Grave Ghoul

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Grymkin Logo.jpg

Grave Ghoul
Grymkin Solo

Grave ghouls have a morbidly playful attitude toward the dead, finding a fascination with corpses without truly understanding death. They are especially drawn to the fresh dead, and their actions resemble a shadow play of the undertakers from folktales. They enjoy using their shovels to unearth bodies to display them to their peers or partially burying other grymkin before they have actually expired. Whether seen driving Death Knell wagons or searching among old battlefields, grave ghouls are creepily terrifying and quite dangerous if confronted. They are particularly aggravated by undead, which they feel driven to return to a less animated existence.

Basic Info

Grave Ghoul
Missing Info
Grave Ghoul.jpg
COST {{{cacost}}}
UNIT SIZE {{{casize}}}
FA {{{cafa}}}
Warcaster 0
BASE Medium
SPD 5
STR 7
MAT 6
RAT N/A
M.A. N/A
DEF 12
ARM 16
CMD 7
ESSENCE {{{essence}}}
FOCUS N/A
FURY N/A
THRS N/A
HP 5
F. Field N/A
WJP {{{wjp}}}
WBP {{{wbp}}}
IHP {{{ihp}}}
FA 2
UNIT SIZE N/A
COST 4
N/A
N/A
N/A
Warcaster 1
COST N/A
N/A
Understanding
the Statblock

Abilities

  • Pathfinder symbol.jpg Pathfinder
  • Body Snatcher - When a living or undead model is destroyed within 5˝ of this model, this model gains the destroyed model’s corpse token. This model can have up to 5 corpse tokens at any time.
  • Grave Digger (★ Action) - RNG 3. Target friendly non-warlock Faction model. If the model is in range, it becomes dug in. (Dig In - While dug in, a model gains cover, does not suffer blast damage, and does not block LOS. A model remains dug in until it moves, is placed, or is engaged.)
  • Knowledge of the Damned - When a model in this model's command range makes an attack or damage roll, this model can spend a corpse token to make that model reroll the dice roll. Each roll can only be rerolled once as a result of Knowledge of the Damned.
  • Prowl - While this model has concealment, it gains stealth.
  • Undertaker - This model gains an additional die on attack and damage rolls against undead models.

Weapons

Theme Forces

Thoughts on the Grave Ghoul

Grave Ghoul in a nutshell

The Grave Ghoul is one of the most powerful support models in Grymkin, indeed in the game. Knowledge of the Damned is an incredible ability, which can be used defensively to punish enemy aggression, or offensively to make your already hard hitting models hit even harder. On top of all that, the Grave Ghoul is affordable (at 4 points/free slot), and has very decent personal output. A massively powerful piece which will almost always be seen as a two-of in every Bump in the Night list.

Combos & Synergies

The Grave Ghoul is a fairly straightforward model, get it within 7" of the frontline and use Knowledge of the Damned to swing the battle in your favour. However to do so, it first needs corpses, and it also needs to stay alive.

Getting Corpses

  • Dread Rots are an obvious choice for feeding corpses to the Grave Ghoul. They are cheap enough to not care about losing a couple, and when they do engage they can feed any corpses they happen to collect back to the Ghoul.
  • Hollowmen are another obvious choice, being as they are able to return dudes to their unit without spending any resources other than activations.
  • However the king of Grave Ghoul corpse collection is none other than the Mad Caps. The trick has to do with how their Cask Imps are spawned, taking advantage of the molotov cocktail attack of the grunts.
    • 1) Spawn in your d3 Cask Imps base-to-base with one of the Mad Cap grunts, far enough away that it won't hurt the Mad Cap itself.
    • 2) Have the Mad Cap grunt attack one of the Cask Imps, hopefully killing itself and all the Cask Imps (plus the other grunt or a Malady Man's Monkey if needed).
    • 3) Return the Cask Imp grunts to the unit with the Twilight Sisters.
    • Congrats! You are now generating d3+2 corpses on your turn, without any interaction from your opponent needed. This is extremely useful on the first two turns of the game, allowing you to take your opponent's alpha with three or four corpses per Ghoul.

