So I just decided that I will take my DE into the GT of Finland. I played a battle against probably one of the worst match ups possible for me and here is the report.

Master + dark steed + heavy armour + seadragon cloack + shield + calerdor's bane 137p

Master + bsb+ shield + soul render + pendant of khalet + heavy armour 161p

Sorceress + 2 dispel scrolls 150p

Assassin + additional handweapon + rune of khaine + touch of death 151p

18 warriors + shields + command 141p

10 warriors + shields + RxB 110p

5 dark riders + musican + RxB 117p

5 Harpies 55p

18 Exequtioners + command + banner of murder 271p

17 balck guard + champion + standard + standard of hag graef + ring of hotek 299p

5 cold one knights + musican 143p

5 shades + great weapons 90p

1 war hydra 175p

My oppoent played beast of chaos horde and all characters had mark of tzeentsh so my opponent had 15 power dice to use in a turn. Not nice!

Here is the the list as I can remember it:

1 Warlord + lvl 4 + chaos armour + frenzy + 5+ ward + 2+ str item

1 bsb + lvl 2 + banner that gives 1+ to rally and something to panic checks

1 hero figher + power stone + dispel scroll + something

1 shamman + lvl 2 + something

2 big herds (20 or something like that) with FC

2 small herds (10) who are ambushing

2 units of 5 warhounds

3 dragon ogres

3 tzeentsh chariots

1 spawn

All left/right references will be from my point of view

In my opponents deployment zone was a hill in the right corner and a large forest 10 inches left from the center of the board. Across that forest was a big building that was almost in my deployment zone and an other forest 15 inches right from the center of the board.

My opponent deployed (from left to right): 1 unit of warhounds on the left side of his forest, chariot on the other side of the forest, dragon ogres, 1 big herd with a fighting hero and and shamman, spawn,2 chariots (in the dead center), 1 big herd with the lord and the bsb (opposite the forest in my deployment zone) and the second unit of warhounds infront of the hill.

I depolyed cold one knights with general on the left side of the building, crossbows with the sorceress behind the building, warriors right from the building, black guard with bsb, harpies infront of them, exequtioners (assassin is hidding here), hydra, shades scout in the forest and dark riders are opposite the warhounds on the right.

I roll 6 when deciding who starts and take the first turn!

So my opponent has 15 power dice and I have 3 dispel dice + ring of hotek. I will try to keep my units inside the "saftey zone" of the ring (right now all units but the shades and dark riders are inside 12 of the ring), and I have to deal with the tuskor chariots, because they pose a serious threath to all of my units.

DE 1

So I beggin with passing stupidity with cold one knights. Crossbows move into the building with the sorceress, cold one knights move forward to threathen the left most tuskgor chariot and the dragon ogres. Warriors, black guard and exes and the hydra move 9 directly forward threathening the chariots and the herd units. Shades move to the forest edge so that they can see the warhounds. Dark riders move also into range of the warhounds. Harpies fly toward the two chariots and block them both from charging or moving (if they charge and destroy the harpies they will fail to reach my infantry and get charged in turn.).

Magic phase. nothing

Shooting: Crossbows from the building wounds a dragon ogre and the combinied fire from shades and dark riders kill 2 warhounds who panic and flee toward the board edge, but remain on 0,5 inches on the board.


Beasts 1

No charges. Hounds rally despite all the odds. Spawn moves at astonishing speed towards my warrior unit (9 inches). The hounds on the left advance and turn towards the cold one knights "threathening their flank". Chariot on the left and the dragon ogres advance, but stay out of the cold ones charge range. The herd on the left retreats, not wanting to risk combat with black guard or the cold ones. The chariots shuffle so that they can see behind the harpy screen. The herd on the left advances towards the shades and dark riders about 5 inches.

The magic phase is vey uneventful. The ring and poor dice rolling on my opponents part means that he mannages only to kill 3 shades who pass their panic check.

No shooting.

DE 1

I charge my general out of the cold one knights into the tuskgor chariot. My opponent guesses correctly that he carries caledor's bane and flees with the chariot into the forest taking 3 wounds in the process. The chariot ends its flee move 1 inch from the table edge and my general fails his charge. No other charges are declared.

Warriors, black guard and exequtioners move forward to get into contact with the big herds and dragon ogres. The hydra moves between the black guard and exequtioners and close enough the chariots to cause 2 terror checks next turn. The harpies block the possible charges from the chariots.
Cold one knights shuffle so that they can kill the warhounds if the crossbows can't panic or kill them . They also block the warhounds charge into my generals flank.This was a mistake that meant that the cold one knights couldn't get into contact with the big herds later in the game.
Dark riders move closer to the warhounds who paniced. Shades march 10 inches and position them selves so that the herd can't see my exes unless they retreat back towards their own table edge.

