Dispel scrolls - is it a must?

[Curu Olannon]

Magical shooting? As Hexwraiths are ethereal they are pretty much permanently in hard cover. They also have a threat range of 31" when combined with Vanhels and 10 S5 autohits allowing no armour saves is very, very nasty.

@Dalamar - I suggest you check out the following report and ensuing tactical discussion: http://www.ulthuan.net/forum/viewtopic. ... 11#p873511 The Hexwraith threat is extremely strong. If noone in your area would have problems against this list then you must play in the strongest meta in the world because this list has placed strongly in multiple countries under various comps by now. "Couple magic missiles" just doesn`t cut it when you`re facing a scroll, shielding, scepter and L4, not to mention being able to heal them with vampire magic, the fact that they`re fastcav etc etc.

It`s interesting to note that a scroll becomes doubly important when facing a list like this: the threat largely stems from the magical synergies present in the list, in this case in particular the double cast of Vanhels. Being able to dispel one and scroll the other for a crucial turn is invaluable and cannot be accomplished in any other way than having a scroll.

[SpellArcher]

I'm not saying you can just blow them off the board.

But magical shooting has to be a partial answer.

[Dalamar]

So that list consists of hexwraiths and a footslogging bunker. Against a rather weak high elf list.

Where are Sisters of Avelorn? Where's Khaine's Ring? If that list were to include a third unit of hexwraiths, there would be no points left for the rest of the army. (900 in Hexwraiths, at least 600 in core, and vampires tend to be character heavy so they could possibly spend all of the remaining points on characters)

Basically High Elves (Magic shooting unit, easy to cast multiple magic missiles), Demons (everything magic!) and Dwarfs (runed up warmachines) auto win. I'm not saying they win massively, but it's an uphill battle for the "uber overpowered VC list"

Then you have to keep in mind that Hexwraiths have to run "through" a unit to do damage, and they do it on a per-model basis, so they can't just clip the unit with one model and do all hits. We're looking at 1" gap, 2" base of the hexwraith, 5 ranks deep enemy is another 3" or so. With their march move of... what, 16"? they need to start 10" away... oh, add 2" if they're 2 ranks deep so 8" away. That at least eliminated turn 1 runthrough.
Once they do run through, they are out of general's range so can't march anymore (Having a lone mobile character with a magic weapon is a REALLY good idea to deal with ethereals). While rest of the army tries to catch up, you get to hang back and score points off of the hexwraiths (just remember to bring all the good toys, sisters and reaver bow, etc. Not even tailoring a list here. You could even bring a phoenix with its magical attacks).

I don't know how you get those hexwraiths to always be in hard cover. They can hide in a forest, that's soft cover. They can hide behind friendly units, that's hard cover but they can't run through friendly units, they have to go around them and lose their range. They can hide behind impassable terrain and buildings for hard cover but how many of those do you have on your tables?

And if they hold back to stay within general's range and within rather short range of invocation of nehek... all the better for you! they're not getting closer and you have more time to kill them.

As you said yourself, you got lucky, and your list is rather on the weaker end of things.

[Curu Olannon]

@SpellArcher - of course. Their main problem is their mediocre range. At worst they can at least provide a threat zone, however they present another problem: you suddenly have on more critical spell to dispel (Gaze of Nagash).

@Dalamar - you have never played against Hexwraiths, have you? It`s easy to "dismantle" strong builds when you don`t understand how they work.

So that list consists of hexwraiths and a footslogging bunker. Against a rather weak high elf list.

The list consists of dual-LD10 Spirit Leech, L4 Vampire Magic, a hard-as-nails character setup and 2 bunkers which are cheap and replenishable. In addition you have not only 2x10 Hexwraiths, but a flying screamer which is hard to contain for many lists. As for the High Elf list, what do you consider a strong list to be?

Then you have to keep in mind that Hexwraiths have to run "through" a unit to do damage, and they do it on a per-model basis, so they can't just clip the unit with one model and do all hits. We're looking at 1" gap, 2" base of the hexwraith, 5 ranks deep enemy is another 3" or so. With their march move of... what, 16"? they need to start 10" away... oh, add 2" if they're 2 ranks deep so 8" away. That at least eliminated turn 1 runthrough.

