The Vampire Counts

[Daicon]

Keep in mind that the Lahmian list in the back of the book is purely based on your opponents consent, so anyone could say no to having him take other heroes.

With that said, I'm a fan of Blood Dragons, mainly because I love characters that will kick a** in close combat, and am not really a fan of magic. Hell, I refuse to use a Slaan in my Lizardmen army, and go for a Saurus Old-Blood on a consistent basis instead.  

[Hoxtalicious]

I'm just getting started with fantasy and my eye has fallen on the Vampire Counts, I'm thinking of doing a normal army led by Lahmians (blame Genevieve for that).

What I've got planned is:

- Vampire Lord
- Vampire Thrall
- Wight Lord
- 2 blocks of skeletons
- 1 block of skeletons with spears
- 2 blocks of zombies
- 1 block of grave guard
- 1 small block of black knights
- 1 banshee

Question is, will it do any good?  

[Daicon]

I'd suggest stepping that Vampire Lord down to a Count, and using the freed up hero slot to take a Necromancer. The more magic power you've got going, the better off you are.

Skeletons are always a worthwhile investment, though I've never seen anyone with the need to give them spears. If you want zombies, minimum unit sizes to begin with and pump them up through the invocation of nehek later. The less victory point you award your opponent, the better. Especially considering how easy it is to kill a zombie.

Grave Guard are always a solid investment, especially if you plan on making that Wight Lord into a battle standard bearer. Stick him in with the unit and you can do all kinds of nasty things.

If Black Knights hit someone in the flank, you've just won combat. Especially if you can manage to give them a hellish vigor.

Banshees are cool for what they do... but I've never seen them be very effective at doing it.

I'd advise getting some ghouls, as a skirmisher screen filled with toughness 4 individuals makes for a very nice missile screen. Not to mention the poisoned attacks they can dish out.

Black Coaches are also quite fun, just be wary of anything with strength seven. After all, you don't want to see your coach with 10 or more wounds get smashed into pieces by a Chaos Lord with great weapon, cannonball, etc.  

[Hoxtalicious]

Daicon

I'd suggest stepping that Vampire Lord down to a Count, and using the freed up hero slot to take a Necromancer. The more magic power you've got going, the better off you are.

Skeletons are always a worthwhile investment, though I've never seen anyone with the need to give them spears. If you want zombies, minimum unit sizes to begin with and pump them up through the invocation of nehek later. The less victory point you award your opponent, the better. Especially considering how easy it is to kill a zombie.

Grave Guard are always a solid investment, especially if you plan on making that Wight Lord into a battle standard bearer. Stick him in with the unit and you can do all kinds of nasty things.

If Black Knights hit someone in the flank, you've just won combat. Especially if you can manage to give them a hellish vigor.

Banshees are cool for what they do... but I've never seen them be very effective at doing it.

I'd advise getting some ghouls, as a skirmisher screen filled with toughness 4 individuals makes for a very nice missile screen. Not to mention the poisoned attacks they can dish out.

Black Coaches are also quite fun, just be wary of anything with strength seven. After all, you don't want to see your coach with 10 or more wounds get smashed into pieces by a Chaos Lord with great weapon, cannonball, etc.

Wow, thank you, finally someone in this guild with an ounce of good sense to give a good reply.

Okay, I've been pondering on what you said and I'll drop the skeletons with spears block and bring the zombie blocks to somewhere around the minimum. I've been thinking about giving the Grave Guard a Banner of Barrows and the WIght Lord who joins them a Sword of Kings. (May not be as effective, but I never really play to win, I like a strong theme through the army.) I'll take ghouls then as skirmishers are much needed and as for the vampire count, I've been thinking about giving her a Blooddrinker and Bonearmour. As for the thrall, I was thinking about giving her an Aspbow.

Would a level 2 necromancer with a dispell scroll and a power stone be a good addition then? Or should it just be a meatbag with no extra stuff?  

[Daicon]

Power stone and dispel scroll are fairly sound choices, as you never know when you'll need those extra dice, or when a bad dispel roll could be saved by that scroll. Just to give you some more options, I've always found a Power Familiar to be a very worthwhile investment. The extra power dice and dispel dice you'll generate are well worth the points, especially seeing as you'll earn well over an extra two power dice in a game from that, and the extra dispel dice can often save your a**.

If flavor is what you love, I'd definately give the Thrall an Asp Bow. I haven't thumbed through my friend's codex in a while though, so I can't criticize on many of the other choices. When Rookwood comes online, he'd probably be able to give you better advice than I, seeing as how VC has been his army for years now.  

