Editing Warhammer/Tactics/8th Edition/Undead Legions (section)

====Named Characters====
'''Note:''' Under the current edition, named characters tend to be overpriced; you can emulate most named characters from scratch and save yourself some points. That said, many named characters do have abilities and war gear combos unique to them so if you need to have them go ahead. Just make sure you're really getting your points worth.

=====Lords=====

<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%"> '''[[Nagash]]:'''  Holy shit Nagash is back!  Not only is he back but he has a crazy statline and summing up everything doesn't quite do him justice, so here's the cliffnotes: He's a melee and magic powerhouse that is capable of taking on Greater Daemons in melee while out-magicking Teclis and summoning legions of Undead straight onto the field (more than anyone else can per turn), so no matter how you want to use him he's up to the task. He is however 1000 points. For more detail, click the "expand" button to the right (he has a fuckload of rules, so his section is collapsible so he doesn't take up a huge amount of space).
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">

Nagash is a special Lord-level Monster with a crazy statline. EVERYTHING is 7 other than Move, Initiative, and Attacks which are 6 and a Leadership of 10, plus even crazier special rules. Not to mention his magic items of eternal FUCK YOU, which make Malekith and Archaon's shit look like Core gear. 
He is a Large Target, and is obviously a Terror-causing Undead. Death Magic Incarnate allows all friendly models within 12 inches of him to suffer two less Wounds from Unstable, which stacks with other modifiers like the Battle Standard Bearer bonus (making Nagash a great model if you're intentionally making the biggest [[Tarpit]] army possible). 

'''Melee:''' Zefet-nebtar, The Mortis Blade, is a Magic weapon which gives him +1S and Multiple Wounds (D3) Special Rule. Morikhane, The Black Armour is a Magic Armor which gives Nagash a 4+ in both Armor and Ward Save. Since he's a Monster, he has the Thunderstomp ability. At this point, he's better than even Red Fury Master Vampires as he's dealing six Strength 8 D3 Wound attacks, some of which can be Heroic Killing Blow, per turn (see Alakanash, in Magic, below). Plus he doesn't HAVE to be the General of your army if you can field something else with a 10 Leadership in a large game, allowing you to throw in Nagash as your sacrificial rapetrain. Nagash can take on any non-End Times character currently in the game in melee and win, although the best suited against him are Thorgrim or a High Elf unit/character under Banner of the World Dragon. Both will have a 2+ against Nagash's attacks. In addition, a build exists for the Dwarf Daemonslayer where he gets Grudge/Might/Speed and ends up with a 40% chance to kill Nagash in Close Combat (which would be an epic death, even by Slayer standards). While not exactly a killing strategy, Dwarfs could make one of their Lords T10 with Shield-Bearers for extra Wounds which would make it extremely unlikely Nagash could land a blow on them in Close Combat, effectively Tarpitting him for the rest of the game. Good thing for Undead Legion players, Warriors don't have Harry the Hammer anymore...

'''Magic:''' He is a Level 5 Wizard with access to Lores of: Death, Light, Nehekhara, Vampires and Undeath, which when using Khaine magic means he gets a full 5 Lores.  His Arch-Necromancer ability allows him to reroll Miscasts, although he must accept the second result (so the original reason Teclis was overpowered back in 7th is now Nagash's). Alakanash, the Staff of Power allows him to store up to four Power Dice from his current pool for later use in any of his magic phases, you can also discard <s>one</s> any of these dice before Close Combat to give HKB to one of his attacks per dice discarded, including ones made with Zefet-nebtar (though you roll for them separately), allowing you to surpass the six Dice per spell limit. 
Supreme Lord of the Undead allows any models summoned from his Lore of Undeath spells to triple in range as well as points allowed, including additional points created by Raise the Dead counters (although it doesn't triple those, merely adds to the range). That's an important rule; while other casters could at difficulty 16+ summon 150 points worth of Monstrous Infantry models somewhere in 12 inches of themselves, Nagash could summon 450 points of models anywhere in 36 inches of himself, using four more dice stored from previous turns (six if you have a character with Black Periapt from Vampire Counts) and isn't afraid of any potential Miscast. That includes options like Crypt Horrors, which puts models that refuse to die anywhere on the flanks of the enemy, and with Nagash's wizard level 5 it's only an 11+ difficulty to cast. Needless to say, Nagash tops in terms of annoyance (and how many models you're going to need to buy) making him effectively a "pay to win" option. The 9 Books of Nagash allow him to have 9 spells when using regular magic, the first always being, "Ryze, The Grave Call" from the Lore of Undeath, and he rolls the others from any selection of the Lores he knows although he does not pick them, but he can roll in any combination (similar to how Alarielle the Radiant rolls for her spells). It's worth noting that each time Nagash casts a Lore of Vampires spell, he'll restore one Wound to himself.