Magic is meangingless

In the shooting phase the crossbow elves from the building kill 3 warhounds on the left and panic them. Dark riders kill 1 warhound on the right, but the 2 remaining dogs do not turn their tails. Hydra breaths on the other chariot and causes a wound.

Beasts 2

Both chariots pass their terror tests on ld 7.
The chariot with full wounds charges the harpies and the spawn lumbers into contact with my warriors. The chariot which fled through the forest doesn't rally and is out of the game. The fleeing warhounds on the left do not rally on this turn, nor on any other.

A beast herd appears in my deployment zone behind the building where the crossbows and sorceress are. Another beast herd scatters and come onto the board directly infront of my dark riders.

The remaining warhounds march infront of my dark riders, blocking their advance to the rear of my opponents army.

Both big herds move back toward their own deployment zone (cowards). Dragon ogres wheel so that they can charge my black guard in the flank if I pursue when the chariot who charged the harpies looses the combat against the black guard. The other remaining chariot move backwards so that it can also charge my black guard.

Magic this time one cold one knight gets killed and the hydra is beast covered. Then my opponent miscasts and takes a wound with his lvl 4 mage and ends the magic phase.

In combat the chariot kills all the harpies and over runs into the black guard. The spawn is not feeling well and can't kill any of the spear elves, who in return make 1 wound.

DE 3

The hydra is beast covered so can't charge the chariot. No one else is in range.

Dark riders move toward the center, so that the little beast herd can't charge them. Shades do something that doesn't matter.
Exequtioners do not want to expose their flank to the tuskgor chariot and turn towards the herd with the lvl 4 and bsb. Their flank is protected by the hydra who can't move.
Cold one knights move to a postion to charge the dragon ogres or the other big herd and are joined by my general.

In the magic face I mannage to cast dark hand of death on the little herd behind the building and kill one ungor. Yes!

Dark riders can't hit anything, same goes for the shades, but the crossbows in the building kill a few ungors and a gor.

In close combat the warriors slay the spawn of chaos. The black guard take lots of casualites(5) from the chariot , but the bsb and champion mannage to make 3 wounds back. Unfortunately the chariot crew kills the champion and there goes the ring of hotek! The black guard however win the combat and pursue 6. They do not catch the chariot which is fine since it flees through the big herd led by the shamman and the fighting charater and causes 5 wounds. The herd passes its panic check.


Beasts 3

The remaining chariot and the dragon ogres charge the black guard. The dragon ogres come into the flank. The little beast herd charges the crossbows in the building, but fail their charge and I kill few of them in stand and shoot.
The chariot which fled doesn't rally and is of the table.
The little herd on my right flank moves towards the dark riders. The warhounds move to block the dark riders from charging the big herd which is led by the general and the bsb.
The other big herd moves along the board edge leftwards avoiding my units.

In the magic phase my opponent mannages to kill of my shades. Hydra is beast covered, but nothing else happens. Some spells might get through but they do not cause wounds.

In the close combat phase my black guard suffer heavy loses, the chariot killing 7 elite warriors alone. 2 of the dragon ogres aim thier attacks against my bsb who doesn't take a single wounds thanks the pendant. The battle standard bearer and 2 black guard cause 4 wounds to the dragon ogres, so one is killed and one takes one wound. The black guard loose the combat, but hold their ground.

DE 4

Dark riders charge the warhounds who are blocking them. The hounds hold. No one else is in range, or they are beast covered.
The cold one knights move to threathen the dragon ogres rear, as do the warriors. Exequtioners move towards the big herd led by the general and bsb. I know that if my dark riders mannage to pursue into the big herd I can force them to pursue my dark riders and that means that my exequtioners will get a charge on the herd because they will move closer to my exes when they pursue.

In the magic phase I mannage to kill one ungor from the little herd near the building.

Shooting kills a few models more from the same unit, reducing it to 3 models.

In close combat my black guard (who are reduced to 4 models after the combat) dishes a lot of pain on the dragon ogres and the chariot. Dragon ogres takes 2 wounds more from the bsb and the ogre can't get through the pendant ward save. The black guard reduce the chariot to 1 wound. The black guard wins combat by 3 and both units break. Black guard pursue the chariot, but can't catch it. The chariot however is of the board. The dragon ogres flee and come into contact with my cold one knights and are destroyed.

Dark riders kill the hounds with ease and pursue into the big herd. The trap is set.

Beats 4

The small beast unit behind the building charges the crossbows inside.

