AoS 2 - Blades of Khorne Discussion

[Kyyn]

27 minutes ago, Bululu said:

Im kinda confused on this one, first it says select a host all your army gets that host keyword, but on next paragraph it says, a unit cant have more than 1 host, but this doesnt prevent for having units with different host in your army.   Im not a native english so i will say wait for some english/american guy to get a full comprehensive read of the host rules and verify this (i also have a non-english battletome wich says the same, im inclined to think that you can have multiple hosts, but cant really confirm)

Yes it would be nice to know, but i guess you can only select one, if not, they should defined more how it works, for example if you have 2, which artifact you must assign first ?

[ChaosUndivided]

The fact you get a command trait and artifact for choosing a warhost it would seem you only get one. They appear to work just like the Stormcast ones.

[Roark]

There's no way they let us have 2 Slaughterhosts in the same same list. We just get one and, unlike Stormcast or other factions, they only benefit half our roster, pushing usage to pure Mortals/Daemons.

I have to admit, it's getting a little harder for me to stay psyched about this book other than just repeating a vague mantra about re-learning, testing and adapting. So I guess I'll do that.

You guys are all very inspiring though. TGA Khorne players are pretty remarkable in that respect IMHO. We may whine a bit, but then we generally get on with the job.

Not gonna get into Skillcannons and their Wrathmonger engineers though lol. Errata page 1.

[Warbossironteef]

I've read the discussion about Blood Warriors taking either double axes of Glaive and I think people shouldn't be using Blood Warriors for their offensive output. The main reason is because, other than not being battleline, Skullreapers do a lot of things better than Blood Warriors.

-Blood Warriors cost 10 points per wound. Reapers Cost 11..33

-Reapers have base 4 attacks at 3+ 3+ rerolling all misses if over 4 models 

-Reapers don't take Battle shock and do mortal wounds on the attack, not saves

I think that Blood Warriors excel with the new Goretide rules and they are probably best served as a fast, intiation/tanky/chaff type of unit. It will be interesting to see how useful they can be, especially in Goretide with run of 6 and charge. But, I do think Skullreapers outclass them in all offensive capabilties. 

[Bululu]

3 hours ago, Kyyn said:

Yes it would be nice to know, but i guess you can only select one, if not, they should defined more how it works, for example if you have 2, which artifact you must assign first ?

Oh that would be an easy one to answer, warlord trait and artifact are not mandatory its only if you pick one you have to select one, but if you chose not to  put any artifact or warlord trait you can still play the house.  So basically you only have to put the mandatory trait on the general and the trait will be the one of the host of the general (as the general can only be on one host), artifacts imagine that you have host A and host B, if you put an artifact on host A it must be the one of the host, if you put a second artifact on host A it will be wichever you want and you can put 0 artifacts on host B, but if you want to put an artefact on HOST B it will have to be the one on host B.

I mean this is not the problem you can acomplish all, the only problem is the main host rules and how it explains it, it explicitelly tells you "you can have units of different hosts in your army" but it also tells "select a host, all your army gets that host keyword" or something of the like. I might write the exact text when i arrive home so we can further discuss it. But the mandatory trait/artifacts its not a problem at all

[AresX8]

1 hour ago, Roark said:

There's no way they let us have 2 Slaughterhosts in the same same list. We just get one and, unlike Stormcast or other factions, they only benefit half our roster, pushing usage to pure Mortals/Daemons.

I have to admit, it's getting a little harder for me to stay psyched about this book other than just repeating a vague mantra about re-learning, testing and adapting. So I guess I'll do that.

You guys are all very inspiring though. TGA Khorne players are pretty remarkable in that respect IMHO. We may whine a bit, but then we generally get on with the job.

Not gonna get into Skillcannons and their Wrathmonger engineers though lol. Errata page 1.

The way I've approached this new book is to forget everything I knew about the old one and look at it with fresh eyes. Once that was done, I saw the new combos and what not. What matters the most though is taking the list that you make to the table, that shows if your ideas will work. I took my first list draft and learned a drastic amount. I wrote something up in the Blades of Khorne Facebook group that I will copy over here shortly.
 

1 hour ago, Warbossironteef said:

I've read the discussion about Blood Warriors taking either double axes of Glaive and I think people shouldn't be using Blood Warriors for their offensive output. The main reason is because, other than not being battleline, Skullreapers do a lot of things better than Blood Warriors.

