2250 DE Competitive balanced list

[Chariot]

Dreadlord + Armor of Darkness + PoK + gw
master (bsb) + banner of murder + gw + ha + sdc
sorceress level 2 + sacrificial dagger
sorceress level 2 + Darkstar cloak

20 warriors + shields + fc
10 rxb
5 harpies
5 harpies
5 darkriders + rxb
5 darkriders + rxb
5 darkriders + rxb

12 blackguard + fc + banner of hag graef + crimson death
5 CoK
chariot
7 shades w/ gw

hydra
1 reaper crossbow

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Dreadlord + master in bg, sorceresses in warriors.
Deployment will depend, but the idea is to refuse a flank against cc-focused armies, playing points denial if they stay away from me. The knights, chariot and reaper bolt thrower will help limit their deployment if they are playing otherwise. I tried to stay balanced between fast units and good infantry, and between using all phases of the game as well as I could.

[notabot187]

Where is the BSB going? The warriors? That unit can already just take that banner. (not that they really have the volume to make much use of it, I've only found witches to work well with it.) If you are taking a BSB, either take a banner that a unit can't normally take, or just take a plain banner and give him some magic items.

The single bolt thrower seems out of place, I usually only take them if I can bring 2 or more.

Other than that I don't like dreadlords without dragons, or medium magic lists, the list looks fine.

[Chariot]

bsb is going with bg as i mentioned in the post, they already have hag graef so they will have ap as well, making it so they can take on heavier armor saves as well.

I might run a list with a dragon at some point, I'd like to just run a vanilla list right now to learn the ropes, then I'll pick up trying out a dragon.

I'm really trying to figure out how much magic I want, maybe just a caddy would work well, with roh on the bsb, fixing the banner problem. (blood armor too?)

alright, heres a tenative list that fixes the concerns maybe, other than the dragon problem


Dreadlord + Armor of Darkness + PoK + gw
master (bsb) + blood armor + gw + shield + sdc
sorceress + dispel scroll x2

19 warriors + shields + fc (sorc)
10 rxb
5 harpies
5 harpies
5 darkriders + rxb
5 darkriders + rxb
5 darkriders + rxb

13 blackguard + fc + banner of hag graef + crimson death (dreadlord)
13 execs + fc + banner of murder (bsb)
5 CoK + fc + roh
7 shades w/ gw

hydra
1 reaper crossbow

I got roh on the CoK and got them some SCR, got some ACR with the execs, and I think my magic defense is better now, at the expense of my own magic, which was mediocre as you pointed out. Dumped the chariot, which is sad, but makes me more mobile.

The only weird thing I guess I see now is the single reaper crossbow, but I just feel that 2 of them makes it too easy for warmachine hunters to get back their points. Also, I'm not sure which way the banners should go, murder seems like it's really helpful for the execs, giving them -4 to armor saves on attacks, but hag graef would be really nice on them too. Hopefully it will be clear with play testing.

[Chariot]

Realized, of course, that the bsb can't join the executioners. So I made them 14 strong and put the bsb back with the blackguard. And, I realized that hag graef can't be taken by the execs, which makes that choice easy for now.

Not sure if I want the execs as they are right now, but we'll see if they work ok.

[super sorcerer]

b"h
Why didn't you use all of your hero slots?
Personaly I would drop 2 units of dark riders, and bring one couldron of blood with a death hag.

[Chariot]

My dark riders provide me with lots of maneuverability which I don't think a CoB will provide.
I didn't use all my hero slots because the fourth hero didn't seem to be pulling it's weight in points.

[notabot187]

I never understand why people feel the need to use all the hero slots up. Unless you are going magic, most of the hero slots are pretty redundant for DE. They have good LD, they win combats or lose combats by enough that a BSB isn't that useful, and the character themselves other than having good items aren't that great.

As for executioners, there really isn't any way to make them work without spending way too many points on them. You can give them a death hag BSB with the ASF banner, but then the black guard can't have it. You can use the cauldron on it, but that is a very expensive 200 point hero. At best I would run 5-7 in one unit as a infantry flanking unit.

