2.500pts Vampire Counts vs. Warriors of Chaos

[Askari]

My second game trying a completely new, somewhat more mobile, Vampire Counts list. Just played it today so I actually remember details, unlike the first one.

Onto lists;
Titus Rivendare Vampire Lord
Level 4 Lore of Vampires, Heavy Armour, Barded Nightmare
Enchanted Shield, Ogre Blade, Talisman of Preservation
Quickblood, Red Fury

Lady Blaumeux Vampire
Level 2 Lore of Shadows, Heavy Armour, Barded Nightmare, Lance, Shield
Dragonhelm
Fear Incarnate, Supernatural Terror

Necromancer
Level 1 Lore of Vampires

Zombies (30, FC)
Zombies (40, FC)
Skeletons (30, FC)
Skeletons (30, FC)
Dire Wolves (5)

Black Knights (11, FC, Barding, Lances, Screaming Banner)
Spirit Host
Spirit Host

Terrorgheist
Terrorgheist
Varghulf
__________________________________________________ __
Only items that were used, shown.

Sorcerer Lord
Level 4 Lore of Shadows, Dispel Scroll
Chaos Lord
Mark of Tzeentch
Sword of Anti-Heroes, Charmed Shield, Talisman of Endurance

Exalted Hero
Battle Standard
Armour of Damnation
Sorcerer
Level 2 Lore of Tzeentch, Mark of Tzeentch, Disc of Tzeentch
Golden Eye of Tzeentch
Throgg the Troll King

Chaos Warriors (22, FC, Mark of Tzeentch, Shields)
Chaos Marauders (40, FC, Mark of Tzeentch, Shields)
Marauder Horsemen (5, Spears)
Marauder Horsemen (5, Spears)

Chaos Trolls (7)

Chaos Warshrine (Mark of Tzeentch)
_____________________________

Scenario - Battle for the Pass...
Deployment


Spells
Vampire Lord Invocation, Vanhels, Hellish Vigour, Raise Dead
Vampire Miasma, Withering
Necromancer Invocation
Sorcerer Lord Miasma, Withering, Pit of Shades, Mindrazor
Sorcerer Flickering Fire, Baleful Transmogrification

Turn 1
Warriors of Chaos

Marauder Horsemen, having vanguard moved closer to the Wolves, charge them. Everything else moves up. Sorcerer attempts to Transmog Spirit Host one, I let it through and it does one wound. Sorcerer Lord casts Mindrazor on the Chaos Warriors - dissuading me from attempting a charge. Warshrine gifts the Warriors Fear. Dire Wolves kill a Horseman without losing a dog in return, drawn combat.

Vampire Counts

That charge is huge anyway, so I make a huge mistake and move the Knights up, but at a bad angle. Varghulf moves up to support and the Terrorgheist 1 and 2 go to threaten the two Marauder Horse units. Spirit Host 1 charges the Trolls, didn't know Throggs vomit was magical... Magic Phase! Something like 8v5. Decide to cast Miasma Movement on the Warriors with 3 dice. IF. They lose 1 movement, I lose 7 Black Knights, a wound on the Vampire hero, and the Power Dice I had left. Well, that was certainly worth the trade. Death Shrieks fail to live up to their name and a single Horseman is killed. Dire Wolves and Marauder Horsemen continue to slap each other ineffectually. Spirit Host doesn't wound and gets vomited on. What a turn.

Turn 2
Warriors of Chaos

Chaos Warriors shimmy up with the Marauders at their flank, avoiding the Terrorgheist. Trolls, Disc Sorcerer and Horsemen move towards the Skeletons on the far flank. Magic is 2v1, and the Sorcerer Lord suffers Not Enough Power! Warshrine gifts the Warriors +1 armour save. Marauder Horsemen defeat the Dire Wolves, but are now staring down a Terrorgheist.

Vampire Counts

Charges! The Black Knight bus intend to charge the Marauders, with that juicy Sorcerer Lord, but I've angled them badly and they're just out, so I go for the Warriors instead. The Varghulf joins their attack and the 'Gheist charges the Horsemen. Skeletons align in such a way that even if they're all murdered, the enemy can't overrun to the Necromancer's Zombie bunker. Vampire Lord kills 4 or 5 Warriors, and the Chaos Lord just about manages to kill the BK Champion in a challenge, the rest of each unit does diddly squat, and even the Varghulf's attacks and Thunderstomp only manage another 2 kills. Warrior's Ld10 Steadfast keep them there. Terrorgheist Death Shrieks the Marauder Horsemen to oblivion.

Turn 3
Warriors of Chaos

That movement error comes to bite me in the backside even more, as the Marauder unit hits my Black Knights in the flank. The Trolls, Sorcerer and other Horsemen hit my Skeletons. Magic has the Sorcerer Lord not have enough power again, and that was that. My Vampire Lord decides to engage the Chaos Lord in a challenge, and I deal two wounds to him while he only manages one in return. The Exalted Hero kills the Vampire Thrall, and my unit and Varghulfs, though they take few casualties, don't cause barely any and that causes my General to crumble away. I hate that rule.

