GHB17 - massive regiments. Horde armies rejoice.

[PraetorDragoon]

Hopefully that Skaven Clanrats change doesn't mean that many horde units that you can take 10s of only come in blocks of 20. I have been getting some good mileage from 10 sacrificial Plague Monks.

[daedalus81]

41 minutes ago, Gotrek said:

you keep saying skeletons are undercosted now, compared to what? i can name a dozen units off the top of my head that can go toe to toe, point for point against a unit of 40 skeletons. hell, against anything with a 4+ save (which is pretty common among the newer armies, KO excluded) each skeleton attack only has a 12.5% chance to deal damage. sure, each model is getting 3 attacks but, hell, you're looking at needing 64 attacks to kill a single korgorath and that korgorath is killing 4 skeletons every combat.

Not a good example.  About 25 skeletons can get in range if they completely surround it, which should kill it.  15 would be feasible for a first round and would still hurt a ton - of course depending on the angle of attack.

[Gotrek]

12 minutes ago, daedalus81 said:

Not a good example.  About 25 skeletons can get in range if they completely surround it, which should kill it.  15 would be feasible for a first round and would still hurt a ton - of course depending on the angle of attack.

a single korgorath is only 100 points, so point for point we'd be looking at a unit of 3 of them. which would do pretty well against the skeletons.

 

edit: heres the math (giving korgoraths first activation because im letting all the skeletons attack and with a 6" move they are more likely to charge, assuming bloodsecrator buff, death hero/deathless minions buff):

6 attacks per model, 18 attacks total on 3s/3s. 11.88 hits, 7.84 wounds, rend 1 bypasses the skeletons save, for 15.68 damage, 13 go unsaved by deathless minion

skeletons fight back, 27 models, down to 2 attacks each, 54 attacks on 4s/4s, 27 hits, 13.5 wounds, 6.75 unsaved.

skeletons take battleshock losing d6+2 models (korgoraths impose a -1 bravery penalty, somewhat offsetting the +2 bravery for having a unit of 20 models).

 

if skeletons charge & activate first they can get a max of 30 into combat (just based off of not being able to fully wrap around the unit). 

90 attacks 4s/4s, 45 hits, 22.5 wounds, 11.25 unsaved.

korgoraths fight back, 12 attacks (because one is dead), 8 hits, 5 wounds, 10 damage, DM saves 2 for a total of 8 dead skeletons. and the wounded korgorath heals a wound. 

 

 

so we have a 320 point unit vs a 300 point unit and the winner is dependant on who activates first. seems pretty balanced to me.

[wayniac]

9 minutes ago, Auticus said:

And quite frankly it doesn't matter.  This is the world that we now live in.  My group has evaporated.  We're off to a different game.  I don't have much of a choice in the matter because I've got no one to play against now that this was announced *shrug*

We'll see how I do at a Kings of War grand tournament in september.  Its been a few  years since I've pushed unit blocks around.

With all due respect, while I completely sympathize with you, I have to question the type of group that evaporates over something like that, especially when it's not like there was ever much hope that you'd see GW really fix things (at least not in the sense you wanted).  What I don't get is, since you have (had?) a close-knit group, why it matters?  Isn't the point of a private group that you can do what you want, e.g. use Open Play and agree not to abuse it, or use your old Azyr Comp, or anything else, because it's a small group that isn't beholden to outside influences?  Or were people still wanting to use only official material and the like?  I get not wanting to house rule things, but the point of a small group IMHO is you have a lot more freedom to manipulate the rules, because you don't need to be open to anyone who shows up.  Having the official change being the straw that broke the camel's back seems really odd to me.

[daedalus81]

7 minutes ago, Auticus said:

  When I'm dumping around 120 dice per unit down

That's the rub.  You aren't - especially not across 120 models. 

[daedalus81]

1 hour ago, Gotrek said:

a single korgorath is only 100 points, so point for point we'd be looking at a unit of 3 of them. which would do pretty well against the skeletons.

Spoiler

 

edit: heres the math (giving korgoraths first activation because im letting all the skeletons attack and with a 6" move they are more likely to charge, assuming bloodsecrator buff, death hero/deathless minions buff):

6 attacks per model, 18 attacks total on 3s/3s. 11.88 hits, 7.84 wounds, rend 1 bypasses the skeletons save, for 15.68 damage, 13 go unsaved by deathless minion

skeletons fight back, 27 models, down to 2 attacks each, 54 attacks on 4s/4s, 27 hits, 13.5 wounds, 6.75 unsaved.

skeletons take battleshock losing d6+2 models (korgoraths impose a -1 bravery penalty, somewhat offsetting the +2 bravery for having a unit of 20 models).

