AoS 2 - Legion Of Azgorh Discussion

[Roark]

10 hours ago, Black_Fortress_Immortal said:

Yeah this may be something I look into as well.  There are many -1 to hit debuffs, but not many -1 to wound.  I would still take 2 magma cannons over 30 Fireglaives though, if we're not allowed to stack.

Oh, I would include two Iron Daemons AND two magma cannons as well. At least.

[Black_Fortress_Immortal]

5 hours ago, Roark said:

Oh, I would include two Iron Daemons AND two magma cannons as well. At least.

Yeah, we'll see what we get.  The only reason I didn't include (and probably won't) my 2nd Iron Daemon is to balance my melee and ranged output... and with shooting out of combat no longer being possible, I don't think it's that great of an Idea.  We shall see in a day's time, though!

[Charly2912]

You all sound so confident about Updates comming for us immediately after the release? 

Dont you think it might take FW some weeks? 

 

 

[mattbarker]

Just now, Charly2912 said:

You all sound so confident about Updates comming for us immediately after the release? 

Dont you think it might take FW some weeks? 

 

 

I think they'll be soon. I doubt they'll be tomorrow. They didn't take a huge amount of time to release them before but as always with FW we could be surprised either way...

[Ar-Pharazôn]

They'll have to, at minimum, give us updated points same as 2017. 

Anyone think the battalions will have more value with command points and a wider net fo artifacts to pick from?

[Trayanee]

Oooh yesss! https://www.forgeworld.co.uk/resources/fw_site/fw_pdfs/aos_warscrolls/warhammer-aos-legion-of-azgorh.pdf

[Trayanee]

Interesting things: Battle traits, command traits, fireball, Draz has command ability, Fireborn summoning was removed, Ironsworn went down, Renders lost -2 rend, Centaur got battalion, Magma cannon bonus against hordes changed to add 1 to roll

Edited June 29, 2018 by Trayanee

[Ar-Pharazôn]

Fireball is an amazing spell that we get automatically. It's essentially an auto-use.  

I'm not crazy about our allegiance abilities but they are better than nothing.

Command traits are all decent.

Chalice of Blood and Darkness is insane in a wizard-heavy edition.  

Pyrelock weapons are better. 

[mattbarker]

56 minutes ago, Trayanee said:

Oooh yesss! https://www.forgeworld.co.uk/resources/fw_site/fw_pdfs/aos_warscrolls/warhammer-aos-legion-of-azgorh.pdf

how did you find that?! Nevermind, apparently this is what I get for trusting the "last updated" text in front of the actual file lol

also - 

Blackshard armour re-roll against ranged now an ignore 1st wound in each shooting & combat phase for each unit. This feels a bit weaker? instead of saving the hit again, we just ignore the first wound of it? a giant blast of a high damage, high rend shot will now hurt rather than be saved.

K’DAAI FIREBORN:

now have a fixed 5+ save rather than the +2 against - rend attacks and have lost their reroll 1 rule  and their burning bright rule and aren't summonable 

IRONSWORN:

Pyrelock Pistol has changed to 1mortal wound + original damage on a 6 rather than 2 damage

FIREGLAIVES:

lost naptha bomb, lost bring down the best and the unit leader loadout has changed to "an Ashsteel Hand Weapon and Pyrelock Pistol" seems odd as the models don't reflect that... 

BATTLE STANDARD BEARER:

only one benefit now?

INFERNAL GUARD CASTELLAN:

only one weapon option with more consistent but lower damage potential, can't stack command ability as expected

CENTAUR TAUR’RUK:

favour of burning gods ability changed to command ability, original command abillity lost

DAEMONSMITH:

blood of hashut no longer a single use, that's pretty awesome. 

DRAZHOATH THE ASHEN:

blazing body much better

command ability is a bubble inspiring presence ?

These are pretty cool, but will take some thinking! 

Edited June 29, 2018 by mattbarker

[KevenM]

54 minutes ago, mattbarker said:

Blackshard armour re-roll against ranged now an ignore 1st wound in each shooting & combat phase for each unit. This feels a bit weaker? instead of saving the hit again, we just ignore the first wound of it? a giant blast of a high damage, high rend shot will now hurt rather than be saved.

K’DAAI FIREBORN:

now have a fixed 5+ save rather than the +2 against - rend attacks and have lost their reroll 1 rule  and their burning bright rule and aren't summonable 

IRONSWORN:

Pyrelock Pistol has changed to 1mortal wound + original damage on a 6 rather than 2 damage

FIREGLAIVES:

lost naptha bomb, lost bring down the best and the unit leader loadout has changed to "an Ashsteel Hand Weapon and Pyrelock Pistol" seems odd as the models don't reflect that... 

