The Cavalry Prince - List Design, Tactics, Battle Reports

[Oranion]

I have been following this conversation on Swordmasters, and I love the arguments from both sides! I run an MMU Cavalry Prince list (inspired by you, Seredain! I have followed this Army Blog since joining Ulthuan)with all three flavors of elite infantry: 20 Phoenix Guard w/ Razor, 20 Swords w/ Discipline, and 11 Lions. I run a Loremaster with the book in my Swordmasters because I feel he has the tools to deal with close combat effectively, but I have been struggling to win lately because I have not had the magic support that Swordmasters require.

What are your thoughts on a unit of 20 swords led my a loremaster? I think that it is wonderful in theory, but I cannot seem to make it work in practice.

Miasma works well against Warriors of Chaos and other elite infantry striking before me, as you have recently mentioned, as well as forcing WS4 troops to hit me on 5's 2/3rds of the time.

Iceshard Blizzard helps contain template shooting and forces enemies to hit you on 5's, which is the best way to protect the unit.

Wyssan's works wonderfully as you have already stated, both offensively and defensively.

Earthblood is usually the most common spell let through, which, due to the lore attribute works both to heal my characters as well as put a 5++ on the unit.

I love the fluff of a Loremaster heading to battle with a retinue of Swordmasters at his side, but even supported by the Book of Hoeth I have had trouble with only having a +2 to cast and dispel. Do you think that Swordmasters in combined arms lists require a L4 High caster in order to hold their own weight in an all-comers list?

Cheers!

[Beregond]

Oranion,

I tried the same thing; I Swordmaster unit supported by the loremaster. I had 2 conclusions: 1) the Loremaster could be very effective in supporting the Swordmasters, but I had to devote my entire magic phase to doing so. With such a large spell selection (and the book of Hoeth), I could get a couple buffs each turn on them when I needed to-- I couldn't predict which ones, but I could always get something that influenced the combat. 2) I couldn't reliably combat my opponent's magic phase. Only having +2 to dispel was a deal-breaker, even with the book. I'd consistently fail to dispel the spells I'd need to stop by 1-2, even if I was being very careful in conserving dice, etc. In the end, I dropped the loremaster because of these 2 things-- a very localized magic phase, and lack of punch in dispelling.

-B

[jwg20]

I say this from the standpoint that I haven't had the opportunity to play a game since September because of med school, but here is my $0.02 on the topic of the loremaster:

Simply put, I love him! There are just a few things you need to consider when taking him though:

1) You need to change the way you cast spells. Most people in 8th edition warhammer lean heavily on the big powered up 6 or 5th spells in a lore. Throwing 6 at dwellers, okkams, sun, or pit of shades is a really common thing. As the 6 spells have been largely toned down from the BRB as more army books have come out, it has become slightly less common, but it is still prevalent. For the loremaster, that isn't the goal. There will rarely be a time when you have that "one spell you need to get off" except for maybe boosted signature metal against a heavy cav bus. Instead, the loremaster excels in the trickle phase. Throwing 1-3 dice at each spell gives you a solid assurance that you will get off something. This is compounded with the book of hoeth, which really makes throwing low dice less risky. Early game, I usually use it to death snipe big targets, fireball chaff, or miasma/iceshard shooting. Later in the game when I reach combat, I trickle cast a bunch of spells on one important combat. I don't rely on the spells to win combat, I rely on the spells to make the combats more certain. Generally speaking, I try to make the combat an easy win for me even without magic, then any magic I get off just helps me ensure that he is testing on insane courage.

This strategy integrates the charge phase and the magic phase, but if you do it well it is almost unstoppable. I actually like it more than having a LV 4. The loremaster has 4 spells that are useful in combat, whereas even a shadow LV 4 will only have two or maybe three, and one of them (okkams) is only useful sometimes, and it has such a high casting value you are basically dedicating your entire phase for that spell. One dispel scroll is enough to ruin that strategy and waste your phase. With the trickle phase, a scroll is costing you 2 or maybe 3 dice from your pool. It makes it harder to decide what to cast, sure, but it also makes it harder for your opponent to choose which spells to dispel.

Using magic this way (to improve an already good combat, rather than to swing a bad combat) feeds right into the second point:

2) The loremaster really emphasizes the need to pick quick combats with elves. You need to make sure that all important combats happen in your phase. If you let your opponent get off counter charges and counter spells, it could end badly for you. Because you don't have one of those killer 6 spells, you need to make sure that you are not being put into a position where your opponent gets off okkams to swing a combat against you. You could argue that this strategy is always important, but I feel it is more important when your opponent has those spells and you don't.

About dispelling, notice that a LV 2 with book is actually BETTER dispelling odds than a LV 4 without book. This is because of two main aspects: Firstly, getting a re roll gives an average improvement of +2 to dispel (so on average he has the same dispelling power as a LV 4 without book) and secondly because getting a re roll dramatically increases the chances of dispelling with 6-6. Granted, a LV 2 with book is not as good as a LV 4 with book, but a LV 2 with book will still put you one step ahead of every other army out there. Math doesn't lie

All in all, the loremaster requires much more finesse than a LV 4. He has more spells so picking which spells to use is much harder, and because he has no big spells there is never an easy decisions in the magic phase. But I feel you can really get mileage out of him if you use him properly. He just requires more finesse and planning, and it requires you to change the way you think about a magic phase.

[sutilar]

Hello Seredain,

I think you would like to see a copy of your Cavalry Prince army riding other pastures, this time against Warriors of Chaos.

In spells I rolled 4,5,6,6 and 4,6 so I chose Drain Magic, Soul Quench, Hand Glory, Fiery Convocation, Iceshard Blizzard and Chain Lightning. The opponent had two 18x Nurglemen bricks, a Nurgle DP (Lvl 4, Death Magic), a turbo-ward save BSB riding a beast, four Dog units...
The only proxies are a tiranoc chariot representing a Chaos Beast Chariot and an elven Prince on a cardboard base representing another Chaos Beast Chariot.
End of Turn 2: http://postimg.org/image/dbk5ykfud/The Helm Bus is on the left of the red tower
End of Turn 4: http://postimg.org/image/6jtqvpqut/ The fallen nurglemens in the image are only made by the Helm Bus, before the attacks of the swordmasters on the flank hahaha

Flanks: Both units of Silver Helms early ate one dog unit on each flank, and the archers shooted down a third. I didn't take an important measurement and the last dog unit ate a RBT.
Turn 1 Fiery Convocation + shooting reduced my east flank Nurglemens to three models until Turn 4. They couldn't arrive to combat because they were crossing a river and they failed a L8 panic test with re-roll due to a single model dog.

Center: White Lions holded on the second Nurglemen brick (intact, 18 models) during Turn 3 and 4. Iceshard Blizzard was activated on the Nurglemen brick every moment. The opponent haven't tried to dispel it anytime, but he stopped my Shield of Saphery on the Swordmasters for two turns (Turn 3 Shield: 6+ Turn 4 Shield: nothing).
Swordmasters (intact, 21 models) on image 1 are flank-charged by two model Skulcrushers, holded L9 Steadfast, reorganized and massacred them (without any buff or hex help) ending Turn 3.

Turns 3 and 4:The Beast Chariots fled from both flanking (charging) Silver Helms, the DP was all the game hiding behind the Skulcrushers first and behind the Chariots later due to my ranged threat and the Nurglemen brick holded by the WL has a fatal ending on image 2 (Turn 4).

Questions to you:
1.- What right-guess and mistakes do you see on my deployment and first moves?
2.- As you can see on image 2, I haven't used any Eagle! Simply I haven't saw a moment to use them. What could be their best use in my game?
3.- With which wizard do you choose spells first? Why?

Thanks for reading my badly Google Translate helped post

[SpellArcher]

I seem to remember that even in your old Life list under the previous book you were contemplating running your AM aggressively up the board Seredain! So it must have been very pleasing when you spotted the High Magic attribute. Quite apart from the benefits to the SM's though, overcoming spell range limitations really helps you to squeeze more out of your repertoire.

