Archive - Ogre Kingdoms vs. Tomb Kings

okay here are some tips to face off against tomb kings...

1.  Swarms.  These are not hard to face against if they are tunnelling because most of your army will be over the other side of the board by when they show up(same goes for the scorpion) but when they decide no to tunnel an easy way to get rid of them is bulls with 2nd hand weapons or even anything in general.  Just don't use your elite units in combat with them or they will be wasted..

2.  Infantry.  Generally speaking their infantry isn't that hard to defeat in combat.  Tomb king players will use attrition tactics in combat to keep you there when there fear effect will take place.  All you need is bulls(or any ogre unit in general..) and charge them with lots of attacks.  You will be hitting on 3s and wounding on 3s(at worst) so with additional hand weapons(and a possible flank charge) you will be standing on a combat resoultion of 8 or even 10.  After that their is usually only about 8 or 7 left which blows that attrition idea out the window...

3.  Chariots.  These aren't too hard expecially when your tyants or even brusiers can smash them up.  Usually they don't field them with more than 3(or at least none around here...) and a character in a chariot.  characters and recieving a charge it isn't that hard to survive either.

4.  Cavalry.  These are like the infantry with speed attached though so all you need is your fast stuff to counter that threat.  Usually speaking they aren't that hard to beak as the heavy horseman have only a 4+ save and strength of 4(on the charge!!  ).

- Zuggut the FAT

Hand to hand combat is not a big problem, because the ogres are immune to fear.

However, it is essential to counter the tomb king magic and catapults, which can hurt the ogres badly.  Catapults (-1Ld) firing twice by magic can drive away  your troops (especially those big regiments).  Magical flank charge by chariots is another trick which can break your army.  If on the other hand the ogres can close in quickly for direct combat, battle can be won fairly easily.

- Wah

a mean trick i have seen is this. When you set up your dice line for setup dont put it at 12 inches. put it at 10 1/2 or 11 (make sure they dont notice).  that way when they try the magic 24 inch charge on the first turn to get to your units set up on the line they are 1 inch short... sucks to be them.

- Squats

The biggest worries you should have vs TK is their movement magic and making SSCs shoot in the magic phase.  Everything else can be weathered.

If you are really concerned about the casket of souls then just make sure one of your characters has 3 thief stones (MR 3) and can see the casket.  The casket casts with 2 dice and you get 3 to dispel ... end of story.  The TK player spent 280 pts minimum for a non-mobile priest and you spent 175 minimum for a mobile deterrent.  You win.

The biggest worries are the SSCs, ushabti, and chariots.  These 3 can mow through ogres like there's no tomorrow.  The SSC does 1d6 wounds even ALL models that take a wound (not just the ones under the whole) and is a magical flaming weapon.  The ushabti have a WS 4 and swing in Init order, both are very bad for ogres ... and they can be healed.  The chariots don't hit very hard individually but a unit of 4 will cause a huge amount of damage just rolling average results.  And the chariot WS 3 makes them difficult to hit.

What do the ogres have to combat this?  Lots of multi-wound, fast, fear causing beasts.  I'd take lots of ogres, no gnoblars, a few butchers with dispel scrolls and charge straight at them.  You will want to overwhelm them with damage and units so that the TK magic phase won't be able to keep up.  A gorger or two would also be quite useful since TK have nothing except their mainline units or characters that can deal with these.

- adsVampire

against the Tomb King armies that I've played, Butchers are very important for both gut magic and just to have chances to dispell some of the Tomb Kings more nasty incantations

two Butchers in an army around 1,500pts is by no stretch obscene for this type of game... also, only 4 dispell dice is rarely enough. taking a pair at least of dispell scrolls is needed.

here's why: even two units of Tomb King chariots can be vicious against the Ogres. with the TK incantation of urgency, they can make an additional charge/move in their magic phase after already making a full move in their proper movement phase. few are the Ogre units capable of surviving an attack from a unit of TK chariots, with their impact hits, horse attacks and standard crew or even character attacks. and when you flee, you'll flee with 2D6, while they will flee with 3.

all is not lost against these chariots though, and with a little magic (wink) they can be easily cast aside. two gut magic spells come to mind.

Bull Gorger - casting this on a unit of Ironguts will give your Ogres S7 attacks, enough to auto-kill chariots and, I'd assume, perform rather admirably against higher T units like giants and Ushabti

Toothcracker - increasing your units T by one is an incredible lift in any situation. a toughness of one higher means that your opponent will be rolling proportionally one higher as well to wound, meaning that statistically 17% of the wounds he would have dealt will fail. in battle terms, let's say roughly that around 1 in every 5 wounds that he would've dealt bounce off instead. also with Toothcracker... you're stubborn! so no matter if you lose CR (which sadly happens all too often with the Ogres, as they get often ranked and outnumbers and out-commanded, etc.), your Ironguts will be still rolling at their Ld of 8 and any other units within a foot of your general will be doing the same with his Ld

- Gutzkrieger

I went up against a 2k TK army, and what did he field with his army a bloody hierophant on a dragon, he slaugthered 2 of my units ironguts and bulls, my hunter seeked out his cav and unleashed his hounds taking out 3 of the unholy things.

Coming to the end of the battle my yetees had survived, so they went after a screaming catapult destroyed that but lost 2 of my yetees so the greyback was all alone, he then charged into the casket of souls killed the guards and and left the heirophant with one wound left thats when the bloody game ended.

I've played around 15 games with my ogres and i find if you want to win you want alot of small units, and make sure the yetees attack the warmachines.

Boris

You can't have a Heirophant on a dragon. Nor can you have a Tomb King on a dragon.

Only TK mounts are chariots and skeletal steeds.

vampire counts can have zombie dragons but thats as close as undead are getting to those big beasties. point this out to your friend, but tell him if he wants his hierophant to fly just pay the 20pts for the cloak of the dunes.