BATTLE STANDARD BEARER:

only one benefit now?

INFERNAL GUARD CASTELLAN:

only one weapon option with more consistent but lower damage potential, can't stack command ability as expected

CENTAUR TAUR’RUK:

favour of burning gods ability changed to command ability, original command abillity lost

DAEMONSMITH:

blood of hashut no longer a single use, that's pretty awesome. 

DRAZHOATH THE ASHEN:

blazing body much better

command ability is a bubble inspiring presence ?

These are pretty cool, but will take some thinking! 

A few additional changes that I caught on reading this....

Daemonsmith:

- Ash Storm spell now has a range of 36'' and subtracts -1 from all hit rolls made by that unit. Excellent!

- Ensorcelled armour now adds 1 to unbind rolls if the Daemonsmith has suffered wounds. Good but situational.

Shar'tor the Executioner:

- Mask of the Executioner has changed from a once a game thing linked to the charge roll to an ability doing up to D6 mortal wounds at the start of each hero phase.

- Command ability lets Bull Centaurs re-roll charges and hit rolls of 1 for their hooves.

Bull Centaur Taur'ruk:

- Command ability has allowing centaurs to run and charge is gone. Replaced by an add +1 to hit rolls made by centaurs within 12'' of this model. Previous command ability was better in my opinion.

Bull Centaur Renders:

- Lost their option to take great weapons for -2 rend. sad about this one...

- Spiteshield now always triggers on a 6 and cannot be modified by rend to send back mortal wounds in close combat.  Increases the value of the shields though...

Infernal Guard Battle Standard Bearer:

- Combined effects of the banner whereas it now both adds 1 to bravery and let's you re-roll wound rolls of 1 instead of having to choose one of the two  *without the need to plant the banner!*. Big buff to this guy's usefulness especially with the new look out sir rule!

- +1 wound

Infernal Guard Fireglaives:

- Hit rolls of 6 now cause an automatic mortal wound on top of any normal damage. This is good and easily outweighs the once per game D3 mortal wounds at 6" of the old Bomb.

- Can re-roll hit rolls of 1 if they didn't move. Happens more often than you'd think...

Infernal Guard Ironsworn:

- Spiteshield now always triggers on a 6 and cannot be modified by rend to send back mortal wounds in close combat.  Quite happy about this one kickbacks are now more reliable.

K'Daai Fireborn:

- Can now always run and charge. Combined with high(ish) movement and fly that's not bad.

- I'll need to double-check but I believe they are +1 attack.

- Save is not modifiable by rend.

Dreadquake Mortar:

- Lost its ability to do 2D6 damage against hordes and can now re-roll 1D6 instead. Ouch that hurts one of the Mortar's only redeeming qualities...

Hashut's Wrath Artillery Train:

- Lost the re-roll hit rolls of 1 for artillery that had not moved in the movement phase and instead benefit from the daemonsmith's presence even if he is not within 3'' of them. Meh, I understand that the old ability did not benefit magma cannons but it made the rockets and mortars more reliable at least. Not sure how I feel about this one.

Execution Herd:

- Pick 1 unit from enemy army and all centaurs re-roll hits against it until it dies, once it is done, pick another unit and do the same. Hmmmm not too happy about this battalion, I would have liked a bit more out of this. I guess it can ****** with your opponents head though as they try to keep their big baddy away from your centaurs.

[mattbarker]

20 minutes ago, KevenM said:

'll need to double-check but I believe they are +1 attack.

Yeah they are - I didn't spot that! Also dropped to 140 points. 

Ironsworn dropped to 90 as well. 

The more I think about these, the happier I am. 

[Trayanee]

13 minutes ago, mattbarker said:

Yeah they are - I didn't spot that! Also dropped to 140 points. 

Ironsworn dropped to 90 as well. 

The more I think about these, the happier I am. 

I think the changes are nice. The rend 2 on Renders and mortar nerf are sad, but we got a lot in compensation and of course going from "do we exist in 2.0" to having allegiance abilities and a wonderful spell is exciting.

[mattbarker]

yeah very true - it feels like someone has gone through all of them as an allegiance rather than as individual scrolls. Feels like there is more synergy between things and yes, artefacts, special rules and abilities are a step ahead of what I was personally expecting. 

Now all I need it for my pre-order to arrive in the post as planned tomorrow and I'll be set. 

Best get my Draz finished too as he is now a much more viable choice for general! 

