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Hi everyone. Was wondering if anyone could give me some insight on this unit. How does it hold up in battle? How is it best deployed? What is the best strategy to take with it? Is it a force to be reckoned with or is it a giant pin cushion? Contemplating whether to take it or not and if I do then I need to figure out what the best way to use it would be, as well as what to equip it with.

Any advice / input would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

I love having one on the flank, its wounds plus armour save makes it a soft unit destroyer

It is awesome. I've used it a couple times before and has always helped me loads. Theres many things it can do, for example I once played a game where it killed 80 clanrats, a vanilla Lord choice, a named lord choice and an abomination. It can also be great at sucking up enemy fire, so your weak armoured boyz etc can close the gap.

its a good flanker.


It runs up a flank and begins to hit his units in the flank. Being a monster it has tons of attacks against RnF.

its main problem is that its only T5. Lots of units have at least Str4, which means they can put some wounds on it. This is alleviated by it having 8 wounds(also means it won't die to a single cannonball unlike most other monsters)

Don't run it up to a unit of bloodletters and expect it to go well though.

Grey: It is toughness 6

Acardia: I ran mine into 30 Slayers and he came out with one wound

@Johnny-Crass: One wound suffered, or one wound remaining?! That sounds like a suicide run given their hatred and slayer ability...

@SoCxWarChief: Played against a couple of them in my last tournament. I really like them as a monster. Not overpowered, but lots of wounds, armor, and good toughness means they can't be easily dispatched either. Don't see a lot of benefit to putting a shaman on one, though...

One wound remaining. I got him in the flank and he never reformed them so I was always fighting 5 slayers

Red_Zeke wrote:@Johnny-Crass: One wound suffered, or one wound remaining?! That sounds like a suicide run given their hatred and slayer ability...

@SoCxWarChief: Played against a couple of them in my last tournament. I really like them as a monster. Not overpowered, but lots of wounds, armor, and good toughness means they can't be easily dispatched either. Don't see a lot of benefit to putting a shaman on one, though...

If not a shaman, then what would be best, if anything, to equip it with?

Bare bones spider is were it is at. Launcher is horrid and Shaman is to pricey

The spider is actually T6

With high T and a decent save it can soak up quite a few hits. It is far from invincible but its too big and potentially nasty to be ignored. I use mine along with wyverns and try to really put the pressure on early. Go monster hunting or get it thunderstomping as quickly as possible.

I think bare bones is right. Don't get me wrong, I think a shaman would be a lot of fun, but I think its a bit like that dragon mage the High Elves have- you have a monster that you don't want to send into combat because the guy on the top is so soft.

So the Arachnarok is best used going up the Flank and hitting infantry in the flank / rear. Ok. Is he good against anything head to head? Is he good against other monsters like the Abomination or Hydra, and things like that?

He really sucks against other monsters but if you engage a unit in the woods or such with a arachnarok he will do well!

Against the Hydra ol' Rokky would probably die, against the Abomination...hmm, touch and go. Still, since both are cheaper, I wouldn't do it. Just goes to show how ridiculously underpriced the Hydra is.

Actually in most of my experiences my hydra gets venom surged by the araknocrap spider. Fail one regen and things get really dicey. Also wounding on 5's vs. him wounding on 4's with more attacks, as against t6 we can pretty much discount the handlers.

At least I think it has 8 attacks?

Except that Venom surge is one attack which you get your regen against. That makes it unreliable for killing the Hydra. If every attack caused the multiple wounds then it would be bad for the Hydra, but in this case it isn't.

The Arachnarok Unit gets 16 attacks all together, correct? 8 from the Spider and 8 from the 8 Crew.

Yes sir that is correct!

Don't forget the Thunderstomp

Let's use that fabulously popular method: Mathhammer:

Basic 'Rakky versus Hydrastupidface:

2 Hydra Handlers: 4 Attacks, 2 Hit, 0.333 wounds

'Rakky chows down: 8*.5 = 4*.5 = 2*.83333 = 1.6667*.5 = .8333 wounds (obviously there's a chance of a Megapoison here)

Goblins attack: 8*.5 = 4*.16667 = 0.66668*.5 = .33334*.5 = .16667 wounds

Obviously this goes up pretty significantly if Rakky and the Gobbos get the charge, since the goblins would wound on 5s and deny a bit of armour. Still, now it's Hydrastupidface's turn, since he goes at the same time as the goblins

Hydrastupidface: 7*.5 = 3.5*.33333 = 1.16666*.83333 = 0.97221

Plus firebreath?: average of 7*.33333 = 2.33333*.8333 = 1.94444

Godsdammit, just realised the Hydra's breath attack is reduced in str depending on how many wounds it has left...can someone else who is actually good at maths do this?

Its dicey as the previously posted math suggests. The only real problem I have with the spider is leadership 6. I think its stubborn? However I still throw my spider at the nastiest stuff staring across from me. At the very least try to get your BSB near or you may find that he's getting broken and run down more often than he is actually killed in CC. However, I see most of my opponents using considerable resources to take care of the spider. And hey, thats fine with me, the rest of my army can try to close unmolested. Venom surge has done some amazing things in a few of my battles, but as stated previously its not something to rely on. The goblin poison spell can make things a bit more interesting though. Just some thoughts...