-Blood Warriors cost 10 points per wound. Reapers Cost 11..33

-Reapers have base 4 attacks at 3+ 3+ rerolling all misses if over 4 models 

-Reapers don't take Battle shock and do mortal wounds on the attack, not saves

I think that Blood Warriors excel with the new Goretide rules and they are probably best served as a fast, intiation/tanky/chaff type of unit. It will be interesting to see how useful they can be, especially in Goretide with run of 6 and charge. But, I do think Skullreapers outclass them in all offensive capabilties. 

What can't be calculated point cost wise is what Blood Warriors do with No Respite and Gorefists. You are correct in that Goretide makes them best as you can slingshot them across the table, but that's another option to have in the toolbox, and you need to know when doing said slingshot is worth it. That requires table experience.

[AresX8]

Double post but much worth doing. As promised, copy over from my Facebook post:


 

I played my first test game using the reveals from the reviews/leaks that have come out the past week. I played against Skaven at 2k and used the following list:

Goretide Slaughterhost

Mighty Lord of Khorne - 140
General
Command Trait: Hew the Foe (Mandatory Goretide)
Artifact: Gorecleaver

Bloodsecrator - 140
Artifact: Thronebreaker's Torc (Mandatory Goretide)

Slaughterpriest - 100
Blessing: Bronzed Flesh

Bloodstoker - 80

Exalted Deathbringer with Impaling Spear - 80

Aspiring Deathbringer with Goreaxe and Skullhammer - 80

10x Blood Warriors - 200
- Gorefists

10x Blood Warriors - 200
- Gorefists

5x Blood Warriors - 100
- Gorefists

20x Bloodreavers - 140
- Meatripper Axes

5x Wrathmongers - 140

5x Skullreapers - 180

Chaos Warshrine - 160
Blessing: Killing Frenzy

Bloodmad Warband - 160

- Skull Altar
100 points left, therefore 2 extra command points
2000 points

His list from my memory:

Allegiance: Skaventide

Leaders
Arch-Warlock (160)
Grey Seer on Screaming Bell (200)
Clawlord (100)
Warlock Bombardier (100)

Battleline
40 x Clanrats (200)
- Rusty Spear
40 x Clanrats (200)
- Rusty Spear
40 x Stormvermin (500)
- Halberd

War Machines
Warp Lightning Cannon (180)
Warp Lightning Cannon (180)

Endless Spells
Bell of Doom (40)
Vermintide (40)

Total: 1900 / 2000
Extra Command Points: 2

We played with the Starstrike mission from GHB 2018. I had first turn. Here's what I've learned from this game:

- Gorefist Blood Warriors are amazing! Even more so when they have Bronzed Flesh on them, I was very pleased with their output. I even slingshot one of the units of 10 into his deployment zone immediately in order to shut down one flank so I can focus on the other. This one unit of 10 Blood Warriors held down 40 Clanrats and killed like half of the unit on their own.

- The Bloodstoker is really hard to leverage compared to before. You have to deploy him correctly and plan who you want to whip a turn ahead so you can position him accordingly. Being able to re-roll all failed wounds is MASSIVE though and helps out Blood Warriors tremendously.

- Skullreapers are INSANE!! I got them to 7 attacks a piece in this list (+1 for charging via Bloodmad Warband, +1 for being wholly within 16" of the Bloodsecrator, +1 for being wholly within 8" of Wrathmongers). They deleted 20 Stormvermin by themselves.

- Wrathmongers are a lot easier to leverage for the attack bonus and do just as much damage as they did before in combat. I do miss the old Bloodfury but I'd happily trade it for the changes they received now.

- The Chaos Warshrine's re-roll all failed hits prayer is incredibly strong, as we've known before. However, the Protection of the Dark Gods aura being model rather than unit makes it hard to leverage. I'm thinking about cutting it once I get more games in.

- The Aspiring Deathbringer was dead weight the whole game but I chock that to deploying him incorrectly.

- I made a mistake with unit activation order in the combat phase and the Exalted Deathbringer wasn't able to hit, he got poked down by the remaining Stormvermin.

- My Mighty Lord rolled pretty badly with his attacks so I couldn't see his full potential. His command ability, however, is STRAIGHT MONEY. I'd take this over his old pick 3 units and they get 3d6 charge dropped the lowest, because being wholly within 16" of his big base and affecting every unit in that range is a big deal. It saved my bacon tons of times during the game and it's a big enough range to even affect Blood Warriors that are slingshot in.

