Kariaq Dreadking

Cycle: Bloodied Path Cycle
War Pack: Last Stand

Dark Eldar

Warlord

Warrior. Archon.

You can include common and loyal events from any faction on the Alignment wheel but can only have one copy of any event. Your units are considered to be of the faction of an event while you play it.
Reaction: After you play an event, draw a card. (Limit once per round)

2 attack, 6 health

When bloodied:

Bloodied.
Reaction: After you play an event, draw a card. (Limit once per round)

2 attack, 6 health

Quantity: 1

Banlist/Errata

No Errata

No Bans

Signature Squad

Rules

"of the Alignment Wheel" refers to the core 7 factions (Astra Militarum, Space Marines, Tau, Eldar, Dark Eldar, Chaos, and Orks). This means that you can include events from any of these 7 factions, in addition to neutrals, but cannot include Tyranids or Necrons events.

Events that are Deepstriked are considered played, and can therefore trigger Kariaq Dreadking's reaction.

Kariaq Dreadking still follows the normal allegiance rules for all non-event cards. (e.g. they can include 3 copies of Void Pirate in their deck, and/or they could ally with Eldar and include 3 Eldar Survivalists)

Yes. While the hale reaction is identical to the bloodied reaction, it is a new instance of the ability, and can therefore be triggered regardless of whether the hale version of the ability had been used.

Yes. It has been confirmed by Apoka that this is intended.

Related: Nullify

No. While Kariaq Dreadking's units are considered to be of the Astra Militarum faction while Muster the Guard is being played, when Kariaq Dreadking deploys a unit the event is no longer being played, and therefore the unit being deployed is not considered to be an Astra Militarum unit. Thus the discount does not apply.

It is theoretically possible that, if the deployment was taking place during the resolution of an Astra Militarum event, then the unit would be considered an Astra Militarum unit, and the discount would apply. This scenario requires very precise setup, and is unlikely to occur during play.

Related: Muster the Guard

Average rating:

from 1 ratings.

Echo
2026-08-24 13:12:56

This warlord is not only bad, but also very limited in deckbuilding potential. While it allows you to include any non-signature non-necrotic non-Tyranid event, it limits you to 1 of each. As a result every Kariaq deck ends up being roughly the same, where you shove most of the good events into your deck (drop-pod assault). This also makes the decks very inconsistent in performance, as there can be massive differences in Kariaqs potential depending on whether it draws into drop pod or battlecry. Additionally, the limit of 1 event prevents duplicate copies of Raid, Archon's Terror, Rapid Assault, Power from Pain, Gut and Pillage, and Promise of Glory. As a result, Hypex Injector becomes more or less unusable, further hampering ones options for deckbuilding. Furthermore, the loss of Gut and Pillage leads to a struggling economy when compared to other Dark Eldar warlords. This issue is exacerbated by an inability to run multiple Archon's Terrors, leading to difficulty in dealing with Elite units, encouraging Kariaq to run Klaivex Warleader instead, which it can seldom afford.

Furthermore, Kariaq is encouraged to put as many events as possible in the deck, as Kariaq draws a card for the first event played each round. Despite this, Kariaq has at times failed to trigger this ability due to either events being reactions (Counterblow), being expensive (Drop pod, Battlecry, Brutal Cunning, Archon's Terror), or being too important. As each event is limit 1 copy, this means that once an event is placed in the discard pile the opponent no longer needs to play around that card. In other words, counting cards is highly effective at discerning the potential threats posed by the Kariaq player. While this can theoretically be reduced by including Colisseum Fighters, this approach is very costly.

The signatures in themselves are not the most interesting. Kariaq's Inner Circle is and adaptable and strong combat or command unit. The Silent Eye is a free deploy stall each round and a potential draw, and is probably Kariaq's strongest card. Webway Schemes are just bad, being effectively 1 resource for 1 Khymera via Deep Strike. Dark Eldar has no cards which benefit from Deep Strike (think Deathstorm Drop Pods or Epistolary Vezuel). I have yet to see the ability to switch locations with the Khymera and Kariaq enter play in any game. Finally there are Grand Schemes. This card is actively harmful to Kariaq due to having the Prepared sigil, meaning that it is always drawn in Kariaq's opening hand. As a result, Kariaq begins the game with an effective handsize of 6 cards due to Grand Schemes being a dead card. Grand Schemes acts as both The Broken Sigil and The Flayed Mask pledges, preventing one from running the Prophets of Flesh pledge. Neither of the aforementioned pledges are useful, and combining them into a single card does not solve this issue, being a waste of a card and a resource for a chance to force the opponent to sacrifice a unit later on (this unit usually being a token or 1 cost command unit).

In conclusion, this warlord's limit of 1 copy of each Event should not have applied to Dark Eldar events, as this limitation has led to it playing more as a glorified slot machine which struggles to deal with Elite units.

Also, I still got no clue as ta whether this here warlord can even use Nullify.

Echo
2026-08-24 13:15:13

Also, technically the hale and bloodied sides of the warlord are separate abilities, meaning that ye can trigger it twice during the round in which it was bloodied.

Coalback
2026-09-04 18:45:37

Hey iridial, give me a Packmaster Kith with extra events.
Extra events!
And hold the DE events.
Hold the DE events?
And hold the Khymeras!
Hold the Khymeras?! Hey ConquestDB, get me a Kith with nothing!
NUTHIN'?