Vampire Counts
Poof goes my upper Terrorgheist to crumble, and the lower one suffers 4 wounds. The remaining Spirit Host disappears and the Zombies and Skeletons, annoyingly, suffer hardly any wounds. Why couldn't they die in droves and the 'Gheists survive I don't know. Magic Phase gives me... typically of my rolling... and 11! With one L1 wizard to use them with. I promptly 6 dice Invocation, IF, summon some Zombies and Skeletons. Miscast result - 3. Resulting detonation kills more Zombies than I resurrected and kills the Necro.

I unsurprisingly concede.

(thoughts to come)

[warplock]

That's rough, IF on three dice is just soooo annoying and makes me feel cheated a lot of the time, especially with vamps. I'm still trying to figure out how to beat WoC, as I too have gone for a more mobile list. I have had the same problems as you did in this battle - my vamp can usually kill quite a few Warriors but my Knights mostly do nothing, the Warriors take the charge, then they slaughter the knights and my general crumbles. I hate that crumbling! Wouldn't be so much of a problem if my TG ever killed anything, but somehow it doesn't. I mean a unit of 10 Warriors (the remnants of a unit) killed it in 2 rounds when I charged them, despite my scream and two rounds of attacks and thunderstorms. That's par for the course for my TG. So next game I decided to apply overwhelming force and charged a unit of Warriors with my knights + general (with VDM on them) AND my TG. Nope. All my guys crumbled.
Currently I think Black knights may not cut it against WoC, I'm currently working on some grave guard...

[Soundwave]

Wow sounds like my typical v.c battles.Although there was a match verse chaos warriors where i was able to finely slice them apart, make excellent moves and encircle the last unit of chosen(cheesy type star,filthy opponent) hit it from all angles to have them melt my whole army due to a there 3+ ward...pfff,pfff.
Did you find red fury to be virtually null and void due to ward saves? This is what has turned me off it to much shield of saphery,bllodshield of khaine and tzeentch parrys really ruined it for me.

[warplock]

If you put the OTS on your vampire those annoying 5+ wards become much less problematic.

[Kayosiv]

He has 0 shooting, although he does have pit of shades and flickering fire. Your knight bus unit shouldn't have gotten into combat until both your zombie units and skeletons units were dead. During which time he is hacking through your skeleton and zombie bodies, you should have been screaming him to pieces and rebuilding your knight bus. Just because your lord is on a horse and fast doesn't mean you need to get him in combat quick. Make em work for it.

Also, you can't charge on turn 1 if you go first and vanguard, he made an illegal move.

[Frankly]

Its certainly a harder scenario to fight with a mobile list. You don't have the wide space to redeploy to threaten with nice combined charges against singled out enemy units.

The biggest thing your list is missing is dire wolves over anything else. They're the 'glue' unit that'll give you control over the table top if played correctly. You really either want to blitz with the list and control who gets into combat with your wolves redirecting or you want to sit back and direct play with your wolves(usually simply by speed bumping) to purely give your TGs alteast 2 turns to shriek a target.

Screams should have been your biggest focus this game. Just get your TGs behind his lines and delete one of his units and feed it either to a combines TG + skellie charge or bus charge.

The other thing is wolves give you deployment drops which are really needed.

Either way if the primary goal of the list is mobility; then its as much about restricting his movement phase as it is your own units mobility.

[Askari]

The Terrorgheists, much like the cavbus, were very limited in movement ability - their huge base and the fact my opponent fielded in bus formations, not hordes, meant I just couldn't get over his units.

The Zombies and Skeletons were, to much an extent, my fault. As I mentioned in the list I placed the General on the wrong side of the cavbus - putting the infantry out of range of his bubble and again, lowering my options for movement as they moved a massive 4" a turn. This in turn put my cavbus in a position where it was either risk the charge - and potentially break through the Chaos Warriors, or stay put and get dual-charged next turn anyway. I figured getting stuck in was better as I had much better chance against just one unit and my Lance bonuses.

The Dire Wolves I had were okay, but I found the Spirit Hosts were almost as quick but much more of a headache for my opponent. The only thing the list can really lose is the Varghulf, as it never seems to do as well as I expect (seeing as it costs the same as a Hydra and all...)

The OTS was a notable thing I forgot - with it, I would have accepted the first challenge with my own Vampire Lord, and probably killed the Chaos Lord - lowering Leadership a few pegs and running the Chaos Warriors down.

[Jagosaja]

He has 0 shooting, although he does have pit of shades and flickering fire. Your knight bus unit shouldn't have gotten into combat until both your zombie units and skeletons units were dead. During which time he is hacking through your skeleton and zombie bodies, you should have been screaming him to pieces and rebuilding your knight bus. Just because your lord is on a horse and fast doesn't mean you need to get him in combat quick. Make em work for it.

Also, you can't charge on turn 1 if you go first and vanguard, he made an illegal move.

