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My friend recently added a bunch of Stormcasts to his Seraphon list and we had the most one-sided game we have ever had. These are the lists:

(We don't min/max, we are pretty casual, usually just throwing out models we have painted)


His - Stormcast/Seraphon:

Lord-Celestant on Dracoth - General
Lord Relictor
Saurus Oldblood on Carnosaur

2x5 Liberators
3 Retributors
3 Prosecutors

1 Stegadon
1 Bastiladon
12 Saurus Knights
3 Terradon Riders

1997pts in PPC

My list:

Mannfred, Mortarch of Night
Wight King w Tomb blade
Varghulf Courtier
Crypt Haunter Courtier

5 Crypt Horrors
3 Crypt Flayers
5 Black Knights
10 Grave Guard

20 Crypt Ghouls
20 Skeleton Warriors

The game was over at turn 3 with him completely destroying me. A few lucky throws of course, got Mannfred on turn 2 with the Bastiladon Solar Flare and a charge from the Carnosaur. But still, it wasn't even remotely close.

Edit: Should also add: Was my list really bad?

According to the GHB, his list clocks in at 2200 pts and yours at 1940 pts. So, that's one thing. I recommend using the GHB as your guideline for point values, but that's just my opinion.

Secondly, Mannfred isn't as great as his points cost would suggest. For LESS points, I could field an Abhorrant Ghoul King on Terrorgheist with more efficiency, more effectiveness and more synergy with my other units. I know you said that you guys are just kind of casual, and that's all well and good, but his list seems more competitive than yours. Flesh Eaters require a good amount of synergy, otherwise they crumble. The Varghulf and Crypt Haunter are good, but I'm not sure they're enough to really keep the Flesh Eater part of your army chugging along. I would remove Mannfred and replace all non-Flesh Eater Courts with Flesh Eater Courts models and try again. I don't think his list is unbeatable by any means, but your list lacks the utility to deal with some of his units.

 puma713 wrote:
According to the GHB, his list clocks in at 2200 pts and yours at 1940 pts. So, that's one thing. I recommend using the GHB as your guideline for point values, but that's just my opinion.

Secondly, Mannfred isn't as great as his points cost would suggest. For LESS points, I could field an Abhorrant Ghoul King on Terrorgheist with more efficiency, more effectiveness and more synergy with my other units. I know you said that you guys are just kind of casual, and that's all well and good, but his list seems more competitive than yours. Flesh Eaters require a good amount of synergy, otherwise they crumble. The Varghulf and Crypt Haunter are good, but I'm not sure they're enough to really keep the Flesh Eater part of your army chugging along. I would remove Mannfred and replace all non-Flesh Eater Courts with Flesh Eater Courts models and try again. I don't think his list is unbeatable by any means, but your list lacks the utility to deal with some of his units.

We used PPC points which is an unofficial attempt att balance, I think. In that system i was a few points over.
But thank you for that answer, it makes sense and gives me a reason to buy more flesh eaters!
I will use my abhorrant on terrorgheist next time. Maybe a smaller game so I can go full flesh eater court

Your army has a number of solid choices that go together very poorly. You need to really pick either Flesh Eaters or not, since they don't do well with a mixed approach. PPC does have much better balance than the GHB but that doesn't mean building a list with good synergy doesn't matter. Note how your opponent has a decent mix of slow tough melee units, fast melee units, ranged support, and powerful heroes. Your list has a powerful centerpiece hero and some good support heroes, but then the troops are mixed between models that do and don't benefit from the support heroes you took, which undermines their purpose. So I think he stumbled on a strong list and you stumbled onto a weak one.

