ASOIAF Miniatures/Tactics/Night Watch

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Why Play Night Watch

"I know nothing"

You are the wall, you will hold the line.

Night Watch are a versatile and tough faction. You are the faction most likely to use combined arms, using both ranged, mobile, tough and hard hitting units in conjunction with each other.

In general they are a tougher faction, due to your elite status.

Pros

• Elite army
• Unique war machines
• Good Attachment
• Vow which gives you buffs over the course of the game
• Good card draw, and wide range of applications
• Above average morale and morale abilities
• Healing

Cons

• Either cheap units or expensive units
• You don't really like neutrals
• Hard to make certain things work in a list
• Tactics card cover a big range of things, and you might get lost
• Some tactics card requires your enemy to do certain actions

Playstyle

Night Watch are another attrition faction. You want to win small fights after each other and then move to the bigger game.

Your vow mechanic gives you another level of tactical play. Calculate yourself if you need a certain spot.

You will fight on multiple lines, push through in 1 fight, to then round up the rest. You also excel on making use of combined arms.

Unit and Attachement Analysis

3 themes. You have builders, rangers and the wall troops.

Wall troops are your Veterans, Sworn bros and conscripts. They mostly hold the line and use standard things to win. Good morale and offense (except conscripts) help you hold the line. Attachments help you hold the line even better.

Rangers are mobile and fast. You have versatility due to your ranged attack. You are fragile, so make use of the retreat action via the horse zone. These are skirmishers rather than line troops so are meant to abuse their maneuverability to pick their engagements.

Builders are your defensive support group. You have builders crossbowmen, which are arguably the best ranged units in the game. The other side of the builders are your semi-static War machines. In summary you are slow, but far hitting, and have sundering on all.

Units

Commander

• Jon Snow: He is a strong and solid choice for a commander, and probably the first you'll pick up to play with. Jonny boy will add a bit of sustainability to your units, restoring 2 wounds to one each time his own unit makes an attack action. Jon will provide you with some strong tactics cards; playing well with the elite nature of the Watch, allowing you to keep units that should be dead still in the game with "it shall not end until my death". My particular favorite "Stand united brothers!" stacks well with Jon's ability to give black brothers a healing factor. Overall, he's as I said, a strong commander that certainly won't let you down (or lose models) and truly embodies the spirit of the Night's Watch's niche of doing a lot with only a few units (because as you all know, size doesn't matter).

• Jeor Mormont: He doubles down on the Vow mechanic with two of his commander cards being attachable to your units, and also gives your units better morale around him (a couple of cards depend on morale tests too so yey). He focuses on defensive buffs and getting the cards you need, he's flexible if utterly boring, you'll either use him as this or not at all since his NCU version is really restrictive.

• Alliser Thorne: My favorite commander. An absolute terror, all of his cards are dedicated to bullying weaker units, with "Pathetic attempt" hitting your enemy back with a potential 6 hits for being a little pillowfisted pansy, "Price of Failiure" making your units realize their full offensive potential and #Seeing their Flaws" basically forcing a unit to not fight your commander's. a good al rounder for when you need someone to keep the pressure and offense on your opponent.

• Donal Noye: The absolute tankiest of commanders, Order: Shieldwall will have him shrug off big attacks and Imporved Armaments will make your vets (the unit you'll put him in, no if or buts) have a similar offensive power as Sworn Brothers. Aboslute defense is his deal, lending your units enough resilience expose themselves on risky engagements to hit where they need to.

• Othell Warwick: The Builder-centric Commander, empowering war machines and Crossbows better than the rest of your units, with a bit of terrain shenanigans to mess with your opponent. He gives re-rolls to warmachines attacking targets within long range of him, and with Hardened his unit gets harder to take down the more punishment its taken, and with his permanent upgrade cards your Crossbows and his unit will become absolutely terrifying.

• Benjen Stark: The Ranger-centric Commander, he gives you a few tricks from the stark book of plays, with added maneuverability and reactive plays, his cards either depend or get addittional effects when a ranger unit is involved, so keep that in mind.

Units

• Conscripts (4pt): Remember I said this is the elite faction? Well, this kinda destroys my point. Conscripts are good, actually, I would say they are great for their price. While your morale suck, a Watch Recruiter negates the crown spot easily. Due to their healing, your frontline can survive longer than expected, just keep them away from the High damage units. They can hold 5 point units in place. You might want to go for more than 1 Conscript, but if you have 2 you won't really have enough points for attachment, which I usually enjoy using in Night Watch. Attachment-wise wise nothing seems worthwhile except Watch recuiters to keep them topped off and Othell in a Wramachines list.