I pretty much agree with everything said. Skeletons and Zombies cannot compete with Warriors, you should have bought enough time by blocking with ethereal units and reducing the Warriors with two shrieks. You are wasting very expensive Terrorgheists on units such as marauders, and you even don't have to fly over anything, just go there and scream, Varghulf will take care of the rest.

[Askari]

You are wasting very expensive Terrorgheists on units such as marauders, and you even don't have to fly over anything, just go there and scream, Varghulf will take care of the rest.

It wasn't wasting. I didn't have a choice. It was Battle for the Pass remember, so I only had 4' width to play with. The Marauder Horsemen were in the way of better targets, i.e. Chaos Warriors and Warshrine, and the Terrorgheists' massive base meant I couldn't get within 8" - 1" away from Warriors + TG's 5" base + 1" away from Horsemen's back + 2" Horsemen width + 1" from Horsemen's front. That's a massive area I couldn't get into.

Better placement of my General would have opened up some of that space granted as my own infantry wouldn't be blocking the way, but once that deployment mistake was made, nothing to do about it.

[Soundwave]

It wasn't wasting. I didn't have a choice. It was Battle for the Pass remember, so I only had 4' width to play with. The Marauder Horsemen were in the way of better targets, i.e. Chaos Warriors and Warshrine, and the Terrorgheists' massive base meant I couldn't get within 8" - 1" away from Warriors + TG's 5" base + 1" away from Horsemen's back + 2" Horsemen width + 1" from Horsemen's front. That's a massive area I couldn't get into.

Better placement of my General would have opened up some of that space granted as my own infantry wouldn't be blocking the way, but once that deployment mistake was made, nothing to do about it.

No it was not "wasting"please do bring on an example of a much more profitable deployment?Askari did all that was right given the army list,scenario and deployment...

[SteelTitan]

I hope this game doesn't make you not want to play the cavbus. That IF was bad luck with a horrible timing. Combined with the scenario....ugh...
I'm looking forward to a report of a less one-sided game!


I agree with Frankly with regards to the wolves. Sure, they are not as much of a headache as spirit hosts but that's not a reason not to take them (or take more of them). Hosts are of course notoriously annoying to deal with (for some opponents) but they fill a different role. More wolves would have been very handy in this game. Not only for deployment (I think that outdeploying is extremely important for my cavbus list) but also for trying to pull apart his battleline, which would have given you (1) better charges and (2) room for your terrorgheists.

I never had much luck with 'small' unit of Skeletons, 40 is about the minimum I would take. They just die (casualties + crumble) too fast to reliably hold up units. Maybe you could try to increase one unit to 60 and use the leftover points for some more wolves? Just an idea On the other hand, I stopped using skeletons all together and only run zombies now (3x40). Skeletons never did much for me so I might as well pay less and have more zombies.

Also, Varghulfs; it's not easy to make it work. I found that it shines late game. I used to play too aggressively with it and felt exactly the same as you. Now, I tend to hold it back and have it charge targets late game. At that point, my army is engaged at all fronts and its hard to still get to certain targets. I love me some Varghulf now However, for the points, its performance (and planning to get the most out of it) is maybe a bit on the steep side...I need to play around more to really reach a definite conclusion here...

Terrorgheists are a bit easier to use because they can scream and all but I found their huge base a real issue. Together with the 1" rule, it's not easy getting it where you want to. Also, their 6" regen is laugable if you got shot at with cannons (i love how Varghulfs just shrug off cannonballs 50% of the time).

Random thoughts over...

[Askari]

Thanks SteelTitan, I have been looking forward to your thoughts on it. I'll still be trying cavbus for a few more games, and have a semi-cavbus Zombie Dragon list I'll also be using soon.

As said, the scenario, my awful angle of movement and then that miscast just gutted me early on.

I'll try the 60-strong Skeleton unit, I don't have enough Zombies to run any more and still have some left for Invocation

[Mikael.K]

Got any more games in with the cavbus?

[Sexiest_hero]

Please think about an earthing rod on your Vamp lord.

[Askari]

Got any more games in with the cavbus?

Not at the moment, playing Empire right now. Marius Leitdorf makes for great battles.

Please think about an earthing rod on your Vamp lord.

Blah, the Vampire Lord doesn't really cast much, he's a Level 4 mostly for dispelling purposes and for two dicing the low end spells such as Vanhel's and Invocation. I believe the Other Trickster's Shard is the better investment in future.

[Sexiest_hero]

Wouldn't it be better for a naked lvl 4 master necro in a bunker? It seems like wasted points just to dispel. Also when things get rough you'll be tempted to toss more dice at a spell you need. Then poof there goes your lvl 4, general, and combat monster in one fell swoop.

[SteelTitan]

I have never lost my level 4 vampire lord and it's always in the thick of it. I really don't see why people have such a problem with slapping on a couple of magic levels on a Vampire Lord and rather pay even more points for a level 4 Master Necromancer.

And if you're afraid to lose your caster, then don't be tempted to throw six dice. And even then...how high is the change he will actually go poof?

I feel people that advocate this aren't really that realistic about how things play out in-game (no offense).


Maybe I feel different after playing in that upcoming tournament...