Warhammer Magic

Magic in Warhammer

Warhammer Magic is great, its so great in fact that it has its the 4th phase (well actually the 2nd but nevermind) in Warhammer Fantasy, while 40k only has 3 phases. The fluff is that your wizard/slann/witch is going into Chaos, and sucks the energy there out to throw it on your enemies. If he's lucky your enemys will explode, if he is not lucky a demon will get sucked to and the wizard will explode. So take always magic if you can because, either you explode or the enemy does, and the important thing is, that some exploding is done, no?

There are 8 main Lores to choose from, albeit most armies can not just choose any Lore they want (vampires with lore of life would certanly feel wrong don't you agree?). There are some folks who have their own magic, because they are more awesome/evil/crazy than the rest.

Magic plays a big role in the Storm of Magic expansion, where you can wield even bigger and deadlier magics. More on the subject can be found on that page.

Light: Wind of Hysh, Lore of Light

Lightmagic is mostly the friend of the "good" races, since they are the only ones who can use it. Its making you faster and harder to hit in short with a few damage spells which are not that bad. The Lore Attribut makes all the funny damagespells all the harder against the undead and demons, which makes this magic extra strong against them.

• Shem’s Burning Gaze: A Fireball which can pumped up to a thunderbolt. Not bad espacially for a signature Spell. Against all the realy bad people like Undead or Demons a real rapetrain in the buffed version.

• Pha’s Protection: You are less likely to get hit in fight and even by cannons, and you can spread that in a lovely 12 inch bubble of cannonfreedom, would be realy great for Chaosknights, but ... oh well they are just to dark.

• The Speed of Light: You know these Ogers/Sauruses which have really nice stats but a shortcomming in WS and I? You know Highelfs hitting you on a reroll 3? When you said yes (and seriously if you said no you don't play warhammer or you play Highelfs), you will like this spell. MAX WS and I for one Unit or everything in 12 inches, turning a reroll 3 into a not reroll 5, easy one of the best buffs in warhammer magic.

• Light of Battle: Making one unit unbreakable is not always what you want, but most times what you need. This is your spell and you can cast it again in a 12 inch bubble, also when you are doing this, things are probably looking bad for you.

• Net of Amyntok: Making the enemyunit test for strength when movin, shooting, casting, going to the toilet, everything except cc. Casting this on a unit with teclis and see how well he can cast with S2 or so.

• Banishment: Cranked up magic missle with more hits but only S4, but the enemy must reroll ward saves so the ultimate demonkiller, which its name implies.

• Birona’s Timewarp: Making your Unit or everything in the 12 inch bubble move matrixstyle while handing out nice leathersuits and sunglasses. The units double in speed, get ASF and more attacks so cast this whenever you feel like it, and whenever you can muster the power dice.

Gold: Wind of Chamon, Lore of Metal and Alchemy

Yeah Alchemy turning whatnot in gold and stuff like this, a shame it can not buy you additional points with this gold but nevermind. The Lore Attribut allows you to wound your enemy at his armorsave, and he has no armor against it. Because its melting him his face of while he tries to save himself. Good stuff so.

• Searing Doom: Signature spell to make flaming wounds with the Lore Attribut. Absolutly useless against Beastmen, absolutly brutal against Chaosknights. Go figure you use this against enemys with armor, the more the merrier. Absolutly hillarius against wood elf trees. Wounding on a 3 without save and flaming, this is gonna burn a whole Treeman away in one go.

• Plague of Rust: Rusting of the enemy armor away, making them harder to hit with this magic, but easier for everything else. And it is for the whole game and without banning.

• Enchanted Blades of Aiban: You are hitting the enemy more easy and also ignoring a bit of his armorsave. Certanly not the most powerfull spell in this Lore, but good for buffing your units nonetheless.

• Glittering Robe: Giving a unit, or all in 12 inches a serious hard scale armor. Useless if you play Lizardmen of course, but +2 to your armorsave is all but bad for anything else.

• Gehenna’s Golden Hounds: "Sniping" the enemy hero but with look out sir? This is kind of a good beginning and bad ending so don't bother.

• Transmutation of Lead: Letting your enemy hit more air and while you're at it taking some armor away. Good deal to make elite units medicore and normal units weak.

