Age of Sigmar/Tactics/Old/Chaos/Everchosen

Warscrolls

Heroes

• Archaon: The Big Cheese himself. Let us not mince words here, Archaon is just brutal and will dominate any game you play him. You want specifics? Alright. He has several melee profiles, all of them powerful. From his damage 3 Kingslayer to his 2D6 tail swipes to his damage D6 claws, everything is brutal. The only profile that seems lacking by comparison, the heads, has some special rules to make up for it, as depending on what those heads ate, you get some bonuses, ranging from extra damage over healing to learning the spells of wizards he just ate. Nothing quite as funny as eating Nagash and then killing Arkhan with his boss' unique spell. Other than that, Archaon is fast, flies, has lots of wounds and a good save and has some more special rules. For one he can adjust Battleshock tests around him by +/-2, which is amazing (use it to convert those 3's for Daemons' battleshocks into 1's, so you trigger their "get more Daemons if you get ones on battleshock" ability), he has an extra save against mortal wounds, can damage guys who punch him and has a chance of evading attacks without ever having to save them. And to top it off, Archaon is a wizard and can cast two spells a turn, though with no unique spells initially, not that a Chaos Wizard needs any. All of this would still amount to "worse than Nagash" if it weren't for the last two tricks: His keyword list and his Command. His keyword list allows him to trigger ALL the Locus abilities of the Chaos Daemons and to be buffed by anything and everything that buffs Daemons and Mortals of each God. Finally, what makes Archaon into the ultimate force multiplier is his Command, as it allows all other Chaos Heroes to use their own Commands in an order of your choosing. No hassle with whom to make your general, you just pick Archaon and get to use all the other abilities. This also serves to make Archaon more at home in big games.

• Gaunt Summoner of Tzeentch: A very fragile little mageling. The Gaunt summoner boasts a bad save and melee that makes your average wizard look brawny by comparison; even the Disc he rides on is awful in melee, with D3 very weak attacks and one of his trademark special rules works only if you have a Baleful Realmgate on the table. This, however, is where the suck ends. The Summoner gets a better save so long as he isn't attacked by flyers and monsters, his staff makes a decent 18" shooting attack and he can cast twice per turn, though his unique spell is quite risky, with its damage and its casting roll scaling with the Bravery of the unit he targeted, making it easier to cast at Skaven and Grots but also less powerful against those. Then, if you do have that Realmgate standing around, the Summoner can summon a new Chaos Daemon unit every turn without even wasting a casting attempt and finally, the Disc of Tzeentch grants this guy a 16" Flying Move, the highest possible movement value in the game. In other words, if the squishy Summoner ever finds himself in a position to be hurt, YOU fucked up. He's also both Mortal and Daemon, so Tzeentch Daemons doubly love hanging around him.

Troops

• Varanguard: The fact that these count as Troops should tell you a little something about how Elite the Everchosen's army is. They're very big models (each rider is more or less as tall as an Ogor) but thankfully they can have any unit size. Each Varanguard has the same profile as your average foot-slogging melee powerhouse Hero, with 5 Wounds and a 3+ save (in fact, in the fluff each of them is a Chaos warlord in his own right). Their mounts are almost as good in melee as a Juggernaut, while being much more mobile and they also all wear shields that protect them from enemy magic on 4+. Not just magic damage, but also unpleasant debuffs will ping right off. Additionally, if the Big Cheese is on the board (apparently, any version of him will suffice) they all hit better and if he also uses his Command, they re-roll charges. Also, each Hero Phase Archaon can make the Varanguard take on a God-specific keyword so that they, for example, don't get hurt when the Lord of Plague next to them spreads Nurgle's Rot. Lastly, they can choose to pile in an additional time once per battle, just delicious. The riders have a pick of three weapons:
  • The Ensorcelled Weapon grants each rider 6 very decent damage 1 attacks.
  • The Fellspear has 3 damage, 2 attacks and nice bonuses on the charge. If you choose this weapon, use their additional pile-in ability the turn they charge, and you'll murder anything.
  • The Daemonforged Blade only makes 4 risky swings with a 5/6 chance of dealing mortal wounds and a 1/6 chance of hurting the user instead. With Archaon and his to-hit bonus on the field, they instead get a 1/3 chance of activating the blades, so they become ideal.

Battalions

Overlords of Chaos

Archaon, a Gaunt Summoner of Tzeentch and a unit of Varanguard.

Bloodmarked Warband

A MORTAL KHORNE HERO and 8 MORTAL KHORNE units.

Plaguetouched Warband

A MORTAL NURGLE HERO and 7 MORTAL NURGLE units.

Fatesworn Warband

A MORTAL TZEENTCH HERO and 9 MORTAL TZEENTCH units.

Pleasurebound Warband

A MORTAL SLAANESH HERO and 6 MORTAL SLAANESH units.

Archaon's Grand Host

An Overlord of Chaos battalion and 4 of the following battalions in any combination: Bloodmarked Warband, Plaguetouched Warband, Fatesworn Warband, Pleasurebound Warband.

Army Building

First of all, for an army as elite as this, your best call is to get some varanguard as battleline with perhaps a gaunt summoner to lead them. All models for this army EXTREMELY pricey, so perhaps ebay is the best bet if you want to save in excess of at least £100 for varanguard, Archaon and a gaunt summoner. With the gaunt summoner's special rule to summon in demons there is one of two obvious routes to go down. Arcahon leading demons with a gaunt summoner or two pulling them out of realmgates, or Archaon leading one (or more) of the battalions. Either is a good call really. As you don't need to specifiy where the points are going to when summoning you can essentially pull on an army of whatever is situationaly better, provided you have the models.This also means that you can still keep the varanguard as your battleine units as well and have as many points as possible for summoning.

However, the battalions all come with special rules and as they are battalions don't affect varanguard being your battleine as well. With Archaon's command ability you can then be popping off all the command abilities from the heroes or alternativley, use the summoned demons to be buffing the legions you pull on. Either way, you're essentially gonna be spending a lot and building a relativley large army given the points cost of Archaon and the Varanguard, which are pretty much staples of the army.

External links

Rules are here