Vampire Thrall & Necromancer

[Nobby]

So I've started my first real campaign with the undead and so far I'm loving it.

I only lost one game when I was still running with ghouls but now I switched over to zombies (still keep 2 ghouls around) with my Globadier & necromancer combo and I've been kicking ass ever since.

My vampire is a fully decked parry tank and to this point he's I've had zero trouble with him.

The two characters I do have issue with is my Vampire Thrall and necromancer. I build her as a dodge tank (for deamonettes) which did ok but the damage was quite low. She got put OOA once and she ended up dead (bad luck). Then I tried a more agressive build on her replacement and she ended up dead to after a few games (rotten luck). Now I have a third one and I'm pretty much out of ideas on how to build her. Anyone got any good ideas for a good Vampire Thrall build (+equipment recommendations)?

As far as my necromancer I build him as a ranged character because he's pretty bad as a melee character and I don't know that many spells yet. I plan on getting Lifestealer, call of Vanh, Spell of doom or Idol of death. It's just kind of annoying to have to invest so much in skills before he becomes any good... On any character I have about 2-4 skill points to spare because I just never have enough money to get them. I do try to do as many quests with good wyrdstones ratings but I just never seem to have enough.

[Rodfather]

For my Vampire Thralls, i thk i just went with one-handed maces and cloth armor to boost their dodge. Skill-wise I went with Sidestep, Combat Focus, Vital Strike, Jaw Strike, Prowl, Fatality, Body Recontruction, Unstoppable, Avoid or something along those lines. Sometimes they would go down alot but at Rank 9 one had about 10 injuries but still was combat effective - I might have fired her towards the last mision of the campaign.

I would mainly use them to gather wyrdstones and then join in the main melee, or patrol a flank and surprise the enemy and/or steal their idol.

[Chrenergros]

I found a Thralls with heavy armor and 2h sword with high meele resist. She really was hard to hit because of his fear. Not only this, his hp and damage reduction was a good combination to tank 3 of my man alone. The same thing happened with a Champion with the skill that increase meele resist when fighting alone vs more enemies (i'm missing the name of the skill....). I've not yet started an undead warband because i'm still a newbie but when i'll do it, i'll probably go to build her as a tank with high meele resist and a decent damage.

[Your Mom's Oshi]

Vampire thralls just have ♥♥♥♥ stat distribution. Go with Dreg/globadier/night runner for ranged damage or doomweavers/lgt warpguards for tanks or lgt ghouls/warpguards for damage instead.

[miniaaar]

Thralls can make decent MR tanks. Something like this for example: link[www.pyrospace.co.uk]
enchants: Axe of perforation or dismay (if you want to use Fear, combine with Idol of Death of Necromancer), Shield of Shielding, Armour of WS/Tgh and Helmet of celerity/magic resist/stun resist/constitution (depends what you need the most).

Staggering Blow if you want to play with initiative or faint to make sure you really don't get hit. 92% MR under Defensive stance will allow her to tank pretty much anything. It will also probably break the AI.

[Chrenergros]

Is me or faint and staggering blow seems useless? Yeah, reduce the iniziative could be awesome for kill an enemy that usually act first so it's ok, but what about reducr the chance to get hit with a counter attack? Most of the time the AI uses all of his OP so it can't counter attack anyway. I'm nrw, as i said many times, so help me to undestand thr utility or strategy of skills like this.

[miniaaar]

The way to use feint against the AI is to engage an unit previously not engaged. Thus, they'll have all their OPs, but will fail to retaliate against your MR tank. And then, your proper damage dealing units can do their business without worrying about getting hurt.

Your tank with Feint should be the first unit to engage (that's why I gave only Light armour and not Heavy, so that Initiative isn't lowered). With Feint, they'll resist almost every attack and thus this is a very safe way to start an engagement. :)

[Chrenergros]

There is a skill that increase your MR for every enemy that you are fighting alone? Something like underdog but that increase MR

[miniaaar]

There is something close to that yes, it's serenity, a leadership skill (+20% MR after passing an All-Alone, Fear or Terror Test). This is great on a human tank with maxed Ld (18 and over) and a pendant, as you'll be sure to pass any test and then get the 20% MR bonus. That's what Karond used for his champions when he won the lastest lvl 10 tournament.