Your old list under the previous book was solid and fighty but could lack power in the magic phase to some extent. Running similar magic but with Banner of Sorcery thrown in, I found the remorselessness of High Magic very hard for most opponents to stop. The downside of course was that the AM would blow his head off now and then with uniformly grim results. Whereas now, you've got the pressure phase only much, much safer.

The old unit of 14 Swordmasters was great (mine did some wonderful things) but the same unit now in an MMU context just doesn't make sense to me. I feel you either go 3 deep (more or less 20+) with serious magic support or you go MSU.

How do you guys with the Loremaster deal with the scroll issue? Take a supporting caddy or build the army to live without the scroll?

[GrottoKnight]

Sword Masters

Excellent write ups and you seem like the best person to beseech on a movement tray Q?

I read through your topic that expanding greatly. I am more for the side of the modelling and looks of the army and prefer the Sword Masters over the White Lions because I love the SM and dislike the WL. I am going more themed with the Lothern and Saphery units. I am in a semi competitive hobby group in Michigan-USA and we have all armies except Daemons and Tomb Kings.

How wide do you go with your SMs? It seems 6,7, or 8 is the best as 5 is too little and 10 is unecessary since they already get three ranks and it would be too many eggs (points) in one basket. 6 is the minimum as it helps keep ranks and helps the most to only allow one unit on the front. 7 maxes out the attacks on the 20mm size units of 5 wide but lowers the rank safety and expands the frontage. 8 allows for the max attacks on 5 wide 25mm enemies lowers rank safety greatly and has the greatest risk of dual enemy units. It would seem at first 7x3 (21 models, 29 attacks) is the way to go as you could do 20 with a character but 3 models lost and you lose a rank. 6x4 (24 models, 25 attacks, yes more models) and more protected ranks as you get one more rank and the +3 would be lost after two models lost.

The more attacks have more potential if manipulated by magic/items while the unit with more ranks seems more stable while only losing four Str5 I5 attacks.

That said....if one plans to have core units provide the ranks Spears/Sea and these units would always be 5 wide (6 wide in larger games) to keep the rank bonus then it would seem that 7 wide would be more optimal or even pushing the smaller unit theory in place for SMs. I guess it is then up for debate as to whether the SMs are the main unit or just a support unit. I could see them used as either.

[Seredain]

Happy New Year everybody. I'll just carry on where I left off.

Budget command choices on the 6 Silver Helms

Tecion / Ferny,

I think I agree that the standard is the better way to go for a unit of 6 helms. I have flirted with the high helm as an alternative chiefly because I have found his presence in the main bus so utterly brilliant an upgrade – so much so that I’m annoyed with myself for not even thinking about it beforehand (we get set in our ways, I suppose). Running the helms as a lance, having the full command allows me to move my characters from the 2nd rank into advantageous positions for any given combat – this can be of enormous benefit. And of course, having the champ to take unwanted challenges is always useful where you’re looking to get the most out of your heroes. Since including the high helm, I have also flirted (on and off) with the idea of upgrading the BSB’s offensive capabilities from Sword of Might to Ogre Blade. Str6 attacks kick the bejeezus out of Str5 attacks – I miss the 7 attacks at Str6+ my old bus was pumping out every round – but this would mean losing the Other Trickster’s Shard, which is massive when my prince is in a challenge, and it would turn the BSB into something of a glass cannon against armour-penetrating enemies. For now, I’m happy with the current build.

The point of this digression, really, is as evidence that the big unit of helms and the small unit of helms are designed for different tasks. I like taking alternative units of heavy cavalry (more on that in a moment…), because it allows me to catch cannon-less opponents on the hop by deploying one or both of my characters in the unit. In this context, a champion is useful. I like the mathematical benefit of getting double the attacks out of one model for less than half his points. He’s also useful for challenging a powerful character, as you say Ferny, who might otherwise tear a 6-man helm unit to pieces. This was indeed my thinking.

But, after more thinking, it strikes me that the 6-helm unit isn’t designed for these roles: it is a combat support unit designed for running over light troops, war machines and other combat support units. Since the latter can be heavily armoured and/or tough (chaos chariots are the archetype, but you might also be looking at doomwheels, ironblasters etc), having the automatic +1 combat res from the flag is just excellent. Ferny, your look at musicians reflects this same issue: musicians help the reavers perform their primary role to flee from charges. You can use helms to flee from things too, of course, but the primary reason I’ve purchased them is to bring some armour and heavy lances into combat with enemy support units. In this context, the standard feels like the better all-round choice. I like free reforms – and movement 9 places silver helms in a good position to take advantage of them – but I hate regularly taking leadership tests on an 8. You’ll fail a 3rd of the time, and that sucks when you need your units (especially the mobile ones), following orders and getting around quickly. In my experience, a compact 3x2 formation is so easy to wheel about that you don’t miss a musician at all, so a standard doesn’t present any problems there.

Hi Seredain,
nice hearing from you again and from your stategies. Looking forward to reading the post you are preparing

i have been using quite a lot your fighty characters setup in silver helm bus since last edition. However i'm finding every time more that there are enemies they can't tackle (loec was such a great loss..as the double rerollable 1+ for both). And if I am doing the investment, they need to be able to cut through anything.

Have you also had this experience about the fighty characters no longer being the kings of the arena? any thoughts?

An interesting question, this, and having thought about it since our new book came out, I think the answer is 'yes and no'.

Cavalry Characters in the New Book

Luckily, the prince himself remains, as a general combat unit, pretty much unchanged. The Talisman of Loec was an incomparably brilliant tool in the right circumstances, but typically I'd find myself using it only when I absolutely had to kill my prince's opponent model in one round (because otherwise the'd have a good chance of killing the prince), or else when that opposing model was unlikely to inflict wounds. Against opponents who weren't likely to kill me in one round, but who were able perhaps to inflict two wounds, the Talisman was a risky choice. You never want to be on one wound for very long: I've actually lost my prince to dangerous terrain as a result of taking one from the talisman (you cannot imagine the heartbreak!). As a result, I often left it alone.

There's no denying the talisman's effectiveness against (in particular) HKB bret lords (etc), but we can live without it. High magic users now get to heal their princes with Apotheosis - not something we could do before. Unforging may not select the item you want to kill ( a big nerf), but it does take a wound off your opponent. If you're able to nerf that enemy ward save some other way (assuming you failed to destroy it), your prince will nonetheless find it significantly easier to kill an opponent if you've blasted off a wound already. Book of Hoeth makes both spells, and magic support generally, a more reliable source of aid. So we lost a talisman, but gained some things. The last of these is the shift from special to core silver helms. Not needing to spend special points on the prince's bodyguard makes him a more efficient choice. Being movement 9 is also a big bonus if you're looking to win vital charges, especially against other buses, and especially if you're packing the Potion of Foolhardiness. It isn't Loec, but 5 Str 7 ASF attacks on your big charge is nice. The rest of the time? The prince performs exactly as he always did. Str 7 attacks with a 1+rr + fireborn save is an excellent all-comers bashing tool, especially since we lost a load of high-strength ASF attacks when we lost Speed of Asuryan.

For me the real drop in fighting power comes from the BSB. My old dude had Str6 attacks, a 2+rr fireborn save and the Other Trickster's Shard. My current build retains OTS, but only has Str5 attacks, a 1+ save, fireborn, a 2++ against the first wound and a 6++ the rest of the time. In terms of protection, this guy actually stands up well to his predecessor: Golden Crown is a great item on a 2-wound model, and a 1+ save is significantly better than a 2+, so offsets the loss of the re-roll. But Str5 is a significant drop from Str6 and I do sometimes miss my old BSB's hitting power. So now I have to choose, between supporting the prince with OTS, or getting better attacks out of my BSB with the Ogre Blade (Star Lance is great too). All-comers the Ogre Blade is possibly the better bet, and yet it's so important that my prince be able to take on most of the baddest stuff out there (who else is going to?), that OTS still seems vital. There's not much in it, but there are some hard characters out there these days, and the hardest of them are packing ward saves.