 

if skeletons charge & activate first they can get a max of 30 into combat (just based off of not being able to fully wrap around the unit). 

90 attacks 4s/4s, 45 hits, 22.5 wounds, 11.25 unsaved.

korgoraths fight back, 12 attacks (because one is dead), 8 hits, 5 wounds, 10 damage, DM saves 2 for a total of 8 dead skeletons. and the wounded korgorath heals a wound. 

 

 

so we have a 320 point unit vs a 300 point unit and the winner is dependant on who activates first. seems pretty balanced to me.

 

 

Right I was just thinking in terms of one korgorath.  Only 5 attacks each though, right?  On the plus side they'd be shooting into combat a little.

Quote

You're looking for efficiency scores.  It takes offensive and defensive scores and ranks them for each item across the board.  

That's the problem with a straight formula - it accounts for none of the positioning or real scenarios.  Modeling all potential opponents is great to get an idea of how a unit behaves, but will not get you a real world output even if it occasionally matches up.

I made a statistical modeler that literally rolls dice to determine an outcome and iterates it 500,000 times.  The data from that also isn't the whole picture.  

[Mikester1487]

This is an interesting change that I strangely want to see, but will get no benefit from in my lists.  

As a KO player I shall fear no horde.  Spin up the volley guns lads... We got work to do.

[Nevvermore]

Here's your chance auticus: https://jobs.games-workshop.com/2017/07/31/rules-writer-nottingham-uk/

as a bonus, you get to leave those d-bags you play with behind, honestly they seem to be the real problem here. I'd bet they'll find ways to make KoW unfun as well.

[Gotrek]

49 minutes ago, daedalus81 said:

Right I was just thinking in terms of one korgorath.  Only 5 attacks each though, right?  On the plus side they'd be shooting into combat a little.

</snip>

5 base +1 from the bloodsecrator for 6. Since the skeletons get the benefit a hero nearby, so do the korgoraths.

1 hour ago, Auticus said:

 

www.louisvillewargaming.com/AOSStats.aspx

You're looking for efficiency scores.  It takes offensive and defensive scores and ranks them for each item across the board.  

The formulas calculated average damage per selection against every type of save, and average number of actual wounds against every type of rend.  

</snip>

Maybe its because im a college drop out but I'm not seeing any context in those stats. Hell, even switching between swords and spears will adjust the math noticeably (50% more attacks at the cost of 17% to hit). I remember looking at this sheet in the nascent days of AoS, did you ever update it to account for points? Base sizes? The lack of a baseline unit for comparison really makes me scratch my head. 

I mean, yeah skeletons are the best battleline death has, and one of our best units overall against lightly/moderately armored units but they are hardly overpowered. Put your block of 40 up against 2 units of skullcrushers from a brass stampede or run the math against 2 squads of judicators, or a unit of liberators with a staunch defender celestant on dracoth. You'll find that point for point, even a maxed skeleton horde isnt a point and click win. 

[Mirage8112]

13 minutes ago, Gotrek said:

Maybe its because im a college drop out but I'm not seeing any context in those stats. Hell, even switching between swords and spears will adjust the math noticeably (50% more attacks at the cost of 17% to hit). I remember looking at this sheet in the nascent days of AoS, did you ever update it to account for points? Base sizes? The lack of a baseline unit for comparison really makes me scratch my head. 

I remember reading that spreadsheet too. I even contacted the guy to voice my concerns about how he was setting up his comparisons. I'm with you in thinking that those calculations are awesome when determining exactly how much damage damage something can potentially do, but as I've said 100 million times; damage alone doesn't win games. The guy may have a ph.d. in math and game theory, but none of that means squat if the numbers being crunched aren't the whole picture. In fact, it reminds me of the story of the blind guys feeling a elephant and trying to extrapolate what the animal looks like. The guy feeling the leg thinks its like a tree, long and skinny, while the guy feeling the trunk thinks it's long and thin like a snake. A limited scope of inquiry yields a definitive but incomplete picture.