• Final Transmutation: Here you have it, transforming things into gold and living things on top of that. Turning 1/3 of an enemy unit into gold without any kind of save is not bad, and you can even kill enemy heroes with luck. And the next round every enemy unit want the gold and is stumbeling around to carry some of their lost friend away to sell them.

Jade: Wind of Ghyran, Lore of Life

This is the most commonly used Lore by lord level mages. Don't bother to have a level 2 mage the Lore of life, you need 4 level or Loremaster at best because you need the third spell, the Throne to realy rock with this Lore and of course other spells so that they can grow stronger. This Lore will make your units hard as hell, is easy to cast and is indeed ecofriendly. The Lore Attribut is the best, healing your mage or a nearby hero for every spell he (your mage) casts.

• Earth Blood: Getting regeneration is nice but only for the unit of your mage, so as long as youre not a Slann or a Damsel in hide, it's not that great of a spell, and Bretonians have a ward save so its realy only for the Slann. But a regenerating horde of Temple Guard is something that will not die under nearly any circumstances.

• Awakening of the Wood: Calling out to make the trees move in a way that would wood elves cry. It's crap as long as it's not buffed AND the enemy is hiding in the woods.

• Flesh to Stone: Yeah turning living beeings in stone, albeit not like in alchemy it doesn't harm your units but buffes them up big time with way more thougness. Cast this on elves so that they are hard as Stone, Cast this buffed up on heavy cavalery to make them as hard as ... what? A Landraider crossed with a shadowfield hidden in a Monolith perhaps.

• Throne of Vines: One spell to buff them all, one spell to ... oh wait wrong universe but hey, this spell gives the whole Lore its meaning by seriuosly buffing the rest of the spells. Oh and you get a 2+ save against your magic going out of contorl. Less esplosions so less fun but probably safer for your 500+ point Slann or the likes.

• Shield of Thorns: Making some hits with low strengst on everything in contact is not so bad if you have a horde going on against 3 other units or so. But for itself not that phenomenal.

• Regrowth: You know how youre elite mob is growing smaller as those mean cannons shoot it up? No problem here is your answer. Just put the seedling of a few power dices into the ground and your Units will grow back in no time. Warning: to much nutrition (power dice) can lead to spontanous explosion.

• The Dwellers Below: Here is your one-spell-solves-all-problems-spell. Cast it on a unit and see everything taking strength test, and when they fail they are dead without any save, because little dwarfes crawl out of a hole in the ground and take them with them. Yes thos badass mages, and those funny Commanders (which get +3S while attacking) are all for naugh and their unit with them. Easy one of the most devastation spells.

Celestial: Wind of Azyr, Lore of the Heavens

Reading in the stars is in, even in the warhammer world. You want to read the future and take the path that will save your ass? Here you go. You wanna take the path that makes your enemy bit his ass? This is your Lore. Oh and you wanna throw lightning and comets on your enemy and feel like palpatine? This is your Lore again. The Lore Attribut helps you against flying units, but there are not that much of them, so never mind.

• Iceshard Blizzard: Blinding your enemies with snowflakes, making him fail more often, because he can't see. Oh and he can't see his pals so his LD is taking a little dump. Not the most devastating spell, but for a cheap price and a signature spell realy working well.

• Harmonic Convergence: You know how you have these super-awesome-heavy-cavalery-rapetrain-unit? You attack and only roll 1s and you need only 2s? That is no problem. This spell let you reroll every 1 your unit rolls for a turn, so give it to your elite units and don't fear the ones.

• Wind Blast: A magic missle which pushes enemy units around. Ultimate when you have a mage on pegasus to mess up the enemy movement phase, but worth it ever time. Use against Goblin Fanatics, commence trollface.

• Curse of the Midnight Wind: You read the Harmonic convergence? This is the other way around. The enemy unit has to reroll all 6s it rolls, so no posion or killing blow, or even wounding your monster with T6 while having S4. Everything is fine with this and it comes with a bubble version.

• Urannon’s Thunderbolt: Yeah feeling like palpatine today? This is your spell shocking your enemy in the ground with a few S6 hits.

