Editing Mordheim/Tactics (section)

===Unofficial Warbands===

====Amazons====
Amazons appeared twice as an expansion-pack warband for [[Mordheim]] in the pages of Town Cryer, the official Mordheim magazine.

The first version, seen in Town Cryer #15, was part of the [[Lustria]]: Cities of Gold setting expansion for Mordheim, and presented Amazons as a reclusive, xenophobic and highly territorial race of women, reputedly descended from a lost Norse colony, with a particular enmity for both [[Lizardmen]] (who they hunted for food and skins) and the Norse. This is reflected in the assortment of special rules that Amazons get under these rules; in addition to "Not One Of Us!", which prohibits them from hiring mercenaries and Dramatis Personae who aren't Amazons, they get the rules "Isolationists" (re-roll missed attacks in the first round of combat against Lizardmen and Norse opponents) and "Norse Enmity" (when facing a Norse warband, Amazons get to re-roll their first failed Rout check, and can't voluntarily fail a Rout check unless their leader is down). Their final special rule is "Sacrifice", which is almost identical to the [[Cult of the Possessed]] special rule of the same name, except that sacrificing a Skink will have the added bonus of rewarding the party with a free Enchanted Skins (also called Skins & Charms), a suit of magical armor that has a 6+ armor save and a 5+ dispel save against spells. 

This "mark 1" Amazon warband is led by a Serpent Priestess, a Leader/Wizard combo character in the vein of a few other warbands; for Heroes, they can take 0-2 Eagle Warriors (melee-focused champions) and 0-2 Piranha Warriors (ranged-focused champions). Their Henchmen are simply Amazon Warriors, though they can also take 0-3 Jaguar Warriors, whose special rule "One With The Jungle" lets them ignore jungle terrain when moving. 

This version of the Amazon warband has its own Special skill table, which is available to all three Hero types; its heroes are otherwise characterized as extremely martial (universal Combat skills) and quick (universal Speed skills); the Serpent Priestess can take Academic skills, the Eagle Warrior can take Strength skills, and the Piranha Warrior can take Shooting skills. The unique Amazon skills are ''Skink Hunter'' (always strike first vs. Skinks), ''Elixir of Life'' (re-roll one Out of Action roll after a battle), ''Mesmerizing Dance'' (models in base contact must pass an Ld test to attack; doesn't work on Lizardmen or undead), ''Savage Fury'' (immune to charm & fear, +1 Attack when charging) and ''Concealment'' (when hiding in jungle terrain, enemies halve the range at which they can spot this Amazon). This iteration of the Serpent Priestess uses '''Amazon Rituals''' as her magic lore, the spells of which consist of Singing Wind, Serpent's Strength, Wendala's Maelstrom, Shield of Thorns, The Living Jungle, and Siren's Dreams.

The second version appeared in Town Cryer #23, and whilst building on the same lore as the previous version, was somewhat more official; it presented the Amazon warband as representing captured Amazons who were shipped to the Empire as curiosities and courtesans, freed by the chaos of the wyrdstone meteorite and now trying to amass the wealth needed to pay for a trip back to Lustria. 

These Amazons only maintain the "Not One Of Us" and "Sacrifice" special rules from their prior version, and lose the Enchanted Skins armor - this restricts them to just helmets and bucklers, making them even more fragile than the original Amazons were. They replace a number of their unique artifacts as well with new versions, and lose their Amazon Special Skills. 

The new Warband is still led by a Priestess (having dropped the "Serpent" prefix), who is still a Leader/Wizard and still using the same '''Amazon Rituals''' magic lore as before, complete with the same spells. However, she's gained a major boost in skills; now she can take Shooting and Strength skills in addition to her original Combat/Academic/Speed trinity! The new Heroes are 0-2 Champions (who, weirdly, despite being WS4 and BS3, can learn Shooting skills) and 0-2 Totem Warriors; melee-focused (WS4, BS2) who can learn Strength skills and who have the Frenzy special rule; both retain the affinity for Combat and Speed skills of their earlier counterparts. For Henchmen, you can take Amazon Warriors and 0-3 Scouts, who use the generic Stealthy rule and replace the old Jaguar Warriors.

