Many thanks to Games Workshop for providing us with an advanced preview copy of the new Nighthaunt Battletome for us to review. We have also been provided with a provisional Battle Profile list for the army to use when writing the review, but please note that these points are subject to change until they are published on Warhammer Community.
Nighthaunt have had an exciting run this edition. Out of the gate they absolutely tore up the meta, getting an over 70% winrate at some points. Their movement abilities and ability to charge out of combat were too strong and the player base simply was not ready.
After pruning some of the more problematic units the army has settled into a solid niche. It’s an aggressive army with technical rules. It’s defensive stats were a complete slot machine since they ignored rend, but also positive modifiers, so you’d be going for a 50-50 almost every roll. It’s definitely one of the more unique armies in AoS history.
Now their Battletome has come and the most recent Battletomes have presented some radical changes to their armies. Will Nighthaunt follow the same trend?
Battle Traits
Battle traits are wildly different from the faction pack, it’s enough that it’s better to look at it starting from square one again, this is an army getting a ground-up rewrite.
The most important change now is that Ethereal no longer cancels positive modifiers to save. This does come with the catch that your saves are awful now. All your troops have a 6+, and your characters and the Black Coach have a 5+. The positive side is that everything has a 5+ ward innately now, and most of your infantry has 2 wounds instead of 1. Doing the maths this is actually a net positive, as a 5+ ward is a 50% increase in wounds (on average) so really it’s like getting 3 wounds on infantry. In short, you’re basically always guaranteed to get a save, can use All Out Defence now, and since Wards are harder to tamper with the maths is working in your favor here but since it relies on a lot of high dice rolls it may not always feel that way.
Since you no longer need Discorporate for a 5+ ward, you now have Ethereal Translocation for 1 CP, which lets you do a teleport outside of 9” of the enemy like the only Vanishing Phantasms Battle Formation, but now available to everyone. Pretty great honestly, you don’t need to choose a specific battle formation or muck around with Awlrach to get teleports (but you still can).
Last new trait is Mounting Dread. Simply subtract the round from the control score of enemy units in combat with your units. Thematic and plays into the new archetype of the faction, the bigger debuffs coming later in the game should work well with the way late game AoS can turn into small units scrambling for points.
Then…there’s the bad news. The Auras of Dread are gone. Just toast. There isn’t really an adequate replacement either. I’m not sure why the change, one could argue they were a lot to keep track of when learning the army but there isn’t really a suitable replacement. As a result the army plays very differently which we’ll get into when we examine the warscrolls.
Battle Formations
Since a lot of the “good” faction traits got rolled into other stuff these are basically all brand new. And you know what? They’re not bad! Quicksilver Gheists is the clear winner here, which is probably why it costs 40 points. On each of your movement phases you can pick a unit, roll a D6 and add that to their movement. It’s basically a run roll without the downsides (i.e. you can still shoot or charge) and you can pass through enemy units or end in combat with them.
Your free options aren’t bad either though. My favorite is Death Stalkers which can pick a unit to retreat and shoot and/or charge and they don’t take damage from retreating. Good if you get stuck in a bad spot or want to lure an opponent out with chaff before swapping in the actual threat. Shrieker Host is a niche option that lets you pick an enemy unit in their movement phase and keep them from retreating. It’s not common someone wants to retreat but if you end up going into a Kharadron list you might be happy you had it. Royal Procession is the only one I find truly underwhelming, it simply lets you grant Anti-Charge to 2 units. Not awful but with Nighthaunt you tend to want to play more aggressively and not just wait to be hit. Not with those saves.
Enhancements
Three Heroic traits, three Artefacts, as usual. Ruler of the Spectral Hosts returns but no longer brings back a dead unit. It lets you heal D3 (on a 2+) or bring back an equivalent number of models to 3 units. Since most your units are 2 wounds now this means most of the time, you’re bringing back a model. This is definitely less great that the previous version but because of the new, grindier version of Nighthaunt I can see the value here. So did GW, which is why it costs points.
Your other free options have potential niches. Shadowy Aura gives the hero a -1 to be hit this turn if they redeployed, which really helps soothe the burn of getting a 1” on a redeploy and not being able to escape a charge. Deathly Possessor is the fun option, letting you pick an enemy hero in combat and then on a 3+ you can swing with one of their weapons into one of their own guys. Can be difficult to set up, as Nighthaunt don’t have many heroes who want to be in combat with another combat hero, but with the rise of combat foot heroes, you probably will be able to find a target at least.
