50% Meta

[Phil Rossiter]

Having limited opportunities to play, I've got my first tournament under the 50% Lords and Heroes FAQ next month. I've noticed several strong players saying that the change is a challenge for Wood Elves. For example, the UK Masters has just finished and two Wood Elf armies played. Neither did well. Take a look, if you will, at the following 2400pt list from the same tournament:

Chaos Lord, Mark of Tzeentch, Disc, GW, Dragonhelm, 4+ Ward, OTS, Soul Feeder, Third Eye, Fl/Breath
Chaos Lord, Mark of Tzeentch, Disc, Sword of Might, Trickster's Helm, 5+ Ward
Sorcerer Lord, Mark of Tzeentch, Lore of Tzeentch, Lvl4, Charmed Shield, Opal Amulet, Ironcurse, Scroll
BSB, Mark of Tzeentch, Barded Daemonic Mount, GW, 4+ Ward Armour, Scaled Skin

17 Chaos Warriors, Mark of Tzeentch, Shield, FC, Blasted Standard
3 x Chaos Chariot of Tzeentch

Warshrine of Tzeentch

Hellcannon

Now this list is not tailored for Wood Elves, for example Blasted Standard is primarily an anti-cannon measure. But the characters are fast, dangerous and very hard for us to kill. The Chariots are always annoying but more troublesome here as a back-up to the characters than as a threat in themselves. They can realistically be shot off but things have to be going very well to bag the Warriors for example. The worst thing is, this list could I believe be made better vs WE's by taking more Heroes.

How would you tackle a list like this and/or what are your experiences of 50% Lords and Heroes in general? Note I'm not including End Times here. That's an interesting subject but I feel deserves a thread of it's own.

[godswearhats]

Comped or uncomped?

High magic is a great choice, picking off the protective gear of the WoC characters. Anti-armor in the form of Waywatchers or a metal Mage is another good choice. With 50% lords, running two L4s is possible (and advisable).

[Phil Rossiter]

My event will be pretty much uncomped, the Masters very light. I agree with those measures. The main problem is that the characters have on average T5/1+/3++ which means that even with Withering or Unforging they are still tough and very fast. Four or five of those look like a nightmare, to me.

I guess Plague of Rust could be helpful and Searing Doom could work too. More usually I see the characters kitted out fully with Firewards or MR1, which also nerfs things like Amber Spear. Stubborn Crown is popular too.

[UKlvrBM]

I mean, you could always use a light council, tons of poison archers and scouts, and max out warhawks and wardancers. Hawks get killing blow on the charge. Not good odds, but not terrible. Shawdowdancers might be good here too. One with a potion of strength and the other with sword of might. Heck, take 4 shadow dancers in units of wardancers and a level 4 beast weaver. That could be pretty deadly.

I've not had the pleasure of facing a list as ridiculous as that. You can build a list to deal with it (in theory), but then what do you do against everyone else? That's what sucks.

[DocDropPod]

Death magic, way watchers, Hagbane guard and wild riders Id say

[Aezeal]

Can you take Khaine rules? I'd forgo the forest just to get the BotWD if they bring that stuff.

The warriors should be easy meat for WW just bring enough.
Hagbane scouts for the cannon.
Take MSU so if he targets a unit not all will die and you can tie him up with those units. Spread the scouts out all over the table for example.

Not sure what the best solution for those 4 characters is though.. we really dont'have a good counter. I think charging WR at them si too expensive an option (and probably not enough wounds)..
Probably just have to got with hagbanes and WW too.. one hoping to get the 6 on hit and then beating the armor and ward saves.. the other hoping to roll the 6 on wound and then beating the ward save.

Probably shoot the weakest first to bag the points and delay the others with MSU. The problem of course being that they will home in on the things netting them most points.
I dont know your list but I'd probably just get some mages and position them spread out on the table and to the back so you will have at least 1, maybe 2 turns of shooting at what you want.

Can you banish those characters? Then a light council might work?
Else High and Metal are nice. Against this specific list 2x metal might be very good too. Everything has armor and so you will be wounding easily and no regular AS will help a lot. A 4+ ward still leaves plenty of room to roll 1-3 .

