WHFB – Dwarves vs Luke’s WoC – part 1 – lists and thoughts.

With the completion of my KOW group games and the new edition of 40k not out until June, I thought i’d try and get in a few games of whfb.

Like me, Luke was a former player who took a break (you can see from the pictures in this post that his figures are very much oldhammer and I love his banners) and came back to warhammer late in the day so both of us are still very much into 8th ed. As such I proposed a series of games against him and having multiple armies I asked him what he had never played in 8th. Of the one’s easily to hand, it was Dwarves and Wood Elves. In order to give him a competitive game I said i’d bring Dwarves to start with and then later on i’d give wood elves a go (and offered him the use of any of my armies for the evening, if he wanted to try something else). Having decided the race, I then offered him the choice of what sort of army he wanted to face: Full gunline, all melee or combined arms. He wanted to try a bit of everything for the first game (and as we were playing a series of games, I could bring something different next time). So with that said (and after some good advice from the EEFL forum – which of course I then mainly ignored ;p), I decided on the following list:

The Throng of Karak Silvertop

Characters – 658pts

Knoffles Silvertop – (General) Lord – Shieldbearers + GW + Ro Fortitude + 2 * Ro Iron – 271pts

Drugin Silvertop – (BSB) Thane – MRo Gromril + GW – 126pts

Harek Silvertop – Runesmith – Ro Stone + Ro Spellbreaking + Shield – 93pts

Barlin Silvertop – Runesmith – Ro Stone + Ro Spellbreaking + Ro Furnace + Shield – 98pts

Burrnoth Strongarm – Master Engineer – 70pts

Core – 626pts

Quarrellers (14) – Standard + GW – 205pts

Dwarf Warriors (39) – FC + GW – 420pts

Special – 749pts

Hammerers (36) – Musician + Standard + Ro Valaya – 589pts

Gyrocoptor – 80pts

Gyrocoptor – 80pts

Rare – 465pts

Irondrakes (17) – FC + Brace of Drakeguns + Ro Slowness – 320pts

Organ gun – Ro Accuracy – 145pts

List thoughts

Though there are elements of what i would normally include the build is somewhat different in order to give Luke a flavor of different dwarf options.

Although I love the model and this is my preferred build if I take him, I would not normally take a dwarf lord, if only because for the points I could fit in another unit! He is however great fun and is the head of Karak Silvertop so for fluff I love taking him in lists (and he is amazingly tanky and it will give Luke a chance to play against him). This build gives him a 2+ armour save, 4 str 6 attacks (and 2 str 4 attacks) and a toughness of 7 with 6 wounds. Almost monster stats, all in someone that still maintains the lookout sir rule!

The two Runesmiths are often staples and with the BSB are known to Dwarf players as the holy trinity. I’ve kept them as bare minimum build so they have a 2+ save and a ‘dispel rune’ each.

I’ve gone for a BSB build I don’t normally take as I wanted to try it out. I have been taking the MRo Grungni because as standard, that gives him a 4+ ward (with a 3+ armour save) and a 5+ ward vs shooting for anything within 6″. I found that this was quite situational so decided to keep him cheap and quite hitty with a 1+ armour save and great weapon. I did toy with giving him a Ro Iron to add another wound but taking more characters than normal meant I tried to keep loadouts at a minimum.

The Master Engineer I would normally give a BoP and Ro Stone but again with points restrictions he is being fielded as standard. I nearly dropped him but with only 1 warmachine in the list, I wanted to maximise it’s potential and use him as a guard.

I’ve fielded shield beards as an anvil recently (mainly as the models were painted) with mixed success, however I decided their defensiveness wasn’t good enough and neither was the damage output. I have found that 8th seems to be more about damage output and so this left me with a dilemma. Having decided I wanted to take a horde, did I take a horde of GW longbeards (this comes to almost 625 on the nose), Warriors or Quarrellers. In the end I went with GW warriors as I have previously taken a horde of Quarrellers (so wanted to try something different) and also it allowed me to include a small unit of quarrellers anyway to make up the core tax and to counter any chaff. It’s worth noting that due to the poor initiative of dwarves, taking great weapons doesn’t really impact them as you normally strike last anyway.

I produced a gzillion lists in the run up to the game (it’s one of the elements that is head and shoulder above KOW) but decided that I wanted to bring a horde of hammerers. The potential damage output of this unit is obscene with 40 str 6 attacks (or str 7 if you charge). I’ve given them the magic banner with Ro Valaya so that, as standard, I am always dispelling on a +4 (or as a lvl 4 wizard lord equivalent). It also allows any remains in play spells to be dispelled on a 3+ each turn. This combined with the 2 channel attempts and 2 dispel runes means it should help to tie down the magic phase.

