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Hello all,

I've been out of the game for a bit and I'm deciding which army to go with. For the record, I've played WoC (Tzeench) most of the time(75%), dwarves (25%) and a couple games of skaven. Those armies are gone and I'm thinking of what to play next.

On one hand I don't want to just play l'armée de fromage , but on the other hand I want to try and win a tourney or two as well. Fun is also important!!

In no specific order...

Vampire Counts:
One difference I want to do this time around in play some tourney's, and from what I've read these guys appearently aren't great in said tourney's. Are they so bad that they're useless? I'm not too worried about the range problem, and I do like the skelly refills. Last I played you needed spells to get the skellies moving anywhere, not sure if it's still like this. I loved when I played Tzeench with magic out the yin-yang but when you're backed up by skellies that's a whole different story!

Beastmen:
Yes, two of my top choices are two of the worst tourney armies and I want to play in tourney's. Call me a sucker for the underdog.
My thought here is (compared to Orcs and Skaven anyway) that the beasts can NOT take a charge at all, but Orcs and Skaven can. To counter, the beasts are huge "IF" they get the charge off since defense = 0 and offense is usually better then par. Maybe thinking of a horde varient (gors, ungors, bestigors, chariots) and a monster varient (mino's, giants, etc).

Skaven:
Play well to my temperment and I really liked playing them when I did. Not too well versed in horde armies (see above) but difference is good. From what I read great in tourney's but have to be careful of . Nice magic, not much shooty but more then zero, which isn't bad (I was fond of warp fire throwers and jezzials). I know gun-lines win but that's boring as all hell to me. Anyway...

High Elves: (Wood Elves?)
Pure finesse. WoC and Dwarves are almost finesse free, so good change of pace this way. Again, maybe not strong in tourney's. Biggest concern here is the appearent lack of love for shooty right now, as although I hate gun-lines, I did like it before when you could have 2 RBTers and say 3 units of 20 archers 2 ranks deep that can all fire (that rule still around?). Still, one of the more Cerebral armies.

Looking for thoughts. If possible, don't just say Army A > Army B, some thoughts as to why appriciated.

Skaven are generally fun to play, although I can't stand some of the older models.
Vampires are getting a redo next year, but Wood Elves won't be done for quite a while.
Apparently, the Beastmen are underrated since they were a 7th edition book written for 8th edition.

Woc is good times imo.

You may lack shooty so you have to make sure that your magic and combat phase go well.

The army is over all fun and can be really competitive if you want and the models are great.

I love Beastmen, personally. Partly because I love the aesthetic, but also because I like the way they play.

I feel that which army (of those you listed) you choose should come down to which phases you want to do the best in.

Beastmen do the best in the Magic and Combat phases, but they can also be pretty darn good in the movement phase. They are above average in all three of these phases. Their core choices are great (IMO), and Bestigors are the best. Ok, well, mathematically Ironguts are slightly better, but that's beside the point.

Vampires, I believe, work best when you focus on movement and magic. Partly because their magic helps them move. They do have some units that are very deadly in combat, such as Grave Guard with flaming killing blow attacks and regen (sick but costly) and Terrorgheists.

Skaven (another army I play) tend to do best when you focus on Magic and Shooting. The most competitive lists I've seen throw slaves at units long enough to shoot/magic them to death. However, if you build your list right (mostly with plague monks and the furnace) they can do quite well in the Combat phase.

Elves...I know nothing about elves. They're sickly, wan creatures that should be shot on sight.

One thing that I believe is worth noting is that Beastmen are much more of a finesse army than they seem at first. One of the reasons why they don't get much love at tournaments is because on of the phases they do better in is also the hardest phase to master; movement. If you can master movement with Beastmen and do well with them, I believe you can do well with any army.

Anyways, go beasts

cowpow16 wrote:Woc is good times imo.

Okay dude, but he said he already played it and is thinking of what to play next.

VC I would wait and see if they redo it. Especially if you get new models. Or if other models get discontinued. Hate to invest in something that's gone.

Beastmen I think are very limited. There's a few builds out there that are okay.

Skaven are very good and can go a lot of ways. They also have a lot of character. But they're dirty rats. I just can't get into horde builds. And fur.

I just got the High Elves book today for something to read. They're pretty silly good. Incredibly good magic. Ward 4 HA infantry(!). GW users with ASF(!). In fact, million year old granny high elves with cancer still have 5 initiative and always strike first. The race has about 700000 extra power dice per magic phase. Some of the most broken Special Characters in the game. Some of the best magic items in the game. 3 dragons, cuz 1 isn't enough. They're just missing some beefy war machines and (IMHO) really great Core. But I was chuckling to myself as I read their magic items. Even if you didn't take Teclis, you can still poo all over everyone else's magic phase. If they weren't just so goody goody and had those ridiculous coneheads...

Beastmen aren't as bad as people make them out to be, barring tourney level lists they can give most armies an even fight.

They can do okay, but they can do okay with only a few configurations. You have to admit there's whole slews of units you will never use in pretty much any circumstance other than to say you did.