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Hey Everyone-

Still new to Fantasy, but I was just wondering if there was a good site that gave a breakdown of the army make up of fantasy?

I play 40k on the tourney scene, and would like to eventually start doing the same for fantasy. Just wondering what the big players to look for are.

I have been hearing tons of griping about DoC, DE, and VC.

Are these the only powerhouses?

Most armies can be played competetivly, so don't feel that you must play one of those to compete ... those three in particular churn out the easiest wins. Explaining their popularity/notoriety

Pretty much breaks down into this listing:

Daemons

Vampire Counts
Dark Elves

Lizardmen
Skaven(?)
Warriors of Chaos
High Elves
Dwarfs
Empire
Tomb Kings
Brettonians
Wood Elves
Beastmen(?)

Ogre Kingdoms
Orcs and Goblins


With specific builds altering the power positions of the middle pack. Beastmen are too new to judge yet.

Daemons are almost agreed upon to be in a class of their own, with VC's and DE's offering competitive Top Tier lists. OK and O&G are easily the two weakest lists so far.

I'm tempted to say empire goes in the same tier with DE and VC. I've seen some bad builds, but I've also seen an empire player show up at 'ard boys and get so many points in 2 rounds he could've taken a nap in round 3 and still gotten first. The guy is pretty unreal at WFB, but he has demonstrated repeatedly that empire has the units to deal with most problems at least to the point of being above the B rated armies.

As a whole, the Empire book is mid tier. The only build I can see doing consistently well against DE/VC/DoC would be the WAlter/Stank build, as evidenced by its popularity during the 'ard Boyz tournies. Overall, though, outside of that build, I wouldn't class it as Top Tier.

Similarly, the Thorek Gunline can cause havoc to Top Tier lists.

Jin wrote:As a whole, the Empire book is mid tier. The only build I can see doing consistently well against DE/VC/DoC would be the WAlter/Stank build, as evidenced by its popularity during the 'ard Boyz tournies. Overall, though, outside of that build, I wouldn't class it as Top Tier.

Similarly, the Thorek Gunline can cause havoc to Top Tier lists.

Agreed. I ran across 2 Thorek gunlines in the prelims and semis of Ard Boyz (playing Daemons), and they were some very tough games. One had something like 6 Bolt Throwers (all at least S7) and 2 Cannons plus Organ Gun. It was mean. I drew with one, and while I got a Massacre of the other, there were maybe 2-3 single dice rolls that could have completely changed the battle (and an opponent more experienced against Daemons would have given me more trouble too).

Of course, Thorek got a minor little stealth nerf since Ard Boyz, for some reason, but it's still a viable build. Overall, though, Jin hit the nail pretty well on the head. I think you could further subdivide the middle books into something like this:

Lizardmen
Skaven
Warriors of Chaos
Beastmen (this is just my guess, jury's still out)

Empire
High Elves
Dwarfs
Tomb Kings
Brettonians
Wood Elves

There's no disputing you can do well with any of them (as evidenced by the Brettonian player finishing 2nd in the the most recent Ard Boyz final), but the higher tier armies have multiple builds that can be competitive. I put Empire, Dwarfs, and High Elves in a lower tier than some of the others because they pretty much have the one strong way of playing them. People don't win too often with big fighting blocks of Dwarfs or lots of Miners or the big Dwarf King... gunlines galore, typically with Thorek, is what you see out of tournament Dwarf armies.

Note that one of the reasons oddball armies do well on occasion is because they have a lot of experience fighting the top tier lists and are likely optimized against them, while said top tier armies do not have experience fighting <insert oddball here> and are not optimized against them. "You play what? With who? And what does that do?" are not good questions to ask in a major tournament.

+ luck. Sufficient amounts of good dice can make up for a lot of armylist dead weight.

Funny you should mention lists built to fight high tier armies like VC and daemons. We had a small games day here in he panhandle called Coastal Assault and this dude drove down from Tennessee to play. What did he bring with him? A high elf army of dragon princes of course! To beat up the DoC fireball list. Unfortunately out of 32 players, not a single person was playing DoC so he placed rather low when his units just didn't make it happen against other armies.

Thinking back we only had two VC players in that lot too.

an unrelated note, how long do i have to hang out on the forums before my title is ANYTHING other than "Unfortunate Ungor". I play beastmen and i KNOW what happens to them ungors

If you're looking for a great starting army and still hesitant with WFB, I'd give Warriors of Chaos or Dark Elves a go. Both a wide range of awesome models and have some darn fine competitive lists that can be easily assembled.

