AoS 2 - Beasts of Chaos Discussion

[kenshin620]

20 minutes ago, Gildaheir said:

So excited for the new beasts army book. Two things...

Firstly, the GMG Review of the codex emphasized the herdstone being a "reduce the armor save of the opponent by one," but the webstore warscroll says it's a -1 to the save. Any clarity on this? I'm asking because I'm curious if it will ultimately affect nighthaunt.

 

Secondly, what are people's thoughts on the cygor? I love the model, but I'm curious if it's at all useful. Based on the warscroll, my hope is that it's very cheap? 

Ethereal Units never suffer or benefit from any armor save modifiers regardless of source. It is one thing to ignore Rend, it is another to be immune to all modifiers. Unless I misinterpreted the rule wrong.

 

Cygor is the Jack of All Trades Master of None monster methinks. He's interesting to have hang around, but he'll never be the best combat beast nor is he point for point a proper artillery piece. Though he does benefit from the unbind increase. His biggest benefit was that he was a Warherds monster, but with other monsters not eating ally points some people are  probably going for some chimeras or something.

Edited September 16, 2018 by kenshin620

[Charlo]

17 minutes ago, Gildaheir said:

Secondly, what are people's thoughts on the cygor? I love the model, but I'm curious if it's at all useful. Based on the warscroll, my hope is that it's very cheap? 

By no means an expert (yet to play a game!) But he adds some ranged punch and a powerful unbind option. He can also get stuck in combat with support to some nice attacks.

He's a support monster in an army full of frontline monsters, so certainly has a place if you ask me.

Not to mention he's a giant minotaur that eats magic and throws boulders. So he's metal as hell.

[Frozenbeast]

15 minutes ago, kenshin620 said:

Ethereal Units never suffer or benefit from any armor save modifiers regardless of source. It is one thing to ignore Rend, it is another to be immune to all modifiers. Unless I misinterpreted the rule wrong

 

I don t think the Herdstone rule was directed to resolve the Nighthaunt problem (for us they are a problem as we don t have as many attacks to compensate the high armor they have). I think that is directed to all those high armor armies (like SCE) that for us are untouchable at the moment. 

From next week on we will have an answer to both NH and SCE in the form of many attacks (from Bestigors, Bullgors, Chimeras, Dragon Ogors, etc...) and rend from the Herdstone and the abilities from the heroes.

 

[CharnelChimera]

33 minutes ago, Gildaheir said:

Secondly, what are people's thoughts on the cygor? I love the model, but I'm curious if it's at all useful. Based on the warscroll, my hope is that it's very cheap? 

I'm not a fan of the stat-block and I wouldn't pay a point over 140 for it. The unbinds are situational and I'm assuming most people are going to take 3 shaman and a Shaggoth from now on.

 

The Ghorgon on the other hand, I think has potential. The Chimera might actually out class it though. What do people think about Gargants? The points increase, despite the buff), makes me want to ignore them and needing to be babysat by a hero for the +1 attack ability seems dumb.

Has anyone gotten the Aura of Madness off on a Jabberslythe? it feels like it would be a game changer, but 1/6 chance is so swing-y, especially since it's no longer the suicidal cruise missile it used to be.

[Gildaheir]

5 minutes ago, CharnelChimera said:

The Ghorgon on the other hand, I think has potential. The Chimera might actually out class it though. What do people think about Gargants? The points increase, despite the buff), makes me want to ignore them and needing to be babysat by a hero for the +1 attack ability seems dumb.

 

I agree the Chimera looks great. It's got an absurd number of attacks now. I really like the Ghorgon a lot as well, though. Jabberslythe seems more style than substance. His 1/6 chance of utterly shutting stuff down is cute, but you can't rely on 17%, and the drop from d3 to 1 for his boiling blood hurts. Again, without knowing any point values, it's hard to say for sure on any of these.

[Dracothjay]

I have a question about ungors. Rumour is they are not battleline. Regardless if they are or not, what’s their best loadout and size? I’m really considering leaving fighting to bestigors and gors and making all my ungors (when I receive them) raiders.