Using Knowledge of the Damned

  • The best targets for Knowledge of the Damned are those who would otherwise struggle to either hit or deal enough damage to be relevant. Both Dread Rots & Hollowmen fall in this category.
  • Piggybacks are a notable model to pair with the Grave Ghoul thanks to their already impressive ability to manipulate your opponent's dice. Additionally, they often struggle to hit back once they are engaged.
  • Neigh Slayers generally don't need the help of a Grave Ghoul (they're too soft to take a hit, and are already good at dealing damage themselves), though having one around to collect their inevitable corpses is always a plus.
  • Rattlers & the Malady Man's Monkey are especially notable options, as they provide ample opportunities for offensive rerolls.
  • The Wanderer with Star Crossed up is positively unfair.

Keeping the Ghoul Alive

  • The Grave Ghoul already has an inbuilt piece of defensive tech, which it can use on itself or another model providing it defensive coverage.
  • Piggybacks, Rattlers, Clockatrices, and Cage Ragers are all good screening models which are notably good at abusing Knowledge of the Damned.
  • Zevanna Agha, the Fate Keeper, the King of Nothing, and the Wanderer all have powerful defensive spells which can prevent the Grave Ghoul from being shot off the table. The Dreamer would also be on this list, however her defensive spell does the exact same thing as Dig In (namely provide Cover).

Drawbacks & Downsides

  • The Grave Ghoul has to be within 5" to collect and 7" to use corpses. This often means you are collecting your own corpses, and only using them for your ranged attacks or for models engaged in melee.
    • It also means the Grave Ghoul has to be very near the frontline to be maximally useful, and almost certainly within your opponent's threat ranges.
    • Beware of sprays, especially boostable ones. No amount of corpses will let you reroll an opponent's boosted Spray 8 attack.
  • Despite being able to provide itself Cover, the Ghoul's stats still make it very killable at range. Indeed, it is often much easier to snipe the Ghoul from 12"+ away (outside the threat range of his aura) than it is to try and engage it in melee.
  • You'll almost always end up paying the 4 points for this guy instead of getting it as a free option, thanks to more expensive free options provided by Bump in the Night.
  • It's a typical Grymkin model, which means it only threats 10".
  • Rerolls do not stack with rerolls, meaning Knowledge of the Damned cannot be paired with Zevanna Agha, the Fate Keeper's Divinator ability. This is something of an upside however, as it does mean you don't have to be spending precious corpses on Agha's battlegroup.
  • The Grave Ghoul will almost always be close to the action, meaning it will suck up corpses which would otherwise be picked up by a Death Knell. This anti-synergy means it is often impossible to go full FA on the Ghouls and run a DK (though it is certainly possible, such as by stacking a big unit of Dreads in the middle of the table equidistant to the three corpse collectors).

Tricks & Tips

  • It's often advisable to let a handful of your own guys die when your opponent charges in. This will fuel up the Grave Ghoul, allowing you to use rerolls to blunt your opponent's additional attacks.
  • Knowledge of the Damned works on both attack and damage rolls, meaning you can use it twice per attack if need be.
    • This is especially relevant when charging, especially the Dread Rot's weapon master charge.
  • Yes Knowledge of the Damned can be used on Star Crossed. Yes it is dumb.
  • Attacks which will generate a corpse (if successful) allow you to freely use Knowledge of the Damned at least once. This is why Berserkers (Rattler, Malady Man) synergise so well with the Grave Ghoul.

Other

Trivia

  • Released at Adepticon (2019.03)
  • The driver of the Death Knell is a Grave Ghoul, which thematically & mechanically fits.
  • Visually & thematically the Grave Ghoul appears inspired by the Backwater Gospel short film [1].

Other Grymkin models

Grymkin Logo.jpg       Grymkin Index       (Edit)
Battlegroup
Warlocks

The Child - The Dreamer - The Heretic - The King of Nothing - The Wanderer - Old Witch 3
Arcana
Warlock Attachment: Baron Tonguelick

Warbeasts

Lesser: Crabbit

Light: Frightmare - Gorehound - Rattler

Heavy: Cage Rager - Clockatrice - Skin & Moans

Gargantuan: Slaughterhouse

Units, Solos, & Battle Engines
Units

Dread Rots - Hollowmen - Mad Caps - Malady Man - Murder Crows - Neigh Slayers - Piggybacks - Twilight Sisters