• Ranger Hunters (8pt): Fun to use, and your best alpha strike unit. You want to attack with these units then retreat sideways, so he'll have to either face you and turn his back towards the rest of their army, or risk you shooting into his flank (remember to shift even more towards his side). Don't forget that you can just retreat normally, with 7 + d6 you can probably get out of range They are also not bad at dealing damage, so the enemy really has to choose to leave an opening somewhere. If you are stuck in battle, you are probably dead. If you survive 1 attack you can still run away easily, find the balance of using a quick attack and just running away. My recommendation is to retreat away as far as you can, if you have access to a free movement. This unit can function well without attachment but if you decide to add them, I recommend Watch Captain, to give you more maneuver or attack actions, Stormcrow Lieutenant for pure better damage, Daario Naharis for the same effect, and if you are feeling really lucky Brienne. Pypar is fun but kinda unneeded.

• Ranger Trackers (7pt): On paper they are really cool. Giving out vulnerable token every turn is basically Jorah's entire life, but they can do it anytime and within long range. If they shoot, they are honestly not too shabby, when targeting flanks they can do serious damage. As cavalry you should always be able to run past the enemy, I recommend not taking a shot or even getting to short range until you are behind the enemy. Your melee is worse than your shooting, and close range is like the name implies, really close. Try targeting already activated units, who aren't a threat to your guys.

• Ranger Vanguards (7pt): The melee mounted Rangers, with outflank and Ambush built in you're memant to harass enemy flanks to shove Panicked and Weakened Tokens down your enemy's throat, they are just as fragile though so the same advice stands, prioritize attacking enemies that have already activated.

• Builder Crossbowmen (7pt): The best ranged unit in the game by most metrics. Sundering and their order is a great deterrant. Most players won't even try to attack you, which is both a curse and a blessing. If you do get charged, remember to shift further away. You might be inclined to put some attachment into it, but make sure you got their use down, if you don't know how to set up firing lanes, all the more damage won't help you. For attachment you want to increase their dmg output or give them some utility, Watch captains can double their damage output while Samwell gives you all the cards you want while in a pretty safe unit, Pypar might be a good idea, but he just means no one will ever attack them.

• Builder Scorpion Crew (5pt): Your monster killer, semi immobile since it can't shift, retreat or charge,, and very fragile with 6 wounds and a 5+ armour save (2+ morale though), but htis thing will put the hurt on monsters like nothing else, this does 2 wounds to monters, warmachines and Cavalry when they don't bolck the hit and with vicious added in armies like Targs start to question their life decisions, its a simple tool, just point it at something tough like heavy cav or monsters and shoot away till they stop moving. With Othell commander they can spend a point to deal d3+1 wounds when they get charged giving you more insurance, or getting the Oerwatch order letting them double the amount of attack actions each round. Will make single model cavalry characters cry salty tears if you manage to get a shot on them.

• Builder Stone Thrower (8pt): Where the Scorpion is meant to take down big threats, the stone thrower is for smaller and more numerous units, aka infantry trays, it cannot target Solo units and has infinite range and does not need Line of sight, if it hits it deals wounds equal to 1+ remaining ranks, menaning this thing can deal a potential 4 wounds in a single attack without aking into acount armour saves or anyhting if you can roll a single 4+ with 2 die, this thing makes Baratheons and Lannisters weep, and will make short work of most infantry centric lists regardless.

• Sworn Brothers (7pt): This is your bread and butter right here; with morale on par with Elite units, hitting on 3+ they are pretty high standard infantry. On top of this the can slap your enemy hard with -1 to defense rolls (Sundering). Their cost can be an issue, at whole two points above standard infantry of Starks or Lannisters (suck it up that's elite armies for yah) so oftentimes don't be surprised if you're surrounded. Other than that these guys are standard in movement meaning you aren't gonna be running any marathons here. Over all, an effective elite unit for troops, and play them right, these guys wont let you down.

• Veterans Of the Watch (7pt): Your anvil, with Disrupt and Counterstrike there are few units that want to get into melee with them, they make a great commander bunker being the defensive version of sworn brothers, attachements like Stormcrow lieutanents or Brienne make them terrifying.

• Watch Marshal (4pt): A cheap activation? yes please, oh it also boosts you attack die? that great man! Oh it ALO gives you a eactive shift action to better handle your already outnumberd units?Oh hell yeas gimme gimme gimme. A great support piece, anything that puts more power on your already rock solid units is always appreciated.

