Hello! Michael here! Today we have our first guest article, submitted by Dan K of Britain, where he goes over his Ironsoul’s Condemnors deck he ran at the Copenhagen Grand Clash this past Saturday. He also gives a quick overview of the event. Thanks to Dan for volunteering to write this!
Without further ado, I’ll let Dan take over!
Copenhagen Grand Clash’25 – The Dark Horse!
I used to play Underworlds a lot during Season 1 and 2 but a certain set of keys and relics made the game extremely not fun for me so I stopped. I was convinced by a friend last February to come back and try again and when he told me about Nemesis and Rivals as formats my interest was piqued.
I came back just before the WHW Grand Clash 2024 where I played Hungering Parasite Crimson Court, as this was pre Frenetic Efforts nerf I spent the whole day trying and failing to charge 4 times a round with Duvalle and finished decidedly less than midtable for my efforts. This was pretty much my approach to the game for quite a while, find something silly, try and break it, fail, find something new and shiny to take my interest.
Then, at some point last year, I met James Waters and Dan Davies (Worlds 2024 participants and thoroughly awesome people). Having access to top players of this calibre on a fortnightly basis really changed how I looked at the game and I started to work on actually getting good (mostly because at 9 out of 10 events I sit down opposite Davies in the final round and he kicks my ass and I wanted to take him down. – I love you Dan but you live rent free in my head and it’s about time you were evicted 🙂)… I even managed to win a couple of WHW events with Skinnerkin.
When Embergard was announced and James and Dan were on the way to worlds, I decided this edition I was going to shoot for a Golden Ticket. Both of them convinced me I have the ability to do it so it was time to get serious. I took Thundrik’s to a solid placing at the WHW grand clash losing my only game of the day to Valentin (who went on to win the entire thing) so that really got me hyped for ticket potentiality.
When Jonas announced they had a ticket for the Copenhagen Grand Clash I immediately decided to give it a shot. I also managed to wrangle a posse together from the Thunderworlds playgroup (those of us that play at WHW) and an invasion was planned!
The Warband / The Deck:
After playing Emberstone Thundrik for a solid three months before the WHW event I wanted to play something a little less thinky and more “roll dice / kill stuff” for a while. I settled on Ironsoul as one of my favourite parts of the hobby is taking a warband and turning into something entirely different. My Thundrik’s are Skaven, my Domitan’s are vampires and my Ironsoul’s are Brettonians. I loved how they came out after they were painted so I was pretty set that I was going to play them in Copenhagen.
Fighter cards:
Ironsoul’s Condemnors are one of the most accurate melee warbands. Two fighters have what I like to call the “Stormcast Special” (3 hammers, 2 damage) and Brodus can get a 3rd dice from the warscroll for a mighty 3 damage. So they hit well and they hit hard (more on this later). The two shield carrying fighters get 2 def when they inspire and Brodus gets a 3rd attack dice. They can take a beating as well as throw one out.
Warscroll:
Inspire: They inspire by rolling crits. Which sounds very random. While their inspire condition is entirely luck based, you can try and fish for crits with a variety of power cards in the game so it’s not overly difficult to do so. Since Critical Effort scores off rolling a crit in an attack, it didn’t sound too bad to me to inspire off the same kind of roll. I think you can realistically expect at least two fighters to inspire over the course of a game.
Bulwark Against the Dark: This is the “always on” ability that you get. If a fighter has no move or charge tokens, your fighter cannot be driven back. I was very much unimpressed by this as I was planning on playing Crash Aggro with the warband so I would be picking up charge tokens with every activation. It felt like it “might” be useful every now and then… I was about to find out I was very VERY wrong. This is actually an incredibly powerful ability and came into play in most games, I’ll cover standout instances later.
Punishing Blow: +1 Attack dice for the guy that swings for 3 damage – sure why not! Nothing bad about this at all.
Aethericaly Charged Shield: So there’s a reason Bladecatcher is forsaken. Turning off grievous at will is super powerful. Timing here is key. The active player must make any “after picking a weapon” choices first, so that means the attacker has to play Twist the Knife BEFORE you decide to use this ability. Not only are they now not killing a guy they thought they were, they lost arguably one of the better ploys in their deck. Brodus can’t use it sadly which means he tends to be first up against the wall on your opponents target priority, but if you can put the other two into scary positions they can leverage this incredibly well.
Aetherically Charged Maul: +1 range to an attack. Solid ability for a warband that charges out on activation 3. If you get driven back and the enemy doesn’t overrun you can lob a cheeky attack back at them in activation 4 from 2 hexes away.
Deck:
Decklink for anyone who wants to follow.