This last point is probably what's changed most. Super-hard enemy fighting characters have become more prevalent. Overwhelmingly, in my experience, it's the Warriors of Chaos that have shifted things: fighters don't get much harder to kill than a Chaos lord with Crown of Command and a 3++ with re-roll and, although Chaos could always field characters that I'd look twice at, I've never seen as many of them get taken. My prince hasn't got any worse against such opposition - Talisman of Loec does you few favours if your opponent survives with his ward save and then gets to pound your 2 wound prince. But it has emphasized the importance of getting your support right. Unforging is massive, massive against these kind of characters - as Vaul's always was. In fact I think it so important to be able to duel with enemy lords that Vaul's / Unforging has for a long time been my chief reason for choosing High Magic. Apotheosis is also important if you're grinding against such a hard character. Weaponskill buffs/debuffs are important for two characters toting relatively few attacks. The Other Trickster's Shard is great against this guy, too. You can't re-roll a re-roll, so hope your opponent makes his first lot of saves and has to re-roll them!

The point is that you have to support your prince (as you always did against the big baddies). In this context we may have lost some effectiveness from our BSB, but we've gained more reliable magic support, and more special/rare points to provide backup (assuming you're taking a helm bus), including the frost phoenix, bolt throwers and more elite troops. In the round, I think it's fair to say that cavalry prince lists gained more than they lost with the new book.

i am going to try moving them into a DP bus with the BotWD:
- The downside is having to drop the OTS, the cost of the DP bus, and not having the BotWD available for infantry.
- The upside, a 2++ against any magic attack, including death spells and characters weapons, and extra protection for the bus to make those bodies last longer; and the extra hit power of the DP!

Aaand this is the major support option we've got for our prince! Personally, I like the benefit the Banner brings in the way of miscast protection, and I'm simultaneously unwilling to add an archmage to my prince bus for fear of the deathstar-busting spells and spoiling my archmage's targeting options. Finally, I feel like core helms are too good an opportunity to pass up. But, the dragon prince+prince bus toting BotWD and a high archmage is one of the scariest units we can build. If you want to go toe to toe with anything using a solo unit, this is one you'll probably enjoy!

As infantry, without the BotWD available, only option i consider for a big block is a PG block w/razor banner. WL and SM won't last without the banner. Actually, i am more than happy of having that PG block: good output damage and excellent durability.
As for magic, still debating debating between a high archmage, for a perm 3++, or shadows for the needed boosts on the PG and DP i know you are a firm defender of high magic, but what is your thinking about the magic lore in a list like this?

I agree that, without ASF, our GW elite infantry need defensive buffs to keep those attacks coming over multiple rounds. You can get this using High Magic and just live without the BotWD on your infantry. It may effect your choices when it comes to throwing lots of dice, but you could work with it. If you're minded to choose phoenix guard as your single big infantry block, though, I think they'll need a different kind of support. PG's are brilliant defensive troopers and have good all-round utility with the AP banner, but Str4 still leaves a lot to be desired and they do suffer when it comes to fighting tougher units. Shadow magic solves these problems by having two spells which make it easier to wound things - Withering and Mindrazor. Str9 Phoenix Guard will kill anything.

[Seredain]

What are your thoughts on a unit of 20 swords led my a loremaster? I think that it is wonderful in theory, but I cannot seem to make it work in practice.

I say this from the standpoint that I haven't had the opportunity to play a game since September because of med school, but here is my $0.02 on the topic of the loremaster:

Simply put, I love him! There are just a few things you need to consider when taking him though:

1) You need to change the way you cast spells. Most people in 8th edition warhammer lean heavily on the big powered up 6 or 5th spells in a lore. Throwing 6 at dwellers, okkams, sun, or pit of shades is a really common thing. As the 6 spells have been largely toned down from the BRB as more army books have come out, it has become slightly less common, but it is still prevalent. For the loremaster, that isn't the goal. There will rarely be a time when you have that "one spell you need to get off" except for maybe boosted signature metal against a heavy cav bus. Instead, the loremaster excels in the trickle phase. Throwing 1-3 dice at each spell gives you a solid assurance that you will get off something. This is compounded with the book of hoeth, which really makes throwing low dice less risky. Early game, I usually use it to death snipe big targets, fireball chaff, or miasma/iceshard shooting. Later in the game when I reach combat, I trickle cast a bunch of spells on one important combat. I don't rely on the spells to win combat, I rely on the spells to make the combats more certain. Generally speaking, I try to make the combat an easy win for me even without magic, then any magic I get off just helps me ensure that he is testing on insane courage.

This strategy integrates the charge phase and the magic phase, but if you do it well it is almost unstoppable. I actually like it more than having a LV 4. The loremaster has 4 spells that are useful in combat, whereas even a shadow LV 4 will only have two or maybe three, and one of them (okkams) is only useful sometimes, and it has such a high casting value you are basically dedicating your entire phase for that spell. One dispel scroll is enough to ruin that strategy and waste your phase. With the trickle phase, a scroll is costing you 2 or maybe 3 dice from your pool. It makes it harder to decide what to cast, sure, but it also makes it harder for your opponent to choose which spells to dispel.

Using magic this way (to improve an already good combat, rather than to swing a bad combat) feeds right into the second point:

2) The loremaster really emphasizes the need to pick quick combats with elves. You need to make sure that all important combats happen in your phase. If you let your opponent get off counter charges and counter spells, it could end badly for you. Because you don't have one of those killer 6 spells, you need to make sure that you are not being put into a position where your opponent gets off okkams to swing a combat against you. You could argue that this strategy is always important, but I feel it is more important when your opponent has those spells and you don't.

About dispelling, notice that a LV 2 with book is actually BETTER dispelling odds than a LV 4 without book. This is because of two main aspects: Firstly, getting a re roll gives an average improvement of +2 to dispel (so on average he has the same dispelling power as a LV 4 without book) and secondly because getting a re roll dramatically increases the chances of dispelling with 6-6. Granted, a LV 2 with book is not as good as a LV 4 with book, but a LV 2 with book will still put you one step ahead of every other army out there. Math doesn't lie

All in all, the loremaster requires much more finesse than a LV 4. He has more spells so picking which spells to use is much harder, and because he has no big spells there is never an easy decisions in the magic phase. But I feel you can really get mileage out of him if you use him properly. He just requires more finesse and planning, and it requires you to change the way you think about a magic phase.

Great analysis jwg - thanks a lot. It's good that you've examined the impact of the Book on the loremaster's casting / dispelling ability - I hadn't looked at him that mathematically before (other than the fact that the Book + Blessing makes a High archmage's casting power awesome. It's also good to keeping looking at the loremaster as a utility caster rather than the Bookless 6-dice baller that I've seen him used as a couple of times before. A good reminder from you and Oranion of the sheer volume of utility magic available to the loremaster.

A direct comparison between an archmage phase and a loremaster phase ought to take account of points cost though, I think. The loremaster is much more expensive than the archmage, so that with just a little more investment, you can get a tooled Book archmage and a level 2 mage to back him up. Pick the right support lore on the Level 2 - Shadow, Heavens, Beasts, and you can garner yourself excellent utility while retaining the advantage the archmage brings in casting and dispelling, and getting yourself the scroll on top of the Book - which is big (loremsater plus level 2 would constitute an expensive magic phase). In the end I suppose it comes down to the spells you need to work best with your list - my phase doesn't have the same number of combat buffs as your 4, but with the cavalry characters, bolters and free Shield, I've felt able to live with that.

How do you guys with the Loremaster deal with the scroll issue? Take a supporting caddy or build the army to live without the scroll?

Yeah I wonder the same thing SA. You're looking at heavy magic investment with the loremaster plus level 2 aren't you. I guess the price is offset because a tooled up loremaster doesn't leave you enough points for a tooled prince at 2.5K. Obviously this horrifies me but does also free up a chuck of points for the extra mage. And double Miasma would be pretty nasty, eh?

Jwg I'd love to see some loremaster games if you've got any? I like how Swordmaster is using his in the MSU context, but it'd be good to see one working with MMU combined arms units.