Now, on to improving things, assuming the flesh eater option. I am noticing he has a lot of smaller units then a huge blob of saurus knights. If you can deal with those knights things will be a lot easier, and I think your best solution there is to take two four-man or three three-man units of flayers to hit them all at once, with the varghulf backing them up to regenerate models and add his attack power to the mix. You are going to want at least one blob of 30 Ghouls with inspiring presence to serve as a front line meat shield the first few rounds. Take a Terrorgheist king with the command trait that buffs your death allegiance save to 5+ to help keep your poor-save Ghouls alive. Take the ring of immortality so if they kill your king he gets a second chance (after doing the explosion-of-bats from dying) but try not to let him get exposed. That said, he will be needed to counter your opponent's big heroes, and if you can go after the carnosaur first. Taking some extra blobs of basic Ghouls would be good to fill out battleline since they are very good counters to both Liberators and retributors (who don't like wasting their mortal wounds on 6+ save models) but remember that their job is mostly to die so more important things don't.

at 2000 Points I took this and it worked against a similar army very well, I tabled him by turn 4.

Mannfred, mortarch

Mourngul

Skeleton Chariots x3

Skeleton Chariots x3

Skeleton Chariots x3

blood knights x5

crypt infernal courtier

crypt flayers x3

crypt flayers x3


Blood knights flank right side...Crypt flayers plus best friend flank left. Everything else goes down the middle.

He HAS to deal with the mourngul.. its simple as that. Either he A) deals with the middle and gets flanked both sides... or B) He tries to deal with everything at once and I promise you he cant.

Obviously I am over generalizing but the list worked well for me. Chariots regen like crazy... crypt flayers regen like crazy... heck even the blood knights regen well.

My opponent tried to deal with Mannfred and the Mourngul... as he should.. and the flayers and blood knights won me the game.

Its easy to see why that list would do well though; it adds up to 2515 points in PPC (sidenote: this sort of thing is why I wouldn't rely on the GHB for balance...). Even that aside, we all know that TK Chariots and the Mourngul are among the most OP models in Matched Play.

Everyone around here uses GHB though I dont know anyone who uses PPC.

I didn't mean to say you should use one or the other, I was referencing PPC because that is what the OP is using and making a general comment on overall balance. Apologies if I came off differently.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Your army has a number of solid choices that go together very poorly. You need to really pick either Flesh Eaters or not, since they don't do well with a mixed approach. PPC does have much better balance than the GHB but that doesn't mean building a list with good synergy doesn't matter. Note how your opponent has a decent mix of slow tough melee units, fast melee units, ranged support, and powerful heroes. Your list has a powerful centerpiece hero and some good support heroes, but then the troops are mixed between models that do and don't benefit from the support heroes you took, which undermines their purpose. So I think he stumbled on a strong list and you stumbled onto a weak one.

Now, on to improving things, assuming the flesh eater option. I am noticing he has a lot of smaller units then a huge blob of saurus knights. If you can deal with those knights things will be a lot easier, and I think your best solution there is to take two four-man or three three-man units of flayers to hit them all at once, with the varghulf backing them up to regenerate models and add his attack power to the mix. You are going to want at least one blob of 30 Ghouls with inspiring presence to serve as a front line meat shield the first few rounds. Take a Terrorgheist king with the command trait that buffs your death allegiance save to 5+ to help keep your poor-save Ghouls alive. Take the ring of immortality so if they kill your king he gets a second chance (after doing the explosion-of-bats from dying) but try not to let him get exposed. That said, he will be needed to counter your opponent's big heroes, and if you can go after the carnosaur first. Taking some extra blobs of basic Ghouls would be good to fill out battleline since they are very good counters to both Liberators and retributors (who don't like wasting their mortal wounds on 6+ save models) but remember that their job is mostly to die so more important things don't.

Very interesting post!
I've just stayed away from Flayers in general since hes only bought Seraphon until now. Meaning their ranged attack has been useless until his Stormcasts arrived.

Taking yours and puma713s suggestions I'm ordering more flesh eaters to make sure I can put together a full 2K army of flesh eater courts.

Honestly I would go into every game expecting the Flayers' shooting to do nothing and be pleasantly surprised if it does something. Its unreliable and really just a small side-benefit to what they really do, which is speed and damage output.

