Tactica: Tomb Kings 8th Edition Book

[w3rm]

I'm feeling...

Tomb King w/ Death Mask, GW, Ward Save
Level 4 Liche

Nectrotect
Level 2 Liche- Light
Prince on Chariot

30 Archers
30 Archers
5 Chariots

40 Tomb Gaurd w/ BoUL
Scorpion

Herotian
Catapult.

Should be around 2kish.

[Asymmetric]

@Asymmetric; I'm not sure how you find your comparison fair

It's an example.

An example of warriors with character support vastly outperforming tomb guard or spear warriors of equal points. Which is more helpful than blanket statements.

Firstly you have pitted your 680pt unit against the ~470pt High Elf unit.

It was an answer to someone point that 680 points of tomb guard or spear skeletons will lose to them, but with character support they simply win

[Asymmetric]

Thirdly you've assumed he'll be a double idiot and not just slice open your Tomb King right off the bat (not a problem for SM once your Potion is used).

You deploy him in the corner. The swordmasters will be oblitatered before he dies/or as he dies.

Lastly, would you bring that unit in an all comers list, 'cause I don't see many people doing it, which makes it a bad comparison even on face value.

I'm considering a unit very similar to it.

[bored1]

Anyway, I'm bowing out of this thread now. I've made my arguments and to be honest am kind of tired of trying to counter all of the 'my super magic buffed unit that's twice the cost of yours will win' posts (not aimed at any one person in particular).

No offense, but I think the practical versions of the units you were countering were far from super buffed. And the point remains that a horde of skeletons with minimal character support can beat a good chunk of elite/heavy units.

You can complain about the inclusion of characters or how easy they are to take out; but the inclusion for the purposes of analysis is perfectly valid holding points constant and I've yet to see anything that shows the characters as easy kills.

[Esco Thomson]

No offense, but I think the practical versions of the units you were countering were far from super buffed. And the point remains that a horde of skeletons with minimal character support can beat a good chunk of elite/heavy units.

Skeletons with minimal character support meaning two characters in the unit I assume...and at base a bit over 150 points I take it?

Also, the ending sentence is under the impression that there is a buff, or else Skeletons with WS and Hatred will NOT beat a good chunk of elite/heavy units. With just character's and a larger unit size will they usually beat average toughness units with little armor, well yes. They might be elite, but I don't think I'd classify those as heavy units...

You can complain about the inclusion of characters or how easy they are to take out; but the inclusion for the purposes of analysis is perfectly valid holding points constant and I've yet to see anything that shows the characters as easy kills.

Easy is a relative term. In the grand scheme of that which is warhammer, are a few flammable characters overall too difficult to take out? Depends on your list I'd say, but in the tournaments I go to, I have learned that if it isn't specifically kitted out for survival(and good at that from the start) then your opponent can probably take him out. Obviously avoiding combat prolongs this, but is also counter intuitive to the entire strategy.

It takes one flaming wound to go through to pop the hatred, or two for the WS to disappear. Unless you are rocking the king, likely you are sitting at a 2+ against fire on the best day, which leaves minimal protection against normal attacks. Killing blow is as always, a constant worry for these guys.

[Asymmetric]

I don't think Necrotects are worth it on regular skeletons. Just a tomb prince kitted for defence or a combat king. Herald (BSB?) optional.

Basically you have a unit that performs well against low toughness troops and against anything it can't deal with will drag the fight out for several turns due to sheer mass and will pull down quite a few enemies as it goes.

Really the only units that I would that worried about sending them against are chaos warriors or killing blow troops.

[Skyros]

So really, tomb guard should be *really* good against tomb king skeletons backed up by other tomb guard characters

oh the irony!

[Ratbeast]

I don't think Necrotects are worth it on regular skeletons. Just a tomb prince kitted for defence or a combat king. Herald (BSB?) optional.

Basically you have a unit that performs well against low toughness troops and against anything it can't deal with will drag the fight out for several turns due to sheer mass and will pull down quite a few enemies as it goes.