Oranion,

I tried the same thing; I Swordmaster unit supported by the loremaster. I had 2 conclusions: 1) the Loremaster could be very effective in supporting the Swordmasters, but I had to devote my entire magic phase to doing so. With such a large spell selection (and the book of Hoeth), I could get a couple buffs each turn on them when I needed to-- I couldn't predict which ones, but I could always get something that influenced the combat. 2) I couldn't reliably combat my opponent's magic phase. Only having +2 to dispel was a deal-breaker, even with the book. I'd consistently fail to dispel the spells I'd need to stop by 1-2, even if I was being very careful in conserving dice, etc. In the end, I dropped the loremaster because of these 2 things-- a very localized magic phase, and lack of punch in dispelling.

-B

This is something I bear in mind too, Beregond. I've got quite a defensive mindset when it comes to magic generally - perhaps the consequence of playing nothing but squishy elves for so many years - and here the archmage has a big advantage. The amount of power dice you spend on the swordmasters is something that separates the High archmage too. As I mentioned before, you can cast none of your spells on the swords themselves and still get the combat buff from the free shield. Sweet.

Sulilar

I'll take a look at your game - thanks for the links. I hope to be able to provide some pointers shortly but, for now, I'll say straight off that the combat High archmage shouldn't be taking Soul Quench without very good reason (i.e. 3 of the 4 spells you rolled were damage spells and included Tempest, which sucks against Warriors. This would be unlucky.). The range of this missile makes it of questionable use for a costly infantry unit: too important to be acting as a missile turret, and it's no use when you're in combat where you really want your shield to be kicking in.

I seem to remember that even in your old Life list under the previous book you were contemplating running your AM aggressively up the board Seredain! So it must have been very pleasing when you spotted the High Magic attribute. Quite apart from the benefits to the SM's though, overcoming spell range limitations really helps you to squeeze more out of your repertoire.
...
The old unit of 14 Swordmasters was great (mine did some wonderful things) but the same unit now in an MMU context just doesn't make sense to me. I feel you either go 3 deep (more or less 20+) with serious magic support or you go MSU.

The ward save for the combat mage was a bit chicken and egg for me, SA. I last thought about doing it with the Life mage as a way of squeezing the maximum utility out of the Lore of Life in the event that I got a bad selection and had to drop down to Earthblood. But this was in the context of a small support unit of white lions that was normally used to engage other small or smallish units. The idea of putting the new high archmage into a fighting unit was both a lovely surprise and a bit of a necessity. I wanted to pursue the idea of getting the most out of my magic by using every spell I rolled, and for this Shield of Saphery was a bolt sent from Heaven! But you've also got to look at running the AM with a combat unit anyway, because otherwise he can't get forward to support the prince and his cavbus. Simultaneously, because of the switch from SoA to Martial Prowess, I needed to increase the size of the swordmaster unit if it was going to stay scary in combat (with all the defensive support available to us now it is, unsurprisingly, scarier). This then made the swords more expensive and so gave me a unit more worth protecting. Spending 30 points on a ward save for the archmage seemed like a small adjustment when the stars align like this!

Your old list under the previous book was solid and fighty but could lack power in the magic phase to some extent. Running similar magic but with Banner of Sorcery thrown in, I found the remorselessness of High Magic very hard for most opponents to stop. The downside of course was that the AM would blow his head off now and then with uniformly grim results. Whereas now, you've got the pressure phase only much, much safer.

Yeah the difference is massive from my last list. If it wasn't for the reliability I may have stuck with something like my old setup (though, as you say, it was an absolutely ruddy nightmare when my old dude blew his head off. Goodbye magic phase!). But the power and reliability of our new Book phase is irresisitble. The one problem is the cost: I've always hated spending the extra points on a second caster because I could always get something solid that didn't need dice to work (like a unit of 5 dragon princes). But if it gets the Book High phase working to its full potential, it seemed worth the sacrifice. Same with the shooting phase, really. Once you've got a battery of high elf archers plus Hand of Glory, you really want to pile on the pressure. Sisters feel essential for the flaming shots, so the 70 point repeater bolt thrower feels like a bargain as backup, and important to tip the scales from utility to power-weapon.

But i do miss that extra strike unit with teeth... 6 helms aren't a replacement to the 5 dragon princes. I've thought about swapping out the 15 white lions and replacing them with a unit of 6 Flaming dragon princes with a star lance/charmed shield drakemaster. Get some more initiative back in an open field...

[English 2000]

I finally got a second game in with my Swordmaster list.

Another loss, this time to the unofficial Dogs of War book. This time I can't blame terrible terrible magic dice but rather my own foolishness.

First of all, I played the list VERY aggressively, starting off with a turn 1 charge on infintrating Ogre Man Eaters.

This is where my first big mistake become obvious; spell selection. I was unable to get more than 2 high magic spells of in any turn.

I picked soul quench with is useless in combat. I should have gone with drain magic in a list that needs to be played aggressively.

I also picked Wall Between Worlds which is great until your main units are all in combat and you can't cast it to buff your ward because you weren't smart enough to realize this in the movement phase and move archers and Reavers into spell range.

He made a huge mistake by charging his heavy cavalry into my Reavers instead of flanking my white lions. Rather than being smart and holding I undid his mistake and fled because I hadn't checked the LOS so he breathed a sigh of relief and redirected into my lions' flank. *facepalm*.

I'm not giving up yet but I feel an Annointed in the unit might be a requirement.

[dolpnkn]

hey Seredain I would like to know what your current lists is with the swordmasters in them you have tweeked a lot from your first cavbus list that I am not sure what it consist of now. if you have it listed somewhere in this forum just head me in the right direction. thanks Dolpnkn

[Seredain]

hey Seredain I would like to know what your current lists is with the swordmasters in them you have tweeked a lot from your first cavbus list that I am not sure what it consist of now. if you have it listed somewhere in this forum just head me in the right direction. thanks Dolpnkn

Hi Dolpnkn,

It's all change at the moment! The loss of true asf has kept me ruminating on the strength of our msu elite infantry for some time, and I finally took the plunge and decided, in the end, that the oppirtunity to garrison buildings was not good enough not to grab another cavalry unit to help in the fight for board dominance, give me sonething to strike faster against tough beasts, chariot cannons and small units of moncav, and give me some ASF flaming to burn out troll and beaststars (here, the GW's on the swords become and advantage). So, the latest list has changed a few things:

Prince
Heavy Armour, Shield, Barded Steed,
Giant Blade, Dragon Helm, Dawnstone, Potion of Foolhardiness.
276 points

Level 4 High Archmage
Book of Hoeth, Talisman of Endurance, Ironcurse Icon.
310 points

Battle Standard Bearer
Dragon Armour, Barded Steed,
Sword of Might, Enchanted Shield, Golden Crown, Other Trickster’s Shard.
170 points

Level 2 Shadow Mage
Dispel Scroll.
145 points

9 Silver Helms
High Helm, Musician, Standard Bearer, Shields.
237 points

23 Archers
Musician.
240 points

6 Silver Helms
Standard, Shields.
148 points

20 Swordmasters
Bladelord, Musician, Standard Bearer,
Banner of the World Dragon.
340 points

6 Dragon Princes
Drakemaster, Standard Bearer,
Star Lance, Banner of Eternal Flame
234 points

5 Firebows
70 points

4 Repeater Bolt Throwers
280 points

1 Great Eagle
50 points

2500 points

The second big change is that I switched the support lore from Heavens to Shadow: Miasma keeps the double with Hand of Glory (albeit a bit more aggressive), and is a good ally to the Star Lance, which is absolutely key to the princes' role as armour breakers. The movement debuff is also particularly important. DPs need the charge, so nerfing the target unit's movement can be huge - especially if it's a flying monster.

