of Reanimate Archers from the oathsworn that were on their way around my flank. Another got behind his army and kept pinning down a Tank-Thorne that it couldn't possibly kill, but just kept engaging/disengaging and dancing with him, essentially neutralizing him for the whole game.

I think I underestimated this unit...

47 minutes ago, QuickWhit said:

I think I underestimated this unit...

You simply need to channel out your inner Latari. Or, being Waiqar, someone else's inner Latari will also do.

Did you experiment any with Metered March? You could use that to pass through units, stop on the other side of them, reform and collide. Instant flanking bonus.

This is definitely interesting maneuvering to see. I hadn't really thought about the turns and jumping through units as much. The straight line unit skipping had made me less thrilled with them, but this definitely renews interest.

Wow, they are going to be masters of the wheel. It's cool to see Ardus *significantly* boost a unit. 3x1 is such an efficient use of trays (Love the 3x1 Daqan crossbowmen). At least they won't have Precise!

2 hours ago, Daverman said:

Did you experiment any with Metered March? You could use that to pass through units, stop on the other side of them, reform and collide. Instant flanking bonus.

I was running Metered March on them pretty consistently prior to this past game. It had its moments. I was only able to get a charge to land on the other side of a unit a few times. I often found it was more valuable in dialing in a late initiative march action and then tweak the range to where I wanted for the next round. Sometimes your turn comes up and you opt to basically not move but just use the free reform.

In short, definitely useful, but not in the way I thought it would be. I am much more excited about the early banks you can do with Trumpets. I found that flanks come more reliably when you can bank to the side of things so quickly. More testing is definitely needed though...

20 minutes ago, Glucose98 said:

Wow, they are going to be masters of the wheel. It's cool to see Ardus *significantly* boost a unit. 3x1 is such an efficient use of trays (Love the 3x1 Daqan crossbowmen). At least they won't have Precise!

I'm hoping their other unique will get them some re-rolls. I would love to see something that utilizes surges for re-rolls. Something like this:

[Attack][Surge] For each surge spent you may re-roll one dice. You may not use this ability after re-rolling.

This would make that blue die much more useful. I get sad when I see double surge and I don't have anything to spend them on...

Ran two more games with this wraith setup. Here's the list I was playing:

Total Cost: 199

Ardus IxErebus [37] 1x1
Ardus Fury [1]
Total Unit Cost: 38

Wraiths [24] 3x1
Trumpets [2]
Raven Tabards [2]
Total Unit Cost: 28

Wraiths [24] 3x1
Trumpets [2]
Raven Tabards [2]
Total Unit Cost: 28

Reanimate Archers [18] 2x1
Combat Ingenuity [6]
Total Unit Cost: 24

Reanimate Archers [18] 2x1
Combat Ingenuity [6]
Total Unit Cost: 24

Carrion Lancers [15] 1x1
Total Unit Cost: 15

Carrion Lancers [15] 1x1
Total Unit Cost: 15

Carrion Lancers [27] 2x1
Total Unit Cost: 27

And the list I was up against:

Total Cost: 197

Kari Wraithstalker [32] 1x1
Fortunas Dice [6]
Wraith Step [1]
Total Unit Cost: 39

Lord Hawthorne [34] 1x1
Might of Daqan [4]
Total Unit Cost: 38

Deepwood Archers [30] 2x2
Tempered Steel [3]
Total Unit Cost: 33

Heavy Crossbowmen [27] 3x1
Tempered Steel [3]
Rank Discipline [4]
Total Unit Cost: 34

Oathsworn Cavalry [46] 2x3
Raven Tabards [2]
Moment of Inspiration [5]
Total Unit Cost: 53

The first game my opponent opted to be first player. Among the objectives was "Demoralize their forces". Looking at my list he just couldn't let me have that so he chose to pick objective over deployment and picked "Gain Ground" instead. One of the deployments was "Mutual Reinforcements", which was great for me having more units, and wraiths so I picked that one. He deployed the majority of his army in one corner together with only his cav in the opposite corner facing my primary army. I deployed both wraiths, Ardus, the 2x1 of CL's, and one of my 2x1's of RA's in the corner that the cav were facing and the two solo CL's and remaining 2x1 of RA's in the remaining corner facing his main army's flank.

These pics are at the end of round 1. I need to get better at getting pictures when I play... I'm often too into the game to remember (and a few drinks in by round 2 typically). My wraiths facing off with the Cav performed a wheel 2 to the outside expecting him to come fast and hard at my flank and hoping to flank him in return and pin him down. Realizing this possibility, he opted to reform the Cav and come after my reinforcements instead. My primary army is pushing forward aggressively hoping to get into the archers before they can shoot next round. My reinforcements are pushing for a flank of his main army with one solo lancer out towards the center terrain piece with the intention of camping it out while spitting blight.

This is the beginning of round 3. In the previous round my wraiths were able to close into the deepwood archers with a turn 3 at initiative 5 preventing his ranged shot (and surprising the **** out of him with the distance it covered).

Here on the left side of the board, my CL reformed to face the Cav's flank as they move forward. My wraiths performed a shift-2 and reformed to line up a flank. However, this round he has initiative and those Cav have Raven Tabards. You can kind of see my dial for those wraiths has a wheel 1 at initiative 2 hoping he won't realize I can cover that distance with this maneuver and that he is trying to move at a initiative 3 march 2+2 to cover more ground. I was correct and got the wraiths into the back of the Cav before they could move, guaranteeing a flank charge with the CL.

Unfortunately, I did not get any more pictures after this (3 beers deep by now). The game went down hill quickly for my opponent with the wraiths on both sides doing substantial damage next round and the other two carrion lancers finding blighted targets and rolling well. It was a round 4 concede after that.

The second game was much much closer, with my opponent picking "Overextended" and us drawing two 6 capacity terrain pieces (burning forest and stone terrace). He placed one right in the middle of the board preventing any legal placement of the other one so we had only one piece of terrain. I picked "Take the Ridge" for the objective thinking I could try to control more territory with more units. The game split into two battles on either side of the terrain with Hawthorne taking the middle and rallying every turn to prevent blight and keep upgrades up. Ardus was able to get well positioned between the 2x1 of lancers and a 2x1 of RA's and roll big to blight/mortal Hawthorne down around turn 5. His Cav came through the gap on the left and was met by wraiths and a 2x1 of RA's. With a just shy of 2 distance stand-off and me with the turn token, I had the option of out charging him at init 3, but he had the option of marching into me at init 2 to cancel my charge. I also considered him dialing in a attack at init 7 but that would leave him open to blight from the archers before the swing. I gambled on dialing in a double attack and it paid off with him marching into me to stop a suspected charge at 3. I rolled very well, removing his entire back rank. The rest of the battle on that side of the table went very well for me. The other side of the table though had Kari reeking havok on my archers while my wraiths got shot down by crossbowmen and archers with nowhere to maneuver to on the narrow table. They were able to charge past Kari and get into the crossbowmen preventing one shot, but the archers smoked them the next turn. My 2x1 of CL's had Kari down to 1 wound left, but I rolled all blanks trying to finish her off (still had two of them and a hit on the dial, she was at armor three, so I only need one hit). The archers then fired on them wiping them out. In the end my opponent won a close game, scoring slightly more objective points and having Kari and both ranged units left while I only had Ardus and one archer unit. Altogether a great game though. Wish I got pictures of this one.

Still high on this unit. It does struggle in tight deployments, but I admittedly could have mitigated that better with my initial unit placement. I also think having two of them makes some objectives so good for your army that it forces your opponent into really tough decisions before the game even starts.