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I had a question in relation to Forbidden lore . Would multiple Vampires be able to use Forbidden Lore with Beasts Lore and cast Transformation of Kadon on consecutive turns with different Vampires .

For example
Vamp A:
Vamp B:
Vamp C:

Turn 1 Vampire A : Turns into a dragon -
Turn 2 Vampire B : Turns into a dragon - *(given vamp a is not dispelled)*
Turn 3 etc.. *(Given vamp a + b is not dispelled)*

I understand as stated in the WH Rulebook multiple wizards cannot select the same spell as per spell generation (pg 490)
Or cast the same spell twice in 1 turn .
However these Vamps have a Loremaster like ability so they are not selecting the spell (Trans of Kadon) and
they are casting the spells on consecutive turns.

##
Forbidden Lore
"In addition to invocation of Nehek the Vampire knows all of the spells from either the Lore of Vamps or any one of the Lores of Magic in the Warhammer Rulebook (except Lore of Life)
"
##

Hope this makes sense . Thank you in advance.

Loremaster means having the same spells isn't an issue. The restrictions on casting a spell are per wizard not per phase (Vampires have an exception to this in any case, although I think its just for their army book lore), so if you have two wizards with the same spell they can both cast it in the same turn. So in short yes this is perfectly legal, except you can turn as many Vampires into Dragons as you want in a single turn. Obviously you are going to be limited by power dice though, which is why you bring a couple of Vampires with Loremaster (Death) to fire Purple Suns around (through your own Zombies if nothing else is around) to get your dice back.

Powerguy wrote:Loremaster means having the same spells isn't an issue. The restrictions on casting a spell are per wizard not per phase (Vampires have an exception to this in any case, although I think its just for their army book lore), so if you have two wizards with the same spell they can both cast it in the same turn. So in short yes this is perfectly legal, except you can turn as many Vampires into Dragons as you want in a single turn. Obviously you are going to be limited by power dice though, which is why you bring a couple of Vampires with Loremaster (Death) to fire Purple Suns around (through your own Zombies if nothing else is around) to get your dice back.

Thanks for taking the time to respond Powerguy . Very true regarding the power dice issue. Im going to be trying to use items that boost dice or create irresistible force rolls with hopefully minimal detrimental miscasts.

All in All this will be a fun list


Thanks again.

The problem you'll run into is that more often than not, you don't have enough power dice to do this more than once per phase, and your opponent only needs a 15 to dispel it.
Adding to the problem is that vampires are only level 1 casters, and you've got issues. You need a lot of dice, and if you do get an unstoppable, you're pretty likely to drain the remaining power pool.

I tried the dual vampires of beasts and was just trying for two signature spells; which was difficult, with those going off on 10+.
That said, the one round of combat with S6 T6 ghouls was brutal.

IMO, you're better off dumping those power dice into summoning. 8 dice a turn into more ghouls is typically better than one turn of being a monster.

-Matt

Which is why you take 1-2 Vampire Lords with Master of the Black Arts and maybe a Power Stone, which lets you get a significant difference between power dice and dispel dice. This means you are always going to have enough dice to get at least one big spell off (minimum dice you get is 4 or 6). Then you take 1-2 of your casters with Forbidden Lore (Death) and some big blocks of Zombies. If you only get 6-8 dice then you fire off a 5-6 dice Purple Sun, ideally through a big enemy unit, but if nothing is in range then you send it through a unit of Zombies. They are initiative 1, so most of them are dying, which is fine because they are cheap and you can always raise more. Purple Sun probably fills you back up to 12 dice, at which point you start casting Transformation. If you get a high Winds roll then you just start with Transformation and do Purple Sun when you get lower on dice. Having two casters with Purple Sun lets you repeat the process again when you get low on dice again.

Yes they can dispel Transformation next turn, but most people are going to be hard pressed to stop 4 of them at once. They also have to worry about the Purple Suns wandering around as well. If all else fails then you just start 1 dice spamming Invocation and overrun them with Zombies. It won't win you many games by itself, but Undead can take a long time to kill off if you do this, which buys you time to strip away his magic defense and try again next turn.

Powerguy, that's good on paper, but it doesn't work that well. Rather than mathhammer out why it's not going to work, I'll just say, give it a try and see. That's pretty much exactly what I tried to do before. The short version is:
1) Thralls add +1 to cast, enemy wizards add +4 to dispel RIP (needing only a 9).
2) Miscasting not only hits your units, but also drains power dice.
3) If you're going into combat, you'll need some protective gear for your vampires, otherwise dispelling it as a RIP will result in a naked vampire in combat.