With the addition of the new rules in the Khaine book concerning End Time Spells, and giving every caster of level 3 or higher the equivalent of Loremaster in any lore they take, Nagash would be able to take a staggering 41 spells, 5 of which are End Times spells that cannot be dispelled. 8 spells each from the Lores of Light, Death, Undeath, Vampires, and Nehekhara added to the Summon Arcane Fulcrum spell. Add that to the new 4 dice for Winds of Magic, no more 12 die cap on the power pool, the fact that you can replicate spells on multiple characters, casting failure no longer ending the wizard's ability to cast for the turn, and the ability to repeat cast spells with a casting cost under 15+ that haven't failed that faze, and Nagash can easily fill all your magical needs.

In summary of Nagash's magic abilities; best in the entire game; see [[Manta]].

Sweet (''un'')merciful fuck. Talk about bringing a Tomahawk Missile to a knife fight. Nagash is currently the most overpowered single thing in the entire vanilla game, putting everything from High Elf Banner tactics and Dwarf Cannon spam to within the "acceptable" range [[Skub|(although it's arguable for the Dwarftillery)]]. 

'''Weaknesses/Threats:'''
Don't think that because you just put Nagash on the table, you're going to win though. There are a couple ways to kill him (although they'll only really be seen once our opponent [[Netlisting|knows you're bringing him]]. The Empire has a low cost magic item called ''Van Horstmann's Speculum'' that allows the character (generally it's going to be a cheap hero, like a wizard or, worse, a witch hunter) carrying it to swap most of his statline with whoever he is fighting in a challenge- but this can be avoided by having a way to avoid getting stuck in a challenge (like having a cheap unit of skellies with a champion charging whatever unit Nagash charges, and let that skeleton champ bravely accept). A cheap unit of Empire troops with a wizard bearing down on Nagash is usually a pretty good indicator of where the Speculum is. Tzeentch daemons have a special character who is sorta similar but not as good (he copies the stats, rather than swapping them). If facing another Undead Legions player you could have a Nagash on Nagash slapfight, although Neferata bearing her shank of crippling (see below) can wreck your strategy. 

Like everything else in the game, Dwarf Cannons are the bane of his existence (re-rolls make it very easy to hit him, and you've got a 50/50 shot of getting through that ward save and causing D6 Wounds) so if you face that Dwarfpoleon buddy of yours you can watch Nagash get blown to pieces over the course of three turns or so (and that's IF they don't spam artillery). However, non-Dwarf Cannons are decidedly less effective. They'll need approximately 7 shots (without rerolls) since on average 1 won't hit, 1 will misfire, 1 won't Wound, and 2 will bounce off his save.  If he survives then he can then heal himself using Lore of Vampires magic, but only one wound per successful spell, and if he's healing himself then he's not casting any summoning spells from the Lore of Undeath which means he loses a lot of his use (although the silver lining is that those cannons aren't shooting the rest of your army). Bolt Throwers aren't much more effective than the non-Dwarf artillery either. 

