AoS 2 - Disciples of Tzeentch Discussion

[Koala]

Well the Tzeentch Battletome has the range to support your playstyle. And you can definitively make it work in a friendly Game! Have fun!

( Just do not rely on summoning. It is more of a nice to have and mostly the game will already be decided before you can bring in more than some emergency screamers)

Historically the Most succesful DoT lists ( that have not been nerfed to death) rely on what i call destructive control: slow them down, stop them from doing their thing. Like Changeling and Kairos abilities, Hosts Arcanum Auto dispell, have horrors die as slowly as possible... 

So pretty much a weird kind of anvil playstyle. 

With too much " spell ranged tricky" playstyles there are some armies that just break you ( although the worst Alpha strike times are over... Ironically because Tzeentch Eternal Confraglation Flamer Spam was nerfed).

It can be a bit frustating to know you can not win after Setup. Which is probably why many players shy away from this even though in a non-tournament setup you rarely meet this scenario.

[Jabbuk]

On 1/17/2022 at 9:26 AM, Koala said:

Well the Tzeentch Battletome has the range to support your playstyle. And you can definitively make it work in a friendly Game! Have fun!

( Just do not rely on summoning. It is more of a nice to have and mostly the game will already be decided before you can bring in more than some emergency screamers)

Historically the Most succesful DoT lists ( that have not been nerfed to death) rely on what i call destructive control: slow them down, stop them from doing their thing. Like Changeling and Kairos abilities, Hosts Arcanum Auto dispell, have horrors die as slowly as possible... 

So pretty much a weird kind of anvil playstyle. 

With too much " spell ranged tricky" playstyles there are some armies that just break you ( although the worst Alpha strike times are over... Ironically because Tzeentch Eternal Confraglation Flamer Spam was nerfed).

It can be a bit frustating to know you can not win after Setup. Which is probably why many players shy away from this even though in a non-tournament setup you rarely meet this scenario.

That's super useful, thank you. It does feel like I cannot fully grasp what you're talking about though, I guess it's the experience. I haven't had the chance to play them yet because of pandemic and painting my army takes forever, so experience will come as I play them. Although, I did play them once in a 1000pts game and I hated them, lol. All my units died to a stiff breeze, I felt like I couldn't achieve much. Coming from a Destruction playstyle, I was like.. what is the point of this army? Isn't it supposed to be strong? (I was playing a Pyrofane Cult build with lots of Acolytes, my tzaangors died surprisingly fast, I got charged and everything died. I guess I learned the hard way that Tzeentch cannot be charged. So I started buying horrors to screen stuff.)

Can't wait to test my 2k list. This time I'm doing Host Arcanum and we'll see how it goes. 

 

[Calypso2ts]

Quick update on the local tournament I took the following list as Hosts Arcanum:

Kairos - Tzeentch's Firestorm

Lord of Change - Bolt of Tzeentch, Arcane Tome

Ogroid Thaumaturge - Arcane Suggestion, General - Fanged Circlet

Blue Scribes - Fold Reality

Changecaster - Unchecked Mutation

10x Kairic Acolytes (Shields)

10x Pink Horrors

10x Pink Horrors

1x Umbral Spellportal

1x Burning Head

 

The tournament was small but had the usual suspects - Drakes, Hallowed Knights, Daughters, Sons, etc

 

Game 1: Stormcast Eternals: Stormdrake Guard in Marking Territory

This game was an entirely Stormdrake based army, I think this is a weaker variant than the one that includes shooting from Raptors but the universal 4+ ignores spells is still rough. I out dropped him and took first turn with the intent to put up screens and try to nuke one Drake squad.

The board is really awkward, but I get 3 units to move 6" and put LOC/Fate in range with the portal for another spell and burning head. I am able to nuke one squad of 2x Stormdrakes and changecaster goes off with +3 to cast (terrain, agenda, Beacon). I summon a screen of blues, and Screamers. I make a mistake here (the same kind of mistake would later come back to haunt me but I got away with it this time), I am not putting my pink/Blue screens forward far enough.