[Phil Rossiter]

Thanks for the feedback guys.

I am starting to wonder whether 2 x lvl4 is necessary now. Simply so that whatever you're fighting, you'll have one or two spells at least that are a hard counter to it. One WE Masters list had High/Shadow, the other Death/Metal. Both combos have some counters to the above list without being complete answers. Death runs into the Wards but Doom and Darkness for example is great if the Stubborn guy turns up.

This leads on to another point, which is that a lot of armies can hope to hold the characters and break them with combat res. Wood Elves not so much because we tend to be shooty MSU. A buffed up unit of Sisters or EG might manage this though.

Coven of Light is a decent shout because of the re-roll Banishment forces on those Wards but I think it'd need S7 to punch through the Toughness and armour.

Because the Heroes are not quite as tough as the Lords, it may be possible to force them into the Warriors for protection from MM's and buffed Waywatchers. Then you likely have a couple of Disc Lords to deal with. The problem is if they can hit a small unit and break it in one round. Flaming Breath is an issue because it adds free hits for this and the template can be nasty if he doesn't want to commit. One idea is to add champions to your units. These then challenge out the character, ensuring you test on Steadfast.

So we manage to pin the guy, what then? I looked at Killing Blow (which works on Discs as they are Cavalry but not Monstrous Cavalry like the Heroes on Daemonic Mounts). The main issue is the high Wards and that Trickster's Helm could be troublesome. The other issue is that the Discs don't have to charge the M5 KB units but at least we'd be starting to get a little board control. Mindrazor is another idea, with the benefit that it can work on any unit. But we have to pin the guy first.

This WoC list is all-comers (player is the Scotland ETC captain) which in a way helps because as I say, it could be worse for us. Equally, as mentioned, a WE list that can handle it needs to be all-comers too. For that reason I'd take Hagbane anyway, though I don't think it's massively effective here. It can chip away at the Hellcannon, Chariots and Warriors but none go down easily. It all hangs on whether we can neuter the characters and then have the leisure to persecute the slower threats.

[FriedTaterExplosion]

Wow, that is a nasty list to come across.

I'm finding High Magic increasingly more and more handy in the current Meta- specifically for Arcane Unforging.

Quick question:

With the Eternity King lists, If we take take a level 2 High elf Mage with High Magic, and a level 4 Wood Elf mage with High Magic- can they duplicate spells? The lores have different lore atributes, so do they count as the same spells for spell generation purposes?

[Aezeal]

Thanks for the feedback guys.

I am starting to wonder whether 2 x lvl4 is necessary now. Simply so that whatever you're fighting, you'll have one or two spells at least that are a hard counter to it. One WE Masters list had High/Shadow, the other Death/Metal. Both combos have some counters to the above list without being complete answers. Death runs into the Wards but Doom and Darkness for example is great if the Stubborn guy turns up.

This leads on to another point, which is that a lot of armies can hope to hold the characters and break them with combat res. Wood Elves not so much because we tend to be shooty MSU. A buffed up unit of Sisters or EG might manage this though.

Coven of Light is a decent shout because of the re-roll Banishment forces on those Wards but I think it'd need S7 to punch through the Toughness and armour.

Because the Heroes are not quite as tough as the Lords, it may be possible to force them into the Warriors for protection from MM's and buffed Waywatchers. Then you likely have a couple of Disc Lords to deal with. The problem is if they can hit a small unit and break it in one round. Flaming Breath is an issue because it adds free hits for this and the template can be nasty if he doesn't want to commit. One idea is to add champions to your units. These then challenge out the character, ensuring you test on Steadfast.

So we manage to pin the guy, what then? I looked at Killing Blow (which works on Discs as they are Cavalry but not Monstrous Cavalry like the Heroes on Daemonic Mounts). The main issue is the high Wards and that Trickster's Helm could be troublesome. The other issue is that the Discs don't have to charge the M5 KB units but at least we'd be starting to get a little board control. Mindrazor is another idea, with the benefit that it can work on any unit. But we have to pin the guy first.

