Ok so i went back to the drawing board on the army as a whole after
finding out that the local tournament scene runs at 2400 points. There
is no point playing above that as both myself and my partner would like
to eventually try the tourny scene.
So after much to-ing and fro-ing i have trimmed the list down to 2400 points exactly.
LORDS
Arch Lector, fpa, shield, talisman of protection, Warrior Bane (Joins halbediers)
Wizard Lord lvl 4 with dispel scroll (joins hand gunners)
HEROES
Witch Hunter with paired pistols
Master Engineer
Captain, BSB, FPA, Shield, Great weapon (joins great swords)
CORE
39 Halbediers, shields, full command
5 man archer detachment
8 Knights, musician
10 handgunners
SPECIAL
Great Cannon
Great Cannon
29 Greatswords, full command, Standard of discipline.
5 man archer detachment
5 Demigryphs, full command, Gleaming Banner
RARE
Celestial Hurricanum
Hellblaster Volleygun.
Please feel free to comments and leave feedback on the list. I think i may go grey and senile before this list is right sigh
For me, personally, it all looks solid until you get to special and rare and the effect they have on core. 8 knights will bounce off most of the things you'd want to throw them at, they prob need to be ten at least (you need five for a rank remember). For me it's the choice of the great swords that is stopping you being able to bulk up the knights and make sure they can hit hard enough by giving them a mounted character (whether captain or warrior priest, I'd go cap for hold the line and pure combat ability). The great swords being there also means you haven't been able to take a full 6 of demis, for two full ranks.
ReplyDeleteBut even though it looks as though I'm saying "ditch the GS take other stuff" I'm actually not lol. I've not used them yet and I favour cavalry for my force, but this is nothing more than personal preference on my part. I just harbour doubts about their ability of even a good sized unit of unsupported GS to inflict much damage, especially if you come against VCs and any of their nasty ethereal stuff. As a result of them you're also going to have to be so careful about committing the knights.
Mind you, take lore of fire, buff them with magic fiery death great swords and who knows?! Empire as with most armies, are most effective when working as a cohesive whole, two/three turns of artillery death followed by slamming some knights into a unit bogged down by halberdiers all the while flinging spells about is a pretty decent approach I just wonder whether you've given yourself too many anvil units in taking both halberds and GS, but again games alone will show that.
Slight worry number three (or is that number 465, I've lost count lol) is whether you have anything to counter rapidly moving beasts, especially fliers. Demis will def help here, but make sure they don't get bogged down in the main combat if their job is countering aerial/fast cav threats.
I've not used the hurricanum but the buffs it gives are nice and I'll be interested to hear how it plays out for you. +1 to hit certainly sounds decent on paper.
This prob all looks really negative, but I don't think there's anything fundamentally 'wrong' with your army selection (for me there are no bad armies, just more and less competitive ones depending on how friendly your opponent is), in fact there are elements I'm going to be keen to get your view on once you've played a game or two with them (GS and celestial hurricanum). As I say, I think you'll discover that your army just lacks a bit of a killer blow element, and if you get some unlucky artillery rolls then dealing with 'big stuff' is going to get shaky.
Enjoy your first game with them and let me know how it goes! For the Empire!