I find targeting the tomb king ancillary, i.e. scorpions, catapults, small units of skellies ushabti etc that they crumble relatively easily leaving the rest of the army vulnerable to attack. Hitting the bigger units of skellies and tomb guard just leave you tar pitted and vulnerable to the ancillary units which usually do enough to break you.

Harlequin

funniest thing to do against tomb kings. The hierophant usually has cloak of dunes. Take a hunter with kitties and sic em on the hierophant. Watch his army crumble. Either that or take trappers.

I have never played tomb kings so I don't understand the thiefstone strategy.  How does the casket work?  How would thiefstones work in this case?

In my battles where I used thiefstones, I have never actually gotten to use them because the unit with the thiefstones was never targeted with magic.  Even if the thiefstones do work to bounce off one spell, the opponent can simply use his magic on other units in subsequent turns, so I'm not really that sold on the item.  But maybe it has a special use against TK that I'm unaware of.

A few things:

- TK units can't flee from charges. Use it.

- TKs live and die by their Magic phase. They tend to have a powerful Magic phase (stacking the same spell on a unit from 3+ sources until it gets through). That said, 2 Butchers with 4 scrolls should shut down said Magic charge (it's almost always a charge). Do this at the right moment, and charge right back (something he can't flee from). That Fear has no effect on you is a very advantageous bonus (e.g. when Grinding).

- Tunnelers. Avoiding the markers doesn't help much (Scorpions run fast). The best tactic is to drop a Gnob unit on a marker before anything emerges. Then whistle innocently, and hope he whiffs when he auto-charges you (in which case, you beat him by 4...).

- Beware of TK shooting armies. The archers aren't that bad (9 shots to cause a wound), but the Skull Chukkas with Skulls of the Foe can ruin anybody's day. Kineater is a must in those instances.

Alright. The Casket of Souls hits every unit in sight. They take a leadership test and suffer the extra points in wounds. Bad stuff.

However, what this means is that, as long as you have your Thiefstones in sight of the Casket, they are added to the dispel pool. So if you have, say three of them, you have 3 DD against his 2 PD. Then, slap Trollguts on a unit and you now have 5!!!

For the Scorps, I would have to agree with Taladryel. Let him chomp on Gobbos. If you dont have the Gobbos to spend (using them for blocking or whatnot) take a unit of three Bulls and get ready to recieve/flank the Scorpion.

-Cion

Alright. The Casket of Souls hits every unit in sight. They take a leadership test and suffer the extra points in wounds. Bad stuff.

However, what this means is that, as long as you have your Thiefstones in sight of the Casket, they are added to the dispel pool. So if you have, say three of them, you have 3 DD against his 2 PD. Then, slap Trollguts on a unit and you now have 5!!!

-Cion

You are so wrong:
You cannot add magic resistance.
You can choose 3 thiefstonse(MR3) ( if you have them ) or MR2 or trollguts.

Sorry the most you van have is MR3 in any army accept with a bretonnian special character(Forgot which one).

But three thiefstones should be enough for 2 casket of souls dice

you cannot add MR, but don't forget that these are additional dispel dice, you can still use a dice from your pool as well.

So, if just one unit in LoS has magic resistance, all units will end up benefiting?  That's pretty neat...  It seems more worthwhile just to cast trollguts, instead of paying 45 points for that extra +1...  Then again, who says you'll be able to?

I think that the two screaming skull catapult with three wizards army is more effective and more frightning.

Ogres vs Tomb  Kings can be a very bloody battle if you are not paying close attention. I have played TK's many times and I'll be honest my first match up I underestimated them and almost lost.

Deployment~ on this one is key as to where you set up your ST7 nasty Great weapon hero(s) to face off with his unit(S) of chariots. And any TK player not using chariots is not playing his army correctly. A unit of impact his will ruin your day, keep in mind that they can cause enough wounds to break through the unit, and if you are a player who keeps your Butchers behind your own lines...they will get caught in the overrun....which is not fun...

The pop up scorpion is an annoyance when he comes behind your lines...your going to have to worry about him sooner or later, so keep in mind that if your opponent has one, you are going to have to deal with him. Same with swarms...

Magic~TK's happens to be an army that lives and dies in their magic phase, if you know you are going to play vs a TK army I suggest you read over their magic section in the armies book.

Ushabti are the heavy hitters....dont let them charge you...DONT LET THEM CHARGE YOU...normally you will see a unit of these bada$$'s on the opposite side of the chariots, with your opponent's plan of trying to steam roll your flanks and then have his little stuff tie you up untill he can get his hammers in again...it is important to remember a a deployment of a refused flank in these situations...

Hope this helps...

Take gorgers. A TK player will always have his priests hanging out in the back with some archers/catapult. If your 70 pt model can keep your 200+ pt units from getting shot/spelled he's done his job. You don't need to save the rare slots for S7 maneaters because an irongut with bullgorger will do the same thing.

A great way to take out TK is to send some Gnoblars to keep your enemy busy while you send up some hard hitting Ogres, i.e:Ironguts, Gorgers, Maneaters, Tyrants, to go and attack there  Tomb Prince or any other important characters.

I've been playing TK's longer than any other army I have.  After playing with Tk's against Ogres, and the other way around there are some must pay attention to points in addition to those listed above.

The good stuff:

TK chariots are the most fragile in the game.  Bonecrusher, Leadbelcher and heck, even thrown sharp stuff can weaken them to the point where your bait units can afford to soak a charge by them.

The whole TK (and VC army for that matter) pay the points to cause fear.  Ogres will never have to test for it unless you are trying to charge the casket or a charcter with the Death mask (both terror causers)

We hit their entire army (Tomb Guard/Chariots/Ushabti/king-princes) on 3's.  That's huge. Ironguts charging into a ranked unit of skellies hit on 3's and kill on 2's. 