[Hoxtalicious]

Daicon

Power stone and dispel scroll are fairly sound choices, as you never know when you'll need those extra dice, or when a bad dispel roll could be saved by that scroll. Just to give you some more options, I've always found a Power Familiar to be a very worthwhile investment. The extra power dice and dispel dice you'll generate are well worth the points, especially seeing as you'll earn well over an extra two power dice in a game from that, and the extra dispel dice can often save your a**.

If flavor is what you love, I'd definately give the Thrall an Asp Bow. I haven't thumbed through my friend's codex in a while though, so I can't criticize on many of the other choices. When Rookwood comes online, he'd probably be able to give you better advice than I, seeing as how VC has been his army for years now.

Still, you have my thanks for this great advice, as it's constructive and not of the "your choices are bad, you are going to lose" kind.

I've always preferred themed armies and I'll be tweaking with the stuff before actually buying the bulk of the force. One thing I'm wondering though is, is it a good investment to give the skeletons light armour? (I smell a future conversion coming)  

[Daicon]

Honestly, it is entirely worth it to give the skeletons light armor. I can't remember for the life of me how many 6+ saves I've seen Rookwood's skeletons make, avoiding death and foiling the attempts of Elven Swordmasters to slay them. Besides, against an average unit of troops, a nice 4+ close combat save can always be appreciated.  

[Hoxtalicious]

Light armour it is then, I'm looking forward to combining Bretonnian Men at Arms bodies with the undead bits for the best effect. Well then, my list should look something like this:

Vampire Count - Blood Drinker and Bone Armour.

Vampire Thrall - Aspbow.

Wight Lord - Heavy armour, shield and Sword of Kings.

Necromancer - Level 2 wizard, dispel scroll and power stone.

Skeleton regiment (30) - Light armour, captain, musician and standard bearer.

Skeleton regiment (30) - Light armour, captain, musician and standard bearer.

Zombie regiment (20) - Musician and standard bearer.

Ghouls (10) - Ghast.

Dire Wolves (10) - Doom Wolf.

Grave Guard (20) - Shields, Crypt Keeper, musician, standard bearer and Banner of Barrows.

Black Knights (5) - Barding, Hell Knight, musician and standard bearer.

Banshee (1).

Grand total: 2.231 pts.  

[Daicon]

The skeleton blocks seem good, high numbers that will only get highers. I'd chop the zombie block in half, using their points to buy some more ghouls. I would split the Dire Wolf unit into two units of five, this way you can effectively threaten some more flanks with them, and make sure a dire wolf doesn't enter either, as I've never found the extra attack to be worth the points. I would try to bump the Graveguard unit up to 25 somehow, as they stay down when slain. Black Knights are solid as they are now. I would personally drop the banshee, but you said earlier that your army is based more towards the fluff side of the spectrum, so if it's what tickles your fancy, feel free to keep it.

The characters seem fine to me, though I've never really been a fan of Bone Armor. *Shrugs* Mind you, that's why any forrays into the Vampire Counts that I've undertaken have involved me using Blood Dragons.  

[Hoxtalicious]

I might drop some things to bring the current point amount down to somwhere around 2.000 pts. so for the time being the banshee can float somewhere else. Zombies can be scaled down, maybe I'll let the necromancer shamble along with them so he reinforce them on the go.  

[Daicon]

Sounds like a plan to me. Once you're happy with the army composition, test it out. See how things, and alter accordingly.  

[Micks 109]

does anyone have any good tactics for fighting a TK army with a VC armyas iwas just kick in by my mate the force i was using was

vampire count, level 2, add hand weapon, von carstein ring 346

vampire thrall, add hand weapon, heavy armour, wolf form, ring of the night 138

necro, level 2, power familer 150

necro, level 2, obsidan amulet 145

skeletons 29, light armour, full command 315

skeletons 19, light armour, full command 215

dire wolves 9 60

ghouls 10 80

spirt host 3 195

grave guard 15, sheilds, full command, magic banner war banner 250

fell bats 5 100

total 1994

my plan was to have the count in the big unit of skeletons the thall in the small unit have the necros at the back and advance towards the TK, i have a good idea of what when worngi was out memovered as i keep my units to close togther.
any advice would most welcome  

[Daemon_King]

Micks 109

does anyone have any good tactics for fighting a TK army with a VC armyas iwas just kick in by my mate the force i was using was

vampire count, level 2, add hand weapon, von carstein ring 346

vampire thrall, add hand weapon, heavy armour, wolf form, ring of the night 138

necro, level 2, power familer 150

necro, level 2, obsidan amulet 145

skeletons 29, light armour, full command 315

skeletons 19, light armour, full command 215

dire wolves 9 60

ghouls 10 80

spirt host 3 195

grave guard 15, sheilds, full command, magic banner war banner 250

fell bats 5 100

total 1994

my plan was to have the count in the big unit of skeletons the thall in the small unit have the necros at the back and advance towards the TK, i have a good idea of what when worngi was out memovered as i keep my units to close togther.
any advice would most welcome

Use a Vampire Lord, they're better than counts, and give him the wolf form so you can stick him with the Dire Wolves for a start.  