• Comet of Casandora: You know these mean Ghosts in SC2 erasing your army with a few nukes? You can do that to with this spell. Ok its not realy controable and fast is also not one of its good pints, indeed its pretty random. But you can wipe out nearly the entire table with this baby if you make a few good throws. And it can not be banned after its out so see as your enemy is running away before the meteorite crashes in his units commencing ARMAGEDDON.

• Chain Lightning: You remember the thunderbolt and this part about palpatine? I joked. THIS is how you play palpatine, potentially shooting a thunderbult at every fricking enemy unit on the field. Perhaps you should say something like "come to the dark side or perish" while you do this, even if you play highelves.

Grey: Wind of Ulgu, Lore of Shadows

Shadowmagic is iffy, it has damagespells but you are taking this lore to make your enemy realy lame and weak, while making your weak little humans/elves phenomenaly strong kicking dragons in the balls and in the ground (not necessary in this order). With the Lore Attribut your mage can play ninja and trade places with another charakter, most times useless, but if you want to hurry away from cc perhaps sometimes clever.

• Melkoth’s Mystifying Miasma: Signature Spells are bound to be good most of the times and this time too. reducing one or all of the following: M,WS,BS,I of a enemy unit for d3. Even better when used in conjunction with the damage spells in this Lore.

• Steed of Shadows: Casting your own shadow Horse, probably feeling like the Ghostrider or something like this. Sadly its not as usefull as it was so no thank you, but points up for invisible shadow horses.

• The Enfeebling Foe: Making your enemy weak. Really, really weak, with a bit of luck. This spell is so nice to reduce the danger to your units and it even stays in the game, so your enemy has to ban this or decide to never make a kill with this unit.

• The Withering: Other way around, making your enemy not weak but less though until even an elf can club him down. Like his counterpart staying in the game so your enemy will ban this and don't have the dice to do the same to you in his magic phase.

• The Penumbral Pendulum: Swinging a big albeit almost invisible and probbably irreal pendle into the enemy lines. It hits almost like a Cannon but only if the enemy is not evading with a test, so use the miasma to make sure he is not evading.

• Pit of Shades: Throwing plates at enemy units is always fun and here you have a plate that sucks the enemy units to their doom, as long as they don't evade of course but hey it can singlehandly take out large units espacially undead or Saurus.

• Okkam’s Mindrazor: You play elves (the good kind not the overpowerd ASF elves)? You know how you hit everything but then nothing happens? This is your answer. Taking your LD for wounding instead fo your Strength and see even Dragons and Chaosknights falling like flies before you. Probably the best buff in warhammer magic, if not than at least top 3. Oh the buff does not stack with LD or S bonus so no greatweapons or general LD bubbles.

Amethyst: Wind of Shysh, Lore of Death

Death is always a good name for spells, and its true, there are many deadly spells among this Lore, albeit they are mostly to kill enemy heroes and not so much entire Units. The Lore Attribut would be nice, if there were more unit killing spells in here, so its just one or two power dices a turn with much luck.

• Spirit Leech: Draining your enemy of his will to fight, leaving him without a soul, or something like that. The fantasy version of Eldar mindbattle, this spell will not work against Vampires but against Grey Seer or so it's a strike of genius.

• Aspect of the Dreadknight: Your mage is going to give a unit plastic surgery until they are so ugly that no one wants to fight them. Well not in every aspect but this is also not a widely used spell so forget it.

• The Caress of Laniph: Summoning a wich, which want to know the enemy hero a bit better, and while she's at it she steals his life force ... yeah we all know women like that. Well long story short sniping an enemy charakter without armor saves (duh if the witch is in your trousers you have no armor), only if the enemy is realy strong he can go through it unharmed.

• Soulblight: Your mage sucks a bit on the soul of the enemy making him less strong and though. Works in a freaking 24 inch bubble so it can hit the whole enemy army and making even Chaosknights to mere humans (at least on S and T). Probably the best hexspell in warhammer magic.

• Doom and Darkness: Doom again, a nice word and realy fitting, since the enemy unit which this is casted on has as heroic as a lone skaven in the Chaosdesert. So cast this on the enemy general to take the LD bubble away, or make sure that stupid units get stupid.

