AoS 2 - Sylvaneth Discussion

[scrubyandwells]

54 minutes ago, Ching Wing said:

http://40k.ghostlords.com/dice/aos.html

Here is the website you can run the numbers for yourself

Swords win out unless it is 3+ saves you’re going against, you get the mortal wounds on 6s plus if youre running winter glade you get more dice to try and roll 6s  with swords. 

Here's the math between 1x3 Swords (left) vs 1x3 Scythes (right):

6+ save = 13 damage vs 8.66 damage
5+ = 11.07 vs 8.66
4+ = 9.15 vs 7.22
3+ = 7.22 vs 5.78 
2+ = 5.3 vs 4.34

On paper, with the warscroll addition of MW's on 6's to W, Swords do more average damage than Scythes across the board.

The primary argument for Scythes is the "on paper" part. In some cases, their 2" reach means they have more ability to both root down for RR saves while staying in range to attack in combat. 

At the same, in my experience, 1x6 Swords can usually attain the movement and frontage via teleport for all six to be within 1" of their target(s), particularly via Dreadwood, Spiteswarm, Cogs, and/or Warsinger.

The challenge is in succeeding rounds: when that larger unit of Swords is still locked in combat, and you need to root them down, which then potentially hampers your ability to keep them within 1" reach with their greatswords.

A related problem is keeping 1x6 Swords rooted down in cover in a Wyldwood without sacrificing their ability to stay within that 1" reach.

Experienced players will also look for opportunities to tag, or double tag, 1x6 Swords on the corners to further hamper their ability to be in range to attack.

In general, though, Swords do more average damage than Scythes, even vs 2+, and can be quite viable in 1x6 with some practice and the right build. They especially shine in Dreadwood since you aren't limited to teleporting wholly within 6" of a Wyldwood.

Edited June 2, 2020 by scrubyandwells

[Popisdead]

1 hour ago, Ching Wing said:

They always have won the argument in the past, the place you gotta stop living in   also you used the words always win over swords, not true, horde army will take more damage from the swords while heavy armored enemies Scythes will win. Go back and do the statistics, I’m not being biased  just looking at rolling statistics. You’re free to ignore it though if you want  

ok

50 minutes ago, Ching Wing said:

http://40k.ghostlords.com/dice/aos.html
 

Here is the website you can run the numbers for yourself

Swords win out unless it is 3+ saves you’re going against, you get the mortal wounds on 6s plus if youre running winter glade you get more dice to try and roll 6s  with swords. 
 
If you disagree that’s fine I just want you to have all the information. You should use the website  

I'm talking about the game, not a website.  I can see why there is a disagreement. 

[Popisdead]

1 minute ago, scrubyandwells said:

Here's the math between 1x3 Swords (left) vs 1x3 Scythes (right):

This is a mistake.  You won't teleport and ensure 6 Swords get to attack.  You will get 6 Scythes.  If there was a mechanism to pile-in 6"s with Swords then they would be quite useful.  

People who come mathhammering or using stats seem to have no experience rolling dice in a game.  (not picking on your S&W).  

For example a 4+ to hit by Bullgors is pretty much the same as a 6+ as there is no mechanic (well,.. one mechanic now thanks to Beastgrave) to make that 4+ better or more reliable.  And really when you roll a 4+ it feels and often plays out like you only hit ons 6s.  This is a perceptive mechanic of the unit in-game.  So this unit while really cool is very swingy.  That is game experience which means future list building and game planning is based on experience.  However late game, a unit of 6 Bullgors becomes pretty good as you taken out the issue of 3 Bullgors only hitting X times, the high Rend and dmg on units plus the Herdstone changes their value.  

If you teleport 6 Swords with Dreadwood or teleport 6 Sycthes and do that 10 times you're going to notice the difference.  The problem with Mathhammering is you aren't playing the game.  Coming on a forum and arguing stats shows you can use a table or do some generic median statistics.  

[scrubyandwells]

17 minutes ago, Popisdead said:

This is a mistake.  You won't teleport and ensure 6 Swords get to attack.  You will get 6 Scythes.  If there was a mechanism to pile-in 6"s with Swords then they would be quite useful.  

People who come mathhammering or using stats seem to have no experience rolling dice in a game.  (not picking on your S&W).  

Our mileage seems to vary here, and that's fine.

I've played since day 1 and have had success with 1x6 Swords, and consider them especially interesting in Dreadwood. Some folks share that view (but not everyone), such as Laurie Huggett-Wilde, who had 1x6 Swords in his list that finished top 5 at multiple majors, including 3rd at the AoS GT Final. 

If you disagree, though, that's perfectly cool. 1x6 Swords does have some challenges, as noted, so there are tradeoffs.

Edited June 2, 2020 by scrubyandwells

[Ching Wing]

2 hours ago, Popisdead said:

 The problem with Mathhammering is you aren't playing the game.  Coming on a forum and arguing stats shows you can use a table or do some generic median statistics.  

lol

2 hours ago, scrubyandwells said:

Our mileage seems to vary here, and that's fine.