Really the only units that I would that worried about sending them against are chaos warriors or killing blow troops.

Waste of points trying to turn a tar pit unit like skeletons into a combat unit anyway

Tar pits should be use as one, no point in trying to win combats with them, (if you do win its a bonus) smash a sphinx is the side to boost kills and your set, or another heavy hitter, combine arms approach is always the best

[w3rm]

I think its a bad idea to put your sphinx in combat with the skeletons. They will just do a buncha wounds to the skellies which will make your precious sphinx crumble into oblivion.

[Ratbeast]

I think its a bad idea to put your sphinx in combat with the skeletons. They will just do a buncha wounds to the skellies which will make your precious sphinx crumble into oblivion.

Depends who wins combat, going to have to be a tough unit to do that much damage, joint chargers is always better then sending 1 unit at a time to its death, not everything is set in stone, i once had a game when 5 khorne knights smashed into a 10 man skeleton unit, bucket load of attacks, failed to kill much, won combat though, skeletons crumble, 3 remained, knights couldnt do anything, flank by blood knights and owned!!!

Either way, only a handful of units in the entire game tar pitting with skeletons and flanking with something decent wont work on, people can sit there and say there useless, but in the end all comes down to luck of the dice

[astorre]

I'd just take Skeleton warriors as is, 50 w/ musician & standard bearer only comes to 220pts. I have the expectation that they will die, and in the process hold up something that I dont really want to fight at the moment.
I have been thinking though of a magic heavy list with nothing but units of 50 skeletons, drop bout 240 models on the board that dont break ever & give them killing blow, target characters, and watch them make their points back.

[Citadel97501]

Has anyone noticed that the longer Tomb Kings avoid a fight the better chance they have winning the game? Considering the new victory point rules are, "Fled or Dead". If you have 50+ skeletons in a unit, they have to kill the whole damn thing or nothing?

Lets say it takes them 4 turns to get into combat with you, so they have to kill an average of 59 models with crumble and combat, to gain 245 points?
(Banner, Musician, 50 = 220+25 for the banner)

While that is going on your using an EBTS, to make a couple hundred points killing war machines, and shooting elite units in the ass? This seems to advise the denied flank battle strategy.

Basically what I am advising tactically for Tomb Kings, is Point Denial.

[w3rm]

4 turns? Try 2. Maybe three if you sit all the way back at the edge of your deployment zone.

[Citadel97501]

With one casting or two casts of Desert Wind, you will make them fail a charge or two, their average movement over 3 turns and a charge is 27 inches for M4 troops, that means if you move back twice with spells or during normal movement, they fail their third turn charge and so get you on their 4th turn and if they roll high, you might as well charge your self.

If they are fielding Cavalry, they will make it on their 2nd turn almost guaranteed, so maybe you should be magicking the hell out of their cavalry or using the Sepulchre Stalkers on them.

[Asymmetric]

Waste of points trying to turn a tar pit unit like skeletons into a combat unit anyway

Tar pits should be use as one, no point in trying to win combats with them, (if you do win its a bonus) smash a sphinx is the side to boost kills and your set, or another heavy hitter, combine arms approach is always the best

It's not a waste with undead.

Anything that loses combat by massive margins, suffers from crumble and doesn't get any mass resurection spells simply isn't a tarpit, it is simply fodder for better troops. You can get it to work in the right circumstances with supporting units of course but I don't think it's at all reliable compared to 1 or 2 King/Prince supported blocks + supporting troops.

Increasing the WS of the unit is as much a defensive reason as an offensive one. It drags out combat many times more than simply adding more ranks of skeletons to the fight. Less enemy attacks hit, more enemys die, less loses to crumble. The effects are culmulative.

[EDMM]

Tomb Kings core is a huge liability.

I simply am not happy with any of the lists I am building. It is such a huge drawback to have to take 625 points of the stuff in a 2500 point game.

