2500 New Empire Tournament Competitive Army

[Jerry]

Fantasy Army: Empire

Another addition to the long list of new empire empire army lists - there is a slight difference though. This army list is supposed to be as competitive as possible so go nuts and take it apart. Nothing here has to be taken and I have access to pretty much all models so don't be afraid to say you should replace X with Y because Z.

Anyway here it is an empire army based around 2 big units

Total 2496
Lords (250pts)
Battle Wizard Lord (250pts) Lore of Life, Wizard Level 4, Dispel Scroll, Dragonbane Gem, Potion of Toughness
- You might notice that my characters are on the low side in terms of protection but I figured with a level 4 of life the lore aspect would let me heal characters not to mention only have 2 big units means I can keep 4+/5+ regen on one - if this fails I can pray for 5++ and F2S on the other unit. Ward save against flaming weapons to go in synergi with regeneration.

Heroes (467)
Captain of the Empire BSB, Full Plate Armour, Crown of Command, Enchanted Shield, Luckstone (136)
- Stubborn 2+ Armour save with 1 reroll
Master Engineer (65)
-naked to baby sit volleygun
Warrior Priest Heavy Armour , Shield, Dragonhelm (79)
- 3+ armour save, 2+ ward against flaming attacks. Going to sit in Wizard Lord's unit of greatswords for regen.
Warrior Priest Heavy Armour, Charmed Shield (72)
- 4+ armour save, discard first hit on a 2+
Witch Hunter Brace of Pistols, Ironcurse Icon (60)
- gives a 6+ ward save to the unit for war machines, this guy will make the halberdiers last longer
Witch Hunter Brace of Pistols (55)

Core (632)

37x Halberdiers Standard Bearer - Holds a warrior priest, BSB and witch hunter making it Stubborn ld8, 3d6 break tests, 6++ war machines, MR 2 and hopefully hatred, +1 to hit, 5++ combat and re-rolls to wound.
15x Halberdiers (Detachment)

10x Handgunners - Chaff clearers not really an optimal choice but hey, chaff needs to be cleared.
10 Knights Great Weapons - Flankers for flanking and possibly war machines although I have cannons for that...

Special (527pts)
Great Cannon
37x Greatswords - The big unit with wizard lord, warrior priest and witch hunter. Hopefully if everything goes right will have 4+ regen, 5++ in combat, 2 MR, hatred, +1 to hit and possibly re-rolls to wound.

Rare (620pts)
Celestial Hurricanum - To be placed inbetween the big units of halberdiers and greatswords, giving +1 to hit to both units.
Helblaster Volley Gun - Possibly sub-optimal? Needs to be tested and needs commenting.

Helstorm Rocket Battery - Also a suspicious choice I was intrigued by the new changes ie everything is indirect fire so I can comfortably sit this thing behind a building or somewhere else for good points preservation and also D3 S3 small templates can be potentially pretty game changing if I get lucky and lets face it games are often decided by getting lucky and in order to do that you've got to give yourself the opportunity

Steam Tank - 2nd cannon and burst damage. The new Stank can't be played like the old one for a number of reasons - 1. grinding is done in the movement phase and you're limited to 3D3 meaning you won't be able to break anything via combat res. 2. Impact hits are still amazing so it's likely I'll only use this bad boy to charge something stuck in combat already to turn the tide. 3. The S8 cannon can be 36" now and that's long enough for pretty much everything if you count for the bounce and overshot. 4. T6 can be easily wounded by big greatweapon hordes and this makes me less inclined to roll the stank into my opponent's deathstar like I did before.

View updated at the bottom of the page!

[Malorian]

Given the Celestial Hurricanum I would drop the two warrior priests. (151 points saved)

Forget about the hellblaster engineer trick, it's not worth the 185 points (185 + 151 = 336 points saved)

With the points try adding in a cannon, a unit of stubborn knights, and bumping up the handgunners so they are a solid choice for watchtower. Make them a detachment.

[ewar]

Well, I played against a helblaster + engineer on Monday and it was brutal, completely nuked an arachonorok plus a bunch of other things, so I'd say keep it for area denial - nothing expensive will want to go within 24" of that thing, and with the re-roll it's phenomenally reliable. The worst result I saw was two misfires, one being re-rolled to give 'only' 6 shots after being halved.

Also, where do you get the 336 from? He only has a single naked engineer.

Definitely try it out, and if anything drop the helstorm. I'm not convinced the strength drop warrants an inclusion now, as the templates really go all over the place. If it was S4 then I'd be much more convinced the pay off would be worth it.

[calnen]

Agreed that Hatred as well as +1 to hit seems like dimishing returns. But then hatred is only for the first round..

Re: The handgunners. If they were a detachment, wouldn't you have to deploy with the main block? (eg they couldn't start off in the tower) ?

[Jerry]

@ Malorian, the warrior priests are more about their prayers for the unit rather than hatred - re-rolls to wound would be fantastic. I've also already got a steam tank and a cannon so I'm thinking 2 cannons+steam tank might be overkill.
Stubborn knights are good what were you thinking in having them as a unit of 5 to tarpit something?

