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Here's my first attempt at a tomb kings army:

King w/ Destroyer of Eternities, Collar of Shapesh and light armour.

Liche (Least important) w/ 2 Scrolls

Liche (Second least important) w/ Staff of Ravening

Hierophant w/ Cloak of the Dunes and Scroll

24 Skellies w/ Light armor, shields, full command

24 Skellies w/ Light armor, shields, full command

10 Skellies w/ bows

10 Skellies w/ bows

3 Chariots

3 Ushabti

Scorpian

Scorpian

Catapult w/ Skulls of the Foe

How is it for a list? Does it need more infantry blocks or heavy hitters? Should I drop some of the magic items? Is there anything else I should change?

Hi Mekboy, right now your list seems pretty defensive: your army selection seems to indicate a castle formation, with scorps diisrupting the enemy and the SC to encourage people to come for you. Te problem is, one catapult doenst do that.. Either take two, or don't take any at all is what I've learnt with them.

Now onto some selections:

Destroyer of eternities seems effective, but isn't. I've tried it several times, and it never seems worth the points. Collar of shapesh is OK, but you want to keep your sekellies alive instad of wasting incantations on them.

A hieratic jar rocks. I'd consider replacing the hierophant scroll with it.

One of the skellie units should carry the banner of the undying legion: it adds to your magic phase and keeps your unit at full strength.

What role do you have in mind for the chariots? Right now, about all they can do is try to flank or hold off light troops. I can't really add any sensible comments without knowing your plans with them.

You seem to lack hammer units: only the ushabti and the king strike with decent strength and number of attacks (assuming you'll be tunelling the scorps here).

I prefer my archer units 15 strong so they can tarpit lighter units, but that's personal preference.

The archers would be better as a consolidated single unit.

TK units dont need musicians.

You need carrion to help disrupt the enemy battle line and hunt war machines - you shouldnt really be using scorpions for that unless the enemy has a LOT of shooting; they are much more important as infantry support, or for mage hunting.

Finally, I would try and get some more chariots into the list as little units - they deal very well with enemy auxilliary (yay!) and can add some mobility to what is otherwise a very static list.

Ushabti really really suck.

Hope this helps. Check the battle report section to see my TK list - it is a similar concept.

@CommissarKhaine:
The idea for my chariots was to have them and the ushabti flank the enemy. The scorpians would burrow and destroy war machines etc. I quite like the collar of shapesh, to me it's a ward save but you rarely lose it against stuff (tricksy trinket etc) and the only downside is you lose a skeletons (Oh noes!)

@fazz
Would a unit of 3 be big enough? I could drop one scorpian in exchange for a unit of that size but would it be effective? Would losing, say 5 archers and making them one unit and dropping the ushabti to make 2 units of chariots work?

Whatever you do, don't drop the scorps! They are easily your best models for their points value. Hell, they're the best models in the whole TK list. You might consider adding 3 carrion for war machine hunting as well, freeing up your scorps for the fun stuff: mage hunting and blocking small cav units. Units withoutb static res or high S really suffer against scorpions. Also, it means your first turn can see a 40" charge towards war machines or vulnerable characters. Always a nice way to draw some scrolls early .

The idea for my chariots was to have them and the ushabti flank the enemy. The scorpions would burrow and destroy war machines etc.

I already thought you were going to use the chariots for flanking. Just keep in mind that they only do well vs unarmoured targets; S4 leaves a lot to be desired for. I like the concept of your army, but I'm afraid you have nothing that can stand up to dedicated combat units. Chosen knights/warriors, hasslehof-bannered graveguard, demon infantry, etc... will rip straight through your troops and you have no way to stop them.

I quite like the collar of shapesh, to me it's a ward save but you rarely lose it against stuff (tricksy trinket etc) and the only downside is you lose a skeletons (Oh noes!)

How often do you encounter the trinket? Also, the wound still counts for combat res, so it can make you lose two skellies where a regular ward save wouldn't.
The problem I have with the collar is that your king is usally there to keep your skellies alive by reducing crumbling. A canny opponent will attack skellies for ranking up combat res, and even with a character TK can rarely win one-on-one battles. Usually, you take a beating for one round, then flank charge the hell out of the enemy. The collar cost you skellies, which, following this reasoning is a bad thing, since you need them for static combat resolution. Still, it's your choice, and if it works well for you... If you intend to use this setup (and it's your army, so your choice!), consider using the archer units as sacrificial units in front of your infantry. Thanks to reforming not causing to hit modifiers for our archers, they can easily advance upfield with the rest of your troops, and if necessary reform to allow room for heavy hitters to sneak past. Also, if your opponent wipes them out in one round (which is bound to happen), you can then combo-charge in your turn without needing magic.

Ifyou drop the Ushabti, you can take a chariot unit with a war banner or something. It's just that the Ushabti are half the source of your high strength attacks in your battleline...

