Equipping your characters with Magic Items

What to Equip your characters

When I started playing Empire, I would spend hours just thinking of the right combo of magic items for my characters. Some of them often ended up not optimized or spent without using any of it at all. So here is a quick guide on what magic item to equip for your characters and some description of how they would be used with your characters.

Captain of the Empire

• Icon of Magnus, Enchanted Shield. The Captain is often used to lead state troops into battle and with the Icon of Magnus in his hands, you do not Fear your enemies. Even Terror has been reduce to fear tests only. With the Enchanted Shield, added with Full Plate Armour, it gives you more protection and survivability of the captain. As of weapon choice, you could give him a magic weapon or simply a great weapon since he have better armour to receive hits.
• Dragon Bow. A lot of people tend to forget that the Captain have a Ballistic Skill of 5. With the Dragon Bow, the Captain could shoot a single Strength 6 with 36 inches range shot.
• Aldred's Casket of Sorcery. This is best with a Captain riding on a Pegasus with some good protection. Fly to your opponent's line of defence with their Spell caster nearby and at the end of your movement, remember to “Steal” their spell. You have a fifty percent chance of stealing away their spell and cast it back on themselves. Once the spell is casted from the casket, the spell is lost for the remainder of the game. Watch your opponent frown as his key spell was taken away from him. Best feat of this item is that you can do it at the end of every movement phase.
• Dawn Armour. Equip this on a mounted Captain with a barded warhorse and holding a shield. You will have a 1+ rerollable armour saves. It still leave you with 15 points to spend on magic items of your choice.
• Sword of Fate. More and more monsters have started to appear in 8^th edition. So this item will give you the chance of killing off your opponent monsters with it's 2+ to wound regardless of Toughness and each wound counts as D3 wounds! Make quick short work of your opponent monsters with this sword. If I were to tailor against my opponent's army, if I suspect they would field a monster, I would field my character on a Pegasus and equip him with this sword.

Battle Standard Bearer

• Holy Relic or Talisman of Protection. Both give the same amount of protection and cost the same. You will need to protect your Battle Standard Bearer as he is important for all those leadership check that your army will have to take. Remember, Empire does not have very high leadership.
• Dawn Armour. Rerolling armour saves. You'll need all the protection you can get.
• Ogre Blade or Sword of Power. I once fielded my Battle Standard Bearer with a unit of Inner Circle Knights which acted as a “hammer” unit. Field him with full plate armour, barded warhorse and charge into your opponent unit like knights (units that are not huge in numbers). Issue challenge with the BSB so that he would hopefully be protected from all other opponent attacks. With Strength 6, you should be able to kill off your opponent character or champion. Beware of opponent character killers so pick the right target.

Warrior Priest of Sigmar

• Armour of Meteoric Iron. Warrior Priests cannot equip fullplate armour. So for the additional armour, why not go all the way and have the 1+ armour save.
• Van Horstman's Speculum. Trade stats in a challenge. This is especially good against a very fighty opponent that dish out a lot of attacks and high strength for its base strengths. Trade your two attacks for more attacks that you cannot usually do.
• Enchanted Shield, Sword of Might. This combo only takes up 30 points. I usually use this combo when I field my Warrior Priest with a unit of knights. Arm him with Heavy Armour and mounted on a barded warhorse. This will enable him to have 1+ armour saves and Strength 5 to boot.
• Armour of Destiny. Fits the Warrior Priest finely especially on a mounted warhorse. Though it will only grant him 3+ armour saves but he will also have 4+ ward saves. Equip him with a great weapon and he will survive to deal two Strenght 6 hits against your opponent.

Battle Wizard and Wizard Lord

• Rod of Power. I almost never leave home without it. This arcane item which is uniquely for Empire only is one of the best items an Empire Wizard can have. Store up to 3 dispel or casting dice each magic phase (friendly and opponent's) to be used next phase. A lot of times we need to defend or make sure some spell would be successfully cast. This is one way of ensuring we have the dice needed for that one particular magic phase.
• Dispel scroll. A simple scroll that would dispel the spell casted by your enemy. Saved units their lives with this one magic item.
• Van Horstman's Speculum. Field your wizard with a unit of knights and charge out against your opponent's army general. See you opponent's army general run away from you. Why? They would probably know you have the Speculum on your wizard. He will avoid having reduced to Weapon Skill 3, Toughness 3 and 1 Attack against your wizard in the challenge. It's funny when you do not have to tell your opponent whether the wizard is having it or not and see the reaction on your opponent's face.
• Holy Relic or Talisman of Protection. Your wizard could not wear armour (except for Armour of Tarnus) so it means that he could easily be targeted and wounded with his low Toughness. 4+ ward saves could save his life.
• Armour of Tarnus. This is useful only for mounted wizards on a barded warhorse. In this setup, he will have 3+ armour saves and 5+ ward saves. A setup that can be used with a Wizard Lord that charges into combat with VHS in his hands.

