Age of Sigmar/Tactics/Old/Death/Soulblight

These are the rules for Soulblight prior to the release of the Legions of Nagash Battletome, and as such are no longer matched play valid.

Army Features

Hey there little Timmy. Do you want to play an army of fuckin scary bloodthirsty vampire knights that will probably skewer every unit they happen to roll over? Well then, look no further, you came in the right place!

PROS:

• They are probably one of the most elite armies in the game.
• VAMPIRE KNIGHTS WITH LANCES
• Said vampire knights come back to life if they die and regenerate, becoming quite hard to deal with.
• They hurt like hell. Can put down an impressing amount of wounds on pretty much anything that does not have a rerollable 2+ armor.
• Really suits aggressive players.

CONS:

• They can be very expensive but there are ways around it discussed in this page.
• Lack of mortal wounds and rend better than 2. Allies can mitigate these problems.
• Their big scary monster could be bigger and scarier but that is what we got.

Army Rules

Battle Traits

• Deathless Thralls: Same thing as death grand alliance, it allows you to ignore wounds on a 6+ if the wounded unit is within 6" of a SOULBLIGHT HERO.
• The Bloodlines: Now this is some sweet fluffy stuff. The old bloodlines are back and with a vendetta, a juicy bloodraining vendetta. You can select one of those for all your army and that is it, free buff for every model with the SOULBLIGHT keyword, and it still applies even if the general is slain! You may notice that some look fairly better than others:
  • Dragon Warriors: The old Blood Dragons bloodline, this allows your units to reroll 1's to hit on the turn they charge. Pretty nice since the general aggressive style of the army though it would be better if you found a way to retreat and charge in the same turn.
  • Lords of the Night: These are the Von Carsteins. The bloodline allows your units to benefit from deathless thralls even if they are not within a SOULBLIGHT HERO. It is an okay buff if you don't have many characters, but it's outshone by every other choice here.
  • Swift Death: The old Lamia bloodline. OH BOY, this is nice. Gives your guys a +2" on movement plus the ability to move as if they can fly. I don't have to tell you how scary flying blood knights are. Unfortunately it has the same issue as Dragon Warriors, as soon as you get stuck in it stops helping you.
  • Necromantic: The old Nechrarcs. Allows you to add 1 to casting and unbinding rolls for WIZARDS and give a -1 bravery to enemy units within 6" of one of your units. Can be combined with the Ruby Vial you can get a -2 bravery which is not bad at all. Unless you've got a good game plan in mind this should be your go-to choice for your army.

Command Traits

• Curse of the Revenant: Add 1 to the wound characteristic of your general. Pretty straightforward and not too bad but there are better choices.
• Dread Knight: The general re-rolls 1's to hit against an enemy HERO in the combat phase. This would have been cool if it affected the mount too, as it is it's not great.
• Transfix: Now we're talking. One enemy HERO per phase within 3" have to subtract 1 from his hit rolls that target the general. A nice duelist tool.
• Mist Form: This is great. If the general retreats from a fight, he can do it as he could fly and then he can charge. Really awesome if you get in a sticky situation, want to charge a unit behind the enemy lines or just want to keep getting the lance bonus if you've sat the general on a dragon.
• Killing Blow: Good old extra mortal wound on a 6+ roll to wound. Goes along great with the Saccharine Goblet for having mortal wounds on a 5+.
• Blood Fury: Add 1 to the attacks of every melee weapon of the general, which translates to add one attack to the only weapon of the general (usually). Only good if you give it to a Vampire Queen on Coven Throne as it gives you a second Blood Kiss attack (and hopefully this will let you turn an enemy into a Vampire Lord) but don't count on it, as it's still just a minor buff.

