AoS 2 and what it means for Destruction

[Skabnoze]

Well, in the last couple of editions of Fantasy the Goblins did have the ability to steal magic power dice from the enemy.  So stealing command points would not be about of character.

[kenshin620]

56 minutes ago, Skabnoze said:

Well, in the last couple of editions of Fantasy the Goblins did have the ability to steal magic power dice from the enemy.  So stealing command points would not be about of character.

Yea hilariously due to stuff like sneaky stealin, goblin wizards were often objectively better than orcs (it didn't help that the big waaagh lore was unreliable and almost always a worse version of things like the lore of beasts).

 

Though are all heroes getting their own command abilities? Curious to see what kind they come up with for things like ogor butchers.

[svnvaldez]

18 minutes ago, kenshin620 said:

Though are all heroes getting their own command abilities? Curious to see what kind they come up with for things like ogor butchers.

I do not believe most warscrolls are getting rewrites. Until ogres get a battletome butchers will not have command abilities.

[Malakree]

The reactive nature of inspiring presence is a huge boom imo as they can no longer shoot the one without it.

mega battalions having 3 on round 1 seems a bit strong but will have to see.

[Iradekhorne]

they also are going to changue some warscrolls, i think some heroes give now extra command points, like archaon, celesant prime, or godrakk. Like the 40 k primarchs or the best generals

[Jgroover]

I think theoretically there is a chance Ironjawz could do some incredible damage under these new rules. If you have three command points you could get a Megaboss on Maw Krusha, a foot Megaboss, and a Greenskinz Warboss to all use their Waaagh! variants. With perfect rolls that could mean 5 extra attacks for every model in range. With that many swings it should be very easy to trigger smashing and bashing and just avalanche down their line. This could end up not being possible but if it is that would be very sweet. 

[Malakree]

Honesty I think the points cost decrease could be the biggest thing for us.

30 ardboyz going down to 400 or even 350 it will make it far easier to squeeze extra wizards in which potentially let's us make use of the new spells.

If you can have multiple persistent spells up we could have 2 or 3 of them roaming around the board like precast arcane bolts.

A big question there would be if they benefit from the weirdfist, imagine a d3+5 nuke the opponent has to dodge continually !

Combine with some QoL changes and it's looking good, especially for brute lite players

[broche]

10 minutes ago, Malakree said:

A big question there would be if they benefit from the weirdfist, imagine a d3+5 nuke the opponent has to dodge continually !

It won't unless they reprint Weirfist, as the current bataillion specificly say arcane bolt, foot or green puke!

[Malakree]

Just now, broche said:

It won't unless they reprint Weirfist, as the current bataillion specificly say arcane bolt, foot or green puke!

Fair enough, makes me a little sad but is reasonable. 

I'm hoping we get the stormcast 2.0 book treatment with new and updated battalions, the old ones are really out of date. 

[PlasticCraic]

10 hours ago, kenshin620 said:

Yea it looks like the 40k command system is a big influence. I doubt it'll be as comprehensive (40k you have like 20 or so things to spend command points on) but I do predict a few common elements will be used such as command point recycling or maybe even some sneaky armies having the ability to "steal" CP (either directly or "whenever your opponent spends a CP, roll and die and on a 5+ you gain a CP").  I think Grots may have some interesting CP interactions in their update.

Oh you sneaky git!

Are you on Twitter? I want to tweet this but give you credit

[Imperial]

I asked about WAAAGH in enemy combat phase, but:

Hey Aleksey,
We're not sure yet.
Some units will be getting a slight rule tweak to fit wit the new edition - we'll have specific details closer to the time.

[broche]

So reviewing the new rule so far:
 
 Turn priority: Like that one. Preserve the double turn but reduce the likehood.
 
 Command point: Cool idea but unfortunatly, it will open combo so I expect to see some broken mechanic (GW is usually really bad for testing). 
 I think it would be cool with a rule of ONE command per turn.  
 
 Look out sir!: Hate that one. And it's badly worded (as the cover rule). I hope it will be clarify in GHB that it's non-Behemoth. 
 In theory, the idea is ok (increase survavibility of small character). But the fact is, they were already survivable enough.
 Especially with the expected rule change to shooting. An unessesary rule that will buff unit like Luminark or Cauldron of Blood,
 who really didn't need this additional buff.
 