- Having a Bloodsecrator fight ignoring all Rend is sooooo silly. I'm keeping this!

- The Goretide's ability to re-roll wound rolls of 1 when wholly within 12" of an objective was quite noticeable and appreciated.

- I originally had the Hexgorger Skulls and Wrath Axe in the list but the proxy bases were left behind, so I turned their points into command points. Turns out I needed them all.

Wall of text post, but very much worth it

Edited March 20, 2019 by AresX8

[Kyyn]

Yes, i am really worried about "wholly within" aura of everything, to me is one of the worst things so far in general in AoS, I understand why it was done, but something like 8" wholly within in think it is just too much, mainly because your hero/unit needs to be just next to the unit to buff and both must then charge, because if not you can easily loose the range, you cannot just run after the unit to buff.

Also it was changed in last FAQ that wholly within means all bases of all models fully within, i mean every part of all bases.

[Warbossironteef]

16 minutes ago, AresX8 said:

The way I've approached this new book is to forget everything I knew about the old one and look at it with fresh eyes. Once that was done, I saw the new combos and what not. What matters the most though is taking the list that you make to the table, that shows if your ideas will work. I took my first list draft and learned a drastic amount. I wrote something up in the Blades of Khorne Facebook group that I will copy over here shortly.
 

What can't be calculated point cost wise is what Blood Warriors do with No Respite and Gorefists. You are correct in that Goretide makes them best as you can slingshot them across the table, but that's another option to have in the toolbox, and you need to know when doing said slingshot is worth it. That requires table experience.

Good insight. I was talking more about people trying to use Bloodwarriors to really kill things. You mention No respite and Gorefists, but Reapers have Murderous to the Last and Daemonforged Weapons., arguably better. They have different uses but I think if you're looking for dmg output Reapers are probably the best mortal option. 

[Impa]

Skarbrand 

bloodthirster insensate rage (general) slaughterhost reapers vengeance taking all command trait/ability artifacts etc

bloodsecrator with banner or rage

bloodstoker

slauggterpriest with killing frenzy 

skull altar

10x bloodwarriors x2 with gorefists

5x wrathmongers x2

30x bloodletters

I believe this leaves 40 leftover to take the bleeding icon of Khorne for your judgement 

 

my thoughts

Have Skarbrand and your bloodthirster pal around with your 30 blood letters and 5 wrathmongers. Giving your greater demon locus to the bloodletters wholly within 16”. Also their 20+ in unit locus.  wrathmongers giving the units wholly within +1 attack. You have your potential of double attacking with the bloodthirster using the command ability leave none alive. And he can now unbind spells with the artifact he’s given. Hopefully keep Skarbrand out of battle round 1 and unleashed mortal wounds round 2. 

 

 Have your 20 blood warriors being buffed by the wrathmonger wholly within +1 attack. Your bloodsecrator buffing wholly within +1 attack and banner of rage re rolling hit rolls of 1. Slaughterpriest casts killing frenzy giving a unit +1 to hit. Bloodstoker whipping one unit to also re roll all wounds. Your blood warrior units now have +2 attack. Re rolling ones. Gorefists to rebound mortal wounds and one unit can re roll all wounds. And one unit can have +1 hit. Also your wrathmongers putting out decent attacks if you can somehow fit everyone in together to make the wholly within buffs and whatnot work. It will be clunky but doable. Then the slaughterpriest brings out your judegment (not great but it’s something) and flinging some mortal wounds with blood boil. 

 

I think im going to try this list. Just need to buy the altar. Judgements. More wrathmongers and Skarbrand. Hmmm that’s not expensive at all 🤪

 

any comments if this would be a decent army? Thanks for reading! 

[Danny76]

I’ve gotten the Khorne Mortal stuff from the first AoS box set, with an extra Khorgorath and Bloodstoker, originally just for painting up. But I’m thinking of dipping in to AoS now.

Do you think that these bits would be ok to play some casual games with, while still being in with a chance. 

No tournament players or anything, just a few people new to the game and trying it out. 

 

I would possibly have that Khorne portal shrine thing too if needed, to maybe round up the points, or if it’s useful with the models at this size, and 10 bloodletters if I can find them anywhere..

 

any thoughts? Don’t really want to be buying new stuff or spending any money, just want to try and work with what I have. Then maybe long term I’d look at converting my Ogres, WoC or Empire if I wanted..

