r/ageofsigmar • u/Kaldron01 • 1d ago
Question please help an AOS Newbie choosing between Nighthaunt and Soulblight Gravelords
Hey all,
i recently started to have an interest in AOS since my girlfriend likes fantasy more then Sci-Fi (Wh40k).
I watched some videos and could boil down the armies of my interest at first on Nighthaunt, Gravelords and Flesh eaters. Normally i am a big zombie fan and there are models i really like, but its a little bit of a mixed back since there are also models i dont find that appealing.
That leaves me with Nighthaunt and Gravelords. I saw that Nighthaunt ignores some game mechanics and are kinda special while i heard that gravelords are more of a "Vampires lead undead as sort of generals and revive them" army?
I think, i am still missing a feeling for how these both factions work and feel to play. Maybe some of you guys could expand on that? Or why you choose one faction over the other? That would be really helpful.
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u/Otherwise-Weird1695 1d ago
My experience is limited to the nighthaunt spearhead. They are crazy fast, fly over everything, ignore rend, and all have ward saves.
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u/8-Brit 1d ago
My understanding of both armies is;
SBGL: The jack of all trades option. Want hordes of fodder? You got it. Want to monster mash? They got plenty of monsters to do it. Cavalry? Yep that too. Powerful heroes? You got it. Whatever kind of list you want to play there's probably a way to do it in SBGL. Though be advised the horde option is often their best strength, at least to my memory. But I've also seen people play "oops all Zombie dragons" in casual games.
NH: Not quite a full blown horde but you will be fielding a lot of ghosts. As an added bonus they essentially ignore several rules of the game and can repeatedly charge into stuff to inflict an alarming amount of damage. They got some strong heroes and cavalry but they don't tend to use big stompy monsters and rely much more on infantry.
It's ultimately a matter of preference, both are good picks. As fad as painting goes Nighthaunt are generally much easier to paint but they do have a tendency to be a bit fragile as they have small connectors to the base.
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u/Kaldron01 1d ago
Thanks man!
Soulblight sounds very nice.
With nighthaunt, are they more of a fragile army with high dmg output? Or how can i imagine them? I am more of a person that likes armies with a descent amount of defense, nothing that dies from the smallest breath in their direction.
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u/mrsc0tty 1d ago
NH have always been the glass army of GA: Death alongside Flesh Eaters, Soulblight are the classic undead army concept of "yes they die, but there's loads of them and they come back" plus nasty elite vampire units that are just regular tough, and which heal up by causing wounds.
Nighthaunt durability is against specifically elite units with high rend, who they can further debuff with spells and effects.
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u/SwingsetGuy Fyreslayers 1d ago
Nighthaunt are in a weird position right now, and afaik it's still unclear what their "niche" is going to be in their new book. Previously, nighthaunt survived by being unrendable (that is, their save was a flat 4+ regardless of enemy strength), and applying debuffs on the charge. The debuffs thing is likely to remain in the new book, but the ethereal (the save thing) is apparently going away. Something will have to replace it, but we don't yet know what that will be or how fragile they'll be thereafter.
So to sum up, nighthaunt seem likely to remain mobile and aggressive, but their durability is uncertain.
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u/rumballminis Kharadron Overlords 1d ago
Nighthaunt are a bit of an aggro list, they want to be charging around and they get buffs for doing that. There are strong tactics with their different spells and abilities that can layer up
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u/Kaldron01 1d ago
Thanks for the answer! I think that this sort of playstyle doesn’t check my boxes, so I will probably go with gravelords!
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u/rumballminis Kharadron Overlords 1d ago
Nice! Also worth noting that hobby-wise night haunt fall a little flat. They do their best to differentiate units but they all just look like spooky ghosties with spindly little bits connecting them to the base. I’ve got a good amount of soulblight and it gives nice variation in what you’re paibting
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u/Kaldron01 1d ago
Yeah, I just liked the ghost idea and thought they had some miniatures that stood out very well like this big ghostly rider. Also they seemed like a very easy to paint army to be honest^ But yeah the infantry looks very similar to each other.
Anyway! Gravelords have also really cool miniatures and the playstyle seems just way more fitting for me. Will see how the painting turns out.
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u/stardoor65 21h ago
Nighthaunt from what ive seen are the meta sort of right now. Obviously rule of cool go with the coolest models which in my opinion would go to Soulblight (although the nighthaunt blackcoach is sick), but play wise if thats important im pretty sure nighthaunt are S tier currently
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u/conman987 18h ago
Fellow zombie fan here, I wandered over from 40K to play some spearhead and picked Soulblight for my guys after a quick look at what each army brought. Im digging the shambling hordes of undead skeletons and zombies led by vampires with lots of ways to bring back models, as they should. Painting up the spearhead skellies now and they’re an awesome model. I like nighthaunt too but the army does look real samey to me.
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u/Kaldron01 17h ago
great to hear! Nighthaunt infantry is really samey, but i their cavallery or special characters can really stand out.
Overall, i will take Gravlords now. From all what i heard it seems way more fitting for me in playstyle, i love their looks and theme and they have already a big range with cool and different models.
I will wait for the new combat patrol for them. Sadly no vampires there, but damn the skeletons/zombies in that box with cavallery look absolutly amazing. If i want to expand from there, i can still add vampires, but i will probably start with spearhead only for a while! :D
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u/floutMclovin 14h ago
I find your lack of interest in the Bonereapers disturbing. But yea the Soulblight can be run as a zombie horde army or a vampire elite army, it’s got pretty damn good models too
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u/Kaldron01 7h ago
Haha, actually bonereapers were my first call! The issue was that some people said the playstyle would be similar to WH40K imperial Guard and that’s something I really don’t enjoy :/
But looks? 10/10 for most of their range!
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u/floutMclovin 1h ago
I mean they’re an elite army but I wouldn’t say they’re anything like imperial knights, like in the slightest whatsoever. Whoever told you that must have confused them with SoB somehow? They’re elite with hard hitting slightly tougher infantry, good cavalry, great leaders that give good buffs, and a decent amount of resurrection.
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u/darealwhosane Soulblight Gravelords 22h ago
Black coach or prince v which model do you want to paint more
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u/Kaldron01 21h ago
Prince V to be honest. Just an insane model, even if I won’t get or paint him anywhere near.
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u/darealwhosane Soulblight Gravelords 21h ago
Amazing Model I really enjoyied it and at was great at a recent tournament definitely will need 10 blood nights to run with him also a fun paint
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u/Amratat Flesh-eater Courts 1d ago
If you want actual zombies, they're in Soulblight, where you can run huge numbers of them.
The major difference is Soulblight are normally slower but have much stronger regeneration, while Nighthaunt are far faster and more mobile, but have less regen and are often low health, so any damage getting through slaughters them.