 Casting and Unbinding: The change to arcane bolt is ok i guess (assuming there will be new spell for everyone). It become pretty crappy. 
 Mystic shield, well it's worse for the most part EXCEPT if you have a 2+ save now it become utterly broken. However i guess going up to 2+
 without Mystic shield will be harder. Unbinding at 30' well hard to tell but i think it's good (help eliminate combo, never a bad thing).
 In any case Weirnob just took a huge boost just with that rule.
 
 So i'm a bit mitigated so far...

[Sheriff]

command ability combos is the big thing. everyone's gunna be coming up with crazy powerful combos, and you'll do them easier with battalions ... but many destruction allegiances are already at a disadvantage without access to battalions. 

[Skabnoze]

I like the change to Mystic Shield.  That was a good spell in 80% of cases, but it was really a bad spell when it was applied to a 3+ armor save unit.  I will miss the loss of that spell for a lot of units in the game that could use it without being broken, but I think it is more important to stop the cases when that spell simply made units or models almost immortal to standard wounds.  This gives me hope that they are going to take a hard look at armor stacking and where that led and do something about it in the new edition.  I don't mind some armies, and select models, having the ability to boost armor - but generic abilities like that usually don't work out very well because there are simply too many interactions.

Having said all of that, they could have put something in the core rules, or the rule for arcane shield, that says that an armor save cannot be improved past 3+ (which I think is a very reasonable restriction to make), but the change they chose is fairly clean.

@broche I disagree with you about "Look Out Sir" and I think it is a great addition.  Small heroes are currently stupidly easy to wipe out via shooting simply because they often don't have many wounds or a good armor save.  Take a look at all of the Grot heros.  The only ones that don't die quickly to a stiff breeze are the ones that are mounted.  This new rule means that you can still shoot them off the table, but they are slightly harder to hit.  I still think a lot of them will get shot off the board still because a single -1 to hit is not that big a deal to a number of shooting units and these characters still have low wounds and poor armor.  But hopefully the -1 may make people have to consider whether to target them or not.

As for the Daughters of Khaine, I am sure that GW has thought of that case for these rules.  If they did not then I expect it will rapidly be FAQed.  I imagine that when the new edition comes out and the new GHB releases that there will be some interactions that slip through the cracks and need to be fixed.  I am sure that they will probably drop a fair bit of warscroll changes for things they discovered while writing the rules, but they won't catch everything.  But, they do seem to be fairly on the ball in addressing big issues recently - so I am feeling fairly positive at the moment.  My main hope is mainly that they clean up some of the current warscroll rules and how they interact with new core rule changes - like the Moonclan Warboss 

[Skabnoze]

5 minutes ago, Sheriff said:

command ability combos is the big thing. everyone's gunna be coming up with crazy powerful combos, and you'll do them easier with battalions ... but many destruction allegiances are already at a disadvantage without access to battalions. 

I think the ability to pay 50 points from your list to get an extra Command Point will go a long way to solving that issue for armies without batallions.  I have no idea where the point costs for batallions will land, but I expect it won't drop that low.  So it stands to reason that just buying command points straight up will be popular compared to batallions in many cases.

I can definitely see some grot or ironjaw armies dropping a stone thrower for 2 command points.  That seems like something you would consider doing if you run a lot of Brutes and want to keep a couple extra Inspiring Presence saved up.  Or if you want to score an early command-ability combo stacking - such as Gordrak and a couple Warboss unleashing a devastating mass charge early in the game.  I can also see Grots stocking up on a few extra command points for Inspiring Presence use.  For instance anyone wanting to play Squig Heavy will want that to keep Cave Squigs on the table until they can  get engaged and start eating people.  I could be wrong, but it seems like there might be good use within Destruction for buying a few command points.

[broche]

@Skabnoze yeah it might be ok if you take some specific case (fragile foot heros) but when you think a stormcast hero with already a 3+ save and cover or Battlesmith (3+ reroll in cover) those are not easy hero to kill. A blood cauldron with a 5++ is not easy to kill (and he can benefit from cover). 

I think they should have stick to include this on warscroll profile for specific hero what were to easy to kill, a bit like they did with Fungoid. 

For mystic shield: it's strictly worse than before, except if you already have a 2+ (that is probably a good thing overall, since getting 2+ without the old shield will be harder). Free poeple Griffon can have a natural 2+ (with meteoric armor) so slap him a shield  and he could hold an objective forever. 

