Rotmire Creed in Warcry 2.0

 

Fresh off my win last month with Rotmire Creed up at Warhammer World and 6th overall out of 32 players yesterday, here is my complete guide to Rotmire Creed for Warcry. See below for the YouTube version but if reading is more your thing then welcome and lets go!

Reaction

Having tried several times to get this reaction to work, my conclusion is that counter is probably a better all-purpose damage reaction then Bile Blood. For each dice your opponent rolls there is an 11% chance that Bile Blood will do damage. First it relies on your opponent critting your fighter and then a second dice roll ontop of that. The majority of your warband is defence 4 already so in the situation where you are being attacked, it is far more likely that your opponent misses with a couple of dice then hits with several crits which would be necessary to make this reaction worthwhile. 

Witherlord

Points per Wound Stat – Damage per attack calculated on a weighted damage average assuming 25% of fighers are D3, 50% are D4 and the rest are D5+. Graveguard are 12.7 as the most efficient unit in the game, Stormfiends are around 20, the skaven deathmaster is sitting at around 25. Anything less then 25 puts the fighter in the top 30% of all fighters in the game and are considered very efficient in terms of damage output vs the points you are investing.

With it's good damage profile and solid 20 wounds, the Witherlord is overall a decent hero considering its your only choice in-faction. It has a very respectable DPA4 (Damage per attack hitting on 4+) of  8.33 which puts most chaff units within it's killing range and the mere threat of huge damage from the Lethal Injection is enough to give opponents something to think about when they try to play around him. A fighter is only allowed to use one action per activation so I have given some potential scenarios below along with the best abilities to use:

Ensnaring Strike vs Rampage

Given that Ensnaring strike is only an additional attack action with a net ability which most of the time won't see any use given the Witherlord's already high damage potential of average 24 wounds on a triple attack, the additional move and attack from Rampage will always be better to use.

Lethal Injection vs Onslaught

This one depends on the target defence;

• If they are defence 3 and you get to attack twice, always Onslaught unless you have a 5/6 triple (netting 25 damage vs 29-32 damage on a 5/6 Injection triple).
• If they are defence 4, Lethal Injection is better if you have a triple 4/5/6 (20.83 damage on Onslaught vs 21.67-26.67 damage through the Injection).
• If they are defence 5, Lethal injection only works on 6s but its always better to use it over Onslaught due to effectively 'always critting' with your extra Injection attacks (16.67 damage vs 17.50-21.67 Injection damage).

The figures on the table in the picture above cover a single attack and a Lethal Injection action where you almost always want to use it if it's available to you (the exception being if you only have a triple 1 in which case it's better to use a simple Onslaught for +1 attack).

Lethal Injection vs Rampage

Always Rampage unless you have a triple 6 for the injection and the target has 3 or 4 defence which allows your Injection to hit on 4s or 5s.

It is worth noting that a double move action followed by a Lethal Injection on a defence 3-4 target is a very valid play if you have a high enough triple. This gives the Witherlord a very good threat range of 9" from his starting point. He is probably the only fighter you would really want to use Gruesome Harvest on – try to go for a chaff unit you are confident the base damage from your Slasher Hook can kill and use Gruesome Harvest for your big triple 6 Injection play next turn.

Bloated Ones

Bloated Ones are your heavy hitters of the warband. The very good damage profile at comparatively not a lot of points makes them extremely efficient at 17.4 and 21 points per wound respectively. There are arguments to be made around which of the two is the better fighter but I would recommend taking a mix if you can as the two builds, whilst similar, can achieve different things depending on the target fighters.

Nets vs Claws

The Hooked Net is effectively an extra attack that always hits on a 3+ doing 3-6 damage which is better then your normal attacks which for the most part will be hitting on a 4+ at base 2 damage. In the event that you only get to attack once (when you do a move-attack action for example), its always better to have nets over claws. Their damage is very similar against defence 4 fighters but when you need to wound something that is defence 5+, the extra attack hitting on a 3+ is better then an attack hitting on your base skill.

Nets vs Onslaught

Similarly, if you only get to attack once, the Hooked Net is an extra attack that always hits on a 3+ doing 3-6 damage which is better then your normal attacks so its always better to have nets over claws.

