Nighthaunt Special Character Rules Revealed - Thoughts?

[Lemon Knuckles]

Are there other examples of things that change an unmodified roll?

[TheOtherJosh]

12 minutes ago, themortalgod said:

NH may stop 1 or 2 but odds are well against us to protect our squishy heroes unless the faction gets some other rules to stop the sniping.

The Myrnmourn Banshees will help a bunch with that, and you now have multiple casters available within the faction, instead of none. And “look out sir” will help if you keep Heroes near the units they’re supporting. (For Skyfires, it’s a full counteract unless they’re near a Shaman or have some other form of +hit)

@Lemon Knuckles Not that immediately comes to mind. It’s been one of those “that’s cool!” Abilities ... followed by “dang that’s a really cost inefficient unit ...” and it gets skipped.

[Nevar]

3 minutes ago, themortalgod said:

Personally, most of my heroes die to mortal wounds from spells during AoS games. Yeah we can try to unbind, but magic armies like Tzeentch or Sacrament will laugh at NH low odds dispel attempts. NH may stop 1 or 2 but odds are well against us to protect our squishy heroes unless the faction gets some other rules to stop the sniping.

Imo the look out sir rule wasn't enough. It was sorta like GW deciding armies with heavy shooting should struggle to kill heroes but armies with heavy magic should not. Personally, I would have made look out sir also do -2 to casting attempts for spells that cause mortal wounds targeting heroes near units.

Also, statistically, in almost all cases, -1 to be hit is the same as having 1 higher save so I wouldn't consider it far superior. The only situation where -1 to hit is better is when it can prevent additional effects on say 6s. So in some cases, it is superior, in most cases it is statistically the same. (or I suppose vs very high rend where the +1 save means nothing, though not relevant for NH)

I agree with you that LoS wasn't quite enough, and my heroes half the time I play get killed by a single roll of a 2+.  I play a Beast Claw player who brings minimum two of those elephant things that cause 6 MWs on a 2+.  I also play against a guy who plays ranged teleporting Stormcasts, and he used to remove my heroes with ease as well.  Now our games are not so swiftly salty.  I still will lose my heroes to beast claws, but my Mr. Shrouds is no longer just arrow bait.

As to hit rolls and the like... sequence matters.  If you can reduce the number of hits, you reduce the number of wound rolls that even get attempted.  If you reduce wound attempts you reduce save rolls that need to be attempted.  There are three 'dice gates' preventing damage from just being auto applied.  Hit - Wound - Save.  The more earlier you prevent damage the less likely a damage will make it through the gates.  If I prevent 3 of 6 hits, my odds of avoiding the damage from a 3+ to wound has decreased by 50%.  The difference between 6 rolls on a 3+ and 3 rolls of a 3+ is 4 expected wounds to 2 expected wounds.  With our 4+ save that cannot be modified, reducing rolls making it down the gates is even better for us than people that have to worry about rend.

-1 to hit also lets you avoid entire effects of weapons and the like, where saves do not always do so.  Reducing an enemy's chances to hit has more benefits than any other incoming damage modifier other than perhaps the ward saves like Deathless Minions as those add an additional gate/roll step.

[themortalgod]

Just now, TheOtherJosh said:

The Myrnmourn Banshees will help a bunch with that, and you now have multiple casters available within the faction, instead of none. And “look out sir” will help if you keep Heroes near the units they’re supporting. (For Skyfires, it’s a full counteract unless they’re near a Shaman or have some other form of +hit)

@Lemon Knuckles Not that immediately comes to mind. It’s been one of those “that’s cool!” Abilities ... followed by “dang that’s a really cost inneficient unit ...” and it gets skipped.

Its still not great odds to unbind even if there is parity on casting bonuses. Armies with casting bonuses will laugh at pitiful unbind attempts. 

[Arentius]

Remember the nighthaunt might not be as squishy as the warscrolls make them out to be, they may have their own version of deathless minions that we don't know about it

[themortalgod]

20 minutes ago, Nevar said:

I agree with you that LoS wasn't quite enough, and my heroes half the time I play get killed by a single roll of a 2+.  I play a Beast Claw player who brings minimum two of those elephant things that cause 6 MWs on a 2+.  I also play against a guy who plays ranged teleporting Stormcasts, and he used to remove my heroes with ease as well.  Now our games are not so swiftly salty.  I still will lose my heroes to beast claws, but my Mr. Shrouds is no longer just arrow bait.