[Ravinsild]

4 hours ago, Bululu said:

Im kinda confused on this one, first it says select a host all your army gets that host keyword, but on next paragraph it says, a unit cant have more than 1 host, but this doesnt prevent for having units with different host in your army.   Im not a native english so i will say wait for some english/american guy to get a full comprehensive read of the host rules and verify this (i also have a non-english battletome wich says the same, im inclined to think that you can have multiple hosts, but cant really confirm)

Basically you select a host: relevant models in your army get that keyword. So pick Reapers of Vengeance. Your 1,2,3,4 bloodthirsters get that keyword. Those are the units. Now you select a second host (Goretide), and the mortals in your army get THAT keyword. Bloodthirster can't be Goretide and Blood Warriors can't be Reapers of Vengeance, but there you have it, two different warhosts.

[andysonic1]

13 minutes ago, Ravinsild said:

Basically you select a host: relevant models in your army get that keyword. So pick Reapers of Vengeance. Your 1,2,3,4 bloodthirsters get that keyword. Those are the units. Now you select a second host (Goretide), and the mortals in your army get THAT keyword. Bloodthirster can't be Goretide and Blood Warriors can't be Reapers of Vengeance, but there you have it, two different warhosts.

There's nothing in the wording f the host rules that indicate the daemon focused ones requires the units in that host to be daemons, and the same goes for the mortal ones. From the Bell of Lost Souls youtube review below you can see that every Khorne unit gets the keyword. HOWEVER, I believe the wording is to allow certain named characters who have inbuilt keywords (like Khul being Goretide) into any army you wish, while opening the door for future characters to be added to the range for other hosts.

[Ravinsild]

11 minutes ago, andysonic1 said:

There's nothing in the wording f the host rules that indicate the daemon focused ones requires the units in that host to be daemons, and the same goes for the mortal ones. From the Bell of Lost Souls youtube review below you can see that every Khorne unit gets the keyword. HOWEVER, I believe the wording is to allow certain named characters who have inbuilt keywords (like Khul being Goretide) into any army you wish, while opening the door for future characters to be added to the range for other hosts.

It doesn't but Reapers of Vengenace specifically mentions Daemons only and Skullfiend/Goretide specifically mentions mortals/bloodbound only. Ergo it would be smart to basically, for lack of a better concept, make "Detachments" like in 40k to separate them so you aren't overwriting your mortals with keywords they get no benefit from. 

[andysonic1]

2 minutes ago, Ravinsild said:

It doesn't but Reapers of Vengenace specifically mentions Daemons only and Skullfiend/Goretide specifically mentions mortals/bloodbound only. Ergo it would be smart to basically, for lack of a better concept, make "Detachments" like in 40k to separate them so you aren't overwriting your mortals with keywords they get no benefit from. 

Except, there is no "Detachment" style rule in the book for doing this. You give your Khorne army the keyword, and all units in your army gain that keyword. So you're free to take Reapers of Vengeance mortal units along with your daemon units, and the same goes for the Goretide. This allows you to take a primarily daemon army with a priest, for example. 

[Ravinsild]

1 minute ago, andysonic1 said:

Except, there is no "Detachment" style rule in the book for doing this. You give your Khorne army the keyword, and all units in your army gain that keyword. So you're free to take Reapers of Vengeance mortal units along with your daemon units, and the same goes for the Goretide. This allows you to take a primarily daemon army with a priest, for example. 

Sigh. Obviously dude. That's super obvious. However, and while it's not literally quoting the rules, as Bululu said, "first it says select a host all your army gets that host keyword, but on next paragraph it says, a unit cant have more than 1 host, but this doesnt prevent for having units with different host in your army" this implies you can designate certain parts of your army a ONE type of Warhost or w/e they're called so you would specifically say "My bloodthirsters are Reapers of Vengeance" and then, in addition to, you can designate the OTHER half of your army (mortals) as Skullfiend Tribe and you get benefits for both mortals and daemons. They are mutually exclusive as per the wording, but also able to exist simultaneously in the same list. You can't however have Reapers of Vengeance mortals (10 BloodWarriors, 20 bloodreavers, 5 skullreapers and a slaughterpriest) who are ALSO Skullfiend. They can't be both. Hence the ability to designate and compartmentalize. 

[ChaosUndivided]

The way this is worded appears to just make an exception for named characters like Khul who have a slaughterhost on their warscroll already. So basically you can take the guy but if you choose a different host than whats already on his scroll he doesn't get benifits. This does not imply you can pick multiple host from list.