Blazing Assault is just a given for anybody playing aggro. Blazing + X is just head and shoulders better than Reckless Fury + X. Blazing has extra dice on attacks, TWO sources of unconditional grievous, cleave, a whole stack of positional effects, and some tech choices as well. Specifically Scream of Anger. Scream was a card that immediately got my attention when Embergard came out and I have wanted to build a deck that could use it well for a while. It’s one of those cards that look bad on the surface but hides some really interesting plays, why on earth would you want to take 2 damage? I’ve seen it put to good use in Mollog, he has enough health to take it, and occasionally it can push his inspire but I wanted to do something else. Welcome to the party… Edge of the Knife.
Ever since Edge of the Knife was released I have believed that elite warbands can use it just as well as hordes. It’s very much mainly a tool for horde warbands but there are some toys in it that elites can leverage a LOT better. I started out with Kainan (Mobbed! on Kainan turns him into an absolute blender and is hilarious, but I couldn’t wrap my head around Mortek Advance in time for the event to use it well enough). I then remembered Scream. “Take 2 damage, remove a charge token”, OR in this case “temper a fighter remove a charge token”.
It’s worth noting at this point that I I think Edge really only works with a three fighter elite warband and only when paired with Scream of Anger. Even against a heavily passive hold deck, your opponent is going to have to attack at least one of your fighters if you put them on tokens. You can then use Scream and Dark Horse to temper the other two which makes Trial of the Tempered surprisingly easy to score.
Power Cards
(I ended up only running five of the red Edge of the Knife cards):
Mobbed! – Is incredibly powerful. It doesn’t specifically say melee (more on this in round 3). It makes a 3 dice attack “anything but swords” and INCREDIBLY accurate. On the new “smaller” board there are not many instances where it’s not getting used multiple times a game.
Dark Horse – This is crucial to making the deck work. Your opponent having a bad dice game is almost as bad for you as it is to them as it means your fighters aren’t tempering so you can’t score your objectives.
A note on Running Riot. A lot of people were asking at the event if I was using this to temper a fighter and the answer is no. It needs at least one other fighter to be tempered to use it. Which means you now need two cards to make it work (Riot + Dark Horse/Scream) AND a successful attack. In an elite build, it’s just hard to justify the space when ploy space is at so much of a premium already.
Death Throes – This is a very solid defensive card. -2 attack dice when attacking a tempered fighter. If your opponent is trying to focus down 1 fighter at a time this is a huge speed bump to get over.
Opportunity Strikes – Another source of extra attack dice? What’s not to like? It’s locked behind tempered, but you can use it immediately after Scream of Anger for great effect.
Spiteful Traps – This was in every way the MVP card of the day and I’d argue the best card in the entire Rivals deck. I was expecting there to be a heavy Jaws meta still as Edge didn’t seem to have changed anything with its release. GIving Krojax a move token so he can’t charge gave me every reason I needed to include this and it was useful in every single game I played. I’ll cover the best in the breakdown.
Objectives:
These largely fall into two categories – hitting stuff / being tempered. While the Blazing Assault red cards are phenomenal, the yellow ones… not so much.
Hitting Stuff: Fields of Blood, Branching Fate, Critical Effort, Get Stuck In, Keep Choppin, Calm Before The Storm, Aggressive Defender, Double Team, Annihilation (yes, you read that right, no it’s not a typo).
Tempered: Power in Numbers, All In, Risky Position. Trial of the Tempered.
Pretty much all of the hitting stuff objectives take care of themselves. With the no driveback warscroll ability Double Team is a lot easier to set up. The head scratcher for most people is Annihilation. This was card 13 in the deck and found its way in as most people will assume you’re not running it because it’s “bad”. When that happens they make riskier plays in round three which you can capitalize on. I managed to score it in two games and missed it in three others by 1 successful attack. It was not until the very VERY last game of the day that my opponent ran a fighter off into the middle of nowhere but I was already not in a position to score it so I took the free “soft” elimination of a heavy hitting piece.
Tempered reliant objectives ended up being a lot easier to score than I thought. Trial of the Tempered was pretty much untested before the event but I was confident in my Scream of Anger / Dark Horse strategy that my fighters would not be the problem and this was pretty much true. I scored this in pretty much every game except my final round against Gardeners where a wounded Phlegmus just refused to take his additional damage.
The Event!:
Alright, enough preamble, let’s get on with it.
Round 1 vs Rasmus Ryberg (Morgok’s Krushaz – Blazing Assault / Reckless Fury)
Aggro! Straight out of the gate we get an aggro matchup, this is excellent news as it means he will be hitting my fighters so Tempering should be easy.
Round 1 activation 1 sees an ‘Ardskull run into Ironsoul for a cheeky 2 damage and we’re off to the tempered races.
I respond by charging Thugg with Ironsoul, who happens to be close enough to hit Morgok with Spiteful Traps which essentially eliminates the big man from combat this round and shuts down a handful of Reckless Fury charge related cards.
