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My basic question is what armies can do extremely well as magic heavy. I mean they can make a list that uses wizards to do the majority of the damage. I understand that the following armies can take large numbers of Wizards and are okay competative wise: Empire, High Elves, Dark Elves, Skaven, Lizardmen, Warriors of Chaos, Vampire Counts, Daemons of Chaos (I have no interest in these for the time being). Did I miss any?

Dark elves- they can use any number of power dice.
Deamons- A lot of thier units are magical.

Don't most of the "competitive" Ogre lists revolve around taking as many Butchers as you can besides the Tyrant lord?

Yes, that's true Minsc.

I say Daemons, Dark Elves, Vampire Counts, and Lizardmen.

Can Lizardmen do magic heavy at lower levels (below 2000)? Are Skinks good enough to run multiples, or can Lizardmen really only do magic once they get their toad?

RustyKnight wrote:Can Lizardmen do magic heavy at lower levels (below 2000)?

They can have three lord-level Wizards (level 3 Skinks on Engines of the Gods) at under 2K points. Just expect it to win-big lose-big depending on if your enemy has lots of multi-wound weapons they can fit at that point level (for instance, Empire). Also pretty limited in what it can do (Lore of Heavens magic isn't that great for unit killing, and I can't recall the other lore choice), so expect the Ancient Stegadon & the Engine itself to do more damage than the rider.

Are Skinks good enough to run multiples, or can Lizardmen really only do magic once they get their toad?

If using the Skinks to man Engines of the Gods, yes. Multiple Engines are some nasty pieces of work.

I'd say DOC, DE, VC, and LM.

Skaven have a lot of fun spells, but I wouldn't rely on them too much.

WOC carnival (lots of disc sorcs) can be pretty intimidating, but is also quite risky.

I do agree with the rest of the people that prob best Magic heavy army's are DE, VC, T Mono Daemons.

It all depends on what sort of magic you are wanting do do. Damage, Incapacitate, Break.

Some of the Generic laws of magic in the core book are quite good. Life, Beasts and Metal (I really like this law).

Vent

Daemons, of course. Getting PD from your Core is awesome.

TheZombieSquig wrote:
WOC carnival (lots of disc sorcs) can be pretty intimidating, but is also quite risky.

How risky? Risky as in can cause a little damge to oneself, risky as in is difficult to play, or risky as in so random it's impossible to do well with?

TheZombieSquig wrote:It all depends on what sort of magic you are wanting do do. Damage, Incapacitate, Break.

Any or all three, as long the army is throwing lots of spells across the table. I wouldn't mind weakening the enemy then crushing them in CC.

JohnHwangDD wrote:Daemons, of course. Getting PD from your Core is awesome.

I know that Daemons can do well, and I already have some Daemon models for my CSM's, but I'm loath to start an army so cheesy that noone will want to play against me.

I think he might be saying risky because the lvl 2s can be screwed, and also because anything with infernal gateway is risky (15+ to cast). Of course infernal puppet makes miscasts more bearable and there are some fun combinations out there, but it can definitely work.

Also as they are on disks, they are generally on their own and liable to be shot at. Of course they are flying so...

Would the army do well if all the Sorcs were taken off their Discs and stuck into Chaos Warrior squads?

Well Vampire Counts can do quite well with magic heavy. The Lord can get up to six power dice for himself without relying on the pool. Or if you want to take one dice away, you can make them know all of the spells of any lore (except Life). For a relatively cheap, hero-vampires get to upgrade to level two wizards, and can be used to increase unit sizes of certain units, or be given some protection and versatility in combat with Avatar. Alternatively they can generate 3 dice for themselves and be used to spam invocation of death.

RustyKnight wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:Daemons, of course. Getting PD from your Core is awesome.

I know that Daemons can do well, and I already have some Daemon models for my CSM's, but I'm loath to start an army so cheesy that noone will want to play against me.

Because they're not playing Daemons themselves?

There are a lot of Daemons players, and growing. If you want magic, just theme your army around Tzeentch. A little theme covers for a lot.

JohnHwangDD wrote:

RustyKnight wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:Daemons, of course. Getting PD from your Core is awesome.

I know that Daemons can do well, and I already have some Daemon models for my CSM's, but I'm loath to start an army so cheesy that noone will want to play against me.

Because they're not playing Daemons themselves?

There are a lot of Daemons players, and growing. If you want magic, just theme your army around Tzeentch. A little theme covers for a lot.