One would at first glance think that Tamurkhan's ability to take control of an enemy that kills him would be the perfect trolling option. But Tamurkhan's villain override only works on Infantry or Monstrous Infantry while Nagash is of the Monster category, and in addition it only works on things that kill him in Close Combat meaning that the player controlling Naggy would simply blast it with magic instead of charging into melee anyway.  And of course, spells that auto-kill victims, such as Dwellers, Pit, and Purple Sun, will still kill him on a roll of a 6.  Low odds, but better than nothing.

As of the ''End Times: Glottkin'', a new serious threat has arisen that could pretty easily take down Nagash- '''Karl Franz Ascendant'''. A flying monster with NINE Auto-Wound, Ignores Armor, Multiple Wound D3+1 Attacks swinging faster than Nagash means the Necromancer doesn't stand much of a chance barring some pretty impressive Ward Save rolls and/or a lot of help from the magic phase (such as getting ASF from a Corpse Cart, rerolls from Danse Macabre, etc).  Other than KFA, the new Elven characters are also more than capable of destroying Nagash. Tyrion Avatar of Khaine has 6 attacks hitting on 3s with rerolls, Auto-Wound, Ignores Armor, Multiple Wounds D6, which on average drops Nagash in a single turn. Both versions of Malekith will also do it, the Phoenix King dealing 10 attacks hitting on 3s with rerolls, wounding on 5s, but doing D3 wounds. This will take him a couple of turns but he will outlast Nagash due to his immunity to multiple Wounds and superior WS. Eternity King version gets rerolls for Wounds as well as D3+1 per Wound, and will drop Nagash before he can lift his sword. Imrik has 10 S10 attacks on the charge, so Nagash will be squished like a bug against him as well, especially since Nagash only hits Imrik on a 5+. 
All of these characters (apart from the Eternity King) cost less than Nagash, and will eat through your other models, requiring assassination tactics and HEAVY use of your army increasing abilities to counter. 

The new End Times spell of the Little Waaagh is also a special nightmare for Nagash (or anyone else), as it can be used to steal those sweet magic items. In addition, the Lockdown spell from the Lore of High Magic shuts down any Wizard.

</div></div>

*'''[[Vlad von Carstein]], Mortarch of Shadow:''' 
Out of all of the Mortarchs, Vlad is the one most likely to survive a battle despite only having 3 Wounds (though as a Vampire he can heal those and gets a bonus to do so). His ring still gives him the chance to pop back to life, and thanks to the fact he's not on a ghost horse/dragon thing he can get Look Out Sir! rolls from a Unit. As such, Vlad ties with Mannfred and Neferata as the best named choice after Nagash to actually put into play (though Vlad plays the classic VC bunker Lord list). He's had his Beloved in Death rule replaced with the Mortarch of Shadow special rule which gives everything a -1 To Hit (both shooting and in melee) against him [[Awesome|and his unit]] and a -1 to the Leadership of all models nearby him, and as a Terror-causer this can be beneficial when facing low Leadership armies. The -1 To Hit makes him even better in combat which, combined with his sword makes him the hardest to kill Mortarch. Aside from his equipment and Mortarch rule he's really just a generic Wizard lvl 3 Vampire Lord, with the added bonus of picking spells like Nagash from Death, Shadow, Vampire, or Undeath (this access to multiple Lores makes him a FAR superior choice to the generic Master Vampire when using Khaine magic rules). As a Vampire, he can restore Wounds lost if he deals an Unsaved Wound against an enemy, but thanks to his Magic Weapon (which also grants him +1 Strength) he gets that Wound on a 4+ instead of a 6+. He also has a 4+ Ward Save, and a 83-84% chance to come back to life with one Wound in a Unit 12 inches near him if he's killed. So is he worth it compared to the generic? ...Yeah. The problem is he's not a level 4 caster, which isn't terrible, and he isn't Red Fury, which also isn't terrible. The generic can be kitted out to either be a best possible spellcaster or have better damage, but Vlad mixes them in an acceptable way. The primary way to use Vlad is to kit him out fully in Lore of Death, since he'll be able to survive in the range that puts the lore to the best use while you have a Lore of Vampires Level 4 Master Necromancer somewhere else. Shadows is also viable if you get Okkam's Mindrazor. 