• The Fate of Bjuna: Yeah the last sniping spell and it's the strongest as long as the enemy char has no high toughness. Because the enemy is gonna laugh until he explodes and you need to be really though to not explode, a dragon perhaps, also even those might explode, and just think of the cleaning thereafter. So cast this on humanoid charakters and see them explode in laugher. (Would be the most stylish end for a great unclean but the have such a fricking huge thougness, a pity)

• The Purple Sun of Xereus: Also known as the Purple Sun of Prepare your Anus, the Purple Sun of Xereus is a big purple ball of FUCK YOU that floats around on the battlefield semi-randomly, and anything that touches it takes an Initiative Test or DIES. Just like that. Very difficult to cast (the most difficult in regular Warhammer, in fact), but when you pull it off correctly it can murder entire armies of Lizardmen or Orcs.

Bright: Wind of Aqshy, Lore of Fire

You know these D&D mages always throwing fireballs at everything? You wanna be one of them? Good this is your choice. Fire Lore is also your choice if you fight anything flamebale, elves of any kind, or other armies with not so good defense but many models. Most armies, espacially the evil ones can use this Lore. The Lore Attribut is ... it is there and that's it, it will only help you if you focus on one enemy unit for a whole phase.

• Fireball: Your one-for-all damage spell goes from "easy to cast and not so hard to hit" to "hard as hell to cast and roasting a mammut ... herd". You always want this spell, because you can use it against nearly everything. From flaming a little flanking unit or flaming away this regeneration from this Hydra to turning entire Swordmasterunits to dust or softening up this big big horde of coreunits. When you want Firemagic you want it because of this spell.

• Cascading Fire-Cloak: A defensive spell only working on the mage and his unit. Not realy worth it, since you don't want your mage in combat, except perhaps for ogres.

• Flaming Sword of Rhuin: The second best spell in this Lore, because it helps your little, weak elfs/humans/anything to wound better and by the way ignore the regeneration of the enemy, espacially good for all elves, but general not a bad spell.

• The Burning Head: Your Mage throws a burning and screaming head on the enemy. It's cool, since that is normale something only Tomb Kings can do, but with this spell you can do it too. The usefullnes of this is not so cool, except for enemy units with realy bad LD.

• Piercing Bolts of Burning: Some kind of fireball for great enemy units, against this 20 row skavenslave unit it's the burner and against every normal unit it's another fireball, so why not?

• Fulminating Flame Cage: So now you inprison your enemy in flames and if he moves, he is toast. Again against realy big units its great against heavy cavallery its lame. But it's always funny to see a light flanking unit destroy itself in the charge because of this spell, or not flanking, so that you can win against the enemy in front.

• Flame Storm: Yeah big plates to throw, but only S4 and not realy with sniper precision, so no thanks.

Amber: Wind of Ghur, Lore of Beasts

The Lore for everyone who wants to buff his units, espacially the heros. The Lore Attribute will mostly affect you if you play Beastmen or Bretonia, but even then it's not so much of an effect.

• Wyssan's Wildform: The signature spell and WHAT a spell this is. It will make your measely humans go and win against other units and it will make your Bestigors or Minotaurs go rapetrain against nearly everything for one round.

• The Flock of Doom: Yeah doom sounds nice, but it's only doom if your enemy is afraid of birds. It is like a new episode of hitchcocks "the birds" with a few crows pecking on the enemy unit, good enough to make this stupid harpies go away but there are better options.

• Pann's Impenetrable Pelt: Make one or more heroes harder to wound, it won't safe your unit, because the enemy can hit something else most times, but if your hero is currently challenging a dragon or so this spell will make his chance to survive go over the 0%.

• The Amber Spear: With this your mage becomes a magic blot thrower, or a crazy combination of bolt thrower and canon. Not bad against heavy knights and monster, expacially if you are lacking war machines.

• The Curse of Anraheir: Making your enemy stumble over roots and die, is one funny thing to do, espacally against this woodloving wood elfs. Also it makes your people harder to hit, what do you want more?

• The Savage Beast of Horros: Yeah now we're talking. Giving one or more heros way more strength and attacks and he will rip enitre units in two. Realy if you have a lot of cheap heros and can make this spell hit them all at once its good bye for your enemy

• Transformation of Kadon: What was that about more strength and attacks? Forget it, this will turn your mage into a fricking MONSTER, what do you want? A Hydra? A Dragon? A Chimaera? Everything is possible. Ok it prevents your mage from casting, but you will only ever cast this in cc so who cares?