To force more bad choices on these sorts of unit during an armed stand-off, I take the extra repeater. I lose an eagle, which sucks, but feel the 4th machine is more influential, and the switch from slow white lions to princes + miasma should make an important contribution to board dominance that counteracts its loss. At a push, 5 sisters make a decent eagle for my infantry line, and I'm always happy to sacrifice 6 helms if it wins me a charge against something like the Bret herostar. Apart from that, I'll have to husband my remaining eagle carefully until I'm ready to deploy him. Still, I used one eagle for most of the last book: with all this increased movement, magic (including movement spells), and shooting (my old list had 3 combat infantry units, 2 repeaters and only one caster, without Book of Hoeth), I should be able to manage.

My army's stuck in the West Country at the moment but I'll be getting some games in later in the month and hope to bring along some hard data soon.

Cheers,
S

[Stormie]

I've also gone to the High side, and had a stab at a tournament with Swordmasters- check the battle report forum for my (upcoming) struggles and thoughts! I'm definitely glad I finally got to use them, whatever might have happened

[Syleth]

Hi Seredain,
It's nice to see your list evolving and understand your reasonings.

I myself was too a big fan of the starlance drakemaster, until i read a recent post here in ulthuan arguing that it is ilegal to equip him with it. This broke my heart, as it's such an excellent choice and it's not overpowered by any means.
How do you understand this ruling? Do you field him agreeing it first with your oponent?
Cheers

[Nicene]

Love the new list! Although reading so much of your thread has convinced me to try Heavens in my next game, and now you're switching back to high O.o

DPs need the charge, so nerfing the target unit's movement can be huge - especially if it's a flying monster.

What do you mean by this? Does Miasma affect flying monsters in some special way?

[Seredain]

I've also gone to the High side, and had a stab at a tournament with Swordmasters- check the battle report forum for my (upcoming) struggles and thoughts! I'm definitely glad I finally got to use them, whatever might have happened

Haha! Oh God that sounds ominous...

Syleth,

I have the great fortune to play amongst a group of experienced gamers who attend (and sometimes organise), a great many tournaments. As a rule they're pretty hard RAW guys (they had no problem with chosen endlessly re-rolling in the last chaos book), but they have a list of 'that's obviously wrong', which includes ETC's 'bad play' list, Shadow Armour not being listed as a suit of armour, fellblade doing multiple wounds on the bearer, and this lance being listed as "mounted character only". Four things have been important here. 1) Ruleswise the emphasis is obviously on the need to be mounted; 2) The wording is ripped verbatim from our last book (when the lance was too expensive for champions, making the wording of no consequence); 3) There is no existing principle in WHFB of 'character only items'; and 4) We've had no FAQ, so GW has not had a chance to amend (or indeed confirm) the error. As such, it's an easy case of RAI trumping RAW.

In the absence of the FAQ, use the lance, just mention to your opponent to be polite. It's helpful that we have such an obvious mistake in Shadow Armour hovering next door. Just point at it and say "look, they cocked this up to."

Nicene,

Sorry to scare you but it's good news! I think you may have got your wires crossed on this one. High was always the major lore: Heavens was the support lore used by my level 2. Keep using it - it is great. It's cheap, it hurts msu (which hurts our infantry), it has long range anti-armour damage output, a buff to make our archers better and Iceshard Blizzard was great for the old list: doubled up on combat defence with Hand of Glory and hit war machines.

So why switch? First, dragon princes only work properly if they charge. For this, nerfing the target enemy unit's movement gives you an advantage. It's important against monsters because Fly makes them M10 - and therefore one of the few units faster than your knights. But even against M7 moncav, using this spell is very useful for turning a risky stand-off into dominance. M9 beats M7-d3. Miasma also, of course, doubles up with Hand, but now it can be used for aggressive purposes at long range. Since the new army has more units of knights than it has fighting infantry, it becomes more important to make sure those charges count by improving your chance to hit. And Miasma still provides defensive redundancy with Hand for the swordmasters (you won't get the chance to force -2 to hit on your opponent, but then I never managed that anyway). Doubling up on Initiative dominance spells is also excellent in the absence of true ASF. Although Shadow is a more expensive lore than Heavens, Miasma is cheaper than Blizzard, so in his redundancy role the Level 2 remains very economical. Finally, in challenges, Miasma is better support for a Giant Blade prince, because high WS opponents can see their hit rolls nerfed at the same time as yours are improved. Against powerful WS7/8 characters, this is great. Now I have more reasons to switch in Miasma, the prince is very happy to make use of it.

As for the other spells? Withering provides a spectacular hex for your shooters which nicely makes up for the loss of Convergence. The extra repeater also makes re-rolling your 1s less important, while providing a mundane replacement for the lost lightning spells (only every game). As for Comet, this is less needed now since I have new ways of projecting early force with the knights and repeater, and fewer reasons for blocking off msu units like chariots. The Star Lance dragon princes can charge then off in a way 15 white lions just can't. The same is even more true of enemy heroes, who actually have something to fear from the champ who, basically, amounts to a cavalry assassin. 1+rr cav characters (Chaos, Bret, Dark Elf and Scar Vet in particular), have no defence.

So, instead of the damage spells I get Pit (great for war machines), Enfeebling to keep my heavy armour saves awesome, and the Withering / Mindrazor double for combat. These might not matter as much to GW elites, but a unit of ASF knights stuck in a 2nd round of combat will make great use of both of them (and even Str 5 could do with the boost more than Str6).

A different set of units has diffferent strengths and weaknesses, so it's important to view your magic accordingly. With these latest changes, Shadow fits the support lore bill very nicely.

[Ferny]

Does miasma's M debuff work on flyers flying? Obviously it would work on their walking profile as stated on their characteristic sheet but I had in my head (backed up by nothing!) that it didn't impact on the rule for Flying.

Incidentally I'm gonna predict her and now that you return your level 2 back to heavens after your dalliance with shadow .

[Seredain]

Incidentally I'm gonna predict her and now that you return your level 2 back to heavens after your dalliance with shadow .

Haha, maybe... I'm sure there will be times I want Iceshard to nerf a doomdiver with, or when I look at the board and think "Christ I wish I had a comet right now", but I don't think so. I've got a better collection of gun-rushing units now, and with all the movement available, closing down board space doesn't have the same appeal. I don't want to find myself making big persuit moves and getting nailed by my own comet (yes, I've done it. More than once).

Yep, Miasma nerfs flyers too. See the FAQ section on spells - page 4 I think.

[Nicene]

Yep, Miasma nerfs flyers too. See the FAQ section on spells - page 4 I think.

I can't find that in the FAQ! Where do you see it?

[Seredain]

Ah, my mistake. It's page 7 of the WH rulebook FAQ, not 4. Last paragraph of the Lores of Magic section. Miasma'd flyers who fly have M10-d3.

[John Rainbow]

I've been inspired by your recent discussions to include SMs in my lists instead of WLs. For reference I am running what would probably be described as a 'net-list' or something close to being cookie-cutter for High Elves. It isn't too imaginative or original on my part but works and allows for competition in all aspects of the game - something my previous monster-mash lists were decidedly lacking so its a nice change

Here is the list (@2500pts):

Archmage(4)[Shadow] + Book, 4++
BSB + HA, Ench.Sh, Reaver Bow, Pot.Str

3 x 5 Reavers w/bows
24 Archers + std,mus
10 Archers + mus

21 White Lions/Sword Masters + FC, BotWD
24 Phoenix Guard + FC, Razor Banner

7 Sisters of Avelorn
4 x RBT
Frost Phoenix

I have been trying to think about the ways in which both SMs and WLs work with this list as I can directly swap between either without making any other changes. I have played quite a few games with this list (with WLs) and have reached the conclusion that no matter what combat I am involved in, HE units generally want some form of magical support. The discussion in your thread of the advantages of Hand of Glory when played on SMs as opposed to WLs is what really changed my thinking - as you have alluded to more recently also, Mystifying Miasma is v.similar in function here and probably synergises better with SMs than WLs as they already have the WS6 advantage. I am usually also looking to cast Withering as often as possible. Again this means that the inherent advantages of WLs are somewhat reduced when SMs would get more attacks which hit more often and wound just about the same as long as I do achieve some sort of reduction in enemy toughness.

