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I wanted to try a dwarf army that was a little bit different. I wanted the army to have zero warmachines and also try and shut down my opponents magic phase.

Let me know your thoughts. (Also, let me know if this army is legal because I always seem to mess the runes up somehow. I've already had to edit once because of that!!!)

L: Dwarf Lord on Shield bearers with runes of Smiting, Resistance, Might and Stone - 295 points
H: Runesmith with Great Weapon and Runes of Gromril and Spell Eating - 149
H: Runesmith with Runes of Spellbreaking and Spell Eating - 145
H: Thane with BSB and Runes of Stone, Cleaving and Master Rune of Swiftness - 105
C: 39 Warriors with Great Weapons (inc full command) - 415
C: 38 Warriors with Shields (inc full command) - 367
S: 38 Hammerers (inc full command) - 486

Lord with Hammerers, Great Weapon Runesmith with Great Weapons and other Heroes with Shields.

Thanks

If I read your list right you have no ranged weapons, and are entirely M3. So your opponent has total control over whether and how to engage your units. They'll probably:

1) Irresistable force you to death to get past your anti-magic
2) Shoot you
3) Gang up on your units

If you wanna stick to your posted themes you might look at options which make you more maneuverable such as: Runelord w Anvil, BSB w Strollaz rune, Miners, Rangers, (Master?) Rune of Challenge, or even a gyrocopter.

War machines are essentially mandatory the way I see it. Even it if it just one Cannon and one Organ Gun, it will still help a great deal.

As for this list, I can't see it being very competitive, as infantry based Dwarf armies usually aren't, sadly. However, there are some changes that can be made to make a tougher, even if it isn't as good as an army with war machines,

I would take out the Runesmiths, and put in a Runelord with and Anvil of Doom. Taking no war machines leaves ample points to spent elsewhere, and that basically means on an Anvil. It will also deal great damage to enemies, and allow you some additional movement on the battlefield.

Take Hammerers! Warriors are excellent of course, but I would suggest taking a small unit to guard a flank, and taking units of GW Quarrellerrs instead to fill up your core. They are great at shooting and will hold their own in combat, especially with a stand and shoot. Then fill up your Special with Hammerers and more Hammerers. They will smash anything aside and be such a pain to kill, especially if the Lord is one of the units(which he will be) and near the other. I am a huge fan of double Hammerers, and always see it to victory!

Keep the Dwarf Lord on Shieldbearers. 2 extra WS5 S5 attacks and a better armour save for 25pts, yes! Leave them with the 38 Hammerers to give a mighty block of 40, or do whatever else really, but I would suggest keeping the front rank with 6-7. (Though Hammerers horde can work well through a quick reform.)

The Runes for the Lord look good, if you have extra points left over, consider giving a Hammerers unit a banner of somekind, maybe RoSlowness. Also for the Thane, consider giving him the MRoChallenging, and stick him a unit as a redirector, flank charge the enemy with the other Hammerers or Quarrellers, and that'll be the end of that.

Another different tactic is to take GW Quarrellers set them up in front, and have Slayers lay in wait behind them under cover, until the time is right and they can run into battle. It doesn't always work great, though I have used this tactic to success on a few occasions. But this is not the best way to utilize infantry in the army.

It is sad that Dwarves cannot be a competitive infantry based army, as I think they should be, or at least be able to. But these thing should help.

You might have fun with this list, but you probably won't be winning the any games, War-machines are a dwarf staple for success. Bringing a knife to a gunfight

 pities2004 wrote:
You might have fun with this list, but you probably won't be winning the any games, War-machines are a dwarf staple for success. Bringing a knife to a gunfight

Yeah this pretty much says it. The closest thing to an infantry based Dwarf list that is competitive, that I have used is a Bugman's Rangers list. And there are still war machines in it.