The big herd on the left marches into the forest and out of my cold one knights arc of sight. The other big herd is locked in combat. The small herd on the left moves towards the exequtioners.

In the magic phase the lvl 4 casts the spell which causes the models in my unit strike them selves. He casts it on my exes, but they don't want to hit themselves and only a few die. Cold one knights are beast covered. Next cast with 4 dice is a miscast and it ends the magic phase.

The dark riders can't wound the enemy general, neither can they kill anyting else. They are wiped out and my opponent over runs 3 inches.
The small herd unit is wiped out in close combat before they get to attack.

DE 5

Exequtioners charge the big herd which is led by the general and the bsb. The herd flees and ends its move 0,5 inches before it reaches the table edge.



No one else can charge. The hydra is free to move and moves toward the fleeing herd as fast as possible. Warriors are joined by the bsb and they march towards the big herd on the left. The remains of the black guard try to get into cover behind the forest in my opponents deployment zone.

Magic and shooting have no impact on the game.

Beasts 5

The big herd rolls a 6 and 4 on the rally test and rally thanks to the magic banner carried by the bsb. I think that the banner could not have been used since the bsb was fleeing, but I didn't want to push it.

The other herd moves out of the forest towards my table edge. They are out of sight from my cold one knights, which means that I can't do a thing to them with my cold one knights.

The small herd moves to march block my hydra and exequtioners.

In the magic phase my opponent casts irresictable forse strike your selves spell on my exes and 9 die. I fail the panic test and run 11 inches.

DE 6

Hydra can't reach the big herd and doesnt see the smaller one. No one can charge.
Exes rally. I move the warriors to capture a table quater, and the cold one kngihts to contest my opponents left table quater.

Magic is uneventful.

In the shooting phase my crossbows mannage to cause a panic test on the big herd on the left, but they pass it. The hydra kills 50% of the small herd and the unit panics and doesn't rally.

Beasts 6

No charges are made by the beasts (cowards).

In the magic phase my opponent kills my exes of but otherwise his spells doesn't have an impact to the game.

The game is a minor victory for me. He has exes, shades, dark riders, harpies and 1/2 black guard. I have everything but his characters and big herd units. I also have 2 table quaters.

Endgame thoughts:

I think that I could deal quite well with a very heavy magic phase. Only the exes died to magic after all, but if my hydra wasn't beast covered half the game I would have fared a lot better. Black guard were awesome, killing everything that they faced. Exequtioners killed them selves, but I still like the unit. I should have been bolder with them.

Same goes for cold one knights. If I hadn't worried about the warhounds on the right flank my knights would have made it into combat with the other big herd unit.

The ring of hotek helped a lot, but it would have been even better if the champion hadn't been killed so early. I am quite pleased with my list as it is, but if you have any improvements I am happy to hear them.

The beast tzeentsh horde was one of the worst match ups for this list since it is mobile enough to avoid my blocks and it has chariots to take out the ring of hotek champion. A gunline would also be a pretty hard list to deal with, but I think that I could get into CC fast enough.

Hope you liked the report, even though I feel like a heretic writing tales of victory about our dark kin here.

The GT is now over and I finished 4 (though there were many guys with the same amount of tournament points who finished the game fourth). I would have been in the top 3 if one screaming skull catapult hadn't killed 7 black guard with one lucky shot. The tournament was very poorly run, but anyway I had fun. I made some minor changes to my list, like dropping the shades and took a second assassin with rending stars. Here is a brief report about the GT.


My first game was against bretonnians and it was a clear victory for me. He had no models left on the board on turn 4 and I lost only harpies and an assassin. My opponent rolled very badly with his generals panic tests and the unit of 15 KoTR fled of the board. Assassins worked tremendosly well in this game, as did the ASF banner on black guard. The objective was to kill as much enemies as you could, and well I succeded quite well.

He had 3 big lances of knights of the realm, 30 skirmisher bowmen, 2 trebuchets, 4 pegasus knights, 2 paladins, damsel and a bretonnian lord. The lances charged my exequtioners and black guard, but bounced of due assassins and the always strike first banner on the black guard. This in turn paniced the generals unit and on the fourth turn it ran of the table due panic again.
I lured his pegasus knights to charge my harpies and then charged the pegasus knights with my cold one knights, destroyed them overan into bowmen and the other catapult.---> dead pesants. The other trebuchet was dealt by dark riders.

Second game was against another dark elf player. He had an army with pretty much only shooting. 2 units of 20 rxbs and one unit of 10, shades, 10 levels of magic and 2 war hydras. Where were the harpies I don't know.
Well I lost dark riders and harpies and killed everything he got. He made some huge mistakes, like not dealing with my own hydra and allowing me to get accross the board almost without casualties. The ring of course helped a lot!