Rasmus struggled to stabilise after having his biggest hitter removed from the game and a cleave toting inspired Ironsoul started to take the orcs apart. I managed to spread my attacks well across the warband to avoid inspiring the orcs early which also left him on the back foot.
Missed the Annihilation as Ardskull refused to die and range 2 means he doesn’t have to stand next to my fighters and trade blows. Final Score 16-10.
1-0
Round 2 vs Heikki Haverinen (Grandfather’s Gardeners – Emberstone Sentnel’s / Pillage and Plunder)
I’m just going to take a moment to draw attention to how much of an absolutely awesome dude Heikki is. Seriously, if you’re at the same event as Heikki, the best thing that can happen to you is that he sits down in the other chair. The two of us are about to have (for me at least) the single best game of Underworlds I have had… pretty much ever. This was a masterpiece in play, counter play, dodge and weave.
Despite how awesome this game was to play, I have a hazy recollection of it. Neither one of us made any overtly bad plays, both of us had reasonable dice throughout without any spikes in luck one way or the other. I managed to temper all three fighters using Scream of Anger to score my tempered objectives. I threw away Trial of the Tempered early because “Gardeners” which would in hindsight be a bad choice as I did actually manage to do 2 damage to all the Nurgle boys. Ultimately the game came down to me having not seen Strip the Realm so playing to deny it which left me on the 4 and 5 token giving me a tie break win. Heikki then informed me there was no Strip. /much fist waving from both parties. Final Score 13-13.
2-0
Round 3 vs Daniele Margarone (Thricefold Discord – Blazing Assault / Countdown to Cataclysm)
Another aggro match! And this was just a straight up brawl for 2 rounds, every single fighter from every warband was adjacent to at least 1 or 2 others in a massive aggro ball in the centre of the table. Turn 1 action 1 I handbrake turn Ironsoul into Vashtiss for some quick damage and lock out Vexmor with Spiteful Traps. Round 2 and Vexmor goes on a rampage killing Tavian and doling out damage to temper my warband. Vile Temptations removed a Great Strength and I got a Hurled Weapon in return. This is where Mobbed! Really came into its own as Lascivyr was running around vulnerable. This was about to be both hilarious and ultimately annoying. Trying to decide what to do I suddenly remembered my gifted range 3 attack, a quick double check of mobbed and a realisation I could still use it at range meant Lascivyr was done for, alas it was not to be, 2 hits into a 2 def and the slippery Slaaneshy weasel survived and promptly spent the rest of the game at least 4 hexes away from everyone denying Annihilation. A dead Vashtiss and Vexmor however pushed my glory total higher. Final Score 18-17.
3-0
Round 4 vs Troels Panduro (Farstriders – Blazing Assault / Countdown to Cataclysm)
This was one of those games where, despite his best efforts, the dice had other ideas for Troels. I aggressively invaded Troel’s half of the board to limit his warscroll abilities and leverage cleave on an inspired Ironsoul and Sharpened Points on Brodus. Round three saw Ironsoul charged by the last remaining Farstrider, however, being unable to be driven back meant she could leverage duellist and sidestep to jump into and out of combat leaving poor Swiftblade with only a crossbow to rely on before succumbing to the cleave onslaught. Final score 27-13
4-0
Round 5 vs Frederick Hummelhur (Zarbag’s Gitz – Countdown to Cataclysm / Pillage and Plunder)
I had done fairly well to avoid Zarbag up to this point but it was, alas, inevitable. Round 1 first activation Sirk comes bounding over to Brodus for 3 damage and promptly bounces off as he refuses to be driven back. Brodus responds by using his now activated tempered status to use Opportunity Strikes and his Warscroll ability to tear the cheeky little bugger in half. Problem 1 solved! I slowly take down goblins and try to maintain a kill schedule of 3 dead out of 4 activations which goes quite well. Ironsoul starts round 2 on a treasure token and Strip the Realm promptly goes in the bin as Frederick knows he has no way of removing her if I decide to leave her there. Problem 2 solved!.Throughout this entire game the underdog token is moving back and forth like a yo-yo and there is never a point where either one of us can get the upper hand. The game ultimately comes down to an oversight on my part throwing Scream of Anger away in round 1. I didn’t want to be too wounded against Zarbag as half the warband can do the Stromcast Special (3 hammers 2 damage) so I erred on not needing it, this was ultimately a mistake as Frederick just flat out refused to attack one of my guys which turned off Trial of the Tempered to snatch the very, very close win. Final score 20-18
4-1
Round 6 vs Sebastian Pelechaty (Grandfather’s Gardeners – Countdown to Cataclysm / Emberstone Sentinels)
This particular flavour of Nurgle is something I am familiar with as it was on my shortlist for the WHW Grand Clash so I had a good idea on where I had to stand and what to do to limit Seb’s glory. Seb didn’t seem to understand that you have to sing Toto when playing Hold the Line which ultimately led to a change in his dice luck. Brodus dies to a cheeky 3 damage attack but the two shield carriers both rocking cleave cleaned house on the Garden lads. FInal Score 23-9.