I have had a game with this list using SMs against WoC but I don't really count it as a successful trial as my opponent called it around T3 as I had already nullified his chariots with shooting and the Frost Phoenix was holding up his Nurgle block like a champ (I rolled badly and won combat by 1 after whiffing I think before he had even worse luck and then fled after needing a steadfast rerollable 9). After this it was pretty much mop-up for me so I never saw the SMs in combat. Having said this, I know they would have outperformed WLs in this scenario. I have therefore being trying to think of other match-ups to consider in the WL v. SM debate and examining the inherent adv./disadv. of both. In the main this comes down to the increased resilience of WLs v. SMs against shooting. I can't really think of anything else to consider here. I am making the assumption that I get the magical support I need in CC and also that in most cases, I am not trying to depend on Stubborn for anything. I think these are both reasonable assumptions, even a bad magic phase usually ends up with at least one spell cast when using the BoH and for me, losing combat but being stubborn doesn't usually come into play with how I use my units. The bad match-ups for this list using SMs then become those with large amounts of low str. shooting i.e. other HE and DE (I don't tend to see TK or shooty Empire/O&G very often). I tend to think then, that the SMs might be a better choice for this list.

Do you have any thoughts about this? I have also been considering making the switch alongside trying to get the Ring of Fury into the list. Having that 5++ against shooting with the SMs would go a long way towards mitigating the above problems and would work well with the stand-offish nature of the list. It would however require dropping a couple of SMs (not a problem as I usually end up with 2 in the 4th rank after dropping characters) but would also mean finding space for the Ring in the Archmage kit - my local comp prevents me from taking BotWD, BoH and a scroll so the lvl2 is less worth it for me here as a scroll/ring caddy.

FROST PHOENIX
Something else of interest (which I don't think you have covered yet) is the Frost Phoenix and the lack of it in your list. Of all the units in my current army, I probably consider the Frost Phoenix to be the least of them in terms of being 'all-comers'. This might seem somewhat controversial but in my experience there is a distinct dichotomy in how the bird performs against various opponents. By this I mean the bird either (almost) single handed wins games or does nothing. The example above of the bird v. Nurgle WoC is a good one in which the Frosty excels, the same is true of games against armies like Lizardmen and Brets which bar a couple of somewhat unreliable methods, have no way of really dealing with the phoenix. Ogres on the other hand deal with the Frost Phoenix very well almost to the point of it being useless. Specifically here I am seeing that Iron Guts with GWs just don't care about ASL or -1 Str. and obviously Iron(-laser) Blasters take it out pretty easily. The point I am trying to make here is that I think this unit could be dropped in favour of other things - for instance 5 DPs and a mage without seriously denting the capabilities of this build. All the bird does is ensure that I win match-ups that would otherwise be favourable anyway and isn't really a help in unfavourable match-ups. I am assuming you had some good reasons for not including the Frost Phoenix in your list and was interested to hear if your thoughts were along the same lines or if you had different ideas?

[Seredain]

Hey John,

You've sure done some good thinking on the problem you're humming over, and I must say I agree with everything you said, including the problem you've come up with as to how you square your magic choices off with your infantry choices. In short, I'm not sure there's a straight answer in your 1-caster magic phase alone.

But this is The Cavalry Prince and we don't do short.

Shadow Magic on Great Weapon Elites

I've said before that, to a certain extent, white lions and phoenix guard jointly provide you with the tools that swordmasters squidge into one unit. That's a little nice to be completely true, of course. While the Swordmasters are better all-purpose killers than white lions and phoenix guard are, the guard can take hits from anything and the lions bring stubborn and their lions cloaks to the party.

I'm personally with you on stubborn - I don't like to rely on it as a weapon either. If I lose combat to a monster or a single rank of moncav, my sword unit gets normal steadfast. If I'm losing a combat and my unit has been blasted apart so thoroughly that steadfast is no longer there, I will conclude that I've done something wrong and shouldn't have committed to the combat. White lions put more damage into specific kinds of unit, chiefly monsters or else units where low weaponskill is combined with T4+ and heavy armour. But for all they deal 2 more wounds than swords against mournfang and demigryphs (in the first round of combat), the units they specialize against, being monsters and monstrous cavalry, also themselves tend to be specialist infantry mashers and so punish our foot elves very heavily (unless they have a ward save). I prefer other solutions - bolts, ASF lances, magic weapons and ward saves - rather than use a weapon that suffers heavily against the targets it's best at killing (mournfang strike me as a bad target for any infantry, especially if you have the option of fielding cavalry), while leaving a much bigger capability gap than swords when fighting against units they're not designed to face. It's nice to have stubborn as insurance, but personally I have a problem in investing 350 points in a unit that holds its ground but (since stubborn only kicks in when the ranks have gone), gets its arse kicked doing it. Either that, or you're facing infantry with ranks, which swords are much, much better against than they are worse against the heaviest armour.

So yes, I can see why you'd want to have another look at your infantry choices, and I agree that the really big difference comes down to shooting resistance. In the round, Shadow is perfectly suited to phoenix guard, who have the defence already but need more offensive output. By contrast it's harder to know where Shadow magic fits with white lions. They struggle against units with Initiative and Weaponskill 5, so Miasma can be super-important. But as you say the strength buff / enemy toughness nerf is not especially useful to them. It strikes me that white lion-based armies would most want to field Light magic, since you've got answers to all their problems in the weaponskill, initiative and attacks department. Swordmasters are a bit harder to pin down when you're looking to support their attacks, because they have less obvious weaknesses in melee. If you had to pick one, of course, it'd be strength. But even so, they can cut through most things because of the combined decent strength and sheer volume of hits. Their most obvious weakness is defensive and, although lions share this weakness in melee, swordmasters fall down (literally) much more against shooting.

I think it's a little dangerous to field swordmasters without protecting them from massed shooting weapons. With Shadow you get to cast Miasma on an archer unit (great if your opponent has one large unit of them, less so otherwise), or you could possibly land a pit of shades on a war machine, but there are armies out there who could tear your swords to shreds if you gave them the chance. Shooty/avoidance dark elves spring to mind. If you take Shadow, I think I'd look at fielding units that could drive these kinds of harassers away. Your own shooting units can be part of the solution but, for me, 2+ save cavalry is essential for getting the job done much more efficiently and allowing your shooting to find targets that are easier to hit. The frost phoenix would also work well: it would only take some helms in your core to create a bit more of a living shield to keep your swords safe. I used swords in our last book and found, by and large, that enemy shooting wasn't a huge issue if I used my knights and shooting together to run over enemy light units and provide a more urgent distraction. Since helms are core now, we're much better able to do this than before. That's something you could take advantage of (albeit I'd keep the big archer unit for Withering).

Unfortunately, the problem remains in dedicated long-range shooting units. Magical stuff isn't a problem, obviously, but armies like greenskin gunlines will hammer a sword unit to pieces unless it has protection. Shooty dark elves might also have so many dangerous ranged units that a frosty and one unit of helms might not clean up / provide enough of a distraction before bolts start raining in on you (if we start to see more of these lists, I wonder if reavers are going to be found a bit wanting). White lions have much less of a problem against things like crossbow bolts and mundane stone throwers, so need less support from fellow units even and, although they benefit less from your spells, they don't mind either that the lore has gaps in defence.

In the end, I decided that swords were killy enough as they were, and that High Magic + Banner gave me some unique spells and access to the free shield, which has seen me beating the hard stuff without needing to worry about all the extra babysitting. Phoenix guard win combats because, although they don't cause many wounds against harder units, they don't take many either. Once you add that ability onto a unit with superior attacks, weaponskill and strength, the results are very impressive. It strikes me then that the results with Shadow could be infinitely more spectacular in melee, but you may need to tweak your list to give you more control of your periphery, some more anti-war machine units, or perhaps a supplementary caster with defensive magic (another Miasma or Iceshard Blizzard). I wouldn't, however, recommend the Ring of Fury. 18" range is not at all useful for the stand-off part of a battle, which is when you'll be getting shot by long-ranged stuff, and when you don't want to be letting short-ranged stuff get that close. Exposing your swords, by marching them up to shoot the ring, would likewise seem counter-productive. You only want to be getting a defenceless sword unit this close to enemy units if it intends to enter combat pronto.

