Ambush Demo Armies (Elves & Undead) to play with friends

[Mikes]

So I’ve been thinking hard about building 2 opposing Elf and Undead Ambush armies and this is what I’ve come up with:

Undead:
Skeleton Warriors Regiment x2 (170pts.)
Werewolf Regiment x2 (310pts.)
Wraith Troop (110pts.)
Necromancer (+ Drain Life, Weakness and Inspiring Talisman 105pts.)
Vampire Lord (+ Surge, Lightning Bolt 195pts.)
Balefire Catapult (95pts.)
Total: 995pts.

Elves:
Seaguard Regiment x2 (300pts.)
Stormwind Cavalry Regiment (+ Mead of Madness 220pts.)
Forest Shambler Regiment (120pts.)
Lord on Drakon (+ Diadem of Dragonkind 190pts.)
Elven Arch Mage (+ Lightning Bolt, Bane Chant, Heal and Inspiring Talisman 165pts.)
Total 995pts.

Only unit not painted yet are the Undead Wraiths and I’m working hard on those
Undead units were partly chosen with painting efficiency in mind (Werewolves especially). The elven units come from my larger main army.

Will eventually try to lure a friend into battle. Feedback on the list would be very welcome.

The goal here was specifically to create a force with lots of gameplay options and variety (hence most characters are quite loaded with spells and items and often not the “typical” picks on would expect) and not to create the most competitive forces. (I will also leave the choice of armies to my opponent or we may even switch sides between matches for a rematch.)

On the Elf side I could make some changes and swap in a Palace Guard regiment or a Drakon Regiment as well a plain Elven King on Foot or possibly a 2nd Shambler Regiment (or make the Shamblers a Horde). On the Undead side I could swap the vampire with a Lykanis without major other changes. For more changes I would have to paint up more minis first

My main worry at this point is whether the Stormwind and/or the Vampire are “too much” for a friendly small 995 point game. But I’d love to have them in because of the variety and because of the models, when running a showcase battle with friends.

Any thoughts and recommendations?

[Clem]

In general in my demo armies i try to limit “complex” rules: I like ogres and forces of the abyss for that because I can have zero individuals for example

Now you have flyers and surge
Depending on your demo context and goals that can be entirely fine.

[Clem]

Another consideration is how many scoring units each list has and how the list function. They seem alright to me but maybe a bit on the punch hard side of things?

I would simply try them out on a couple of games and see how it goes, if it works as expected or can be tweaked.

[Mikes]

Thanks for the advice @Clem ! And yep I’ll try em out and see how it goes. And now that you’ ve said it: The heavy punch focus may just be the way I m used to build lists without realizing it.

I’m not worried about including too many rules though as the friends I intend to play with are old gaming buddies. KoW is way more straightforward and easy to understand than the rules those guys usually tackle with. (And my guess/hope is that this will be a major draw as well … it’s hard to go back to the convoluted messes of most other game s rules once you ve had a taste of KoW, well at least it was for me )

[Clem]

Yep, that’s entirely fair! With tabletop veterans, you can (and even maybe should!) go full on rulewise! It’s not like KoW is thatcomplicated that they can’t figure it out quickly.

It’s fair as well for the punchy part. In the maybe 5 or 10 ambush games I’ve played so far (at 800 and 1000pts) I have the 1st impression that regiments are much stronger, and since you have not much of it, US is critical. you may well destroy the entire force, but you need US to “win”.

But anyway, give it a try and report back!

[Mikes]

Will do! May be a while with the little one keeping us busy as he is lately , but will sure happen eventually. Maybe I’ll have that Revenant Regiment painted up as well that is now still sitting in the box by then, we’ll see. (Then I could just make it a regular 1200pts. KoW force and have some more US on the Undead side. It’s 9US to 12US in the Elves favor right now.)