Over to Artefacts, Lightshard of the Harvest Moon returns intact, it’s a good artefact. Once per game +1 attack wholly within 12” on the big charging army? That’s a staple. The other 2 are new. The Brazier of Nagashizzar makes your redeploys a minimum of 4” for units within 12”. Pairs well with the Shadowy Aura. The Mirror of Echoing Failures is a high risk, high reward option, letting you respond to a Priest or Wizard within 12” when they cast a spell. On a 2+ on a D3 that caster gets -1 to Cast/Chant and takes a mortal wound if they biff a spell roll. This does happen in the declare step, so it works even on the spell that triggered the ability.
Spell Lore
All brand new. Your unlimited spell is Fell Blades which at a casting level of 6 makes it so targeting all attacks at one unit gives that units -1 to saves for the rest of the turn. This plays best with the Knight of Shrouds since he can have a unit fight directly after him. Otherwise its a tough spell to work with because you generally want to guarantee you wipe stuff out on the first swing, but it can be very solid insurance to finish off a tougher unit. Luckily you have the spell Chains of Death which grants Strike Last to a unit within a whopping 18”. So cast Fell Blades, Chains of Death and then beat on it.
The last spell is Wrench Souls which is a very solid utility spell. A unit wholly within 12” can immediately move or retreat as if it were the movement phase. This does mean they can move again in the movement phase, and with the Nighthaunt high movement they get where they need to go very easily. The downside is a retreat still counts as a retreat so you won’t be able to charge again, but it can get you out of a jam and then move further away from the threat.
Warscrolls
As stated during the battle traits, every unit had its defensive profiles changed. Most every unit now has a 6+ save and Heroes have a 5+, since they now have a 5+ ward and can All out Defence. Most infantry also gained a wound, except Chainrasps since they’re a speedbump anyway. But the “good” infantry like Bladegheists and Harridans are 2 wounds now, which with their 5+ ward means they have a lot of wounds.
Heroes
Nighthaunt have a lot of Heroes so I can’t hope to go over all of them. I will hit up on the ones that have new and interesting abilities for the most part so if you don’t see your favorite pet unit, just assume they didn’t change enough to be interesting. Special Shout out to the Cairn Wrath and Tomb Banshee which will be going to Legends in June of next year. We didn’t get Warscrolls for them so it’s not clear if it’s going to stay the same or not.
First I’m sure you want to hear about the new guy, the Lord Vitriolic. Games Workshop already unveiled his Warscroll but he’s fun. You get to hurl a potion at an enemy unit within 10” and on a 3+ get one of 6 effects. You can either choose or roll two dice and pick both. You probably don’t want to do that because the majority have specific keywords or criteria to fulfill but it’s nice that they gave the option.
Nagash’s Warscroll Spell Invocation of Nagash got a slight tweak. Since handing out a 5+ Ward wouldn’t do anything in this army, the secondary option is to move the target 3” but only if it wasn’t set up this turn. Not bad.
Next, our power couple. Lady Olynder is mostly the same, but she’s traded in the weak companion attacks for two more attacks with the Staff of Midnight. There’s also a new version of her Mortarch of Grief ability, and it is better. Hit rolls of 1-4 automatically miss. Since the army now reduces control as a core rule her old version wouldn’t be of much use, so making her more defensive so she can risk getting closer is much appreciated. Kurdross hasn’t ditched his companion attacks, so Scourge of Ghyran remains the better beatstick. Instead, there’s a new ability where Kurdoss can charge something an a unit of Craventhrone Guard get to immediately shoot at it at the cost of not being able to then charge themselves. They didn’t want to charge anyway, so that’s not much of a drawback. Getting to double tap a shooting unit is pretty rare in AoS now, but it’s not an earth shattering combo.
Awlrach stayed exactly the same, if you need a CP free teleport, and he even gets a free move or retreat at the end of the turn on a 3+. Neat. Scriptor Mortis got a huge upgrade. He still sentences an enemy within 18”, but now attacks against them by infantry become Crit Mortals. Way less clunky and very effective for the huge number of dice most Nighthaunt units are rolling. He also has a fun interaction with the everyone’s favorite enhancement caddy, Lord Executioner who is mostly the same but can straight up murder a Hero now at the end of turn on a 5+, or a 4+ if it was sentenced by the Scriptor Mortis. I don’t think we’ve seen this sort of cross-warscroll terminology used before but its a neat flavour win.
Pretty much everyone else is the same which is good, the support heroes in the army fill important niches like the Guardian of Souls and it’s +1 to wound.
Infantry
Glavewraith Stalkers are getting Legends’d next June. So long, you weird-ass four man unit.