Wrong. Their rule does not define "through" as entering on one facing and exiting on another. In practice they simply have to touch a unit (same as Terradons) which is what is also being practiced at tournaments. Since they are fastcav they can free reform as well. Thus the math becomes 16" march, 8" from Vanhels then free reform to 1-file at the end of the 8" move. Since they are 10 models big, they are capable of free reforming another 8" (the maximum permitted as this is 2x M) so if one touches the unit at this point, you can free reform 10 times to ensure every Hexwraith touches the unit. Since units are never perfectly aligned in Warhammer I round this down to a 31" threat range.

Once they do run through, they are out of general's range so can't march anymore (Having a lone mobile character with a magic weapon is a REALLY good idea to deal with ethereals). While rest of the army tries to catch up, you get to hang back and score points off of the hexwraiths (just remember to bring all the good toys, sisters and reaver bow, etc. Not even tailoring a list here. You could even bring a phoenix with its magical attacks).

Usually it`s not a good idea to run through T1 because of the issues mentioned above. However T2 the Vampire will be as much as 20" across the table, making it perfectly viable for him to reach Hexwraiths so they can march. Remember, he can march before they move (it`s not start of the turn), so by T3 the Lord can have marched 30", meaning the Hexwraiths can be anywhere within 42" from the Lord`s starting point. This is pretty huge and is not even considering a boosted Vanhels!

I don't know how you get those hexwraiths to always be in hard cover. They can hide in a forest, that's soft cover. They can hide behind friendly units, that's hard cover but they can't run through friendly units, they have to go around them and lose their range.

This statement just makes me wonder if you even know their rules at all. "Soulstriders" specifically states that they can move through friendly and enemy units, as long as they`re not engaged.

ou get those hexwraiths to always be in hard cover. They can hide in a forest, that's soft cover. They can hide behind friendly units, that's hard cover but they can't run through friendly units, they have to go around them and lose their range. They can hide behind impassable terrain and buildings for hard cover but how many of those do you have on your tables?

Usually 2-3, not including hills.

To try and keep this on topic, let`s see this threat in the light of a dispel scroll. Let`s assume worst case, Vampires get T1 (relatively low drop count so not infrequent by any means) and go full speed ahead. A typical magic split is 8v5. He starts off with a 3D6 Vanhels on the bunker. What do you do? Then comes a 5D6 Vanhels boosted. What do you do? Without a scroll, the vampires are on you before you`ve even moved, with a scroll, shielding and scepter intact!

[SpellArcher]

I wasn't specifically talking about Sisters Curu, though I take the point. But that reforming 10 times thing is awful! Thanks for the heads up!

The scroll is wonderful because sometimes you don't see a particular spell strategy or bound spell for example coming.

[Prince of Spires]

Wrong. Their rule does not define "through" as entering on one facing and exiting on another. In practice they simply have to touch a unit (same as Terradons) which is what is also being practiced at tournaments. Since they are fastcav they can free reform as well. Thus the math becomes 16" march, 8" from Vanhels then free reform to 1-file at the end of the 8" move. Since they are 10 models big, they are capable of free reforming another 8" (the maximum permitted as this is 2x M) so if one touches the unit at this point, you can free reform 10 times to ensure every Hexwraith touches the unit. Since units are never perfectly aligned in Warhammer I round this down to a 31" threat range.

But they are not allowed to end their move inside another unit and must end their move at least 1'' away from the unit.

ALso, I get the feeling you're applying the free reform a bit to liberally. Going to single file with a unit of 10 hexwraits is 10'' already, seriously limiting other options. Also, from the way it's written I would say that the 2XM includes the rest of the move you make. Also, reforming 10 times is bound to hit that 2XM number. And reforming allows you to change the number of ranks, direction you're facing or both. It does not let you move R&F models inside a unit. So the 10 reforms have to be done in such a way that you keep changing # of ranks or facing while getting all models somehow touching the unit. Good luck with that one... I would actually even argue that there is no way to determine which R&F model is which, so shuffeling them around doesn't actually do anything. It's only models that actually move through.