I let him take the first turn, and his shooting did almost nothing, because he had deployed them to deep into his deployment zone. On my 2 first turns I failed stupidity checks with my cold ones who were screening most of my units. This meant that for the first 2 turns my main line advanced only 6 inches. After that I moved in with full speed, forced him to shoot at my haripes and cold ones, he couldn't kill them all and then I charged with everything. When all my combat units were in mele with his gunline he conceded. Quite a boring game.

Third game was against Tk and I knew it was going to get tough. My opponent was good and had a very fast army with 2 units of 5 chariots, 2 catapults, light horsemen, 3 scorpions, 5 carrions and 2 swarms. Characters were a king, prince, liche and two priests. The objective was to capture tabel quaters and his magic was so unstoppable. I mannaged to kill the king and the other unit of chariots, but because he killed the black guard unit on his final turn with the catapult he won the game. The game objective was to controll table quaters, so unless he had killed 7 BG with the catapult I would have contested the quater and it would have been a draw. Even if one had lived it would have been a draw, but no.

Forth game was quaters again and against druchii again! This time my opponent had 6 lvls of magic, an assassin, 10 black guard, 20 crossbows, 8 shades, 2 reapers, 5 dark riders and 5 harpies. It was a draw and I had times when I rolled just horribly. I charged my exes and an assassin into his hydras flank and didn't cause a single wound. Re-rolling break tests with ld 8 I failed and was run down. Lost that flank right there. He also put 3 wounds on my hydra in a single turn with his dark riders.

Anyway I made it to the otherside, killed his blackguard and lvl 4 mage and some other stuff. We both had 2 quaters at the end of the game.

Fifth game was against a guy I played eariler this week. In that game I managed to kill all of his units, so I was quite confident, as he ws using the same list. If we would have reached turn 6 it would probably been a draw, but as we only got to play 5 turns I held all the objectives. Black guard killed his temple guard and slann (who hang there alone for 3 rounds after the temple guard had been killed) and stegadon was killed by exes and black guard. Nice game though I lost my general and left flank on my turn 2.

The final game was against teclis led high elves (cheese!). Basicly he had a hammer of dragon princes joined by bsb with battle banner, 14 PG, 10 archers, 10 sea guard(?), 3 repeater bolt throwers, 2 units of 6 swordmasters and no eagles(?).

He killed my dark riders, cold ones, general and harpies, we played only to the fifth turn as he had only 2 seaguard and the crew of a bolter.

I got the first turn and started a general advancement towards his line. I blocked the movement of his princes with harpies and in the following turn he charged them, but didn't pursue. I charged the princes with cold ones and inflicted no wounds, though my general killed his champion. I failed the break test and got caught, but he over ran into the black guard. My assassin and the rest of the unit slaghtered them. Next turn I charged with BG into his PGs flank and he decides to flee. he rolls 10 and is 7 from the board edge. That was pretty much it. The rest was mopped up by shooting/magic/hydra and exequtioners. That's what happend when you use special characters


In my fifth game my crossbows and some other minis suffered from a catapult effect, as one kid leaned on the table and my minis flew through the air in a beautiful arc. It could have been worse. I saw at least 3 armies that were totally destroyed in the same way.

Anyway it was fun, shame that the black guard got destroyed in the third game, other wise I would be very happy, but now I'm so sad, angry, mad, raagh!

Sounds like a great time. Good job on placing 4th. How many people were there?

I don't see many lists with fully ranked executioners like that, but it seems like they worked well for you, although your ASF BG w/ Assassin were clearly the stars. Do you feel like you got a lot out of your character set up? two Assassins can be just sick, but how did your two Masters do?

There was around 50 people playing fantasy I think. The big tournament in finland used to be bigger when it wasn't a GT.

I like the exequtioners in big units because they can take some damage on the way in, have some combat resolution and are an excellent place to hide an assassin. Sure the black guard preformed better, but that unit is so much better than anyother options in the druchii book.

Most of my opponents were expecting one assassin, and when I revealed the second one they realised that they had underestimated my army.

The bsb was useful with str 6 attacks he cut down temple guard and the tomb king in no time, but everytime I had to roll for break tests I failed even with the re-roll, so that ability didn't come into play very much. The 1+ combat resolution was much more useful.
The master on dark steed destroyed 3 chariots in one turn with his str 7 lance, but otherwise he preformed quite weakly, though I made some mistakes with him. He also charged out of my infantry units to assassinate lvl 4 mages.