AoS 2 - Disciples of Tzeentch Discussion

[Sumanye]

I like the current destiny dice to be clear, and I hope they don’t change it.  I don’t think Battleshock immunity is why horrors are strong; any competent player would use inspiring presence on horrors instead of spamming LoC CA anyway and the horror issue needs to be addressed separately imo.  I also don’t think spending DD to ignore Battleshock is any stronger than Battleshock mitigating abilities of other armies either, especially since it comes at the cost of a finite resource.   I think ignoring rend is fun and interesting.  I also like that you can’t modify cast rolls with DD, just makes things a little more interesting and I think DD are still stronger after the change than before, so who cares.  Yeah, I’m a fan of our new dice.  If it really is intended for battleshock, then I’m happy.  When I roll my 9 dice with this book, I feel a lot more excited about the possibilities than I did prior.

 

[jaWn]

Hi! I've got 20 Tzaangors to build, which I'll likely use as a blob of 20.

To sanity check my loadout, how does this look?

1 Twistbray w/ Savage Greatblade

1 Brayhorn w/ Savage GB

1 Icon Bearer w/ Savage GB

5 Normies w/ Savage GB

4 Mutants w/ Pair of Savage Blades

8 Normies w/ SB + Shield

Is there any reason to do more than 1 Icon or Brayhorn?

[NJohansson]

1 hour ago, Sumanye said:

I like the current destiny dice to be clear, and I hope they don’t change it.  I don’t think Battleshock immunity is why horrors are strong; any competent player would use inspiring presence on horrors instead of spamming LoC CA anyway and the horror issue needs to be addressed separately imo.  

 

I don’t necessarily disagree with your assessment that if necessary you will save a CP.  The problem is that Tzeentch is generally starved for CP. Both the LoC and now the Fatemaster really wants to use their abilities every turn and Tzeentch lacks the CP generating abilities of other armies. Saving a command point can easily result in all your casters having an effective  -1 to cast and dispel. Or all your units within 9” Not getting re-rolls on hits and wounds. That is a very big investment in maybe saving a unit of horrors and also it will maybe save one - what if more than one is in combat? DD takes away any real resource management - what is otherwise a tough choice becomes a non issue.

[Sumanye]

Just now, NJohansson said:

I don’t necessarily disagree with your assessment that if necessary you will save a CP.  The problem is that Tzeentch is generally starved for CP. Both the LoC and now the Fatemaster really wants to use their abilities every turn and Tzeentch lacks the CP generating abilities of other armies. Saving a command point can easily result in all your casters having an effective  -1 to cast and dispel. Or all your units within 9” Not getting re-rolls on hits and wounds. That is a very big investment in maybe saving a unit of horrors and also it will maybe save one - what if more than one is in combat? DD takes away any real resource management - what is otherwise a tough choice becomes a non issue.

When you are tarpitting your opponent with a unit that denies retreats and spending a cp is the difference between another turn or 2 of tarpit or your opponent breaking free, there is no question on where to spend the command points imo.  That could win you a game on the spot; no CA is that strong.  You also know if you’re going to tarpit, so it’s not like you have to guess if you need to save a CP or not.  My point is, saving horrors from battleshock is going to happen no matter what.  And spending DD to do it instead of CP so your army gets a +1 to cast is not why Tzeentch is wrecking tables.  Idk what the solution for horrors is, I’m just saying I don’t think it’s removing DD for battleshock, at least for competitive play.

[Sumanye]

32 minutes ago, jaWn said:

Hi! I've got 20 Tzaangors to build, which I'll likely use as a blob of 20.

To sanity check my loadout, how does this look?

1 Twistbray w/ Savage Greatblade

1 Brayhorn w/ Savage GB

1 Icon Bearer w/ Savage GB

5 Normies w/ Savage GB

4 Mutants w/ Pair of Savage Blades

8 Normies w/ SB + Shield

Is there any reason to do more than 1 Icon or Brayhorn?

Yeah, this is the ideal setup.  Extra horn and banner is good in case your opponent can target specific models, but it’s not worth caring about imo; go for whatever you think looks cool.

