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Hi guys, I have recently decided to take a break from 40k and start a warhammer army. After a hard time choosing, (I was stuck between these guys and Tomb Kings) I finally decided on Vampire counts
. Now, I am beginning to collect the army, and realized, I dont know jack.

I wanted to start with troops first, skeletons zombies, ghouls. I searched around the web for a while though could not really find a comprehensive comparison for them.
From what i saw, aparently zombies are the best to spam, but im not sure.

So really, which of them are best to start with/ to get? What is the role/ tactics for each? How should i equip them? And any other general tactic to use with the troops would be very helpful

Thanks a lot if you give me an answer, though if you can't, ill just search the web some more.

Okfirst things first goodf choice on a Fantasy army
next thing is:
zombies are tarpit troops no point expecting them to do anything other than die and tie dowm an enemy unit. but that depends on your unit size... ( zombies are something you start in small numbers then rasie more as you go tho)

Skellies are more durable and have the added ability to actually kill things, i use spears for the extra ranks support, but sword and board skellies last longer. ( i run 30-40 models per skellie unit)

ghouls are VC's killing core poison is great and 2 attacks per model is fantastic downside is no armour.. (i run them in a 40 pack 7 wide)

anything else you wanted to know?

Thank you a lot Interrogator-Chaplin for the helpful and clear answer.

I have one more question:
would you suggest me buying a battalion box set for a nice core to my army? Or are the corpse cart/ dire wolves not worth it?

No worries

well thats how i went about it, i use the dire wolves for chaff/ redirectors. i rarely use the corpse cart tho...

have you decided if you'll use necro's mainly or vamps?
because if you want a good looking necro a few conversions on the chaos socerer makes for a great looking necro i'll post a pick up later tonight

I really, really love the Corpse Cart model and have been debating trying to include one in my army. I also really like the Balefire upgrade to it, and it's the cheaper of the two available upgrades, which kind-of astounds me (it seems way better than the Unholy Lodestone).

The problem with the Corpse Cart (and I hope some others can provide their input on this) is the following:

The main benefit to having the Cart seems to be its special ability, which is to provide the ASF bubble when it's hit with an augment spell. The problem is that it's very slow, which makes it difficult to include your strong units within that bubble. This is especially considering the fact that the most commonly cast augment spell is Invocation of Nehek. This spell is primarily used to keep your core units alive, which means it will often be cast within range of those core units, and these units are NOT the units that you really want to get the ASF bubble.

So, if the Cart wants the bubble, it has to stay within range of IoN, and this almost forces it to stay close to your Core units, which often keeps your stronger units (who would really benefit from the ASF bubble) too far away to benefit.

I think I'm going to be sticking my corpse cart on a 60mm by 100mm base (with more zombies) and having it count as 15 zombies in the zombie horde.

It works in a creeping death list (lots of infantry, with lots of zombies, and lots of vampires for hitting power and invoking), but that is about it. If you need to move quickly at the enemy, leave the cart at home.

-Matt

I honestly thought zombies were made much cheaper with the new army book. Then again skeletons got a whole lot cheaper too. It's definitely worth noting that zombies and skeletons are pretty much the price of skaven-slaves and clanrats except both have fear and both can be raised back constantly. Personally i'd probably use a zombie army as base considering the new rules but whatever (they have toughness 3 and str 3 now if i remember and both are up from 2). Ghouls cost a lot more than they used to.

I have a question. Are crypt horrors any good? I may be a long way off from doing vampire counts but i got the book and magic cards when they respectively came out. Considering crypt horrors they somehow interested me. If i ever do a vampire army i figure going for a double death shriek ghoul king on terrorgheist (he'd be using that special sword). The idea of doing that seems fun to me.

 Interrogator-Chaplin wrote:
No worries

well thats how i went about it, i use the dire wolves for chaff/ redirectors. i rarely use the corpse cart tho...

have you decided if you'll use necro's mainly or vamps?
because if you want a good looking necro a few conversions on the chaos socerer makes for a great looking necro i'll post a pick up later tonight

Sorry for taking so long to post again, but yea, im thinking of going mainly vampires.

Considering the new megaforce came out for them, im probably going to get the vampire lord on a zombie dragon. Is it any good?

I think it's generally viewed as not being that good, primarily because there are so many other options that are better.

