Editing Total War Warhammer/Tactics/Vampire Counts (section)

==Tactics==

===Multiplayer Strategies===
You are currently THE fear faction, as obvious as it may seem. Your armies of spookiness are designed to take advantage of enemy leadership and get them to shit themselves and run off the field. Your powerful Lords and monsters also act as nice encouragement to get them to flee. Generally your plan in most battles is to invest in your Lord, a few strong units like Blood Knights or Terrorgheists, then spend literally everything else on chaff. Have your chaff soak up enemy fire then use your OP healing to keep your actually important units alive. Better scare them off fast too before they start stabbing your skellies and zombos and realize "Hey, these things are actually really easy to kill". Keep your Lord alive too, for if they die, the game is pretty much over.
Anywho, here's how to pilot the champions of the night:

*'''Beastmen''': What used to be one of your best matchups is now one of your worst and it's due entirely to two monsters -- Ghorgons and Jabberslythes. You rely on drowning your enemies in a tide of zombies and skeletons while your characters and monsters do the work of actually killing things. The Ghorgon will kick the crap out of all of your monsters one-on-one, even the anti-large Terrorgheist. The Jabberslythe has its own Mortis Engine effect and a poison vortex that let it chew through hordes of zombies like a puppy through a bowl of kibble. The good news is Beastmen have terrible leadership, low armor and aren't great at winning a war of attrition. Lore of Death is very good against them and be sure to focus down any Wargors who might be buffing the leadership of their infantry. Drown Jabberslythes in a mix of Skeleton Spears and zombies, ideally backed up by a Corpse Cart; they might not win but you can slow the Jabber down. Beware of the occasional Bestigor build designed to counter tarpits. Deal with any Ghorgons quickly, ''especially'' the Bloodbrute Behemoth, as they not only can kill your monsters but the Bloodbrute in particular poses a big threat to your lords. Blood Knights, Terrorgheists, debuffs, magic missiles, throw them all at that four-armed cow until it goes down or runs away. Be sure not to bring any ethereal units in this matchup; the Jabber's madness aura deals magic damage.

*'''Bretonnia''': On the one hand, Bretonnia is a pain because they field a lot of cavalry and you lack anti-large. On the other hand Blood Knights are one of the few cavalry units that can take on Grail Knights and win, especially since they can be resurrected while The Lady's simps cannot. Bretonnia's front line probably hasn't eaten more than one potato in the last week so they're pretty easy to roll over with zombies and skeletons, but one or two Grave Guard and a Corpse Cart can give you a good core to fall back on. Bring a few bats or wolves to take out archers and a Wight King or two can fend off Paladins. Bring a few bats or wolves to take out archers and the occasional trebuchet.

*'''[[Total_War_Warhammer/Tactics/Chaos_Dwarfs| Chaos Dwarfs]]''': Your roster lacks good anti-monster options, has a lot of vulnerabilities to fire damage and hates attacking range-heavy armies. Guess what the Chaos Dwarfs have in spades? You want to avoid this matchup if you can but if you can't your best hope is that they bring a chaff heavy army. Everything you have causes Fear or Terror and Greenskin Labourers can be easily routed. You on the other hand will want to go cavalry heavy both to shut down the enemy ranged units but also to outmaneuver the Chaos Dwarfs' relatively slow roster. Your Blood Knights are probably the best counter you have against both heavily armored Dwarf infantry and any of the big monsters that may company them. Avoid sending your bats and wolves after actual Dwarfs unless you have to, they won't make a dent in that armor. Instead, save them to go after the Hobgoblins. A Black Coach won't go amiss here, so long as you can keep it from getting blown apart.