[TheadTheOgorSlayer]

On 1/28/2020 at 12:02 PM, MattyP said:

From the new Wrath of Everchosen book....looks like new stuff for tzeentch under allegiance abilities....Unbound flux and cult of 1000 eyes are tzeentch cults/factions.  Cool cool 

 

Wait, are those allegiances legal for events and stuff? Or just narrative play? Is this book like the psychic awakening books where they supplement the rules?

[MattyP]

2 minutes ago, TheadTheOgorSlayer said:

Wait, are those allegiances legal for events and stuff? Or just narrative play? Is this book like the psychic awakening books where they supplement the rules?

from what i've heard and seen, the contents are used in any form of play....

[Sinfullyvannila]

1 hour ago, NJohansson said:

DD takes away any real resource management - what is otherwise a tough choice becomes a non issue.

Laughs in Bonereapers and Slaves to Darkness

And that’s probably exactly why they changed 2d6 rolls to needing 2 dice.

[Lord Krungharr]

To save on CP, have the Blue Scribes cast their Boon of Tzeentch spell to let all Tzeentch Wizards in 18" reroll casting rolls, and they can do it with their auto-cast on a 2+ awesomeness that can't be unbound.

[Freejack02]

6 hours ago, Sumanye said:

I don’t think Battleshock immunity is why horrors are strong; any competent player would use inspiring presence on horrors instead of spamming LoC CA

You do realize that a hero has to be within 6" of the unit to do that right? Or the general within 12"? That's not always going to happen, especially if an enemy charge kills that hero or shooting snipes them off. Saying that the ability to negate any battleshock roll on Horrors from anywhere on the board isn't strong is just disingenuous. It means that a unit of Horrors can fight for an objective across the board with complete autonomy and be a real problem - that's not something to be understated. 

[Sumanye]

4 minutes ago, Freejack02 said:

You do realize that a hero has to be within 6" of the unit to do that right? Or the general within 12"? That's not always going to happen, especially if an enemy charge kills that hero or shooting snipes them off. Saying that the ability to negate any battleshock roll on Horrors from anywhere on the board isn't strong is just disingenuous. It means that a unit of Horrors can fight for an objective across the board with complete autonomy and be a real problem - that's not something to be understated. 

I mean, Locus of Change is a thing, so yes, I assume a competent player will have a hero next to their Horrors and also know how to screen it.  Nobody said the DD on battleshock wasn't strong; it is strong indeed.  I said it wasn't the reason Horrors are bonkers and changing it isn't going to keep horrors from being bonkers if you are a competent player.

[Freejack02]

1 minute ago, Sumanye said:

I said it wasn't the reason Horrors are bonkers and changing it isn't going to keep horrors from being bonkers if you are a competent player.

There is no single reason Horrors are so strong right now, it's a combination of things... DD ignoring any battleshock losses being one of them. Change that, and they become less effective... it's not rocket science. I understand that you are against the change (I'm not especially for it, I just expect it to happen), but saying it doesn't warrant a change because competent players will just ignore the effects is just silly.

A problem is worth addressing even if you can't fix 100% of the things at once. 

[Sumanye]

3 minutes ago, Freejack02 said:

Change that, and they become less effective... it's not rocket science.

I mean, I don't know how I could be anymore clear in explaining that this isn't the case, so I'll just agree to disagree.  

 

However, I do agree that Horrors are too good for a combination of reasons and any one change is not likely to fix them (without being so drastic as to make them useless).  I just don't think DD is the change to make.  Btw, this whole thing was in response to someone earlier saying the only fixes Horrors need is the DD for battleshock.  So, I don't disagree that you shouldn't try to address something if you can't fix it 100%, I just don't think this is the change to make.

[Daramiz]

3 minutes ago, Sumanye said:

I mean, I don't know how I could be anymore clear in explaining that this isn't the case, so I'll just agree to disagree.  

 

However, I do agree that Horrors are too good for a combination of reasons and any one change is not likely to fix them (without being so drastic as to make them useless).  I just don't think DD is the change to make.  Btw, this whole thing was in response to someone earlier saying the only fixes Horrors need is the DD for battleshock.  So, I don't disagree that you shouldn't try to address something if you can't fix it 100%, I just don't think this is the change to make.