Also, would raiders be better in maxed out units for the rerolls or smaller 10 man units?

[kenshin620]

I'm pretty sure normal Ungors will stay battleline, it would be utterly bizarre if they weren't.

ESPECIALLY because they are GA CHAOS Battleline. How many units lose GA Battleline?

However it seems Raiders will lose their Battleline, unless thats a weird oversight. For Raiders in old Brayherds, I've seen units of 20 park next to the shaman.

[decker_cky]

So I know Rhu said marked battalions were something special allowing them to be taken in the marked armies, but so far in all the previews that go through the armies, nothing indicates that they're any different than the Everchosen warscroll battalions in terms of coming from ally points despite containing all units with marks. 

Has anyone seen reference to an actual rule that could justify them being taken in marked armies?

[Dracothjay]

22 minutes ago, kenshin620 said:

I'm pretty sure normal Ungors will stay battleline, it would be utterly bizarre if they weren't.

ESPECIALLY because they are GA CHAOS Battleline. How many units lose GA Battleline?

However it seems Raiders will lose their Battleline, unless thats a weird oversight. For Raiders in old Brayherds, I've seen units of 20 park next to the shaman.

I’m hoping raiders are battleline. Ambushing them then being able to pepper enemy in the shooting phase seems quite nice. 20-30 man units of shooting seems quite nice to me as the rest of the army runs up the board. Also as they are dirt cheap, can also act as a screen I suppose.

Edited September 16, 2018 by Dracothjay

[lord_blackfang]

In case this hasn't been found yet, the updated Tzaangor warscroll has been hiding under the 40k box version (the one with chainswords and autopistols)

 

https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/PDF/Downloads//ENG_AoS_BeastsOfChaos_Tzaangors.pdf

 

Note that units of 9-17 actually got buffed as the blob bonus now adds +1 attack to their beaks too, when it only affected held weapons before.

Edited September 16, 2018 by lord_blackfang

[Mandzak-Miniatures]

2 hours ago, Dracothjay said:

I’m hoping raiders are battleline. Ambushing them then being able to pepper enemy in the shooting phase seems quite nice. 20-30 man units of shooting seems quite nice to me as the rest of the army runs up the board. Also as they are dirt cheap, can also act as a screen I suppose.

They won’t be. Not that WHC people are always right but to them their logic to my question on it is that bows are rare for beastmen to acquire..

by that logic I’m not sure why they would let garbage make use of the bows to begin with lol.

 

[Dracothjay]

36 minutes ago, Mandzak-Miniatures said:

They won’t be. Not that WHC people are always right but to them their logic to my question on it is that bows are rare for beastmen to acquire..

by that logic I’m not sure why they would let garbage make use of the bows to begin with lol.

 

You think raiders are worth it? Regardless of battleline.

[Satyrical Sophist]

Do people have a list of points changes? I'm trying to work out just how much bang for your buck (Your point buck I guess) you get.

What I've currently heard is that Tzaangor enlightened on foot are 100, Bestigor are 120, and disk enlightened are 140 (The last one I've not seen mentioned much, think it might be some confusion with Skyfires, which are dropping 20 points).

In any case, assuming the bestigor numbers are right, then 10 bestigor charging 4+ armour save enemies will do an expected 6.9 wounds to a small unit, and 9.2 wounds to a big  unit. If that unit has 5+ saves, it'd be 8.6 for a small unit, or 11.5 for a big one. So doing a fairly reasonable chunk of damage. 

Whats kind of interesting is that Tzaangor are actually not that outclassed on the charge. Tzaangor'll do more damage, but obviously cost more. If you look at the number of wounds caused per 100 points of unit then you get a fairly balanced result. On the charge, vs a large units, Bestigor out perform Tzaangor (7.7 to 5.8). They are roughly equivalent charging small units (5.7 for BG, 5.8 for TG), and drop off rapidly in following turns (Down to 5.2 for big units and 3.9 for small units).

