The Undead cometh! D:

In theory at least!

Greetings everyone I hope you all are doing well!  It's a rainy day here where I am at so it's a great time to jot down some ideas for my future Vampire Covenant army.  For a copy of the army book I am referring to feel free to grab it here.  As is probably the method I have been doing with this blog I will talk a bit about part of the army and then leave the rest for another post.

I'm not sure what scale 9th Age is 'supposed' to be played at, I know a decent game of 40k is about 1500-2000 points so I guess that might hold true for Fantasy style games?  I know during the End Times era of WHFB a good minimum was 3000 so you could get the ridiculous characters and units, but 9th Age does not have that aspect so I'm thinking a 2000 point VC force is a good starting point.

One thing I feel like I need to point out is that in 9th Age there is a current lack of special characters.  I'm not sure if that's intentional but I kind of like it in a way.  I like special characters but I always felt from reading/watching bat reps of WHFB they almost got a point where you needed to take a special character or else your army was sub-par.  Maybe that's false, but it's how it seemed to me.  I like being able to make my own lord, also I sort of have no choice in the matter.

So starting out I have to make sure I have my Lords and Heroes how I need and want them to be.  I feel that 9th Age has done a decent job of tweaking things around so there isn't any omgwtfhaxx sort of choices, but depending on your playstyle there are better choices than some.  One caveat is that if you choose a bloodline you get access to the "super bloodpower" but all the vampires in your force HAVE to be that bloodline.  So no Nosferatu magic slinging vamps walking right next to a Brotherhood of the Dragon. 

So here is my theoretical list:

2000 VC starting point

Lords:
Vampire Count - 305 pts
Level 2 Wizard, Lamian Bloodline, Commandment ancient bloodline power, Blade of Red Thirst, Glittering Cuirass, Shield

Heroes:
Necromancer - 215 pts
Level 2 wizard, Cadaver Wagon w/ Endless horde

Barrow King - 125 pts
Hardened Shield, Sword of Strength, Gem of Fortune

Core:
36 Zombies - 128 pts
Standard bearer, Musician (why do zombies have these?)

40 Skeletons - 230 pts
Spears, Shields, Full command

20 Ghouls - 210 pts
Full command

Special:
20 Barrow Guard - 300 pts
Full command, Banner of the Barrow Kings, Shield

Varkolak - 205 pts
Fly (9)

Rare:
3 Winged Reapers -280 pts
Light Armor, Additional Hand Weapon

Total cost: 1998

Overall I believe I am pleased with this starting point.  My big concern is my lack of 'fast' units but I think that's kind of a weakness for VC.  I have a couple faster units that can fly so I think I would keep them as a second wave/response unit (if that even works?).  I feel that the 'anvil' units are large enough to absorb a good charge and hold off until my 'anvil' units can get in.  We shall see though.  I wanted to bring more special choices but at 2000 points I felt the squeeze of "I want to take that but I caaaaaaaan't :(" coming on.

I went with the Lamian bloodline mostly for the Ancient bloodline.  Since I plan on plopping her in the unit of Barrow Guard (read Grave Guard) she will be able to impart that unit a WS of 5.  Couple with the Banner of the Barrow Kings, her Glittering Cuirass/Red Blade, and their armor of 4+ means that it's going to be a great hammer unit if I can get them to flank.  I feel that 2 level 2 wizards should cover my magical needs (maybe, I hope).

If you have any suggestions please feel free to leave a comment below on what might work better or what might not work.  Until then happy gaming!