Sadly, that won't work for a Thrall as she's immune to psy tests in the first place. And the Dreg with a whopping 6 max LD (9 with book), won't be able to take advantage of this either.

[Chrenergros]

My final question to you is: How can i undersrand when it's better to go armor, dodge or mr?
It's based on the stats of the character?

[miniaaar]

Well, many things to take into account here:
- Stats of course, not just maximum stats but also stat distribution (e.g. how many points you get to invest in Physical, Mental and Martial). For example, a Merc Captain with a maximum of 10 Agility (starting at 4) and only 11 Physical points to distribute (other leader usually have 14) will probably not make a very efficient dodge tank. Similarly, a Brethren with a max of 10 in WS will make a very poor usage of parry skills.

- Roles you might want to give to a character. Do you want a unit to prevent a very high amount of attacks per turn? In this case, MR is probably the answer, as both dodge and parry gives you a maximum of 3 attempts (with advanced stances) at negating an attack, whereas melee resistance is active for a whole turn. But this also forces you to take into account All-alone tests if you want to tank many units at once, thus to think about your leadership value.

Another principle is that if you want a unit in heavy armour and shield, parry (web of steel is the advanced stance) is usually a good solution. Armour will provide you an additional layer of defense, as a mitigating device that will be activated in case your main defense fails. That's why main tanks in warband usually have a decent chunk of melee resistance, use parry as an active defense, then they wear an heavy armour and finally focus on Toughness for more HP over agility and strength. They're not doing a lot of damage, but they're very hard to kill and that's something you might want. :)

If you're fine with a character in cloth, with a high value in agility and thus lower strength (melee damage) and Toughness (hps), like for range/magic/crit builds, then a dodge defense might be indicated.

Finally, you might also run very specialised characters as glass canons, and forego any defense on them. You should use them as finishers that attack only units with depleted action points.

- Synergy between band members is also to be taken into account. You can build support units that give various buff to your frontline units; Given the nature of the buffs you expect to count on, you can then decide on a proper defense strategy.

You should really use the talent calculator (link[www.pyrospace.co.uk]) to help you create the builds you like.

Using the various combination, you should be able to determine the max amount you'll be able to reach for dodge/parry/melee resistance. A rule of thumb is that a reliable dodge/parry defense can be reached at 110% and over for a leader/hero/impressive. Melee resist is always good but if you want to rely solely on it, more 80% (under stance) or more is probably indicated.

[Chrenergros]

You seems to be really expert on this game, aren't you? Your answer is rich of vital information thank you!!!

[miniaaar]

Originally posted by Palaz:

You seems to be really expert on this game, aren't you? Your answer is rich of vital information thank you!!!

That's very nice of you to say. I'm just the first "old timer" that responded to your questions. ;)

[Chrenergros]

http://www.pyrospace.co.uk/mordheim/#
I've started a new warband at level 5 merc with 2 champions that will br my mr tank. I've put web and difensive because they will go alone vs many enemies so difensive stance and serenity will make them really hard to hit but when they face only one enemy that can fo at max 3 or 4 attack, then weeb of steel could be better because the % of parry is higther without serenity. It's bad?

[miniaaar]

You have to use the "share link" or "profile summary" icons (top right) to share your builds on pyrospace. You only linked the base starting page.

Otherwise, I'd say your two champions option is a pretty sound idea. Be sure to focus all their mental points in Leadership as soon as they come, every martial point in WS and most Physical points in Toughness with a sprinkle of Strength and Agility.

If you want to use them as bait, you might want to give them pendants instead of helmets if they're going to pass all-alone tests regularly.
Web of steel is ok and you might use it when your champion is facing a single unit, so that he can take advantage of the reduced cost of parrying. When facing more than one unit, then Defensive stance would be indicated.

You could even plan to make one of those champions your alternate leader, via the skill "born leader". Be sure to take the mastered version of the skill as soon as possible, it's basically free (you get a refund in skill points).

Your champions can then act as twin towers, locking ennemies in place while your archer can safely fire and your more squishy units come at the flanks.

If I may, this is basically the winning combination Karond used in the last tournament. You might want to take a look at his warband there:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VljLKoigIhY

[Chrenergros]

With phone it doesn't give me the possibility to cut and paste the link D: when i'm at home i'll do it woth my pc