Enlightened end up kind of brutal, leaving aside the disks, foot enlightened end up being a bit more efficient overall than regular Tzaangor (6.3 wounds per 100 points), but if you ever get to trigger their guided by the past ability their damage output leaps to 11.3, which is almost 50% more than bestigors charging, and almost twice the damage at charging small units. 

I'm also pretty interested in knowing about various synergies you can get, like that Gavespawn ability, and whether the wording will boost ALL melee profiles, as well as any other buffs that can be given out. I assumed that you had the Tzaangor shaman present for the enlightened, which might be a bit unfair, but I love that bird goat.

[Oldshrimpeyes]

What's the general consensus on the Depraved Drove?

[Mandzak-Miniatures]

37 minutes ago, Dracothjay said:

You think raiders are worth it? Regardless of battleline.

If they were battle line I’d take them. But they don’t appear to be worth it.

it makes more sense that ungors would be used to sacrifice and therefore shouldn’t be the easy battle line to nuke for summoning. It would make more sense to have them not be battle line so you are paying for the sacrifice AND they don’t spam fill the battle line option.

i like the shooting aspect, I just don’t see why you would want that when there are many other options

[The_Yellow_Sign]

I've found Raiders pretty effective, personally, especially when ambushing with the brayblast trumpet. In a block of 40 they deal 13.444... wounds (before saves), or 17.82 (before saves) when ambushing with the Brayblast trumpet. Good for softening up a target for my Bestigors. With our new abilities that drop saves, they should be even more effective than before.

[swarmofseals]

I use a formula that I call WDR to compare offensive efficiency across different values of rend. I won't get into the nuts and bolts right now, but suffice to say it's good for general comparisons. If you want the exact numbers against models with a specific known save, you can do a more accurate comparison. Just looking at some of the new warscrolls:

Tzaangors (at 18 points per model, all paired weapons or greatblades, supported by a Tzaangor hero and with +1 attack): WDR of .121

Bestigors (at 12 points per model. Minimum efficiency: not charging, target <10 models, not against order/Maximum efficiency: charging, target 10+ models, against order): .078/.179

Tzaangor Enlightened on Disc (at 140 points per 3, without shaman/with shaman/with shaman and guided by the past): WDR of .105/.127/.235

These numbers are quite interesting, I think. Tzaangors are just overall solid. A WDR of .121 is very good, even in the context of recent battletomes. They also don't need any specific scenario to make them good. Bestigors have a lower floor but also a higher ceiling. In less than ideal circumstances they are far less efficient than Tzaangors, but in ideal circumstances they are quite a bit more efficient. Tzaangor Enlightened are similarly efficient to Tzaangors as long as they have a Shaman, but if you can manage to pull off Guided by the Past they become absolutely bonkers. 

Looking at defense, Tzaangors are 9 points per wound with a 5+ save while Bestigors are 12 points per wound with a 4+ save. Against rend 0 they are identical efficiency, while Tzaangors pull ahead slightly against rend 1 slightly more against rend 2 and solidly against mortal wounds. Tzaangors Enlightened on discs are 11.67 points per wound with a 5+ save, making them generally less efficient than both of these options.

Bestigors are a tiny bit faster than Tzaangors, while Tzaangor Enlightened are crazy fast.

Tzaangors fall off a lot when they drop below 9 models.

Both Bestigors and Tzaangors suffer from a similar problem in large unit sizes. Both get a massive regiment discount, but they are also on 32mm bases with a 1" range. While their raw efficiency gets a lot higher in a massive regiment, they also are going to have a lot of trouble getting all of their models into range. This is somewhat less of a problem for Tzaangors who have more of the damage output concentrated in the models with special weapons. If you load up these models in a small area, they can concentrate damage better. However, if your opponent gets the drop on you and charges the opposite side of your blob you are also going to experience a steeper dropoff in your offense than you would with Bestigors.