*'''Warriors of Chaos''': This matchup has all the complexity of a 6-year old smacking [[Bionicle]]s into each other in his room. It's one of your best matchups because you have 3 HUGE advantages that turn the game in your favor: Fear/terror, Mobility, and Magic. Chaos is reliant on it's slow-moving infantry and monsters, which tend to have pretty middling leadership. This means that their heavy hitters are generally much easier to tarpit than other factions. Since every single unit in your roster causes fear (and many cause terror) this can really add up and cause early routs on key enemy units. You also have the mobility to dick Chaos around all day, and they really have very few options to do anything about it. The units they have that can keep up (like skirmish cav and hounds) really don't have much in the way of killing power. Finally, you have healing. They don't. Invocation of Nehek means you can make even less favorable trades go your way by regenerating models which can pay huge dividends over the course of a battle. Blood Knights are an EXCELLENT pick in this matchup due to their mobility, and they are probably one of the best responses to Chaos' large units. Mortis Engines can really get some work done as well, since you don't have to worry much about it being shot up by missiles. Ethereal units can make the Chaos gods cry if played right, because Chaos has pretty limited sources of magic damage (though you'll still have to worry about lore of fire). Invest heavily in your lord, play aggressively during the skirmish phase (you definitely want to take cav fights!), and do a good job of avoiding their big monsters (Chaos' best option here is usually Shaggoths), and you'll easily be able show the Warhammer world what a pussy-whipped failure Archaon really is.

*'''Dark Elves''': Ironically, all that AP damage is actually wasted, since most of your units are pretty lightly armored. What you're really going to have to worry about are their monsters and anti-large. Their army is quite squishy, and your monstrous infantry and cavalry will have a grand old time stomping on most of their infantry options (though watch out for Black Guard, which can take out your cav and monsters, and still have time for coffee at the end). You can absorb a lot of their missile play with chaff, or use summons to take their Darkshards and Shades out quickly. Make sure to do so before they can get their shots into your lord or monsters though! Crypt Horrors or Vargheists can also be good for taking them out. Scourgerunners will kite most of your monsters to kingdom come, so bog them down with bats or wolves as soon as you get the chance. Your cavalry can easily outmatch theirs most of the time, but Doomfire Warlocks can be a problem with their bound doombolt spell. The worst units to deal with are their monsters. Kharybdiss can spell doom for many of your better units, but is pretty slow and easy to tarpit. Black Dragons can also be a problem in the air, and many of their lords have them as a mount option. Murderous Prowess also means you can't get the Dark Elves to rout as easily as most of the other factions which can be a very big deal, so make sure you're playing a longer game, and pay attention when it procs.

*'''Dwarfs''': No lies, this is not going to be fun for you. Dwarfs are tough, have great ranged/artillery options, are resistant to magic, and their leadership is so high your fear and terror effects aren't as useful. Fortunately they're super reliant on protecting their back line and aren't great at dealing with large units in melee. Wolves, bats and Vargheists will serve you well here in shutting down their ranged units, Black Coaches can mow down Dwarf infantry for days, and your cavalry can almost always pick optimal engagements. Ethereal units are kind of a mixed bag; dwarfs don't have a lot of access to magic damage but their magic resistance makes it harder for your ghosts to hurt them. A few Grave Guard with Great Weapons can help get through all that dwarf armor but don't over-invest in them. Your biggest challenge will simply be reaching the dwarfs without taking too much damage. If the dwarfs have any characters mounted on Anvils of Doom (especially Thorek) then be careful with your casters; if they cast spells too close to those guys they'll eat automatic miscast damage.

*'''Empire''': You can bring a similar build to Bretonnia, mainly zombies/skellies, blood knights, a few bats and wolves, maybe a corpse cart and a couple of Wight Kings. Try to avoid letting anything important get bogged down fighting Flagellants, summon zombies on their back lines and try to kill their lords and Warrior Priests so your Fear and Terror effects can have maximum impact. Never underestimate the strength of pinning an enemy lord between a zombie summon and a blood knight charge. If Outriders and Pistoliers make your life hell then throw bats at them until they go away.

*'''Greenskins''': Greenskins have few anti-large units, other than archers, which means a Varghulf or some Crypt Horrors are a good idea. This is especially true since Greenskins have shit leadership and Terror routs are very effective against them. Watch out for Black Orcs or Squigs though, as they all have Immune to Psychology. Unfortunately you ''also'' don't have a lot of great anti-large options and the Greenskins have plentiful monsters. You want a mix of Grave Guard (especially Great Weapons) to deal with Black Orcs, along with zombies or skeletons to tarpit everything else. Greenskins love their skirmish cav, tie them up with bats if you can.