[andysonic1]

3 minutes ago, Ravinsild said:

Sigh. Obviously dude. That's super obvious. However, and while it's not literally quoting the rules, as Bululu said, "first it says select a host all your army gets that host keyword, but on next paragraph it says, a unit cant have more than 1 host, but this doesnt prevent for having units with different host in your army" this implies you can designate certain parts of your army a ONE type of Warhost or w/e they're called so you would specifically say "My bloodthirsters are Reapers of Vengeance" and then, in addition to, you can designate the OTHER half of your army (mortals) as Skullfiend Tribe and you get benefits for both mortals and daemons. They are mutually exclusive as per the wording, but also able to exist simultaneously in the same list. You can't however have Reapers of Vengeance mortals (10 BloodWarriors, 20 bloodreavers, 5 skullreapers and a slaughterpriest) who are ALSO Skullfiend. They can't be both. Hence the ability to designate and compartmentalize. 

You are correct: it is not literally quoting the rules. When you literally quote the rules, line by line from start to finish, you see that you are not able to use more than one Slaughterhost for your Khorne army. "If your army is a Khorne army, you can give it a Slaughterhost keyword. All Khorne units in your army gain that keyword." These two lines tell you everything: you can give your Khorne army "a" keyword, and "all Khorne units in your army gain that keyword." The next line does not overrule those two previous sentences, it simply allows you to take units that have inbuilt Slaughterhost keywords in armies where you've already taken a Slaughterhost. Right now that only applies to Korghos Khul who has the Goretide keyword. You can take Korghos Khul in an army that is using the Skullfiend Tribe Slaughterhost keyword, for example.

This book and all rules in it are trying very, very hard to not only simplify but be as clear as possible what you can and cannot do. Take the rules literally.

[Ravinsild]

4 minutes ago, ChaosUndivided said:

The way this is worded appears to just make an exception for named characters like Khul who have a slaughterhost on their warscroll already. So basically you can take the guy but if you choose a different host than whats already on his scroll he doesn't get benifits. This does not imply you can pick multiple host from list.

If a model already has a Slaughterhost keyword, it cannot gain another one, BUT this does not prevent other units in your army from having a different Slaughterhost keyword.

How does it not imply that? 

[relic456]

Yeah sorry @Ravinsild, the wording is exactly the same as the Stormcast's Stormhost rule and you can't have two Stormhosts.   The key  for both is you can give your army (not units) "a" Slaughterhost keyword.  That's one Slaughterhost per army.

[ChaosUndivided]

6 minutes ago, Ravinsild said:

If a model already has a Slaughterhost keyword, it cannot gain another one, BUT this does not prevent other units in your army from having a different Slaughterhost keyword.

How does it not imply that? 

Yes that is what i was trying to say... You can take the character but he doesn't get the benifits.

[Ravinsild]

Well that sucks. That literally encourages you to fully commit to either wholly demons or wholly mortals and to not really mix and match. Or I suppose you pick a Slaughterhost for one and a Battalion to support the other or something? Is it better to mix and match or double down on mono-strengths now? I feel like the old book encouraged mixing and matching army types with mortals and demons fighting side by side. 

Stormcast doesn't have to worry about that because everything is the same thing, but mortals and daemons are clearly different. What are the other big 4 chaos god books like?

[ChaosUndivided]

All Chaos factions have mortal and daemons but none have these new warhost rules yet. I imagine Tzeetch and Slaanesh are right around the corner at the rate GW is moving.

[Ravinsild]

Just now, ChaosUndivided said:

All Chaos factions have mortal and daemons but none have these new warhost rules yet. I imagine Tzeetch and Slaanesh are right around the corner at the rate GW is moving.

What I mean is are they encouraged to intermix or to segregate? Like is Nurgle encouraged to be Nurgle Daemons only, or Nurgle Mortals only or any mixture of both with rules giving blanket benefits to everything? Same for Tzeentch etc. 

[ChaosUndivided]

Nurgle can be powerful mixed. I don't see Tzeech using mortals often but i think its more cuz mortal half is just outgunned by deamons. Currently Slaanesh has very few mortal options outaide of marked STD. I can't say the rules really promote mixing but it sorta has to do with overall state of the game (in flux) and STD not being clearly great.

On a side note i wouldn't bank on Darkoath being able to take marks the way generic STD can as they seem more unique specialized subfaction of STD and its not guaranteed they work in exactly the same manner.