====Bretonnians====

This warband was published on town cryer 8. It has the “anti-dakka curse” which consists in: Take a Ld test with the warband’s leader. If it’s successful, the curse is applied. When a enemy model tries to fire a blackpowder weapon, it must roll a d6 first. On 4+, it can use the weapon normally, below, it can’t. When using any other shooting weapon, it has to do the test only if it aims against the Questing Knight or any of the Knights Errant. Also, the maximum warrior number is 12. 

Heroes:
* Questing Knight (80 gc, WS/S/I 4, immune to all alone tests) 
* Knights Errant (0-2, 50 gc each, immune to all alone tests)
* Squires (0-3, 15 gc each, shit WS/BS 2)

Peasants:
* Men-at-arms (0-8, 25 gc each, Ld 7)
* Bowmen (Limitless recruitment, 20 gc each)

Special Equipment:

* Barding (Rare 11): Yes, the French are so french that the special stuff is not for their warriors, but for their goddamn horses. It adds a extra +1 save for a model mounted on a barded warhorse (so a +2 for the natural +1 of being mounted). A warhorse with barding will only be killed on a D6 roll of 1 (injury roll) if it’s taken out of action instead of the normal 1-2. The barding is exclusive to warhorses.

Forget about the shooting and academic skills, they don’t exist here. Also, the Bret*nnians are so classist that there’s a equipment list for each type of warrior: Knight, Squire, Men-at-arms and Bowmen. Alse there’s this funny “If I don't, neither you do” mechanic with the horses. There is the Questing Knight, the Knights Errant and the Squires. The squires only can have horses if the Questing Knight or any Knight Errant has a warhorse, and the Knights Errant only can have a warhorse if the Questing Knight does. So, if you want all of your Heroes mounted, you have to spend 360 gc on them all. And we’re not counting the barding, which would cost a total of 90 gc more for all three knights, which leads us to 450 gc spent only on the horses and armour!... Moving on, all the three knights have this rule of immunity to all alone tests. The differences on the equipment lists are tricky so read the doc yourself is fucking free. Moving on, the WS/S/I 4 of the Questing knight is the best starting stat of the whole warband, the Knights Errant have nearly all 3s on their statline making them very basic, but the squire has 2 on WS/BS so it has the amazing job of intercepting enemy charges against knights.The men-at-arms are also nearly all 3s on their statline, better than a squire, but no missile weapons on their equipment list. The bowmen, as their name says, have access to bows and longbows, with a better BS than a squire. Let's move into the special skills. Of course, they're all exclusive to the Questing knight. Dispel a spell on 4+, re-roll failed hit rolls against enemies with higher Strength, re-roll a failed rout test if the knight is not knocked down, stunned or out of action, hate enemies with shooting weapons and finally, roll a D3 each time you want to charge, adding the result to the charge distance. So, in general terms, this warband can be quite expensive (damn horses) and have less ranged power than the average merc warband, but it can be really nice with the right choices.

====Outlaws of Stirwood Forest====

Heroes:
* Bandit Leader (60 gc, WS/BS/I 4)
* Champion (0-2, 35 gc, BS 4)
* Petty Thieves (0-2, 20 gc)
* Cleric (0-1 replaces one champion or one petty thief, 35 gc, can do prayers of Sigmar lets goooo!)

Henchmen:
* Marksmen (0-7, 25 gc, BS 4)
* Outlaws (Limitless recruitment, 25 gc)

So, suddenly there are these guys we’ve never heard of. Robin Hoods, but some of them are actual thieves. They have a very specific rule towards ranged weapons. “All warriors in an Outlaws warband may be equipped with only one missile weapon at any time. All warriors must carry a type of bow, but not crossbows, as part of their equipment. So, even if an Outlaw acquires skills that allow him to use additional ballistic weaponry, he cannot do so. The only exception to this is the Cleric who may choose to carry a bow, but is not compelled to do so.”. I don’t understand this quite well and I hope future editors do. But moving on, they have an interesting hero choice, which allows them to have a priest and champions (which are quite decent) at the same time. The petty thieves aren’t that good, so I would exchange them for the cleric and more gold for the warband. Both henchmen options are nice and cheap. But wait, enthusiastic hooded youngling! They have exclusive common equipment:

Hunting Arrows (30 gc): These are available to Heroes at the time of their initial recruitment without having to roll for Rarity. If you wish to subsequently purchase this item during the Trading and Exploration stages of the game, then you would have to roll for Rarity as normal.

