AoS 2 - Hosts of Slaanesh Discussion

[Enoby]

5 minutes ago, Poryague said:

possibly some change to pretenders. I believe on stream they said the box comes with the allegiance abilities in it so its possible if a change happened its already in the box.

I may be wrong here, but I'm pretty sure they said no allegiance ability changes.

[Poryague]

16 minutes ago, Enoby said:

I may be wrong here, but I'm pretty sure they said no allegiance ability changes.

Well even if its not yet it could happen in the future. Maybe reroll 1 to wound would be a nice change

[jackmcmahon]

Daemonettes now forcing rerolls of unmodified 6s instead of 6+ could end up being huge in the right list.  Possible to get a 1/36 chance to hit them in combat now with some other debuffs in the list.

[PUFNSTUF]

So with the reveals is it looking like going demons over mortals may be the way to go?

[Carnith]

42 minutes ago, jackmcmahon said:

Daemonettes now forcing rerolls of unmodified 6s instead of 6+ could end up being huge in the right list.  Possible to get a 1/36 chance to hit them in combat now with some other debuffs in the list.

It has always been that way. Rerolls happen before modifiers anyways, so someone would always be rerolling 6's as there was no way to make them reroll a 5+. 

The big thing is that Daemonettes reroll 1's to hit regardless of pretenders or not due to the standard granting that for the whole squad, plus this works on seekers too, which might make them more desirable.

[Enoby]

5 minutes ago, PUFNSTUF said:

So with the reveals is it looking like going demons over mortals may be the way to go?

Currently, yes. But I think we'll be getting new mortals sometime in 2019.

[Waiyuren]

Aww, the 30 Daemonette bomb with icon of infinite excess got nerfed. ☹

But otherwise they got buffed, which is nice. 😅

[Carnith]

Slaanesh did better with Breathtaker, or Realm Artifacts, but if you wanna run Icon, it's still good considering that daemonettes hit on 4 and fiends hit on 3 so with icon thats 3's and 2's and both have ways to reroll ones.

[Rock Lobster]

Sadistic killers is a pretty silly ability on the seekers isn't it? Still the same requirement as the daemonettes for 20 models in the unit, but their unit size is max 20 and costs a whopping 480 points for that... and after you take 2 wounds it goes away. They might as well have not bothered, or for seekers dropped it to a 10 model requirement.

[Waiyuren]

31 minutes ago, Rock Lobster said:

Sadistic killers is a pretty silly ability on the seekers isn't it? Still the same requirement as the daemonettes for 20 models in the unit, but their unit size is max 20 and costs a whopping 480 points for that... and after you take 2 wounds it goes away. They might as well have not bothered, or for seekers dropped it to a 10 model requirement.

It was probably a copy/paste error. I noticed the icon only brings d3 back now too, but that brings them in line with 40k.

[Waiyuren]

37 minutes ago, carnith said:

Slaanesh did better with Breathtaker, or Realm Artifacts, but if you wanna run Icon, it's still good considering that daemonettes hit on 4 and fiends hit on 3 so with icon thats 3's and 2's and both have ways to reroll ones.

I haven't used breathtaker, and my meta doesn't use realms at all. Making one unit go last just didn't seem as good to me as making (effectively) 90 attacks was... 

I might try it it a tanky list with all the hit negation we have access to though, as a final "f you, buddy"/distraction. 😅

[Carnith]

So depending on who you ask, breathtaker is interpretted differently. I took it to be that the unit must be the last thing your opponent activates, but one of the guys who helped play test the ghb told me its supposed to be that it activates after everything else has gone. Still playing it on a keeper of secrets with a double pile in and telling their hero or large squad of dudes to go take it while you ram a bunch of attacks down their throat is always good fun, especially if you use the keeper to go monster hunting to generate depravity, though at that point you might want to give him a -3 rend artifact to get through the monsters armor. I know that I could get a stardrake with -3 armor, that would make my day.

