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To the vampire counts players out there...why would anyone take skeletons when ghouls have a better stat line and cost the same?

AbaddonFidelis wrote:To the vampire counts players out there...why would anyone take skeletons when ghouls have a better stat line and cost the same?

Ghouls have no save.

They cannot take musicians which are helpful, and standards which are necessary in one of the missions.

That's all I have. I'd say Ghouls are certainly the superior choice.

Skeletons could take standards.

And, models of ghouls are ugly. lol

tokugawa wrote:Skeletons could take standards.

And, models of ghouls are ugly. lol

They're meant to be ugly. They're undead sub-humans that have been bred on a diet of corpses and dirt.

@OP: Ghouls are better in every respect, except that cant take banners, which is an absolute necessity for one of the missions.

if you give a vampire a battle standard does that count? Is rushing forward with the ghoul kin ability a good play? How useful is poisoned claws?


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Yeah and the models of ghouls are ugly. Agree 1000%. Think I'll buy skeletons and call them ghouls

Skeletons actually have a save, and can take spears.

Standards, musicians, both of which are very useful.

And, as has been said, Ghouls are butt-ugly.

I'll use Skeletons, thanks.

I love the new ghoul models!

As far as effectiveness, ghouls are better fighters. A large unit of ghouls can cause LOTS of damage. Picture ghouls 40 strong, 4x10. Someone who charges can kill most all the back rank. You still get like 35 attacks back, all with poison. Cast Okkam's Mindrazor on the unit and they're S5. If within range of the general, S10. If the general's wearing the Crown of Command, WS 7. That unit of ghouls is lethal to EVERYTHING!

That being said, you can join a character to a unit of skeletons carrying the hellfire banner, giving them all flaming attacks. Great against trolls and the like. Take konrad and his wounds double, giving him a ton of red fury wounds to kill even more!

Okkrams only works on your base ldership, so they'd be ST5

I'd say always take ghouls and leave the standards for the Grave Guard (generally should have 2 units) and BSB, maybe Blood/Black Knights if you want them in your army.

Skeletons are just bull. WS2, T3, People say "Armor Save!" but I say ok, take your 5+, my ghouls have T4 and throw out 1.5 times your attacks, with Poison.

Okkams works off generals leadership.

yeah... it seems to me like the ghouls are stronger. I don't really care if I take a few more ghoul casualties, I'm just going to bring them back next turn anyway... I think the extra damage potential that the ghouls have will balance out with the 5+ armor of the skeletons.... after all every extra guy I kill is an armor save I don't have to take at all later. Half the time you don't even get the 5+ anyway.

On a side note I played a game with counts yesterday and completely smashed my buddy's skaven with blood knights. There was a vampire lord with a blood drinker in there so basically the blood knights were impossible to get rid of.... I believe they could have gone through his entire army by themselves.

Mostly the standard thing, since now Parry is 5+ 6+ instead of a solid 4+. Against S4 shooting it's better to be the Ghoul, but versus S3 (non-armor piercing) they have comparable durability (33% of all incoming hits).

Another vote towards "Ghoul models are ugly", but then I preferred the old Ghouls to the new ones (The new ones aren't particularly bad so much as a flavor change that I didn't like).

So, in hand-to-hand versus S3 WS4 or better (See: Core Elves?) or two or worse (Goblins, Skinks, many other undead, Skaven Slaves?), Skeletons are slightly more durable. Slightly. Against S6 or more, again, Skeletons have a chance of being slightly more durable. However, the Standard is the key thing to keep in mind: Without Skeletons, most VC army builds I'm aware of would have just four break points (General, BSB, Graveguard Standard). Taking even just two Skeleton blocks upgrades to a six break point, which is a lot of leeway earned for your forces.

Oh, and also because Skeletons can sorta be mass-built. Talk to anyone who played VC's last army book / Skeleton box, or even look at their model trays: If in the single digits they probably bought only two boxes, if in triple digit numbers they're possibly four, five if they really disliked conversions.

what do you mean by break points? I'm new to fantasy still learning...

AbaddonFidelis wrote:what do you mean by break points? I'm new to fantasy still learning...

There's a specific mission that has a win condition of breaking the enemy army. When an army's fortitude is equal to or less than the Breaking point, they lose. The Breaking Point is 1 for every thousand points being played(1 for 1K, 2 for 2K, etc.). The Fortitude is equal to the number of banner plus 2 for the General(so 2 banners, a BSB, a General is 5 points).

One of the missioms in 8th has break points based on how many standards you have – less standards means you are easyer to beat.

ok I get it. because skeletons can take a banner and ghouls can't the skeletons help in this mission. hmm..

AbaddonFidelis wrote:ok I get it. because skeletons can take a banner and ghouls can't the skeletons help in this mission. hmm..

Also you can turn Skeletons from mediocre to good in a fight by taking the helm of commandment. A good choice would be a mix of skeleton blocks and ghouls. Together they make a good combination.

I've had decent luck running a mix of both skeletons and ghouls. Like 1 large ghoul unit in horde formation and two small (20) skeleton units with spears. Need to experiment a bit more and want to try running two horde Ghoul units and a single Skeleton unit but so far it's been able to stand up to just about anything.

can't you use helm of commandment with ghouls?