Hello.

I have just recently started playing Warhammer. been gaming since 93, played Warhammer quest, necro, and all sorts of other games. Me and my gaming group just recently got back into Fantasy. And well we play 3 v3 games ... long, but fun any way. we play weekly.

One of our members, put together a pretty mean empire army ... he has broken a 4 gen Slann, popped some WofC with it ... and is pretty proud of himself. I was hoping that someone, has some advice on the army that I am planning of throwing at him.

here is his list, as far as i can tell.

2000ts:

A hellbaster cannon.

3 X 5 knights Full command

about 25 knights of the inner circle full command

and that is it for rank and file

Heroes are

Kurt Helborg :he has a Runefang and laurels of Victory (wounds count as double for combat res)

Ludwug Schwarzhelm : Emperor's standard, killing low, and the sword of Justice (doubles rank bonus)

And two Captains of the Empire equipment changes

All the Heroes go into the huge knight block and the use the smaller knights to protect the flank and set up charges for the large block ... hellbaster is kinda useless most of the time.

i plan to field this list

Highborn alter Bow of Loren, Arcane Bodkins, Briarsheath, fimbulshard and Great weapon

Noble, waywatcher, HoDA

Noble waywatcher, horn of the asrai,

Noble wardancer, Blades of Loec

3 x 10 glade Guard

2 x 10 waywatchers

2 x 10 wardancers mus and champ

there are about 60 pts left ... any advice of idea would be greatly Appreciated

Welcome to the Glade,

It seems like his army is very spesifically tailored. March blocking and good shooting will work fine for you. But you might consider adding some more flavor to your list.

I don't think you'll need waywatcher upgrades for the nobles. You might want to transform one of them into the standard alter noble (GW, HoDA, HoH) and drop the other one all together.

Also your army is very very stable and his cavalry will outdistance all of your troops. Consider adding a wild rider unit with warbanner as flank charger(which should team up with the Alter noble) instead of one of the wardancers.

I prefer waywatchers in groups of 5-6 but I see why you're deploying so many. KB is pretty unreliable so I would probably drop one the WW and reduce the numbers on the other one because you will have a hard time getting cover for such a big unit.

With the opening rare slot you might consider getting a GE for redirecting and march blocking. Since he has so little shoting you should be able to use the birdie pretty effectively.

Your lord will make short work of his 5 knight units in two turns. So you should march block as much as possible and dance aorund his army. Do not try to engage the knights unless you get a healthy flank charge. Move out of the way shoot like crazy, when he turns to engage you, just get out of the way once again

Good hunting!

against an empire list which has that little artillery, i've had great success with a couple of units of wild riders, a couple units of glade riders a treeman. the fast cav can easily out maneuver him. esp if you take a unit of waywatchers and keep them hidden and march block. heck you could even take some warhawk riders to do the same job for cheaper. as good as the hoda is, against a 1+ armor save it loses much effectiveness. you will average 10 shots, hit with 8-9 and wound with 4-5, he may lose one or two knights.

the unit of wild riders with the moonstone of the hidden ways is nice. they can jump to another wood perhaps on a flank or behind him as he advances. give you a nice charge to remove some of his static res.

in any event, good luck

Thanks alot for the advice.

I wrote up a new army list:

Highborn alter, bow of Loren, arcane bodkins, Highborn alter Bow of Loren, Arcane Bodkins, Briarsheath, Annoyance and GW

Noble, Alter, Hoda, HotH GW, La, Sh

Noble Wardance, Blades

2 X 10 GG

2 X 8 Dryads

2 X 6 GR + musician

10 wardancers musician and champ

Treeman

6 Wildriders full command


I decided to drop the WW in choice of the Treeman, I figured that having 3 heavy hitters (tree and two alters) would work out very well pound his huge flanks (about 6 ranks deep of cav). I don't have a GE model, so that is reason i didn't pick the Birdie. Though i can see the Strategic Value of such a mobile unit... my next investment will be Warhawks and Eagles

I am also debating if i really need a Wardancer noble, if the noble would not be better sutied as a wilder rider with the Moonstone ... and adding a warbanner to the wild riders. i would have to trim the points from the wardancers. I am also wondering if i need the annoyance on the Highborn. perhaps there is another item that i might want to put on him.