Thiefstones.  I'd take 2-3 on 1 character just to nullify a casket.  This becomes more important as the game size increases.  I've had a casket do lots and lots of wounds to oges that have strayed away from the tyrant's LD radius.  Result?  Failed panic checks.  What the casket will do to a unit of trappers.... eesh.   Also if a TK player knows he's going up against ogres, a casket is a MUST BRING ITEM.  Argue with me all you want, but just the presence of the casket makes all Gut magic go off on a 4+ instead of a 3+.  I'd reccomend Gorgers against this item.  1 gorger will take care of a casket, noooo problem.  He's immune to psych so he doesnt have to take a fear test to charge it.  direct all his attacks on the Liche Priest that's making the box work, and poof! no more casket. 

The bad stuff: Ushabti.  As  Punk stated above, they are probably the unit that should be avoided as much as any in the TK army.  With higher WS, I, than bulls/guts and str 6, they'll chew thru any non-buffed ogre unit with no problem.  Even maneaters  should be wary. 

Shooting.  Not so much their archers, yes, even though they can shoot 2x a turn w/ incants, they hit on 5's, wound on 5's and we get whatever armor save / regen.  Its the catapult.  Beware this.  You can't regen against it as it's flaming.  1 wound on a unit will cause a ld check at -1.  (assuming it's been upgraded to skulls of the foe, but I've never field, nor seen one fielded without that upgrade)  And, it can shoot 2x a turn w/ incants.

Scorpions.  As a Tk player I wouldnt bury a scorpion against an army that is bum rushing into my deployment zone from turn 1.  They move 7", and can move 7" then be incanted to charge 14".  2 of these will take out a unit of bulls/guts with their poisoned str5 attacks.  They are T5 so bulls are wounding on 5's.  Dont try to bonecrusher them either, they have MR1.  They make great casket protectors, so I would always have 1 hanging around the casket, ready to pounce on any Gorger that shows up. 

Swarms.  Rank/file Ogres hate lots of poisoned attacks.  Against a unit of these I've charged a lone butcher out of a unit into 4 stands  of these buggers.  The butcher will usually last out 3-4 stands of them.

And finally, the magic. As above a TK army without magic is like a VC army without vamps to do the dirty work.  Bad thing, lots of spells that ALWAYS ARE CAST.  Good thing, most are 1d6 or 2d6.  In 3k games is where you usually see the High Liche Priest that's tossing 3d6.  So, whenever I fight against TK's with any army, I always take staff of sorcery for +1 to dispell.  in 2k games, 3 butchers are a must.   One with the 2 or 3 thiefstones, 1 with staff of sorcery and 1 with 2 scrolls probably.  Also, Giants are great against the TK undead.  They manouver easily to get into a flanking position.  No cannons/bolt throwers to worry about.  No 2d6 flaming spells being tossed their way.  And TK archers still need 5's to hit, 6's to wound.


One last word on their fighty characters.  They don't hit as hard as their VC equivalents, but are very, very hard to kill.  i usually kit out a prince with Great Weapon, Vambraces of Defense and Armor of the Ages.  So that's a hero with 4 wounds and you lose 1 attack in btb with him.  The King starts out with 4 wounds, and both are T5.  Against Ogres I start that prince out with the catapult, so he can incant on it, then he moves to a big skelly unit when it gets to crunch time.  The King gets the flail of skulls, it does 2 wounds per wound folks.

My regular opponent plays Tomb Kings. Some of the advice I have learnt has been posted before, but I would like to reinterate, as well as add some advice of my own.

Take Gorger/s. Quite often your opponent will be hanging around his side of the table - especially with the speed of Ogres. You can also use them to crash into a Screaming Skull Catapault. I normally take 2. However, don't rely on them, because if you do, they won't turn up until turn 5.

The key to the Tomb Kings is their magic phase. You need to know their magic phase. Their is a strict order in which they have to do things. If they do it in the wrong order, pick them up on it. Think about what is likely to be coming up and what you MOST need to dispell at the time. For example, on his Turn 1, it will be more important to dispell him shooting his screaming skull catapault then it would be to dispell moving out of turn. This is because it will give him one "practice" guess towards his target before his shooting phase proper. However, as the turns go on and you get closer to his units, it will be more important to dispell his move out of turn, as he can use it to charge you with a unit. From my experience, you won't be able to out-magic the TKs. I tried, even using 3 butchers and 4 dispell scrolls. So the key is to out-think him during his magic phase.

Remember, the TKs love to use their ranks, so if you can flank charge them with a unit of bulls or gnoblars, all the better. (This probably goes for most armies against TKs but).

I use 3 units of Bulls with no armour but additional hand weapons. They go out the front and try to draw the charge from other units, and quite often they will flee, leaving the charging unit open to a counter-charge from one of my two Ironguts units. They can also be put out on the flank to nullify the flanking of chariots.

A tyrant with Tenderizer and a Gut Maw will spank most TK characters in a challenge, especially on the charge. Put him in your warbanner unit, and his overkill and that banner will be pretty good for combat res. The only thing you risk is if his character has the magic item that allows him to redirect all wounds on a 4+. Make sure you give your Tyrant a ward save - maybe the wyrdstone necklace (thats what I use at least).

Be careful of the Screaming Skull catapault, as it causes a terror check when you get hit by it. Make sure you keep your army relatively together, as you will need to use the Tyrants leadership. Also, make sure you have a BSB, so that you can re-roll break checks. I find it more useful for that last character slot then a 3rd butcher.

The Banner of the Undying Legion is a pain in the butt. Either send fodder into that unit, or hit it with everything, because you can spend a lot of the fight trying to kill that unit, only to have him keep healing it. I find hitting it with my Tyrants unit with warbanner can go a long way to sorting out that unit. You can choose to just ignore this unit - but if you are playing against a good player, it will be at your own peril.