Kairos forces a failed charge by a 4x Deep Striking Stormdrake unit. He doubles me - which he needed or this game is basically over. Everything gets in but the horrors are just too many wounds. I do a surprising amount back with melee/shooting and tear him down the rest of the way with magic - Ogroid does some work being injured but surviving and getting full rerolls. Due to the battleplan and time, I get a Minor.

 

Game 2: Daughters of Khaine (Morathi, 15 Bow Snakes, assorted Medusa) in Tectonic Interference

I out drop again and line up the snakes, nine go down from Kairos and the Lord of Change - spawn stops hero phase shooting. I am rushing and forge to summon my Blue Horrors screen but Kairos forces Morathi to fail her charge. I supercharged (Finest Hour, Mystic) the Lord of Change on that flank to repel shooting. I get doubled again but the screens hold and once again do a surprising amount of damage to her snakes. Everything is now engaged with Horrors on my battleline with my wizards all intact. Magic goes out to finish off the Bloodwrack heroes and I fly over the combat to her board side to summon onto objectives and prevent pile in shenanigans. I end with a Major victory and end up running out of Blue Horrors (I brought 40) due to summoning and splitting.

Game 3: Sons of Behemat (2x Gatebreaker, 2x Warstomper) in First Blood

I win the roll for deployment order and out drop him (we both have 4). This one is tough because all the objectives are on the center line, so he does not need to hold back any giants. I need to score first turn because I will not score again until turn 3 or 4 at best with Giants being worth 35 models each.

I roll a 1 for my pregame move - which is bad because I really need to get both Birds in on Turn 1. In spite of this I drop 26 mortals onto a Gatebreaker from Kairos, spell portal, burning head (I was rolling a lot of 6's for d6 damage - Pink Fire, Gift, Bolt, Choking, Burning Head). I roll very poorly on my runs - I should have used Destiny Dice here, I had four 6's and I needed to get the Pink Horrors further forward OR I should have pushed my birds furthers back. Either way, I drop out Screamers and Blue Horrors as two screens. I make an error here and did not put the Blues far enough - I should have summoned from max distance and used a throwaway hero to do so.

My mistakes add up as all 4 giants simply advance right into my army. The screens hold Turn 1 and Kairos prevents him from charging over one of them on my flank. I need the Turn here to drop back, summon more screens and start in with a full magic, I mean hero, phase. . . he rolls a 6 and I roll a 5.

The double sees the other giants hop over my screens or advance straight through. In spite of Mystic Shield, Finest Hour, and All Out Defense Kairos gets smoked, the Lord of Change gets smoked (he rolled really really well on both sets of attacks) and I am out of gas to take down the giants. At this point there is really no way for me to win.

Lessons Learned:

1. I need to push my screens further out to keep Kairos and the LOC out of 3" for big units.

2. Movement Turn 1 was awkward with a LOC/ Fate in front of the army but really wanting to get the pinks in front of them.

3. I underused/misused my Destiny Dice - the key roll might be a run roll on Turn 1 or critical cast roll, I tend to want to save them too long.

 

Final Thoughts:

This list has A LOT going on with it. Agendas of Anarchy, Battle Tactics, splitting horrors, fate points, delicate movement, etc. I made a checklist of spells associated with each caster, agendas of anarchy, and battle tactics so I could run through them all each turn. This helped A LOT and I highly recommend (the checklist was by battle round with all casters, and I crossed out their row if they died).

Each game really starts the same - if going first move the birds up 6", Beacon of Sorcery, Reroll casts with Scribes, Portal from the Lord of Change - then Gift of Change, Firestorm, Choking Tendrils, Bolt of Tzeentch, Infernal Portal, and Pink Fire all into the target unit with the burning head jumping through the portal. Summon Screamers, pinks and screamers move to screen (ferocious advance as a tactic with LoC, Fate, Changecaster) and summon blues as an initial forward screen. After that it becomes more dynamic as target priority comes into the picture. This was very powerful in every game (even Behemat when I could have taken down a giant if I had the Lord of Change in the mix).