Now, on the other hand, a vampire lord with lore master death is a beast. I'm running a flying, scouting, death lore master. He almost never goes into combat, but is able to dance around the battle field and he snipes enemy wizards 1st, then goes for the BSB, then the general. It's terribly effective. Yeah, you could try to shoot him. -3 to be shot, 5+ armor, 3+ ward. Good luck with that.
I'm usually KILLING a hero a turn. LD10 soul leech is brutal; especially with the FAQ on "unmodified leadership".

-Matt

HawaiiMatt wrote:Powerguy, that's good on paper, but it doesn't work that well. Rather than mathhammer out why it's not going to work, I'll just say, give it a try and see. That's pretty much exactly what I tried to do before. The short version is:
1) Thralls add +1 to cast, enemy wizards add +4 to dispel RIP (needing only a 9).
2) Miscasting not only hits your units, but also drains power dice.
3) If you're going into combat, you'll need some protective gear for your vampires, otherwise dispelling it as a RIP will result in a naked vampire in combat.



Now, on the other hand, a vampire lord with lore master death is a beast. I'm running a flying, scouting, death lore master. He almost never goes into combat, but is able to dance around the battle field and he snipes enemy wizards 1st, then goes for the BSB, then the general. It's terribly effective. Yeah, you could try to shoot him. -3 to be shot, 5+ armor, 3+ ward. Good luck with that.
I'm usually KILLING a hero a turn. LD10 soul leech is brutal; especially with the FAQ on "unmodified leadership".

-Matt

Aloha Matt -

I completely get what your saying . There are more likely better compositions for a stronger win. However this just seems like a really cool option having these Counts transform into a Dragon by the skin of their fangs . Im going to be testing the list tonight. Ill let you know how it fared.

BTW I live in Oahu !

Good Luck with the dragon spam. If you make it out to the big island, let me know.
It's a power die problem, I don't think you can get enough of an advantage to make it work the right way.

I had better luck with 1 beast vampire, and 1 shadow vampire. Shadow guy was great support, and the steed of shadows + smoke and mirrors let me get the right guy out of the wrong fight; or shift in a guy who then dumps all his dice on transformation.

The biggest problem was lack of power dice, with monster vulnerability running 2nd. With a 50mm base on monsters, it isn't hard for rank and file to put 2 wounds on a monster, and after a dispel, that's 1 dead thrall.

I haven't tried it yet, but I've been kicking around the idea of a sky is falling list. 3 vampires, all with loremaster heavens, all raining down comets and resummoning troops.
The idea is I can afford to take the losses, you can't.

-Matt

-Matt

Has anyone tried a coven of light with Vampire Counts? Since the Loremaster ability seems to bypass the restriction of can't have the same spell more than once, this could mean casting multiple Banishments at S6+.

As for Transformation of Kadon, I think the spell isn't that great. Since it is so easy to dispel in subsequent turns (only 16+), you will need to cast it when you are already in combat (otherwise the opponent will definately dispel it once your Dragon reaches combat). Charging into combat without knowing if the spell will go through or not is a pretty big risk in my opinion.

Hey Guys -

Tried out the list last night and I must say It pretty much worked well .

Lords/Heroes

Vampire lord
-Power Scroll (one use only any friendly wizard cast doubles causes irresistible force.
-Helm of Commandment
-Forbidden Lore

Vampire -
-Charmed Shield (DMG ignored on a 2+) Used for Miscast DMG
-Crimson Gem of Lahmia (Anytime during the magic phase the bearer can take a wound to add a magic dice)
-Forbidden Lore

Vampire -
-Power stone (one use only +2 power dice)
Forbidden Lore

OF course all three had lore of beasts.

So Basically first magic phase All three vamps became Great Fire Dragons with one dispel scroll used.

Second magic phase - I had two Great Fire Dragons with my Lord casting beast spells. My opponent had a tough choice to either dispell the dragons or my spells casted from my lord.

Of course this would have sucked if I faced Lizards with the
cube of darkness. (Dispels all in play spells)

Again this was just to try out a fun idea.

Thanks again guys

That's amazing. Greater Fire dragon has a casting value of 20.
That means, in the first magic phase, with only a +2 and +1's to cast, you must have been rolling really hot.

With a 20 to change into great fire dragon, but only a 13 to dispel (have to beat the base casting value of 12), I'd always put my money on dispelling, especially since it's common to face a +4 to dispel.

-Matt

I smell some stinky stinky cheese in this thread.

One interesting ancillary benefit of this spell is that it acts as a certain amount of magic defense. If your opponent wants to dispel it, it's going to take about 3 or 4 of his dice to do reliably. Of course, if he doesn't want to dispel it, that won't work at all, but I think he probably does... who wants to fight a great fire dragon twice?