If you haven’t yet notice – there is a new FAQ (and much more) that was just released on redesigned Warhammer Community site (link). This update “unlocked” a lot of listbuilding options (that were very inefficient before), especially for players with older Warhammer Underworlds warbands in their collections (sadly there are some factions where bladeborn fighters are better than standard fighters). I will not go into a topic of availability of mentioned boxes as availability of every single Underworlds team is a location related topic (in my area its not that difficult to get older UW warbands and lately there is an avalanche of people selling them as new logo of Underworlds reminded people of warband rotation or something like that). I tried to also build the lists in a way that make them work in narrative whenever possible (ideally using archetype rule) and skipped both battle traits and blessings as not everyone is using them. Let’s go straight into lists:
DEATH – OBR (Necropolis Stalkers + Kainan’s Reapers)
In my opinion the biggest problem in this faction is lack of good leaders (for more context – I’m not a fan of “OBR Brewgit” and I also prefer Stalkers over Morghasts) and the new FAQ gives us 25 points discount for great looking model of Mir Kainan, who maybe isn’t the most efficient killer in the world, but is certainly way more interesting fighter than the cheapest and most popular alternative for a faction leader – Mortek Hekatos. Keep in mind that the pictures still have old point values, so he actually costs 205 points now.
Other fighters from his warband are now also cheaper thanks to the FAQ, which is a great news – especially for Nohem, one of the only small shooters available in DEATH (10 points cost reduction to 70)
Our roster of chaff will be finished with 2 (out of 3 in the box) variants of Mortek Guards available in Kainan’s Reapers. They cost 65 points, so only 5 more than regular Mortek, have 2 wounds more and have slightly worse attack profile.
This are all fighters we will use from Mir Kainan warband, at least for now – at the end I will also include list variant using all of them.
Let’s now take a look at the second box we will use. Our starting roster has some interesting chaff units but really lacks both speed and punch. Both of this (together with very efficient usage of abilities) we will get from Necropolis Stalkers. They might seem only 2”/1” faster than other units but access to “charge” double makes them very fast. To round up our list nicely we will use 2 “regular” stalkers and 1 with great falchions (you can build only one stalker with falchions from their box).
I really like how simple yet strong their plan for using abilities is – you want doubles and triples can get upgraded into rampage (they are quite good rampagers, which is as good as it gets as this grand alliance lacks great rampagers). Then you invest all of your doubles/quads into your stalkers and you either use charge from “Hunt and Kill” ability to get bonus moves towards enemies (11” threat range is great) or if already in combat, you use Nadirite Weapon increasing the damage of your hits and crits by 1 (Spirit Blades going to 3/6 are very deadly with 10 attacks from 2 attack actions). The final list looks like this:
Kainan’s Stalkers
1000 points (1060 pre FAQ), 7 fighters
– Mir Kainan 205pts (Hero, -25 points)
– Necropolis Stalker with Spirit Blades 200pts
– Necropolis Stalker with Spirit Blades 200pts
– Necropolis Stalker with Dread Falchions 195pts
– Nohem 70pts (-10 points)
– Karu 65pts (-15 points)
– Senha 65pts (-10 points)
I promised a variant using all the models from Mir Kainan box – but in order for it to work you need to use your Hakor as the regular great weapon Mortek Guard (your opponent might not like it as using bladeborn fighters with their bladeborn profiles and also as proxies for “regular” fighters within the same warband is very confusing) and replace one of the 200 points stalkers with him and Binar Khenta (that is now 5 points cheaper).
CHAOS – BOCH (Grashrak’s Despoilers + Bullgors)
Before starting I must mention that there is significant risk that this faction won’t make it to next edition, so it might have less than a year of life left, as we expect 3rd edition in 2025. This list will be quite similar to previous one as bladeborn team will grant us a leader and chaff and we will take our big guys from second box. The only hero we will use will be the Grashrak Fellhoof, who is now 20 points cheaper (185).
Even after the cost reduction he is still a GBS with +5 wounds and +1 dmg in melee for 40 more points, so not that great, but at least you also have a quad unique to him that might win you some games as it prevents enemy fighter from activating that round. I also must mention that the main reason for including Grashrak is Devolve – great pull ability that is one of the best tools for disarming your opponent plans.
