Hobby Update: Rebased Herd Heroes

Leaving 3rd Edition, I had well over 10,000 points of Herd. With the army being folded into the Forces of Nature now though, I am juuust over 6,000 points of legal stuff now. Ouch. Ouch indeed! The edition change has hit them the worst by far of all my armies. About 2,000 points of what remains are Centaurs, including a half dozen various Centaur Chief models, another 2,000 of various trees, Elementals, and several Scorchwing Rimewing units, and the remaining 2,000 points are miscellaneous remaining Herd units and assorted monsters, including 4 rather expensive Beasts of Nature and multiple Chieftains. Overall, Characters are inflating a bunch of these numbers, and the core tax is very difficult to pay.

The Herd's unique roster was nearly completely gutted. Lycans are voided; Gur Panthers and Harpies are voided; and the mediocre tribal offerings have lost the powerhouse Spirit Walkers, ranged Trappers, and even the Tribal Spear units are culled too, despite the new fluff calling the Herd out specifically for knowing the value of "the humble spear." The collection is in a rough spot asI have 3 hordes of Tribal Spears, and these would have been great core units.

All that said, the Guardian Brutes did somehow survive the transition, and the Longhorns are back to their old fighty selves, and most importantly are Core units. Prior to the new Edition being announced I was busy trying to make the Brutes work, and was gearing up for taking the army to our local GT in February. It's probably ill-advised, but the Brutes surviving seems fortuitous, and so that's still the plan, so next up here is some quick(ish) rebasing work for the Herd, transferring over a trio of heroes, to help with the tournament preparations!

The trio. Exploring some options.

The first up is the Chieftain. The Herd was not a very popular army (nor a very competitive one) from what I gathered, and many they played the army seemed to really like the Chieftain with the Horn, which provided Dread and a small Wild Charge aura. This hero often had Wings of Honeymaze for a very mobile nexus to nudge fights in their favor. I hobbied up a special model for this, but he wasn’t quite doing it for me, as Dread and all the Brutal in my list didn’t stack, and Wild Charge was rarely enough to really push me into a strong engagement from the few Speed 6 units that it could actually aid, based on the keyword restrictions at the time. Unfortunately the Herd seems to have been greatly culled in 4th, and has even fewer options than before, but the Chieftain is the only way for me to get the new Guardian Brutes, so I needed to get him ready.

So far he's been good for a foot character. Eight attacks is a lot, and a good mix of CS and TC means he's wounding most things on 2's, if he isn't hindered. I like him so far.

The Druid.

Next up is the Druid. Inspiring seems harder to come by, and despite the price-hike her and Bane Chant still seems like a decent option to have around? A mount might be a better choice, but we'll try to play around in January.  Having a spellcaster around still seems like a good idea for the army.

The Centaur Chief.

The last character up right now is the Centaur Chieftain. A mobile character seems great, and he's got the stats to add in a few damage here and there, which might prove valuable, if he's not hogging an valuable facing slot in an important combat. We'll get to testing soon, and see how all these all do!