AoS 2 - Moonclan Discussion

[5kaven5lave]

Is there any word on new plastic? I’m definitely interested but the oldhammer models aren't my favourite. 

[Donal]

10 minutes ago, 5kaven5lave said:

Is there any word on new plastic? I’m definitely interested but the oldhammer models aren't my favourite. 

nothing confirmed, expectation next month or month after. 

We live, We hope, We Pray, We Waagh

[Skabnoze]

I expect that we will see the range revamped from mostly resin to plastic.  It would only take a couple boxes to replace the existing units and add a couple new ones if they design the kits to be dual kits.

[Scythian]

25 minutes ago, Skabnoze said:

I expect that we will see the range revamped from mostly resin to plastic.  It would only take a couple boxes to replace the existing units and add a couple new ones if they design the kits to be dual kits.

Hopefully, we’ll get some new, updated squigs. Moonclan will be the shot in the arm that Destruction needs. 

[Skabnoze]

11 minutes ago, Scythian said:

Hopefully, we’ll get some new, updated squigs. Moonclan will be the shot in the arm that Destruction needs. 

People have been clamoring for plastic squigs for many many moons now (see what I did there!).  I think plastic squigs would instantly jump the sales potential of this army up quite a ways.  Squigs have always been popular with most players I find.  Even if you don't play goblins they are just fun.  And a plastic squig kit has a big cross-over sales potential with 40k Ork players - who will notoriously kitbash from all across the GW model range.  I know this because I have been a 40k Ork player longer than I have played  fantasy (thats saying something) and I will use whatever shiny model catches my eye no matter what army or game it belongs to if I have a fun idea for an ork 40k project.  Plastic squigs would open the door to all sorts of wacky possibilities and I expect that I am not in the minority for Ork players.

I already have a big collection of metal squigs.  Honestly I probably have more squigs than I would field in an all-squig army.  But even so I would stock up on a stupid amount of plastic squigs simply for the modeling opportunities they provide for more fun Moonclan conversions.

[Arkanaut Admiral]

Plastic squigs are a must.  They probably should have created them ages ago.

The metal/resin kits need replaced, so that's new characters.  I'm sure that the Fungoid Cave Shaman will probably pretty much replace the 'standard' one.  Thing is though, what about the current rank and file moonclan grots?  Think they'll stay put, in the same way that the Black Orc kit became Ardboyz?  I think they'll keep it, as it was a fairly recent kit and although it was designed for rank and file squares I think it still holds up.  But some think that they'll just ditch it.  That would be a waste though right?

[TeddyMadeMeDoIt]

1 hour ago, Skabnoze said:

 People have been clamoring for plastic squigs for many many moons now (see what I did there!). 

Nicely done!

Options for an all Squig army would be amazing but at the very least new plastics would be great , we had a new Squig on the Fungoid Cave Shaman so I don't think it's far fetched to think we'll see more

I would also like to see a return of some of the wacky side of this army, I remember when first started playing (can't remember the edition sorry) when you let the fanatics fly they were just as likely to fly back towards you rather than at the enemy... I loved that! I know it doesn't have a place in serious tournements and such but for those of us who play for fun it was fantastic, I'd love to see an element of that in the army somewhere 

 

@Arkanaut Admiral I think your spot on mate, nothing wrong with those plastics, they stand up against all the new stuff, spend the time and effort in models that need it

[Skabnoze]

I am not sure that they will retire the regular shaman in place of the fungoid.  I think we will see the standard shaman warscroll stick around and a plastic model get made for him.

[TeddyMadeMeDoIt]

With all the spirit like things they are doing with Nighthaunts it would be great to see a Shaman like the Forgeworld mini 

[Skabnoze]

24 minutes ago, Arkanaut Admiral said:

Thing is though, what about the current rank and file moonclan grots?  Think they'll stay put, in the same way that the Black Orc kit became Ardboyz?  I think they'll keep it, as it was a fairly recent kit and although it was designed for rank and file squares I think it still holds up.  But some think that they'll just ditch it.  That would be a waste though right?

There is no reason to ditch that kit.  It is actually pretty old as it was created not long after GW switched to using CAD for their sculpts, but it has held up well.  It has nice detail and it fits in perfectly with the current grot aesthetic.  In fact, that kit (and the spider riders) was what led to the new grot aesthetic when they created the Battle For Skulls Pass box set which contained the 1-piece version of this unit and also the current spider rider kit.  The currently available Grots kit is just the multi-part version of those 1-piece models that also included the expanded unit upgrade options.