Soulblight Artefacts

• The Slaking Blade: Choose a melee weapon. When it has dealt at least 6 wounds the model heals D3 wounds and the weapon get a permanent +1 damage. Cool and simple, you're going to get that bonus fast (since unless you're using a Vampire Queen, all of the weapons you can choose deal 2, 3 or D3 wounds) however it's not the best choice here.
• The Scabbing Plate: If the general deal at least a wound in the combat phase he heals a wound. Since our heroes are quite slashy, that should not be too hard to do, but overall it's not worth it unless it's used with a dragon. For a foot lord the Slaking Blade can heal you at about the time you'll need the Scabbing Plate and if you really need a heal fast, just use your chalice. If it's on a dragon however, then it can really help deal with the wounds dealt to the character since with the Hunger and Mist Form you can virtually guarantee kills (causing it to healing 2 wounds per combat phase) and with the size of the model (and their reputation) you can guarantee it's going to need the heals sooner or later to keep its stats up.
• Crimson Wing: It is an angry bat. You choose an enemy unit within 30" and roll a dice. On a 3+ the bat tears out the eyes of a model, dealing one mortal wound to the unit. Not good, you've got Mist Form and regular (so to speak) bats if you really want to close in on mages, let alone the fact that you've got nothing to combo the bat familiar with.
• Sigil of the Sanguine Throne: Now this is a nice piece of awesome. Once per charge phase it allows a VAMPIRE unit within 12" of the bearer to re-roll a failed charge. Good in general honestly.
• The Saccharine Goblet: Fantastic. Other armies have items that can only be used once per game to give half the effect this item delivers. Giving +1 to hit and to wound is great in general, but it really goes above and beyond when combined with Killing Blow or Blood Fury on a Vampire Queen. The Queen's kiss becomes a lot more effective (going from 1 attack with 3+ to hit and 4+ to wound, to 2 attacks with 2+ to hit and 3+ to wound) while the regular Vampire Lords now hit/wound on 2+/2+, with 5+'s dealing a Mortal Wound in addition to their normal D3 damage. Sure there's 2 downsides, the first is that it only applies to the bearer (so no boosted handmaidens/spirits/dragon) and the second is that if you're unable to allocate any wounds at all after using it, the bearer takes D3 wounds. Honestly though, if you haven't caused any wounds with it you're either (un)healthy enough you can heal with the Chalice next turn, or you're hurt so badly the enemy units would've finished you off even without the Goblet's help. Unless you've got a great plan for the other items this is a solid go-to choice.
• Ruby Vial: Once per battle you can use this to give ALL enemy units a -1 to bravery and charge rolls for one turn. Use it wisely and keep in mind, it lasts for 2 combat phases.

Lore of the Vampires

1. Blade of Shyish: roll for each enemy unit within 12" suffer a mortal wound on a 5+. Terrible, even if you're up against an army that spams small units they usually have enough wounds in those units that this has no real effect. Pick something else.
2. Spirit Gale: roll three dice and inflict a mortal wound on each 5+. if you rolled doubles, subtract 1 from their hit rolls. If you roll trebles then also subtract 1 from their wound rolls until your next hero phase. Not great, but it's better than Blade of Shyish.
3. Vile Transference: an enemy unit 12" away takes d3 mortal wounds and then a friendly unit within 6" heals that many wounds. Pretty good both for keeping your Dragon topped up, as well as your Blood Knights (un)healthy.
4. Amethystine Pinions: Gives 5" and fly to the caster. This is an odd one since anyone who can take this can already choose to have wings by default. You also shouldn't really need the extra movement anyway, especially since that takes away extra protection you can give your dudes, or the extra hurt you can put on the enemy (you can only cast one spell with the user, why waste it on this one?).
5. Soulpike: Target a unit within 18", until your next Hero phase, if the unit charges, roll an amount of dice equal to the charge roll. For each roll of 5+ the unit suffers a Mortal Wound. Excellent, your hardest hitters need to get the charge and this helps enemy units think twice before going for a long-range charge to take away your charge advantage.
6. Amaranthine Orb: has a casting value of 7, draw a 1mm line that extends 12" away from the caster. Roll a dice for each unit (friend or foe, apart from the caster) that has any models beneath this line. On a 4+ that unit suffers D6 mortal wounds. Also great, pair it on a Vampire Lord that can fly (preferably not one on a dragon as that can be hard to position right) and have the line extend right down a combat cluster to rake up the enemy units hit. If you are scared of using it against yourself, then just remember that there's little to no issue using it through Bat Swarms, since they can heal all the wounds you deal to them unless you accidentally roll a 6.