Chainrasps got a new rule which probably works out a lot better for them. They lost their +1 to wound when charging but you probably never charged with these guys even once. Instead they get a free 6” scout move at the start of the game, so you can walk onto any objectives just outside of deployment if you want to set up early. Honestly a good change, nothing was going to make these good in combat so let them being annoying instead.
Let’s look at the trio of “elite” infantry because they bring the biggest changes to the table. In addition to the extra wound and Ward they had their abilities scrapped and…not always for the better. Grimghast Reapers probably made out the best here, their Reaped Like Corn ability now lets you roll a number of dice equal to the enemy unit and each 6+ is a mortal, 5+ if there’s 20 or more models. This does not scale with larger Grimghast units so you probably can settle for unreinforced units to deal with any hordes trying to screen you out. Dreadscythe Harridans lost their abilities which makes them a lot less killy, their new ability blocks all healing and model recursion while in combat with them. This is not bad but definitely is more niche depending on the army you’re facing. If their only healing is Rally they weren’t using it anyway. But against Sylvaneth? You’ll love it. The Bladegheist Revenants got probably the most radical change, they don’t get a +1 to attack anymore but if they contest an objective you own your opponent cannot charge them unless they roll a 7 or better. This turns them more into control pieces that can hold down objectives and make them much more difficult to get onto and take back from you.
Overall I think the Dreadsythe Harridans and Bladegheist Revenants epitomise the army’s new vision. Instead of a lightning fast hammer, it’s a control army that wants to bog the enemy down in no-win scenarios they cannot escape from, trying to cut through swathes of spectres that seem to refuse to die.
Moving on. the Craventhrone got a new ability that is a bit mixed. Their ability to shoot units they couldn’t see did come in handy in the rampant Obscuring of Scourge of Ghyran but now they can retreat in their movement phase without taking damage and deal D3 mortals to the unit they escaped from. Now given they have the same 2 wounds, 6+ save, 5+ ward as every other non-chainrasp infantry its a bit of a dice roll if they’ll survive that long, but if they do you’ll be glad they escape to shoot another day. Still in the world of Death Shooting, Pyregheists now hit on a 2+ and still do their poke mortals to things close by. Points between Craventhrone and Pyregheists haven’t changed much and whilst you can’t reinforce Pyregheists the Craventhrone are still base 5, so only reinforce to 2 more models. Reinforced Craventhrone are, however, 70 points more than Pyregheists and do basically the same damage. Basically – Craventhrone are awful unless you’re trying to do the double shoot thing. And even then, not a great use of points.
The last notable change is Spirit Hosts. Since everyone gets a 5+ ward now, they grant a 4+. Simple but probably going to turn a few heads now with the worse saves.
Cavalry
Both cavalry, Hexwraiths and Dreadblade Harrows are exactly the same. I’m sure you didn’t expect a return to the launch Dreadblade Harrows but since the elite melee infantry took a bit of a hit in the damage department, Hexwraiths are likely to remain popular as a hammer unit for the army. The downside to Hexwraiths is that their Health didn’t get an upgrade whilst their save did get worse, so they’re looking much more fragile compared to where they were. They’re still expensive as well, so have become more difficult to use.
Warmachine
The Black Coach remains the same as its current Warscroll counterpart which is a bit underwhelming. Like Kurdross, the Scourge of Ghyran version is still legal so you can still take that should you wish.
Terrain
Yep the Nexus of Grief is still pretty busted. No changes here.
Endless Spells
All three manifestations remain the same which is a bit of a shame since we’ve seen faction-specific ones getting better. Ah well.
Armies of Renown
The Clattering Procession
Like Cavalry? This Regiment of Renown only allows Cavalry, the Black Coach and Reikenor. It brings a lot of interesting movement tricks to the table to allow you to exploit their very high movement. At the end of the turn if a unit Charged or Retreated, is within 9” of the edge of the board and wasn’t in combat at the end (i.e. Power Through or just straight up killed them) then The Speed of Death allows you to set them up again within 3” of the battlefield edge. Spectral Swiftness just lets them walk out of combat during the movement phase. It is a retreat so they can’t charge again, but they won’t take damage. Finally Pitiless Reapers lets you roll a die for each model that flew over an enemy unit and deal Mortal Wounds on 6s, 5s for a Black Coach. It’s only the number of models in your unit so only the Hexwraiths will really benefit from this, I wish the Black Coach got some bonus dice or something.