Forest Cloak (50 gc): So long as the wearer is beside a tree, bush or hedge, any enemy using any kind of missile weapon at a warrior wearing a Forest Cloak is at an additional –1BS to hit (in addition to all other modifiers). Similarly, if any spellcaster wishes to target a magical attack against an Outlaw camouflaged in this way, he can only do so by successfully rolling a 4+ on a D6. The only exception to this is if the shooting warrior or the spellcaster is already within their Initiative range in inches. Forest Cloaks are available to Heroes at the time of their initial recruitment without having to roll for Rarity. If you wish to subsequently purchase this item during the Trading and Exploration stages of the game, then you would have to roll for Rarity as normal. Availability: 50gc, Rare 10, Outlaw Heroes only

Hunting arrows at the start of the campaign can be quite useful in combination with a longbow (which is also hero exclusive). Not to mention the hunting arrows are already useful for taking down important targets. The forest cloak is really useful!... unless you’re playing a campaign based on Araby, Khemri or any other forestless battlefields.

Sample Warband:

* Bandit Leader (65 gc) with longbow (15 gc), hunting arrows (30 gc) and a sword (10 gc)
* Champion (35 gc) with two hammers (6 gc)
* Cleric (35 gc) with bow (10 gc) and axe (15 gc)

All that reduces our gc to 279

* 3 Outlaws (75 gc for all) each one with shields (15 gc for all) and hammers (9 gc for all)
* 3 Marksmen (75 gc for all) each one with bows (30 gc for all) and axes (15 gc for all)

The final reserve is 60 gc. We got our sniper bandit (we didn’t pick the cloak because this list is for all campaigns with or without trees) A champion in charge of stunning whatever is in its path and the cleric balanced between ranged and melee. Our henchmen are also in charge of stunning everything and the marksmen have what they need to do their thing.

====Pirates====

====Pit Fighters====

====Shadow Warriors====
Alias; the big cheese, shadow the edgehog warriors, the thinking mans warband.

These guys used to be an official warband introduced in the lustria campaign until the creators committed ritual suicide. This warband is noteable for being so op it became banned officially and made unofficial. Anyone playing this warband either doesn’t know any better, or has just asked for 20 slings to the face.

Why are they op you ask, dear reader?

Bs4 baseline elves bs5 warband leader. Ws4 for heroes.

a magic lore that in addition to being quite easy to cast has wonderful gems such as ‘aoe hidden aura that cant be broken unless you move within 6 inches on a 6+’ this is not even the best spell.

I6 and at worst i5 in every fucking model and m5, and high ld.

Access to elf bows for cheaper and easier.

Common house rulings: 

Cap elves at t3

Move house before your opponent comes over

Hire Assassins to kill opponent 

Provide loaded die to opponent


If you must fight a player with this warband, kill his mage promptly, then his most expensive heroes, the only way to stop shadow warriors from quickly snowballing in campaign is to cull them early and brutally, once the mage is down ruin his most expensive heroes quickly. 

Tactics FOR shadow warriors:

Abuse your insanely good bs,movement and initiative to be up high and run away from your vertically challenged opponents. Choose at least longbows, get quick shot then trick shot. If you instead desire a melee focused elf. Get  the weapon master skill, then obtain a rapier(or 2) these work wonderfully with your high ws meaning you will get to roll far more attacks than is listed on the hero. 

 After 1-3 matches of this, congratulations you have won the campaign as you are now the sole player, don’t worry I hear Lucifer has a shadow warriors band just like you.