Revisiting The Scourge

In the first Warhammer 40,000: Conquest War Pack re-review I mentioned one of the main draws of the Living Card Game format is the slowly growing card pool that is expanding with new releases introduced at regular interviews. I’m going to continue the re-evaluation of the cards we’ve seen so far. After having reviewed the card in the game’s first War Pack, The Howl of Blackmane, it only makes sense to continue on with the second set of cards released. Today I’m going to look at the second War Pack, The Scourge.

Chaos

We start things off with Ku’gath Plaguefather and his signature squad. The arrival of this plague infested warlord opened up a different play style that focuses on attrition and survival opposed to the fragile aggro game that Chaos had previously been playing. His ability to move damage from himself not only meant he can survive longer than almost any other warlord in the game, but also that he can pick off select units in combat. It’s noteworthy that his ability doesn’t have to target the unit he is attacking, and that the damage moved isn’t assigned, and as a result cannot be shielded. He was very exciting at first but may have suffered from what could be called “little brother syndrome”. After his introduction Ku’gath didn’t see much widespread play. The general opinion was that Zarathur, High Sorcerer was the better choice. Ku’gath is beginning to see a resurgence, showing up at National Championships around the world and appearing in some very creative new deck builds. (If you are curious, go look for the most recent version of Sam Mann’s “Dirty Baker’s Dozen” decklist.)

imageThe tools at Ku’gath’s disposal require finesse, but can be very powerful. First we get four copies of Ku’gath’s Nurglings as his signature army unit. This army provides a double edged blade giving both interesting control but the possiiblity to severely hamper your own game. Thankfully, due to Ku’gath’s ability to move damage, this ability will often play toward your long term game of attrition. But once Ku’gath becomes bloodied they can be a tremendous liability. Playing them out early can provide a degree of control over an opponent with lots of mobile units, such as Tau or Eldar, but often times holding them until a key battle can help you break an opponent’s swarm of units coming to battle from HQ and thin out their total forces.

Next in the signature squad we received Vile Laboratory. This signature support combos well with the Nurglings, allowing you to force your opponent into triggering their effect. Its greatest uses though are likely the ability to control the board, allowing you to force command units to be moved or combat units to leave the first planet.

Quite possible the MVP of the signature squad, and a probably contender for best signature attachment, Ku’gath’s squad includes one copy of The Plaguefather’s Banner. This attachment instantly turns Ku’gath into a beast and allows him to survive and compete in the long term attrition game even after he is bloodied, if your opponent can even get him there in the first place. If you think that your opponent has ways of causing you to discard this card from your hand you should strongly consider playing it at your first opportunity, otherwise consider waiting until as late in the deploy phase as possible to put it out to help increase its impact on the game.

027-fetid-hazeFinally we round out the signature squad with two copies of the signature event, Fetid Haze. This event further Chaos’ massive damage game and carries the same costly price tag as events like Warpstorm. While the amount of damage dealt may be less than Warpstorm, Fetid Haze has the advantage of healing your warlord. When you play this event make sure you’re cognizant of the fact it can only damage army units, this means that warlords, tokens and now synapse units will not be affected by the casrd. Any extra damage that can’t be assigned to enemy army units just disappears which isn’t necessarily a bad thing since its still healing Ku’gath. Regardless, make sure you are paying attention when you play this, a Nullify or even some unexpected damage could mean that Ku’gath ends up bloodied if you mistime your Fetid Haze play.

All told, this signature squad has excellent synergy internally and also some reasonable good synergy with the Chaos faction as a whole. I think the fact that he has seemed to be outshone by Zarathur has really been his main failing so far. An enterprising playing who works on their deck and get familiar with the play style of Ku’gath could find themselves being richly rewarded by his ability to play a very different style of game than any other warlord we have seen so far. I need to thank Victor, a player in my local meta, to reopening my eyes to Ku’gath’s real strengths.

Space Marines

This pack didn’t see much exciting for Space Marines, giving the faction the Morkai Rune Priest and the Fenrisian Wolf. Both of these cards provide some interesting possibilities but unfortunately seem to be over costed for what they provide. If you do bite the bullet though and dish out the resources Fenrisian Wolf provides a very interesting counter to a wide variety of abilities such as flying and Honored Librarian, in addition to allowing you to get a jump on damage in the combat phase.

Astra Militarum

imageFor AM we saw a variety of what could be seen as utilitarian but not overly exciting cards. First they get the Iron Guard Recruits. This army unit caused a lot of debate over whether it should replace the Sanctioned Psyker in decks when the Squad first reviewed it. The answer to the debate though is that it shouldn’t because they go in together! The Iron Guard Recruits are such a solid command unit that they add to the over all ability for Astra Militarum and its allying factions to compete in the command game, teamed up with the Psyker it helps build a formidable command presence. This is definitely a staple card for any deck that can take it.