The one Heroic Trait Silent Overseer lets you pick three units wholly within 12” who can then retreat and charge. Pairs great with Spectral Swiftness. The Talisman of the Nadir artefact lets you unbind a spell targeting a unit within 12” of the bearer, with a +1 to unbind at that. Given how rare Unbinds are and the fact you lose Banshees in this detachment, appreciated. For spells you get two great spells for cavalry: Spectral Lashes grants +2” to movement and Fell Riders grants a Reroll Run and Charge rolls to a unit, both to a unit wholly within 12”. Then for your manifestation, you get the Shyish Reaper.
Overall this seems decent. You’re trading up in mobility from the main battle traits, and with no CP investment, at the cost of a severely limited pool of warscrolls. Hexwraiths should do well in the new book as a lot of their competition has decided to take up other roles and Reikenor and the Knight of Shrouds on steed are both good heroes. Plus you still get to use the very good Scourge of Ghyran Black Coach. Watch out for how fragile this army can be though, as Hexwraiths being 200 points a pop with a 6+ save will not give you a particularly deep or sturdy wound pool to draw from.
The Eternal Nightmare
So…I want to like this one, I really do. It’s one of the coolest, funniest and stupidest sets of rules they’ve published this edition.
You must take Nagash, and then you can take any non-unique infantry. Nagash starts the game napping and slowly needs to wake up. He starts off big sleepy next to a Nexus of Grief and on round 1 he has a 3+ ward but a Control Characteristic of 1, cannot move and has fewer attacks. On round 2 he’s a bit groggy, with a 6” move and cannot move far from his Nexus, His Ward then drops to 4+ and his control increases to 5. After that he’s at full power.
So what comes after? …Nothing? It’s weird. The rules seem to set up the idea he starts sleeping and needs to charge his Kaioken but he never goes beyond his base warscroll. The Heroic Trait Damned Vessel lets you channel a spell through it and measure from it instead of Nagash. I suppose this helps with his warscroll spell to help spread it around but I’m not sure that’s worth it. The artefact is pretty bad, letting you do 3 damage to the bearer and then healing Nagash for 3 once per game. It can help get him out of a jam but I’m not sure 3 will make a huge difference if he’s really being pressured.
The included spell lore isn’t bad. Divine Terror causes enemy units to lose 3 to their control score, which helps since you don’t get Mounting Dread in this AoR. The Will of Nagash makes it so you can pick a friendly Infantry unit and Rolls of 1-3 always fail against them. Actually pretty decent, I can see the value here. And then you get all 3 Faction endless spells. Having only two spells on the list here for an AoR entirely focused on a hero that has NINE casts a turn is stingy to the point of being unreasonable.
Overall I love the concept but thinks it fails in execution. In Round 3 and beyond he should get more powerful than his base form to justify waiting two rounds for him to get off his ass and join the fight. The man is half your list he has to pull his damn weight. It just feels like you might as well take Nagash in a normal list. What this has done is make me desperate for a proper Nagash AoR where he gets to pick and choose from across the GA, Big Waaagh! style. Please make this happen GW.
Regiments of Renown
Craventhrone Executioners
Scriptor Mortis and two units of five Cravenguard. While the Scriptor Mortis’s ability won’t work as well without melee units, the rule with this Regiment of Renown grants +1 to hit and to wound to the Craventhrone Guard if the unit has been Sentenced by the Scriptor Mortis.
Honestly, it’s passable. Death armies have some pretty bad shooting, if any at all, so I can see this get some use in OBR or Soulblight Gravelords. Craventhrone Guard are pretty poor, but if you can get the buff up on them they can do a bit of work. I wish this was cheaper than 300 points, but it at least offers something new to the GA.
Casket of Resurrections
Want a Black Coach in your other Death Armies? Here you go. It even can bring back non-Unique Death heroes who aren’t Nighthaunt if it does any damage. Since the current rules allow you to bring the Scourge of Ghyran stuff in Regiments, this is great and I can definitely see this getting use in other death armies. 200 points for a beatstick that can keep key buff heroes alive is a decent sell.
Final Thoughts
When I first came across this book I wasn’t sure what to think about it. The initial power changes felt like a huge downgrade. Certainly, Nighthaunt are paying for the sins of what they inflicted on the launch of fourth edition but this seemed a bit harsh.
After playing around with it a bit I feel like the vision has simply changed to something else. With the additional wounds and higher Ward, the army is hardier than it was before. It also still has a lot of movement tricks and healing available to it. The goal seems to be to create an army that’s more about creating tarpits and area denial than the fast glass cannon slot machine that was the previous army. Whether or not it succeeds at that is going to take some time to see but I think it has a place here. It’s definitely a unique design space to explore an army that has awful saves but a lot of wounds and wards on top of that.
So go forth, condemned, and reclaim the mortal realms for Nagash!
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