Zimagic

Wow, new low: 2 glory vs out of the box Mournflight. 2. And one of those was "Catching Up".

After 2 sold weeks playing them, I can put my finger on loads of things that are lacking: Movement/range: Ok, it's fluffy that they are slow, I'm totally ok with that. However, if they are slow, they need to have a way to interact with opposing figurines from distance or, more importantly, a reason for opposing figs to come interact with them. So, if they don't have movement, they need to score something that forces your opponent to have to react to what you are doing and play your game (this applies to all 3 movement bands). You end up having to play cards just to extend movement which cuts space for cards that do other things. They make up a little for this by having range 2 & 3 attacks but these are on a limited number of figurines to attack with. That brings us to: Model count: 3 models is limiting in what you can do with certain strategies, notably hold multiple objectives. It also cuts down the range of activations to a reduced number of models. Lose one of those and you're in an even worse spot. Essentially, having 3 models means you have to be very good at at least 1 thing. Not dying easily would be a good thing but some sort of scoring related advantage is a necessity, and the Wurmspat don't do this in any one area better than any other warband: "You want to hold objectives? You shouldn't be playing a 3-man warband. Magic? Cursebreakers", and so on. At the very least, they should have an extra model (or a way to make one) if they don't have a clear & strong glory path to allow them to go get objectives. Objectives (& Flavour): So here is where I feel they dropped the ball. Already being a 3-man warband has inherent disadvantages. In addition, they have no regeneration/reanimation ability and their faction cards are middling to bad. Their glory objectives are very poor. Where they should be defining achievable ways to steer your strategy (Look at Mantrappers: "Make big Ogre, smash face"), instead they are highlighting in different ways what's missing from the fighter cards/model count. What's even more annoying is that every warband gives an opportunity to make a strategy that's different and unique for them. Sometimes they take that opportunity, sometimes not. With the Wurmspat, it would have been really refreshing to see them look at a different way to score glory or a rule that defined how they interacted with nearby figurines. Instead, though flavourful, they were blessed with a statistically irrelevant damage reduction ability. How hard would it have been to put in a flat -1 dice to opposing rolls (to a min of 1) if adjacent? It fits the fluff and it's already an effect that's present in the game. Hey, even water it down to "-1 dice if adjacent & wounded" to tie it into their inspire trigger if you want, just so long as it's relevant. Or give them innate Guard. They are supposed to be hard to kill and the "no knockback" would be more useful in scoring that pointless Tri-lobe Supremacy than whatever it is an 8% chance of taking 1 damage instead of, em, 1 damage is...... And, unfortunately, Fecula is the biggest victim of the warband's overall weak power level. She doesn't gain a second shield inspired and, as the only Wizard, makes Magic an extremely fragile strategy. No-one wants to go heavy Magic in a 1-Wizard warband at the risk of too many dead cards, more-so when your only Wizard is also your most fragile fighter. Yes, a 3-lightning-dice attack is good, but it's still for only a single damage. Not something you can reliably build an entire strategy around on a 1 Block model. To be perfectly honest, they don't actuelly need *all* of these things but they do need some of them or et least better access to solutions to some of them. Right now, they feel like one of 2 things: they were once good in development and were seriously nerfed or they felt flavourful and just weren't tested.

Thoughts on the upgade that gives you Dodge X, where X is the round number, on Fecula? Gives her benefits on dodge, shield & crits & more defence dice rounds 2 & 3 than she has on her card as well as dome Cleave protection.

Looking forward to taking these for a test run. Not hugely excited by the majority of the faction cards though.

Ah, sorry. I didn't even bother looking at the dice, tbh.

I think it will come down to the cards & playstyle. We get a new card-type/mechanic (poison apparently) and fluffwise they should be slower and harder to kill so they should feel different to play.

Why not? All the cards have "Even if this fighter doesn't have a wound"

Ok, they made a version, published it, realised it was misleading and edited it. I got to it before the edit apprently:

With the new FAQ, the Cursebreaker Acolytes are reffered to as being on guard when they are inspired. If they charge when inspired, will that trigger Change of Tactics?

This is pretty good . Lets you hit with an attack and try to do a couple of extra damage while probably inspiring. Will probably play. Molog looks fun and Darkoath are pretty much what I expected. Javelin girl is particuliarly sweet with her range + movement even if it's only a 1 shot. Feels like a much more nuanced Reivers.

Sure, for the heck of it, 2 free images. Firstly the Orruks Jeremy gave me: And a very WIP fantasy warband. All our group are doing one, character cards & figs only. My riffs on a Necromancer and her 2 hellhound familiars: Plague & Flame. Bases, decoration & about half the Flame-Hound to finish (Necromancer stolen from Blood Rage & is actually one of the first figurines I ever painted: the Volur Witch with her bone Knife & Fox-fur cloak):

Season 2. Don't have the Eyes & am currently painting the Gits so we just have Cursebreakers (and of course, noticing the things I didn't finish even as I post this!) : And the Thorns. The photo doesn't do these guys justice really. Firstly I messed up my white primer, patches & lumps everywhere. I cleaned up as best I could before painting them. If they look washed out, it's on purpose. I don't get the whole thing where a ghost can hold a real sword or plank or chains. It's a ghost so their weapons & accessories are ghostly too. I represented this in 2 ways: Firstly, on anything that's "real" (on the base), I ramped up the colour. Secondly, all of the ghosts are done in washes, inks & heavily diluted paints so that the Nihilakh Oxide on the white base shows through, even on the weapons, chains etc. Pretty happy with the tabletop result after such an inauspicious start:

Rounding out Shadespire (I didn't buy the Skellies & a friend gave me his painted Oruks) : Quite happy with these in the hand but from any sort of distance they look like mud so I'll have to revisit to work the contrast: And my favourite warband for playing & painting :

Wasn't happy with either Chosen Axes or Garrek's Reavers so stripped them & repainted in normal. The Axes stripped badly, it was a pain to clean them before painting and I missed some patches so they are only so-so. Reavers are now normal & boring, but between them & the Axes, I started getting a little bit of a feel for painting flesh, something I'm pretty bad at: My other painted bands that I haven't yet posted follow on.

Ok, here' s the rules parsed into easier steps: If he’s not on guard, he goes on guard. End turn. If he is on guard, players determine who controls him. Player with no figs controls him or a dice roll determines the controller. 1.) He may “kick” an adjacent figure of the controller’s choice (1 damage + 1 push) 2.) He “moves” twice. a) If he cannot move, he Bellows (1 damage to each other fig) and ends turn. b) If he can move, once he has finished moving, if there’s a figurine in range he chooses an attack, resolves it and ends turn. c) If he can move, once he has finished moving, if there’s no fighter in range and he’s not inspired, roll 4 def dice and heal = number of Shields & Crits and ends turn. d) If he can move, once he has finished moving, if there’s no fighter in range and he is inspired, he Bellows (1 damage to each other fig) and ends turn.