This is evident even more so in AoS, as it's not unit section alone that determines how much damage a unit can do, but how that unit synergizes with everything else in your army. I'm not entirely sure how you can account for that in a spreadsheet. In my conversation with him, the author was clear that his approach did not account for that. He both conceded it was a fair point, and that there was no way to objectively quantify those types of synergies. While not totally worthless (it does give a reasonable picture of damage output vs. saves) there are admittedly big gaps that directly impact the picture that it paints.  



 

[J-P]

5 hours ago, Mirage8112 said:

Clanrats are now min sized 20 instead of 10

I believe this is the big thing. It's the hidden change that's going to have quite the impact.

It makes sacrificial units more costly - i.e. "Bubble wrapping" and roadblocks went up twice as much in points. Any Skaven Warlord would agree that Clanrats only ever has one use anyway - and it's not fighting.  

I'm not impressed. It took a little energy out of me to be honest, having just scraped 80 Clanrats free from mold lines. Because it's a half-glass type of argument:

20-rat unit: 6 points per model.

40-rat unit: 5 points per model.

Is one option discounted, or is the other taxed? 

As a Skaven player, I'm thinking that this change limits my choice of unit strength, it adds a tax to the minimum size unit (just 1 point, but still), and it consequently makes it more expensive to protect my army from "alpha strike" lists (because they're fun to play against, amiright?). 

But, I bet owners of Stormcast Brotherhood warriors and all the other "alpha strike" armies rejoice.

Still excited to find out what nice new Skaven shiny-things the book contains. My hope is that there is a way to make Clanrats the real backbone of my army.

[Mirage8112]

35 minutes ago, J-P said:

20-rat unit: 6 points per model.

40-rat unit: 5 points per model.

Is one option discounted, or is the other taxed? 

This is good point. Ultimately if you were using clanrats only as bubblewrap, than it's effectively a points increase. Especially if you were filling out your battleline requirements with min sized clanrat units. Overall (at least in regards to the changes we've been been previewed), it actually looks like the new massive unit rule results in a net points increase offset by (mild) bonuses.  3 min sized clan rat units to make battleline cost a grand total of 180 points before (60pts x3 units). Now you're looking at 360pts if you want to take min sized units and 600 if you take max sized units. That's a big change in how Skaven generals are going to build their armies. It also means less room for warpfire throwers/stormfiends in the army (on top of whatever points adjustments they've made).

All in all, it actually looks like a tactical nerf to players that are cramming elite level troops into what have traditionally been horde armies. Basically, nerfing certain army builds while keeping the points (relatively) intact. Actually pretty clever if you ask me. 

 

[Karlbonner]

 

57 minutes ago, Mirage8112 said:

All in all, it actually looks like a tactical nerf to players that are cramming elite level troops into what have traditionally been horde armies. Basically, nerfing certain army builds while keeping the points (relatively) intact. Actually pretty clever if you ask me. 

 

Tactical nerf? Hardly. The ability to splash 20% of your points elsewhere without losing alliegance means running skryre alliegance armies just got even easier. And in those you can count stormfiends as battleline. No clanrats needed unless you want to take 1 block of 20 and use it to bubblewrap or somesuch.

 

And if you arent taking skryre alliegance, youre better off running an 80% verminus list and using stormvermin as battleline anyway.

[Mirage8112]

5 minutes ago, Karlbonner said:

Tactical nerf? Hardly. The ability to splash 20% of your points elsewhere without losing alliegance means running skryre alliegance armies just got even easier.

Do you know anybody who took clanrats in units of 30? And its only a 15% "splash" if you pay the 200 pts for a max sized unit. Basically you're paying 100 extra points to get 40 pts free. That doesn't exactly "free up" space does it? 

 

9 minutes ago, Karlbonner said:

 In those you can count stormfiends as battleline. No clanrats needed unless you want to take 1 block of 20 and use it to bubblewrap or somesuch.

 

And if you arent taking skryre alliegance, youre better off running an 80% verminus list and using stormvermin as battleline anyway.

Previously, yes. You could. But we don't know how the battleline selections have changed. Certainly we're also seeing unit factions get some remixing. So we'll have to see exactly how skaven armies can be built. But since at least one of the battelplans has objectives that can only be captured by characters or hordes, there looks to be good reason to carve some space out of your list for a horde (or two). Making space for horde sized units means less for other things.

