[Sombre]

It's no use to you as long as summoning rats is working out. But if your opponent has countered the rats (say with missile fire, or battlefield wide spells) then the fact that they can also ferry troops and blood hunt is a factor. Similarly, if you use plague priests purely as army support casting sermon of courage and random death spells, but suddenly find yourself without a foe (does happen in MP a fair bit) with an army trapped in a fort or province or require an ok leader, you'll be glad they have more tricks up their festering sleeves.

You're right of course that once you get multiple special abilities and you can only use one at a time, you shouldn't have to pay full price for all of them, but it isn't like that's the case with the Plague Priest. You're paying more than the baseline of any one of those abilties it's true, which is the cost of versatility. Not just of the unit, but of the race. Skaven aren't that predictable, outside of the fact they'll be using hordes of missile vulnerable chaff (legions of steel + clanrats helps there btw). This is partly because their commanders can be used in different ways and suddenly switch tactics. There are also abilities that commanders have (such as the Grey Seers being able to spy) which you get 'for free' and aren' supposed to be the basis for a strategy, they're more like easter eggs. I'm not expecting anyone to use grey seers as dedicated spies, but the ability will occasionally be useful in the course of some other strategy (stealthy army for instance) and it makes thematic sense.

It is optimal to have a unit which just researches, a unit which just leads, a unit which is all combat magic with no ability to research, H1-3 priests with no other abilities etc all at the lowest possible price and just have a load of these specialist commanders, but it isn't like you get that with dom3 base nations.


As for the Ermorian Grand Thaumaturgs, I don't think their reanimating ability is really that hot. If that's all they do, I'm not sure they're worth it. It seems like it's just another special ability which makes them more versatile. I could be wrong on that though because I'm no MA Ermor expert.