Lets now look for the chaff options that come with Grashrak. We have 2 pairs of exactly the same profiles (I will only show one profile from each pair because of that). First pair (Ushkor and Gnarl) have their cost increased to 85 points and give us a ranged option.
The second pair of twins (Korsh and Murghoth) were not modified by the FAQ and are still a great alternative for Gor with Pair of Gor Blades as they offer +1 crit and +1 range for 5 more points.
Before we decide on the configuration of chaff we want lets look for the different profiles available for bullgors. In my opinion the option with the most damage is the most interesting, so for the main version of the list we will use 3 great axes.
Points don’t want to cooperate much here and the list we end up with is:
Grashrak Bullgors
985 points (1000 pre FAQ), 7 fighters
– Grashrak Fellhoof 185pts (Hero, -20 points)
– Bullgor with Bullgor Great Axe 195pts
– Bullgor with Bullgor Great Axe 195pts
– Bullgor with Bullgor Great Axe 195pts
– Ushkor 80pts (+5 points)
– Korsh ‘the Sneak’ 65pts
– Murghoth Half-Horn 65pts
Outside of a space for a small blessing (assuming you use this optional rule) there isn’t much we got from the FAQ here, but I wanted to show this list since quite some time and I decided to bend the rules a bit here. If we want to fit 2 archers there is an option for that, but we must degrade our great axe bullgor to two axes.
This way we can replace one 195 bullgor with this cheaper one and for saved points (together with our 15 points from “blessing budget”) improve one of our melee chaff twins into a ranged one. The last variant will copy what we did in grand alliance death – instead of degrading one of the bullgors we remove it completely to fit all the fighters from Grashrak’s Despoilers, which is possible thanks to the 10 points cost reduction for Draknar from last FAQ. The list includes both pairs of our chaff twins, Draknar, Grashrak and 2 great axe bullgors.
Destruction – Bonesplitterz (Hedkrakka’s Madmob + Savage Orruks)
This time even though once again we have a bladeborn team lead by a hero with “magic missile attack” with few smaller guys and an archer among them we will twist it and go slightly less elite route. Just as with Beasts of Chaos there is a big risk that this faction won’t appear in next edition, so please keep this in mind. To be honest Savage Orruks box alone is enough to build quite a lot of different warbands, but it would be a sin not to fit there Hedkrakka – interesting Shaman that just went down 55 points and now costs 170!
If you don’t know why he is my 1st choice for leading this facton check out his abilities. His unique triple is a fun ability that is great for casual games, but in my opinion isn’t strong enough for competitive games, but his quad is one of the strongest abilities in the game
The reason I’m not a fan of his triple is that he also has access to faction triples, that I like more than “An Eye For Weakness”:
Counting on quads is a bad idea, but having a way to swing the game in your favor when you will eventually get one is very important. With ability to boost your team mobility, offence and defense using different triples Headkrakka is a useful mobile toolbox that will help troubleshoot problematic situations in game. Sadly most of other fighters from his box are not efficient enough to justify taking them and definitely not over the profiles that we have access to from the second box.
Lets move to a sea of options available for us in savage orruks box. We will definitely want to build few chaff units and few damage dealers that we have access to. Unlike with previous lists lets start with beatsticks and then we will see how much points we have left for chaff.
First fighter we add isn’t necessary the biggest damage dealer, but have a nice range and a double boosting Toughness around him. We definitely want that in a T3 warband.
Continuing with higher range fighters, the weapon so big it takes two orruks to carry – Big Stabba. We can build 2 of them and this is what we will do and include in the list as our main damage source.
Last fighter I list here before moving to our chaff choice will not make our list, but will be an alternative leader option (he costs 5 points more than headkrakka, but we will leave 5 points unused to have this option available)
In the end we have to make decision about the chaff profile we want to include. As this list is quite low on damage, I think picking the most offensive one (and slightly more expensive) is the best choice, so we will wrap our list up with 3 Morboyz.