[Enoby]

Just thought I'd bring in a bit of maths for the fiends (always assuming a 4+ save):

Unit of 3 against 1 wound infantry:

- no buffs = 4 wounds average 

- rerolling 1s = 5 wounds

- battalion and rerolling 1s = 7 wounds

Unit of 3 against 2-3 wound infantry:

- no buffs = 5 wounds on average

- rerolling 1s = 6 wounds

- battalion and rerolling =  9 wounds

Unit of 3 against 4+ wound models:

- no buffs = 7 wounds on average 

- rerolling 1s = 8 wounds 

- battalion and rerolling 1s = 13 wounds

 

Double and quadruple this when putting them in a unit of 6 (ideal, I think), and when piling in twice from the KoS. 

 

As you can see, these are some pretty nice stats - they're able to lay low big monsters and heroes quite easily with support. In addition, they are weirdly tanky at 4+ models. Have a unit of hellstriders follow them about and watch the opponent weep; 20 grave guard would do an average of 5 damage against a unit of 4 or more fiends backed by Hellstriders.  

 

[Carnith]

I was thinking that Hellstriders following them as they go head long towards a character who might be too close to the front line get stung by 2 of them for a chance for them to take 2d6 damage. On average would out right kill most heroes. 

[Popisdead]

23 hours ago, kenshin620 said:

I'm assuming the former, kind of like how BoC work (you can't have multiple heroes sacrificing on the herdstone). Vs Khorne who can have a bunch of slaughterpriest since theres always the chance the blood sacrifice can fail and takes up their prayer use.

I feel it will be a mechanic like BoC going forward.

Also with this formation and the Depraved Drove, there are two formations Slaanesh can access even if the book is further away than February.  

[Rock Lobster]

I think the big decision point is going to be depravity vs bodies given the new unit warscrolls which are greatly improved. The way depravity works encourages hero hammer with as few units as possible and as many killy heroes, but now those units are very good and much more resilient than the heroes. Its a good call from GW which is going to encourage some balance.

I think I will steer clear of the Battalion for now since I believe the extra movement from seekers is better than pretenders in keeping units alive and striking first. Guessing at points I am still leaning towards characters and movement 10 and over for the +2 to move and charge with seekers.

Exalted greater daemon of slaanesh 440 (general - seekers) (probably supremely vein and -3 rend sword, blender lord)

Exalted greater daemon of slaanesh 440

Chaos sorcerer = 160 - (daemonic power allows the lord to kill an entire unit of 20 sequitors in 1 turn)

Harp lady = 160?

Character cost = 1200 (36 built in depravity from wounds and 1 a turn from harp lady

Cogs = 60

5 hellstriders = 100

5 hellstriders = 100

5 hellstriders = 100

6 fiends = 320?

2 command points = 100

Total  = 1980

I can see probably stronger lists for extended fights with lots of big units and the battalion, but I think this would be a nasty army to field. I will have enough command points to either do 2 turns of the exalted daemons fighting twice, or if my opponent hasn't screened well, go for the kill turn 1 with both exalted daemons and fiends all double attacking.

If spaced correctly, you can throw the lords in with overlapping auras from the 2 Hellstrider units for -2 to hit to keep them alive longer and with 1 unit of Hellstriders the fiends will get the innate -2 to hit and -1 to wound.

With Seekers, average move and charge for Fiends is 23" and 25" for lords. If Cogs goes off that becomes 27" and 29" making a first turn triple charge a good prospect, especially with most scenarios set 18" apart.

If they get first turn , the cool thing with Hellstriders is you can choose to forgo screening for a bait for charge. Stick the high value fiends and lords on the very front line and closely overlap the Hellstriders behind so that if the opponent does charge them thinking to take off your key pieces turn 1, they will find themselves at -2 or even -3 to hit and you get a free turn to beat them up.

Could be fun. Only need to add harp lady and fiends.

 

[Enoby]

30 minutes ago, Rock Lobster said:

*snip*

Sounds like a very interesting list. I feel these new models help Slaanesh lists diversify. We have no 'winning list', but we have a lot of really good units that we can mix and match.