However if you were to lean toward Dwarfs, Orcs, Bretonnions, or Empire I wouldn't blame you. They're still solid armies and its only a matter of time (very SOON...as in the next Army book) before they get an updated army book (which will probably kick some serious ).

I officially picked up my army book this morning. I suppose I am a WoC player now. The models just keep wowing me. I love the range GW put together for them.

And I want a solid magic phase with hard hitting units. Seemed like the right fight for me.

It is good to see that most people agree that it is 80% general, 15% Army, 5% Luck!

I can deal with that, and I would hope that a properly prepared player will beat out a person who was too busy drooling over a cheese list.

infamousxiii wrote:an unrelated note, how long do i have to hang out on the forums before my title is ANYTHING other than "Unfortunate Ungor". I play beastmen and i KNOW what happens to them ungors

Gotta keep posting

You can always say "Hi" to the new people or comment on painting/modeling.

I would like to know, would VC's still be broken if you played at a FLGS with no DoC players, or wouldn't they be that bad?

Vampire Counts classification as a Top Tier army is almost completely based on the fact that they are one of the few armies that have a decent chance when playing Daemons of Chaos. If Daemons of Chaos wouldn't have been so powerful, then Vampire Counts wouldn't be classified as Top Tier as well.

Cool, I won't feel so bad starting them then.

I played some with my friends this weekend and I gave the VC player (our WFB vet) a run for his money, I nabbed the vampire and didn't realize how crazy good that was.

But then again it was a really low point game and I think I caught him off guard when the newbie ate his vampire.

Great great game though, I am really enjoying WFB. Seems like the tactics put 40k to shame.

While not being a fan generally of tier lists, I do believe there is some disparity apparent in army books. Mostly because some books lack a full range of unit and tactical options. This makes them predictable, boring, and ultimately not good (other than being noob slayers).

The armies that I consider to be fully developed are: (no particular order, generalship and good list building are a large part of who is better)

Beastmen
Chaos dwarfs
Dark elves
Empire
High elves
Lizardmen
Skaven
Tomb Kings

Armies that have certain narrow builds that still compete relatively well (or are just new players slayers)

Brettonia
Vampire counts
Warriors of chaos
Wood elves

Armies that I consider to be nearly unplayable, outside of the very predictable builds (that usually isn't that hard to beat even)

Orcs and goblins
Ogre Kindoms
Dogs of War
Dwarfs
Kislev (lol, how many actually own this?)

Obviously certain armies are more powerful than others, like how I rated tomb kings in the same category as daemons. With generalship being more important that any other factor (IMHO), I rate armies that have the full range of tools above armies that can't compete in one or more aspects of the game.

I rate vampires in the second category, though I respect their power, they are the definition of predictable army. Also they have virtually no shooting, and rely on characters to make the army work at all.
Brettonia I rate in the second category because most people just use the normal knight spam (which experience players can deal with) They do have a more balanced list, but it is so rare to see actually fielded I usually ignore the fact they have most of the tools to be a fully developed army. I guess I really should put them in between the two categories.

People might take exception to where I put dwarfs, but think about it: They have MV 3, no cavalry, and virtually nothing that moves fast. So they don't really contest the movement phase. They have no magic at all, so only defend against magic. Their combat units are very slow so don't find favorable combats unless the opponent allows it.... so don't really contest the Combat phase. They have shooting, but only move or shoot units. Not really much to recommend it, even if you can win with it.

O&G would be a good army, but animosity makes it too unpredictable. On good day they can crush the hardest daemon army. On a bad day they can't beat the all gnoblar army.

I loved playing Tomb Kings when our group started Warmaster. The chariots and simplified magic phase made me want to start TK for WHFB.

Then putting together the chariots, lack of getting magic off, and lack of flexibility I shelved TK for WHFB.

I started Empire for WHFB and enjoy the better playability.

notabot i was just wondering why you rated tomb kings higher than vampires?

Vampires can actually march unlike tomb kings which have a rule where none of their units can march giving them much worse mobility.

Another thing is that Tomb kings are an undead army which relies heavily on magic for their army to succeed but have extremely weak casting abilities, sure they have no miscasts but they still have much less magic then vampires.

The last thing is the vampires access to bound spells. In my vampires list at 2500 i run book of arkhan: free charge in addition to my march move giving me a 16' charge range. staff of damnation: so my skeletons get 10 attacks at your unit and my grave guard get 7 Great weapon attacks in the magic phase before the combat even starts. A Corpse Cart: so that when combat starts i have ASF to add another 11 attacks before you hit so you'll be lucky to hit back. And last of all Helm of commandment giving any unit within 12' WS 7.