Um theming mono-tzeentch is probably one of the best ways for people to not play with you...

@rusty knight- yeah but then you probably are not doing tzeentch. I think the best lvl 2 sorcerers are from nurgle (almost all their spells are good and their default is good as well) and lvl 4 is for tzeentch. The lvl 4 is really looking to get Gateway, with +1 spell he has a really good chance of getting it. Give another guy infernal puppet (to make your miscasts better and his allowing you to cast infernal gateway), possibly black toungue to turn a fail into a miscast at the cost of a wound, or if you want to be tricky skull of katan and keep the casters close together. Allows gateway on a 13+ (much more reasonable), and nurgle sorcerers dont mind a +1 either (helps curse of the leper on 3 dice), use 2 dice for Nurgle 1 or 2, 3 dice for any nurgle spell except 6, and 5 dice on Gateway. Gives you over a 70% chance to cast every spell. Otherwise +1 pool dice is amazing, if you take another sorcerer you can give them that. The best thing is that miscasting is slightly less harmful because you have the infernal puppet, so throwing 5 dice at the chance of killing a unit is worth it.

Also imho HE can have the best magic phase for anywhere near 525 points, teclis and BOS, gives you ~10 pd, and you have over 50% chance of getting 2 IF spells per turn, and have a 92% chance of getting one off at IF. Also you ignore the first miscast per turn and the chance of miscasting twice in a turn at 5 dice is ~4%. an average of 6dd and a super scroll for defense.

One think i will advise is that do not just use magic as your attack otherwise you could be in trouble for instance if you miscast and end Magic phase on first role or something like that.

I have found the Heavy shooting plus Heavy magic and an Anvil unit works well for instance the list i played last night was

Lvl 4 DE sorc

3 x Lvl 2 DE sorcs

2 x 12 Rxb

2 x 19 Spearmen

20 black guard

4 bolt throwers

Worked well even though i got a draw. (Was playing Daemons though)

RustyKnight wrote:

TheZombieSquig wrote:
WOC carnival (lots of disc sorcs) can be pretty intimidating, but is also quite risky.

How risky? Risky as in can cause a little damge to oneself, risky as in is difficult to play, or risky as in so random it's impossible to do well with.

Risky in several ways, as tiekwando pointed out. Firstly, WOC are an expensive army and if you want to be magic heavy you have to commit a lot of points to doing it right. Only fielding a couple of lvl 2s won't get you far, you'll need a lvl 4 as well. Then the problem of them being unsupported as they fly on their discs. Also, Flickering Fire and Infernal Gateway are both risky in that their effects are subject to D6 rolls.

But the benefits are there as well. If you run in a disc squad, Skull of Katam is a nice item to use. Golden Eye of Tz will protect the lvl 4 from shooting. Conjoined Homonculus isn't too bad for the lvl 4, in case you're ever short with a Gateway cast. Infernal Puppet is great for mitigating your own miscasts and worsening your opponent's. You may also want to use Pandaemonium and Black Tongue to increase his miscasts. You can put an exalted hero BSB on a disc as a bodyguard, I like to give him Book of Secrets with Fire magic, if you don't roll Sword of Rhuin for melee power, take Fireball and act as a support caster. He can fly off on his own to deal with warmachines, too.

For a basic magic heavy WoC army, what is needed other than two boxes of Warriors of Chaos and some sorcerers? Warhounds for harassment?

If you want to start relatively inexpensively the battalion box is actually pretty decent. Hounds, Knights, Warriors and Marauders. 20 with flails can be a pretty good unit. Especially if you can grab a flank charge.

RustyKnight wrote:For a basic magic heavy WoC army, what is needed other than two boxes of Warriors of Chaos and some sorcerers? Warhounds for harassment?

Warriors of Chaos are not needed in a WOC army. It's a sad design fault IMO. If you plan to go with a mobile sorcerer group, you can compliment that with a fully mobile force: horsemen core, hounds for redirecting/shielding/hunting, and knights and dragon ogres for hitting power. This is effective and themed. (If that's not what you're looking for, then the battalion is the best deal.)

If you intend to go magic heavy, then you should intend on using Pandaemonium as it is a great spell for synergy. It increases your opponent's miscasts and stops him giving leadership, so you can capitilise on this further by taking Infernal Puppet and fear-causing troops, and targetting Flickering Fire at units that will likely panic.