 

I really want to 'practise' with the fiends. Maths is fine and all, but it's only half the battle. I'm still trying to decide between daemonettes (with their new rules) and fiends.

[Rock Lobster]

2 hours ago, Enoby said:

Sounds like a very interesting list. I feel these new models help Slaanesh lists diversify. We have no 'winning list', but we have a lot of really good units that we can mix and match.

 

I really want to 'practise' with the fiends. Maths is fine and all, but it's only half the battle. I'm still trying to decide between daemonettes (with their new rules) and fiends.

Based on the warscrolls I don't think you can go wrong with either, Daemonettes are super strong now, might be one of the best battle line in the game in big units. In my list I am working on the assumption of high speed and summoning daemonettes later, i cant start with them on the table as they will fall well behind. Summoning 20 daemonettes for 18 depravity is a bargain, and with Cogs and seekers they can appear 9" away and then charge in on a natural roll of 5 which is a nasty shock for anyone.

[Enoby]

2 minutes ago, Rock Lobster said:

Based on the warscrolls I don't think you can go wrong with either, Daemonettes are super strong now, might be one of the best battle line in the game in big units. In my list I am working on the assumption of high speed and summoning daemonettes later, i cant start with them on the table as they will fall well behind. Summoning 20 daemonettes for 18 depravity is a bargain, and with Cogs and seekers they can appear 9" away and then charge in on a natural roll of 5 which is a nasty shock for anyone.

Good point. I will be buying a few boxes of W&R so I should be able to mess about with different lists - your idea for a speedy frontal assault is a good one.

[Carnith]

I definitely think daemonettes will still be a mainstay. If we can get a hero that helps us wound, then we will be in a good spot.

[Enoby]

2 minutes ago, carnith said:

I definitely think daemonettes will still be a mainstay. If we can get a hero that helps us wound, then we will be in a good spot.

Yeah, a +1 to wound (or even just a aura of rerolling 1s to wound) would be great. Maybe another herald will do that (after all, they did have two new Nurgle heralds). 

Do you reckon we're going to be a magic light army when we get our book. The Infernal Enrapturess looked like a wizard and was in a box that could have benefited from something for Karanak to dispell, but yet we still don't have anything besides the Keeper.

That said, the IE reroll successful casts seems very useful as we normally suffer from spells. What do people think of the battalion? Worth using?

[Carnith]

The battalion seems good, yet feels weird, cause I dont want to use seekers, but +A is really good and for something like the fiends to get +attack on that barbed tail attack, will really make them invaluable. Even on Daemonettes, +attacks is going to help them not feel as much of a loss for dying. Them also natively getting reroll 1's to hit, will help them go a long way, even for tinier squads summoned in. 

 

[Rock Lobster]

38 minutes ago, carnith said:

The battalion seems good, yet feels weird, cause I dont want to use seekers, but +A is really good and for something like the fiends to get +attack on that barbed tail attack, will really make them invaluable. Even on Daemonettes, +attacks is going to help them not feel as much of a loss for dying. Them also natively getting reroll 1's to hit, will help them go a long way, even for tinier squads summoned in. 

 

I think of all the elements, the seekers are the only dud there, they are really the tax for the battalion.

[Poryague]

43 minutes ago, Rock Lobster said:

I think of all the elements, the seekers are the only dud there, they are really the tax for the battalion.

Well at least they are slightly better then what they were with the flag bearers reroll Hits of 1. Depending on what your playing against they can go chase a vaulnerable shooting unit or caster.  They are stupid fast. Still a tax but not to bad they still have uses.

[Enoby]

52 minutes ago, Poryague said:

Well at least they are slightly better then what they were with the flag bearers reroll Hits of 1. Depending on what your playing against they can go chase a vaulnerable shooting unit or caster.  They are stupid fast. Still a tax but not to bad they still have uses.

Yeah, I agree. While I don't think they're amazing must have units by any means, they're not bad. I've found them best as use of them is against high powered shooting; someone has a canon? Kill the crew. Irondrakes? They'll be waisting their shots. Jezzails? They may just run. Almost no chance they'll stay within 12" of the herald, though.