Dr. Delorean wrote:
'Rakky chows down: 8*.5 = 4*.5 = 2*.83333 = 1.6667*.5 = .8333 wounds (obviously there's a chance of a Megapoison here)

Don't forget that rakky has poisoned attacks.

So it would be:

8*1/6 1,33 autowound
8*2/6 2,66 hit then 1,33 wound so total 2,66 wounds minus regen makes it 1,33. 1/8 chance that one attack is the D6 wound one.

Since we have to account for the venom surge, I'll do out the math of any single attack wounding, and then add them up.

1 attack has a 1/2 chance of hitting, however we have to account for poison here. As such only a 4 or 5 will follow the standard hit - wound - save trend, or 1/3. So, the chance of one attack 'hitting' and rolling to wound as normal, is 1/3, or .3. S5 vs. T5 is a .5 chance to wound, so we are sitting at ~.17 chance from the chance the roll was a 4 or 5, adding in the 1/6 chance of poison, we have about a ~.3 chance of each attack wounding. Multiplying by 8, we have ~ 2.6 wounds from the spider. 1/6 will be saved by hydra armor., so ~2.2 go to regen, for an average of ~1.1 wounds a turn, and the goblins spit out ~.17 wounds, for a total of 1.27 wounds a turn, with a 1/8 chance that the hydra took multiple wounds.

Handlers get their 6 attacks back, 6 * .75 (factoring in hatred) = 4.5 hits. S3 vs T5 results in .75 wounds, of which 1/3 are saved for .25 wounds. Hydra hits, 7 attacks needing 4's with hatred is 5.25 hits. Needing 4's is 2.625 wounds, of which 1/6 are saved for about 2.4 wounds in the first turn including handlers. 7 s 4 breath weapon attacks give about .7 breath weapon wounds, for a total of 3.1 wounds.

It takes rakky about 3.9 turns to kill the hydra, discounting venom surge. In later rounds of combat the handlers hit 3 times for .16 wounds after saves, hydra wounds 1.5 times after saves with a bit of rounding, needing 2.9 rounds to kill the rakky. So really, hydra wins unless he gets venom surged unsupported. The charge matters very little as the goblins even with s4 are nearly negligible.

Edit: I should probably note that the venom surge over the 3 rounds is a bit tricky to figure out, but is around 3/8 chance if I'm not making a glaring statistical mistake.

Plain Arachnarok works perfectly well for me. I'd like to try the Shaman once (for the Loremaster mostly I guess) but not to keen either. High T, lots of wounds and poisoned attacks, plus the ability to simply walk over forests. Place him behind a conveniently positioned forest and Spidey will shine. Near the flank, of course. I've once had it go through an Empire unit's flank along with all its detachments (save one), killing about 40 models before sending the others fleeing for their lives.

And lets not forget the Gobbos! 8 extra attacks (albeit at 2 WS) can put that extra little damage on your opponent, like the other time they miraculously managed to deal that last wound on that pesky Stegadon.

All in all, I believe it is worth its money.

Well the Gobbos have spears and the big spider can walk over impassible terrian

angelshade00 wrote:Plain Arachnarok works perfectly well for me. I'd like to try the Shaman once (for the Loremaster mostly I guess) but not to keen either. High T, lots of wounds and poisoned attacks, plus the ability to simply walk over forests. Place him behind a conveniently positioned forest and Spidey will shine. Near the flank, of course. I've once had it go through an Empire unit's flank along with all its detachments (save one), killing about 40 models before sending the others fleeing for their lives.

Forests don't impede anyone's movement. They just inflict dangerous terrain tests on Chariots.

Maybe you are thinking of Buildings and Impassable terrain, which the Spider can indeed just walk right over.

Grey Templar wrote:

angelshade00 wrote:Plain Arachnarok works perfectly well for me. I'd like to try the Shaman once (for the Loremaster mostly I guess) but not to keen either. High T, lots of wounds and poisoned attacks, plus the ability to simply walk over forests. Place him behind a conveniently positioned forest and Spidey will shine. Near the flank, of course. I've once had it go through an Empire unit's flank along with all its detachments (save one), killing about 40 models before sending the others fleeing for their lives.

Forests don't impede anyone's movement. They just inflict dangerous terrain tests on Chariots.

Maybe you are thinking of Buildings and Impassable terrain, which the Spider can indeed just walk right over.

Indeed, apologies for the mistake. Thanks for correcting me.

Against the A-bomb, the spider doesn't do too hot considering his points, especially if the A-bomb gets the charge (which is generally unlikely, thanks to the spider being super-fast). Otherwise:

A-bomb's Feed attack: average of one wound/turn. Spider returns with 2.08/turn, minus Venom Surge.
Pummel: 2.5 wounds/turn versus the Spider's 1.75 minus Surge.
Avalanche: 4/turn versus 2.08 minus Surge.

That is...assuming the Spider is WS4 and I3, but...maybe he's I4? That would make sense, actually. All that means, though, is that he doesn't get a -1 to hit the A-bomb versus Pummel and Avalanche does, like, 3.333 instead.

The Spider's W8 and Venom Surge tip the odds, but not enough, I'd say, to justify his 35-50pt mark-up. Then again, I'd throw him at the A-bomb anyway, to prevent that thing from hitting my other units, and to prevent my Spider from getting zapped by Warp Lightning Cannons while its eating slaves...

The spider is I4