Solos

Baron Tonguelick, Lord of Warts - Cask Imp - Defiled Archon - The Four Horseymans - Glimmer Imp - Grave Ghoul - Gremlin Swarm - Isiah, Dread Harvester - Lady Karianna Rose - Lord Longfellow - Trapperkin - Weird Wendell - Witchwood

Battle Engines Death Knell
Theme Forces Minions
Dark Menagerie - Bump in the Night Refer to Category: Grymkin Minion
This index was last updated: 2021.08

Rules Clarifications

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Rules Clarification : Pathfinder      (Edit)

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Rules Clarification : Body Snatcher      (Edit)

  • You can collect corpses from Brute Thralls.
  • You do not need LOS to the destroyed models.
  • If there are multiple models eligible for collecting a corpse token and you need to determine the closest, then you measure to the Necrosurgeon, not to the Stitch Thralls.
    • The Stitches don't count as "models eligible for collection" - they merely extend the range the Necrosurgeon can collect from.
  • A Stitch that dies in the same attack as a Thrall (caught in the same AOE for instance) may collect the corpse token, because the Stitch Thrall model is still on the table when both of them reach the "destroyed" stage.
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Rules Clarification : Grave Digger      (Edit)

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Rules Clarification : Dig In and/or Foxhole Buddy     (Edit)

  • Unlike nearly every ability in the game, Dig In doesn't have a "expires after one turn/round" clause.
  • Thus you could spend your action on turn 1 to Dig In and (assuming you don't move or get engaged) stay Dug In on turn 2 and use your action to make ranged attacks.
  • Being pushed counts as moving. (Locked thread)
  • If a model with Dig In is added to play or returned to play, it does not count as "starting the game". It can't be put into play already Dug In. (Infernal Ruling)
  • You can use Dig In while you're in someone's back arc. You are engaging, but not engaged.
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Rules Clarification : Knowledge of the Damned      (Edit)

  • If both players have a Knowledge of the Damned, then only one player gets to use it. The active player chooses whether to use it first. (Infernal Ruling)
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Rules Clarification : Prowl and/or Just a Tree?     (Edit)

  • Whether you can trigger this ability is a bit awkward;
    • As long as you have concealment you get Stealth ... even if the attacker ignores concealment (such as with Hunter).
    • If you're standing in a cloud, and the attacker "ignores clouds for LOS" (such as Bird's Eye) you get Prowl/Tree.
    • If you're standing in a cloud, and the attacker "ignores clouds completely" (such as Alchemical Mask) you don't get it. (Infernal Ruling)
    • Similar for standing in a forest.
  • If a debuff removes Stealth, Prowl/Tree do not reapply stealth... But this ruling is being rechecked. (Infernal Checking)
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Rules Clarification : Stealth      (Edit)

  • Stealth models are not invisible and you can target them - you'll just auto-miss most of the time.
  • You can target them with a charge.
  • You can target them with an AOE, have it auto-miss and scatter, luckily land on top of them anyway, and that will hit them.

Rules Clarification : Undertaker - None yet. (Edit)


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Rules Clarification:  : Magical Damage      (Edit)
(Click Expand to read)

* The "Damage Type: Magical" is not inherited by "secondary" damage from a weapon. That is, stuff like arcs (Electro Leap) or hazards (Scather). (Infernal Ruling)
  • All spells have "Damage Type: Magical" (refer errata).
    • This is inherited by "immediate" secondary damage (such as Eruption of Spines). (Infernal Ruling)
    • and might be inherited by "lingering" secondary damage (see below).
  • If a spell leaves a template in play that does damage to models that walk around in it, then:
    • if it is not described as a hazard it will do magical damage to models that walk around in it. (Example: Razor Wall)
    • if it is a hazard then it will not do magical damage to models that walk around in it. Instead, it does whatever damage type is specified by the spell description. (Example: Breath of Corruption).
    • (Infernal Ruling)
  • If a weapon/spell includes Magic Damage and another kind of elemental damage it will still damage Incorporeal models. Incorporeal models are not affected by the rule "if an attack does multiple types of damage and a model is immune to at least one it is immune to the entire attack."
    The phrase "immune to non-magical damage" should be interpreted as "immune to damage that doesn't include Damage Type: Magical" (not interpreted as "has immunity to Corrosion and Electricity and Cold and etc.")