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I just started playing Age of Sigmar, and I am not sure how to build a good Ossiarch Bonereapers army. I was wondering what I should buy and how I should build my army. Also, you can post the best army and argue over what is really the best.

You should definitely request this get moved to the AoS section of the forum. You’ll get more foot traffic for it in its proper location.

I hear Mortek Guard, the catapults and Petrafex (+1 to armywide saves) is a good starting point.

Moved to the AoS forum

The meta is Mortek Guard with Harvesters. Note that if you run this as Petrifax Elite too you may struggle to get games, it's that good.

It's good, but not game-winning good. That army composition is incredibly durable and strong in melee, but it is not a game-winner. It's slow as dirt and needs to stick together. There's few missions it has an advantage in.

That being said, I'm not going to understate the durability, sustainability and raw power of Mortek Guard and Harvesters.

When building your army from the ground up, pick one of two Battleline options then your Heros, then add the extra bits on to flesh out your build.

1) Mortek Guard with Soul Mason, Boneshaper, Liege-Kavalos or Katakros are common.

2) Kavalos Deathriders need to have Liege's with them, to keep up with their speed and be able to provide the necessary buffs.

3) mix of Mortek Guard and Deathriders, probably won't be as strong due to having a less cohesive force

If you take a Mortek Crawler catapult, you should take a Soulmason.
If you take bricks of Morteks Guard, you should take Harvesters and Boneshapers.
These suggestions come from a more competitive viewpoint. The army is still fun and reasonably strong with the less-optimal but cool choices, like Morghasts, Necropolis Stalkers and Immortis Guard.

Don't forget, you can include Nagash or Arkhan in your Ossiarch lists.

 Thadin wrote:
It's good, but not game-winning good. That army composition is incredibly durable and strong in melee, but it is not a game-winner. It's slow as dirt and needs to stick together. There's few missions it has an advantage in.

Yes, you can beat it on objectives. It really depends on the goal the OP has in mind here though. If they want an army to have fun at their local store with playing somewhat casual games but still have a decent win rate, I would advise against doing the full Mortek Guard and Harvesters list. Because some armies do not have the tools to fight it at all, and even if you do it is not fun to play against.

I don't even have fun playing the Mortek Brick + Harvester list when I'm winning with it. It rarely feels like a close game, if the enemy plays to have fun and smash models together. I just don't die, I fight back, delete units and slowly trudge forward. The only tactical thinking I need to do is deciding when and how to use my Relentless Discipline points throughout the battle-round. I much prefer playing with some Morghasts or Stalkers or Immortis Guard, playing a faster and more aggro style.

Yeah, that's what I would advise. Sure, take a few Mortek Guard and maybe a Harvester as a solid core - but then make the other half of your army the fun cool stuff like Stalkers and Morghasts. Should still be strong enough for an average shop scene, and it'll be much more fun for everyone involved!

Throw together whatever you want. It's really difficult to make an OBR list that is truly bad. If you struggle to win games switch to Petrifax since it is a flat upgrade to the entire army regardless of unit choice. If you still struggle to win games you are probably up against someone with a properly run T1 army (Tzeentch, Slaanesh, Skaven, FEC) and there's nothing you can do.

I'm also (slowly) building a Bonereapers army. I'm probably going to start with the Morteks as I can paint them faster (and still have them look decent). One question I have is, should I bring 2 40 man blocks with Spears or 3 20 man blocks with Swords?

Also, what are ideal numbers of Stalkers and Morghasts to have on hand? I've got 3 and 2 respectively, and I know they can deal good damage, but a) I don't see why I would bring more of them over more Morteks, Deathriders, or a Harvester or Catapult and b) All of mine are going to be unique in a way (Peking Opera Masks), and I don't have enough ideas for paint schemes for more of either.

You hit the nail on the head, Stalkers and Morghasts are cool and can dish out solid damage, but they're just outshined by Mortek Guard. They're the unit you bring to spice your list up, look cool and have some fun with them.

As well, I think the general consensus is that even when you're in a big brick of Guard, you should take Swords. Swords with rend are lethal. Optionally, you can take a 40 strong unit with spears under Petrifex and still get the Rend... Or bump the Swords up to -2 Rend which is tasty indeed.

Edit: To add an anecdote. Sometimes I'll run a list with a 4-strong Morghast Unit. Halberds are the best option. Some rough math-hammering with them and an easily-granted full compliment of buffs (+1 attack, reroll 1s to hit, +1 to hit from Liege relic) they dealt 30(ish, don't remember exactly from when I did these tests) to an Abhorrent Ghoul King on Terrorghiest, that was also loaded up with buffs that my friend commonly takes, namely the additional FNP safe. You can toss the Petrifex command ability for an additional -1 rend on their Halberds if the target has a 4+ or better save. Reduce, or entirely remove their save if they're a 4+ or worse.

Harbingers and Archai are both good, but as Thadin mentioned halberds are strictly better (GW has apparently yet to hire a warscroll designer that understands algebra).

Ossiarchs are really easy because they are a small army and don't really have any bad choices as such. An army even placed really well at a recent event which was mostly Deathriders. So basically anything works well with them.


The key things to realise are:
1) They are slow. Whilst you can boost speed, their native base speeds are pretty slow, especially for things like mortek guard. This means that they are not "as good" at reacting to game changing situations as other armies can be. You can't just change plans half way through the game easily.

2) They are tough. Even without Petrifax sub-army (+1 save on all units) they are tough; with it they are tougher still. A lot of the time you will win fights, but it might take time. They do hit hard, but not outrageously so; its more that they are very durable. Throw a harvester into the mix and guard can keep going and not die and keep advancing.

