How to beat zombie necromancer?

[sshroom]

Have gotten trounced pretty soundly by my friends zombie swarm necromancer. He uses battleforge and libro with meditation amulet and death ring to deploy armor and zombies almost every turn. He'll start with a brute or 2 then move on to venomous zombies and plague zombie eternal servant who gets eaten again and again by Shugzorrah or whatever his name is. Wherever the necromancy goes he's covered by his cloud of zombies. I tried to focus on attacking his maye buthis brutes guard so really you have to deal with them. But if you just wound the brutes (which you will because they take so many frickin dice to kill) than Shug will just eat them and grow meaning lots of wasted effort so really Shug has to die first. But really with the venomous zombies there dropping taint and with all those bloodthirsty dice nothing can survive in the necros zone. There's no time to chew through everything you need to chew through with only one third of your dice actually getting through. And once you are down low enough its deathlock time and gg. So far I have only tried semi aground builds against him (priest and beastmaster). Both times I was unable to damage him significantly before his swarm became insurmountable. Zombie swarm necromancy seems super strong to me especially with Frenzy waiting in the wings which he never even had to use in our games since Ai brought the fight to him but would have been devastating and eliminated any chance of a tactical retreat. So how do you beat this guy? Are ranged heavy books the only ones that stand a chance?

[Wildhorn]

He cant use eternal servant with Shaggot's "food". Obliterate prevent that. It also prevent Plague Zombie death effect to trigger.

[sshroom]

Sorry he was using sacrifial altar to do his eternal plague zombie. Shaggoth just ate any heavily wounded zombies. May have triggered one plague off of Shaggoth... honestly it didn't make a huge difference if he did. The games weren't close.

[Wildhorn]

The solution is to either direct damage them via Burns and Corrodes or to roll alot of dice.

People freak out that only criticals goes throu, but it just means that 1/3 of dices will hit instead of 2/3. This means you need to roll 50% more dice to get same damage, but zombies have 50% less hp too, so it more or less even out.

[sshroom]

Yeah I was able to take some zombies down but that battle of attrition was a losing one for me. Between bloodthirsty dice and poison conditions my creatures dropped faster than I could replace them. Seems like an unwinnable fight to try to go toe to toe

[Myrddin]

Well brutes can guard but have bloodthirsty, so they have to attack if they can... a tough wounded creature can therefore draw off all the guards.

Zombies are incredibly tough and strong for the points, but bloodthirstiness and speed are both problems for them. Pushing/teleporting the necromancer away from his swarm and putting up walls isn't a bad start. Also just quick, early attacking. If you're in his face on the third turn, a battleforge/libro/ring approach is just too slow.

[silverclawgrizzly]

Ok I've no idea what mage you're using but here are a few ideas.

-Get on that Necromancer immediately. The Force Master, Arraxian Warlock, and Anvil Throne Warlord are all superb melee fighters and can get the hurt on him quick. The Beast Masters likewise can as well.
-Use Mongoose Agility to just ignore his guards and brutes in general. Guards mean nothing to Elusive. Likewise if you're using a Beast Master bring out Cervere.
-Use Tangle Vines to tie up the big dog zombies for a while. If you're a Druid then those Vine Tokens can also slow them down thus negating the Fast benefit(mostly) from Zombie Frenzy.
-Get a Wand of Healing to remove Taint and a lot of armor. Zombies with the exception of the one that grows don't hit for that much. Get a Veterans Belt too.
-Use the Suppression Orb and Modoks Obelisk if you got the spell points and aren't using a creature heavy book. It's amazing what this does to ones Mana.
-Walls can control the flow of zombies very effectively. Especially walls with a good bit of health and some armor like Wall of Stone and Wall of Steel. Wall of Fire can actually kill Zombie Crawlers in one hit if you get lucky. Caltrips an Hellfire Traps also can damage them. Remember Burn tokens are your friend with zombies.
-Chains of Agony and Agony work on Zombies. In fact Chains of Agony works VERY well on the slow little buggers.
-If you're a Warlock put the Demonhide armor on. The damage barrier is only one die but it is Critical.

[blackirishguilt]

Ok I've no idea what mage you're using but here are a few ideas.

-Get on that Necromancer immediately. The Force Master, Arraxian Warlock, and Anvil Throne Warlord are all superb melee fighters and can get the hurt on him quick. The Beast Masters likewise can as well.
-Use Mongoose Agility to just ignore his guards and brutes in general. Guards mean nothing to Elusive. Likewise if you're using a Beast Master bring out Cervere.
-Use Tangle Vines to tie up the big dog zombies for a while. If you're a Druid then those Vine Tokens can also slow them down thus negating the Fast benefit(mostly) from Zombie Frenzy.
-Get a Wand of Healing to remove Taint and a lot of armor. Zombies with the exception of the one that grows don't hit for that much. Get a Veterans Belt too.
-Use the Suppression Orb and Modoks Obelisk if you got the spell points and aren't using a creature heavy book. It's amazing what this does to ones Mana.
-Walls can control the flow of zombies very effectively. Especially walls with a good bit of health and some armor like Wall of Stone and Wall of Steel. Wall of Fire can actually kill Zombie Crawlers in one hit if you get lucky. Caltrips an Hellfire Traps also can damage them. Remember Burn tokens are your friend with zombies.
-Chains of Agony and Agony work on Zombies. In fact Chains of Agony works VERY well on the slow little buggers.
-If you're a Warlock put the Demonhide armor on. The damage barrier is only one die but it is Critical.

Fantastic post from SCGrizzly here, I will just add that having a few heavy hitters with extra dice vs. Undead/Dark like [mwcard=DNC06]Kralathor, The Devourer[/mwcard] and [mwcard=MW1C31]Samandriel, Angel of Light[/mwcard] can do a lot of heavy lifting for you.

[silverclawgrizzly]

Thanks Black Irish. How did I forget Kralathor!?! Doh! Yeah if you're a Druid or Beast Master NOTHING kills zombies faster than the giant zombie eating plant. Eagle Wings him and watch the zombies cower in fear.

[baronzaltor]

Blinding Flash stands a good chance of doing good damage to a zone of zombies cheaply due to the +2 vs non living.   Even if it doesnt it stands a great chance of daze/stunning them for the same reason.

Temple of Light is good against them too, even with no other temples on the table  its an action-less, long ranged 3 dice of damage with a decent daze/stun chance.   Supporting it and yourself with a Hand of Bim Shalla should be an obvious piece as well.

Stranglevine, Force Crush, Demonhide Armor and Corrode are sources of direct damage that can help.

Quicksand can usually mess with zombies too... since they have Bloodthirsty +0 they HAVE to try to attack a wounded creature in the zone, which means they cannot choose to attempt the escape roll and will eventually drown.

[Wildhorn]

Oooo... Nice finding with the quicksand and bloodthirsty.

[Laddinfance]

It's also great to have a creature with counterstrike, like a [mwcard=MW1C09]Darkfenne Hydra[/mwcard], damaged so that zombies have to keep running into it's face full of fangs.

[Wildhorn]

It's also great to have a creature with counterstrike, like a [mwcard=MW1C09]Darkfenne Hydra[/mwcard], damaged so that zombies have to keep running into it's face full of fangs.

Nasty.

[Laddinfance]

I had to zap my own Hydra to get damage on it, then push it forward to keep all of my opponent's zombies off me.

[baronzaltor]

Damage Barriers too.