Lore of Undeath - High Elf Synergy

Discuss your tactics for the 8th Ed army book here.

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Ferny
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Lore of Undeath - High Elf Synergy

#1 Post by Ferny »

http://www.thefieldsofblood.com/2014/08/the-lore-of-undeath.html wrote: linky: http://www.thefieldsofblood.com/2014/08 ... death.html
Lore Attribute - Raise Dead
Place a counter on the battlefield every time a friendly Wizard successfully casts a spell from the Lore of Undeath. Any friendly Wizard who casts a summoning spell from the Lore of Undeath may choose, after having successfully cast the spell, to spend one or more counters. For every counter spent, he increases by 10 the amount of points that the spell may summon.

Signature Spell Call of the Grave

1. Dark Breath

2. Hand of Dust

3. Soul Stealer

4. Abyssal Swarm

5. The Herald

6. Dark Riders
Apparently if your opponent is playing an End Times list it means that you have the option to access the Lore of Undeath with any of your wizards. Is this correct?

I've posted above leaked 'provisional' rules for the new spells - if this is risky then mods please remove it and just leave the link to source.

So - who's going to give it a try?

What, if any, lists would synergise well with it?

Lv 1/2 or Lv4?

And perhaps the first FAQ question on it...can a loremaster take it (and to what effect/why would you?)?

Is it worth it or just an excuse to buy, paint and maybe use some of the nice new undead minis?
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Prince of Spires
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Re: Lore of Undeath - High Elf Synergy

#2 Post by Prince of Spires »

Given the accuracy of the spell description, I would say it's not really a rumour/provisional rules, but just someone with the book in front of them (given that the book is out already). So I've removed the descriptions.

Feel free to add a summary of what the spells do (just leave out the casting cost).

Your friendly neighborhood loremaster

Rod
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Casazzo
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Re: Lore of Undeath - High Elf Synergy

#3 Post by Casazzo »

I am not impressed with the lore of the undead. IF it is the Lore, he quotes ...
(there is some doubt ... look at the magic cards ... there is a spell ending with "darkness" ... i cannot find it in the qutoed descriptons)

They tried to make up a 'summoning lore' and mixed it with some slightly modified, already existent spells.
The summons are strong pointwise, but they get get a little over the top with the use of the lore-markers.

This for itself is a underwhelming presentation imho. But what makes it really bad (for ME) is, that everyone can use this lore.
Yeah ... High elves and Bretonians summoning undead swarms .... i can totally see that ;-)
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Re: Lore of Undeath - High Elf Synergy

#4 Post by Prince of Spires »

Casazzo wrote:I am not impressed with the lore of the undead.
I generally agree, though I think it will have some nice uses on a lvl2 mage. The signature alone is a great board control spell. Summoning redirectors anywhere you want (within range) is great. The rest is Ok I think. And with the casting cost it's actually a nice lore for the Book of Hoeth.

There is one exception here (and it's a big one). If you are playing Nagash (as in the special character), then this lore can be absolutely murderous. Simple reasons are: as a lvl 5 wizards, these are all low cost spells. Add to that that he can save up to 4 dice from a previous phase for an absolutely overwhelming magic phase. And, and this is the big one, tripling the maximum unit sizes (and range!) each summoning spell summons is massive. Suddenly that 150pts unit becomes a 450pts one (on an 11+ for Nagash), and it goes from an annoying unit to a serious threat. Or summoning a 170pts character on a roll of 5+? or 450pts of monstrous cav? And that's even without the counters (which also triple). That's a pretty serious threat. Just imagine a situation where T1, your opponent stores 4 dice. T2 is a low winds phase (3-2 or something) and suddenly you're down 9-3 on dice and you have a 400 pts monster in your backline and a 450pts monstrous cav unit in your flank. pretty serious business.

Rod
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PS: Bring cookies!

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Baleanoon
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Re: Lore of Undeath - High Elf Synergy

#5 Post by Baleanoon »

The Lore of Undeath is cute, its only ever useful beyond ryza (and creating re-directors or increasing the flee distance of the enemy) when you use Nagash or Arkhan which is limited to End Times games or 2600 pt games. Although my friend and I did considering creating level 1 wizards on lore of light.
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Dalamar
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Re: Lore of Undeath - High Elf Synergy

#6 Post by Dalamar »

Spells 0-3 are good for any wizard... spells 4-6 are only really good for a specialized summoning force, although I suppose you can't go bad with summoning a terrorgheist (6 dice needed though)

Unless used by Nagash or Arkhan, the lore won't break any games.
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Re: Lore of Undeath - High Elf Synergy

#7 Post by Prince of Spires »

spell 1: is pretty bad for most wizards. It only targets undead units, which means for normal wizards you first have to create such a unit. Makes it very situational. Also, the range is a concern.

Spell 2: again, pretty bad for most wizard. It requires your wizard to be in combat. Which is not somewhere you want to be with most of them. Also, 1 attack, usually has a 50% change of hitting not all that spectacular.

Spell 3: Caress from lore of death is usually better I think. Low range. And 2D6+2 is 9 on average. And because you're testing vs LD, you're up against LD9+ in a lot of cases (there is bound to be a general somewhere). Situational, but it can be nice vs low LD armies or monsters on a flank or so.

The summoning spells are interesting, but not really gamebreaking. The best one is probably the signature spell actually. It offers a lot of board control for a low cost. This probably makes it a great lore for a race with access to cheap mages. A 40pts goblin shaman summoning 50+ point units left and right is great value for money. Especially if you have 3 of them. For a HE lvl2 @120+ points not so much probably.

Rod
For Nagarythe: Come to the dark side.
PS: Bring cookies!

Check out my plog
Painting progress, done/in progress/in box: 167/33/91

Check my writing blog for stories on the Prince of Spires and other pieces of fiction.
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