Using the von Carstein Bat Skills

Hi all,

I am quite excited about the prospect of using the expanded Vampire skills from TC11 and The Aristocracy of the Night.

In particular, I was thinking of running Bat Form alongside Summon Bats.

Mr. von Carstein summons his D3 Fell Bats, then in the next Recovery Phase, turns into a bat. The swarm then fly off to help secure objectives or whatever. The summoned bats might even charge, with the transformed vampire staying close. Then in the next turn he reforms and charges in himself.

This seem to fix one of the Undead scenario weak-points I have noticed (being too slow to secure locations) and also seems like a lot of fun.

Has anyone else tried it, or have any feedback on this combo? Or it still worth focusing on the combat/strength/speed skills?

I haven't used any of the animal shape skills myself since, in my opinion, they come with as many downsides as they do upsides. You become very vulnerable when using bat form so you really need to make sure that you don't leave the vampire as a target for any shooters. I'm not familiar with the aristocracy of the night since we don't use those rules but having some fell bats to help out might make things better.

The animal forms seem to me to have more flavour than substance but things like that are fun to try out. Mist form on the other hand is fantastic and heartily recommended if you've decided to use the optional rules.

What are the "The Aristocracy of the Night" rules that you have mentioned?

They're a set of fan-published rules to include the different vampire counts bloodlines into Mordheim. I haven't found the file available without any site membership of it anywhere but if you're a member on the yaktribe site you can get it here. It's also available under files in the Mordheim facebook group.

Can we upload files on this anywhere on this forum?

Edit: Just look below here for a direct link.

Here's a link. Though not official, it was edited and endorsed by the TC editor;

Aristocracy of the Night

I'll have a look, thanks.

I'm not sure what stats are used for the Fellbats, if they are the same as a Warhammer Fellbat that seems a bit much. However Bat Form weakens the Vamp so its a trade off.

Aside from the zombies, I wouldn't call the Undead slow. The Vamp and some wolves can project power at a longer distance than most warbands and with just one skill the vamp can reach 18" on the charge (like the wolves).

Good point @Von Kurst.

The summoned bats are:

M2 WS3 BS0 S3 T3 W2 I3 A2 Ld5

However they are automatically OOA when they hit W0 and disappear when they are outside 6" of the vamp at the end of a turn.

The specific situation I had trouble with on a recent scenario was occupy - how the buildings were allocated meant the Skaven could get all three in the 2nd or 3rd turn. In another scenario, I couldn't catch the Dark Elves getting away with the treasure chest. In both cases, one of my Dire Wolves came close but was on his own.

To be honest it would save me picking up some Fell Bats by going with the wolf skills

I am relatively new, so am still learning which rulesets are generally used or ignored. I take it the Bloodline rules are not that widely accepted?

Welcome to the forum.

Every group of players approach the game differently.  I have played the game since it was released and many of the 'best' practices recommended by the internet never occurred to me.  Nor did many of the so-called issues of the game.  My group used the TC11 rules once and didn't bother with them again.  We have never used "The Aristocracy of the Night" rules, mainly because I was completely unaware of them until this morning. (Although I won't be seeking them out either, our Undead warbands usually pack a mean enough punch on their own.)

Occupy and Treasure Hunt--
Both of the examples listed above are fairly easy to overcome without additional rules.  Occupy is a scenario with a set game length and no reward for winning beyond the extra exp for your vamp.  My advice is to punish the enemy warband if it tries to 'win' the scenario by occupying buildings.  I don't bother with buildings.  I just set out to inflict as many casualties as I can to make hanging on for 8 turns unappealing. If my opponent has spit his forces to occupy buildings, I just hit the nearest with overwhelming force.  This nets me experience for my heroes and reduces his forces.

In treasure hunt you just need a response force made up of wolves and the vamp in early games and add a LGT ghoul with sprint in later games.  A mounted Dreg or two or a hired ogre doesn't hurt either.

Now that's my version of best practices, but if you wish to test rules that your group allows, I think that is very worthwhile.  Especially if you report back on your experience.  People rarely do that...

Fantastic advice, thank you. I will post some reports for future battles. I have been hit by the Mordheim bug pretty hard, so will definitely be using these forums as an outlet

I think we must have misread Occupy. We thought that the game would be won as soon as the requisite buildings were occupied.

I may pass up the Bloodline abilities after all, but I do like the TC11 ones.

Thanks again!