There is also a lot of non-interactive elements to this list I do not like as a player. It has very powerful magic - but I spend most of it casting on my own because there are not enough unbinds and most casts come in so high they really cannot be unbound. I also found my opponents really hated the pinks and got frustrated at points in the game. They did have the joy of killing models but it seemed like it did not matter because of the endless hoards. I also moved fast on my games but the pinks bogged it down at times. This lists needs proactive play, meaning have your dice and attacks ready to go so you are not counting models every turn. Some quick math helps as well "I have no pinks, and 2 brimestones - that means I have 18 blues for 36 shots"

For the sake of variety, I think my next tournament will be running Legion of the First Prince with some plaguebearers for troops and summoning with pinks. It is probably less directly powerful but will help with the fatigue from seeing 15+ casts every month.

[Halkbat]

I run a similar list sonit was nice hearing about it in action.

 

One comment I notice you use your free 6 screamers as a screen a lot.  They summon in the hero phase and can still move and charge the turn they arrive.

[Calypso2ts]

7 hours ago, Halkbat said:

I run a similar list sonit was nice hearing about it in action.

 

One comment I notice you use your free 6 screamers as a screen a lot.  They summon in the hero phase and can still move and charge the turn they arrive.

I do tend to use the Screamers to screen - with 12" summon range and 16" movement they can definitely hit things early on. There are a few reasons I used them to screen:

Game 1 - Dragons: I wanted him to advanced into Magic range with his remaining dragons. If he had moved to 18" range wiped the screamers in his deployment zone then he could have held off the 4 man unit one turn before using all their hero phase movement to hit me with them all at once (sans an extra screen). Pinning so many units for a turn in the backfield is good - but not in this mission which only scores battle tactics with a 'sudden death' victory condition. I was also concerned that if he had position 8 dragons withing 12" of my Lord of Change and Fate he would drop them (their fire breath average 2 mortals a dragon so 16 MW with some spikes possible.) I could not move the Horrors far enough forward this game to get the gap I needed to protect them while also preventing him from flying over my lines into the casters.

Game 2 - Daughters: I did not have enough bodies to keep the Kairics as a legitimate rear screen against the Shadow Queen. Screamers are much more durable (-1 hit, 18 wounds) and I was concerned he would shoot/charge the acolytes and pile into the casters the next turn. The Kairics are not shown because they got mulched very quickly in that game.

 

Game 3 - Sons of Behemat: So many mistakes here. I needed a second unit to stop the Gargants but placed the Screamers REALLY badly to do that. Same issue of needing to stop them from walking over the screen in the charge phase. It is an akward balance of making sure they cannot charge between the screens and hit the back one versus maximizing the space you can buy - I did this poorly.

I think in Game 3 I should have summoned, moved for a flyover (the weak Gargant on 9W was a wizard which gives a 5+ for d3 mortals for 2d3 (4) on average. Then assaulted him. Screamers with AOA is 18 attacks, 12 hits, 6 wounds, 3d3 damage (I had destiny dice to max this). This would have dropped one major damage dealer and with good positioning I might have been able to have them survive to pin a giant in place for an additional turn. With other good positioning, I might have been able to shift my positioning for a possible double turn of casting/summoning to kill another...maybe 2 with some lucky Horror shooting.

 

[Congratz]

Hello,

 

I have a bit of an odd request:

I’m new to Tzeentch, and have just begun collecting and painting.

I’m going to a bit of a weird tournemant in April where I’ve decided to play Tzeentch, however I don’t know what’s good and since it’s not a normal tournemant list building have been quite hard. It’s a real time tournement. Imagine risk and Warhammer together

So I’m asking if anyone have any good 1350 point list, you mind sharing

 

Tournement rules are: 
 No Artefacts, No unique Characters, You may only summon units that cost maximum 250 points

Cheers!

 

[Adammck66]

Hey, was wanting to see if you guys could see if anything from my Tzeentch collection could be turned into an average 2k list?

I play casual, usually vs slaves, sylv or undead.

I have -

Lord of Change, Gaunt Summoner on foot, Tzaan sham, Ogroid, Magister on disc.

20 Kairoc, 20 Tzaangor, 6 disc enlightened, 6 skyfires, 3 screamers.

 

Thanks for any tips or help 

 

 

Edited February 16, 2022 by Adammck66

[Dejnar]

Hey guys. 