@ Ewar yeh I'm really thinking of dropping the helstorm and I think he meant 336 from the 2 warrior priests and the helblaster+engineer (malorian really does try to go cheap for characters if I didn't know it already from all his videos)

@Calnen I'm pretty sure they can deploy in the watchtower as long as the regimental unit is within 3"

[Malorian]

I wouldn't count on the steamtank cannon too much since it should be pushing forward into combat.

[jonnywright104]

Given the Celestial Hurricanum I would drop the two warrior priests. (151 points saved)

Forget about the hellblaster engineer trick, it's not worth the 185 points (185 + 151 = 336 points saved)

With the points try adding in a cannon, a unit of stubborn knights, and bumping up the handgunners so they are a solid choice for watchtower. Make them a detachment.

I wouldnt go with stubborn knights....if you are worried that you will lost the combat and need stubborn....you shouldnt be charging! and if you are being charged...then you have already failed :P

[Malorian]

I wouldnt go with stubborn knights....if you are worried that you will lost the combat and need stubborn....you shouldnt be charging! and if you are being charged...then you have already failed :P

You see that horde of savage orcs biguns that are about to tear your army apart?

Either you can dedicate your entire army to stopping them or you can toss in a conga line of stubborn knights. Up to you...

[jonnywright104]

You see that horde of savage orcs biguns that are about to tear your army apart?

Either you can dedicate your entire army to stopping them or you can toss in a conga line of stubborn knights. Up to you...

Touche!....But Ive just played a game against a unit of 55 chosen....yes FIFTY FIVE!!! and I got round them by ignoring them and outmanouvring!

[GodlessM]

I'd make the Handgunners a detachment just so you can get free bonuses on them to start out. I'd ditch the Helstrom in leiu of another Cannon (the Steam Tank can't always relaibly be firing its Cannon). Other than that, looks great.

[Jerry]

Ok Update time. I've taken in a lot of the criticism as I mostly agree with them and some of the choices I weren't certain of to begin with anyway.
BTW to anyone interested, I use Battlescribe to make my army lists it's fantastic and the catalogues have a nice quick updating group behind them.

The changes are: I've tweaked the character gear a little and dropped the WHs because I think they're points are better spent elsewhere. I've also added a cannon and dropped the helstorm.

Lords (275pts)
Battle Wizard Lord (275pts)
Lore of Life, Wizard Level 4, The White Cloak of Ulric, Dispel Scroll

Heroes (397pts)
Captain of the Empire (136pts)
Battle Standard Bearer, Full Plate Armour, Crown of Command, Enchanted Shield, Luckstone

Master Engineer (65pts)

Warrior Priest (109pts)
Heavy Armour, Shield, Ring of Volans, Dragonhelm

Warrior Priest (87pts)
Heavy Armour, Charmed Shield, Opal Amulet

Core (638pts)
38x Halberdiers, Standard Bearer
15x Halberdiers (detachment)
10x Handgunners (detachment)
10x Knightly Orders, Great Weapons

Special (683pts)
Great Cannon
Great Cannon
38x Greatswords (418pts)
Standard Bearer, Standard of Discipline

Rare (500pts)
Celestial Hurricanum
Helblaster Volley Gun
Steam Tank

Pretty much the same old army list revolving around 2 main units - wimpy attempt at points denial.
Some C&P from the tactica thread on how I use my army.

I have a big unit of 4x10 halberdiers with a warrior priest and BSB with the crown of command and another big block of 4x10 greatswords with a WP and my WL of life. I gave them both a detachment of 15 halberdiers and what I do is.
let D = Detatchment H= Halberdiers and G = Greatswords C = Hurricanum

D_H_C_G_D This way you have 4 blocks of stubborn troops and your two main blocks are within the BSB's range and general and you get the +1 to hit from the Hurricanum. You also have 2 stubborn detachments protecting the immediate flanks of your big blocks or you could use them on the offensive and block off either board flank with a steam tank/knights.
I take pretty large greatswords because I think fielding them deep is a big waste because you don't need steadfast and you want to get out as many attacks as possible. Also 3x10 isn't enough because you'll be striking last and you don't want to be losing attacks before you can strike with hatred due to casualties.

I take lore of life because I think it's the best lore for empire because you get to heal your characters/steam tanks/hurricanums and F2S and 4+ regen is fantastic for your big blocks of troops which don't have much survivability. What I try to do is get regen on my Greatswords and flesh to stone on the halberdiers because I want to spread my buffs and I will never put my expensive wizard lord in a block of halberdiers. Then I try to get the 5++ ward on my halberdiers rather than greatswords because regen doesn't stack with a ward save.
So generally in my magic phase I cast the smaller spells first because they are less important and your opponent is more likely to expend DD when he has a full pool.
My usual casting sequence before combat is 1 dice for re-rolls to wound on my greatswords, 1 dice 5++ ward on halberdiers, 1 dice re-roll to wound on halberdiers, then 3 dice F2S and 3 dice regen.
That uses 9 dice but I usually only cast the re-roll to wounds in the first round when I have hatred. Also I don't mind not having throne of vines in the first round of combat because really +2T and 5+ regen is good enough when I still have lots of spare wounds on my big blocks.