They do have bowmen, but I have found they are not that effective against Ogres. Don't worry about those too much.

I hope that I have been some help, this is the first time that I have given advice on playing WFB, as I have only been playing for about 6 months. However, I have played probably 10-12 games against TKs in that time.

Where I play the tomb king player runs alot of bowmen. I mean 3 units of 15 or 2 of 15 and 2 of 10 eithier way it's a lot af shoots. He also run the High Queen Khalida Neferher. Which makes them poision. Then she is  auto casting smiting once per turn. (that you can not dispell) He will take 1 skull chucker or the casket which makes a hard army to face.

Things that i found usefull is the Gnoblar screen of 2 units in 2 ranks helps block los alittle.
But what really worked was two big blocks of orgers bull and iron gut 8 to 10. Then with Tyrant and 3 butcher in the units how ever you want them but the Tyrant must have the Kineater big name and the butchers have the min. of 3 dispell scrolls.
Do not run the 2 units up  the middle take them down the flank keeping the close togetherer to get the re-roll of the panic test. During the set up phase put out any thing you got so show you plan on going up the middle like most orger armies do.
It all pays off when you do get in combat with all the gut magic in play .

I've played this from the other side now and think I can add the following to this thread.

chariots: although we have plenty of S7 characters and possible units (maneaters or buffed ironguts) These are still a threat given our usual choice of fielding ogres in units of 3.  A unit of 4 chariots (not a bad size for them as this costs only as much as 3 guts+bellower - and they're immune to panic so can afford to soak a casualty if need be) will contact a unit of 3 ogres will all chariots and inflict 4D3 impact hits at S4 - that's before the 12 S3 attacks and 4 S4 attacks from the crew.  Without any additional help from a smiting spell in the magic phase, this will inflict an average of 3 wounds from the impacts and 3 more from the normal attacks before saves - enough to ensure you are only going to get 3 attacks back most of the time - and you'll be lucky you'll be lucky if you ever get 3 wounds in reply.

they'll also have the outnumber....

now, this means that bulls and even ironguts aren't going to enjoy getting charged by these units, but yhetees are a bit more survivable with their -1 to hit aura of frost - the average wounds against yhetees are just under 5 - meaning 2 attacking back is more likely.  With this information it might be a plan to get yhettes out in front as tough bait, hopefully with their backs to terrain if things go wrong, and angle them to attract chariots in, but also to set them up for charges from the rest of your line.

this way you can either:

1) flee with teh yhetees to get the chariots out of position - with their 3D6 flee they stand a fairly good chance of escape, ceertainly better then the rest of our stuff

2) flee through terrain, hopefully either escaping (their movement isn't halved) and/or attracting the chariots into the terrain

3) using them as a blocker - if your TK opponents sees the flee into terrain, chances are he won't charge in response - and the yhetees become a brick wall to him, channelling him in another direction - you can use this too to set him up for hits from other stuff if you think it through.

4) let them get hit, they stand a pretty good chance of actually not losing by much and, with a tyrant within 12", of holding and then really kicking  some bony butt!

chariots will dictate the charge movement, just like cavalry does - and jsut like cavalry they also have weaknesses

1) they are totally weak in the flanks - even a unit of gnoblars will crush chariots units if it can catch them in a flank - unaided the chariots will just crumble away to your 40-50 point unit of pests, forcing the TK player to either write off his elite unit of send anotehr unti to help them out!

ogres in the flank of any description spell and instant and ugly death for the chariot unit - same goes for the rear!!

2) their armour is pathetic - they are very much like bulls in this respect - but without the strength of attacks!  ogre clubs ignore their armour saves and their 3 wounds don't last them that long!

3) chariots can shoot, but leadbelchers can do it better!  even a unit of 2 will smash these apart - just like they do to other fast cav - but again, don't get caught in the flank where only 1 belcher can fire!.

i've been playing ogres for a while now but have been playing tomb kings for years
there is a banner called icon of rakaph many people i've played with this item dont
consider it a threat IT IS this alloms a unit of skeletons or tombguard a free reform
BEFORE CHARGES understand that this will almost always guarante a charge into your bigest
units flank and thier is know way to stop it activating i;ve used this item to take out
chosen chaos warriors so whatch out

if they are using large units of bowmen you can expect them to form large block units the
turn before you charge giving them a 4 base CR take this into acount before charges and
make shure you get your impact hits 2's to kill a skeleton will almost always cancel out
their rank bonus in a 3 wide ogre unit

watch out for carrion if thier taken they will be monster of a hasle to get rid off and will be
used to march block your army turn 1

hope this helps your skeleton crushing

One nasty trick to watch out for is the TK movement/reform spell, this allows a unit to change direction and charge which can be nasty.

A key thing to worry about is Enkhil's Kanopi, a little doohickey that will end all Remain in Play spells if not dispelled. Few things can ruin your day like suddenly not having T5 or Regeneration just before your foe's charges are reslved, or in the worst case, before a priest triggers a Righteous Smiting for 2 CC phases sans buffs.

well they are 'even' to us, may be our OK army slightly powerful to TK. And about fighting against them;

*Keep your Dispel Scrolls against Casket of Souls. Our ogre are not high Ld and CoS will be death to us. In deployment don't let enemy to deploy CoS in a good position (choose terrain wisely). And catch them with gorgers and trappers as fast as we can (or with scruplaucher)

*Their bowmen. Not important treat! 5+ hit with S3 to 24" doesn't make any sense to me.

*Well like against VC army thundermace and scruplauncher are great for turning boneheads to dust n ash!

*Tomb Guards are their best block and they are really good. Attack them with care (well at least they can't killing blow us! )

*Light Chariots! With TK combo a chariot unit is their death star! they are mobile -and fast with succesfull magic phase-. Attack them with care and don't let them attack our important units.