Just on the King's equipment, I always found the Flail of Skulls + Collar + Cloak to b the most aggressive set-up.

To get some points for Carrion, amongst other things I would:

1) Drop the skeletons down to 2 x 21 (freeing 54 points).
2) Drop the Ushabti altogether (my god, they really really are pants) freeing 195 points (so 249 total).

This then allows you to purchase another 3 chariots (120) and another 5 carrion (120) = 240.

More deployments, more mobility, and most importantly for Tomb Kings - more threats for movement incantations - you need pressure on your opponent quickly, to try and drain scrolls early in the game, as mentioned by Commissar Khaine.

I have never found a lack of high strength attacks to be the source of my losing games - you can get by without it with careful play, and in many matchups it is almost irrelevant.

Hope this helps!

Oh another thing, I just wanted to add that yes, the Hieratic Jar is simply amazing, you really would benefit very much from its inclusion.

What about bone giants are they worth the points investment. It seems either 1 bone giant or 2 screaming skulls.

Lemartes wrote:What about bone giants are they worth the points investment. It seems either 1 bone giant or 2 screaming skulls.

If you purely conside rpoints: yes. For effectiveness, two bone giants or a bone giant and a regular giant are pretty nifty in my book. The main problem are gunlines with these guys, but you have carrion and scorps for that.

Are Ushabti really that bad I have three I picked up in a trade and will try them out tommorrow.

Lemartes wrote:Are Ushabti really that bad I have three I picked up in a trade and will try them out tommorrow.

They're a bit sub-optimal. But they're not horrbile either. SOme quiick pros and cons:
pro:
- S6 attacks. Not easy to get in a TK list!
- constructs
- WS4; one up over most ogre sized stuff

con:
- large footprint makes them hard to maneuvre
- for 65 pts/model they're pretty fragile
- they compete for special choice with more 'optimal' stuff such as carrion and scorpions
- only M5; combined with a large frontage reduces maneuvrability

Mekboy wrote:Here's my first attempt at a tomb kings army:

King w/ Destroyer of Eternities, Collar of Shapesh and light armour. the DOE is not my personal choice for 2k, but it could be usefull

Liche (Least important) w/ 2 Scrolls fine

Liche (Second least important) w/ Staff of Ravening the staff isn't really worth it, get another scroll or two

Hierophant w/ Cloak of the Dunes and Scroll he should have the jar instead of a scroll. an extra incant at that crucial time is worth it.

24 Skellies w/ Light armor, shields, full command

24 Skellies w/ Light armor, shields, full command both fine

10 Skellies w/ bows

10 Skellies w/ bows both fine

3 Chariots

3 Ushabti

Scorpian

Scorpian

Catapult w/ Skulls of the Foe pretty much good choices all around

How is it for a list? Does it need more infantry blocks or heavy hitters? i think your fine in both regards, a little light cav for harrasment could be usefull, but not needed Should I drop some of the magic items? i think there is some definate change needed in the magic items, but dropping, no.Is there anything else I should change? skulls of the foe is a waste of points in my opinon. the enemy is already gonna be panicing anyway, and the extra -1 modifier is really a waste of points.

suggestions in quote

Instead of Skellies with bows why not one unit of Horses with bows. They still hit on 5+.

The other option is maybe one large unit of Skellies for the Tomb King.

Note that I did not really read the other posts.

Light Cav in TK aren't very good. They are slow and can't flee, and they cost a bit more than i would like for just having bows. Nothing in there stat line makes it worth taking them either. If you had a mounted liche one could possibly see using them. But I personally wouldn't.

they may not be able to flee, but they can certainly double back thier movement rate and then turn around (thier fast cav)

they are good for harrasment, which people often don't think is a viable tactic with TK. i beg to differ.

I have been noticing that if you take a TK you get dominated in the magic phase and thus have to take a lot of Dispell scrolls. That must be why I am seeing multiples in every list I see.

nope, we actually are very good at the magic phase. the reson people take lots of dispel scrolls is that besides the jar and the cloak, there are no overtly usefull magic items for priests, and thus the empty space is filled with extra magic defence.

lord marcus wrote:they may not be able to flee, but they can certainly double back thier movement rate and then turn around (thier fast cav)

they are good for harrasment, which people often don't think is a viable tactic with TK. i beg to differ.

They can be used in this role, but carrion move faster and have better stat lines. Sure they cant shoot, but a handful of bs 5 s 3 shots isn't going to do much. Carrion fulfill the march blocking and support group hunting role better.

BS 5! I want some!

nope, we actually are very good at the magic phase. the reson people take lots of dispel scrolls is that besides the jar and the cloak, there are no overtly usefull magic items for priests, and thus the empty space is filled with extra magic defence.

Really, because every time I play VC, High Elves, and Certain Daemon builds with a TK I get dominated and this is with 3 liche priests.