A final consideration is buffability. I'm honestly not sure of all the same external buffs apply to these units, but assuming they do it's worth noting that they benefit a bit differently from extra attacks. In general, Enlightened do love extra attacks with three different melee weapons (two of them being quite good), but with far fewer models per unit they usually won't get as much out of extra attacks. Bestigors vs. Tzaangors get pretty interesting. My guess is that Tzaangors get more out of extra attacks overall. They have two melee weapons (albeit one is crappy), but more importantly their Greatblades have a much higher value overall than individual Bestigor attacks. That said, Bestigor attacks have a higher value than regular Tzaangor attacks. At some point I'll do the math, but my gut is that Tzaangors have a slight edge.

 

TL;DR - Tzaangors, Bestigors and Enlightened are all really good offensive choices. Tzaangors are a bit more reliable, but Bestigors will shine brighter against horde armies (order in particular). Tzaangors are a bit better at concentrating damage, but they also require a higher points investment on a unit by unit basis. Enlightened are also really nasty and super fast, and become ludicrous if you can force their Guided by the Past buff to be active. 

[CharnelChimera]

4 minutes ago, swarmofseals said:

snip

What about Enlightened on foot? How do they match up? I believe they're supposed to be 100 for 3.

[The_Yellow_Sign]

17 minutes ago, swarmofseals said:

I use a formula that I call WDR to compare offensive efficiency across different values of rend. I won't get into the nuts and bolts right now, but suffice to say it's good for general comparisons. If you want the exact numbers against models with a specific known save, you can do a more accurate comparison. Just looking at some of the new warscrolls:

Could you explain what WDR is, please?

[Satyrical Sophist]

24 minutes ago, swarmofseals said:

Many stats.

I just plugged a bunch of numbers into a spread sheet. Yours is a lot better laid out. One thing I'm curious about is whether you included the additional beak attack Tzaangor get now for being 9+. Original wording of Tzaangors just said you get extra Savage Blade/Savage Greatblade/ Paired Blades. New wording just refers to melee weapons, which means they each get a bonus beak attack. 

I'd also love to see Enlightened on foot. The fact that they have 2 inch range on their main attack makes me think triggering guided by the past looks pretty simple, either as a line behind ungor, or even just bubble wrapped. A unit of 3 enlightened on foot is expected to do 11.3 wounds to 4+ troops. Even without the beaks, still gets 10.5.

[Nin Win]

Well, I'm not going to use the Depraved Drove battalion.  I don't really dig the whole "get treasure and then sadly break it and have to go look for more" theme and the rules are all about going after the artefacts of power the enemy has.  I think I'm going to stick with just Gavespawn and maybe use the generic batallion in larger games.

[CharnelChimera]

I'm not sure if anyone cares, but there's 4 LE editions of the Beasts of Chaos book on Ebay right now from a Polish seller. Comes out to about the same price as GW, too.

[decker_cky]

What bonuses were you counting for tzaangors? I assume you were counting savagery unleashed and destined mayhem?

Half of the issue with tzaangors and tzaangor shamans is that they're a  tax on each other now that tzaangor shaman no longer can summon new units of tzaangors with his spell. That means a minimum 360 pt investment (only slightly less than 30 bestigors and a bray shaman), and you'll want to keep them wholly within 12" of each other basically all the time.

[Megaboss Gorstag]

For the God battalions I would be happy if we could just add other khorne marked units to our army. Ie Add a blood secrator and blood stoker alongside a brazen despoiler force o warherd and friends. 

[swarmofseals]

2 hours ago, Satyrical Sophist said:

I just plugged a bunch of numbers into a spread sheet. Yours is a lot better laid out. One thing I'm curious about is whether you included the additional beak attack Tzaangor get now for being 9+. Original wording of Tzaangors just said you get extra Savage Blade/Savage Greatblade/ Paired Blades. New wording just refers to melee weapons, which means they each get a bonus beak attack. 

I'd also love to see Enlightened on foot. The fact that they have 2 inch range on their main attack makes me think triggering guided by the past looks pretty simple, either as a line behind ungor, or even just bubble wrapped. A unit of 3 enlightened on foot is expected to do 11.3 wounds to 4+ troops. Even without the beaks, still gets 10.5.

