So are monsterous mounts worth it? This is the question to be debated.
In my opinon
Monsterous mounts are not worth the points cost because other then the oh cool/ oh crap hes got a giant dragon monster with his lord. They can do little to win the game other then being CC monsters and pincushions. They may be able to negate ranks but if they take a cannonball to the face (a likely occurance) or have to many hits from models benifiting from Large Target special rule (bolt throwers namely). They are like Giants in a way. But giants dont come with a expensive general screaming hit me on them.

Discuss

I fully agree with you.

A character is more vulnerable if mounted on a monstrous mount: he has less armor save, he's bigger (and thus, easier to hit with cannons and stone throwers), he's sometimes a Large Target and it's more tempting to shoot him.


Monstrous mounts are often able to fly, too, but sometimes that's not so useful.


Dragon-mounted Elf Prince: "Chaaaarge!"

*flies into the enemy army*
*hacks his way with his sword*
*realizes that he's greatly outnumbered on all sides*
*looks over his shoulders*

"Hey, hurry up, guys... I kind of need help here. I can't win the battle by myself, you know. Hey, quicker, what are you slowpokes doing?!"

.

However if he hangs back he can be a valid rank negator. Thats the other side of the argument. And also maybe they can be like a chariot. Break the enemy on the first round of combat. Chase off the board then be positioned to be ready to kill next turn. Also Combat by turn 2 isnt such a bad concept. :D just trying to support the other side as well.

Monstrous mounts (the real ones- dragons etc.) are an investment. Like all things in warhammer, your opponent can counter them. And like all things, you need practice to use them ^_^ .

There are only a few things that can threaten a monstrous mont: enough firepower, magic, and ranked units. You can protect yourself from firepower and magic, and your manouvrability should mean you don't charge ranked units up front.

Standard tactic for my elf prince on dragon:

turn 1) Hug terrain or move into a flanking position and use breath attack

turn 2) Either move to the rear of the enemy army causing terror tests, or charge something nasty in the flank.

Look up the palace herald issue 2 if you want sme ideas on using big fliers.

Dragons are absolutely lethal. Very difficult to kill off with shooting, flyers, large targets (allowing them to charge over enemy units, making defending your flanks against them very difficult), and with a breath weapon so that when they're not charging you, they can amuse themselves by roasting your troops. A unit that gets flanked by a dragon is usually going to die: a unit that gets charged in the front is still in trouble, due to the rider's high leadership, the huge number of high-strength attacks, and the low likelihood of them being able to hurt the thing. The same goes for Bloodthirsters. Evil, evil things.

Lesser monsters tend to be a worse investment for their points. Anything that can fly and has US5+ is still very valuable, but Hippogriffs and the like tend to be very vulnerable to missile fire: anything that can't fly has the problem of having to avoid getting drawn out by the enemy's distraction/harassment units, and wasting its potential.

The monsters I've used have been a Chaos Dragon, a Carnosaur, and a Hippogriff. The Chaos Dragon was a game-winner; the Carnosaur put the fear of Sotek into my opponents, but sometimes had a hard time actually getting into combat when they played cunningly, and the Hippogriff was generally the subject of ridicule ("The Chicken of Doom") and often got shot to pieces with painful ease, but could still be very dangerous on a flank, and forced my opponents to incorporate it in their plans. If you're making them react to you, then you have taken the initiative, and you are the one controlling how the battle plays out, which is about the biggest advantage you can have - and if there's one thing you can guarantee about a monstrous mount, it's that the enemy is going to have to react to its presence.

Chilli is very correct indeed. Since most of them fly, it allows them to make the enemy react to them and not the other way around. I have never used such bing nasties in a game, yet! I very much would like to when the new high elves are released.

I for one am a fan of monstrous mounts, if they can fit in with the army. With my orcs in particular it helps with a defensive strategy as a general on a wyvern works well in tandem with a unit of Boar Boys for breaking up my opponents units.

Like Maelduin says using the terrain to your advantage is a must in all cases, as even a powerful spell could knock him off, and get him either into combat or behind the enemy asap to limit his shooting opportunites.

I'm here in defence of the 'lesser' mounts (eagles, pegasii especially). For only 50 points or so, they give a hero the ability to fly. That should not be underestimated, especially if it carries a souped-up pissed off brettonian knight. This guy is more than a match for most skirmishing / war machine / small missile units: able to outmanouvre it and crush it in combat.

As long as you don't front-charge chaos knights, it's not a bad investment: maybe 100-150 pts.

But one needs to be very careful with eagles as mounts for example. They are not very hard to kill so they should be used with care. Though I agree that they can fill their assigned role more than well :).

I once had some success with a Pegasus-mounted Paladin who acted as a war machine hunter against my Dwarf-playing opponent (who luckily had no gunline), but as Tyrion said, this kind of mount can be brought down fairly easily. It's not always worth it to have a flying mount unless the mount has 4 Wounds or more (and thus, allows you to negate ranks with your total Unit Strength of 5).


But I wish there were some more good 1-wound mounts. Cold Ones are only for Dark Elves and Lizardmen, unfortunately...