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I was thinking the bows because the Syl have a lack of ranged, but I am slightly put off by the low hit chance.

Can't decide whether scythes or greatswords are better, is the loss of an attack worth the extra rend and risk of lower wounds?

My overall plan is to get Allarielle and use her heal ability on these multi wound models.

Facehammer were having a great discussion about this (I really recommend their podcast review if you want to learn the tactics of the new book).

The bows have such a strong threat range that they give you a lot of options, especially in objective games, to have a couple of units stick back - hold objectives and pepper the enemy with shots.

My plan is buying 2 boxes of them.

After that, I'm going to magnetize them all. Its tedious, but its worth it.

I did that with stomcast eternal bowmen and the venerator.

There is no best as they all have good times they can be used.

Bows are good since the army has little range options, the greatswords good for swarms and the scythes are good vs large targets like themselves

 Bottle wrote:
Facehammer were having a great discussion about this (I really recommend their podcast review if you want to learn the tactics of the new book).

The bows have such a strong threat range that they give you a lot of options, especially in objective games, to have a couple of units stick back - hold objectives and pepper the enemy with shots.

Is there a written summary or anything like that?

Just listen to the podcast, man. Do you have an iPhone? You'll have the podcast app built in, search and subscribe in 2 seconds and then listen to each podcast over the course of a few days as you paint or commute to work. Trust me. Podcasts are awesome :-)

There's a great bit where they talk about all the allegiance abilities and all the shenanigans you can do with surfing Wildwoods around the board. There's also a very funny tangent where they compare the Maw Krusha to a cabbage in appearance.

I'd say bows if you are running pure/mostly Sylvaneth. They need the ranged support, and the melee weapons have a slight downside in that they don't get re-rollable saves the turn they charge. Parking them in cover with bows means your enemy can't afford to ignore them but will be dealing with a 3+ save (and rerollable in melee).

But they look so cool like Ushabti with both. Bows first, then great weapons for box 2....cuz, come on, there will be more boxes.

I would never use Kurnoth hunter with anything else but the bows. The carnage you can bring with a 30inch range weapon is considerable. Points for points, the bows actually outdammages repeater bolt throwers ! Thats pretty insane dammage right there.

 cyberjonesy wrote:
I would never use Kurnoth hunter with anything else but the bows. The carnage you can bring with a 30inch range weapon is considerable. Points for points, the bows actually outdammages repeater bolt throwers ! Thats pretty insane dammage right there.

Pure maths hammer I agree with you, and in general think the Hunters with Bows are both great looking and pretty tasty. However I think that you need to consider your whole army before you write off any one option. If you are planning use your hunters to take and hold an objective, the bow may not be the best option. If you are playing versus Seraphon or a Duardin army then having rend -2 is a very valuable option and you may want the Scythe. Depending on your battalion and war grove there is also some shifts between relative advantage.

I was thinking of using one melee squad and one or two squads with the bows to support the rest of the army. I like the bows a lot better though.

mhsellwood wrote:

 cyberjonesy wrote:
I would never use Kurnoth hunter with anything else but the bows. The carnage you can bring with a 30inch range weapon is considerable. Points for points, the bows actually outdammages repeater bolt throwers ! Thats pretty insane dammage right there.

Pure maths hammer I agree with you, and in general think the Hunters with Bows are both great looking and pretty tasty. However I think that you need to consider your whole army before you write off any one option. If you are planning use your hunters to take and hold an objective, the bow may not be the best option. If you are playing versus Seraphon or a Duardin army then having rend -2 is a very valuable option and you may want the Scythe. Depending on your battalion and war grove there is also some shifts between relative advantage.

While this is certainly true, I think in the context of Sylvaneth specifically it falls a little flat. This is because they have literally every other unit option to pick from for melee punch; Seraphon may ignore rend but dryads dumping no-rend wounds on them don't care, for example.

Although the bows seem the best at first glance, I think in wider army you will be more likely to choose the melee options. The Sylvaneth army has lots of ways to teleport your models for a first or second turn charge. There are also ways to make your army "one deployment drop", I.e there are some loose battalions that can be made up by any combination of Sylvaneth units. This allows you to play for the double turn, or take the first turn and alpha strike threats.

The melee options become very hardy with the rerollable saves and also the constant churning of additional mortal wounds. Lastly, the ability to act as "nodes" for your command ability let's you make your whole army pack much more punch.

I would say a mix of the two. Maybe 2 units of 3x bows and 1 unit of 6x Scythes. I choose the scythes because when you have 6, that 2" range is going to be crucial to get the second rank striking in combat and the rend -2 means you can chew through though opponents like a Steamtank.

I'd probably have (if you can afford/points allow - depending how you play) a couple of units of 3 Bowmen for some ranged threat, they have an ability where they can re-roll armour saves if you stay still.

With a 4+, put them in a wood (you'll have loads with the new spells and abilities) for a 3+, 30" range they're going to be great.

I'd support them with a unit of 6 of the Greatswords. The -2 Rend with the Scythes are great but the D3 Damage can be hit or miss, one turn you're rolling Damage 3 for everything but alot of the time it'll be 1s. At least with the greatswords you have the guaranteed 2 Damage for wounds that go through.

Worth mentioning that there's a formation of 3x Kurnoth Hunter units and a Spirit of Durthu. Dunno what it does yet, but it might address the concerns about the hit percentages for the Kurnoth Great Bows.

 Kanluwen wrote:
Worth mentioning that there's a formation of 3x Kurnoth Hunter units and a Spirit of Durthu. Dunno what it does yet, but it might address the concerns about the hit percentages for the Kurnoth Great Bows.

I haven't looked at the Warscroll but I recall Facehammer saying the whole battalion gets an extra move in the Hero phase. Seems pretty sick, especially if it's every turn.

At least the leader gets +1 to hit which will help them a fair bit. Extra move in the hero phase seemed really strong when I saw some flesheaters in action and would make sense if the formation was made with melee focused hunters and durthu basically rushing in and smashing things.

But, the movement in a way doesn't feel all that useful for the greatbows, I guess it could help them kite if you really wanted to but considering their range and durability to start with it's not something they needed help with.

I'm adding some with bows to my storm casts. That range 30 is going to be extremely useful for wizard/buff characters that hide in the back. Or even whittling down big units or monsters.

And at 180pts which is only 60 more than judicators they're super worth it

 n0t_u wrote:
At least the leader gets +1 to hit which will help them a fair bit. Extra move in the hero phase seemed really strong when I saw some flesheaters in action and would make sense if the formation was made with melee focused hunters and durthu basically rushing in and smashing things.

But, the movement in a way doesn't feel all that useful for the greatbows, I guess it could help them kite if you really wanted to but considering their range and durability to start with it's not something they needed help with.

Cover is a thing. You can't always get LOS, and there are some units you don't even remotely want to be in view of.

I'm definitely starting with 6 Kurnoth Hunters with bows. Once I get the battletome in my hands, the first thing I'll do is to find a way to give them +1 to hit or re-roll 1 to hit.

 Haechi wrote:
I'm definitely starting with 6 Kurnoth Hunters with bows. Once I get the battletome in my hands, the first thing I'll do is to find a way to give them +1 to hit or re-roll 1 to hit.

With the rest of the options so melee heavy that's what I was looking at as well.