8th Ed. Ways to deal with Ogre Kingdoms Hellheart

[Raymond Caleatry]

I have just started to play Warhammer, and in a recent battle the Hellheart came up and totalled my Slann bunker.

Being new to Warhammer i made loads of mistakes in that game, and would have lost anyway, but the hellheart greatly contributed to that by destroying the magic phase i was counting on to buff my guys so they could weather the ogre charge.

I had the cupped hands, but i rolled a 1 , and my skink priest on his Engine of the Gods also got hit. What other strategies do people employ to deal with this game changing item?


Ray

 

[Arli]

Beyond the cupped hands, you could stay out of his range or make sure that you keep your casters separated enough to avoid everyone being hit. That item is one of the most powerful anti magic items in the game. It also cost 50 points if I recall correctly. Another way to deal with it would be to take a magic light list and it would not hurt nearly as much. Unfortunately, the Ogres are pretty tough either way.

Other may have better ways to deal with it.

Welcome to the forum by the way.

 

[Stonecutter]

Arli has covered the major and most effective ways of completely avoiding the hellheart. Here are a few other ideas that may help since a) cupped hands is likely to disappear with the new book and b) keeping the TG & slaan far away means 1000+ points of the army are doing nothing/very little to help win the battle.

1) Soul of Stone - the ability to re-roll the miscast can help avoid the worst miscasts and hopefully allow a roll of 8-9 so that only the slaan is wounded. Also, if it disappears with the new book, the earthing rod offers a similar capability.

2) "Miscast Friendly" Formation - Any detonation usually hits 12+ TG since the slaan is in the middle of the bunker. By placing the slaan on the extreme right/left flank and adopting a frontage that eliminates contact with the rear of the slaan, this can be reduced to 5 models as shown below for a unit of 25 TG (S= slaan, T= temple guard). While losing 5 x TG isn't great, it is far superior to losing 12+!!

T T T T T T T T
T T T T T T S S
T T T T T T S S
T T T T T

3) Assassination - Try to kill the caster with the hellheart either by a suicide charge and direct attacks (very hard to do) or by using death magic sniping (easier but limits magic options).

Hope this helps.

 

[Arli]

Great points. I like both of those options. The formation that minimizes the TG at risk is a great idea. I would probably rush that unit in and hope to kill off as many Ogres as possible.

 

[Raymond Caleatry]

Thanks for the ideas, I think that next time I will try to provoke the Hellheart with just my Slann unit, and try to cup of hands it, whilst keeping my other casters well back. I may try that special formation, but it may give the game away. Though using such formations might be a good way to reduce the effects of normal miscasts if the cup of hands was no longer available.

Ray

 

[skillfull_dan]

Stonecutter, I never considered that formation before, thanks for the tip!

 

[Stonecutter]

Stonecutter, I never considered that formation before, thanks for the tip!

Glad to help out Skillful Dan. When you miscast as often as I do, necessity does prove to be the mother of invention

 

[jarbs]

I was under the impression the Hellheart just caused you to "roll on the miscast table" not cause a miscast, thus Throne of vines and cupped hands would have no effect.

Yes/no?

 

[rychek]

No. The "devil" is in the details. From the Ogre Kingdoms army book: "...Special rules or magic items that affect a normal miscast roll can be used against miscasts caused by the Hellheart...."


Edit" correction/carification

 

[Shadoer]

So now with new book, we have a new nice option. Take Loremaster of High Magic and keep targetting the Butcher with Unmaking until you kill that blasted item

 

[KristofferD]

So now with new book, we have a new nice option. Take Loremaster of High Magic and keep targetting the Butcher with Unmaking until you kill that blasted item

I'm sorry to burst your bubble here, but if you're up against a solid Ogre army you can expect that he is running a Banner of the Greater Maw, making it nigh impossible to break off the Helheart

 

[Caneghem]

So now with new book, we have a new nice option. Take Loremaster of High Magic and keep targetting the Butcher with Unmaking until you kill that blasted item

I'm sorry to burst your bubble here, but if you're up against a solid Ogre army you can expect that he is running a Banner of the Greater Maw, making it nigh impossible to break off the Helheart

Hmm, the Rune Maw appears to only effect spells that target the unit itself. I'm guessing this applies to a single model within the unit? I'm sure with Death snipes this issue has already been settled.

Pretty brokenly awesome banner, not to mention Hellheart...