Warscrolls

The common keywords of these warscrolls are: DEATH and SOULBLIGHT. Apart from Bat Swarms and Fell Bats all the units also have the VAMPIRE keyword.

Heroes

• Mannfred, Mortarch of Night: Just like Nagash, Mannfred has Behemoth status. This beauty sits on top of the Mortarchs point pyramid at 420pt. The close combat monster of the three, because Mannfreds' already powerful melee profiles get added to the powerful profiles of the Dread Abyssal. Like all Mortarchs he heals 2 Wounds whenever he kills a model in combat, can cast twice though with no modifiers (gains +1 to cast/unbind if his sword kills something) and gets a bonus to Hit and Wound with his sword if he successfully casts a spell. The Armour of Templehof also means a lot more on such a huge target like this. Also, the Vigour of Undeath ability that non-Mortarch Mannfred has gets buffed a lot by affecting ALL Death units in range instead of just one, though that range varies with his Wound count. Mannfred is an absolute combat beast. His sword (provided you cast at least one spell that turn) hits and wounds on a 2+, and if you use Mannfred's command ability (Which you should, only Nagash's is better) makes both of that 2s rerollable. This basically guarantees that he is hitting at all times with 4 -1 d3 damage attacks, not including his 2 sickle-glaive attacks, or his Dread Abyssal's attacks, or the spirits. The sheer number of rending multi-damage attacks that he puts out a turn will rip most enemies to pieces.

• Neferata, Mortarch of Blood: As all of the Mortarchs are, she's classified as Behemoth. Mid-ranged at 400pt. Not as powerful as Mannfred and not as costly as Arkhan but tricksier than both put together. Her Command Ability creates a huge bubble of -1 To Hit for enemy units, a spell lets give a selected unit the Nighthaunt abilities to fly and ignore save Modifiers. her personal attacks (so not the Abyssal) create new Vampire Lords if she kills Heroes with them and her dagger has a chance to auto-kill any model she wounded with it. Set her up at the head of your army for her Command Ability to affect as many enemies as possible.

• Prince Vhordrai: He is basically a vampire lord on zombie dragon on steroids which wake up really early in the dusk and have no time for any of your bullshit. No, seriously, this guy is a fucking blender and probably a claimer for the title of smashiest hero in the game. Better statline than a VLoZD with lance, chalice and shield but with a +1 attack on every profile, a rend -2 lance and a fucking angry dragon which can spit some death-fire-rape-juice that causes FUCKIN 6 MORTAL WOUNDS when full hp (it can degrade quite quickly if the enemy focuses him down but remember that he can heal). To add some gravy on a really really bloody beef, his unique spell allows him to add 1 to BOTH HIS HIT AND WOUND ROLLS. I mean, Nagash almighty, that is downright terrifying. His command trait allows a hero to attack as if it were the combat phase (this hero cannot be him unfortunately, that would have been waaaay too gross) or, if the hero is a wizard (which all of your heroes are), to cast an extra spell, so you can consider bringing another VLoZD along with him if you plan to smash some eggs with your dragon goon squad. He comes at 40 points more than a vanilla VLoZD, so if you're going to be bringing one Lord on Dragon, you would do well to bring him unless you've got a really good plan on what to do with the regular VLoZD.