Thanks to the buffs he confers to the unit he is with he can be a total nightmare on the battlefield: he isn't a magic monster like Nagash, Mannfred or Arkhan, nor a killing machine like Neferata, but he is intended to be more of a support character, and he is one of the best in the game. Vlad in a big block of Graves Guard with the Banner of Barrows AND a Tomb King (or Prince, if you want to go cheap) is pure MURDER! Add Vlad's spells to it (Miasma, Invocation of Nehek and Soul Leech are what you're guaranteed to have, and what great spells they are indeed!) and you have just doubled the fun.

*'''[[Mannfred von Carstein|Count Mannfred]], Mortarch of Night:''' 
Mannfred may have lost Loremaster, but he got survivability and some of Konrad's batshit insane melee action instead. A Mannfred list is one full of fast and killy options, as you want to get into combat as soon as possible and tear up the enemy without giving them a chance to reposition themselves to take what you're dishing out. His statline is pretty impressive being a Lvl 4 Wizard Vampire Lord that picks spells like Nagash from Death, Vampire, or Undeath and his mount (that he cannot be separated from) upping some of his stats to T6, W10, and A9.  Mannfred is best to put into the weakest enemies first, so you can use those 6-12 Attacks (Dark Cunning gives him more attacks when he's in combat, and more magic dice when he's out of it) to rip apart the enemy and generate more Power and Dispel Dice from his sword for yourself.  As for those Power Dice, you're going to be sitting on a HUGE pile of them so you'll want to bring spellcasters to use them (and lessen the burden on Mannfred in case of a miscast coming his way). His extra toughness and wounds are going to help against mass shooting and artillery which he'll attract being a Flying Monster (being a Vampire he can heal himself the usual way, which goes great with his playstyle), and the double range summoning spells mean he can be up close to the enemy and still bring in troops wherever you need them allowing you to engage enemies in the middle and Lore of Undeath something to distract the ranged models like Zombies in their faces. Overall a good unit on the offensive and defensive for both combat and magic, but still not quite worth the 650 points (though with his magic generation he comes very close) since a generic Vampire Lord and generic Master Necromancer can do the job as well if not better without being cannon bait. This changes quite a bit when Khaine magic is used; Mannfred becomes THE. SINGLE. MOST OVERPOWERED MODEL, IN THE ENTIRE GAME. 

*'''[[Queen Neferata]], Mortarch of Blood:'''
Neferata is terrifying for several reasons. One is that she is the first Monster that has Always Strikes First and Initiative 9. Unfortunately, Stomp/Thunderstomp cannot benefit from any other special rules(see Errata), so she always do Thunderstomp LAST even if with ASF. You'll be rerolling all of her eight Strength 5 Attacks which with her Weapon Skill of 8 makes her a fucking engine of destruction that can eat a unit by herself. Anyone trying to hit her in melee will be hitting her on 6's (anything trying to hit her has a -1 To Hit), wounding her on Toughness 6, and has to eat through 8 wounds, with a 6+ save just in case. Her dagger is another horror which, if it causes an unsaved Wound, drops the Strength, Toughness, and Attacks of the target '''by 1''' for the rest of the game. This effect can only happen once per model and only works in challenges although regardless of what your opponent tries to tell you will work as many times as she can swing it against something new per game. Her Always Strikes First combined with her high Strength, Weapon Skill and Initiative and rerolls she's usually get mean she will will cripple anything dumb enough to take her in a challenge. Being the Mortarch of Blood means if she kills an enemy character in a challenge (very likely since the first wound she causes takes away some of their toughness and offensive ability) then she'll spawn an un-upgraded generic Vampire, which is not exceedingly useful unless you're playing the kind of game where you will be killing a large number of weak characters. She deals D3 extra Strength 5 hits to anything she Hexes or hits with a Magic Missile which is fairly nifty against small (expensive) Units, and is a level 3 in Death, Shadow, Vampires, or Undeath. Of them, Shadow is the best for those tasty Hexes and Vampires lets you actually heal her every time you cast a spell coupled with Invocation to keep her entourage healthy. This makes her a dedicated offensive caster on top of being the single biggest melee powerhouse you can bring after Nagash himself, and a list built around her should bring some Necromancers or Priests to provide the necessary Augments as well as enough models in the right places that you can stick Neferata exactly where it will hurt without fear of redirection or charges. Remember, that with level 3 she cannot be your main caster the way Mannfred on Arkhan are. Her main use is in countering the comeback of Herohammer the new 50% Lord allowance will undoubtedly bring, as her role in the army is that of a finesse scalpel, used to cut out the tendons of any named characters when there's an opening. 

