Thoughts on my (Tzeentchian) army composition

Jellyphas

For campaign. Not multiplayer.

Kairos Fateweaver
Iridescent Horror (Tzeentch)
Cultist of Tzeentch (Fire)
6 Exalted Pink Horrors
6 Chaos Knights of Tzeentch
3 Doom Knights
2 Soulgrinders of Tzeentch

Thoughts? You think I should replace a unit or two with something else?

GloatingSwine

TBH I don't know as you want that many chaos knights *and* doom knights, unless you plan to micro the hell out of everything all the time forever. Consider some Forsaken to stand in the way of things instead. Doom Knights are real good, but Chaos Knights are a bit redundant when you have them.

Jellyphas

GloatingSwine said:

TBH I don't know as you want that many chaos knights *and* doom knights, unless you plan to micro the hell out of everything all the time forever. Consider some Forsaken to stand in the way of things instead. Doom Knights are real good, but Chaos Knights are a bit redundant when you have them.

I specifically chose Chaos Knights because of their tankiness and speed. They seem to be a good frontline whilst my missiles and magic wear down the enemy.

For Doom Knights, I'm pretty good at micro-ing them, and due to Tzeentch being pretty micro-heavy, I've had a lot of practice. They deal great damage to enemy units when I use them.

Valkaar

Eh. It's entirely dependent upon your style, difficultly, etc.

It's incredibly hard to 'rate' Campaign stacks because almost anything can be made to work, it's just a matter of preference a lot of the time.

That being said:

I personally don't see the point in triple casters. Kairos is pretty good at Magic Regen by himself. He should be doing most of your casting. The other guys have some 'battery power', but enough to justify a slot is debatable. Certainly not enough to justify TWO slots. One will suffice if you're determined to keep a hero.

I also concur with the other poster that that's too much cavalry. Both of those units are decent at what they do, but you only need so much backline harassment before you start encountering diminishing returns. Neither Chaos Knights nor Doom Knights are THAT good in sustained combat. They're just 'okay'. They're moderately tanky and mobile, but not great with damag. Damage really should be coming from range and Kairos. So I'd cut that amount of mobility in half and add more ranged units of choice.

Don't get me wrong, your stack as is, will work. But if we're talking about areas for improvement, it has too many redundant units and low DPS.

Neodeinos

I'd probably replace two Knights by two Burning Chariots. Disable fire at will with them and focus single entities, they will literally melt.

drclaw_tw

I haven't played much Tzeentch but 9 units of Cavalry seems like a pain in the ass to micro. Why so much? I would frop some Chaos Knights for some regular Pink Horrors, maybe a burning chariot or an an exalted flamer. Unless you simply want a heavy cav-focused army, but Tzeentch ranged units are good. Keep the Doom Knights, they are better than Chaos Knights.

HarveyJames

i quite like normal flamers myself

Neodeinos

HarveyJames said:

i quite like normal flamers myself

Regular flamers are really good with some horrors holding the line, the horrors are small enough so that you don't have any line of sight issues with the flamers. They are quite fragile and vulnerable to ranged units however.

IZZESparkling

Valkaar said:

Eh. It's entirely dependent upon your style, difficultly, etc.

It's incredibly hard to 'rate' Campaign stacks because almost anything can be made to work, it's just a matter of preference a lot of the time.

That being said:

I personally don't see the point in triple casters. Kairos is pretty good at Magic Regen by himself. He should be doing most of your casting. The other guys have some 'battery power', but enough to justify a slot is debatable. Certainly not enough to justify TWO slots. One will suffice if you're determined to keep a hero.

I also concur with the other poster that that's too much cavalry. Both of those units are decent at what they do, but you only need so much backline harassment before you start encountering diminishing returns. Neither Chaos Knights nor Doom Knights are THAT good in sustained combat. They're just 'okay'. They're moderately tanky and mobile, but not great with damag. Damage really should be coming from range and Kairos. So I'd cut that amount of mobility in half and add more ranged units of choice.

Don't get me wrong, your stack as is, will work. But if we're talking about areas for improvement, it has too many redundant units and low DPS.

Faster regen translates to faster spells and Kairos benefits from having multiple spell casters with Mastery of Elemental Winds where intensity can be stacked up to 200%. So, Kairos kind of do have reason to stack casters that will not see action.

Asamu

You'd probably get more mileage out of less knights and more horrors/some lords of change (for the spell intensity). It'll be easier to micro and more effective in sieges/minor settlement battles, where the knights won't be as strong, especially vs cathay.

MiniaAr

It's a lot of cavalry but it could work. I like that you're focusing on only 2 red lines buffs (except the soul grinders). I like my armies focussed as well.

I think getting two heroes, with the horror with Locus of Conjuration, is the right way to go. Kairos can become a formidable caster (as he should be) and getting some additional support on the magic department, for example with Metal spells that he doesn't really have access to, could be great.
There is also something to be said to the double cast of Infernal Gateway (one from Kairos, the other from the Irridescent Horror you get on turn 2) to melt ennemy infantry from early on.

Personnally, I'd like my Kairos army to be deamons only and use a Herald Army that would combine knights, spawns and forsaken.
So for Kairos, something like:
Kairos
Irridescent Horror (Metal)
Irridescent Horror (Tzeentch)
Cultist (Fire)
-> All characters give mastery of the elemental winds, which is good for a magic focus army

6 Exalted Pink Horrors
4 Flamers (I like those buggers)
1 Burning Chariot of Tzeentch (the one you start with)
3 Screamers (for air superiority and help the 3 magic caballeros)
2 Lord of Change that will act as your "frontline", e.g. locking ennemy blob in place and unleashing the magic). The early Soul grinder can play this role in the beginning but I like the LoC who will give mastery of elemental winds as well.

Then for the secondary army with a more balanced focus:
Herald of Tzeentch/ Exalted LoC (Tzeentch)
Irridescent Horror (Metal)
Cultist (Fire)

6 Forsaken (frontline)
3 Spawns of Tzeentch
2 Kights of Tzeentch
2 Doom Knighs of Tzeentch
2 Soul Grinders of Tzeentch
2 Burning Chariots of Tzeentch (so that the army isn't only melee).

This way you get two very distinct army still with the limited Tzeentch roster.

BloatedCorpse1234

I prefer doom knights over Chaos knights.

For general crapstacks I often do well with just a mix of different types of horrors.

Kairos does not need an army at this point.

I would prob. separate horrors as their own stacks and do "fast" doomstack with doom knights and soul grinders.

GloatingSwine

Jellyphas said:

GloatingSwine said:

TBH I don't know as you want that many chaos knights *and* doom knights, unless you plan to micro the hell out of everything all the time forever. Consider some Forsaken to stand in the way of things instead. Doom Knights are real good, but Chaos Knights are a bit redundant when you have them.

I specifically chose Chaos Knights because of their tankiness and speed. They seem to be a good frontline whilst my missiles and magic wear down the enemy.

For Doom Knights, I'm pretty good at micro-ing them, and due to Tzeentch being pretty micro-heavy, I've had a lot of practice. They deal great damage to enemy units when I use them.

Cavalry doesn't usually do well in that frontline role because despite appearing to have tanky stats they're low entity count so they get individually overwhelmed. Especially since a lot of other frontlines you'll face have anti-large. That's why Forsaken are a reasonable shout. They're still quite tanky, still quite hitty, and harder to swamp with numbers.