It seems to me that it would be a waste of resources to rework this kit unless they plan to do something quite different with it.  The current kit is just fine and they can probably get better returns by working on other stuff in the range.

[Skabnoze]

15 minutes ago, TeddyMadeMeDoIt said:

I would also like to see a return of some of the wacky side of this army, I remember when first started playing (can't remember the edition sorry) when you let the fanatics fly they were just as likely to fly back towards you rather than at the enemy... I loved that! I know it doesn't have a place in serious tournements and such but for those of us who play for fun it was fantastic, I'd love to see an element of that in the army somewhere 

If there is an army where crazy and wacky belong Moonclan is most definitely it.  The craziest and most random parts of Orcs & Goblins has always sat firmly in the Night Goblin parts.  Skaven come in a close second, but they have always had more of a randomly powerful mad scientist vibe to their army and less of the wacky lunatics aspect that Night Goblins exemplified for years.  If GW decides to retain some of the comic-relief aspect of Warhammer Fantasy in Age of Sigmar then this army seems the most likely place where they will do it.  I'm sure that would take this army off the table for the most serious-minded competitive players, but this army has never drawn that crowd in the first place and it has been a cult favorite.

[Skabnoze]

I am not sure that they will retire the regular shaman in place of the fungoid.  I think we will see the standard shaman warscroll stick around and a plastic model get made for him.

[Critch]

13 hours ago, Skabnoze said:

I'm sure that would take this army off the table for the most serious-minded competitive players, but this army has never drawn that crowd in the first place and it has been a cult favorite.

I have been playing Moonclan for the past couple of years in AOS, never touched WFB. Recently I have been to two tournaments and gone 2/3 on both, I came 7th out of 17 and 4th out 13 on the second one. I feel that Moonclan are highly competitive, especially in the magic side, with a 1 in 6 of getting a +2 cast is very good and with an aggressive spells like Curse of the bad moon Moonclan can do really good damage.

My lists centers around two max units of squigs and one big unit of sixty grots, I also have two spear chukka's to snipe heroes which are amazing as they hit on 3+ re-rolling all failed hits and even with look out sir they still hit reliably.

the warboss now with doppleganger cloak has huge survivability,  with certain armies like nighthaunt what my best mate plays, if I keep my warboss near a grot net the spirit hosts can't actually hurt my warboss as sixes are treated on ones and they hit on five plus I believe.

With a colossal squig the big beasty can almost get t1 charge happily with the fungoid command it can run and charge that is 5d6 in movement and 2d6 charge,  with a re-roll if you have a command point spare too.

In my opinion and I have been reading this thread since it was made when I'm at work, if we have different squig effects like -1 to hit like the spore squig from Malign Potents character, or re-roll charges from another sub race of squigs, or even double damage if they run in battleshock.

With all the theories and ideas in this thread I hope a couple get picked up and we get a good battletome hopefully on par with maggotkin that would be a dream, but keep up with all the cool ideas in this thread!

[HypnoKraken]

I doubt GW would decide to make a non competitive army. While I don’t think Moonclan would lose its comedic relief, it would be a profit failure to not make them competitive and the way things are trending it doesn’t seem they would sacrifice that. 

[Skabnoze]

5 hours ago, HypnoKraken said:

I doubt GW would decide to make a non competitive army. While I don’t think Moonclan would lose its comedic relief, it would be a profit failure to not make them competitive and the way things are trending it doesn’t seem they would sacrifice that. 

I don't think anyone was advocating for an army that cannot win.  But GW has made a number of armies over the years with features that the most competitively minded players would deem "uncompetitive".  The fact that Animosity was a feature of all Orcs & Goblins armies all the way until the creation of Age of Sigmar was usually a massive turn-off for people.  People bemoan the Giant because he has a slight chance to fall down on the charge and his attacks value is random.  People used to detest the Weirdnob when his rules made him the most likely one to get hit with magic overload damage.  While that was a mistake with the verbage of the rules, Orc & Goblin shamans for years used to have a tendency to explode in the middle of battle.

GW likes random effects and they have never really gotten away from that.  Even AoS 2 is littered with random stuff.  While I do think that you can make an army that has comedic elements and also has good rules, I would not at all put it past GW to fall back their old idea of "random = silly".

I would prefer an army that has good abilities than an army that has terrible but silly abilities.  But, I have also played Night Goblins as a full force for so long (through when they were bad and good - mostly bad) that I am honestly just excited to see them fleshed out as a full faction.  I would prefer that they don't end up at the bottom of the barrel like Flesh Eater Courts - but if that happens I am still all-in.  This army has always been something that I just really enjoy and it has never been the army that I picked because it was "good".  If effective rules and tabletop performance had been my primary desire then I would have picked a different army long ago (probably some flavor of elves - yuck...).