*'''Grand Cathay''':

*'''High Elves''': You're one of the few armies that can contest the sky against the High Elves, though it's a risky proposition. With dragons, phoenixes, and Alarielle breaking out the Tempest spell it's very easy to lose the air war with a few bad engagements. Consider bringing the generic Von Carstein lord. His Varghulf summon will mess up the High Elf backline and he has his own version of Tempest that can prove decisive in clearing the skies. All your big flyers have their uses here, but you probably don't want to invest in both them and cavalry so pick one or the other. Big ground monsters will be magnets for arrows so maybe leave them at home. Focus on overwhelming the ground forces with cheap infantry and the usual bats and wolves combo. You'll be beating their elite troops with either your flying circus or some Blood Knights.

*'''Khorne''': This is going to be a bad matchup for you. Bloodthirsters will beat the pants off of your monsters, the Skull Cannon will run circles around you, and if you try to drown them in chaff they'll just laugh in blood and skulls. Grave Guard with great weapons will be needed just for some AP. Forget the bats and wolves, bring Terrorgheists and Vargheists, you need armor piercing ant anti-large. They are absolutely going to try to goon your lord, so maybe put them on a Hellsteed just to keep out of reach. Black Coaches might be useful for running over Chaos Warriors and Blood Knights might not hit as hard as Khorne's cav but at least they can be healed and resurrected. All in all, it looks like you might have to go tight and elite to match the same thing.

*'''Kislev''':

*'''Lizardmen''': Good news, you don't care about their big, scary monsters because your undead soldiers will never run away from them. In fact, you're one of the best armies in the game when it comes to tarpitting them. Bad news, their big, scary monsters will generally slaughter most of your forces without a care in the world if you don't focus them down once they're in battle. Having said that, your first and biggest concern when facing a Lizardmen army will be their casters. Fire and Light Slann, in addition to Heavens Skink Priests, will utterly decimate your lines with their myriad of vortex spells. Slann in particular, due to having Banishment as a bound spell, will be your biggest concern. To this end, the first effective counter is to spread your forces out. Additionally, (Ancient) Salamanders and (Sacred) Kroxigors will be secondary targets due to their flaming/magical attacks being tailor made to ruin your day. If you can take out most of the Lizard magic, Hexwraiths will actually get some solid work done against their armored frontlines and cavalry. Skeleton Spears will be your desired chaff infantry; though more expensive than regular zombies, their spears will enable them to get not-inconsequential chip damage against the monsters they're tying down and their shields give them a bit more staying power against skink skirmishers and even Salamander Hunting Packs.

*'''Norsca''': This can be a rough one. You might think 'Well, the Chaos matchup is pretty favorable, why not Norsca?' The answer to that question is mobility. Norsca is fast enough to keep up, and their constant pressure can wear you down if they are played well. Their skirmish cav will drive you to insanity if you don't manage to shut them down with bats or wolves, their infantry (and monstrous infantry) can go toe-to-toe with yours, and their monsters simply counter yours in most cases. Mammoths in particular are an absolute nightmare for your battle lines to deal with, and you don't have many ways to shut them down quickly. Skin Wolves and Marauder Javelins can take the fight out of your monsters in an instant, and they usually have an easy time positioning their anti-large units to take down your elite cavalry since you can't apply pressure at range. Your best bet is to try and leverage your magic to get their monsters to rout early; perhaps with a death wizard that has spells like spirit leech or doom & darkness. You can typically outfight them in the skies (with the Frost-wyrm being expensive and rather squishy) so use that advantage to the fullest to shut down their ranged (if they bring any) or pick off their skirmish cav. It's a hard matchup for sure, but not impossible.

