Special Characters and Supporting units

[Sultan Akbar]

Raise of hands for anyone who uses special characters! If so, which ones, and at what point values? Favorites? Best models? Just any and all general thoughts on the WoC named characters.

Also, what do you guys choose for special and rare choices? I've just started out, and I am definitely thinking some Chaos Knights as my hammers and a Hell-cannon or Warshrine. What do you guys think?

[bliss-giver]

I've used Archaon a couple of times just for fun really, in competitive games, the points are normally better spent on a sorcerer lord or even a chaos lord (it was 3000 points).
But with the size of the game, and just playing a fun game, I thought I may as well try it, he was very effective, but not neccessarily worth the points, although he was effectively a lord and a second caster.

Throgg is very often great, 3D6 hits ignoring armour in a challenge never goes amiss.

Wulfrik is unreliable for his outflanking and can be a bit 'meh' in challenges, the points can be better spent elsewhere.

Festus I'm looking to field sometime to try out, he could be quite useful.

I've also seen a few people use valkia effectively, but again it's one I've yet to play myself, but from the outlook, without a ward save, she looks quite fragile.

[Papa_Wheely]

I feel that the only cost effective Special Characters in our book are the Hero Choices, but Throgg and Festus are both very effective. Throgg allows for a whole new build for our army (100% monstrous) and is a great beatstick. The only other model I would bet for above Throgg in a challenge is Skull Taker, and if he's not winning challenges, then something is seriously wrong. And Festus adds some much needed resilience to a unit, as well as the extra hitting power of Poison. It's generally more powerful to take his points in additional models for the unit, but its a hell of a lot cheaper to buy one character.

As for use, I use them pretty regularly, but i do ask my opponents if they have any qualms about it. The answer is invariably no, they don't mind, but still. I am really excited for next week though, when I play a 7000 point battle and use Festus, Throgg, Wulfrik, and Valkia in one game. It should be fun. But ya, just go for it, but don't plan on taking them in every battle. They can be kind of a crutch sometimes, so play the odd battle without them.

[Boshea]

Festus is about the only character I've really played with. Costs the same as kitting out a lvl2 wizard so not a big point sink to add him. Fielding his trusted AHW Armor Piercing Khorne Warrior block is usually the harder part. Throgg gives an alternative army build, and Wulfrik is neat without costing a ton more than adding an exalted. I find most the Lord level characters are all over costed for what they do, and the points are usually better spent on more models. Kholek is fun as balls to play with in a game that doesn't involve cannons though.

[HellcannonsRcool]

Ive often wondered why people are so adverse to special characters, i think they're awesome! i use them all the time, in almost every army i play with. My local scene doesn't ban them from tournies so you see some neat ones there.

I recently ran a monster list lead by Kholek with Throgg and a whack of trolls,

Im taking Festus to a tournament next weekend.

I use Throgg in almost every list i make as i absolutely love Him. played a game the other day where i steed of shadows throgg up beside an empire knight bus and templated them, killed 13 knights and left the 2 characters wondering what the smell was.

I built a valkyia model out of the 40k DE winged guys, I like her for khorne themed armies. she can be a beast if you protect her in a decent unit.

The only character Ive yet to use is Vilitch as I'm not the biggest fan of the tzeentch lore. Ive used Gualrach 2x because the model i have for him is friggin sweet, but since storm of magic came out he is now relegated as a normal chaos dragon!

On special characters in general, I am a big fan. I find that the Generic Lord / hero builds are very stale. sword of anti heroes, armour of destiny, talisman of preservation, dawnstone, dispel scroll, etc
the magic items are very limited. With GWs latest trend of compacting the new army books to 10-15 magic items i can see the generic character builds being even more stream lined and repetative, special characters bring unique and interesting items to the game that would otherwise remain unseen.