Or you could leave everything as is and decide that, against particular armies, you don't mind taking a few casualties because, when your mindrazored swords hit home, they'll turn everything into a red mist even if they've lost a rank. Thing is, though, this is risky even only looking at close combat. Phoenix guard don't mind if they don't get Mindrazor - they'll just keep trucking with their 4++. By contrast swords, unless they blend their enemy first, will get walloped like white lions. But, unlike white lions, they won't stick around for more if they've had steadfast knocked off them. So, you're kind of relying on Miasma alone for your defence and this (especially in a small phase where you can cast fewer of your bigger spells), is dangerous. Shield of Saphery, with Miasma as back-up, is less dramatic but much more reliable support. Risk vs reward eh..?

The Frost Phoenix

I agree with absolutely everything you said. There's no denying that the frosty is one of (the?) best rare monster in the game but, like most monsters, you can lose it to a couple of cannon balls (or even one). You don't even need to be that unlucky. I always hated fielding units that could be cannon-sniped, and always will. Cannons are such an obvious hard counter to the frosty that it seems best avoided unless you're happy to live with losing the 240 points against certain armies, or happy to take so many easy cannon targets that you don't mind losing a couple early on. I'm not, especially since the number of cannon armies has increased with all these mega chariots running around. For me, being all-comers means avoiding hard counters like this as much as you can.

My second problem with phoenix is that it doesn't really kill anything (the 2nd reason I took the 15 white lions even though, on paper, they are an inferior defensive unit). Well, it kills infantry, but loads of stuff in my list kills infantry: swordmasters do it exceptionally well, archers, repeater multi-shots and Hand of Glory combine to shred low-armour troops, archers can fight light infantry well with their ASF, Fiery Convocation burns whole units away, dragon princes smash face on the charge and can grind a bit thereafter with their 2+ save, the helm bus has better things to do but can cut up infantry too. I just don't feel like I need to add thunderstomps to this list.

Against all the other stuff, though, the frosty doesn't do much other than stay alive, because 4 attacks at Str6 just isn't that good. It's hard to kill enemy units off and, the longer combats go on against enemies with any static res, the longer you have to fluff your attacks and fail a break test. Now, a charge from 6 dragon princes toting 13 ASF attacks, 3 of them Str6 allowing no armour saves (plus a banner), is scary to infantry but it's also much scarier against everything else than the output of a frost phoenix. I therefore feel like the princes are a serious threat in their own right against so many more targets, and yet can't be taken out by such an easy counter as a couple of cannonballs. Metal magic doesn't work, and even doomdivers can't target the Star Lance. Dragon princes do need the charge, which is a flaw, but they don't need only one kind of target (infantry), to excel in combat. You have more control over the charges you win than you do over the enemy you fight.

So, if dragon princes are more likely to single-handedly win one-on-one fights against a larger variety of opponents (a bit of magic support not going amiss), we come to the question of supporting your fellow units. The frosty's -1 strength is great but, in a list full of heavy armour, ward saves and WS buffs/nerfs, it's one I am generally able to live without. It doesn't matter much to my swords, because they have the ward save which isn't modified by strength. It would be great for helping my prince in a duel against the scariest lords, but having my bus and a 240 point phoenix in the same combat is a luxury I can't rely on. Why? Firstly because, having spent a lot of points on characters, I don't have enough units to feel free, against many opponents, to deploy them together from the off. Secondly because, against non-infantry armies especially, it's very possible that the frosty will be stuck roadblocking a hard unit rather than killing it and moving on to offer support later in the game: having only 4 attacks makes it less likely to break through such combats. It is, in fact, more likely that my bus will want to break through things and ride on to help the phoenix than the other way around. As a great all-purpose strike unit, the Star Lance dragon princes are less likely to be road-blocked.

As for the ASL nerf, in my list (which is mostly ASF except for the swords, who have the free defensive buffs to compensate), it only really matters against Slaanesh units and other ASF elves. Against these, my natural strengths in fast armour (improved by the princes) and massed shooting (+ magic) are already potent enough that I feel I have the match-ups covered. So, the frost phoenix's abilities are very nice, but they don't actually bring me anything I really need.

The dragon princes do bring me buffs I need, because they can carry magic items. The Star Lance is good for anti-armour generally, but is unique in being able to take out tough armoured characters or monsters in a way the frosty can't manage. That's a hugely valuable against armoured opponents when my bus can't be everywhere at once. More important is the flaming banner (which, note doesn't stop the lance from nailing fireproof characters, since it's magical). Sisters are great against regeneration in the shooting phase (all my shooting, focussed on the same unit at 24" range, kills 4.5 trolls in a single round without magic assistance, and yours can do better with those extra archers). But sisters can't help you smash regenerating units fast in close combat. Fluffing the shooting phase, or needing to shoot other stuff for the first few turns, can therefore be very bad news if you're facing trolls or beasts in large numbers, and opens the list up to hard counters again. Having the flaming combat unit as back up, however, means I can safely handle massive single regen threats (like the Throggstar and Beastbus), or multiple regeners that might overwhelm my shooting phase through sheer redundancy. This strikes me as a gap that needs filling more than my melee defence against high strength combat units.

Further, because dragon princes are ASF, having the flaming buff is particularly brilliant for combined combats because it knocks off regen before my I5 swordmasters get to strike. This makes a mess of regenerating units very, very convincingly. A combined front+flank charge from swordmasters and dragon princes against a Beast of Nurgle bus sees me win combat by 10 points. 10! Without a ward save, trolls just disappear: it's massively utility for a 10 point banner (and causing fear against enemy cavalry is awesome too). What's more, because the dragon princes are better at quickly smashing through various targets, you are more likely to be able to use them to clean up in the early game and still be able to see them hit that important combat in the late game.

I feel like the princes are, therefore, a potentially more game-changing choice for the points, with fewer hard counters except the large steadfast infantry units which my army already has the tools to deal with. I'm sure the frosty is great for some lists, but it isn't for me.

Thanks for the post John - it was good to think it all through!

Cheers,
S.

[John Rainbow]

In short, I'm not sure there's a straight answer in your 1-caster magic phase alone.

But this is The Cavalry Prince and we don't do short.

Lol.

Your response is great and cuts to the heart of the matter so thank you for taking the time to put pen to paper (or fingers to keys?) and write down your thoughts. They are incredibly useful. I'm trying to form some decent responses to the thoughts you've put down so expect some more sometime soon.

[RE.Lee]

Damn, you've almost talked me into dropping the Frostie from my list... It is true that his recent outings have been disappointing - I've attributed it mostly to my poor decision making. I guess the best idea is using him to clear chaff first (a glorified eagle role) and then to swing grinds in your favour. I've fallen into the trap of using him on his own to many times!

Thanks for the analysis, its some serious food for thought, as usual!

[Nicene]

Seredain,

you lament the dropoff of your BSB's killyness with the new book.

Consider your current loadout, but replace the Sword of Might with a lance and a Strength Potion.

It my sound gimmicky at first, but hear me out: your knights spend a lot of time (hopefully) charging, and on those turns the lance will be superior with str6. On subsequent rounds, when you're stuck against a tough foe, you can choose one round in which to have str7 to swing that critical combat. I suspect you'd encounter few turns when he's stuck fighting at str4, wishing for str5.

And then, if the opportunity and a juicy target present themselves, you can hit the button and have a round of str9 (necrosphinx anyone?) if you really need it. I think, for 6 more points, this build should offer you on average a better performance, and more flexibility to choose exactly when you need the boost.

With his defensive kit, it's hard to foresee a situation on which you get charged and lose him before he gets a chance to drink the potion. And you can always drink the potion to discourage said charge, which might swing the game your way anyway.

Thanks

[Seredain]

In short, I'm not sure there's a straight answer in your 1-caster magic phase alone.

But this is The Cavalry Prince and we don't do short.

Lol.

