✠ Warhammer Wolves Of The Sea
Warriors of Chaos The Old World
A tournament is coming up soon.
But the tournament restrictions just ruined your plans of a Chaos Lord on dragon + level 4 sorcerer. Don’t worry—there’s hope.
Here you have a brutal and fun alternative that fits perfectly with the restrictions: the Sea Wolves. Maybe you didn’t even consider them a viable option on a first glance, but here’s an analysis that might change your mind. This Wolves of the Sea Warhammer breakdown will help you see their true potential.
Or at least that’s what I’d say… if version 1.5 of The Old World hadn’t dropped. Updating the post now with how the Sea Wolves adapt to it.
Old World Wolves Of The Sea: Advantages over the Regular Army
Basically, the advantage of this army is that, even though they have inferior armor compared to what we usually see in Warriors of Chaos, their mobility is very good, their hitting power is strong, and as they’re ambushers, you can skip the part where your troops slowly move towards the enemy while they get shredded by ranged fire while you’re powerless to respond.
This sub-faction has a couple of very interesting units. Which ones?
First, the Marauder Tribe Berserkers (“bárbaros berserkers de la tribu” in Spanish, way too long!), who are a Core Unit. As a second top unit, we have the Marauder Tribe Huscarls, who are beefed-up barbarian cavalry, or Chosen wannabes, depending on your perspective. Either way, they’re cavalry who, when charging (and counter-charging, since they have the special rule), deal three attacks each at Strength 5, Armor Penetration -2 (with flails and the Mark of Khorne, obviously).
Do they have a save? Yes, a 4+ armor save against shooting, with flails and the Mark of Khorne, obviously. They also have toughness 4.
Additionally, they have something very good: they come with Swiftstride and Warband rules, which make them harder to redirect, as I already explained in the post linked below, despite having Frenzy from the Mark of Khorne. A fantastic unit, especially when you add the Icon of Darkness for just 20 points.
What does it do? Check out the linked post below, where I analyze the magical items worth taking.
Wolves of the Sea Army List: How to Easily Fill Your Core Units
The only problem with the Huscarls is that they’re a Special Unit — they don’t count toward core points and, as of 1.5, they can’t hold objectives either.
But don’t panic: when it comes to Core units, you can easily fill the requirement with Ambushing Berserkers and Chaos Marauder Horsemen, with or without Frenzy — up to your taste.
A lot of tournaments only allow you to include the same unit three times, and with three units of Marauder Horsemen and three units of Berserkers, you can easily hit the 500-point core requirement. I already talked about these Berserkers in another post where I dive deep into all the Core units of the Warriors of Chaos, including the Sea Wolves — I’ll link it below too.
With the June 2025 rule updates and FAQs, this army has taken a hit overall.
Why? Because it relies heavily on Frenzy and flails, and BOTH now only apply when charging (or pursuing).
On top of that, as skirmishers, you can now only charge if more than half the unit can see the enemy, and if you lose cohesion during the charge, your own guys can die before even swinging. So be careful with large skirmisher units.
Also, keep in mind that to score objectives, you need units with Unit Strength 10 or more. That means small skirmisher units need to be bigger now to adapt — which brings us back to the problem above.
I’ll just say it now: I’m not planning to run them. I really liked them in the previous edition, but they just don’t work for me anymore.
What Not to Include in Your Wolves of the Sea List
There’s also the ForgeWorld Werewolves. They have about as much future as a sober Dwarf. The reason is their transformation only happens in close combat. If they could do it in any turn, you could give them toughness 5 and a 5+ armor save during the journey into combat, which, combined with their regeneration, would give them enough durability to reach close combat.
Remember, being skirmishers doesn’t give a -1 penalty to enemy shooting due to their unit strength of 3, so they’re not saved by that either.
Some people used to pull off a combo with characters inside this unit, and it was super dangerous. You can’t do that anymore — they finally FAQ’d it.
Another unit that is purely thematic because it simply had to be included is the Barbarian Chief. He’s like one of the most underwhelming Chaos Champions, but even worse. Instead of having a special 5+ armor save from Chaos armor, he has only a 6+ Chaos armor save, and in exchange, he has Ambusher. Meh.
We all know character points are highly valuable, and we’re not going to spend them on him.
Sea Wolves limitations: Characters and Rare Units
The biggest drawback at first glance is that in a regular army you can take a Chaos Lord or a Daemon Prince and still bring a level 4 wizard. In this subfaction, you have to pick just one of the three. It’s an army more focused on troops than characters.
That said, in version 1.5 this limitation isn’t so bad, since magic overall — and the Chaos Dragon in particular — are no longer such rigid, must-have options. That actually works in favor of this charismatic army.
On the flip side, even though this army can include up to 33% Rare Units instead of the usual 25%, it really depends on what you want to bring. If you’re going for Giant Spawns of Nurgle, it might make sense. But if your goal is to max out on Dragon Ogres, then a regular Warriors of Chaos list is much better (they’ve gone up by 3 points, but they’re still amazing).
If you’re playing with the tournament rule of max 3 duplicate units, here you could run two units of four Dragon Ogres and one solo — and I love those guys. (I’ll explain why down below, in the related posts.)
The special Challenge Rule: When and whom to challenge
Finally, let’s finish with a very interesting detail that gives this sub-faction tons of personality: who starts the battle? AFTER DEPLOYMENT IS COMPLETE (when you already know your opponent’s army and also know who has the +1 bonus to the roll-off), it’s the Chaos player’s decision to issue a challenge through a unit champion with only one wound.
The enemy decides whether to accept. If refused, the Chaos player chooses who starts the battle, without any roll needed. If accepted, it can only be with a one-wound unit champion, and the duel lasts until one of them dies.
Obviously, as you decide whether to issue the challenge or not, you’ll have the upper hand (challenging a Bretonnian or an Elf who strikes before you usually isn’t a good idea…).
Keep in mind that your Berserker unit champion, who used to hit in duels with Strength 5 thanks to his flail and 3 attacks from Frenzy, is now a nobody swinging just 2 measly Strength 3 attacks — because he doesn’t count as charging, so none of those bonuses apply.
If you’re still unsure about trying this army due to its low armor, I guarantee its incredible mobility will surprise you. Wolves of the Sea Old World army has one of the most dynamic playstyles. Check out the linked posts below—I hope you find them useful.
