Eternal Wardens Skirmish Tactics

Why Play Eternal Wardens

The Eternal Wardens are incredibly beefy. Each of your soldiers is incredibly strong and fairly well protected. While it's not like Grimdark Future's battle brothers in being a massive wall of unbreakable steel, you've got more than enough to keep them alive. Command groups do not exist for the wardens, so while you'll lose on their boosts in combat, you do have enough weapons to cover the gap.

PROS:

• Quality is always at 3+
• Plenty of good armor
• Even your infantry is an absurd Tough 3
• Plenty of casting

CONS:

• Your troops are very expensive and thus you will be lacking activations
• Heroes are very specialized

Wizard Spells

• Terrify (4+): Enemy unit within 12" takes -1 to hit in shooting. Your army is quite vulnerable to getting shot to hell, so you'll be needing it.
• Thunder (4+): One enemy unit within 12" takes 2 AP 2 hits.
• Star Chains (5+): Enemy unit within 18" loses 6" from their charging distance. It's pretty much made to limit charging distance to a very short distance.
• Lightning (5+): One enemy model within 12" takes a single AP 3 hit. It's pretty much only made to snipe out special weapons and command squads Heroes...somewhat too.
• Shock Speed (6+): One friendly unit within 12" can immediately move 6". This gives you a desperate escape button or possibly an easier charge.
• Storms (6+): Two enemy units within 6" take 8 hits each, making this hell for mobs of grunts.

Unit Analysis

Heroes

• Celestial Lord: Your most well-rounded hero. Melee is clearly his focus, as he has Furious and a an open selection of weapons with a bit of a focus in melee. Combined with their many options for mounts and special rules and you pretty much have a one-size-fits-all hero. If you seek some sort of mobility, you'll have to purchase a pair of wings, providing Flying and Ambush.
  • Melee: By default, the celestial lord's hand weapon gives four AP 1 swings, giving you a pretty hefty tool if you don't decide to pick any of the alternative weapons. You can also buy a beast-hound, giving four more attacks and a 18" bubble to stop any Ambush setup.
  • Shooting: Your shooting options aren't quite as vast, but still impressive options. The heavy bolt pistol is a bit on the shorter side, but packs a hefty punch with A2 AP 2. The venator bow is similarly powerful with a better range, but is quite costly. If you're just looking for something to harass enemies from across the board, you can buy a hunting eagle for some Rending hits.
  • Upgrades: The celestial lord has a list of mutually exclusive orders all made to support the folks beside them. The Celestial Beacon is to help Ambush-ready forces by making a 12" bubble that allows any unit to deploy without regard to enemy distances. The Herald Horn gives you the chance to shove a friendly model closer to the enemy, but it's not the most reliable. Relic Banner is the most basic but costliest of upgrades, granting +1 to hit in melee for nearby allies.

• Mage Warden: Your wizard of the lot, and is a good bit weaker to show. This guy only has a hand weapon to fight and with no shooting and a 4+ defense, you wouldn't want this guy to be thrown in the front lines.

Infantry & Cavalry

• Liberator: Absurdly expensive for what's supposed to be your frontline troops...until you notice that this guy's got Tough(3). These guys have a wide selection of weapons so you can be ready for any situation so long as it's not shooting, and buying Ambush can let them overcome that to an extent. In such a case, you'd best focus on their roles as walls with the combat coming second if you keep them stock. These are also the only unit that can be used as a command group.
  • Weapons: If the hand weapon just doesn't cut it (and at 2A each, they're not exactly lacking), then you've got options. Cheapest among them all are the hammers, which add AP(1). Halberds similarly add Rending. Spears provide Phalanx, making this burly mob of armored bozos into a right pain. Great weapons add AP(2) for twice the cost of a hammer. Dual wielding hand weapons and hammers also ramp up the units cost by a considerable margin. Most expensive of the lot are the greatsword for a flurry of attacks or the greathammer for a can-crunching AP(3).