In addition to that i run a 5 man blood knight unit with 2+ armor, regen, and a vampire w/ blood drinker so every time he causes a wound a blood knight comes back, making a death star that's almost impossible to kill.

I don't know to much about the TK magic items but i'm pretty sure it can't be better than the cheese listed above.

legion of bugs wrote:I don't know to much about the TK magic items but i'm pretty sure it can't be better than the cheese listed above.

I think that's his point. He's talking about the difference between armies that can do well with a variety of builds vs. ones that require certain narrow builds or... cheese... to do well.

A well-played TK army is going to make you wish he could march, rather than use the magic movement tricks they have.

My listing would be (in order) for 2250-2500;

Daemons *vomits on floor* I was playing at a tourney at the weekend and finshed the game with 1 spear chukka and crew left vs all but 8 models from a nurgle/khorne army with x1 slime trail and standard of sundering.... no other upgrades. :(

Vampire Counts
Dark Elves, Just pip skaven due to Ring Hotek and unkillable lords.
Skaven (after seeing them in action on the weekend their magic, the HPA and all the other great weapons/abilities they have, they are simply awesome)

Lizardmen
Warriors of Chaos
High Elves
Dwarfs
Empire
Tomb Kings
Brettonians
Wood Elves
Beastmen(?) - They are somewhere in this ranking group. Still to early to tell. They are solid but not super fantastic.

Orcs and Goblins
Ogre Kingdoms
DOW

But a cheesy Vampires army will still be able to slaughter Tomb Kings as long as there's a good General behind it.

legion of bugs wrote:But a cheesy Vampires army will still be able to slaughter Tomb Kings as long as there's a good General behind it.

It's a tough fight, to be sure, and I'd certainly say that the VC's are favoured in the matchup. But 2 equal generals behind either army and I'd be willing to call it a coinflip of a battle each time.

legion of bugs wrote:notabot i was just wondering why you rated tomb kings higher than vampires?

Vampires can actually march unlike tomb kings which have a rule where none of their units can march giving them much worse mobility.

Another thing is that Tomb kings are an undead army which relies heavily on magic for their army to succeed but have extremely weak casting abilities, sure they have no miscasts but they still have much less magic then vampires.

The last thing is the vampires access to bound spells. In my vampires list at 2500 i run book of arkhan: free charge in addition to my march move giving me a 16' charge range. staff of damnation: so my skeletons get 10 attacks at your unit and my grave guard get 7 Great weapon attacks in the magic phase before the combat even starts. A Corpse Cart: so that when combat starts i have ASF to add another 11 attacks before you hit so you'll be lucky to hit back. And last of all Helm of commandment giving any unit within 12' WS 7.

In addition to that i run a 5 man blood knight unit with 2+ armor, regen, and a vampire w/ blood drinker so every time he causes a wound a blood knight comes back, making a death star that's almost impossible to kill.

I don't know to much about the TK magic items but i'm pretty sure it can't be better than the cheese listed above.

Tomb kings have less magic for sure, but TK magic always goes off, no matter the value cast at. Free attacks in the magic phase? TKs have a spell for that. Free movement spell? TKs have that. Bring back lost models, TKs can do it. Shoot during the magic phase (including on of the best war machines in the game) TKs can do that, and VC can't even shoot. Powerful bound items, TKs have some. An shrine type unit that can devastate an entire army, TKs have that (and it also makes opposing magic harder to get off) Units that can enter from reserve in the opponents deployment zone? TKs scorpions are really nasty beasts.

Also the less magic isn't quite true, if you take a liche high priest list. 2 3 dice spells from the LHP, 2 2 dice spells from the regular liches, 1 dice from the prince, and finally 2 dice from the casket of souls = 13 dice worth of spells that never fail due to power level. You can also take some worthwhile bound items on top of it all.

The combat ability of the list isn't the greatest, but having core chariots in a king list is nice. As is the KB tomb guard that can take a banner that gives them a free reform during the movement phase before charges are declared. (which means you can abuse the intent of the rules to get off 20" charges if you really want to be cheesey about it) A prince with flail of skulls is pretty nasty, and in a king list the destroyer of eternities is one of the best weapons in the game. S7 killing blow, special attack that auto hits twice all models in contact with him means that he clears front ranks by himself. (put him in a unit of tomb guard for a nasty long charge surprise)

So even though VC are considered a more powerful list, TKs can do nearly everything that VC can do, but also be active in phases that VC can't. Considering how old the TK book is compared to the VC book, I think it has held up quite well. The only real advantage (and it is a big one) is the VC ability to raise units past their starting size. It makes it so that in a VC vs TK game, TKs will probably lose unless the Scorpions do their job at vampire hunting. (with poison and KB there is a decent chance they will work, but its still a matter left to the dice unfortunately).

