Black amulet, best item in the game, notice long time gamers, that they toned it down, but
its still a 4+ ward save (under new rules) and it only runs out if used in hand to hand
and that's when its doing damage to the enemy. if you want a one man vs a unit, you'll
need this little sucker to help give you the wounds to break even. Though with the new
overkill rule, if there's a lowly champion in the unit why bother........
Golden helm-still pretty sick, but it'll not stand up to constant pressure (new rules for each 2 wounds negated by crown roll 4+ to see if it runs out). So if you are only going to be taking about one wound every turn, e.g. good armour save but hit by lots of arrows... also useful for the Dwarven King who has everything (like a Master Rune of Gromil). Notibly a good idea for Thorgrim (since you can change his items, see the special characters section before army lists, and he does have 4 items.... well if he has a weapon, some armour and a talisman, what else can you give him but a miscellaneous item). Note, Armour of Protection, does not run out, it gives a 4+ wrd save rather than 3+ and throughs in heavy armour to boot!
Chalice of sorcery, under new rules with the storing of cards in your wizards, the chalice is very useful since it gives you that extra card. Note the wound can be equally as annoying, so try to pair it with the Amber Amulet (Dark Elf book, but it's the same as the talisman of Ulric). I remember taking 3 wounds from the dratted thing and a frilly little Elven battle standard with a lance ended the poor necromancers dark schemes.
Amber Amulet, recover a wound beginning of your turn, very handy for things that let you take a wound on a 6 in magic phase. E.g. a Black Axe of Krell, a Chalice of Sorcery, or a Fellblade. Also very handy if you have good saves because the odd wound that does get through is healed back up. Note in short turn battles it i next to useless since if it is a big character they can take the casual wound, but could use the magic item slot for something better. In to the death, try to fit it in somewhere. However note its cost. Its cheap because when a Frostblade hits your 4h level Slann Shaman, it doesn't give flying that he has 8 wounds.
Skull Staff- first seen in Kemmlers Dark Claw, but since then it has made an appearance in almost every battle I've had. This is for two reasons. One, a fifth level wizard has no higher level mage so he always dispells on a 4+ or a 3+ for any "normal mage", e.g. 4th or below. Now you add one to that and you get a 2+ against most people and at the worst a 3+ if the person has bothered with a fifth level. You can see it sort of rocks the game. Thats why under new rules its a pain in the arse to get a fifth level, in fact since only Teclis and Nagash are allowed to get to 5th level, you might not be able to do it. Unless necromancers can still take Books of Nagash, however this is a bit of a problem since your average necromancer has a base cost of 410, and he doesn't need an 100 point item and then a 35 point staff. Gee look at the victory points sitting right there and that's not even giving him a sword or any protection. Still, might be worth it in the long run...... the other point is if you look at it Books of Nagash say Necromancer only, not liches, or vampires. I've found it's rare to lead an Undead army with anything but a Vampire Lord. Sure its nice to keep your opponent on his toes. But the last time I took a liche he got fried first time by Storm of Shemtec ever seen a human lightning rod? Poor little bugger got hit by 9 Str 6 bolts doing D3 wounds each, and he's only T4 and W4. So yeah now where was I?
Oh yeah items.... Well you'll have to wait for me to play more games under new rules but staff of Nurgle is still worth 100pt. Armour of Skaldor is still the best value for point so of any Dwarven Armour. (half the cost of Gromil and if its near the Golden Sceptor of Norgrim. Mmmmm... 1+ save, 4+ rerole, for 75 point + total fir immunity). Even Runefangs don't stop the reroll, which is fair enough, because the dwarves made the Runefangs and wouldn't let 'em get through their king's armour.
In the old game there were two easy ways of winning, no matter what army you were. Magic, or flying suprerioity. some armies did this better than others, or had advantages because of what they were but in general if you piled all you points into one of these you could easily overwhelm your opponent. But firstly the pros and cons of each approach. Magic. Okay its been said that some armies have a hard time pulling this off. Empire is a good example. It was one of the earlier books to be released, and as a result isn't up to standard with the rest of the "newer" armies.
Still you just have to know your opponent. This is true for every gaming group but I've
noticed that in our games very few dispell magic scrolls are taken, who wants to mast the
slots of a high level wizard with dispell magics scrolls for 25pt! Almost everyone's first
wizard of an army is a level 4 with Book of Ashur, Skull Staff, Chalice of Sorcery, and
for the last item Black Amulet or Amber Amulet depending on if the Black has been used or
not. Maybe you might have a subordinate 2nd or 3rd level with a few scrolls but it'd be in
a big battle were the scrolls wouldn't last very long. Now if you are going to dominate
magic it is important to take lots of spell caster and hope that the opponent has few if
any mobile character eaters.
� Chris Pavey 1997