Yeah, idk why GW doesn't think the snowball should count as a normal "to-hit" roll, you are throwing a snowball, how is that any different than any other projectile? The idea that a model can run up and do 6 MWs on a 2+ with no counter play is ridiculous.

One of my main opponents spams slaughter priests who don't even need LOS and can't be dispelled, just a 50/50 (or better) chance to do D6 MWs to something in 16". My heroes tend to just evaporate unless I hide them way back. I've also been on the receiving end of Tz MW spam, which also can easily blast through most unbinding thanks to chickens getting +1 AND lower dice becoming the higher. 

Personally, i feel the concept of the mortal wound is fundamentally flawed and really limiting. I wish they would just go back to effects similar to old fantasy where spells had effects similar to shooting, for example a fireball could be: "D6 hits wounding on 4+ with -1 rend". Spells that do MW like effects should be special, not the norm.

[Urauloth]

2 hours ago, themortalgod said:

We know the pts costs for them? What are they?

But yeah, it seems like hero fragility is going to be a huge problem across NH as a whole. I feel like it was a bit lost on GW that look out sir doesn't actually really address the hero sniping problem as most hero sniping comes from MWs.

I can't post the source yet, but yes. 220 for the King, 240 for the Mortarch and 180 for the Grimhailer. I think Olynder is a good purchase in bigger games (at 2k she seems like a great buy) I can just see it being a struggle to keep her in one piece. Then again, having thought it over, I should probably apply those concerns more to the Craven King, because at least Olynder has a range on most of her abilities, while he might never make it into melee.

[ledha]

1 hour ago, themortalgod said:

Personally, most of my heroes die to mortal wounds from spells during AoS games. Yeah we can try to unbind, but magic armies like Tzeentch or Sacrament will laugh at NH low odds dispel attempts. NH may stop 1 or 2 but odds are well against us to protect our squishy heroes unless the faction gets some other rules to stop the sniping.

Imo the look out sir rule wasn't enough. It was sorta like GW deciding armies with heavy shooting should struggle to kill heroes but armies with heavy magic should not. Personally, I would have made look out sir also do -2 to casting attempts for spells that cause mortal wounds targeting heroes near units.

Also, statistically, in almost all cases, -1 to be hit is the same as having 1 higher save so I wouldn't consider it far superior. The only situation where -1 to hit is better is when it can prevent additional effects on say 6s. So in some cases, it is superior, in most cases it is statistically the same. (or I suppose vs very high rend where the +1 save means nothing, though not relevant for NH)

Spells have rarely more than a 18" range, before moving, which make hero sniping trough spell much more previsible, and avoidable

48 minutes ago, themortalgod said:

Yeah, idk why GW doesn't think the snowball should count as a normal "to-hit" roll, you are throwing a snowball, how is that any different than any other projectile? The idea that a model can run up and do 6 MWs on a 2+ with no counter play is ridiculous.

One of my main opponents spams slaughter priests who don't even need LOS and can't be dispelled, just a 50/50 (or better) chance to do D6 MWs to something in 16". My heroes tend to just evaporate unless I hide them way back. I've also been on the receiving end of Tz MW spam, which also can easily blast through most unbinding thanks to chickens getting +1 AND lower dice becoming the higher. 

Personally, i feel the concept of the mortal wound is fundamentally flawed and really limiting. I wish they would just go back to effects similar to old fantasy where spells had effects similar to shooting, for example a fireball could be: "D6 hits wounding on 4+ with -1 rend". Spells that do MW like effects should be special, not the norm.

Thundertusk are a 300 points shooting unit.  6 mortal wound seems unfair, but most of ranged units of comparative cost will do more wounds in average.

MW is here to guarantee that heroes, spellcasters and elite units will always do something, without being to dependant of lucky/unlucky dice rolls

[Nevar]

47 minutes ago, ledha said:

Spells have rarely more than a 18" range, before moving, which make hero sniping trough spell much more previsible, and avoidable

Thundertusk are a 300 points shooting unit.  6 mortal wound seems unfair, but most of ranged units of comparative cost will do more wounds in average.