General of the Empire

• Sword of Fate, Talisman of Protection or Holy Relic, Enchanted Shield. Mounted on a Pegasus like the Captain setup above, the General could also perform the same task. A monster killer with more protection. Although I prefer the cheaper version like the Captain above, the General would last longer and could fly in and give the necessary Leadership when his troops needs it.
• Armour of Meteoric Iron, Holy Relic or Talisman of Protection. This setup is mainly just for the General to provide his Leadership to the troops. He should be placed right in the middle of the entire army. Also feasible to equip with Dragon Bow to utilize his Ballistic Skill of 5.
• Dawn Armour, Holy Relic, The Other Trickster's Shard. The combo goes with a General mounted on barded warhorse, equipped with great weapon. He has a 2+ armour save with a 4+ ward save that enables him to survive hits and then hit back with three Strength 6 attacks. The Other Trickster's Shard is there to reduce the chance of surviving the attack by the general. Quite an effective combo for the general who joins the “Hammer” knight unit.

Templar Grand Master

• Holy Relic or Talisman of Protection, Laurels of Victory. The Templar Grand Master already comes equipped in a 1+ armour save. For more protection, the Holy Relic or the Talisman of Protection gives him the additional 4+ ward saves. Equipped with the lance, on the charge, the Templar Grand Master deals four Strength 6 hits. With the Laurels of Victory, each wound counts as 2 Combat Resolution. Meaning, on the charge, the Templar Grand Master has the potential of 8 Combat Resolutions himself!
• Laurels of Victory, Sword of Sigismund. This combo is useful against lower toughness opponents which would be easily wounded and low armour saves. ie. Elfs (all three of them), skaven, Empire infantry, goblins, skinks and some of the Toughness 3 daemon units. The high initiative of the Templar Grand Master and the Always Strike First from the Sword of Sigismund enables the Templar to reroll to-hit attacks ensuring maximum hits to be delivered and the Laurels of Victory to double up the wounds for Combat Resolution.
• Sword of Bloodshed, Potion of Strength. The one hit must kill Templar Grand Master. This combo is used when wish to kill off an enemy unit or character. On the turn that you wish to do the kill, declare that you're using the potion, charge in, with seven Strength 7 attacks, you should be able to kill off any opponent character that you have to face.

If you would have noticed, I've left out the Arch-lector of Sigmar. That's because I have a special article for the Arch-lector himself as the Arch-lector is my favourite selection for my army general. As with the magic equipment chosen above, they are just some examples of what I have used before and have some degree of success in them. Of course, the dice rolling is another matter themselves but with the equipment stated above, one should have a picture of how the Empire could be equipped and played. Empire don't particularly do well in combat but buffed up with some magic items, they can do the damage and give the opponents a pleasant surprise.

Here are some other good potential magic items which I have not described above that can be equipped to the characters of the Empire:

• Mace of Helstrum. The cannonball on a stick. Exchange all your attacks for a single multi-wound Strength 10 attack. Risky but blessed with “Hammer of Sigmar”, you have the potential chance of killing off your opponent. No matter what they are.
• Shield of Gorgon. This is a very interesting shield which would reduce your opponent's number of attack by 1. Potentially charge into your opponent's unit and reduce off at least 3 attacks from their side.
• Wizard's Staff. This is an arcane item which enables you to roll 7 dice when casting a spell. Especially useful when you just need to get a spell to go off and that extra dice could just make the difference.
• Dragonbane Gem. This cheap item gives you the best protection against flaming attacks in shooting, close combat and even magic. It takes up your talisman item's slot but you usually don't use too many talismans in your army list. Try it and soon you will like it.
• Dawnstone. It's not too expensive but allows you to reroll your armour saves. Especially good for characters in knight settings (ie. Fullplate armour, mounted on barded warhorse and a shield). Might just give get you the double protection your character needs.

A lot of the magic item combos are best created to suit your own playing style. There's not right or wrong except for the difference of opinions in a game. Sometimes one may opined that a risky move is better while another might choose the defensive way of protecting their characters. But all in all, it's just a game where you need to remind yourself that it is a hobby that we all enjoy and the point is to have fun.