3) As a result of the above they are very much like a rolling wall of death. Many times opponents won't out-kill them unless they are smart enough to avoid the troops and go for the buff and support units first.

4) Furthermore because they are not as fast nor reactionary they rely on the player having a sound strategy for the game. Because you're not fast to react you've got to pick your objectives and targets and go for them and keep going for them. Not letting the enemy distract you or tarpit/slow you down. Because chances are they'll secure objectives first so you've got to commit to your plan and trust in the tough units to fight their way through.

5) They don't generate command points, but have their own system. They can use more of them, but at the same time their units rely on them a lot more. Again this is about thinking ahead and planning your moves and choices.



Ossiarchs reward a player who can plan it out and stick to the plan. They are a tough and hard hitting army that relies on those traits to make up for being generally slower than most others. Often as not you'll hve the opponent secure points earlier so you'll have an uphill struggle to win "faster" on points rather than get bogged down in a killing field.
Opponents who don't have their own plan and who rely mostly on blindly charging in can find them hard to fight because that's basically what Ossiarchs want - they want to be in combat and they don't really care who attacks first, they are durable (by and large).
What they hate is when you sneak around and flank them - hitting harvesters and leaders and catapults to put them out of action first.



They are also an expensive army in points (in models though they are very nicely priced). This means, again, that you're not going to have all that much on the table to react with. What you have is great, so you've got to use it well.

They aren't a slow army; they are a mid-speed army. I have watched a lot of people go up against OBR treating them like a slow army and losing because of it. D6+8" run move is not shabby, and that's just the infantry. They also aren't particularly 'planny' as an army. Discipline refreshes every turn and you can't stockpile it, abilities are used per phase so you don't have to use them in your turn in anticipation of an opponent's turn. The petrifax bonus rend ability can even be used after the opponent rolls their saves, that's how much non-planning is required. They are a point-and-click army through and through, which is also their biggest weakness because their ability to counter-play enemy shenanigans is limited.

I say this based on first-hand observation at LVO.

Well, kinda, they are 4" with the ability to get +3" and +1" for run. At times they are 5+D6, as its 1 unit can move +3" for each hero you have.

What would be a good Bonereapers army that has a lot of offense, a lot of elite units, is fun to play, and if possible decent speed (and also that Petrifax thing)

IMO, fun to play is almost all on what you are up against. Most of AoS will either crumble to OBR or roll over OBR and only the minority will put up a flight such that the game isn't a foregone conclusion from the lists.

But what are some elite units that are really made for the offense?

Liege-Kavalos Hero, Morghasts, Necropolis Stalkers, Kavalos Death-riders. Those are your quicker offensive options.

What should I add to that?

Awesomest_Dude wrote:
What should I add to that?

Why not get the book and read each unit to see what you like. everything int he book is playable. Rule of cool

Yeah Ossiarchs are so small a faction that they really don't have any bad choices.

Even when you've got weapon choices like spears and blades for the deathriders and mortek guard; both perform very similarly and the differences between them are quite minor.

https://warminiatures.wordpress.com/2019/12/08/ossiarch-bonereapers-spears-vs-swords/

I did the maths on them and basically swords out-perform spears on both units unless the spear lets you get more units into closecombat range. So on mortek guard 30 or 40 model units have more chance to work well with spears; whilst with deathriders its less clear cut since the bases are much longer; but again likely only units of 15 would benefit.

Otherwise swords give you better overall performance.

That said, the differences are marginal not massive.

Spears on Deathriders also are a bit better if you're running the Kavalos Lance warscroll battalion, since you get to retreat->charge if within 12" of the Liege at the start of their charge attempt and the lance triggers on a 5+ instead of a 6+ for Nadirite Weapons(4+ instead of 5+ with Empower Nadirite Weapons)..

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
They aren't a slow army; they are a mid-speed army. I have watched a lot of people go up against OBR treating them like a slow army and losing because of it. D6+8" run move is not shabby, and that's just the infantry. They also aren't particularly 'planny' as an army. Discipline refreshes every turn and you can't stockpile it, abilities are used per phase so you don't have to use them in your turn in anticipation of an opponent's turn. The petrifax bonus rend ability can even be used after the opponent rolls their saves, that's how much non-planning is required. They are a point-and-click army through and through, which is also their biggest weakness because their ability to counter-play enemy shenanigans is limited.

I say this based on first-hand observation at LVO.

Agreed. OBR are not slow. Sure, Mortek Guard have a Move of 4", but they don't care about charging or being charged all that often. More often than not Mortek Guard are just going to Run. If a Bonereaper opponent wants to charge Mortek Guard they better be prepared to really hurt them (not that easy), take a whollop and stay standing or water the grass in blood with their own troops. Worst case scenario, they get make Run first turn (12-14"), get the double turn and either Run again (covering 24-28" if not stopped) or Move another 4" and make a long Charge. That's well into most deployment zone setups. As mentioned, the OBR players I have experienced don't even care if their Guard are the ones charging most of the time as long as they are holding the piece of the table they want.

As for moving objectives games, Mortek Guard aren't the ones chasing them down (they got Deathriders or Morgasts for that). Mortek Guard are the ones either trying to predict where the objective is going to be and/or blocking the fastest path for their opponent to get their forces there depending on how much teleport is available and reliable.

Is a Cavalry Army particularly viable? I’m toying with themes in my head, and I’ve got to say an all mounted Undead army definitely appeals!

A Cavalry force won/placed well at one of the tournaments recently.

I also just got my order of hussar wings which means I can now built this:

15 spear and shield Deathriders
15 spear and shield Deathriders

10 sword and shield Deathriders
10 sword and shield Deathriders
10 sword and shield Deathriders