MW is here to guarantee that heroes, spellcasters and elite units will always do something, without being to dependant of lucky/unlucky dice rolls

Thundertusks are not 'just' a shooting unit.  They are also brutal in melee.

The auto 6 MWs is the main problem.  Two Thundertusks can literally just remove behemoths from the game.

Most ranged units will not do 6 automatic no save wounds.  And they will be very unlikely to be able to maul other things in melee after removing heroes at 18" on a 2+.

[Crispen]

I like the new heroes. The +3 to cast for the grimhauler isn't so bad, might come in handy for a clutch endless spell and he is pretty mobile with a 14inch fly move all for the cost of basically 3 troggoths (in current edition). Being a wizard he also becomes more useful still in some of the new scenarios where only wizards and characters with items can capture the objectives.

Still the other two seem much better, I especially like the craven king. He potentially kicks out some decent dmg with a bit of support from a spirit of torment and guardian of souls (hitting on 3s re-rolling 1s, wounding on 2s)

I personally don't think they will add all that much more mortal wound survivability past the deathless 6+ sve. There might be an item here or there to up to 5+ for a character, but can't see it being better than that.

 

[themortalgod]

3 hours ago, ledha said:

Spells have rarely more than a 18" range, before moving, which make hero sniping trough spell much more previsible, and avoidable

Thundertusk are a 300 points shooting unit.  6 mortal wound seems unfair, but most of ranged units of comparative cost will do more wounds in average.

MW is here to guarantee that heroes, spellcasters and elite units will always do something, without being to dependant of lucky/unlucky dice rolls

Unless GW adds things to the game that can massively increase the range of spells, such as say a giant tornado thing or a pair of mirrors.  Or mechanics that allow movements during the hero phase. Or deep strike mechanics. etc etc. Its pretty easy to have a spell caster in range on turn 1. 

Thundertusk isn't just a 300pt shooting unit. For 300pts it is incredibly efficient as it can soak a ton of damage while also bringing huge pain in the combat phase. It also has a ridiculous threat range being able to move very fast before shooting.  I still don't see a problem with the snowball having been a shooting attack though that hits on 2+ and down 6 MWs, It still would have been damn strong without eliminating virtually any counterplay. 

Mortal wounds were added because GW wanted to simplify magic stuff down to a single type of damage that generally can't be saved against. It still absolutely often depends on lucky rolls but as a mechanic it makes the opponent feel like they have no recourse in the vast majority of situations. It was an oversimplification that functions ok but has drawbacks. (Though, remember, when MWs were invented GW thought that Mystic Shield and Arcane Bolt were the only spells needed in addition to warscroll printed ones) I'd be willing to bet they came to be because of a mandate to get the core rules down to 4 pages. MWs were a simple "one size fits all" approach to damage via magical effects.

[themortalgod]

1 hour ago, Crispen said:

I like the new heroes. The +3 to cast for the grimhauler isn't so bad, might come in handy for a clutch endless spell and he is pretty mobile with a 14inch fly move all for the cost of basically 3 troggoths (in current edition). Being a wizard he also becomes more useful still in some of the new scenarios where only wizards and characters with items can capture the objectives.

Still the other two seem much better, I especially like the craven king. He potentially kicks out some decent dmg with a bit of support from a spirit of torment and guardian of souls (hitting on 3s re-rolling 1s, wounding on 2s)

I personally don't think they will add all that much more mortal wound survivability past the deathless 6+ sve. There might be an item here or there to up to 5+ for a character, but can't see it being better than that.

 

Have the pts costs been posted someplace? I currently have no idea how much any of them cost?

[Lemon Knuckles]

1 hour ago, themortalgod said:

Mortal wounds were added because GW wanted to simplify magic stuff down to a single type of damage that generally can't be saved against. It still absolutely often depends on lucky rolls but as a mechanic it makes the opponent feel like they have no recourse in the vast majority of situations.

Unbinding?

[Nevar]

1 hour ago, themortalgod said:

Have the pts costs been posted someplace? I currently have no idea how much any of them cost?

Full Nighthaunt points have been leaked yes.  We are just not allowed to post them here.

A search on imagur or redit will likely get you the list.