*Bonehead Giant is weak unit! Catch it with unit like yhetees and bye bye Giant! Just terror may cause trouble!

*Their cavalry....I see no importance of their cavalry except being annoying. May use for flanking us (but instead they prefer to use chariots for this stuff)

*Their special deployment units; Scorpion and bugs. Well unless you are not defending which is not a logical tactic for an GK army in regular pitched battle- they can be only annyoing if you are attacking with packed blocks instead of lines. So try to focus on line attack if you see special deployment units. Only problem is poison! We don't like poison...no we don't!

*skull throwers! Deathly! really deathly! with their extra shoot incarnations they are deathly against us! we, ogres don't like panics checks don't we! Catch them with gorgers and trappers as fast as we can (or with scruplaucher)

* Find hierophant and concantrate shoots,magic, attacks on him! one of the easiest  and oldest tactic against undead in book! and it still works!

*carrions are little more annoying verisions of tunneling units. 24" fly can stop our advance! but at least they are not poisonous!

*ushabi, same as giant but they are not rare and they don't cause terror. otherwise with M5 we can catch them and they will be death again.

about their tricks: banner of hidden death, expensive but good trick if your opponent is experienced. their dispelling item (Enkhil's kanopi) is annoying stuff and cheap! Terror mask (Death Mask of Kharnut) is a trickster move! beware!

In their magic phase calm down. let them throw dices and make incarnations as long as don't harm you, keep your dices and use them wisely!

Well playing OK and finding an 'even' opponent to us is not an easy thing (well i must admit we are slightly little more powerfull to them)

right well aint been on in a while, so hey

firstly i would say if they have the casket be VERY VERY careful, save scrolls for it or save dice, otherwise kill the priest, dont wast magic on it, it wont get through :/

characters, if you have the chance to kill a priest, take it, dont hesitate, chance to kill the herirophant, TAKE IT, but remember crumberling is actualy very rarly the point were the tomb kings crumble (so to speak)  many of their "better units" have high leadership and their general is LD 9/10 depending.

chariots, if they are stupid enough to take chariots, (excluding achariot army) they are idiots, but be carful of them, they will caus esome damage if tehy charge but then they fall apart.

the bowmen, dont worry about them, but dont waste time in front of them, they may not be the most effective, but why get shot

the basic foor infrantery of the TK are rubbish, u hit them on 3's   an dthey have very little armour.

tomb princes/kings:  these guys are tough cookies,  not desighened to deal out horendous damage but to take it on the chin,  a king can have 5 wounds, a 4+ ward, an item which removes one of ur attacks and a gw, painful :/  also be carful with who u kill them with.  you could loose ur character or a large part of ur unit by killing them (when you kill them, take a LD test or suffer D6 wounds no saves!) nasty. oh and also they have one very nasty magic weapon, the flail of skulls,  its a flail which doubles unsaved wounds, (so a str7 king with 4 attacks doubling wounds, ouch!) that is teh only way their "fighting" hero's can do damage against you.

Tomb scorpions are quite dangerous, they will eat your small units of bulls, but apart from that you ar efine.

tomb guard, these are tough cookies, they are the "generals guard" of the army,  good str, good T, good armour and a decent WS, be careful of these guys and be cautious when trying to flank them when they are not engaged with another enemy, their a nasty baner they ofthen take which lets them REFORM before they charge :/ nasty.

Ushabti: be CARFUL. be VERY carful,  good movement, they can catch you off guard with magic, also they have decent toughness and an amazing strength (6) and they strike in Iniative order, they are I 3   they will chomp through a ogre unit so be cautious, hit them hard and FIRSt, even in the flank u arent guarented to kill them all, without suffering serious injury,  oh and they hit most of your units on 3's


caterpults, KILL THEM! KILL THEM!  if they get enough shots off you will not survive

carrion, tough brids but not to much of a problem for you,  except as march blockers, which with the caterpult could be fatal

bone giants,  on their own they arent that much of a threat,  if their are two however (I take two)   they can be a very big problem, big tough, strong, good armour and possibly enough attacks to kill a full unit of ironguts :/  also they will ofthen work togeather :/  i would recomend the tenderiser for this :/ and make sure they dont get the charge, els ethey get their special rule for tehir attacks

Magic, its relentless but not offensive, it supports their own units, not destroy your own,  a 2k list with a lord level liche will throw out 10 casting dice (a total of 4 spells)  dosent sound like much but when ogres can max get 5 dispel dice :/ it aint looking good :/.   their movement spell is the most dangerous,  it quite simply lets the unit it is cast on charge in the magic phase :/ its very dangerous. so us eur dice carfully, judge the charges carfully and accepte that you will not stop them all!

all in all, kill the priests, and make SURE you get the cahrge, and WITH MORE THAN ONE UNIT against one of theirs, espescialy with bone giants, i once rolled through a whole! empire kinght army with two of them :/.   kill the cateroults or hold them up, ignore the bowmen or caverly, chariots i wouldnt worry about, the princes/kings are tough but not incredably dangerous (excluding the flail).  Th emagic is RELENTLESS, so accept you cannot stop all the spells, so use your dice wisly

Well the thiefstone against casket tactic wont work in 8th ed. beacause MS gives the Unit a wardsave instead of dispel  dices against magic. Well thats not fun

tomb kings can now get a disgusting amount of shooting out which can spell disaster for us, i play TK and with the new rules for measuring the SSC is horribly effective against big blocks of infantry and their archers firing in two ranks and always hitting on fives can be dangerous as well cos with three units of sixteen thats 16 hits and around 6 wounds which is two dead ogres which alone can leave a hole that catapults can enlargen (is that a word?) if you can get into combat and fast you can take most things that they have to offer but tomb kings are rock solid and with the new rules for their crook and flail weapon they have five WS6 S7 attacks ASF. also their magic is nasty like ours but they can get their troops back unlike us. go after the heirophant in the same way you go after a vampire lord except these guys are a lot more fragile than vamps. big units of ushabti now hit as hard as we do but stronger as well and their bone giant can tear strips off our slavegiants, their tomb scorpions are better than our gorgers and watch out for those chariots their d6 impact hits into a unit of bulls can wipe out most of a unit before blows are struck and they even leave a fair size dent in big units.