So 16'' march, 8'' vanhels, gives 24''. The must be 1'' beyond any unit they move through, their base are 1'', you end up 2 ranks deep, so 2''. Since you can't actually gain any movement at all by reforming (since you reform around the centre of the unit), this doesn't change. Gives you a max range of 21''

You could stop 1'' in front of a unit and then reform (so for 25'' range), but then you would only get half the hits (as per no shuffeling of models during a reform).

Rod

[Curu Olannon]

You can argue all you want but this is the common consensus and how it is played at tournaments. You move them up to 24" and start your reforms to tomorrow come. A free reform is not a move and as such does not count towards 2x M allowance. Thus the threat range is huge. Hexwraiths really are strong and until you have faced them in the hands of a competent player I think just about everyone underestimates them.

[Prince of Spires]

common consensus can of course be wrong

You are definatly wrong about the 2X M part though. It mentions it twice on p14: top left of the page: "also none of the models in the unit may move more than twice their movement rate as a result of a manoeuvre. and bottom of the page under reform: Remember that none of the models in the unit can move more than twice their movement rate.

And even again on p68 for fast cavalry: provided that no model ends up moving a number of inches higher then double its Movement value.

In all cases, it's total movement (including reform distance) that is counted. So common consensus all you want. But RAW the reform movement counts towards 2X M. If you only play half the rule, don't complain it's broken.

Which means that after 8'' VanHels, you only have 8'' max left to do all your reforming. And that includes ending up 1'' from the target unit. (and if you would try it on me at least, be sure to measure all of the models move distances. I sure will)

Of course, even without the reform shenanigans, they're a pretty strong unit.

Anyway, perhaps best if we go back to the actual topic at hand, being dispell scrolls...

Rod

[Grenic]

For me, I run a Teclis based list so I can and do take two dispel scrolls.

While it won’t protect me from a 6PD IF Dwellers, it will provide protection ~75% of the time.

As for how to “comp” casting, I would limit casters to being able to roll spell numbers equal to or less than to their caster level +3. This would make the powerful #6 spells available only to Lord Level casters.

As for the movement of fast cavalry, I agree with rdghuizing, in that you need to ensure that no one model moves more than 2 times its M characteristic in the current movement phase. Unfortunately, this means that the game can really get bogged down with measuring when Fast Cavalry units have to make more than one reform. As a result I tend to allow my opponents to move their Fast Cavalry units anywhere within in 2xM less 1” for each increase/decrease in rank number for each reform made and allowing for wheel distances (measured based on the initial and final unit centres). As for my Fast Cavalry units, I tend to only use one reform, so I don’t burn too many brain cells.

[Dalamar]

Maybe it's common consensus in Norway but "through needs no rules definition, it's a basic English word you can look up in a dictionary if you need to. Even if you allow it played another esy it dtill deserves a kick in the sportsmsnship and end any chances at winning

If you play it differently then it sucks for you.

There must be a reason hexwraith builds are not successful in non comped environment... they can't win consistently.

And the vampire bunker getting this close on turn one? Hell I'll charge it with my witch elves and pop the lord on turn 1 for an easy win

As for the topic at hand.
You better have a damn good reason not to have a scroll, but its not a must.

[Sinsigel]

Actually, even if such reform is possible for hexwraiths, the spectral hunters rules tells us
those S5 armour-ignoring hits are dealt at remaining moves sub phase only, if I recall correctly.
So no additional S5 hits via vanhel's macabre danse.
Although the spell allows the target to move as if it were in remaining moves sub phase,
it is still done at magic phase technically.
(Otherwise I would definitely cast walk between worlds on flamespyre phoenix for those S4 flaming hits)

[Curu Olannon]

I`ve created a topic for the fastcav discussion here: http://www.ulthuan.net/forum/viewtopic. ... 61&start=0

Now this topic can hopefully be about dispel scrolls