[Trayanee]

2 minutes ago, mattbarker said:

yeah very true - it feels like someone has gone through all of them as an allegiance rather than as individual scrolls. Feels like there is more synergy between things and yes, artefacts, special rules and abilities are a step ahead of what I was personally expecting. 

Now all I need it for my pre-order to arrive in the post as planned tomorrow and I'll be set. 

Best get my Draz finished too as he is now a much more viable choice for general! 

Draz is awesome now and I hope he will manage to cast fireball and flames on one target in one turn in some of my games. Between that and Magma Cannons we can borrow a quote from a different universe here: "By fire be purged!"

[mattbarker]

13 minutes ago, Trayanee said:

Draz is awesome now and I hope he will manage to cast fireball and flames on one target in one turn in some of my games. Between that and Magma Cannons we can borrow a quote from a different universe here: "By fire be purged!"

[KevenM]

My initial feelings on the update are actually pretty good - aside from changes to the individual warscrolls I feel like the Legion is going to be able to compete in the new edition.

First off, the Blackshard Armour allegiance ability is easy to overlook but I think its a bit of a hidden gem. Ignoring the first wound done to each unit in each combat and shooting phase is better than it sounds when you consider that this also includes the opponents combat phase. If we do a quick bit of math-hammer here, let's assume that your enemy is targeting 4 units in the shooting phase and each of the combat phases and you are negating 12 wounds a turn. Over a 5 turn game that's a total of 60 ignored wounds. Considering most lists at 2000 points have between 100-150 wounds I don't think that's a trivial amount! Plus, combining this with things like the new Look Out Sir rule just adds to the resiliency of heros...

The Burning Skies ability is a lot more situational though and not a big game-changer. That being said, against certain armies its going to have an effect. The new Nighthaunt or the Idoneth Deepkin for example where all or a large portion of the army is flying are going to be taking a number of mortal wounds out of it. Heck in the best case scenario your opponent gets psyched out and moves his units (or especially weaker support heroes)  less far to prevent those mortal wounds from triggering. Look at it this way, you essentially get a chance at a free arcane bolt against each flying unit. I'll take it.

The Fireball spell all wizards get is also pretty good. It's an easy cast with a possibility to D6 mortal wounds on hordes...

For command traits, sure none are as good as the old cunning deceiver (which is now going to change I believe?) but they aren't bad either. I don't care much for the Contemptuous trait but I like Relentless for the possibility to trigger a second attack sequence for your general which could be devastating on Drazhoath, Shar'tor or the Taur'ruk. However, I think the Grotesque trait is the best here. Combine it with the new Look Out Sir and you are at -1 to hit against your general in both the shooting and combat phases - oh and throw on a new and improved Ashstorm spell on whatever your boss is fighting and you are looking at a cool -2 to hit for both shooting and combat attacks against the general.

The artifacts are ok for the most part. The Black Hammer of Hashut is meh in my opinion since there's a lot of ways to re-roll1's in this army. The armour of Bahzerak is cool as it gives the hero a 5+ ward save and I'm a fan of the Chalice of Blood and Darkness since it can spoil one of your opponents magic phases...

My read of the overall changes to the faction is that our heros pretty much all got better without increasing in points. Drazoath has a nice command ability with the 24'' battleshock immune bubble (although you'll have to be careful with his mobility), Shar'tor has a much better ability to cause mortal wounds and a situational but useful command ability when there are a lot of centaurs around.  The Castellan hasn't changed and the Taur'ruk remains a beast in close combat with a 2+ (often re-rolling 1's), 3+ once he uses his command ability (although his previous command ability was likely better).  The real winners in the hero department though are definitely the Daemonsmith who can throw the Blood of Hashut each turn, has a much improve Ashstorm spell, access to Fireball and can cast endless spells for a cool 100 pts as well as the Battle Standard Bearer who now gives off a permanent bubble of +1 bravery and re-roll 1's to wound at 18'' for 100 pts.

On the monstrous cav side I think the bull-centaur renders took a pretty big hit a losing their -2 rend but at least their shields always trigger on a 6 and they didn't increase in cost. I think they were probably a bit undercosted before to be honest. Although the Fireborn's are no longer summonable, they've got an extra attack, can run and charge and are unaffected by rend now for a drop of 20 points too! I think they are now viable in a lot of lists.

I feel like our infantry got a nice buff and I'm probably going to be running bigger blocs of Fireglaives and more Ironsworn now. The Fireglaives doing mortal wounds every time they roll a 6 to hit will really add up if you start taking big blocs of them and the Ironsworn's Spiteshield ability is now a lot more useful than it was now that its no longer affected by rend. Oh and ironsworn are now 10 points cheaper to boot. All in all, supported by a BSB and maybe a Castellan/Blckshard Warhost battalion I feel that our infantry can really do some work.

