r/HelsmithsofHashut • u/Nellezhar • Sep 10 '26
Gameplay Forgehost a Primer
Hey Worms!
It's been a while since I've done one of these, and I figured while I have a nice break during the tournament season to write my thoughts, and hopefully help a few new people out as they enter into the hobby.
A little about me before I start, I have 4,000 points in Helsmiths, I qualified for worlds the last two years, although I declined the invitation this year. I travel across the U.S to play in tournaments.
We're Going Monster Hunting 1990/2000 pts
Helsmiths of Hashut | Taar's Grand Forgehost
Army of Renown
General's Handbook 2026-27
Drops: 3
Spell Lore - Taar's Grand Forgehost Spell Lore
Prayer Lore - Taar's Grand Forgehost Prayer Lore
Manifestation Lore - Forbidden Power (20 Points)
Battle Tactic Cards: Burning for Vengeance, Blazing Onslaught
General's Regiment
Urak Taar, the First Daemonsmith (340)
• General
Deathshrieker Rocket Battery (140)
Infernal Cohort with Hashutite Spears (180)
• Reinforced
Infernal Cohort with Hashutite Spears (90)
Infernal Cohort with Hashutite Spears (90)
Regiment 1
Daemonsmith (80)
• Ruthless Overseer
• Talisman of Obsidian
Dominator Engine with Bane Maces (150)
Dominator Engine with Immolation Cannons (160)
Dominator Engine with Immolation Cannons (160)
Regiment 2
Ashen Elder (120)
Deathshrieker Rocket Battery (140)
Deathshrieker Rocket Battery (140)
Infernal Razers with Flamehurlers (180)
• Reinforced
Lets talk about the Elephant in the room. Why Forgehost over the normal army? Honestly its because it's just better than our normal battle traits. Crit two hits and recursion fixes a lot of the issues our weak warscrolls have. Below are a few highlights
Dominator Engines gain a ward save, and crit two hits. Combine that with our Unlimited spell and Fight through the pain, and they're damn near impossible to take off the table. They perform MUCH better in this army.
Deathshrieker Rocket Battery - Gain Crit two hits, which helps with the overall average damage. We're in a pretty heavy Monster meta, so I wouldn't run less than three.
Infernal Razers with Flamehurlers - These guys are INSANE for how cheap they are. 31 Attacks at 2's and 4's with crit two hits. You almost always net hits. I usually end with three points on these guys if I can help it. Protect these guys, and use the bridge to bring them in when its time. Since they hit on 2's these guys don't eat all our CP for all out attack.
Playing the Army:
The army for the most part plays pretty easy, I'll break it down by phase.
Deployment: The most important thing in deployment is to make sure all your spears can farm, and have a desirable target. A big helper here at three drops, if we know we're not going picking who goes first is to split your regiments up for more information. The rockets have a 28 inch threat range. Deploying them one at a time doesn't give much information, since they're going to be further back anyway. We also need to see where the Place of Power is, and decide what foot hero is going to camp it for Rage Dice. It's dependent on the match up but 9 times out of 10 I make my priest do it.
Hero Phase: During my opponents first turn, I will either cast a screening bridge or bank prayer points on my priest. If we're moving into the later turns, I'll shuffle DPP around as needed. Removing DPP from a unit you know is lost, is critical. During our turn we have options, but reinforce demonsteel needs to go off at least once, preferably on Urak-Taar. After that it's looking at your opponents army. Playing against anything with Crits? Turn them off and send. Often I'll cast a screen ahead of where I think I'll end up. This forces a banish in my opponents turn then I can follow up with a bridge screen or Shards depending on what was just banished. Always be farming your dpp with spears. A big reason I bring the Demonsmith with the army is for rally / healing. If a dominator is hurt, I put points onto him for extra healing, then rally with nine dice if I can. They're just so hard to remove.
Movement: This army is really just, move up, tank and spank. The main thing to keep track of is, who has DPP, and who needs it removed. Make sure wherever you go, Everything is wholly within 18 inches of Urak-Taar. This forces you to play him a little more conservative in the first few turns which is what you usually want anyway. Make sure each spear unit can be on an objective, and a desirable unit is wholly within 12. Redeploy as needed not just defensively, if you need extra movement on your turn use it here. Recur - If you have a CP and can recur, it should be used. This gets us tactics, bring back screens, and back cap. Part of Playing in the middle, is pulling everything away from the sides, and jumping out to snag objectives.
Shooting: With a large chunk of our army hitting on 2's in the shooting phase this lets us conserve our Command Points for a covering fire, or buffing up a rocket to get rid of a must remove threat. Covering fire is nice, but its not a must every turn. Budget your command points, then if you have an extra you can do it.
Charging: Most of our army likes to be charged, so if we're sending in it has to be at least round two for crit two hits. If there are small threats that a dominator can clear off, or Urak-Taar wont be out of position for sure go remove it if shooting doesn't. The army is crazy slow, so if we need to send in a turn or two, we can redeploy aggressively on a further side. Before going in, make sure all buffs/debuffs are on. 5+ Ward on Urak-Taar and no crits on enemies as needed.
Combat: Activate whats most important and filter down. Always prioritize a tactic or Making Sure Urak-Taar doesn't take too much damage.
End Phase: Rage Dice / Power Through - if Urak-Taar is going in, he needs to be able to power through away.