• Coldhands (4pt): Cheap, infinite, and supportive. While the Marshal is meant to stand behind your lines Coldhands is meant to harass the enemy's flanks without the same fear of getting geeked since he can impose a -1 to hit when he needs it (do consider dropping it on Vets to abuse their counterstrike ability), do mind that he still gives a VP each time he dies.

Non-Combat Units

• Craster (4pt): When he claims the Swords, Bags or Horses they have an enchanced effect, cheap and effective, if you don't know what to bring, Craster is a good jack of all trades.

• Maester Aemon (4pt): The coolest Targ. Healing's his thing, he'll prolly run you on averae about 9-10 wounds healed across the game all by himself, simple stuff really, if you're expecting to get tharshed he'll save your units bacon and do whatever the zone he claimed does too.

• Bowen Marsh (4pt): A free scry and draw with any claim. Field him if you dislike the letter spot, else it is a bit of an overkill. Since you have one of the easiest to use decks of all of them and get to choose which or the two cards yo keep, he's another solid no brainer pick when you don't have a plan.

• Qhorin Halfhand (6pt): One of my favorite NCU. He is of the only troops you have which can increase damage. Another 1 movement is not too shabby especially with Hunters and everyone who have an attached Watcher on the Wall. His other ability is quite strong but you will fuck yourself over with it. Best, to wait for turn 4-5, so you won't gimp yourself. Watch out for Olenna.

• Jeor Mormont (4pt): Pretty restrictive, he replaces whatever zone he takes with his own effect, which means you don't get the usual benefit of a Zone-and NCU. What he does is either switch a vow from one unit to another or search your deck or discard pile for an attachable card and attach it, without the immediate effect mind you. He's a tough call, he'll kick you vow mechanic into high gear getting you the vows you need on whatever needs it, but he doen't do anything besides that.

• Donnel Noye (5pt): A nice piece of kit not gonna lie, twice per game he lets you either attack with rerolls and denying weakened tokens or defend with +1 to rolls and denying vulnerable tokens, he follows the same theme of up for whatever comes that other NCUs have, I rarely use him as an NCU since I really like his commander version better.

• Othell Yarwick (5pt): When he claims, he can opt out of the usual effect to instead throw 3 (+remaining ranks) dice at 3+ with either Vicious, Sundering or assigning a Weakened token to the defender depending on whether he claimed the Crowns, Bags or Swords respectively. He's one of the very very rare reliable sources of weakened tokens (the rarest in the current version of the game), and lets you kill shit faster, 10/10 I can't live without this old bastard manning my war-machines.

• Samwell Tarly (5pt): Honestly, I love his design, he does the Increased hand size trick which is always good, but he brings along Gilly, you se Gilly is and NCU that can only be activated once, which means you get your regular NCU stuff and once per game you get to use Gilly to absolutely shaft your enemy for thinking that more NCUs was a bad thing.

Attachments

• Othell Yarwyck (1pt): Probably required if you play Stone Thrower, and if you play Scorpion this attachment pushes your damage output above Crossbows. As I will write below; a war machine list, wants him. So you stick him in a cheap unit. Two schools of thoughts exist, either you go put him in a conscript unit, or throw into stormcrows mercenaries, both are 5 points. Unless you play against high volume of attacks and no weirdwood trees, I would say conscripts are better. But it is your choice.

• Qhorin Halfhand (2pts): Way better as and NCU, To the last lets you save your bacon when you lose his unit, go down fighting isn't something you want to pair with it though, he's insurance rather than an investment, make of that what you will.

• Grenn (1pts): Taunt for a point, nits like Veterans do want to be in the thick of it and to take the heat for other units, taunting a uni of raiders into charging them would be horrible for that cheese mongering Free-Folk player wouldn't it?

• Pypar (1pts): Can go into Grenn's unit or on his own, gives Swift retreat, stacking defensive and control utility on the same unit is good, they let you take agency away from your opponent and get out before he wheels in the real hammer.

• Alliser Thorne (1pts): Iron Resolve and Stuborn Tenacity, morale insulation and a bit of bite to compliment it, he'll do great on you Brothers or Vets.

• Jon Snow (2pts): Autocharge and shout Vulnerable and Panicked at the enemy? this is the good stuff my brother, your unnits are top-rate badasses and all they want is to get into combat from half a mile away with someone who you previously in the same turn scared shitless of you, so yeah, take him, he won't dissapoint.

• Benjen Stark (1pt):Sentinel and Ambush, he really feels like a stark doesn't he? he lets you get free charges and imporves them since the enemy will be front facing your unit already, he's even cheap so no excuse not to put him somewhere in your lists.