tl:dr, Neferata combines the traditional VC strengths. Defensive and offensive casting mix, Challenge god who ensures enemy characters won't be a nuisance, and eating Units with a fuckload of high Strength fast Attacks. She still works great with traditional Lahmian Leadership/spellcasting games as she is the best option there is for making LD bestowing characters die or bow out of Challenges and stop providing morale. New fluff has included a group of Ghouls who worship her that she uses, lifting fluff restrictions of "ugly" options as well as playing up her Nehekharan roots making any Undead Legion thing other than perhaps the von Carstein Vargheists and Corpse Carts fluffy ("Hail to the queen, baby"). 

*'''[[Arkhan the Black]], Mortarch of Sacrament:'''
No longer a 5th level Wizard, he's now level 4, and generates his spells from the lore of Death and Undeath like Naggy, making him the only Dread Abyssal Mortarch who cannot heal himself with Lore of Vampires. Instead he can only heal in combat like a vampire, which provides him with some mighty survivability despite him being far from being as good in combat as Mannfred with 12 attacks + Thunderstomp or Neferata with her...well, absolutely ridiculous everything. Since Death would require him to be near the front of the battle, he's more or less stuck in Lore of Undeath which is awesome, since he summons double amount of points. Sure, he is no Nagash and lack of increased range hurts, but he can still pump out ridiculous amount of Undead, and his staff provides him with a nice edge in magic phase. He's a perfect substitute for Nagash in smaller games where a 1,000 point doom character is not appropriate, or if you want to avoid having such a huge target for all enemy Cannons. His playstyle is the same as Nagash's with less emphasis on melee, he's just less likely to cause your opponent to flip the table from the amount of unadulterated bullshit that Nagash can pull (like summoning 1,000 points of undead onto the board in one Magic phase and ignoring the Miscast that rightfully should have obliterated him).

Arkhan goes well with any Undead Legions army that can fit him in.  In the fluff he uses both types of undead as a large army (he uses the horde, horde in the numerical sense), preferring Nehekharan but he is pragmatic enough to use whatever is available and make use of tactics.  Fluffy options are Necromancers, Zombies, Skeletons, Wights and Morghasts with heavy hitters such as undead constructs/war machines when he needs them.  