This WoC list is all-comers (player is the Scotland ETC captain) which in a way helps because as I say, it could be worse for us. Equally, as mentioned, a WE list that can handle it needs to be all-comers too. For that reason I'd take Hagbane anyway, though I don't think it's massively effective here. It can chip away at the Hellcannon, Chariots and Warriors but none go down easily. It all hangs on whether we can neuter the characters and then have the leisure to persecute the slower threats.

I think in all comers hagbane and waywatchers are always good investments.

Btw how would wild wood rangers with a character with the other tricksters shard and a KB dancing shadowdancer work out? (they would probably be able to avoid it which would be the biggest problem.. but if they fight it might work).

I think the problem with a lot of the spells is that it's not that easy to get more than 2 spell through in a magic phase (if using the old rules). So unforging a lot and then damage isn't easy. Metal would be able to do real wounding with just a single damage spell.

[Phil Rossiter]

I'd agree that High Magic is pretty damn useful. HE's have the advantage that if they Unforge a character's Ward for example, the RBT have a good chance of taking him down. But it's still a good spell for WE's to have to hand. Searing Doom is no good against most WoC characters, as you're facing a 2+ Ward, either from Dragonhelm, Dragonbane Gem or 3+ Ward plus MR1. The second Lord here is unusually vulnerable to it, a trade off for the Helm of course.

I'd say against a good opponent it's unusual to get more than one spell through per turn.

I'd imagine the Disc Lords would indeed avoid that unit and pick on other stuff. He'd probably try to tackle it with the Warriors and BSB.

[Coyle_Ravane]

I can't really think of anything to add about that list in particular, but my experience has been that after an initial rush of "bring ALL the characters!" People around here quickly realized that all those points spent on expensive characters left them too few points for special and rare units, which usually makes for weaker lists overall.

Since then, it's mostly been people upgrading their L2 backup mage to a L4, or upgrading a fighty hero to a lord, alongside a L4.

[Phil Rossiter]

I feel it depends on the army.

There were Daemon armies at the Masters with just Kairos, double Skillcannon, Beasts and Plaguebearer Death Star with Heralds. The guys playing them are very good and have won tourneys with this, so I suppose this bears your point out Coyle. But the two Legion lists with mega-Dragonlords did better.

[Coyle_Ravane]

Don't get me wrong, there are some nasty builds with a lot of points in characters. Quite a few are a bit gimmicky, and can be completely undone if you know how to beat the gimmick, but some are just plain nasty.

As a general rule though, special and rare is where you'll find the real game-winners.

[NonnoSte]

I have to disagree with you, Coyle.
There are armies where characters earn you many more points than regiments and are easier to protect (mainly WoC, DE and HE, but Ogre, Lizards and Vampires are shortly behind).

I think that a Star Dragon, matched with two Frost Phoenixes (even if one is ridden by Caradryan) and a Silver Helm bus is much more killy and reliable than the more "classic" approach with White Lion and Phoenix Guards blocks.
Similarly 3 Pegmaster alongside a mounted Dreadlord or even two is much more dangerous than a horde of Executioners.
Especially for armies like ours.

The WoC example provided by Phil is IMHO tougher to face than a classic Throgg list (tough as it is already).

If I were up to face an army like that I would just expect lots of casualties, even if I played perfectly.

A double Weaver looks like mandatory, as Phil said, to pose a real threat with any casting attempt.
I'm just afraid that with a scroll and a ln effective 2nd turn charge threat you don't even have the time to cast what you'd need.

I think that any combination with High Magic is great. Be it High+Shadow for shooty lists (GG/GR core, Scouts, Sisters and Waywatchers), High+Metal for more combat oriented lists (EG, WR and WHR) or even High+Death for any purpose.
All of them can pose threats to any of those characters. The difficulty is to threaten all of them at the same time when 3 Chariots and a block of Warriors of Chaos is closing onto you.
What's more, they work regardless of Winds of Magic/Casting attempts, so you'll always be behind, relying partially on luck alone.