For the last 95 points (we keep 5 points unused) we have a choice between one more Morboy or Toofdagga, who just got 10 points cheaper
Just to have more options to play with +3 crit triple from our leader, lets take his bladeborn friend. The final list looks like this:
Naked Orcs led by a Lunatic
995 points (1060 pre FAQ), 8 fighters
– Hedkrakka, Gob of Gork 170pts (Hero, -55 points)
– Savage Big Stabbas165pts
– Savage Big Stabbas 165pts
– Savage Orruk Morboy Bone Totem Bearer 115pts
– Toofdagga 95pts (-10 points)
– Savage Orruk Morboy 95pts
– Savage Orruk Morboy 95pts
– Savage Orruk Morboy 95pts
I already mentioned a variant with alternative leader. By also exchanging Toofdagga for 4th Morboy the list suddenly require only single box, which makes it extremally budget friendly.
Order – Sylvaneth (Skaeth’s Wild Hunt + Kurnoth Hunters)
With Order I was trying to find home for Farstriders, but with the 2 box limitation I wasn’t able to create anything satisfying. Last month I wrote about listbuilding Seraphon around Starblood Stalkers so this time lets focus on Skaeth’s Wild Hunt, which for a long time was a 2nd most popular source of cheap chaff after the skinks crew (I know that Ylthari is a new hotness in order, but it will be a main focus of next article). You can probably already guess that the list will look similar to previous ones – few chaff units (with a bowmen) supported by 3 big guys. Having a threat in every deployment group is a proven formula so there is no need to change something that works well. Lets take a look at our UW fighters and this time there are no variants as we can fit all of them (also unlike before the pictures show correct point values, as at this point Warcrier.net managed to already update):
Skaeth is not the most impressive fighter, but is fast and durable enough to threaten objectives that are just at your opponent doorstep. Range of his attacks mean that he can avoid getting engaged and also deal damage at the same time. 20 points discount will definitely make him see more play now.
Karthean is definitely the most popular of Skaeth friends mostly thanks to Might of Kurnoth triple and the fact that it just got 5 points more expensive will not change it. Great fighter especially when close to few Kurnoth Hunters.
Next fighter simply has nice attack profile for a chaff and 4 attacks dealing 4 damage on crits is something that will make life of your opponents threats way less convinient. It will see a bit less play after it got 5 points more expensive.
Althaen is a fighter that I hate playing against and in my opinion is the most efficient one in this group. I don’t understand why it got 5 points cheaper and for me he was definitely an “autoinclude” fighter (now Ahslaine from another bladeborn team is better, but Althaen is still great).
In the end the lion, that just had its price reduced by 5 points. Having 2 fighters with 8″ move is great and Lighaen is a great target for wait action as even with single move it should reach the place where you need it.
With the “smalls” of the team out of the way lets move to “talls”. The points left are just enough to play 2 Kurnoth Hunters with scythe and one with a sword.
Scythes work great in this team not because they have the highest damage output from the options we have available (more on that in a second), but because attacking opponents from 2″ away make it possible for both Althaen and Skaeth to also attack the same target from range.
Sword has a reputation of having lower damage, but actually both weapons deal almost the same amount of damage against basically every Toughness as you can see below:
Because of only T4 on Kurnoths and the synergy with other ranged fighters we took as many Scythes as possible. I also think having single Kurnoth build with sword is very useful as I think the hero version with sword is a great option to have and Sylvaneth is a faction where you really need to cut corners to fit everything you want in the list because of quite expensive chaff and lack of hyper-efficient units that top meta factions have access to.
The final list looks like that:
Kurnoth Wild Hunt
1000 points (1020 pre FAQ), 8 fighters
– Skaeth the Huntsman 160pts (Hero, -20 points)
– Kurnoth Hunter with Kurnoth Scythe 185pts
– Kurnoth Hunter with Kurnoth Scythe 185pts
– Kurnoth Hunter with Kurnoth Greatsword 170pts
– Karthaen 85pts (+5 points)
– Althaen 75pts (-5 points)
– Sheoch 75pts (+5 points)
– Lighaen 65pts (-5 points)
I wasn’t sure if I should include both Bonesplitterz and Beasts of Chaos as they might be discontinued next year, but I wanted to write about them since a long time and I figured that with every month their inclusion in any article would have less and less sense and there won’t be a better opportunity than this one.
As always thanks for reading and if you enjoy my articles please consider supporting the blog on Patreon. Next article will be dedicated to new must have UW warband in Order – Ylthari’s Guardians and should appear on the blog quite soon. Expect also some lighter, narrative related content as our local playing group will be starting Ravaged Coast campaign soon.
Overthinking Warcry 