5-1
Round 7 vs Tristan Stadler (Zarbag’s Gitz – Countdown to Cataclysm / Pillage and Plunder)
Alright, let’s start this one out with a flashback and some maths. Tristan and I have already played this match when he came over for our Nemesis event in February to try and make off with one of our tickets. 3 hammers into 1 dodge is a 75% chance of success. That means that in 3 out of 4 swings a Goblin dies. On this particular Thursday evening I rolled 24 dice over the course of multiple attacks and rolled….. 1 hammer. This was not Ironsoul’s finest hour and Tristan passively pillaged his way to a very convincing win.
Not today Mr Stadler, one of the many reasons I gravitated towards Edge of the Knife was how good Mobbed! is and I put it to work in this game.
Snirk, having not learned his lesson from his previous run in with Brodus died in much the same gore spattered way out of the gate.
Sadly though it wasn’t enough and the sheer passive power of Pillage/Cataclysm was too much to overcome again. Final score 23-21.
5-2
So overall not a bad swiss, despite leaning heavily into cards to help against the goblins, that deck combo combined with the 21 health, multiple activation compressions and a stack of 3 hammer 2 damage attacks was just too much to get past. I resigned myself to “somewhere in the top 8” and began to unwind. No relaxation for me though as I have a 3rd/4th place play off to decide.
Playoff vs Heikki Haverinen (Grandfather’s Gardeners – Emberstone Sentnel’s / Pillage and Plunder)
What a way to end the event, I get to play Heikki again! Whatever happens here we both know it’s going to be epic. Let the goblins slog it out in the other room, this is where it’s at! Heikki and I engage in a little table talk while setting up and we both agree that I may have the knowledge advantage going into the game as I don’t have to make suboptimal plays to avoid Strip the Realm and we get to it.
I come out swinging straight away and score Aggressive Defender and Get Stuck In off my first activation, however I now have 3 end phase objectives to work for. Heikki drops Dripterus on my objective and promptly gives him a guard token. I know from playing Gardeners there is absolutely no reason to swing at him as you can’t kill him and he won’t move so I have no choice but to watch him score Claim the Prize, Share the Load and Careful Survey. End phase 1 and I only score a single point while Heikki lands a solid 5 putting him 8-3 up in round 2.
Round 2, all the plague dudes have damage and Tavian drops Dripterus for his earlier nonsense. Brodus Takes out Slunge and I crawl up to 9 glory only for Heikki to score Supremacy and Lost in the Depths. 13-9 behind going into round 3, I’ve closed the gap but I’m looking at a Trial of the Tempered in my hand that I NEED to score.
Round 3, Branching Fate from a swing at Strewg closes to 13-10. Strewg replies and whiffs a 4 hammer attack that would have killed Tavian. Strewg then uses Hidden Paths to vanish into the farthest hex he can. I can still score a power in numbers as the underdog taking the score to 13-11. Tavian hulks out and charges Phlegmus with 3 hammers and 2 rerolls fishing for an overrun to get him off an objective scoring critical effort, no damage scored as Phlegmus defends and resolutely sits uninspired and untempered. 13-12, this is so close. After Tavians failed attempt to temper Phlegmus he is closely followed by Brodus in activation 3.
It’s over. I’m looking at a Trial of the Tempered I can’t score as I still need to damage Phlegmus AND draw Dark Horse for Brodus which I topdeck like a champ with a 1 card draw focus but it’s not enough.
I score All In at the end for 13-13 and Heikki only has ONE GLORY in the end phase for the win with 14.
Yet another absolutely fantastic game against a truly awesome guy and the best way to end the event and I’m so happy that I got to go out against him.
There were two tickets available at the event, one for straight up winning games and one more old school for “overall performance” that included your results for painting, a quiz which was deviously complicated and sportsmanship and I was stunned to discover that I had managed to fight my way to 2nd place in the overall scoring. I came away from the event almost floating, while I didn’t get the ticket this time, it has made me realize that maybe James and Dan were right and I can do it and I am excited to see if that’s the case.
As a final note I want to shout out to Jonas and Thomas for running an amazing event that made me fall in love with the hobby and the people all over again. You guys were awesome and I will most definitely be back next year! Count on it!
Michael: Thanks for your article Dan! It was a pleasure meeting you at the event 🙂
If you would like to find Dan to chat about Underworlds you can find him with the Discord tag Whizzwang. He recently joined the Staggerers server as well! Thanks all for reading, and I hope to see you again soon!
If you have your own guest article you would like to submit, please do ping me on Discord as well. Many thanks to Dan for starting this!
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