2 Gyro’s round out the special choices as they are fantastic chaff and the 2 flame templates will mince large low toughness units.

As i’ve stated before, Irondrakes are one of my favorite units and work as both an anvil and highly effective shooting unit (especially with the Ro Slowness). This is one of the reasons I will now rarely take shield dwarves.

The final element of the army is my single warmachine, an organ gun. It has a single Ro Accuracy, which when combined with the Engineer will give it a standard 2+ to hit, or 3+ at long range (15-30″). Added to the ME artillery dice reroll ability should make this pretty effective (assuming I roll well on the 2 art’ dice and it isn’t killed in a turn or 2).

I consider this a true dwarf combined arms list rather than a gunline. Yes it does have a number of shooting units and the number may be greater than other armies but for dwarves this is almost a minimum and only one warmachines is practically unheard of! I’m sure i’ll regret not taking a cannon but this list is not about warmachines. I’ll leave them for another day when I don’t take the lord and so have more points to spend.

The hammerer unit will go front and centre with the lord and bsb in it. The Irondrakes will be set up forward and will do their normal retreat each turn to try and maximise their shooting. Their priority will be the trolls. The quarrellers will likely be to one side of the hammerers (or GW dwarves) and will aiming to remove all chaff. If they are attacked, one of the hordes can counter (though with their stand and shoot and GW’s, they should be able to hold their own somewhat).

Luke’s Warriors of Chaos list

Nurgle Daemon Prince – level 4 Lore of nurgle, flight, chaos armour, charmed shield, sword of striking, dragonbane gem, scaled skin, soul feeder, Chaos familiar – 525pts

Exalted hero (bsb) – Disc of tzeentch, halberd, enchanted shield, MoT, tzeentch third eye – 241pts

Throgg – 195pts

5 chaos hounds – 30pts

5 chaos hounds – 30pts

21 Chaos Warriors of Nurgle – FC, MoN, halberd, banner of swiftness – 444pts

5  Chaos trolls – additional hand weapons – 190pts

Marauder horse – champion, standard, javelins, flails – 110pts

Warshrine – MoT – 135pts

Warshrine – MoT – 135pts

Hellcannon – 210pts

3 Skullcrushers – champion, standard, ensorcelled weapons – 254pts

When he sent it through, he said he wanted to try a double shrine list and the only point of the shrine is to maximise the chances of good rolls on the eye of the gods table and it also has a bound spell that allows D3 eligible characters/champs within 12″ to roll on it when cast. This explains the number of unit champions. I’m not sure if two is over kill though.

He also stated that he wanted to try Lore of nurgle rather than death. The lore is a good all round one. There are no terrible spells but it does also lack a killer spell too.  I will need to be careful of curse of the leper, as that spell reduces toughness which is one of my strengths. One of the spells also increases the regen save by +1 which would be filth on the trolls.

He also got caught out on blood and glory in the recent comp and so has ensured banners in every unit.

I’m also not sure if he has taken a prince before. If he has, he must have been quite lucky as 8th is often a cannon heavy meta and it is not well protected against them. As I don’t have one, I will have to contend with a 1+, 5++ (2++ vs fire). Knows 5 spells, channels on a 5+. Flies. Hits everything in my army on a 2+ and is at -1 to hit (so everything in my army hits on a minimum of 5+) and he regains wounds on a 6 in combat. Frankly this is a beast, though is over a fifth of his points in one model so it has to be high on the list to kill. *sigh* where’s my cannon. 

He also included the standard unkillable (although surprising killable) bsb, with a 1+ (3+ in combat), 3++ save (rerolling ward rolls of 1). I do think that the discs have to be the most under-priced mount in the game (well with perhaps the exception of the shieldbearers).

I’ve not faced Throgg before but he will obviously be going in the troll unit which makes that my number one target for the irondrakes. If they get some hits then the organ gun will be tasked with finishing them off (if it is still there, as it’s primary target has to be the prince and Luke has to be thinking that the organ needs to be gotten rid of early).

He has 3 sets of chaff and the quarrellers will be aiming for them asap with priority going to the unit nearest the organ gun (with perhaps the mauraders first if possible of only due to it having a champion).

 The gyros will generally be a nuisance but will primarily try and tie down the hell cannon as that could mince my large blocks.

And with all that said, I decided to post this early and give him a heads up in case he happens to read this before Friday. I’m nice like that.