 Tangent wrote:
I think it's generally viewed as not being that good, primarily because there are so many other options that are better.

Aww, well is the alternative thing you can build it as any good?

If its also meh, I'll just build it has a zombie dragon for kicks

Yeah, the other thing that you can build it as is the Terrorgeist, which is seen as one of the best units in the book. I'm not sure if the megaforce will "allow" you to build it as a Terrorgeist, though - maybe by purposely not including the Geist sprues or something. I've never cracked into a megaforce before, so I couldn't say for sure, but the reason I bring it up is because the megaforce also contains 3 Vargheists, but the Vargheist kit allows them to also be built as Crypt Horrors and the megaforce doens't even mention that.

Awesome, then i'll build it as a terrorgeist

I'm pretty sure the mega force does give the optionbuild them as each one, bc it says mortis engine, and shows a coven throne. (also, why would they go out of their way to make something worse)

Also, is that the Terrorgeist with ghoul king?
Or the rare unit terrorgeist?

Both. You can take a Terrorgeist as a mount for either a Ghoul King or a Vampire Lord (I think) or by itself with no rider as a rare choice.

Cool, but i was asking which one is better? with the rider or without?

 Tangent wrote:
Both. You can take a Terrorgeist as a mount for either a Ghoul King or a Vampire Lord (I think) or by itself with no rider as a rare choice.

Just the ghoul king

Remulus wrote:
Cool, but i was asking which one is better? with the rider or without?

There really isn't a "better" configuration per'say, a ghoul king on a terrorgheist will kill anything he gets into CC with. However if you mount a ghoul king on a terrorgheist it will cost 485pts before any other upgrades which is almost your entire "lords" point allotment in a 2000pt game. Thats alot of points to add more killingness to a lord that is already pretty deadly. Plus there are several drawbacks, such as being a cannon magnet, and your army not being able to march because the general is too far away.

So people generally run the ghoul king on foot in a unit since he's a CC powerhouse with the right items. Terrorgheists are often taken as rare choices and used for their scream attack and as maneuverable flankers.

Got it, that's what ill run then, ty all for the help

Yeah, didn't have my book right on hand and couldn't remember if you could put a Vampire Lord on one or not. What's the main advantage of running the Ghoul King over the Vampire Lord? Consider both on foot in a unit. Is it because the Ghoul King starts with a ward save (regeneration, right?) which allows you to use all of your magic item allotment on weapons, whereas the Vampire Lord needs to spend some of those points on survivability?

Ghoul kings are considered worse the vampier lords. However, I think they are kick ass! He is a cheap combat machine. Give if you give him a magical weapon he looses poison. Both giving him one and leave him as be are OK options. He cannot buy armour, but if you get him a dragon flame gem he gets 2+ ward vs flaming! Give him vampirick powers to allow him to hit like a brick. If you are worried about his saves I do belive one of the rare entries makes close regeneration one point better? While a regular vampier will outlast him, nobody can kill as mutch as he can for as cheap as he can.

Also, I know some builds try to get as many terorr gheist as possible to make them fast kill things with low leadership, and they sue a ghoul king as their armylord.

The mega force is actually a pretty good deal. Get a couple more boxes of ghouls, run the ghoul king from the Terrorgheist set on foot, and you have a pretty decent 2000 point army.

I've used both the ghoul king and the vamp lord and both are great. The vamp is a little more survivable, but the ghoul king is bargain priced for what he gets. Makes it easier o fit both a Necromancer lord and ghoul king in a 2k list.

 Ozymandias wrote:
The mega force is actually a pretty good deal. Get a couple more boxes of ghouls, run the ghoul king from the Terrorgheist set on foot, and you have a pretty decent 2000 point army.

I've used both the ghoul king and the vamp lord and both are great. The vamp is a little more survivable, but the ghoul king is bargain priced for what he gets. Makes it easier o fit both a Necromancer lord and ghoul king in a 2k list.

Yah im prolly going to get the mega force for the holidays, and then latter prolly get a battalion set, for the extra 20 ghouls, skeletons, and wolves to round out the army and some vampires.

ooooh but then i probably wouldnt use the second corpse cart, and dont really want the direwolves which would make the battalion not a deal.

*Dire Wolves are a good core choise. Runn them cheap on the flansk and have them chew up warmachines turn 3-4.