Good luck to you sir!

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I didn't mean to say you should use one or the other, I was referencing PPC because that is what the OP is using and making a general comment on overall balance. Apologies if I came off differently.

No worries man I didn't take it that way. I was just saying that's all me and my local group uses once it got released. It is interesting to see though how PPC ranks that list so much higher than GHB did. I am not completely convinced the GHB balances things out, but at least its better than what we had before which was nothing. The homebrew balancing was all great but GW really needed to produce their own.

When I play my dwarfs vs. my friends Seraphon he always utterly smashes me. His list even just feels more OP than mine when you look at whats on the table. Seraphon in general though just have so much synergy its ridiculous.

I didn't feel bad even for a moment when my Death army trollololed them. Mourngul and all.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Cayhn wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Your army has a number of solid choices that go together very poorly. You need to really pick either Flesh Eaters or not, since they don't do well with a mixed approach. PPC does have much better balance than the GHB but that doesn't mean building a list with good synergy doesn't matter. Note how your opponent has a decent mix of slow tough melee units, fast melee units, ranged support, and powerful heroes. Your list has a powerful centerpiece hero and some good support heroes, but then the troops are mixed between models that do and don't benefit from the support heroes you took, which undermines their purpose. So I think he stumbled on a strong list and you stumbled onto a weak one.

Now, on to improving things, assuming the flesh eater option. I am noticing he has a lot of smaller units then a huge blob of saurus knights. If you can deal with those knights things will be a lot easier, and I think your best solution there is to take two four-man or three three-man units of flayers to hit them all at once, with the varghulf backing them up to regenerate models and add his attack power to the mix. You are going to want at least one blob of 30 Ghouls with inspiring presence to serve as a front line meat shield the first few rounds. Take a Terrorgheist king with the command trait that buffs your death allegiance save to 5+ to help keep your poor-save Ghouls alive. Take the ring of immortality so if they kill your king he gets a second chance (after doing the explosion-of-bats from dying) but try not to let him get exposed. That said, he will be needed to counter your opponent's big heroes, and if you can go after the carnosaur first. Taking some extra blobs of basic Ghouls would be good to fill out battleline since they are very good counters to both Liberators and retributors (who don't like wasting their mortal wounds on 6+ save models) but remember that their job is mostly to die so more important things don't.

Very interesting post!
I've just stayed away from Flayers in general since hes only bought Seraphon until now. Meaning their ranged attack has been useless until his Stormcasts arrived.

Taking yours and puma713s suggestions I'm ordering more flesh eaters to make sure I can put together a full 2K army of flesh eater courts.

Take 2 squads of flayers and a courtier and I am telling you, you wont even care about their shooting. They are so mobile and resourceful its insane. It takes a ridiculous amount of attention to completely wipe them off the board, much more than their worth. When your courtier gets to roll 6 dice and you bring back entire models on a 5+ and all of a sudden each unit gets to revive 1-2 a turn your opponent will quickly realize the mess hes in.

 Rezyn wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I didn't mean to say you should use one or the other, I was referencing PPC because that is what the OP is using and making a general comment on overall balance. Apologies if I came off differently.

No worries man I didn't take it that way. I was just saying that's all me and my local group uses once it got released. It is interesting to see though how PPC ranks that list so much higher than GHB did. I am not completely convinced the GHB balances things out, but at least its better than what we had before which was nothing. The homebrew balancing was all great but GW really needed to produce their own.

When I play my dwarfs vs. my friends Seraphon he always utterly smashes me. His list even just feels more OP than mine when you look at whats on the table. Seraphon in general though just have so much synergy its ridiculous.

I didn't feel bad even for a moment when my Death army trollololed them. Mourngul and all.

It's not his Seraphon, it's the dwarfs. Dispossessed are very overcosted in the GHB, their infantry are particularly bad for their point cost which cripples the army since its based on them.