Has anyone ever tried this item before? Seldom used magic item discussion

So I'm seriously considering trying a list with an item that I doubt many people have tried.  The Helm of Discord was probably written off by many when 8th edition first came off, including myself because of how easy it is to pass leadership tests.  However, if they fail they cannot attack and are hit automatically.

Now I think the ogre army has a good chance to tailor an army list with this item in mind, a Slaughtermaster with Death magic can snipe the enemy BSB eliminating re-rolls.  Furthermore, if Doom and Darkness is rolled you can greatly improve your chances of them failing.  Lastly, I plan on using an irongut bunker for my character with the item and so with all those S6 attacks you can really capitalize on their vulnerability.  Now of course I don't expect it to happen every round of combat but Warhammer is all about minimizing risk and maximizing reward, for a small 30 point investment and working my list to create an advantageous situation I could easily turn the game around when that unkillable lord or blender vampire lord suddenly finds itself "defanged." 

So what do you think of the idea? I will try and post a list in the right forum later that shows the idea in its entirety.

Secondly, what magic items have you used that are seldom seen?  Did your idea work?  Do you think you could have changed anything to make it more effective?

Now this is just one example of tailoring your list to take advantage of a magic item.  What items have you used, good or bad?

Here is the link to my own list
http://www.ogrestronghold.com/forum/index.php?topic=27540.new#new

It's an interesting idea, but it seems a little overly focused. If you want it to kill characters with the item and you load up on death magic to make the item work better, you miss the fact that the Death magic itself could kill the characters for you (2 out of 6 are very good at it and even the sig can pull it off). You are even relying on it to kill a character for you already (the BSB) so why not just use it to kill the character you want dead in the first place?

Now if you wanted to just make a character hunter build for a tyrant, lets say, then the helm might find its place. Maybe toss on sword of anti-heros, the helm, OTS, and either giant breaker or death cheater (according to preference). Now you have a model that makes any character nervous.

As for my own forays into unliked items, I've tried out the gnoblar thief stone with mixed results (the best being stealing the talisman of preservation off of the enemy hierophant and using the resultant 2+ ward to brush off the casket of souls), as well as the gut maw (I just really like the visual image...), but all in all I was not impressed with their performance.

I figure that the main thing my main combat unit has problems with is an even harder character than mine.  If I snipe the BSB first I can kill the main combat character later (who probably has greater magic protection anyway). 

I actually thought about the Anti Heroes sword but thought it was counter-synergy with the Lore of Death.  Being that I would actually weaken its power before combat.

You would only weaken the sword's combat power if the BSB is in the same unit as the target character. I'm not sure how often this comes up where you play, though.

Another issue i see is with a lvl 4 SM to try and get the death spell you need, that leaves very few lord point left for your helm bearer, meaning you are forced to use a hero level character to take out a super killy lord (hope the helm works!). An alternative to a lvl 4 death wizard would be sniper poison man eaters. This way you can still kill the BSB and have plenty of points left over for a tyrant to be your character hunter (the extra 50 points of gear is a great help)

Or get a bruiser+helm+gw... it is not a super cheap option though but can work : ) S7 4A will hurt anything.

Death in general for ogres is not the typical setup and maybe the chance to catch the opponent off guard has its merits but other armies will do better in this aspect I guess.

Perhaps running two lvl2 death mages may be better? You will have two sniper-spells in the sig, points for the tyrant, more options for arcane items (eg power stone for the +2 PD for the essential cast), just remember the maw-tax.

Including the posion/snipers in the list can make a decent ogre army with focus on shooting and magic for character/monster killing. Hell heart and some of the scrolls in the BRB will add for the wizard killing.

It can work ; )

I've been interested in the same topic for a while, though I never found the courage to try it. I think it could be a very nice trick, but at the end of the day you have to make sure their combat character gets into combat with your Helm character, after you've cast Doom and Darkness, and after you've sniped their BSB, all without them realising they're going to be in trouble...

It seems like a lot of effort- if you get it, great! You'll destroy them; if you fail/ they pass their leadership test, then you're in a world of hurt against a very hitty character...

On a different note, I've been wanting to try out a Hunter + Sabretusk pack (probably only one Sabre, just for Vanguard and Swiftstride) with a Great Weapon and Trickster's Helm. I think it would be very interesting just throwing him up against a unit early on, then casting Spinemarrow to lock him in place; he shouldn't take more than a wound per turn, if they don't have a character.

It seems that builds like these are fun and interesting, but the effort/ reward ratio tends to be pretty heavily weighted; you put a lot of effort into making one awesome thing happen, but it's not guaranteed, and at the end of the day you probably won't be so good at something else because you've chosen to specialise and limited yourself in other areas.