I've played since day 1 and have had success with 1x6 Swords, and consider them especially interesting in Dreadwood. Some folks share that view (but not everyone), such as Laurie Huggett-Wilde, who had 1x6 Swords in his list that finished top 5 at multiple majors, including 3rd at the AoS GT Final. 

If you disagree, though, that's perfectly cool. 1x6 Swords does have some challenges, as noted, so there are tradeoffs.

The voice of reason. 

I think you can be successful with either build honestly. I think in game having the mortal wounds is clutch from the swords. 

2 hours ago, scrubyandwells said:

The challenge is in succeeding rounds: when that larger unit of Swords is still locked in combat, and you need to root them down, which then potentially hampers your ability to keep them within 1" reach with their greatswords.

If you take winter glade you can avoid this in later round by piling in during the hero phase then rooting in the charge, also rooting down doesn't specify whose turn so you can pile in further on your turn and and root on theirs if you want. I agree as well with my experience the 1" range hasn't effected my ability to get in range to attack with 6 swords. 

[rbstr]

7 hours ago, Popisdead said:

For example a 4+ to hit by Bullgors is pretty much the same as a 6+ as there is no mechanic (well,.. one mechanic now thanks to Beastgrave) to make that 4+ better or more reliable.  And really when you roll a 4+ it feels and often plays out like you only hit ons 6s. 

Maybe you feel that way but a lot of feelings, like this one, aren't in any agreement with reality. 4+ is effectively the same as 6+ is complete nonsense.

[Popisdead]

17 hours ago, scrubyandwells said:

I've played since day 1 and have had success with 1x6 Swords, and consider them especially interesting in Dreadwood. Some folks share that view (but not everyone), such as Laurie Huggett-Wilde, who had 1x6 Swords in his list that finished top 5 at multiple majors, including 3rd at the AoS GT Final. 

I was not aware of him actually playing Sylvaneth in tournaments lately.  Neat.

[Landohammer]

On 5/31/2020 at 1:57 PM, Grimbok said:

How many sylvaneth armies do you see at tournaments? 

How many at your local club/store? 

 

Very few, for a once wildly popular army. It’s a bad book, both for casuals and competitive. 

 

 

Grimbok

I am the only Sylvaneth player in my region. I think the biggest turnoff for potential players is just the cost of entry. We have the most expensive army to play in the game. Most notably with Spites, Wyldwoods, and Hunters. 30 Spites (my preferred battleline) is $240. That is simply outrageous for infantry. Oh and they just had a price increase 🤦‍♂️

Competitively we suffer from the same issues as Idoneth and Fyreslayers: Low unit options, too many characters, and reliance on a single unit to carry the army. (Hunters, Eels, Hearthguard)

If GW would just give each of these armies a new non-character dual kit it would alleviate 75% of the issues. But instead we got Endless spells, a more expensive forest, and ANOTHER character. 

But the Glades were nice. Not sure they were worth a new codex though...

 

 

[Xil]

@the matter of Swords vs Scythes:

Scythes can Attack over a Screen if the enemy made a placement error.

 

@Landohammeri collect Sylvaneth and DoK...both are pretty expensive. DoK especially when you want lots of Wiches

Regarding the price increase... Guess I won't buy me Spites to just have them as an option. I don't think GW is winning out on these moronic price increases. It's especially dum on those old kits like the Aeldari Wave Serpent, lol

Edited June 4, 2020 by Xil

[scrubyandwells]

On 5/28/2020 at 11:07 AM, Shmaravoz said:

New Battle Report is here! Subscribe, Hit Like, and most importantly ENJOY!!!

 

This was an excellent batrep, guys! Greatly enjoying your channel. It's awesome to see non-standard lists as well. 

[Popisdead]

On 6/9/2020 at 11:04 PM, scrubyandwells said:

This was an excellent batrep, guys! Greatly enjoying your channel. It's awesome to see non-standard lists as well. 

Guerilla Gaming has done a couple bat reps with Lords of the Clan Household.  While not a great army build it is refreshing to see someone trying to make it work.

Hey Tyler, great job on the Warhammer Weekly. It was a good episode (and often hard to be aguest on) .  I especially liked the "math-wise swords are better" except all your game-examples were scythes (even pointing out Hugh taking 9 Scythes and 6 Swords in those lists he did well in)   bwahaha, I tease.  it was good, this argument will also never die >.<  I'm not against Swords, I have 6 of each of the Hunters.  They're great.

I would say regarding defensive issues in 6th ed when WE came out again the Treeman being T6, 3+, stubborn LD 10 made it really hard to shift.  While I agree with Vince's comments about a game that is too defensive, the Treelord is a key model I would like to see more defensive as a pillar that holds up an army.  In which case you could keep it's,.. meh dmg output, not make it a hero, but make it harder to chew through.   I thought about -1 to W on Treelord models.  The problem is it could open or couple -2 to W with the Frostheart which I'm not sure can be allied into Sylvaneth post CoS or a Treeman or Durthu coupled with a Frostheart in CoS becomes not fun to play against.  -3/-4 to hit Eldar was dumb in 40k.  Stacking modifiers to -2 can also get silly in AoS and leads to bad game experience.  So,.. I dunno, I guess I just miss Treelords being good and I miss them being "oh ******, how will I get through that."