i played a game against our TK player last night and i won it by around three hundred VPS but i had the watchtower so they werent needed but that was only because one of his SSC misfired and rolled a one and the other couldnt hit a damned thing, their tomb king and my tyrant fought a war of mutual destruction and the last 8 guys from my ogre horde held the day by rallying then taking the watchtower after his tomb guard got nasty.....remember their initiative is worse then ours.....their dead

TK chariots only do D3 impacthits

Or do they D6 now in 8th?

D3. Chariots are terrible now. Any TK player you see using Chariots for more than fluff reasons is out to lose.

I hv only played tomb kings once in 8th and i was lucky. hierophant blew up first turn and gorger showed up 2nd turn and silenced skull catapult. his chariot riding tomb king or prince charged my unit of 9 decked out bulls w bsb and were annihilated bcaus he fluffed impact hits.

Tomb Kings were a favourite army of mine to play in 7th.

Scorpions are solid but their best attributes (Killing Blow and the ability to hold up small units on its own) really won't do much against an OK army. If I were using them against Ogres I would send them after Scrappies - making them burrow up near the Scrap, but behind/ inside terrain - or against Trapper units/ Hunters where they have a better chance of lasting against a unit with no static combat res.

Tomb King shooting is nothing to sniff at but neither is it the most dangerous thing you'll face (outside of Skull Catapults). The example of the 3 units of 16 archers is not a good one against Ogres; if 384 points of skellies want to pick off 2 bulls a turn (by shooting in both regular & Magic phases) then they won't come close to making their points back before we're in combat with them. Often I found using their D6 hits 'Fireless Fireball' (Incantation of Vengeance IIRC) more effective against T4 opponents than an extra round of shooting with 5s to hit and 5s to wound. The biggest threat from 2 rounds of shooting is from the Catapults and they are mean SOBs, chiefly due to the repeated panic tests and the possibility of Skulls of the Foe being used to drop your Ld by 1.

Does anyone know of any errata on TK chariots, regarding their ability to disrupt ranks? It was the only reason to use them in 7th- the ability to rapidly redeploy them and get flank charges combined with another unit charging the front. If they've lost that ability then, as someone mentioned their would be very little point for a TK player to take them except to hunt other Fast Cav. (which is a moot point against OKs)

Ushabti are the real killer can-openers of the TKs. At WS 4, S6 (base stat, NOT from great weapons), I4 they can make a mess of other monster units pretty quickly. Add onto that the (albeit limited) resurrection potential, the extra movement phase & the potential extra attacks from their magic and they are a very very good/ bad unit depending entirely which side of the table you're on.

@Woad Ogre: How did the Heirophant 'blow up'? They don't miscast like regular wizards, to my knowledge; they used to auto-cast like 7th Ed. Bound Items, but that might have changed with the advent of different rules for bound items in 8th- if anyone could elablorate on that I'd appreciate it.

Also: Gorgers can't charge on the second turn unless they start the game in your deployment zone- the turn they appear from a board edge they can't charge...

oh he just rolled on the miscast table. that wld hv helped the noob.

D3. Chariots are terrible now. Any TK player you see using Chariots for more than fluff reasons is out to lose.

That's not entirely true.

Sure the usefulness of chariots is diminished but I've run over many units (granted, no Ogre units) with my Sword of Bloodshed-waving Tomb King on the Chariot of Fire. The key is to put him in a unit of at least 5 other chariots and carefully pick your targets (NO! Bad Tomb King General! Do not charge this unit into a Chosen Deathstar! *thwap...at least not without the Other Trickster's Shard). Combo charge this unit with a Bone Giant or some Ushabti and watch RnF infantry evaporate barring bad rolling.

You leverage this by giving this unit the Icon of the Sacred Eye (+1 to hit on the first round of each combat). You can even take it one step further by plopping a pair of Tomb Princes on Chariots with Great Weapons and defensive set ups (like MR, the extra TK dispel scroll or Ward save vs. shooting). This also stacks the magic deck by putting 4 Righteous Smiting or Urgency Incantations within the unit two of which have a 6" range. Good luck stopping it from charging what it wants. Want even more yucks? Put the Shield of Ptra on one of the Princes and try to force some S3 schmuck to attack him and trigger an armor save. Ohnoes...WS1 for that combat round just in time for RAWRBONEGIANT to go nuts walking through troops. I've pulled this off twice and it was utterly disgusting for my opponent.

It's a lot of points, and it doesn't always work, but it's really the only way to use chariots currently the way our Army Book details since Skeletons are as bad as Gnoblars in close combat and cost 4 times as much. Most TK players don't do this however. They are content pretending to be Dwarfs or Wood Elves hoping to bore their opponent into submission. Me, I prefer the more aggressive, blaze of glory approach.

No wonder I'm about to start an Ogre army. 