Nets vs Onslaught when attacking twice

Always Onslaught unless you are wounding on 5s, in which case the nets are a better option. Ofcourse, if you are bringing your standard Raker Claw Bloated Ones, then you always onslaught for the increased damage.

Slashing Attack vs Onslaught

Normally, abilities like Slashing attack are generally never worth the triple as a standard Onslaught is better for damage against most targets due to the high base and crit damage of the claws. However, the range of 3” on the Slashing Attack makes the ability an interesting prospect as a bloated one has the toughness and wounds to run into a group of chaff fighters, survive, and have very good reach with the extra Slashing Attack damage.

Carrion Catchers

Carrion Catchers are probably the least effective units in the warband; They are less points efficient then Bloated Ones and do about half the damage for only a 20% discount. They are also less points efficient then Mirefolk outcasts at almost twice the price so I wouldn’t take them over either of the other two options. You do however, get two in the base set and they do have a little nuance with their 2" range allowing for a 6" threat range on their attacks.

Ensnaring Strike vs Rampage

Given that Ensnaring strike is only an additional attack action with a net ability which most of the time won't see any use given both the triple attack and the additional move from Rampage. Given this, it's always better to equip your Carrion Catchers with Impalers for the extra damage instead of the Snatcher Hook.

Onslaught vs Blowpipes

Because they are generally better, the one attack, double stat here in the section above is for Blowpipes. If you only get to attack once, its always better to use your double on blowpipes instead of onslaught due to the blowpipe effectively being 2x attacks that always hit on 4s with 2 damage. If you get to attack twice then it’s always better to use Onslaught due to the better damage of both the Snatcher Hook and Impaler.

Mirefolk Outcasts

Mirefolk Outcasts are the chaff units of your warband. Which flavour you take depends on the local meta you are facing and also how many points you have leftover. Nowadays I prefer shields due to the bigger amount of strength and defence 4 in the game and better crit fishing opportunities. This also allows them to perform their role as blockers a little more effectively so that on average they will be wounded on 4s and 5s instead of on 3s.

Blowpipes vs Onslaught

Its worth noting that the DPA4 (double) stats above are for Blowpipes. It’s always more effective to use the double on blowpipes then +1 attack (on a single or double attack) due to the blowpipe effectively being 2x extra attacks that always hit on 4s with 2 damage.

Allies and Monsters

Rotmire Creed are all movement 4 so can really benefit from a fast moving, hard hitting unit to act almost as a distraction from your high damage Bloated Ones and Witherlord. A few examples might be the Blissbringer with its very high base speed and boosts to its damage from abilities, or the Varanguard with it's all-round excellent stats. Another interesting option might be the Fomoroid Crusher with great offensive and defensive stats. Being able to force your opponent to deal with a Crusher running through their Warband is a great way to give some breathing space for the rest of your fighters to take down their targets.

Taking this idea to the extrame would be to bring a monster. Both the Witherlord and the Bloated Ones have good damage, and Outcast are cheap enough chaff so if you wanted to double down on that you could bring a monster and still have a functional warband. Some good options are the Cygor due to its Hurl Masonry ability which would give the warband some very good ranged options or the Ghorhon, even if only for its very high damage and being one of the few monsters that can beat out a Chimera if you win the activation war.

Sample Warband Lists

The first list is what I took to Warhammer World's last event. It has 7 fighters so about average in its amount of activations, good damage from the 3x Bloated Ones, Witherlord and the Mindstealer which put the majority of the Warband at 2/5 damage and and the ability to chew through opposing chaff units quite easily. It's also not very triple hungry so it allows me to save my dice as doubles for nets, onslaught, etc. The Mindstealer was included for a couple of reasons; It's generally good stats, movement and net through the Telepathic Threatening ability makes for a flexible fighter that I can be relatively sure will survive the battle, and a clutch quad from it's charm ability gives a backup plan against key opposing fighters that I might need to deal with.

The second list was suggested by TheSaltySea over on the Warcry Discord and on his YouTube. It is still 7 fighters so it has a decent amount of activations but this time it also includes either one of the aforementioned Ghorhon or Cygor, again for the ranged ability or threat to enemy Chimeras.