Dire Wolves

Dire Wolves is a Vampire Counts melee war beasts unit in Total War: Warhammer. A pack of Dire Wolves is a lacerating mess of teeth in the melee, effective against enemy infantry. In Rise of the Tomb Kings, the Followers of Nagash faction also has access to these.

Description
Dire Wolves are macabre parodies of the living Giant Wolves that roam the Badlands and the forests of the Old World. Their flesh hangs in tatters from cracking bones, their skulls and innards exposed through tears in their skin. They are swathed in an eerie, glimmering twilight and their eyes glow with unnatural energy. The stench of putrefaction hangs on their wet breath and their howls cause shivers of fear to freeze the bold. When they are slain, their bodies dissolve into a coiling miasma, leaving nothing behind. Vampires sometimes keep the largest of these creatures in pens deep below their castles and towers, feeding them on local peasants until they are large and glutted, then goading them to new heights of viciousness. The Vampire imbue their creations with Dark Magic to increase vitality and bestow a callous cunning. These monstrous creations are known as Doom Wolves, and it is these larger, more ferocious beasts that lead the Dire Wolf packs to war.

Strategy
The wolves low melee defense, low model count, and especially low leadership makes this unit poorly suited to flanking any foe that can fight back. Thus they are best used to target artillery/ranged units, charge into engaged units rear's, and to chase down fleeing or broken units. The combination of high speed and high melee attack lets them rip and tear into the much less armored rear of escaping units while your more important Hammer and Anvil units take care of high value targets. Bats might chase a broken unit to the edge of a map, but wolves are more likely to kill anything that does not regain moral and fight back. While Fell Bats need to be wary of too much missile fire, Dire Wolves need to watch out for melee cavalry as they lurk around for an opportunity on the flanks. A single solid cavalry charge will hurt them pretty badly. Also, unlike their Norscan or Chaos counterparts they don't have a slowing or poison effect that adds value as a supporting unit in melee or aid them in running down missile cavalry. Fell Bats actually tend to work better in the latter case due to their higher speed, though they won't kill the missile cavalry as quickly due to their lower melee attack.