Warhammer Fantasy Battle Reporter Forum

What do you think are Vampires biggest weak points, and how do you protect them?

Some people say VC's alone are cheesy but i believe they do have their weaknesses.

To start off -

Crumble - without the general, almost all units will eventually crumble up

Low initiative - (Apart from Characters, or certain bound spells)

Combat Res - While Core units have high static res, Skeletons and Zombies can only hold off for a certain amount of time before Ghouls, Guard, or Knights are needed or will be wiped out.

Magic - Imo the average List has alot of magic involved, and an enemy who has read our army book would know which ones to dispel, and which ones to ignore (While some bound spells are great, some other spells are better)
Also, We can cast Nehek a lot of times, but more casting = higher chance of a miscast

Blood Knights - while these are awesome, they cost heaps of $$$ for only 5 in a box.

Shooting - we don't pack any war machines, and Vampires do not have any Artillery units


To counter them i think of the following -

Crumble - My general joins a unit of something very resilient and acts more as support, rather than a front line vampire.

Low Initiative - Numbers, and make sure each units strengths supports another units weakness and vice versa. This way the Army is greater than the sum of its parts.

Combat Res - As mentioned above, a supporting (Nearby, i wouldn't have a loner zombie unit around) unit can flank while zombies/skelies hold off a unit and Ghouls/Guard deal the killing blow (Pun intended)

Magic - While Tactically using other spells to burn enemies dice/scrolls i can also use items to bolster my mage casting with more dice and lessen the chance of a miscast (well... i hope )

Blood Knights - Get a Job

Shooting - Banshee can shoot, but your Plans should not involve shooting making any difference, that way bad shooting does not put a hole in the battle plan. Let enemy Advance upon you and soften them up with magic, or Harden your own units

I agree with everything you posted. I find it hilarious that Vampire Counts actually cause fear to players who go up against them. I don't think the Vampire counts are unbeatable, and when I argue with my wife about it, I always offer to let her play as them, just to show that I believe they are definitely beatable.

Crumbling with the death of a general is devastating, and it can turn a solid victory into a solid defeat in very little time. I am still in the air regarding my preferred method of countering it. One the one hand, I think it is really cool to have a bunch of Vampire "bodyguards" in the same unit as my general, and on the other, it is just as easy to make my general totally magictastic and leave him out of fighting all together. Regardless of what I choose, I still think it is an easy thing to make your general almost impervious to damage. I love the Crown of the Damned on my Vampire Lord. With Leadership ten, stupidity is rarely a problem (for me anyway, I can't roll above a three on dice, let alone ten) and it is a good ward save for cheap.

As for initiative, I don't even really consider it. I think the undead are just there for moral support while the vampires do the work. And if I intend for them to actually do anything, I try to keep a corpse cart nearby so I can avoid the initiative issue all together.

Magic is just a matter of having lots of dice. Even then, I have rarely been able to do much with magic (it those pesky low die rolls again), it intimidates other players, but I don't think it should. The VC spell list is, to me, less scary than what a lot of other armies bring to the table. Just bring dispel scrolls, you know?

I love Blood knights and I think I am going to have to start a thread just to talk about them. But they are expensive as all get out, and I can't bring myself to buy anymore of them, even though I really want to run a unit of ten. Oh well.

Just came back from the hobby shop an hour ago, they suggested converting some plastic "Chaos Heavy Knights" as they are much cheaper and are still big enough to play off as blood knights once converted.

Imo sounds like a nice idea

Edit: Your wife should see Vampires up against a Magic Heavy Dwarf Army. Those things really ruin our magic phase

Ha! Yes, I imagine Dwarfs are good at ruining most Vampire magical plans. Actually, come to think of it, I have never played against a dwarf player. Ever.

Played my first match vs. Vampire Counts last night. 1000pts VC + 500 Chaos vs. 1000 Dwarfs + 500 Empire. Final result massive victory to the mighty Stumpies and their Empire allies.

Picked up on a couple of things for when I start fielding my own VC army.
- Grave Guard & Black Knights are must haves, my opponent only had Skeletons, Crypt Ghouls and Dire Wolves so was weakened there (although the Chaos Knights and big unit of Chaos Warriors made up for that in this game)
- Dire Wolves are great for screening your larger units from missle fire, and are a relatively cheap way of doing that
- Vampire Generals can be easy to kill, my Slayers took the VC general out in 1 round of combat. So lesson is if you are going to have a magic focused VC general keep him out of combat.
- Konrad von Carstein is brutal, but can be taken down if you get the charge in first. Took him out with my Hammerers Champion in a challenge.
- If you are going to rely on Invocation of Nehek then have bound items to get rid of your Enemies DD first. At 1000pts with a Runesmith a Dwarf army has 5 DD vs. the 4 Casting Dice for my VC opponent. Meant I could Dispel pretty much everything and he was forced to rely on rolling all 4 Dice at once in order to try for an Irresistible Force.

Was a real shame that your VC enemy took all squishy no armour save models. Please tell me he took a corpse cart!!!!!!!!

I have learned that grave guard are a must, and always make room for atleast 20 of them.

AWWW POOR VAMPIES!

[off topic]He only had 4 PD? Damn. My 1000 point army has 7 Power Dice and 5 Dispel

And thats not even going magic heavy

But thats just me i don't think VC's should go light on magic.

[on topic]

Yeah he was pretty keen on getting his VC stuff onto the table and so hadnt completed a lot of his stuff yet. Still it gave him (and me for when I finish building my VC stuff) some good ideas about what to do next time. He also had some Bat Swarms he could have added, and will have a Corpse Cart next week.

Did think of one other weakness they have - no real missle troops, unless you count the Banshee.

Hey Kiwi? you played with shibb?

I live in Australia, not New Zealand

I added the extra weakness to the top post, we seem to have a pretty good summary up there perhaps someone could sticky it for future users who join?

In addition to not having any shooting units VC don't have any artillery either.

Doesn't Artillery use the same rules as shooting? (Bar its Guess Range)

However i'll add that in thanks!

I am thinking more along the lines that artillery is a way to either cause multiple wounds to large targets or do tons of wounds to a unit (espicially stone throwers)

[magic Frenzy]
I also looked up a magic heavy theme in my army book, and i think for 1000 points you could get 20 power dice, however this is illegal as it needs a Vampire to be upgraded with Master of Black Arts, AND Dark Acolyte.

Without breaking rules how ever (in one turn only), it ranges from 17 (using Master of Black Arts, and a Power Stone for each) or a cheaper in points 14 (using Power Stone's and Dark Acolyte)

The Former is only really useful for a game which would be over 4000+ Because all a level 1 is really good for is Invocation spam, but that would be 17 Invocations, for an average of 9D6 Cast (31 Zombies Avg.) Plus the extra bonus zombies they get when Invocation is cast on them.

The latter however in, say, a 2000 point game with a Lord, could dhave each vampire out fitted for other magic tasks, such as Ghoul summoning (14 Invocations, on a 3+ in one turn is around 5D6 Passing, equalling an average of 14 Ghouls being summoned! (or 100 points!))

[/Magic Frenzy]

I think one of the biggest weaknesses is the lack of shooting. We can't whittle down enemy units unless we use magic, and, for me anyway, it usually gets dispelled. So we have to face the full force of the enemy in close combat, where we aren't that good.