• Vampire Lord: While most armies must choose between fighter and caster, your Vampire Lord does both. He's got a great melee profile, can cast a spell a turn and has a powerful Command Ability. And since he can heal wounds by killing stuff, you want him in the thick of it. Can also have wings or a nightmare to increase his movement, with the wings letting you fly while the nightmare grants you another melee weapon. Since the command ability grants an additional attack with each weapon of the affected unit, it's best to use this on models with few strong attacks or better yet on models with more than one weapon profile. If you want to be a real jerk, use the Lord's buff on a Necrosphinx, which turns into an absolute rape machine thanks to this. Using his command ability on a big unit of skeletons is also a great tactic to just drown the enemy with attacks. If you play carefully enough, 30 skeletons would be getting 4 attacks each (1 attack base, +2 attacks with a unit of 30, +1 from buff) with +1 to hit if they are near a lord. To top it off, he has one of the best debuff spells in the game: at 6+, it subtracts 1 from the Attacks of EACH weapon of a unit to a minimum of 1. Yes, against basic troops with one attack it's useless, but against those elite units with 2 attacks (stormcast, chaos warriors, hammerers, Phoenix guard, saurus guard... come on, every army has at least one)? Well, all of a sudden, that crucial unit is half as powerful. Use this spell wisely and you can beat almost anything even with half-decomposed zombies! He can always has a blood chalice that gives him back D6 wound once per game (it's 'optional', but since there's no downside to taking it you should always have it), increasing the dude's (un)life span. All in all, a quite nice little hero that can be a pretty scary backline assassin, ready to debuff an enemy monster and then jump some squishy unit while topping up your own dudes or putting serious hurt on the enemy with the right spells.

• Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon: Unless you've already taken Vhordai, there is next to no reason to take this dude (unless you want him to have certain traits/gear) as he's only 40 points cheaper and doesn't have nearly the same statline to compensate for being similarly priced. That being said, he does still have a bunch of devastating attacks and what might be the meanest breath attack in the game, as it hits units of 6 or more models automatically and then Wounds on 2+. The Vampire, on the other hand, provides a bunch of healing to the Dragon and yet another powerful melee profile. Like all Vampires, he's a Wizard, but with a very gimmicky unique spell that will never see use. His Command Ability is providing re-rolls To Hit to a friendly Death unit, which works well with your already high to hit values (or if you really needed a Bat Swarm to hit something for once). His durability is also something to be amazed at, not only does he have a once per game chalice of blood that heals him D6 wounds, the right traits/equipment (see above) can help the dragon live far longer than most monsters too. Get Vile Transference, Mist Form and the Scabbing Plate and you'll passively heal 2 wounds nearly every combat phase, heal D3 wounds per spell cast and heal D6 wounds once per game if you really need it. Keep that statline up so that the dragon can keep ripping and tearing. This guy will have your opponents wishing they were playing Soulblight.

• Coven Throne: For when you really want to cherry-tap some shmucks. This thing pours out TWENTY-FIVE attacks in melee, but only one of them is actually powerful and can potentially make new generic Vampire Lords, but don't bet on it. They also allow you to reroll a single dice roll per game (either your own or your opponents. That's right, you can force your opponent to reroll a critical save in a pinch or a roll if they're using a warscroll that let's them bring back units). Don't you dare forget that, it might help? It's also a wizard with a meh unique spell (Bravery test on 3D6, if they fail they cannot attack the caster). Can be good if you're up against mortal units, otherwise stick to stuff like Vile Transference, Amethyst Orb or Soul Pike. Its Command Ability lets you allows a Death unit to Re-roll all hit, wound, and save rolls of 1 until your next hero Phase, which is great. It's also ridiculously fast with a 14" flying movement.

• Bloodseeker Palanquin: Similar to the Coven Throne, only it sucks. It can increase the attack of all Soulblight units if a Hero is slain near it, but you've already got traits or abilities for that. It has a short-range missile weapon that deals d3 mortal wounds if you roll higher than the unit's leadership with 2 dice. is also has a 12" spell that targets a hero that has a 50% to deal 1 mortal wound, 2/3 to deal d3 and a 1/6 chance to deal d6 mortal wounds. Just skip it, it's not worth the ridiculous points you have to pay for it (being 60 points more expensive than a Coven Throne and nowhere near as useful, gaining a possible 1 extra attack for your dudes instead of a shitload more damage and a possible new Vampire Lord).