I'm new to DoT. Mostly building a list for fun games but I don't want it to totally suck though. 
What's your expert opinion on the lists below? I love flamers so that's the subfaction I want to play.

OR

 

 

Edited March 2, 2022 by Dejnar

[Ben__Halford]

Can anyone help me please - Can the Blue Scribes' Scrolls of Sorcery but used to cast an Endless spell?

Edited April 6, 2022 by Ben__Halford

[Jabbuk]

On 4/6/2022 at 7:11 AM, Ben__Halford said:

Can anyone help me please - Can the Blue Scribes' Scrolls of Sorcery but used to cast an Endless spell?

I would tend to say yes. I don't see why it wouldn't. It seems to meet all the criteria. The ability only mentions casting a spell. 

[Baron_Bathory]

Hey guys!

So I've been playing Greenskins since 6th edition fantasy, looking for a bit of a change of scenery. Since GW seems to be taking their sweet time releasing some variant of Chaos Dwarf, looks like I might be going with my next favourite pick; our boys in blue!

My gaming league does not allow special (named) characters, which was great for my Ironjawz, but I'm not sure how it will fare with DoT. Can anyone help me out with what a cool and competitive list without special characters might look like? Obviously Archaon and Kairos shenanigans are off the table. I really want to use a lord of change and flamers. Magic and shooting is kind of what I'm aiming for. Can I also get a brief rundown on general DoT tactics?

Any help would be amazing. Thank you all so much in advance

Edited April 14, 2022 by Baron_Bathory

[Painbringer]

I've started collecting Disciples of Tzeentch last summer. Up to that point, I have played them only in Warcry, but then I decided to collect the full army as well, because I really like the look of the miniatures (especially Tzaangors and Lord of Change/Kairos). I've yet to play my first proper game, but I have bought and assembled most of the stuff I wanted by now and I also started painting my models. Here's my Lord of Change: 

Edited April 26, 2022 by Painbringer

[Baron_Bathory]

4 hours ago, Painbringer said:

I've started collecting Disciples of Tzeentch last summer. Up to that point, I have played them only in Warcry, but then I decided to collect the full army as well, because I really like the look of the miniatures (especially Tzaangors and Lord of Change/Kairos). I've yet to play my first proper game, but I have bought and assembled most of the stuff I wanted by now and I also started painting my models. Here's my Lord of Change: 

 

Dude this looks spectacular! Extremely well done! Blending is superb as is the OSL. The pinkish purple & white wings & tongue were a great idea. Turned out fabulous!

[Archibald]

I just started Tzeentch and got myself a Start Collecting, the Changeling, a box of blue Horrors and a magnetized Kairos/Lord of Change. I only want to play daemons. So first question: Any more recommendations besides another Start Collecting and more blue horrors?

Now i was looking for some competitive lists and could only find stuff that is from january or older. This Threads looks also more dead than alive. So my question is what happened to Tzeentch? I can recall that we were feared for our magic and fire power... 

[Grimrock]

2 hours ago, Archibald said:

I just started Tzeentch and got myself a Start Collecting, the Changeling, a box of blue Horrors and a magnetized Kairos/Lord of Change. I only want to play daemons. So first question: Any more recommendations besides another Start Collecting and more blue horrors?

Now i was looking for some competitive lists and could only find stuff that is from january or older. This Threads looks also more dead than alive. So my question is what happened to Tzeentch? I can recall that we were feared for our magic and fire power... 

To me the repeated points nerfs, horror re-write, and interactions with 3rd edition rules have left the army feeling a little... flat. Not a terrible army, but definitely lacking in damage. We pay a massive premium to get access to reliable mortal wounds and outside of those I've struggled to put out any damage. Back in 2nd the rend -1 from Eternal Conflagration was sufficient, but now everyone can stack +2 to their save without even trying. That makes it next to impossible to kill even remotely tanky units with shooting. Then you start seeing mass ward saves like Nurgle just completely negate even the magical side of our damage and it starts looking pretty bleak. Competitively the faction was crutching on Archaon pretty hard to make up for all the issues we were having, but him losing all access to allegiance abilities pretty much put the nail in the coffin.