But overall i think it's good, it will be harder to built buffed death star like Tzaangor, cause they already had the access to reroll but their only +1 was mystic shield.

[Sangfroid]

The change to mystic shield is excellent for armies that have access to a lot of rend...... like ironjawz ?????

[Sheriff]

2 hours ago, Skabnoze said:

I think the ability to pay 50 points from your list to get an extra Command Point will go a long way to solving that issue for armies without batallions.  I have no idea where the point costs for batallions will land, but I expect it won't drop that low.  So it stands to reason that just buying command points straight up will be popular compared to batallions in many cases.

I can definitely see some grot or ironjaw armies dropping a stone thrower for 2 command points.  That seems like something you would consider doing if you run a lot of Brutes and want to keep a couple extra Inspiring Presence saved up.  Or if you want to score an early command-ability combo stacking - such as Gordrak and a couple Warboss unleashing a devastating mass charge early in the game.  I can also see Grots stocking up on a few extra command points for Inspiring Presence use.  For instance anyone wanting to play Squig Heavy will want that to keep Cave Squigs on the table until they can  get engaged and start eating people.  I could be wrong, but it seems like there might be good use within Destruction for buying a few command points.

Also bear in mind that fanatics could make opponents waste 1 or more command abilities when they get blocked, and we can gain 1 point by setting up that block without needing to spend any. That's a net gain of 2 command points! Fanatics ❤️

I mainly want battalions so that we level the playing field and have the option, but also because I want gordrak's command ability in a grot army, applied to a grot battalion. 

[Sheriff]

1 hour ago, broche said:

For mystic shield: it's strictly worse than before, except if you already have a 2+

Not just that, but it makes killing things easier if they already have a re-roll 1s ability, e.g. loads of stuff seems to have a 3+ base and can re-roll 1s somehow - now they stay just the same. 

(2+ re-rolling 1s is the worst...)

[broche]

exactly! we just need to hope there's not a bunch of spells in the faction that will give +1 to save or it will become much worse lol

[Skabnoze]

4 minutes ago, broche said:

exactly! we just need to hope there's not a bunch of spells in the faction that will give +1 to save or it will become much worse lol

Someone will get that spell.  It might be attached to a realm lore.  But, if attached to a realm lore then at least you would have a 50% chance to select a realm without that spell if you don't want to be up against it.  Hopefully they keep it out of the generic spells though.  We just have to hope that when GW gives that spell to a faction that they do it with a bit of thought rather than going back to stupidly tough units and another arms race.

[broche]

yeah i'm wondering how you realm selection will work for matched play. 

[Skabnoze]

10 minutes ago, broche said:

yeah i'm wondering how you realm selection will work for matched play. 

I would think the same as it currently does in the core rules.  Decide with your opponent, or else roll a die and the winner picks.  Seems simple and easy enough that there is little reason to change it.

[Sheriff]

2 minutes ago, Skabnoze said:

I would think the same as it currently does in the core rules.  Decide with your opponent, or else roll a die and the winner picks.  Seems simple and easy enough that there is little reason to change it.

But that doesn't actually happen. You'll start that conversation and the other guy says "nah... nobody plays that rule" 

[Skabnoze]

Just now, Sheriff said:

But that doesn't actually happen. You'll start that conversation and the other guy says "nah... nobody plays that rule" 

Well if they don't want to pick the realm then it gets to be wherever I want it to be.  Otherwise we can roll off.

Unless you play at the table at my house - then we are playing on Ghur 90% of the time because that is how I have modeled the terrain.  Although, if someone really wants to play another realm for whatever reason then I am ok with that.

But, if I have a rule that says I get some nifty bonus for playing in a certain realm, then I am going to try to use it (realm lores are pretty much the same thing) and I am perfectly fine having a roll off for it.  If the opponent makes an issue about it then he can just go find someone else to play.  I have been in this hobby long enough that I would prefer to simply not play a game than play against someone that is going to be a dou.che about something as trivial as that.

As far as I am concerned it is part of the core rules and so it is going to get used.  If someone does not want to use a particular core rule then we can have that discussion before the game and decide on some house rules.  But with generic spell lores becoming a thing available to all players I expect the rules for realm choice will be used more commonly.  As it stands now, rules for specific realms are fairly uncommon so Realm choice really does not make much of a difference.