*'''Nurgle''':

*'''Ogre Kingdoms''': This is a good matchup in your favor. Except for the firebellies, the ogres have a lot of trouble dealing with massed infantry. You'll need to take out their anti-infantry catapults and firebellies fast and after that the ogres don't really have many answers to a swarm of skeleton spearmen

*'''Skaven''': This matchup kind of sucks, but you do have a few tools to make it work in your favor. Skaven have a ludicrous number of guns built to suit virtually every battlefield need, many of which are either magical, armor-piercing, shield breaking or some unholy combination of the above. They also have artillery and missile units (Warplock Jezzails) that excel at sniping single entities, like the lord holding your shambling forces together. Fortunately, Skaven are rather skittish and have a relative lack of cavalry. Black/Blood Knights and Vargheists can quickly tie down artillery and gunlines while your fear and terror causing wall of meat and bone close in. In fact, their complete lack of an aerial presence will give your flying forces effectively free reign to pick their engagements. But check their casters before committing your flyers. If the skaven brought lore of ruin, they can snare your air units with howling warpgale and shoot them to pieces.

*'''Slaanesh''': Hey look, another faction that thinks ranged units are for pussies! Due to that, there really isn't much reason to invest in Bats and Wolves since there isn't much of a backline to dive. They're are much faster but also much squishier than you, so your goal here is to win a war of attrition. Make sure your lord has a flying mount, as due to the lack of missiles, so if they can fly and heal you're in a good spot. Your ground forces should comprise of Zombies whose sole job is to hold whatever deviants get thrown at them in place. Your killing force should go to your airforce, as Slaanesh doesn't really have a lot of ways to contest them. Vargheist and Terrorgheists should be able to choose their engagements and as long as you can keep them from getting pinned, you can have them avoid their bad matchups. Blood Knights won't catch their cav but if you can pin them in, they should be able to tear apart any Seekers or Hellriders they can get their hands on.

*'''Tomb Kings''': The Counts have an edge over their Nehekaran brethren. Since the Counts are likely the best rush faction in the game, shutting down their artillery and missiles should be second nature. Flyers really matter in this matchup, since all the Tomb Kings have in the skies is the piss-weak Carrion. The Vampires are far superior in the infantry grind (although the Tomb Kings Monstrous infantry is a whole different story, with Sepulchral Stalkers and Ushabti being a huge pain in the undead behind to deal with), and have an edge in the cavalry matchup (though Necropolis Knights can be threatening). The biggest stumbling block is the Tomb Kings constructs, which can be seriously tough if not dealt with effectively. Luckily, you do have a few armor piercing options like Hexwraiths or Blood Knights to counter, or failing that, you can usually shut them down with your lords or hero units. However, watch out for the Necrosphinx with it's ludicrous bonus vs. large. You really just want to lean into the rush element of the VC army, since if the Tomb Kings can withstand your initial assault, things can turn very bad for you.

*'''Tzeentch''': Difficult matchup, since they have scores of flaming and/or ranged attacks, but you can still shine here. Your Blood Knights are better cavalry than anything Tzeentch can throw at you, so you will need a few in your army to take care of the cavalry, kill single entities and flank the horrors. Your Crypt Guards are actually pretty good at tanking fire with their shields, so you will need a frontline of them, you can add one or two great Weapons variants to do some damage once they're in melee. Bring a mortis engine or two to keep the frontline alive, but don't bring them into contact before your Crypt Guards have reached melee. Summons can tie down Horrors and Flamers temporarily.

*'''Vampire Coast''': Once you close the distance, the coast turns into mush. The trick is getting there without getting shot half to hell. In this matchup, a more mobile build will be to your advantage. Make sure you're using your environment, and don't feed too much into their skirmish game. It's tough to bring monsters against The Vampire Coast cause they can get shot full of holes before the battle has even started. The Varghulf CAN work if micro'd well but it's pretty risky and Terrorgheists and Mortis Engines are a HUGE no-no. Trees are helpful to keep your units from getting shot, and you can usually outmatch them in the skies and with cavalry. You're going to need to rely on those flyers and cav for your killing potential, so if there was ever a time to drop that extra money on a unit of Black Knights or Blood Knights, it's this matchup. Also, Ethereal units don't tend to work out great because the Vampire Coast has a good few units with magical attacks.