Both flavours of Cavalry are awful still, Skeletons are nothing but free victory points, and chariots are overpriced rubbish.

I can't find 625 points of core in a Tomb Kings army that doesn't make me want to pull my own hair out.

How can it be this bad?

[Skyros]

4 turns? Try 2. Maybe three if you sit all the way back at the edge of your deployment zone.

At least TK can do this without running the risk of fleeing off the board.

Tomb Kings core is a huge liability.

I simply am not happy with any of the lists I am building. It is such a huge drawback to have to take 625 points of the stuff in a 2500 point game.

Both flavours of Cavalry are awful still, Skeletons are nothing but free victory points, and chariots are overpriced rubbish.

I can't find 625 points of core in a Tomb Kings army that doesn't make me want to pull my own hair out.

How can it be this bad?

Yeah, I wish I could just spend all my points on special/rare

Still, it's not so bad. I don't think Chariots are overpriced rubbish and I plan to take 2 units of 3 (better than one unit of 6 for a variety of reasons). One, maybe 2 cheap min sized units of horsemen to go after enemy war machines (unlike other light horsemen, they are not going to flee off the field when they take a single casualty). Fill out the rest with skeleton warriors/skeleton archers.

[EDMM]

Yeah, I wish I could just spend all my points on special/rare

No, I wish I could spend some points on core units that were worthwhile.

In my Skaven army, I love my Clanrats, Stormvermin and Slaves. I could build an army with nothing but.

In my WoC army, I love my Marauders and my Chaos Warriors. I could build an army with nothing but.

In my Daemons army, I love my Bloodletters and Daemonettes. I could build an army with nothing but.

In my Lizardmen army, I love my Skinks (of every variety). I could build an army with nothing but (and 2 Slanns for support).

In my Vampire Counts army, I love my Ghouls. I could build an army with nothing but.

Other armies don't have every single useful unit type hidden away in Special and Rare. Other armies have one or two or three useful Core troops. Hell, every Core unit type in the new Orcs and Goblins book is useful. Why don't we have ANY?

In my Tomb Kings army, I'm just trying to find a way to spend 625 points that hurts me the least. It's a painful experience to consider every single unit type in the mandatory composition slot as nothing except a detriment to the army.

You literally can't build a Tomb Kings army around any of the Core choices - or I can't see it, at any rate.

[Skyros]

To be far, skaven core is ridiculously overpowered for the cost and marauders are extremely undercosted for what they do.

Not measuring up to them is not so bad.

You can't build a high elf army around the core choices either, but it doesn't mean they are terrible.

TK core is weak and needs support form characters and special/rare but they aren't the only army in the game for which that is true.

[Esco Thomson]

Had the first game with the new book yesterday against DE...

It was sloppy, and I squeaked out a win in the end though largely due to luck/bad luck on my opponent.

Things I noticed:

Casket is great, not because it is blunt force trauma, but because it is versatile. You can use it for extra PD, or its Bound Spell, or both, sometimes just powering itself as to not disrupt your other dice.

Death Mask is really solid, and has a lot of little perks of fielding it, one of those perks is definitely NOT the points remaining to protect your TK...but he did not die, close though.

I used the Mighty Scrolls, and have to say that it is a great pick for your level 4. You don't want to bust it out from the gate, as you risk your Hierophant(in most games), but if you are smart about it, you can really fire off something important at a crucial time and seal the game.

Warsphinx are really great choices. Fiery Roar all the way, and you have an HPA priced churning machine. Watch out for Miasma and PoS, or you will lose one...

Tomb Guard...well, they are great. I can't really say much past that. They aren't chosen, or anything of the like, but they are a very good unit. I ran mine with the Banner of Eternal Flame, to provide an answer to Hydras/HPA/The Like, but did take note to whether I will need to switch to the BotUL.

Healing is rather hit and miss. It really is noticeable for those close fights, but not much else. Though to be fair in 7th, I don't think many people(at least myself) healed really all THAT much...