[super sorcerer]

b"h

I never understand why people feel the need to use all the hero slots up. Unless you are going magic, most of the hero slots are pretty redundant for DE. They have good LD, they win combats or lose combats by enough that a BSB isn't that useful, and the character themselves other than having good items aren't that great

Well you have a good point. Anyway, if you don't deploy 4 hero slots then your opponent might be paranoid about shadowblade. So this is a good reason why not to take another character.

[drpieceofme]

Dreadlord + Armor of Darkness + PoK + gw
master (bsb) + blood armor + gw + shield + sdc
sorceress + dispel scroll x2

19 warriors + shields + fc (sorc)
10 rxb
5 harpies
5 harpies
5 darkriders + rxb
5 darkriders + rxb
5 darkriders + rxb

13 blackguard + fc + banner of hag graef + crimson death (dreadlord)
13 execs + fc + banner of murder (bsb)
5 CoK + fc + roh
7 shades w/ gw

hydra
1 reaper crossbow

RoH on the CoK's is less effective because they won't remain at the center of army taking advantage of the 12". If they fail stupidity you are not being allowed to march the rest of your army while keeping the key units (BG/Execs) protected. Crimson death is great on the BG champ, but you should decide if you want the extra killiness or magic defense. You will have a hero and a lord in there so it's a null point imo.

Give Armor of eternal servitude to your BSB and put him on a Cold One. Same armor save if you mundane him out and has 4+ regen. Can give him a sword of might to go with it. One bolt thrower is weak and has no real ranged threat, but it's better than 10 Crossbowmen for the 360 los. Get rid of the Xbowmen since you don't need the core, and possibly the Bolt thrower too. Should invest the points in more mobile threats to accompany your battle line. I would use these points for more blackguard. Even BG aren't too great with only 5 models when they get to combat. Blackguard, even with cauldron, are rediculously vulnerable to shooting and magic. T3 w/ a 5 up! Get some more bodies in there. They will be easy to wound and saving on 6's or not at all to most shooting. 18 is the magic number for BG most of the time.

Consider dropping one DR unit, giving the other ones a musician, and using those points to give your CoK's Standard of Slaughter and other upgrades and bodies on the table. You already have an SB so might as well give them an even greater chance to win combat on the charge.

Soul Render is an amazing 15pt weapon for foot heros/dreadlords. If your taking ASF banner then it is a hands down weapon choice for a dreadlord as it mitigates it's only downside.

As stated before, BG + cauldron provides a 5+ ward as they march into battle that can be shifted to your Execs at certain times. Then it can be shifted to KB which is crazy for BG against heavily armored enemies (Chaos Knights for example) or +1 attack which makes Execs or BG even more killy. And it causes terror for anything that decides to pop or fly behind you line, plus it makes you Execs stubborn within 12".

[Chariot]

My biggest goal with this army was to keep everything as cheap as I could but still fulfill the intended purpose of the unit. Lots of this advice seems to be the opposite direction: like spend 11 points to give my general armor piercing, or spendng another 25 or so to give my bsb regen.

My biggest concern with this army though, is how many points are located in the bg. Harpies are there to screen, I don't need to double up on more points again to protect it from shooting. I like squeezing every point out I can.

Anyway, I think I went the other way, my shooting was so low it bothered me, so here's a list with buffed shooting, and i dropped the execs altogether.

Dreadlord + Armor of Darkness + PoK + gw
master + bsb + gw + blood armor + sdc + shield + roh
sorceress dispel x2

21 warriors + shields + fc + warbanner
20 rxb
5 harpies
5 harpies
5 darkriders + rxb + music
5 darkriders + rxb + music
5 darkriders + rxb + music

12 blackguard + fc + banner of hag graef + crimson death
5 CoK
7 shades w/ gw

hydra
2 reaper crossbow

Now the list is pretty balanced. My magic phase is the only surrendered phase.

EDIT: I also moved roh to the bsb.