ANYONE who fights against tomb kings should have a good unit that can chase down the Hierophant and beat him in close combat. But before I go into details, I need to mention what the Tomb King player will do to preserve the hierophant (since bad things happen to tomb kings when the hierophant dies) thay will either stick him in a huge block of infantry, or just have him sit as far back as possible. If the hierophant falls in with a horde of skeleton warriors, you need to kill as many as possible and dispell then stuff they use to raise models. from then, just hope to kill as many as possible with your bulls (ironguts always strike last, and 30-40 skeleton warriors dish out so many attacks, that you will lose to many ogres to do anything) don't forget the Bull Charge special rule. If the hierophant is just sitting around in the rear, try to get something fast around the fight to throw at him. gorgers are great for this(all your flank are belong to us)

If the Heirophant is in a big block of infantry then you should just allocate attacks against him as swiftly as possible. Your best bet if you want to go Heiro hunting is to us Gorgers to hem him in. The heirophant will need to be central to the TK army to best utilise his abilities and this means that there will usually be units all around him to keep him out of touch. Try to decimate units in front of him so that a good overrun will loand you smack dab in the middle of his face.

Hunters as usual, also make excellent wizard hunters as the SabreTusks will tear a Hierophant to shreds if you can get the charge. You'd likely lose them afterwards but I thinkthat's a fair trade

The new Tomb Kings release has greatly increased their fighting power against OK (mainly with the sphinxes),

I played a 2.000 game against them and got my ass handed to me... F*%^king necrosphinx scored heroic killing blow on my BSB and runned down my Tyrant!!

If you suspect that your opponent will field Necrosphinxes it is a good idea to use Relic sword (wounds anything on a +5 for 10pts), Pidgeon Plucker Penant (5+ ward against models with Fly for 5pts) and and if you have points to spare Featherfoe Torc (flying creatures reroll attack rolls ,35pts)

Why would you send your BSB & Tyrant at the Sphinx when you can send a Gnoblar Bus?

With a charge distance of 2D6+10 the Necrosphinx will come to you.
Your opponent will want to try to use heroic killing blow on your characters

Pretty sure that with 5 Attacks on 3's/2's and Thunderstomp he going to chew through Gnoblars fairly fast. Not to mention the fact that a General who let's his big nasty 225pt HKB Flying Herald of Death get charged by a Gnoblar Horde definitely needs a lot of practice

Fair enough, I havn't had the (mis)fortune of playing against it yet.

Wait... what do you mean it flies?!? 

So even if we do get a big gribbly of our own it might not even stand up to these things. Though IIRC it only has one attack with HKB so your opponent will have to get pretty lucky with it to kill you outright. I'd justrely on a Tyrant w/ Tenderiser, 4+ Ward and a luck Gnoblar; that or the Glittering Scales + Yhetee pelt so that one heroic killing blow attack will need 6s to hit & to wound.

So even if we do get a big gribbly of our own it might not even stand up to these things. Though IIRC it only has one attack with HKB so your opponent will have to get pretty lucky with it to kill you outright. I'd justrely on a Tyrant w/ Tenderiser, 4+ Ward and a luck Gnoblar; that or the Glittering Scales + Yhetee pelt so that one heroic killing blow attack will need 6s to hit & to wound.

even more reason to take Tricksters Helm.

Isn't the HKB attack at Str10 though?

I'd justrely on a Tyrant w/ Tenderiser, 4+ Ward and a luck Gnoblar; that or the Glittering Scales + Yhetee pelt so that one heroic killing blow attack will need 6s to hit & to wound.

I believe Bob talks about the chance of a successful HKB.

Yes the HKB is done at STR 10 but our main concern is if he rolls a 6, our Tyrant will probably survive even if he recieves a wound from a STR 10 strike 

Actually I asked because if its Str 10, the tricksters helm wont really help much.

It might even hinder, as if he rolls a 2 to wound he would then have to re-roll it giving him another chance of that 6. Trickster's Helm is great at stopping basic infantry from hurting him, but if a Monster wants him gone he may be in trouble.

i'm actually thinking of bringing back the BigT because of TKs, having my Tyrant kitted out with that plus the Pot of Strength, Wyrdstone Necklace and Mawseeker. One round of Str10 doing D3 wounds ought to make them think twice about tangling with him!

It might even hinder, as if he rolls a 2 to wound he would then have to re-roll it giving him another chance of that 6. Trickster's Helm is great at stopping basic infantry from hurting him, but if a Monster wants him gone he may be in trouble.

i'm actually thinking of bringing back the BigT because of TKs, having my Tyrant kitted out with that plus the Pot of Strength, Wyrdstone Necklace and Mawseeker. One round of Str10 doing D3 wounds ought to make them think twice about tangling with him!

unless he gets to hit first, then you're most likely done.

He only gets 1 attack with HKB, and still need to hit with it then roll the 6 and assume that I fail the Ward.

So, I'm going to assume he's hitting on 4+ since I don't have my book yet...

0.50 x 0.17 x 0.67 = 0.06

So a 6% chance to be HKB'd. That's also rounding everything up to 2dp. I'll take those odds.

for the record, the Necrosphinx has 5 attacks...

1 of them has HKB (S10), the other are S5.
and he can be upgraded to have poison attack too

so its not just a 1 hit wonder. Even if you survive the S10, there's 4 more coming your way.


The Warsphinx can switch all his attack for one single attack, which is like our big weapon (small template S3, with the hole being S9 (D3 Wounds)).



I'm playing a game in 2 hours against them, and what i'm planning to do against them is to keep my unkillable Lord there, but, like someone else recommended, i'll be using that 10 pts weapon (always wounds on 5+) on my SM in 2nd rank (with crown of command). Might not kill him outright, but i should at least be able to take him a few wounds each round.

Ok, some more math and I think that my Tyrant set up has something like a 95% of killing the Sphinx in one go on the turn he uses the potion.

Without the Pot, just with BigT, it drops to 62% chance of killing it in one turn. Still not bad.

Compared to the Sphinx, which has a 5.559% of killing the Tyrant in one go. This includes the HKB chance.


How 'bout them apples?

for the record, the Necrosphinx has 5 attacks...

1 of them has HKB (S10), the other are S5.
and he can be upgraded to have poison attack too

so its not just a 1 hit wonder. Even if you survive the S10, there's 4 more coming your way.


