Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I have been putting together an all comers list for the chaos dwarves and began to try and balance my army with the magic. I was wondering what lores people have found to be best against each army. As a CD I have the choice of Fire, Death, Metal, and Hashut. However, it would be nice to know from the 8 lore in the BRB which are best against which armies. In other words which ones exploit the weaknesses of each army. For instance I would say against CD I would take Metal.

mbutler132000 wrote:
I have been putting together an all comers list for the chaos dwarves and began to try and balance my army with the magic. I was wondering what lores people have found to be best against each army. As a CD I have the choice of Fire, Death, Metal, and Hashut. However, it would be nice to know from the 8 lore in the BRB which are best against which armies. In other words which ones exploit the weaknesses of each army. For instance I would say against CD I would take Metal.

Death or Shadow vs Lizardmen, Dwarf, Orc, Ogre, vampire, tombkings (basically any low init army). Metal vs Chaos Dwarf, Brets, and Warriors. Fire is good against elves. I like death for sniping beastmens low Ld characters. Life vs Skaven.

If I were running chaos dwarfs, I'd take Death. You're good leadership makes the default spell useful, and the sniping characters is great when you have warmachines to deal with the rank and file.

-Matt

As a CD player you should always choose Hashut, that lore is just insane.

 Grey Templar wrote:
As a CD player you should always choose Hashut, that lore is just insane.

Agreed, but only the Lord level wizard can take Hashut. Smaller games I have to take 1-2 Daemonsmiths and they can only take Metal, Death, or Fire.

To be honest, it's about which lore works best with your army, not which works best against your army. For example, for my Dark Elves, I'd take Shadow on my level 4, almost every time.

There are a few notable exceptions though. The obvious one is that Light is best against Daemons (and undead too, if I recall the lore attribute correctly). Fire is also best against Wood Elves and Metal works against heavily armour armies, such as WoC or Dwarves.

Of course, it really does depend on what army composition your opponent has used. For example, if you're playing Wood Elves and your opponent hasn't taken any Treekin or anything of the sort, then Fire suddenly isn't that useful anymore.

TLDR: go with the lore that suits YOU best.

+1 to what The Shadow said. You should look at which one helps out your own army best. I take metal every game with my Empire because at the end of the day only 2 spells roll against armour values, and one is the sig so I don't even have to take it. I take it for Plague of Rust, Glittering Robes, Enchanted Blades, Final Transmutation, or Transmutation of Lead. I almost always have most if not all those spells.

Similarly, everyone says Light is best against Undead and Daemons, but only 2 of the spells (one being the sig) use the Lore Attribute. The rest are buffs. If you're playing a gunline and using Light against my Undead, I laugh at my easy victory, since I know EXACTLY which 2 spells to stop each time.

Of your choices, I'd go one Metal, and another Fire. Try for the combo of +1 to hit, armour piercing from Metal with +1 to wound, flaming from Fire... it's gross (another thing I do with my Empire). The extra damage from Fire is always nice too.

 Cirronimbus wrote:

Similarly, everyone says Light is best against Undead and Daemons, but only 2 of the spells (one being the sig) use the Lore Attribute. The rest are buffs. If you're playing a gunline and using Light against my Undead, I laugh at my easy victory, since I know EXACTLY which 2 spells to stop each time.

The net also does hits. D6 hits each time you fail a strength test, which would be 2D6 hits vs undead/daemons.
If an opponent is running light, most of the builds run with ~3 casters of light.
That's 3 magic missiles doing 2D6 S6 hits, and 1-2 banishments doing 3D6 S6 hits.

If you're playing in an area with little variation of armies, or few players, it might be a good idea to work out what is best to use against an specific army.

I have found over all if you have no idea what you will be fighting Shadow is the way to go. I has the best hex's, best signature, and a great intra lore synergy with miasma and shades/pendulum.

tgf wrote:
I have found over all if you have no idea what you will be fighting Shadow is the way to go. I has the best hex's, best signature, and a great intra lore synergy with miasma and shades/pendulum.

It might have the best hexes, but I find the direct damage underwhelming. Pit of shades can be really good; it can also do nearly nothing. The problem with shadow is it's just hitting 1 unit with most of the lore. You don't get any bubble effects. Running a deathstar free chaos army, I can pretty much ignore the entire lore except for mindrazor.
What I want in a lore is 2 good spells that work against every army. I don't want my opponent going, "All I have to do is just stop _____."