Troops

• Blood Knights: Battleline. Quite possible THE reason you play soulblight, Vampire Cavalry. Now these guys used to be winning you best cavalry ever awards. They do a lot of damage, ridiculous amounts of it on the charge, 3 attacks with 3's and 3's, -1 rend and D3 damage a piece and they can regenerate lost wounds, now slightly nerfed. They used to bring back 1 slain model every hero phase with the banner but now it's changed to lower the enemy's bravery by 1. They also got a 20 point discount, though it doesn't quite make up for the nerf. They can still be used really effectively however, Necromantic means they inflict a -2 debuff to Bravery while the Ruby Vial, Necromantic and their standard put a -3 debuff to their Bravery. Kill even one model and you can watch half a unit of Chaos Knights run away. That's not to say the other bonuses, re-rolling 1's on to hits when they charge, and gaining movement 12" while being allowed to fucking fly! Do note too that thanks to their shields, if you get these guys in cover they are nearly impossible to remove against anyone without rend, as they get a 2+ save which, combined with Mystic Shield allows them to re-roll failed save rolls. While the Vargheists can do more damage out of the charge (and the same amount on a charge but in a more reliable way), the Blood Knights are harder to kill and have more staying power in general. A mix of the two sound like a pretty nice idea.
  • The models are horribly overpriced but there are ways around it until GW puts out a new kit for this bad boys.

• Fell Bats: SUMMONABLE. These are odd. They have surprising staying power with 3 wounds each, but their damage output can generously be described as lacking. However, once an enemy model in their vicinity dies, they double their attacks for the rest of the game, granting 6 attacks to each bat. If you're going to use them then you should keep them near your Blood Knights or Vampire Lord (despite their movement). Once those units kill something then these guys become great.

• Bat Swarms: SUMMONABLE. They're swarms. Lot of attacks, awful Hit, and Wound rolls. Their flavor heals all wounds if it inflicts a wound, but that's not why you take them. You take them because all enemy units within 12" of them take a -1 penalty To Hit in the shooting phase, which is fucking massive considering they have a 12" flying movement. Keep in mind too that their melee range is 3", in effect meaning that you can put them behind Blood Knights, Fell Bats or Vargheists to inflict further wounds on enemy units while keeping them relatively safe. Have them come up to the side of those units so that hordes can't lap around them (while still letting them heal all the damage they receive) and you'll appreciate them more.

• Vargheists: Like most 4-Wound models, Vargheists have to endure the obligatory comparison with Ogres. And they don't come up short, as they have a 12" Flying movement and -1 Rend on their weapons over Ogres. Unfortunately, unlike basically all Vampires, they can't heal lost wounds and with a 5+ save these guys can go down quickly if put in too deep. A nice tactic for them is to have them hunt artillery or wizards as they can do this easily without being quickly gunned down and torn apart by other combat units (looking at you stormcast) while blood knights and VLoZD take care of meanest enemies. They also look fuckin amazing, which is a great plus.

Army Building

So you want to play pure Soulblight? You're in for a treat. You've got one of the most elite armies in the game, with some of the most ridiculously hard to kill models in the game that will come back from the dead to crush your opponents' dreams. The problem, of course, is that a lot of the army is stupidly overpriced old-ass ugly resin recasts of metal models (blood knights, fell bats and bat swarms), forcing people who don't want to sell a kidney and/or gouge their own eyes out to look at alternatives.

Matched Play

Don't buy blood knights. They're an overpriced relic of single-model metal clampack days and are the single most overpriced thing in the universe. Instead, buy Aelf Dragon Blades and paint them red. Bam, you can get two boxes of these for barely over half the price of a single blood knight box and they look pretty much perfectly the part. Hell, get the Death Upgrade Pack with them: you'll have enough vampire-looking shields to equip both boxes, a cool banner, and it'll still cost you less than buying the actual blood knights... Even if you buy enough oval bases to fit everyone on top of this. If you're good with converting models and have spare bits, you maybe also want a bigger alternative as Dragon Blades models are a bit smaller than Blood Knights models, you can buy a box of Chaos Knights and the Death Upgrade Pack (they come with oval bases). Either option gives you 10 Blood Knights cheaper than GW's 5 Blood Knights. That's how overpriced blood knights are.