Changing DD seems like the thing to hit right now. It doesn't feel right, even for units that aren't out of control like Tzangors or Acolytes. 

If horrors are still a problem in the competitive scene after that, I would guess GW will go to changing points.

[Inquisitorsz]

6 hours ago, Sumanye said:

When you are tarpitting your opponent with a unit that denies retreats and spending a cp is the difference between another turn or 2 of tarpit or your opponent breaking free, there is no question on where to spend the command points imo.  That could win you a game on the spot; no CA is that strong.  You also know if you’re going to tarpit, so it’s not like you have to guess if you need to save a CP or not.  My point is, saving horrors from battleshock is going to happen no matter what.  And spending DD to do it instead of CP so your army gets a +1 to cast is not why Tzeentch is wrecking tables.  Idk what the solution for horrors is, I’m just saying I don’t think it’s removing DD for battleshock, at least for competitive play.

I think the problem can go deeper though.... For example, if changehost required a CP (like most other army's teleport abilities), then having to spend CPs to save horrors from battleshock starts to become a bigger decision. 

I agree that horrors are a terribly designed unit (in every aspect) but the destiny dice modification thing is also annoying and unintuitive. 
Plus you still want to use 1s for battleshock anyway so they get their models back. 
I could probably go either way on the rend thing, just because passing 1 save every now and then is rarely of huge consequence (though I did have it used against me like that vs Alarielle's -2 Rend D6 damage spear, and that sucked.) 
but at least it uses up those 4+ dice that you'd otherwise use for charges

I think they did it this way so that 2s, 3s and to some extent 4s, were still useful in the destiny dice pool. But I think they should mostly be there to combine with 5s and 6s for charges and cast rolls, while the 1s get used for horror battleshocks. 

In any case, something needs to change, whether it's horrors or DD or both I'm not sure. 

[Jaskier]

In all the madness about Changehost and Horrors in light of the Cancon results, I want to give a special shout-out to Ash McEwan. He placed 5th at the event with a very mixed Arcanite-themed Guild of Summoners list and only had 1 Lord of Change in  his summoning pool (his starting list had zero) and only 10 Horrors (summoned from 1 Gaunt Summoner.) If you follow the Australian scene then you'll know this is very much more to do with Ash being a Masters-level player than the list he ran, but it's still inspiring to see an Arcanite/mortal-heavy build do so well in such a competitive field despite the daemonic side being the one that's getting all the attention right now. I've had my own Arcanite army since the first Tzeentch book dropped and it's really helping motivate me to finally get them painted and tournament-ready.

[Death1942]

4 hours ago, Sumanye said:

I mean, I don't know how I could be anymore clear in explaining that this isn't the case, so I'll just agree to disagree.  

 

However, I do agree that Horrors are too good for a combination of reasons and any one change is not likely to fix them (without being so drastic as to make them useless).  I just don't think DD is the change to make.  Btw, this whole thing was in response to someone earlier saying the only fixes Horrors need is the DD for battleshock.  So, I don't disagree that you shouldn't try to address something if you can't fix it 100%, I just don't think this is the change to make.

This is why they need to be very careful with the fix.  Ideally they should change 1-2 things at a time and see how it impacts it, we don't want to kill the unit entirely.  If they rush into a fix they could easily destroy large parts of the book for a long time (Hello old KO)

[Hebroseph]

On 1/22/2020 at 8:11 AM, NJohansson said:

This is puzzling me as well. Feels like there are many much better Endless Spells and even Arcane Bolt is a better spell than the one the tome let’s you cast.

Don't know if anybody answered this or not. Taking the tome with the Changeling is because he does not have a warscroll spell. This gives him somthing to try and cast every turn, and with rerolls its an average chance to do so. Sure its just a d3 mortals and a potential LD debuff, but its better than not attempting to cast anything. 