• Sequitur: Dropped to a 4+ defense, but Combat Stance can mitigate that by either granting +1 to defense or +1 to AP each turn they're in melee. Because of that, you're going to have to be more careful with how you play them.
  • Weapons: Your options for weapons are much slimmer than what the liberation squad has. You can grab a hammer if you just want to break armor, but you can instead pick up a greathammer if you really want something dead.

• Evocator: Equipped with sword and staff to add Poison to their attacks - pretty good trick if played right, but it'd be a gamble since you're still at 4+ defense. If you buy a great staff it'll double their output. You can also buy Wizard so you have a means to cast outside of heroes.

• Decimator: Heavily armed bruisers and they mean it. Their shock axe gives 3 attacks and with Furious you'll be doing more than most could hope for at a comparable pricetag. That said, charging is the only thing they're good at, so you need to clear the way for them to make the charge. You can buy a star mace (A4 AP(2) Rending) if you think you'll be needing to nail heavy armor.

• Retributor: Essentially what happens if you give a decimator a shock hammer for AP(2). They can also buy Ambush for surprise assaults, which might be worth considering since they offer little else that a liberator might have offered. Like with the decimator, you can also grab a star mace to add a few more swings.

• Protector: Stealth gives these guys much more protection than others. The fact that they have a shock halberd with Rending is really just icing. You'll want to take them so you can buffer against shooting. Again, you can buy star maces for better heft.

• Hunting Hawk: Poorly armored, but they're relatively cheap and can fly to wherever they need to be so they can tie up the enemy. Don't expect them to do anything else though.

• Beast-Hound: Essentially cover a similar role to the hawk, though they hold up better. They get more attacks and they have a 4+ defense. More important is their Howl ability, which denies Ambush units anywhere within 12" of them. Thanks to being Fast, this allows them to be a much more mobile zone of denial when compared to an order lord with their own hound.

• Judge: Equipped with a bolt crossbow, a rather short-ranged weapon that packs a punch with AP(1). If you're more keen on range, then you can instead equip them with the bolt bow for free; they get better range but lose out on a shot. You can also buy either the thunder crossbow or bolt bow based on whether you plan on hitting bruisers or mobs.

• Castigator: The aether greatbow gives slightly better range and AP(2), which is a decent get for mid-range but suffers from any further since they lack any alternatives. In fact, their only upgrade is a pet beast-hound. This isn't so bad, since it still has Howl for protection against ambushers. Just be sure to defend them against less-concealed threats since they're at 4+ defense.

• Raptor: The cyclone crossbow provides a bunch of attacks where the Judge and Castigator squad tend to focus more on quality shots. That's not to say that such is beyond them, not when they could instead get free precision crossbows for a bundle of Sniper shots.

• Prosecutor: While the shock javelin doesn't sound so hot compared to all the crossbows, being able to fly over and blast the enemy has its own charm, especially when you buy a shock trident to grant a bigger punch. If you want more shots, you'll need to buy sky hammers to double the output but lose out on AP. Melee, unfortunately, is limited to merely hand weapons and a costly option for either a greatsword, greathammer or greataxe depending on what you want to kill.

• Hunter: Unexpectedly, you've got scouts. Scout and Stealth give them a good combination so they can shoot as soon as they can since their bolt pistol has a rather short range. If you're going for melee, you might want to reconsider with only one attack - thankfully the handaxe is a cheap way to bolster that.

• Gryph Rider: Pretty tanky light cavalry, gifted with Fast and Strider for max mobility. This guy can buy either a bolt pistol or a shock javelin so you can shoot away while riding around. Simply put, making them charge is more of a desperate act than it would for most.

List Building & Tactics

General Advice

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Tactics

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See Also

• Eternal Wardens
• Eternal Wardens Skirmish Quickplay Armies
• Age of Fantasy: Skirmish