I plan on having The highborn waste the smaller units of knight while i have the larger on chase the GR around, before hitting him hard with as many units as i can.


Any advice on that?

The wardancer unit is kind of biggish so I would try to cut it to a bit smaller size and give the wild riders a warbanner. Also get the eagle as soon as possible. Against an army like that it is golden. He will have nothing to deal with it, and if you get the smaller knight units tied up he will either have to charge it with a character from the big block, or get march blocked at every turn.

If it were me. i'd drop both units of glade guard, add a unit of waywatchers. they are good for shooting off a hod and charging artillery units round 2. they will also march block very well if deployed correctly. this would also make you much more mobile and able to get out of his way. if you can deny him any charges, you take away his biggest advantage.


i personally think waywatchers are the best way to deal with artillery. much of the artillery i face is bunched on a hill. this means i can charge more than one unit at a time.

If all you want them for is warmachine hunting, then I'd rather have warhawks then waywatchers. That way you will have that rare slot open for your eagle, which you really should get... really!

and once that artillery is gone, your warhawks will be available for setting up crossfire situations which could help. The last hting you want is to put all that hard work into combi-charging that big knight unit and breaking it only to have it rally the next turn. General's leadership with muso, oh yeah, its rallying.

One thought about the Wardancer noble.

Blades of Loec are nice because, with the extra attack from your Wardancer Weapons and the re-rolling to wound, you have about the best chance of landing that KB when it counts. But the Noble is only going in with 4 attacks, if you don't land that KB, which you might not, then your naked and probably dead. If you want the Wardancer with BoL, consider the Highborn with AoN and talisman of chioce, I like the Amber Pendant, but that's just me.

I know that against all of those knights the Highborn Alter with bodkins and bow sounds like the no-brainer chioce, and I'm sure he's very effective. But the Wardancer has the benefit of being protected in a unit, so you don't need the briarsheath and can take a ward save instead. He's st 5 on the charge and has more attacks if you dance the storm on the charge, which is what I do to get the most out of that +1 st. and he comes in with a full compliment of wardancer attacks, so you come out of it doing more wounds than the alter.

Wardancer Highborn + retinue + wild riders w/ Warbanner and Standard Alter in the flank will break that unit as reliably as anything else we have available. Especially with glade riders and an Eagle to redirect everything else, and maybe a Treeman in the face a round early to set up the combi-charge.

Whatever you do, I'd get that Eagle, it will help.

Thank you all for your advice. I Played my friend's army this weekend and it went fairly well, i scored a massacre on my part.

This was the list i used.

Spell weaver lvl 4 on a elven steed, Ranu's heartstone, 288

Noble Alter Hoda and helm of the hunt, GW, LA 156

Noble Wild rider Moonstones Steed 157

Noble wardancer Blades 140

8 Dryads 96

8 dryads 96

5 Glade riders Musician 129

6 Wilder Riders full command + combat banner 217

1 tree man 285

5 waywatchers 120

8 wardancers musician and Champ 165

7 wardancers musician and champ 147

total 1996

The game was rather one sided. I managed to get behind him with the wild riders and pop the hell baster with combined fire from waywatchers and hoda. got the beast cowers off on his main block, then slammed it for the front and back with wardancer noble, dryads to the front, treeman to the flank and wildriders in the rear. KB his general (directed all the attacks at him, scored 2 KBs out of 9 attacks). broke the knights and ran him down (he rolled 1,2,3 to flee) caught the unit and it was pretty much over from there ...


We are on for next week, he said that he is retiring his "knight block" after such a massacre.

Thanks for all the advice. I had been having the hardest time trying to find the strong points in the army. I have learned tons about how to play wood elves from this site.

Thank you all for the advice again.

Good Job Kindred!

great job. just hope he doesn't get a steam tank. there is very little we can do to deal with one of those, except stay the heck away from it