Maybe units of 6 WD with champs can buy you some times, while being relatively cheap (cheaper than GG at least):
Charge them, challenge and dance for the KB; champ dies and you're steadfast. Then dance for the 3++ and hope to hold. Either way, you can repeat this 2/3 times and tie one of them up for 2/3 turns for "just" 300 pts

[astorre]

I just came fromwardancers are only steadfast in a forest.

[NonnoSte]

I just came fromwardancers are only steadfast in a forest.

My bad.
Just forgot about skirmishers not having ranks. Then it's just plain silly as a suggestion.

[Phil Rossiter]

What NonnoSte said pretty much. Unfortunately, it tends to be the armies near the top of the pile that benefit most from the 50%:

As said HE's probably want some Rares but PG, despite being some of the best infantry in the game, are very much optional. DE's probably want a few RBT's or Warlocks only. WoC had regarded Chimerae as a decent elf counter but why not just swap for something that can't be shot? Crushers aren't what they were, Hellcannon take them or leave them. Character choices (and Core are damn good) from those armies are horrific.

Treemen can actually do a decent job vs WoC because they bounce chariots and hold the characters. The problem is their vulnerability for all-comers to magic and Flaming cannon.

[Beragon]

I'd like to add that unit champs I find are a very good take vs. armies that charge individual characters at units, just to hold them up for an extra round.

[Aezeal]

I just came fromwardancers are only steadfast in a forest.

My bad.
Just forgot about skirmishers not having ranks. Then it's just plain silly as a suggestion.

I'm at work so no time to mathhammer myself.. but how would the chance be of killing a chaoslord be with units of 5 wardancers if you try to KB him?
if anyone has time I'd love to see the math. Would you need like 2 of those units to get like a reliable chance of succeeding ? or way more?

[NonnoSte]

Mathammering:
a unit of 8 WD (ie the max amount of attacks on a chaos lord on disc) has 24% of chance to kill him in a single blow if he's sporting a 3++ reroll 1s.

If you lower his I to 6 with a Miasma (or boost WD's to 7 with Hand of Glory) you get back the rerolls and the odds increase to 36%.

Not that bad actually considering you're investing just 120 pts in a multipurpose unit.

[Phil Rossiter]

That's a unit he doesn't want to charge but Discs are the only things in his army that applies to, except the Sorcerer. I guess the Wardancers project a threat zone he doesn't want to fly into. He's better off going round the flanks and hunting archers. To take the Wardancers out at range, he wants MM's or Flaming Breath, though the Chariots are good for this.

Makes me wonder about the Acorns.

[astorre]

I'm torn about acorn too but dropping 100 on them prevents me from really play testing it. For us masters, there's 6 games, there will be two games I only get one forest and it doesn't seem worth the comp hit.
I just came from Swedish tourny using heavens + metal and it just doesn't cut it against 50% lords. I'm back to two weavers, high + shadow or high + metal, death is comped too heavily.

[Aezeal]

Mathammering:
a unit of 8 WD (ie the max amount of attacks on a chaos lord on disc) has 24% of chance to kill him in a single blow if he's sporting a 3++ reroll 1s.

If you lower his I to 6 with a Miasma (or boost WD's to 7 with Hand of Glory) you get back the rerolls and the odds increase to 36%.

Not that bad actually considering you're investing just 120 pts in a multipurpose unit.

I think that 4 units of 5 wardancers might be a nice investment.. they might do decently against the warriors too, if only to keep them away from the archers. And vs chariots if you fo 3++ first you can pin them down a bit too. if a lord comes near you just try to KB it.

[Phil Rossiter]

A chariot will still kill 2 models on average, even with the 3++. The dancers might do a wound if 8 models strong. So with +1 for charging the chariot wins by 2 or 3 which is a Ld5 or 6 test. Might be OK with BSB but in a wood (Acorns) that's Stubborn 8, much better. I feel the chariot grinds better, so you'd want to help the dancers out probably. A unit of 5 in a wood might hold briefly.

[astorre]

War dancers make a great bunker, especially with MR, but if you want them to fight go with 10+ and try to get mindrazor off.