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So, the way I look at high magic is that it's really good in situations where you want to shut down magic using your free drain magic spells against a Slann or an army like VC that rely on getting some spells off. But, that got me to wondering, are there specific armies against which a specific colour of spell is a must have, or are there specific HE army builds that will benefit from a certain school? Any thoughts?

Metal against WoC doesn't seem bad to me, especially if he has a big mean chosen unit with shields. 2d6 s5 hits on their warriors and 2d6 s7 hits on the knights, with no armor saves btw. I would imagine that would get his attention.

To me I ask the following question. "Is my opponent magic heavy (and not TK)?" if the answer is yes then I go High Magic as drain rules. If the answer is no then I pick lores that are specific to situations. beasts against monster heavy, life against gunlines (howler wind is funny against handgunners), metal vs WOC or knight heavy empire. Light vs TK's etc........

In the end high magic is usually the best as it offers so much. Vauls unmaking the drakenhoff banner is priceless, 5+ ward saves so on so forth.

If you're facing an opponent with lots of monsters, Lore of Beasts is pretty great to have, just for Beast Cowers.

High has a fix for just about every army in the game.

It's got a disgusting spell for horde armies.
It shuts down magic heavy armies
it turns your missiles into heat seeking death dealers
it hits like a truck with it's magic missiles.
Your army depends on magical items? That's too bad.

Seriously, it's easily the most well rounded magic list there is, the rest of them do somethings well, and other things poorly or not at all.

Vs Dwarves. No magic, so drain magic is useless, and lore of metal is just plain awesome against them.

Do you get to pick the lore before the game? (Sorry, I'm used to playing Orc, so no choice)
Awesome.

lore of metal is ok vs dwarfs
they will dispel the lvl 1 spell and suck up the hardest spell (only str 4 against them).

The others can be good situational.

Lore of life is better (hit guys on hills, slow dwarfs down more, etc).

High lore is still good. flames of the phenix will kill half of a dwarf unit in one shot if it goes off (str 3 followed by str 4)

Yes, you pick what lore you want to use, at the beginning of the game before deployment but it is usually acceptable to decide on magic after you figure out who deploys first.