Artillery-wise we remain in a good position and I can't find too much to say about it. The Dreadquake isn't going to see much more use, the Magma Cannon remains an amazing choice at 140 points and I continue to like the rocket launcher for 120 points with a possible 4 attacks, 3+, 3+ when shooting at infantry blocks.

The battalions are a bit of a disappointment for me though. I'm lukewarm on what the execution herd does for 160 points... it comes in at a minimum of 1080 points for re-rolled attacks against a unit of your choice and that seems... expensive? The Hashut's Wrath Battalion I feel is a bit worse off than it was but its cheaper than the other ones for that extra command point / artifact and let's you get more use out of the Daemonsmith. On the other hand, I like the Blackshard Warhost a lot more now that the BSB is actually useful and that you want to take bigger blocs of Fireglaives. With the battalion, unit banners and the bsb its possible to get your Fireglaives and Ironsworn at bravery 9 pretty reliably now which is good (plus the bonuses for 10/20/30 models) -  however the re-roll hit rolls of 1 in melee is probably going to be wasted since we get a lot of re-roll 1's in this army.

All-in-all I'm quite happy with these changes and look forward to fielding the Legion in AoS 2.0!

 

Edited June 29, 2018 by KevenM

[mattbarker]

Only one I still can't get my head around is the Fireglaive Deathmask. 

Quote

FIREGLAIVE DEATHMASK: The leader of this unit is a Fireglaive Deathmask. A Fireglaive Deathmask is armed with an Ashsteel Hand Weapon and Pyrelock Pistol instead of a Pyrelock Fireglaive and a Pyrelock Fireglaive’s Bayonet-cleaver.

Really not sure why they've made him worse at shooting, which is what the unit is for, and better at close combat, which isn't what the unit is for! 

[KevenM]

5 minutes ago, mattbarker said:

Only one I still can't get my head around is the Fireglaive Deathmask. 

Really not sure why they've made him worse at shooting, which is what the unit is for, and better at close combat, which isn't what the unit is for! 

They want to sell more infernal guard command kits maybe? Those don't come with Fireglaives unfortunately so they are making the unit champions loadout fit with the kit I suppose?

[mattbarker]

7 minutes ago, KevenM said:

They want to sell more infernal guard command kits maybe? Those don't come with Fireglaives unfortunately so they are making the unit champions loadout fit with the kit I suppose?

That's possible - still just seems like a weird choice. Either way it makes the champion worse not better! I'd rather have the extra re-roll than trust he might be more useful should things get too close! Especially seen as we have no bomb to throw at them now

[Roark]

Hmm, some pretty unexpected stuff in there! Good on FW for a comprehensive package.

The only thing I'm personally really disappointed about at this stage are the new rules for "More Power!". One of the great things about having a 3+ save was that they often retained enough wounds to stoke the boiler on the regular. It seems now they're a little pigeonholed into dishing out a number of attacks that just aren't that intimidating. But maybe the other little bonuses floating around can mitigate that.

Loving K'daai at 140pts. I think they'll become a key tactical element in the army with 8" + fly + run & charge + a cool 15 attacks per unit. The changes have transformed the unit.

[mattbarker]

Yeah. I'm going to have to rethink a lot of things! I feel pleased. Can't wait to see how people start working through these with some new combos and endless spells! 

[Lobeau]

The Chaos Seige Giant was moved to the Monstrous Arcanum, and looks like it lost a number of attacks down from 2D6 at full health to 7 now, and declining to 6, 5 so on and so on. Not sure about that. On on hand you know how many attacks you're getting, and remove the chance of rolling for only two or three attacks, but on the other hand if you decided to take one, part of the fun in running him in a going for broke hoping for 12 attacks.

[AaronWilson]

2 hours ago, mattbarker said:

I don't play the army but I'd love to maybe one day (How can you NOT love chaos dwarves), then someone made a Ragnaros refference. You guys seem my sort of people... "Goes to FW website" 

[mattbarker]

7 minutes ago, AaronWIlson said:

I don't play the army but I'd love to maybe one day (How can you NOT love chaos dwarves), then someone made a Ragnaros refference. You guys seem my sort of people... "Goes to FW website" 

Go forth and splash your cash my friend! With this update out in the wild now, I feel we will see a lot more of them on the table rather than just personal project pieces because of trashy rules! Which can only be a good thing!

[Ar-Pharazôn]

Until I can order more command sets I'm going to have to trust that my opponents don't mind me doing a lot of "counts as"