The other card the came out in the pack worth noting is the Inquisitorial Fortress. Though this card is more often then not a telegraphed presence on the table top it provides AM with a strong control piece that can be used in a large number of circumstances. Its definitely a strong consideration for inclusion in any deck that includes the Enginseer Augur and is noteworthy for being one of the few effects in the game to date that can pre-empt the effect of the Gleeful Plague Beast by routing it in the command phase. Originally I was not a huge fan of this card but now I’m really considering the ways I can put this to use in my decks.

Militarum also received the attachment Dozer Blade. While cheap is good and it has a decent effect for its cost, there aren’t enough prominent Vehicle units in the game so far to really warrant its inclusion.

Orks

Next, our fungal green friends got what seemed to be a very solid trio of cards. Attack Squig Herd provides an excellent staple unit for the cost, giving great value in Nazdreg and providing, as Alex put it so eloquently, a “Glorious damage sponge”. This unit hasn’t seen as much play in the game as I think it deserves and is maybe a card that some ork players are just missing out on.

imageDakka Dakka Dakka!, while very, very exciting at first is probably more situational than it originally seemed. While the ability is very powerful against swarms and many command units, and even helps boost some of your own command units and all or your brutal units, exhausting your warlord in the deploy phase has shown to be a tremendous cost. Ultimately because this card has two shield icons it proves to be a solid inclusion, but it is unfortunately the downside means that it isn’t effective as an event too often.

Finally Orks received what might be their most important card to date, the Kustom Field Generator. This card provides what seems to be an almost necessary ability for Nazdreg decks and really just the faction in general. Due to the way indirect damage works this card can result in a number of defensive tricks. You can use it to assign damage to multiple units, allowing for multiple shield cards to be played against what was originally one big attack. You can make excess damage disappear if the indirect damage created is beyond the amount of health you have remaining at that planet among your ork units. Finally in the most basic sense you can just use it to push your Brutal units to the optimal point before attacking. You need to be aware though when play against Zarathur that it will cause extra damage to be added again, and that against Armorbane units it won’t allow you to use shields.

Dark Eldar

imageIn this pack the torturous denizens of Cammoragh received the accursed Klaivex Warleader and the game called Conquest changed forever (or until rotation or a restricted list is introduced). This card is tremendously powerful, providing one of the few pure removal effects from the game. And Klaivex is an effective combat unit to boot. This card is an auto-include in most Dark Eldar decks and its something you should should be aware of whenever your Dark Eldar opponent has four resources in combat.

Dark Eldar also received Soul Seizure in this pack. A very expensive event, Soul Seizure is really only playable in Urien Rakarth decks. When utilized by Urien this card provides a potentially game changing ability depending on what your opponents deck make-up looks like. It’s important to note that the unit put into play with this ability stays under you control until it dies and is then returned to its owner’s discard, meaning it could be a tremendous boost to your board position.

Fortunately for everyone else Bladed Lotus Rifle also came in this pack, evening out the power curve of what Dark Eldar received by being almost irrelevant to the game. Currently it has a few interesting targets, but unfortunately due to Kabalites being small and there not being much variety in the trait it really isn’t worth looking at yet.

Eldar

The Eldar received three cards in this pack, but only one card is worth mentioning, Death From Above. This card plays a role in building towards a strong economic mobile unit game in Baharroth but without his signature units or his general deck style is maybe not worth including in many decks at the moment. The other cards Black Guardians and Dome of Crystal Seers don’t really provide anything of not to Eldar or their allies.

Tau

imageOur scions of the Greater Good also received three cards in this pack. The first card, Bork’an Recruits, provides a strong combat unit to the Tau and its allies. As a two cost warlord groupie it proves to be an excellent unit for its cost, and can be very dangerous played in any of the warlords that have access to the card.

Next, Kau’yon Strike comes as a lynch pin for the Ethereal game plan for Aun’shi. Its two shield icons, low cost, and its very powerful ability means it an almost definite 3-of in any of his decks, though because of its trait specific nature it will likely not see play often in many other decks. This is a definite card to be wary of any time you are playing against the blue menace.

The pack ends with a fizzle with the almost irrelevant Blacksun Filter. At this point this card does not provide much utility and is hard to rationalize for the deck slot. Accompanying this with some other Tau cards we’ve seen may provide for an alternate economic engine, I’m not sure it really stands up in the long run.

 

All told The Scourge provides some really excellent staple cards to the long term health of this game. It is a definite contender for top pack in the cycle, though it does maybe suffer from some strange and complicated rules interactions from the cards it provides. I would strongly consider this as a good buy for any player interested in playing Orks, Dark Eldar, or Chaos.

Pack Rating

Space Marine 2/5
Astra Militarum 2/6
Ork 4/5
Chaos *
Dark Eldar 2/5
Eldar 1.5/7
Tau 2/7

ratings based on power cards out of the faction and ally cards received in the pack
* = signature squad

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