At the end of the day, I will personally be happy if Moonclan gets a dedicated book and new models that fit in visually and thematically with the old range - even if they push the army in a new direction.  Bear in mind that this army was ultra-niche for a very long time so the idea that it would get turned into it's own full-blown faction is still hard for me to wrap my head around.  I would be fully satisfied if this army ends up competitively somewhere around winning 4 of 5 games on average.  If it is top-tier then great, but I will also admit to being a bit of hipster in this regard and I would rather not see it end up as the bandwagon go-to army-of the-moment. 

I want a great book full of fun background, stories, and art.  I want rules that are fun to play - win or lose.  And I want great models that I can't resist buying despite the fact that I already own an absurd amount of goblins.

[amysrevenge]

19 minutes ago, Skabnoze said:

 I already own an absurd amount of goblins.

The only absurd amount of goblins is zero.

[Skabnoze]

6 minutes ago, amysrevenge said:

The only absurd amount of goblins is zero.

Wrong, any amount of goblins is absurd.  That is exactly why I like them so much.

[Steve Rose]

Any moonclan WhatsApp groups out there? PM an invite if there is please!!

[Critch]

I hope we get some kind of summoning that involves coming out of near by caves or squigs popping out the ground, that would be cool and go with the fluff, and I want all warbosses to have the option to come with a squig too, as if it is just the moon prodder model that gets it then it would be a real shame in my eyes.

[Donal]

15 hours ago, Steve Rose said:

Any moonclan WhatsApp groups out there? PM an invite if there is please!!

@Steve Rose you joined the group right?

If anyone else wants to join, just shoot me a PM!

[froo]

22 hours ago, Skabnoze said:

 The fact that Animosity was a feature of all Orcs & Goblins armies all the way until the creation of Age of Sigmar was usually a massive turn-off for people. 

I think that they could bring a random test for each Moonclan unit in the form of a Spore Squig or something that gives the unit a minor buff/debuff at the start of that players turn that lasts for the round, but just remove the "this unit can do nothing" aspect.

I wouldn't even mind if they mostly replicated the scenery rules on the unit. EG the unit gets +1/-1 Bravery, Can ignore wounds on 6's, can hurt themselves each time they move/charge etc - just so that we know that the unit is just weird.

Or I'd like perhaps a dial like what Maggotkin get, except instead of moving 1 step, ours would move D6 steps, so it would be literally spinning out of control.

[Malakree]

22 minutes ago, froo said:

I think that they could bring a random test for each Moonclan unit in the form of a Spore Squig or something that gives the unit a minor buff/debuff at the start of that players turn that lasts for the round, but just remove the "this unit can do nothing" aspect.

I wouldn't even mind if they mostly replicated the scenery rules on the unit. EG the unit gets +1/-1 Bravery, Can ignore wounds on 6's, can hurt themselves each time they move/charge etc - just so that we know that the unit is just weird.

Or I'd like perhaps a dial like what Maggotkin get, except instead of moving 1 step, ours would move D6 steps, so it would be literally spinning out of control.

Make it like the Moonclan Shaman.

"During your hero phase this unit can eat a Mushroom, on a 2+ you get X bonus, on a 1 this unit cannot move, pile in or charge this turn...."

[Steve Rose]

7 hours ago, Donal said:

@Steve Rose you joined the group right?

If anyone else wants to join, just shoot me a PM!

Yep!!

[Mayple]

Getting increasingly hyped about a Grot/Moonclan release Been looking at Gitmob and Moonclan warscrolls for the past few days, and my mind is starting to churn. A small mental break from Skaven can only be healthy. 

It also helped that I discovered the wonderful forgeworld squig warboss model. What a beast!

Do I understand the Moonclan warboss on foot's ability (cunning, or just lucky) correctly that if your opponent can only hit him on a 6, they can't hit at all?

[Malakree]

Just now, Mayple said:

Do I understand the Moonclan warboss on foot's ability (cunning, or just lucky) correctly that if your opponent can only hit him on a 6, they can't hit at all?

I believe that an errata has said "All hit rolls of a 6" means "All hit rolls of a 6+" but I can't find it. Currently anything which doesn't say "unmodified roll of a 6" means 6+.

So if your opponent has a 5+ normally and is at -1 then the rule has no effect.
If your opponent has a 6+ normally, a Colossal Squig jaws attack while at 14+ wounds taken, then it could never hit no matter how many + to hit.