Once you've done that, you got 2 units of 5 blood knights, leaving you at 520 points. From there, there are actually a lot of options:

All fine and dandy, but since the release of Cities of Sigmar. Dragon Blades got fucking squatted. So your only option to prox them with GeeDubs models are Chaos Knights.

-Get a Vampire lord on zombie dragon. That'll drop you at 960 points, meaning you will usually get a Triumph in 1000 points games. That's also a 1000 points army with 11 models in it, which is sort of hilarious.

-Get a Coven throne and a Vampire lord. that'll leave you at 920 points, leaving you with the option of either putting a bat swarm, fell bats, or keep the points to summon something (probably skeletons). Since the old bats are both ugly as sin and expensive, you'll probably want to look at alternatives: options that won't get you thrown out of GW stores include slightly converted tyranid gargoyles for fell bats (Seriously, they're way cheaper and you can just not put the gun arms and bam, that's it. As a bonus, they come in big boxes, making it easy to supplement your army as you go bigger), and the sky slasher swarm from FW (one pack will give you three swarms for slightly more money than one pack of two bat swarms, shipping included) or the slightly-less-ugly, still-expensive LOTR metal bat swarms. Otherwise, a bunch of companies make decent-looking bats, although usually not for cheaper than the GW ones... Either way, I suggest the swarms, as they give your army some much-needed protection against shooting.

-Get two vampire lords. That leaves you with 200 points for summoning things and decent wizardly prowess at this low points scale, which will help vary things, but will probably be weaker as you'll need to use a lot of your magic trying to get units in time, and you also don't have any big monster. On the other hand, since summoned units don't need to be chosen before the game, this essentially lets you list tailor on the spot if you have enough models for different units. Thankfully, the blood knights are so tanky this might actually work.

-Cheapass option: Get three vampire lords and a unit of zombies or dire wolves. Keep the zombies/doggies for summoning (they're the only things you can summon that only cost 60 points). You don't have any monsters either, but you have a -ton- of magic at this low points scale, letting you cast arcane missile, mystic shield and Spirit Blight (the vampire lord unique spell) every turn.

-If you don't mind having to use rules for out of print models, the vampire lord on abyssal terror is 220 points, which is actually absolutely perfect to reach the cap seamlessly. Example: 3 units of blood knights + vampire on abyssal terror = 1000 points. 2 units of blood knights + vampire on abyssal terror + coven throne = 1000 points as well.

From there, there's more room for expansion, since the biggest problem with building Soulblight is that your only battleline choice eats over half of your starting 1000 points, which is less of a problem in 2000 and more points games where it doesn't gnaw as much. Perhaps it is the time to bring some vargheists.

In addition, Soulblight is a pretty good army if you want to play a summon-heavy style in higher points games. Since battleline restrictions only apply during deployment, and Soulblight can bring a ton of wizards by spamming Vampire Lords (who even have ridiculous model variety thanks to the flurry of old vampire special characters still being in print), you can definitely keep a big gap in your army and fill it with zombies, skeletons, and otherwise fun stuff as the game goes.

Free Play

Do whatever. Your army is ridiculously superelite with lords that can support every other Death faction like it's no one's business.
Don't forget to have as many summonable units as possible, whether you're using Legions Of Nagash Soulblight rules or not, if it can be summoned in one way or another, have them on hand. With Legions, it had to have been destroyed for you to summon it from a gravesite, otherwise, summon away!

Allied Armies

• Deadwalkers: Cheap hoard of zombies and some dogs
• Deathlords:
• Deathmages: The necromance probably can't keep up with the rest of army, but their unique spell lets you hit harder.
• Deathrattle: A cheap hoard of skeletons.
• Nighthaunt: A hoard of Ghosts

External links

Rules are here

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-vampire-lord-en.pdf

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-vampire-lord-zombiedragon-en.pdf

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-coven-throne-en.pdf

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-blood-knights-en.pdf

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-fell-bats-en.pdf

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-bat-swarm-en.pdf

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/AoS_Warscrolls/aos-warscroll-vargheists-en.pdf