Yes, I did include the extra beak attack. If Enlightened on foot are indeed 3 for 100 then they will probably have pretty similar efficiency to Enlightened on disc.  Their WDR with a Shaman but without Guided by the Past is about .125, so yeah that's nearly identical. Their points per wound is 11.11, so a tiny bit cheaper there. The problem is that they lose the incredible speed that the discs give, and I don't really see any advantage to compensate. The scenario that you describe doesn't really help trigger Guided By the Past. It's not that easy to pull off a charge in a formation like that. If your front line unit fails their charge, then your enlightened on foot are stuck. If your front line unit succeeds, then you still need to get the enlightened within .5" of the enemy unit for their charge to succeed. If you can manage that, then the enemy unit can reach your enlightened. They might not be able to get quite so many models in range, but that's mitigated by the enlightened having 1 less wound per model. To trigger GBtP you need to get the enemy to activate but not cripple your enlightened, and I don't quite see how this strategy accomplishes this. It might work better on defense where you can stick a line of Gors or Bestigors in front of the enlightened (and thus they won't be reachable by 1" range weapons but can strike back), but in that case the enemy probably charges at an angle where the enlightened will be out of range if at all possible.

2 hours ago, The_Yellow_Sign said:

Could you explain what WDR is, please?

Basically its a measure of offensive efficiency that calculates the amount of weighted damage that a warscroll does per point that it costs. The weighted part is the interesting bit. Each different value of rend and mortal wound is given a weight based on it's relative value against the entire range of possible armor saves, with the relevance of each armor save being itself weighted based on how common it is. I did a bunch of math and ended up with a relative weight of 1 for rend 0, 1.33 for rend 1, 1.66 for rend 2, 1.9 for rend 3 (rarely used) and 2.16 for mortal wounds. Note that this does not factor in situations with rerolls, ward saves, or models that partially or fully ignore rend. As a result WDR is meant to be a general measure of efficiency and not precise for a specific combat situation or metagame. Feel free to recalculate it if you want with different weights based on the types of armor that you expect to face. In general, if you face heavier armor or opponents that have a lot of rerollable saves you should place a bit more weight on rend and mortal wounds. If you face lighter armor, opponents that tend to have ward saves or who are partially or fully immune to rend then you should place a lower weight on rend and/or mortal wounds (depending on the specific situation).

2 hours ago, CharnelChimera said:

What about Enlightened on foot? How do they match up? I believe they're supposed to be 100 for 3.

See above.

47 minutes ago, decker_cky said:

What bonuses were you counting for tzaangors? I assume you were counting savagery unleashed and destined mayhem?

Half of the issue with tzaangors and tzaangor shamans is that they're a  tax on each other now that tzaangor shaman no longer can summon new units of tzaangors with his spell. That means a minimum 360 pt investment (only slightly less than 30 bestigors and a bray shaman), and you'll want to keep them wholly within 12" of each other basically all the time.

Yeah, I was counting savagery unleashed and destined mayhem but that's it (I did actually specify that in the original post). Tzaangors are definitely worse if you don't take a shaman. I don't think it's fair to call it a "tax on each other" though. The shaman is a powerful warscroll on its own right. That once per game casting reroll is a very good bet for getting of key endless spells like cogs on turn 1. It's also a very fast and reasonably tough wizard, which is important for several battleplans. Tzaangors are definitely less efficient without a shaman, but if the battleplan dictates separating them they hardly become useless. They are still more efficient in that situation than Bestigors who aren't charging and aren't facing a 10+ model unit (which will happen a lot against certain armies like deepkin). 

I also don't think the change to the shaman spell is a big nerf. Setting up a new unit of d3 models isn't that great, while adding d3 models to an existing unit to keep those key bonuses going is quite good. I'm also not sure how adding models to an existing unit works in terms of how you are allowed to equip the added models, but if you are allowed to "return" slain models with greatblades and/or mutants then that's a pretty big game.