*'''Vampire Counts''': Skip the bats and wolves this time, they're no use here. You're both going to be tearing your hair out over how to deal with the other's big monsters. Victory will probably come down to who can snipe the other's lord first.

*'''Wood Elves''': You know the "We have more bodies than they have ammunition" quote? Well, the wood elves have more ammunition than you have bodies and they're fast enough to stay three steps away from your rotting soldiers at all times, so don't try your usual Infantry blob + Wind of Death combo. Bring some Dire Wolves and/or Fell Bats to run down Glade Guard and Waywatchers and bring out the heavy hitters; Black Knights and Blood Knights are likely going to be your go-to core; they're fast enough to catch up to and slaughter any wood elven infantry while Blood Knights can actually tangle quite well with Wild Riders/Great Stag Knights, so long as they're not the ones getting hit by the initial charge. This is also one of the matchups a Black Coach can actually get some solid work done, if the Wood Elven player has any Dryads/Tree Kin on the field. You'll want to shy away from bringing any ethereal units against them; Tree units don't give a shit and several of their ranged units happen to be packing magical arrows.

===Domination===

General Tier Rank: '''S'''

Grab Ghorst with only his cart and mortis effect, a couple Necromancers with heals, summons and the power recharge ability, 4 Crypt Horrors, and then just spam skeletons and zombies. There, you're probably going to win roughly 90% of your battles. Everyone will fucking hate you and you really aren't going to have that much fun but hey, at least you win. Because you have so many cheap infantry units that are all unbreakable once you have a point you're pretty much never going to lose it unless you really mess up. Combine all of this with your incredible healing and not even Nurgle will be able to keep up with you in the blob. My only warning is watch out for nerfs, because at some point you are absolutely going to get smacked with the nerf bat.

However, there is one faction who was put in domination whose whole purpose for existing is to burn ass and drink ale, and they’re almost out of ale, the dwarfs, you’re probably wondering right now, “dwarfs? Aren’t they considered a poor faction for domination?” In most cases yes, and that’s because of their poor speed, however they are more than capable of kicking the smug teeth out of any vampire that think their being funny by spamming trash, with irondrakes, blasting charges, bombers and flame cannons, they are one of the best factions for clearing out chaff without depending on magic, and you know what most of your army is? TRASH units, mobs of expendable unbreakable units will quickly cease to exist once the dwarfs start raining hellfire on you, to fight this, you will need to be much smarter than flooding the points as the dwarfs will laugh their asses off while drinking their pints if you do that, best prepare some Pepto-Bismol as fire rains down on you, remember that 90% wins? This the 10% where you lose

===Campaign Strategies===

* You don't have any artillery or ranged units, so be ready for sieges to take longer, & for siege assaults to have more casualties as you scale walls & storm gates.
* Create a fortified Northern boundary for the inevitable Chaos/Norsca invasion.
* Establishing good diplomatic relations with ''anyone'' will be a challenge. Don't expect trade agreements with anyone besides Mousillon.
** On the other hand Vlad now has an easier time with the Empire due to one of his new skills giving him a whooping +40 to relationship with Franz and co, so at least this part will be less of a harrow.
* in immortal empires mannlet now starts in the middle of the 'southlands bloodbowl' with such amazing people such as skarbrand as neighbors. with every single major race combination right on your doorstep this is shaping up to be one of the most difficult campaigns.
* '''IMMORTAL EMPIRES''' In Immortal empires the vampire counts have been heavily hit with the nerf-bat. the removal of free skeletons as well as the nerfs to magic alongside their generally weak roster are a tough pill to swallow. They're shaping up to be reworked post-launch or have some sort of DLC in the future because for now just stick to playing warhammer 2 if you want the vampire counts experience. Unless they remove the easy to spam necromances you can still just mass recruit them to boost income in your richest province so at the very least you should have a powerful economy still, that counts for a lot.
[[Category:Total Warhammer]] {{Total War Warhammer Tactics}}