*'''Krell, Mortarch of Despair:'''
No horse so he can bunker and get Look Out Sir! and at only 250 points is the cheapest Mortarch. Mostly unchanged other than swapping from Kemmler to Nagash in servitude. 
His statline is pretty low (compared to the rest of the Mortarchs) and at LD 10 you almost NEED someone else LD 10 to make General as Krell is pretty vulnerable on his own, but he's worth every penny when supported in the right way.
You will almost never use the Champion of Nagash rule because the points level to field them together is a minimum of 2500 and since he's Infantry while Nagash is a Monster it requires careful positioning to get them into the same Close Combat together. Mortarch of Despair grants Krell a Wound restored if an enemy within 12 inches of him fails a Fear, Terror, or Break test, which is very useful against low Ld armies as Krell himself of course causes Terror (and can be put in a unit with the Screaming Banner to force rerolls on any that pass). Armour of the Barrows is nice, but usually the things you want him fighting such as monsters (where he excels using The Black Axe of Krell's constant wounding rule) or other characters will be able to punch right through his armour, unless you are putting him in a Grave Guard unit supported by a Lore of Metal Vampire Lord which can be a very effective combo (and boosting his dispelling armour from 4+ to 2+) since Generals don't have to take Lore of Vampires anymore.  If you want to put more eggs in that basket, add a Tomb King to make said unit have more WS, add Banner of the Barrows plus a BSB with Screaming Banner and suddenly everything melts and fails break tests against your deathstar. 
Krell is a good option for elite lists, made up of buffed killing models. Vlad is the preferred option with massive waves of weaker models. 

*'''[[Queen Khalida|High Queen Khalida]]:'''
Queen Neferata's cousin, oddly enough you can take her in the same team as her even though they hate each other's (lack of in Khalida's case) guts right up until the last minute before the world ended.  Another relatively cheap option at 365 points, and comes with Hatred (Vampire Counts) so you can route any other players dumb enough to keep going with the inferior Undead faction.

She's unchanged from her Tomb Kings role, and unlike Tomb Princes she doesn't change in use any when put alongside Vampire Counts since they have no archers for her to buff. Her ASF rule, combined with 5 poisoned attacks at S4 make her a very formidable melee character against basic troops, but even with her high Toughness and light armour on top of being Flammable, any character with decent combat ability will hit her hard.
She makes a good General for archer-heavy lists, although if you AREN'T building an archer-heavy list there's no reason to take her, but a fragile one so if you take her you must keep her in a unit, preferably buffed with some form of protection (Incantation of Neru). She had The Curse like any other Tomb King, causing D6 Strength 5 Shooting Hits against any character or unit(s) that caused her to die. She's also Flammable and Immune To Poison, but those will rarely come up (Lore of Fire being inferior to nearly every other lore and poison rarely hitting her) so you shouldn't worry about either of them.
Don't forget that you can support her unit with Lore of Heavens and watch them re-roll failed To Hit and To Wound rolls of 1. Good times.

Her viability in listing only really comes down to one question. "How much dakka do I need?"
She can be useful with Arkhan or Nagash (more the former than the latter obviously) as a mildly killy barrier between something nasty and them, giving you ranged support for whatever you summon onto the table.

=====Heroes=====
*'''Prince Apophas:'''
Apophas is unchanged from his Tomb Kings role and still costs 130 points. Apophas has the Desert Revenant rule, meaning he cannot join units nor can he be the army General. The latter hurts him, the former doesn't.

He has the Entombed Beneath the Sands rule, can Fly and has Strider, enabling him to get into position where you want him and cause Terror checks to things he zips past.  He's got a Strength 2 Breath Weapon (pretty useless, as it's unlikely to do much) and upon death causes 2D6 inches worth of 2D6 Strength 2 hits (very gambly for not much potential damage). He can re-roll To Hit and To Wound rolls against a specific character, and He also has Regeneration, keeping him in the fight just a little longer against that character.  The problem is with his terrible stats, at Toughness 3 Initiative 1 he'll be killed by any character built for combat, as well as any mount that a wizard rides on (let alone how he'll get butchered against units). 

Theoretically, he'd be useful against horde armies as he'd allow you to pop him right into the middle of a cluster of units and cause Terror Tests everywhere before belching out beetles to wreck all the low Toughness buggers, but since you can't count on more than 2 inches of 2 hits of 2 Strength when he dies or on him even making it where you need him in the first place, he's pretty useless.  His only real uses are as an anti-warmachine or a wizard trap, but even at those roles he's questionable. He's fun no doubt, and can cause a bit of chaos for an opponent who's planning on number-crunching though.