[Sception]

Google image search finds the points readily enough.

TBH, I'm kind of surprised at how powerful these heroes *aren't*.  Not that they're terrible for the points necessarily, but the miniscule wound count and lack of mortal protection makes even the mortarch significantly less survivable than I'd normally feel comfortable running in 2k games.

They carry some potentially impressive offensive and utility abilities, but that only seems to make it all the more likely the opponent will put in the relatively little effort it should take to put them down.

Maybe one of the yet unshown units has some sort of bodyguard ability?  Or maybe there are formations that help protect them, like nagadh & his first cohort?

Honestly, though, despite all the talk of winning battles through attrition, durability seems to be a major problem for the nighthaunt faction in general.  Maybe the allegiance abilities will help with that.

[Crispen]

2 hours ago, themortalgod said:

Have the pts costs been posted someplace? I currently have no idea how much any of them cost?

There is a reddit thread with pics from the new ghb. If you google it, you should find it

 

[Sleboda]

8 hours ago, Captain Roderick said:

It needs faq-ing because that's messy. You've still rolled an unmodified 6, the shift to 1 happens after. But I can see it being argued the other way too. 

A FAQ world be generous of GW, but not needed. You are in no way modifying the roll. No plus or minus, no actual change to the roll. It's just how you treat what was rolled.

[Nevar]

35 minutes ago, Sception said:

Google image search finds the points readily enough.

TBH, I'm kind of surprised at how powerful these heroes *aren't*.  Not that they're terrible for the points necessarily, but the miniscule wound count and lack of mortal protection makes even the mortarch significantly less survivable than a common necromancer.

They carry some potentially impressive offensive and utility abilities, but that only seems to make it all the more likely the opponent will put in the relatively little effort it should take to put them down.

Maybe one of the yet unshown units has some sort of bodyguard ability?  Or maybe there are formations that help protect them, like nagadh & his first cohort?

Honestly, though, deslite all the talk of einning battles through attrition, durability seems to be a major problem for the nighthaunt faction in general.

I do not want to hype myself with wild speculations, but I did notice the return of Frightful Touch to these new warscrolls.  With it being printed on these models I think we can assume Frightful Touch will not be a faction trait.  Perhaps instead we will get an army wide ward save similar to Nurgle units since they are harping on our durability and attrition capabilities.  It would make sense for our heroes to be lower in HP if they are going to have their survivability boosted with a 5+ ignore wounds/MW save or something of the like.

[Evil Bob]

If multiple effects are going to proc generally it is the person’s whose turn it is that decides in what order they happen.

[choocheelo]

Guys.. look at wound characteristic of new models.. and BW rules   "Wizards with a Wounds characteristic of 9 or more, that are part of a unit of two or more models, or that are already on a Balewind Vortex, cannot attempt to cast this spell".

:D

[arka0415]

It looks to me that Reikenor can deal a surprisingly large amount of damage in the Hero Phase. He deals 1MW to a target near him for each spell he casts, and that damage cannot be countered by an enemy wizard. If he casts Wraithstorm it's basically 2D3+1 mortal wounds to any 1W target, if he casts a spell like Geminids as well he could be doing 4D3+2 mortal wounds. With Chronomantic Cogs + Wraithstorm + Arcane Bolt he could fire off 2D3+4 mortal wounds instead. And maybe there will be special Nighthaunt-only spells he could get access to as well.

It seems that his damage output is actually pretty great, the drawback is just the low durability (7W/4++).

[Dorimant]

Has anyone had a good look at the statue that the Grimhailer is jumping over? It would make a great Wight King and the whole aesthetic would be a very AoS style update for Wights.

[herohammer]

I am really liking all 3 since they all are to an extent multifunction characters. For the high point cost that they require that should make them fit into more armies than if they were just one dimensional beaters or casters. Really like Reikenor's casting bonus ability for the faction.

[themortalgod]

8 hours ago, Lemon Knuckles said:

Unbinding?

Not all sources of mortal wounds are spells. 

[Captain Roderick]

13 hours ago, arka0415 said:

It looks to me that Reikenor can deal a surprisingly large amount of damage in the Hero Phase.

Well that's heartening. I think he looks amazing as a model but rules-wise he immediately looked like the worst of the three by several orders of magnitude.