Someone posted game stats on the rumor thread earlier today and it looks like we've dropped to a win rate of 36%. Pretty depressing but not overly surprising.

Edit: Model-wise I think you're on the right track. I've always enjoyed the blue scribes but with the  horrors not being of spell casters anymore I guess they're a lot less important these days. 

Edited May 27, 2022 by Grimrock

[Cambot1231]

On 1/12/2022 at 3:39 PM, TerminusRex said:

This is my current Conflagration list that I want to drop once I've had my fill of goats. I am really trying to prove that mortal units aren't so bad, and have been doing quite well with both Pyrofane Cult and now Transient Form. Although I have yet to face dragons, which I understand just deletes Tzeentch anyway.

 

Battalions: Battle Regiment, Command Entourage (extra artifact), 4 drops, 15 point bid for Triumph: Inspired

Changecaster - Artifact: Aura of Mutability, Spell: Bolt of Change

Fatemaster - General: Coruscating Flames

Kairos Fateweaver - Spell: Tzeentch's Firestorm

Magister - Artifact: Shroud of Warpflame, Spell: Glimpse the Future

The Blue Scribes - Spell: Fold Reality

10x Pink Horrors

6x Flamers of Tzeentch

6x Flamers of Tzeentch

Endless Spell: Umbral Spellportal

 

Main issue I see with the list is that it really wants to move in one block with Horrors upfront, flamers on the flank, and all the heroes (except blues and Kairos) in the middle. That means all the daemons are -1 to hit in range and melee, and are re-rolling to hit and to wound.  With all out attack on the horrors for first turn, that's an average of 19 D1 and 25 D3 wounds, all at -1 rend. This is assuming the flamers are only hitting on 4s.

It really strikes me as similar to my Pyrofane shooting list, with more damage output but with a smaller footprint and fewer scoring tools.  It also generates fewer fate points, but should have 12 by turn 2 to summon an exalted flamer.

 

How did this list play out if I may ask? 

 

[Ganigumo]

The new GHB lets battleline infantry fight in two ranks, I crunched some numbers on Tzaangors....

These are all with the +1 to wound from an arcanite hero, and +1 to hit (mostly for my sanity since half the unit has it baseline).
 

[R3n3]

Tzeentch news is good news!

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2022/06/27/magical-might-comes-to-the-fore-in-the-latest-warhammer-age-of-sigmar-battlebox/

 

Love the new curseling and the overall selection of models. Hopefully arcanites receive a boost in the new battletome 

[GrimDork]

New box seems like very good value, will probably get one.
I like the new curseling but imo it’s not quite as good as the current one.

Can’t help wishing it had been a new fatemaster instead.

[Dreadmund]

12 hours ago, GrimDork said:

New box seems like very good value, will probably get one.
I like the new curseling but imo it’s not quite as good as the current one.

Can’t help wishing it had been a new fatemaster instead.

Genuinely surprised they updated the wonderful curseling sculpt over the fatemaster that everyone always proxies because its so hideous. Knowing GW they'll keep the fatemaster's rules quite good so everyone will be forced to cut up an Ahriman from 40k still 😅

[Jabbuk]

10 hours ago, Dreadmund said:

Genuinely surprised they updated the wonderful curseling sculpt over the fatemaster that everyone always proxies because its so hideous. Knowing GW they'll keep the fatemaster's rules quite good so everyone will be forced to cut up an Ahriman from 40k still 😅

We don't need a new sculpt for the FM. I mean Ahriman is literally him.

[GrimDork]

I have a Fatemaster conversion in my head, using the leader min from the Cypher Lords Warcry warband.

Just haven't got round to executing it yet.

[Duke of Mousillon]

Would that new rule to make each model of a unit count as three on objectives work on horrors after they split? I am talking about the new  core battalion expert conquerors.

[Archibald]

9 hours ago, Duke of Mousillon said:

Would that new rule to make each model of a unit count as three on objectives work on horrors after they split? I am talking about the new  core battalion expert conquerors.

Yes.

[Duke of Mousillon]

So for those who actively play at the moment. How many Bounty Hunters battalions have you seen walking around in lists? We cannot really avoid being veterans. Well except maybe if burning chariots are battleline but that was never a viable option was it now.