• Coldhands (Infantry) (1pt): Outflank and Pathfinder, Rangers like him, but so do Crossbows or Sworn brothers, lets you play the tricksy game.

• Coldhands (Cavalry) (1pt): Sentinel and Intimidating Presence, you cavalry is quick so they'll have a real easy time getting into a position to abuse Sentinel, Intimidating Presence to up you damage output won't hurt either.

• Samwell Tarly (2pt): He does his Hand size increase while on the field too! and lets you discard 2 from your hand to seach your deck for whatever you want, he's good but you need to have a plan to make full use of him.

• Watch Recruiter (1pts): Order: Incite keeps you fighting at peak efficiency and adds vicious, while reinforcements gives you up to 2 wounds per round to keep your exxpensive units topped off easier, no reason to not put him into conscripts to have a unit dedicated to sustaining your battleline.

• Watch Captain (3pts): Absurdly powrful, Relentless lets you get in another (if limited) activation in your turn so he increases the number of things to do each round for a measly 3 pts, find a spot for him, a unit of Sworn Brothers with this guy is an absolutely solid that won't dissapoint you ever.

• Watch Marhsal (Cavalry) (1pt): Your fragile Ranger cavalry can escape so as to not get bogged down and lets you play around with tokens, both your own and you enemy's, a nice piece of kit.

• Senior Builder (1pt): Better armour saves when holding the bags and once per game place a Stake terrain piece in front of you, he goes swimingly in Crossbows when you want them holding a position.

• Hardened Ranger (1pt): Furious Charge and Elusive escape, por a meager point you get better charges and better retreats, whats not to love?

Building your Army

Night Watch list usually field 2 * 7+ units. Having lots of activation is rarer.

Usually, your list depends on your commander and objective. Within the Night Watch this is only true for a certain extend, some of the commander can be slotted into most list. I would say your list is determent by which 2 units are your 7+ units

In general you will have 7 activation in your army. Your best units all cost 7+ points, and you usually field more attachement then usual list. I like 2 NCU, you have good abilities, need to claim a lot of spots and these are cheap.

Your commanders are determined by which unit you want to field, pay attention to it

Sample List: These are made to get into the game early.

Literally just the starter box

Tactics Deck

Night Watch have a unique feature with their vow ability. In many cases the vow ability have a better ability then the original.

The Night Watch deck covers a wide range of features, most everything really. Most of your cards have some real easy conditions, get attacked, attack, take a morale test, kill something, something yours dies, so you'll rarely have your full hand for a turn.

In use of your vows, put them on correctly, do keep in mind the long term benefit.

Lastly as your vow are open information, keep a straight face, don't read you cards to obviously and don't telegraph you plan

• Take the Black: After destroying an enemy restore 4 wounds to a single unit in short range and nick watever attachement it had (regardless of ususal Attachement restrictions), lets you keep your momentum by ehaling your units and getting more effects on them.

• The Sword in the Darkness: Quick and dirty, deals out a panicked and vulnerable token if you're attacking someone who hasn't activated. Gives the unit +1 attack die when you attach it. Offensive, simple, lets you press the advantage while doing what you SHOULD be doing.

• And Now his Watch has ended: Attach to unit A at the start of a turn, when you lose unit B you get to move a card it had attached to unit A and unit A makes an atatck, maneuver or march action, lets you recycle and get some value out of your expensive units getting geeked.

• The Watcher on the Wall: The one for your rangers and builders, after one of your units gets attacked, someone else gets to pivot, shift and attach to get +1 mobility and charge rerolls, lets you reposition and get the mobility to take the best engagements.

• The Fire that burns against the Cold: Re-roll a morale test and attach to suffer wounds to remove tokens that you get. your units are expensive and while regeneration is one of your strong suits you should still use this sparingly, mostly when you KNOW you need that token off to accomplish whatever immediate goal you need.

• The Light that Brings the Dawn: Play before rolling attack dice, re-roll any misses, and attach to attack with your highest attack die value if the enemy has more ranks. Keeps you operating at peak efficiency and gives you a little offensive boost this one's prolly a no brainer 90% of the time.

• The Shield of the Realms of Men: Defensive, re-roll defense dice after rolling, attach to auto-block 1 hit each time you get attacked, always good for your frontline units, sworn brothers and vets are probably the best targets since they are already tough and will take lots of heat so they'll make the most use, you rangers and builders aren't really well armored so even with an aouto-block they won't last that much longer.

List Discussion

Warmachine Heavy

Might do later