Murder Crows

"Cruel beaks, unblinking eyes, slashing talons... all hope dies."

Hideously transformed for their transgressions against others, murder crows creep into the battles of the Wicked Harvest to reap a deadly toll. Appearing seemingly from nowhere, these unnatural assassins are adept at singling out and eliminating vital targets to aid the armies of the grymkin.

Basic Info

Abilities

• Template:Advance Deployment
• Template:Pathfinder
• Template:Stealth
• Template:Ambush2
• Template:Gang
• Template:Prey

Weapons

• Claws - 0.5" reach, P+S 9 melee weapon
  • Template:Magical Damage

Theme Forces

• Template:Bump in the Night. They gain Rise in this theme.
• Template:Si

Thoughts on Murder Crows

Murder Crows in a nutshell

Murder Crows are the faction's light skirmishers/ambushers. They're fast, surprisingly accurate, and can strike from ambush. Don't expect them to live long once they reach combat, however!

It’s never a good idea to compare factions (due to all the layered faction buffs and caster differences) but everything that can be said of Paingiver Bloodrunners is true of Murder Crows. They ambush and use gang to hit accurately (even if not fighting the prey target) but beyond this they will never damage (more than a tickle) anything other than infantry.

Why should I include Murder Crows in my army?

Murder Crows are an accurate, cheap pathfinder infantry who gain a very handy rule of Ambush from the Bump in the Night benefits. They are also not limited to one unit gaining, both gain it. This means they are absolutely excellent at providing scenario pressure from ambush, as well as funneling your opponent towards the middle of the board.

Essentially, take murder crows when you want an aggressive, fast melee unit that can hit your opponent in the sides or get into their backline. They will die very very quickly but at 1.5pts a model, they are cheap. They are also a pathfinder unit in grymkin which makes them very valuable, overcoming one big faction weakness

Combos & Synergies

• Hollowmen & Frightmare's can use their guns to kill off the Murder Crows prey target, allowing them to swap it to the most relevant model they want to charge
• The Heretic allows them to get some truly absurd damage numbers. With the whole hog (Prey, Fury, Gang, Trump Arcana, Backstrike) the murder crows gain +8 MAT, and +9 to damage rolls. MAT 14 and P+S 18 is a hell of a hit. Don't expect to get the whole combo off very often but when you do...
• The Wanderer gives them better threat range through use of his gun. Anything that can boost their threat off the ambush is super valuable.
• The King of Nothing has some really great synergies with the unit
  • They enable his assassination - running 14" and then being the sands of fate target to be in the back arc of target caster, and within 5" for Master of Ruin is how the King Assassination usually begins
  • He can give them Burning Ash cover after they come in, when they are usually clumped and going to be massacred
  • They like Scything Touch for a damage bump
• Rattlers and Mad Caps love if the enemy clumps up more to try to avoid the ambush

Drawbacks & Downsides

• They have absolute victim stats, like most Bump infantry.
• The Gang/Ambush combo they have means they usually die in great numbers when they come in because they end up clumping around targets they want dead
• If your opponent remembers they exist, it's not incredibly difficult to premeasure their threat from the side of the board
• They are quite lackluster when not ambushing
• Their attacks are quite weak individually. It takes Gang to take them to a good POW (POW 9 won't even ding a heavy reliably).

Tricks & Tips

• You can Waterfall Prey to boost its effectiveness
  • Example - The enemy has a solo that is Prey target, a damaged light jack, and a full health heavy warjack. you send in 3 murder crows onto the full health jack and 2 onto the damaged light, and one onto the Solo that is the prey target, preferably in his back arc. You then do your attacks to kill the solo, swap prey to the light, kill the light, swap prey to the heavy, damage the heavy.
  • Efficient use of Prey is an extremely good tactic to use
• Prey management - Maximising a powerful ability gets a lot of value for Murder Crows
  • One tactic you can use is to place Prey on an easier to kill model that wants to be in the fight. This lets Hollowmen and other ranged elements take it out and lets you shuffle prey to wherever you want it.
  • You can also place Prey onto your opponents most key models to make them play a bit more skittishly
• Use Murder Crows to gain a scenario advantage the turn they come in. They're good at both contesting zones and flags and helping clear zones on the sides.
• They can simply run to engage some gun using models to shut the guns down. Use this tactic sparingly because any kind of free strike immunity or nearby models who can unjam the gun models make it a bad tactic.
• They don't always need to gang up on targets, many infantry models will die to the Mat 6 + backstrike pow 9 charge. Gang is helpful vs high def or high arm.

Other

Trivia

• Released with the Faction launch (2017.06)
• A group of crows is called a murder of crows. Get it?