Hey folks! Thought with a lot of new players becoming interested in the game due to the release of the generals handbook, I would pop together a handy guide to basic list construction. As ever, these are only my thoughts and should not be taken as iron rules, but can hopefully help others with the process. I'll break it down into the following: The Basics Allegiance Aggressive/Defensive Balance Synergy > Chocolate Box 1. The Basics Units in match play have now been assigned both points and battlefield roles: these are Leaders, Battleline, Artillery, Behemoth or left blank. Depending on how many points you're working with, you will have a minimum number of Battleline units you need to take, and a maximum number of Leaders, Artillery and Behemoths. You can take any number of units that have been left blank. The exact numbers for each point bracket can be found in the Generals Handbook (or on this forum if you are without the book). With that in mind, lets crack on with list building. 2. Allegiance So, the first thing to consider is whether you're going to be either pure Seraphon allegiance, or Order allegiance. What does each offer? Seraphon allegiance lets you pick Saurus Guard and Knights as battleline units, but every unit in your army has to be a Seraphon unit, and you can only use the Order artefacts and command traits, no Order Battle Trait (Defiant Avengers). Order Allegiance lets you pick from a far wider pool of models (anything from Order!), as well as give you access to not only the artefacts and command traits, but the overarching Allegiance Battle Trait as well. Don't forget, you do have to pick units only from a single grand alliance (Order, Death, Chaos, Destruction) so no piggy back rides for Archaon on top of a Bastiladon. 3. Aggressive/Defensive Next step is to detrmine how you want to play. Aggressive armies revolve around a lot of fast moving units, and rely on out maneuvering enemies and grabbing objectives. Optimal units in an aggressive army would be Saurus Knights, Ripperdactyls/Terradons, Chameleon Skinks and even normal skinks to a degree. The aim would be to use your increased mobility to dictate when and how combats ensue, and to take out key enemy units early on. Warscroll Batallions such as the Shadowstrike Starhost or the Firelance Starhost are exceptional to fit into these kinds of armies. Defensive armies instead revolve around bolstering up and making it as difficult as possible for your opponent to kill your units. Optimal units in a defensive army would be Saurus Guard, Eternity warden, Bastiladon and Kroak. The aim would be to grind your opponent down and hopefully wipe him off the board. Warscroll battalions such as the Eternity Starhost and the Thunderquake Starhost would be great additions to a force like this. 4. Balance When putting together your army list, it is important to not get too carried away with a particular element. Balancing a list is integral to not only being competitive, but also a good sportsman. Focussing on a single aspect can lead you to having extremely skewed matchups- ranged armies will do great against static blobs, but will die in droves to aggressive, fast moving lists. Ignoring magic completely, or at least interactions with magic, is also ill advised, as it will leave you completely defenceless in the face of opposing magic users. Try to ensure in each list that you include at least 2 elements of the following: High Mobility Support Magic Ranged Defensive Blob Objective Grabber Damage Dealer 5. Synergy > Chocolate Box The final thing to consider when list building is synergies. Age of Sigmar is all about the concept of armies being more than the sum of their component parts. What is better than simply adding? Multiplying. Rather than simply picking strong units in isolation, try and find synergies between units that can elevate them to perform far better than the alternatives, be it in either stat boosts or strategic overlaps. A simple example would be the Eternity Starhost- it makes great units absolutely amazing. But then if you were to add in a Shadowstrike starhost to it as well, there are strategic synergies available in addition. There are some fantastic units outside of seraphon that can help us- anyone who has seen some of my lists will know that I have a real soft spot for empire battle wizards, namely Jade and Amber variants. One can heal your tanks (e.g. Bastiladon) and the other can add 1 to your wound rolls (works wonders with the starpriests staff). Experiment to see what you can find, freedom of choice is one of AoS's biggest draws! - - - - - - - - - So, there is my quick guide on getting going with list building. Any suggestions, questions, insults are absolutely welcome, it would be great to have this as a resource for existing and new players alike. Happy List-building!
Just thought that I would add the Allegiance rules and the Order points for those without access to them: Allegiance rules: http://imgur.com/a/sg32b Order Points: http://imgur.com/a/AHKdu
About Alleageance.. Generals Handbook Faq states what "you can take either allegiance abilities for the allegiance you army belongs to, or Allegiance abilities for the Grand Alliance yor army belongs to" you don't have to choose.
Thanks for this, beany. My son has been struggling with his list-building and I was having trouble explaining to him what you have so succinctly presented, particularly in regards to balance.
Finally got round to editing the original post about Allegiances to reflect the clarity provided by the FAQ's, oops!
Yeah, it was nice to get that update. Hopefully they will come out with individual army allegiance traits and artefacts.
Here is a website that will help you create your list. And it has points http://www.scrollbuilder.com
Are we sure about this? As quoted: Abilities include Battle trait, Command traits, Artefacts. My take is that if you pick Seraphon Allegiance, you cannot have Order artefacts, because they are included in the Order abilities.