[Sinfullyvannila]

5 hours ago, Daramiz said:

Changing DD seems like the thing to hit right now. It doesn't feel right, even for units that aren't out of control like Tzangors or Acolytes. 

If horrors are still a problem in the competitive scene after that, I would guess GW will go to changing points.

I don’t care if it feels right. It should be obvious that nerfing the entire army when there are problems with a combination of specific Subfactions and Warscrolls is the definition of an overcorrection.

[Daramiz]

34 minutes ago, Sinfullyvannila said:

I don’t care if it feels right. It should be obvious that nerfing the entire army when there are problems with a combination of specific Subfactions and Warscrolls is the definition of an overcorrection.

I'd consider changing the Horror warscroll or point value to be a more detrimental nerf to "fair" Tzeentch lists. I'm still of the opinion that the new interaction with battleshock was an oversight. I'm interested to see what the designer's commentary regarding DD says in any upcoming FAQ about their intent.

[Dreadmund]

5 hours ago, Hebroseph said:

Don't know if anybody answered this or not. Taking the tome with the Changeling is because he does not have a warscroll spell. This gives him somthing to try and cast every turn, and with rerolls its an average chance to do so. Sure its just a d3 mortals and a potential LD debuff, but its better than not attempting to cast anything. 

Another slight advantage of the tome of eyes is that it's on a 40mm (approx. 1.5") base and can be set up within 1". Caster and Tome are considered 1 model, so things like spell range and endless spell setup range can be measured from the Tome, giving you another 2.5".  So altogether the Spell gives you an extra spell to cast (great for changeling, situational for all others), re-roll spellcasts and 2.5" extra range on spells. I actually rate the Tome pretty high, I'm definitely going to have one in my list.

[Sinfullyvannila]

13 minutes ago, Dreadmund said:

Another slight advantage of the tome of eyes is that it's on a 40mm (approx. 1.5") base and can be set up within 1". Caster and Tome are considered 1 model, so things like spell range and endless spell setup range can be measured from the Tome, giving you another 2.5".  So altogether the Spell gives you an extra spell to cast (great for changeling, situational for all others), re-roll spellcasts and 2.5" extra range on spells. I actually rate the Tome pretty high, I'm definitely going to have one in my list.

Wow I never even thought of that.

[Malakithe]

16 minutes ago, Dreadmund said:

Another slight advantage of the tome of eyes is that it's on a 40mm (approx. 1.5") base and can be set up within 1". Caster and Tome are considered 1 model, so things like spell range and endless spell setup range can be measured from the Tome, giving you another 2.5".  So altogether the Spell gives you an extra spell to cast (great for changeling, situational for all others), re-roll spellcasts and 2.5" extra range on spells. I actually rate the Tome pretty high, I'm definitely going to have one in my list.

Gloomspite have been doing this for a while with their spider pot endless spell. 

 

4 hours ago, Daramiz said:

I'd consider changing the Horror warscroll or point value to be a more detrimental nerf to "fair" Tzeentch lists. I'm still of the opinion that the new interaction with battleshock was an oversight. I'm interested to see what the designer's commentary regarding DD says in any upcoming FAQ about their intent.

It definitely wasnt an oversight. The old book and DD worked the same way. The old system and this new one are the same except for the new unmodified part. And the old one was changed cuz it used to allow you to change the result of the damage of the spells themselves. 

[Daramiz]

3 hours ago, Malakithe said:

It definitely wasnt an oversight. The old book and DD worked the same way. The old system and this new one are the same except for the new unmodified part. And the old one was changed cuz it used to allow you to change the result of the damage of the spells themselves. 

Right, that's where the oversight may come in. They changed the rule to fix one thing and may have caused an unintended major change to how DD play out. 

[Malakithe]

1 hour ago, Daramiz said:

Right, that's where the oversight may come in. They changed the rule to fix one thing and may have caused an unintended major change to how DD play out. 

Paragraphs and thought out sentences describing rules isnt an oversight. They fully meant for DD to be unmodifiable. From a lore stand point they are meant to twist and tweak fate and reality and thats what the DD do.  They wont change the entire mechanic but might tweak what they can be used for such as they did for spell damage.