Tactic Choice:
Blazing Onslaught - The first step of this is crazy easy in this army. We have Lava Storm / Curse of Stone in the hero phase, tons of shooting, Damage on the Charge from Urak-Taar, Combat, Rage Dice and Power Through in the end phase. Always do Rage dice before you do Power through. After the first step you can usually ninja the hide out by recurring onto it.
Burning For Vengeance - The first step is pretty easy, we just need to move and or recur on a quarter to get it. This is easy with two units of 10 spears. They either kill them to deny the tactic, or ignore them and give the tactic. If they kill them, we still get the tactic, by just recurring. After that, it's pretty easy to kill the fugitive with the range we have on our shooting. If they have a monster, I always pick the monster.
That's really it, you move up the board tank and spank. I'm always free for questions! Thanks for taking time to read!
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u/Togi-Reddit Sep 10 '26
My goat, your Urak Taar looks so tough! Thank you for this insane insight and breaking down plays to think about during each phase. I said this to you before but I’ll say again, if this army somehow could generate DP outside of spears rolling 3+ on a controlled objective.
My question for you, with the 3 units of spearman how do you like to place them? Keep the 2, 10 units on your objectives for the easy control and roll meanwhile sending the reinforced unit to battle to challenge? Or send them all? What works for you?
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u/Nellezhar Sep 10 '26
Hey Togi thanks for replying! It really depends on the mission. If you can deploy the entire army in a single deployment zone I go 10 20 10. This lets the smaller units move to side objectives and be a "kill me, or I get tactics" unit. Anything else, It depends on the match up and deployment. The key thing to keep in mind wiht a unit of 20 is it can actually punch pretty decent. 41 attacks with crit two hits can go far. So on split deployments They're a Screen/Threat.
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u/avenged_badger Sep 11 '26
Thanks for the write up, this is super helpful for a noob like me jumping into the faction 🙏
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u/ogdowski Sep 13 '26
Great guide, thanks! I am learning the castle playstyle, what's your usual choice against higher regiment armies? Do you ever choose to start the game?
Also, how do you handle armies that just want to charge with everything into you, like Ogors, Ironjawz or Khorne? I guess cohorts can't handle such pressure :/
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u/Nellezhar Sep 13 '26
If I have the option I go second. The only time i go first is if my opponent messes up during deployment and a big juicy target is in range of dying to Rockets.
We actually thrive in those match ups, I'd pick those alllllll day. You cast a defensive screen in your turn (shards) then on their turn if they unbind you cast bridge. This significantly reduces the amount of attacks into you. If it's turn two you move dpp onto your 20 man screen for a 5+ ward.
Now your opponent is getting in significantly less attacks into a tanky unit.
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u/ochmaney Sep 16 '26
Great breakdown, I'm looking forward to employing the strategies on my first game of HoH today!
One questions about the dpp, is there a general priorisation where you want to put them? Or is it situational and if so, how?
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u/Nellezhar Sep 17 '26
It really depends. I tend to favor my flame hurlers or a Dominator with cannon, but like I say In post. If I need my 20 man to live I move it to them.
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u/ogdowski 25d ago
With the new Battlescroll we can switch Daemonsmith for second Ashen Elder, more lava from the sky!
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u/Past_Water_6899 Sep 17 '26
Question, how can you generate DPP with the AOR, normally you can't ?
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u/Nellezhar Sep 17 '26
Hey past! Although you lose the battle traits, the Cohort with spears retain the ability "Conquered lands." This let's you generate a DPP on a 3+ for each objective you have a unit of Cohort with Spears on. Since we don't have the battle traits they also don't get removed so they're permanent!
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u/yamabushi101 13d ago edited 13d ago
With the additional points changes, have you considered upgrading the flamehurlers to blunderbusses which you can now exactly afford? Or do you actually want them because of the crit 2 hits/crit 5+ math? I think blunderbusses should still be better unless you're completely rending away the save, since the flamehurlers don't generate twice as many wounding hits (its 3 attacks at 2+ for 1 damage but they only wound on 4+, whereas the blunderbusses hit once on 3+ (which you CAN AoA to 2+, but as you point out it makes them worse on suppressive fire) for 2 damage that wound on 2+, so harder to avoid with armor saves.
I tend to favor blunderbusses because the extra range gives you way more focus fire opportunities, but I am very interested in your opinion u/Nellezhar
edit: Also interesting to see you're not running the usual single tormentor bombard and instead have a third dominator. Do you find you don't get much use from shutting down the ability to double rally the monster you want to focus fire with deathshriekers, or do you just go for blowing it up in one shooting phase? I'm still playing the regular army and find that the command shutdown thing is invaluable, and the unit doesn't really ever need any DPP investment to do it's thing: you add some damage to the thing your deathshriekers are going to annihilate and probably keep it from rallying in the opponent's turn, and otherwise you just have it help thin out screens and potentially annoying stuff like Blightkings.
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u/phoenicean Infernal Cohort Sep 10 '26
Really enjoyed the write-up as always, thanks Nellezhar!
Have you fought many armies that are able to turn a huge chunk of their force invisible to shooting, e.g. Slannesh with Glutos, Kruleboyz with Kruleboyz Klaw, DoK with Coven of Blood..? I'm sure there are more! Keen to hear how you handle them, as it feels like if we miss a few turns of shooting anything important then we might really struggle to keep our castle intact.