Your response is great and cuts to the heart of the matter so thank you for taking the time to put pen to paper (or fingers to keys?) and write down your thoughts. They are incredibly useful. I'm trying to form some decent responses to the thoughts you've put down so expect some more sometime soon.

My pleasure John - looking forward to see what you come up with.

Damn, you've almost talked me into dropping the Frostie from my list... It is true that his recent outings have been disappointing - I've attributed it mostly to my poor decision making. I guess the best idea is using him to clear chaff first (a glorified eagle role) and then to swing grinds in your favour. I've fallen into the trap of using him on his own to many times!

Thanks for the analysis, its some serious food for thought, as usual!

Thanks RE. It may be a trap to use the frosty against units he isn't really designed to take out (and this is unfortunately rather a large group), but it's an understandable trap to fall for because he costs 240 points. He's not a cheap eagle model with a useful buff, he's a large and expensive monster. As such he almost necessarily ought to be expected to take on, and win, combats in his own right and, the fact is, he often can't. If he were cheaper, our units would probably see more use of the -1 strength buff in combined combats. At the moment, in lists like mine he'd provide more opportunities for awesome combos in theory than he would in practice.

I can think of a few things that might change this. The first is to treat the frost phoenix, in your own mind, as part of your character choices. He shares more in common with our characters than with a unit like the princes, since he brings far fewer attacks than the equivalent unit of elite elves, but is harder to kill (cannons are still there...), and can augment our units in close combat. As such he's like a very hard monster-mage. So it strikes me that we'd be freer to use him for this purpose if we reduced the number of points we'd spent on characters, and increased our number of decent combat units. Even one extra combat unit would free up the frost phoenix to abandon essential combat duties and focus more on augmenting combats involving units other than itself.

Secondly, you could dedicate a flank of your army to harassment and redirection. You'll be much more free to focus a huge chunk of points into one big big combat if you have one portion of the enemy army tied up chasing reavers and eagles around, making it too slow to take advantage of your weakness in that part of the board. By the time they've bludgeoned their way through, ideally your smashy flank will have done its work and be ready to move in. There are limits to this - massed enemy shooting destroys reavers (so take many redirectors for redundancy), and other flyers cannot be redirected - but a decent shooting phase (for example), could help close these gaps.

Thirdly, you could extend the principle of Option 2 and build a whole army populated with fast moving units. We can build an army comprising only of cavalry and flyers, if we choose. If the weaker bits of your army are all freely capable of running away from fights they can't win, then I suppose you'd run far fewer risks in loading one flank while leaving the other exposed.

Seredain,

you lament the dropoff of your BSB's killyness with the new book.

Consider your current loadout, but replace the Sword of Might with a lance and a Strength Potion.

It my sound gimmicky at first, but hear me out: your knights spend a lot of time (hopefully) charging, and on those turns the lance will be superior with str6. On subsequent rounds, when you're stuck against a tough foe, you can choose one round in which to have str7 to swing that critical combat. I suspect you'd encounter few turns when he's stuck fighting at str4, wishing for str5.

And then, if the opportunity and a juicy target present themselves, you can hit the button and have a round of str9 (necrosphinx anyone?) if you really need it. I think, for 6 more points, this build should offer you on average a better performance, and more flexibility to choose exactly when you need the boost.

With his defensive kit, it's hard to foresee a situation on which you get charged and lose him before he gets a chance to drink the potion. And you can always drink the potion to discourage said charge, which might swing the game your way anyway.

Thanks

Nicene that's genius! Great build and answers (for a round at least) the problem left by the Star Lance, which leaves the BSB vulnerable to, or ineffective in, combat in subsequent rounds (because he switches to a great weapon/halberd and loses protection, or else sticks with a hand weapon and does very little damage). I'm reluctant to lose the Other Trickster's Shard, because it's a great buff to my whole bus's charge against warded troops and, in particular, it answers hard counters to my prince's Giant Blade in big challenges. I must say, though, if I was looking to drop OTS and make my BSB more killy in the name of all-comers performance, I'd look very seriously at this. In fact I'm going to mull over this one now... Really elegant build - thanks for sharing.

[daid13]

The problem with is it means he has to drop the other trickster's shard which I think Seredain considers essential and Idon't see anyway to put it on the prince without dropping some defense.

[Seredain]

The problem with is it means he has to drop the other trickster's shard which I think Seredain considers essential and Idon't see anyway to put it on the prince without dropping some defense.

Yeah, there's the rub. The thing about the Shard is that it doesn't matter in enough games that it's always tempting to drop it for the extra strength which you know will see service in every single game. But when the Shard does matter, its impact is tremendous, and any fighting character looking to tackle enemy lords (or daemons), would hope to have it in play. At the very least, it takes some pressure off Arcane Unforging when it comes to which enemy item you destroy. 4 Str 7 attacks are so much more dangerous if your opponent can't rely on bouncing them with his ward save. It'd be a difficult item for me to lose.

[Bolt Thrower]

Not to sound too much like a demanding plastic-crack addict, but did I miss the Lizard bat rep hinted at on page 45? I so enjoy reading the lizzie batreps...

[Nicene]

The problem with is it means he has to drop the other trickster's shard which I think Seredain considers essential and Idon't see anyway to put it on the prince without dropping some defense.

Gah--I forgot they were both enchanted items. Not often you run into that particular problem! I was of course suggesting you take both. I'd venture to say OTS is better overall

[Seredain]

Wassup BT!

I'll be honest, I gave up on drafting that particular battle report, because late nights were kicking my arse, and it was so one-sided that it hardly seemed worth slogging through it. But, I took the photos, so I may as well summarise...

I was facing a Life Loremaster channelling Slann parked in a medium-sized TG unit, heading up a pretty varied army of horded saurus warriors (HW+Shield), a scattering of javelin skinks, some sallies and a clutch of dinosaurs: a laser bastilodon, an Engine of the Gods and a Scar Vet riding a carnosaur.

My list was in its last draft form - with 15 flaming white lions full command instead of dragon princes, 3 repeaters and the extra eagle.

I deployed my missile units around a hill to my right and, in the centre, I plonked my silver helms and swordmasters bang in the centre and as far forward as possible. Why? Because my opponent had dropped his slann front and centre, and I thought I could just run in and bash his unit to death.

So I rush the knights forward and march the swordmasters up close behind. My opponent seems happy to let this happen, because he's got all these defensive buffs, and hopes to counter me with his dinos and saurus. That gets harder when my combined shooting tears a chunk out of the saurus warriors. A poor first magic phase hinders the lizards more, giving them no Dwellers threat against me, so I got to save my scroll. I'm actually pretty sure he got nothing important off at all. Uhoh! No redirection (what?!?) gives my knights a charge on Turn 2...



Which I then take. My firebows leap out of the forest and charge the skinks flanking the temple guard, to hold them in place to block off an immediate counter by the bastilodon. The swordmasters get transported infront of the saurus with Walk and dare them to charge. They end the phase with a 5++ and an extra 2 weaponskill from Hand of Glory. Another hail of arrows and bolts kills a bunch more.

My helms do a number on the Temple Guard and my opponent starts to look worried. He charges the stegadon in to help out. The beast crushes a few knights but he can't do enough damage to turn the fight, my opponent sees a more respectable magic phase blocked off by the scroll and Book, and the guard keep falling. The swords take a charge from the saurus warriors, but they're no match hitting on 5's, and the swordmasters cut them down in numbers. The saurus break, but get away through some sallies, who fail their panic test and bolt as well. My white lions, moving toward the buildings on the right flank to clear out some salamanders, close in for the kill.





But it makes no difference: my silver helms finish off the temple guard, my prince dodges the slann's ward save by attacking the flanking stegadon for more combat res, I win combat by loads and the slann breaks and dies. After that it's all clean up operations. Poor old scar vet did nothing but eat eagles and overrun, with frenzy, in the wrong direction. At least the skinks chew my firebows up (annoyingly), but it's small comfort for lizard kind.

So that was too easy, and not really representative of much, but it's nice to kill things, eh? Now I'm going to have to put up a Chaos Warriors report... Because it's better.