Because of that, I like death magic more.
Between snipes (which kill more than just characters), the leadership debuff, and purple sun it's an effective multiple threat. The real winner for me though is soulblight. Being able to bubble it over 24" has a very positive effect for my whole army. It augments a shooting army (by wounding more often) and helps in combat as well (not being wounded as much, making armor saves easier, and wounding the opponent more often). More importantly, the lore attribute is awesome.

For the same bubble effect reason, I like light.
You've always got the choice of a good magic missile if you need it, a decent hex and the best buffs in the game, all of which you can bubble.

IMO, being able to affect multiple units is what takes a lore to the front.
How many more people would choose beast is the Higher casting Wildform gave several of your units +1 S/T?

-Matt

Personally i'd be taking death for your hero level dude. Granted I've been playing Arkhan the Black left and right.

The Hero is LD 9, which is pretty awesome for Spirit Leech. Soul blight and warmachines is also awesome. Doom and Darkness for panic, terror tests. I like Laniph over bjuna due to range issues, but YMMV. If no enemy characters make it to your battle line you are in great shape.

Also if you play VC or the new WOC low model count army, spirit leech will rock.

Don't worry about getting aspect of dreadknight, as it is poor, most of the time, you'll want the spirit leech.

Oh and purple sun.

Decent synergy with Hasut too.

Bubble Soulblight+Bubble Hatred= potential game winning

D&D + subjugation- pretty sweet.

For the record, fire magic is surprisingly in effective against wood elves. At least no more then other magic missiles. This is because while our big trees are flammable, they are also BIG. And with fire magic being restricted to str 4 its no autowin, against treekin it might work (wound on 5's, 5 + save) is wont against treemen (wound on 6', 4 + save). Not to mention wood elves are very good at dispelling with wand of wych elm and clusters of radiants, so not game braking. I'd hate fighting life a lot more, its such a good lore! Also i dont like it when tree's hit ME back!

 ALEXisAWESOME wrote:
For the record, fire magic is surprisingly in effective against wood elves. At least no more then other magic missiles. This is because while our big trees are flammable, they are also BIG. And with fire magic being restricted to str 4 its no autowin, against treekin it might work (wound on 5's, 5 + save) is wont against treemen (wound on 6', 4 + save). Not to mention wood elves are very good at dispelling with wand of wych elm and clusters of radiants, so not game braking. I'd hate fighting life a lot more, its such a good lore! Also i dont like it when tree's hit ME back!

Usually you can catch an opponent off guard once with flaming sword. Have the wizard cast it on his own unit, and he gets +1 to wound with his spells.
The D3 bonus for kindle flame is nice.
Dark elves do really well with fire. Between the knife (bonus power dice) power of darkness (makes power dice), the Darkstar cloak (+1 power die) and Kindle flame, you can generate some pretty impressive magic phases while starting with very little. Don't forget to bring the ruby ring.

-Matt

HawaiiMatt wrote:

 ALEXisAWESOME wrote:
For the record, fire magic is surprisingly in effective against wood elves. At least no more then other magic missiles. This is because while our big trees are flammable, they are also BIG. And with fire magic being restricted to str 4 its no autowin, against treekin it might work (wound on 5's, 5 + save) is wont against treemen (wound on 6', 4 + save). Not to mention wood elves are very good at dispelling with wand of wych elm and clusters of radiants, so not game braking. I'd hate fighting life a lot more, its such a good lore! Also i dont like it when tree's hit ME back!

Usually you can catch an opponent off guard once with flaming sword. Have the wizard cast it on his own unit, and he gets +1 to wound with his spells.
The D3 bonus for kindle flame is nice.
Dark elves do really well with fire. Between the knife (bonus power dice) power of darkness (makes power dice), the Darkstar cloak (+1 power die) and Kindle flame, you can generate some pretty impressive magic phases while starting with very little. Don't forget to bring the ruby ring.

-Matt

In a standard 2400 point game, I would still rather have a Lvl 4 with Shadow and a Lvl 2 with Metal for my Dark Elves. Shadow just synergises with the army brilliantly and metal is great against heavily armoured enemies that our massed low strength hits can't take out. Okkam's can't solve everything, after all. In larger games though, I do like taking a Fire Mage.