[EliotJamesRookwood]

Micks 109

does anyone have any good tactics for fighting a TK army with a VC armyas iwas just kick in by my mate the force i was using was

vampire count, level 2, add hand weapon, von carstein ring 346

vampire thrall, add hand weapon, heavy armour, wolf form, ring of the night 138

necro, level 2, power familer 150

necro, level 2, obsidan amulet 145

skeletons 29, light armour, full command 315

skeletons 19, light armour, full command 215

dire wolves 9 60

ghouls 10 80

spirt host 3 195

grave guard 15, sheilds, full command, magic banner war banner 250

fell bats 5 100

total 1994

my plan was to have the count in the big unit of skeletons the thall in the small unit have the necros at the back and advance towards the TK, i have a good idea of what when worngi was out memovered as i keep my units to close togther.
any advice would most welcome

Your graveguard unit is too small, it can't hold out against a unit of 22 Tomb Guard. As well, you need your heavy calvary. Black Knights are a huge advantage for you, seeing as TK can't take the hits, and don't have the toughness to protect themselves, if you position them right, and use the book of Arkhan, you can ensure they are moving at least 15" a turn. If you want to use the strategy of moving those guys up quickly, have a necromancer on a horse follow the unit from behind, with the book of Arkhan. That way, they don't have to be within 12" to march, and should be able to move quickly.

Skeletons, lower their unit sizes. You can summon more, and they don't cost a thing. Get them down to 15 each to save points. Fellbats are good, use them to go Liche Priest hunting, or attack the Screaming Skull if he has one. Spirit host, use them as a missle screen, advance your more valuable troops behind them.

Your Vampire Count doesn't need the Von carstein ring, its very nice, but you can make him much better. Give him aura of Dark Majesty to increase his range of generalship to 18", make sure he remains in the center, and you can have your force marching, and moving closer to him faster. If you want him to have a decent save, you can give him the Obsidian amulet instead. and alltogether you'll still have 30pts to spend. With that you can give him a magic weapon, or an arcane item. He has a 4+ ward against magic, so he's fine there, and he'll be much more useful.

Your other Necromancer should have a book of Arkhan, and a powerstone. Much more effective that way.

I'd go for 3 necromancers, but if you want a thrall, but him a horse instead. Have him lead the unit of Black Knights, and have the Banner of the Barrows to make a unit of 5-6 hit on 3's. With the Vampire Thrall in the unit with a lance, you should have about 6 or seven attacks at strength 6 and 3 at Strength 7(Strength 7 automatically destroys chariots) Thus making a very strong unit, that Tk will have a hard time defending.

For general tactics. Have your skeletons and blocks of infantry move up and engage, while your Black Knights with Thrall go in on the side or rear, while your General remains in the middle, preferably out of combat, unless necessary, and your necromancers stay close to the units, adding on to them. As this is happening target his spell casters, or carrion with your fellbats, use your ghouls to protect your spell casters.  

[EliotJamesRookwood]

Daemon_King

Micks 109

does anyone have any good tactics for fighting a TK army with a VC armyas iwas just kick in by my mate the force i was using was

vampire count, level 2, add hand weapon, von carstein ring 346

vampire thrall, add hand weapon, heavy armour, wolf form, ring of the night 138

necro, level 2, power familer 150

necro, level 2, obsidan amulet 145

skeletons 29, light armour, full command 315

skeletons 19, light armour, full command 215

dire wolves 9 60

ghouls 10 80

spirt host 3 195

grave guard 15, sheilds, full command, magic banner war banner 250

fell bats 5 100

total 1994

my plan was to have the count in the big unit of skeletons the thall in the small unit have the necros at the back and advance towards the TK, i have a good idea of what when worngi was out memovered as i keep my units to close togther.
any advice would most welcome

Use a Vampire Lord, they're better than counts, and give him the wolf form so you can stick him with the Dire Wolves for a start.

No... Dire wolves are weak, T 3. The movement 9 is great, but Strength 3 arrows will tear them apart quickly. A Vampire Lord is stronger yes, but you want to outmagic them, and you need more characters. That unit is too vulnerable, and the VC Lord will be left by himself, if he's stuck in combat, thats a major problem, as Combat resolution will kill him.