The Warsphinx can switch all his attack for one single attack, which is like our big weapon (small template S3, with the hole being S9 (D3 Wounds)).

His other 4 attacks will be at STR 5, so the Tyrant can handle them, at least for a turn or two.

Also the template attack only hits infantry, war beasts and swarms, like thunderstomp, so we are fine 

Also the template attack only hits infantry, war beasts and swarms, like thunderstomp, so we are fine

Not sure about this, as I don't have the book, but I would think we're as affected by it as everything else. Possibly less due to bigger bases, but I don't think there is anything in the rules that prevent it.

It is in the new White Dwarf.
Thundercrush has the same restrictions as Thunderstomp

Interesting. Wonder why? I can imagine if it replaced the Stomp, but it replaces the other attacks, so it seems a bit weird. Oh well, at least we don't have to worry about that then!

well, last night i had my first glimse at the new Tomb kings.... 2 things ;

1 : keep dice, as long as your opponent has some left. Why? Enkhil's and the Casket.

the first is a bound spell on 3+ that destroy all RiP Spell (oh wait, might have played that wrong... anyway) on 2+, and give back D3 PD.

2 : Their big monster isnt that scary. Sure he might run your Tyrant down, but he can be taken out much easier than i feared.

He's I1, so unless you fight him with IG, you'll hit first. 2D6 S2 works pretty well against it too (Just like against anything else, it'll hit on 6s anyway).

3 : Skeleton are really worth just 4 pts, unless coupled with the guy who give his WS.

4 : the snake rider, really scary. Dont ever expect to hold them for very long, even with a very deep Gnoblar unit.

5 : one last thing ; they have an item that can really screw up any plan ; The Golden mask. It cause terror, and you can't use BSB or Inspiring presence 6" around it....

It's only 1 game, but i can already see alot of strenght, and some weakness.

Yeah, I reckon the Death Mask is going to be cropping up a lot. From what i have read, even though they got the same number of Magic items as teh O&G, theirs are actually worth taking. Big plus looking forward - I won't mind each book only having 8 items if they are all good!

Yeah, I reckon the Death Mask is going to be cropping up a lot. From what i have read, even though they got the same number of Magic items as teh O&G, theirs are actually worth taking. Big plus looking forward - I won't mind each book only having 8 items if they are all good!

The grave guard banner isnt bad either... its a boundspell lvl3 or 5, that regains D6+1 wounds.

So yeah, facing them is gonna be more than expecting a few spell, you gotta consider the possible boundspell too...

They have a ton of bound spells to watch out for. The Hierotitan has two, the casket, the banners....Lots of hidden things you won't even know about until they're used.

But they still take up dice. They can only spread those so far. And if they are Casketting you, Death Sniping you and activating the BotUL, then they are not getting the Ward Save or moving or healing their small units.

As with everything else, pick what you HAVE to dispel that turn and let other things go.

thing is, unless its open list, the only bound spell you'll know is the casket, the other, you have to prepare for it, thus playing very conservative in their magic phase.

its not that big of a problem, you just have to plan accordingly when facing them, otherwise you end up screwed big time.

They only get it once as a surprise!

Plus, i'd be pretty sure just from looking if they had a Heirotitan too.

I know what you mean though, and it will make it difficult. But Bound spells aren't the awesomeness that they were in 7th, as they need the dice to power them. Still, I think that the TK ones are some of the best 8th Bound items yet. Certainly better than the Ruby Ring, considering you can't power it up.

I actually face a TK army tomorrow, with lots of archers and skeletons riders. The riders could be a problem if they get into a flank I guess...

I actually face a TK army tomorrow, with lots of archers and skeletons riders. The riders could be a problem if they get into a flank I guess...

the good news about their archer, is that they cannon stand and shoot. And even if they always hits on 5s, its still just S3.

Everything I have read so far says watch out for killing blow with TK.  They have several units with it, and several ways to kill you even after you kill them.  Tomb Guard being a nasty unit that if it gets into range of us could give you issues.  Other units like the necro are brutal too, but certainly not the end of the world imo.

Things to keep in mind with them are this...

Construct: gives them a lot of abilities that are pretty nice, less wounds from CR and what not.

Killing Blow: ...

Movement:  They're for the most part very slow, moving only 4 inches a turn.

Late Deployment:  Coming up in the in the middle of the ground.

And yes the Necro can fly 10inches but can not march, however it gets all the perks of being large and having flight when it charges.

Killing Blow doesn't bother Ogres. It only works on Infantry, not Monstrous Infantry.

You certainly need to watch for Heroic KB though!

that is a very good point, and who cares if a gnoblar gets an armor save. heh

I would also think that normal mob destruction tactics wreck TK since they crumble.

BTW I look at each army from the perspective that they did not design their list against me, however foolish that might be to think that they didn't.

Right then, I played Tomb Kings a couple of days ago.

His shooting was appallingly awful to be honest, doing no more than two wounds. That was remarkable actually, since there was such a hype.

Once again, it was Close combat where Tomb Kings shine. They won't budge, and are very very tough. I managed to beat them simply by slaying all the characters almost on the charge. (Kill the Tomb King and you hit skeletons on 3's and wound them on 2's (or 3's).

I'd just say, watch your flanks. There is not alot that can kill our big units in one go in the front, but alot that can flank us with our limited amount of units.

Thanks,
-Birdhunter

Watch out for Tomb Kings armed with the Destroyer of Eternities- it is no longer a great weapon, so strikes on initiative (pretty sure before we strike, most of the time) but gives the King +2 Str and HKB on all attacks; he can also auto-hit people in base contact with him (which isn't a big deal for us as that'd be 2 Ogres, max) but it's having 5 attacks with heroic Killing Blow that does it; if he kills 2 Ogres with HKB that's 6 points of combat res straight up!