As for your blood knight unit in question: That is a ton of points for a unit that just gets baited around and shot to death. 2+ doesn't save your from gunpowder units (getting a 4+/4+ isn't bad, but its a blood knight so even losing 1 is bad) Repeating bolt throwers and reaper bolt throwers kill that unit very well. Have you seen what happens when dwarfs with flaming war machine ammo or the skull catapult hits that unit? No armor saves, no regen means a dead unit very fast. Very powerful unit to be sure, but also very predictable, and very fragile compared to its cost. I don't consider it to be a death star at all. (especially since I have personally killed it with a typical black guard anvil unit only 14 strong.)

notabot if you actually ran a army with a liche HP, two liche priests and a prince with a casket you be looking at 730 points with no equipment or magic items. after equipping them you'd be looking at around 900 points of characters, and without the ability to increase a unit past starting size, you'll suffer from a low number of units. As where vampires you can run 3 moderately good casters w/ strong combat stats, and a uber casting lord. around 960 fully equipped and be able to raise 300~ points worth of models a turn. making up for the high character cost.

Airmaniac is there any reason that vampires do good aganist a daemons army? my FLGS doesn't have any daemons players because it's frowned upon (even the employees frown upon it) so i haven't played aganist them much

legion of bugs wrote:
Airmaniac is there any reason that vampires do good aganist a daemons army? my FLGS doesn't have any daemons players because it's frowned upon (even the employees frown upon it) so i haven't played aganist them much

I'm not Airmaniac, but VC do well against deamons because almost every unit is ITP and either causes Fear or Terror. That and they can raise new units when other armies can't.

legion of bugs wrote:notabot if you actually ran a army with a liche HP, two liche priests and a prince with a casket you be looking at 730 points with no equipment or magic items. after equipping them you'd be looking at around 900 points of characters, and without the ability to increase a unit past starting size, you'll suffer from a low number of units. As where vampires you can run 3 moderately good casters w/ strong combat stats, and a uber casting lord. around 960 fully equipped and be able to raise 300~ points worth of models a turn. making up for the high character cost.

Airmaniac is there any reason that vampires do good aganist a daemons army? my FLGS doesn't have any daemons players because it's frowned upon (even the employees frown upon it) so i haven't played aganist them much

So it is a bit character heavy... But so isn't just about any army with heavy magic. (my DE and lizards sometimes bring similar points total of characters, yet still get 80+ models)

That 300 points of models doesn't happen in games where your opponent brings magic defense. Also those 300 points aren't actually good models. Yippee, I got more WS junk guys with meh to aweful saves running around at MV 4. (raising dogs and bats is pretty decent though)

TKs having a low number of units isn't really as big an issue, a chariot units costs less than 150 points, and scorpions are well under 100 points. A unit of bowmen? 80 points. A full combat block of guys is a bit pricey at 250, but you don't need more than one or two. The catapult is very affordable as well. The thing is being more mobile and able to shoot means you don't have to have hordes of guys who's entire purpose is to clog up movement lanes.

Usually when you see a LHP list at 2k, there is only 1 LHP, 1 LP, and a prince. The 3rd caster is usually skipped to save points. At 2250+ the 3rd lich is seen much more often, but it really doesn't add much to the already potent magic phase. LHP is next to the bows usually, casting smiting on 2 units (and urgency on the nearby warrior block), LP is on casket, also casting smiting on the catapult, so the 3rd one is a bit harder to find a spot for.

The biggest reason why VC can take on daemons is number of attacks vs unbreakable and able to raise. Daemon units have a limited number of attacks, with only a few units having very many attacks. They make up for this by being really good attacks and being fear causers. So when they run into a block of VC guys, they kill some, but not enough to break apart the unit. Then VC starts raising the unit back up a bit, and set up for a flank charge with something that can kill like black knights or such. Daemons all have ward saves, but it is a 5+ so volume of attacks really can hurt them. The units that daemons have that have a high enough volume of attacks are almost all units that aren't considered competitive: Daemonettes, fiends of Slaanesh, beasts of nurgle, and tooled up slaanesh characters.

legion of bugs wrote:But a cheesy Vampires army will still be able to slaughter Tomb Kings as long as there's a good General behind it.

And a cheezy Tomb King list with a good general behind it will likely slaughter a generic Vampire list as well. Cheeze trumps non-cheeze; good general trumps average general. Duh.