[Karlbonner]

6 hours ago, Mirage8112 said:

But since at least one of the battelplans has objectives that can only be captured by characters or hordes, there looks to be good reason to carve some space out of your list for a horde (or two). Making space for horde sized units means less for other things.

There does look to be good objective based reasons for blobs, but my point was that skaven players will have no reason to take clanrats just to fill the battle-line. Formerly if you wanted stormvermin or a verminlord deciever in the same list as a stormfiend you had to go Grand Alliance Chaos. But with 20% for allies now, i can run mono skryre and splash in some stormvermin with no beed for clanrats at all.

 

And it is 20%, not 15%. Look at the tables; 200 is 20% of 1000. And thats actually a fairly significant amount of allied space for play in listbuilding.

 https://www.warhammer-community.com/2017/07/26/the-new-generals-handbook-your-first-look-inside-the-coversgw-homepage-post-3/

 

Also they explicitly said they were bringing on more alliegance specific battleline choices, so true, we aren't certain units like stormfiends are still battleline... in principle, they are adding more battleline choices, not taking them away.

 

In any case this will be a very good thing for skaven players (like me) and will allow a lot more flexibility in lists even if in some areas that more than compensate for the clanrats being bumped to min 20.

[wayniac]

I am not going to lie you are kinda making me want to try Kings of War But that's neither here nor there.  Very sad what happened to your group, especially over something so seemingly trivial.

[Nico]

Quote

Any Skaven Warlord would agree that Clanrats only ever has one use anyway - and it's not fighting.  

I beg to differ:

 

[Nevvermore]

^{40 players is a LOT for one game, that's as big as our entire gaming Group (which is basically GW only with a few of us playing other stuff on the side. That said, I've never been tempted to play KoW, mainly because it seems to lack really strong unique identities for the armies in terms of both fluff and rules. To me the "anything goes" in terms of miniatures actually works against the game, I want a consistent and strong visual identity to the game I'm playing. I also don't care too much about heavily tactical games, I mostly want to roll some dice and look at some nice models}  

[Sheriff]

Cavalry units such as boar boys will also be getting a Massive Regiment discount. 

[Furious]

7 minutes ago, Sheriff said:

Cavalry units such as boar boys will also be getting a Massive Regiment discount. 

You're speculating?

[polarbear]

2 minutes ago, Furious said:

You're speculating?

GW posted it on Facebook in the comments of the bullgor post.

[Sheriff]

2 minutes ago, Furious said:

You're speculating?

Nope, they said so on facebook. 

[Furious]

I hope they can be held to their FB posts, then! Thanks folks.

[Sheriff]

They frequently announce new stuff in facebook comments, hard to keep up with it. Fortunately I'm at work with nothing better to do! 

[tea_wild_owl]

9 hours ago, Karlbonner said:

There does look to be good objective based reasons for blobs, but my point was that skaven players will have no reason to take clanrats just to fill the battle-line. Formerly if you wanted stormvermin or a verminlord deciever in the same list as a stormfiend you had to go Grand Alliance Chaos. But with 20% for allies now, i can run mono skryre and splash in some stormvermin with no beed for clanrats at all.

 

And it is 20%, not 15%. Look at the tables; 200 is 20% of 1000. And thats actually a fairly significant amount of allied space for play in listbuilding.

 https://www.warhammer-community.com/2017/07/26/the-new-generals-handbook-your-first-look-inside-the-coversgw-homepage-post-3/

 

Also they explicitly said they were bringing on more alliegance specific battleline choices, so true, we aren't certain units like stormfiends are still battleline... in principle, they are adding more battleline choices, not taking them away.

 

In any case this will be a very good thing for skaven players (like me) and will allow a lot more flexibility in lists even if in some areas that more than compensate for the clanrats being bumped to min 20.

how do you want to use stormvermin as battleline in skryre when they are only battleline for a verminus army?

actually, I do like the new horde rule. when I play my (skryre) skaven army it felt wrong to me to use a 10 clanrat unit to fill the battleline role (instead of a second unis of stormfiends in friendly games). decreasing the points for a max unit but increasing the min size is a good way to balance it. 20 rats min for 120 points which was a 60 point 10 model unit and a warpfire weaponteam earlier. when using the horde buffs for 20 models one usually takes some extra bodies to be able to take some hits. however, one has to take the 40 instead of 30, which costs 20 points more now. doing it for 3 battleline means there goes another weapon team. worth it? no one knows yet as we need to see the other unit points and battleline roles