One last thing, can you go into further detail and example of Spell portal usage.  Are you using them to summon dryads or forests through?

Cheers

Edited June 12, 2020 by Popisdead

[scrubyandwells]

16 hours ago, Popisdead said:

One last thing, can you go into further detail and example of Spell portal usage.  Are you using them to summon dryads or forests through?

Thanks man, glad you liked it! We were trying to balance the bad with the good and (hopefully) some constructive ideas. I tend to agree the Treelord should be more durable. It just doesn't have much of a role at the moment, other than contributing to the Stomp Game and providing a free teleport. 

On the Spellportal, I've been casting Verdant Blessing through it in non-Dreadwood lists. It increases the odds of placing woods, especially in the enemy's territory/deployment in order to apply greater pressure. Doing so might otherwise be difficult with the normal 24" (or 30" with Balewind), since the wizard casting it, at least in my lists, is usually the Branchwraith with Spiritsong Stave and Throne of Vines, who is almost always near the back of my deployment, trying to stack Throne of Vines and stay alive.

Edited June 13, 2020 by scrubyandwells

[Thalandor]

Are you sure you are allowed to cast Verdant Blessing and Roused to Wrath through the Umbral Spellportal? 
The wording is the same as with endless spells ( set up modell wholly within X of the caster) and you are not allowed to use a portal to set up the spell next to the second portal.

Or did I miss something here?

[scrubyandwells]

6 hours ago, Thalandor said:

Are you sure you are allowed to cast Verdant Blessing and Roused to Wrath through the Umbral Spellportal? 
The wording is the same as with endless spells ( set up modell wholly within X of the caster) and you are not allowed to use a portal to set up the spell next to the second portal.

Or did I miss something here?

Yeah it's a good Q that hasn't been 100% clarified. If they do FAQ it, let's hope we can do it. The army is struggling enough as it is.

In the meantime, I think we can. A Wyldwood isn't a predatory endless spell, so technically the errata doesn't apply to it.

The "spell" part of Verdant Blessing is the Wyldwood itself (otherwise it's incoherent...), so in general, I think the Spellportal works for it.

[LordCelestant Imperius 1st]

On 6/3/2020 at 12:56 AM, Ching Wing said:

If you take winter glade you can avoid this in later round by piling in during the hero phase then rooting in the charge, also rooting down doesn't specify whose turn so you can pile in further on your turn and and root on theirs if you want. I agree as well with my experience the 1" range hasn't effected my ability to get in range to attack with 6 swords. 

Hi there. 

Noobie question here.... where do you get the piling in the hero phase please ? I think i missed something. ( SCE player spotted.... Sorry for not beeing sorry =)).

Thanks fellow treemen. 

[Ching Wing]

5 minutes ago, LordCelestant Imperius 1st said:

Hi there. 

Noobie question here.... where do you get the piling in the hero phase please ? I think i missed something. ( SCE player spotted.... Sorry for not beeing sorry =)).

Thanks fellow treemen. 

Oh no worries  it’s a one time use artifact you have to take when using that glade that lets you pile in during hero phase, very handy  

[Shmaravoz]

On 6/10/2020 at 2:04 AM, scrubyandwells said:

This was an excellent batrep, guys! Greatly enjoying your channel. It's awesome to see non-standard lists as well. 

Thank you very much! We are glad the you've enjoyed the batreport. A new one is coming in few days, make sure u check it out   

[Popisdead]

On 6/12/2020 at 8:18 PM, scrubyandwells said:

Thanks man, glad you liked it! We were trying to balance the bad with the good and (hopefully) some constructive ideas.

For those who missed the talk about Alarielle.  

[Falkman]

On 6/13/2020 at 5:23 PM, Ching Wing said:

Oh no worries  it’s a one time use artifact you have to take when using that glade that lets you pile in during hero phase, very handy  

...no? Frozen kernel is used at the start of the combat phase, which is after you have already rooted your Hunters.

[Ching Wing]

42 minutes ago, Falkman said:

...no? Frozen kernel is used at the start of the combat phase, which is after you have already rooted your Hunters.

Haha oh oops 😛 good catch!

[Lanoss]

Hi @scrubyandwells what are your thoughts on the wording next to the Verdant Blessing spell?  It states something like “all Sylvaneth wizards know the Verdant blessing in addition to any other spells they know.” <full stop. It then says “in addition, they can also choose one from the Syl Lore if they’re a wizard in a Sylvaneth Army” - paraphrasing of course. 

My question  to you is, would you assume then that Syl allies in another army can use the Verdant Blessing spell? (And therefore summon trees and dryads and teleport)

That is my understanding but I have never seen anyone in any tournament scene or battle report perform such action. 

Anyone, feel free to chime in. 

[Landohammer]

20 hours ago, Lanoss said:

Hi @scrubyandwells what are your thoughts on the wording next to the Verdant Blessing spell?  It states something like “all Sylvaneth wizards know the Verdant blessing in addition to any other spells they know.” <full stop. It then says “in addition, they can also choose one from the Syl Lore if they’re a wizard in a Sylvaneth Army” - paraphrasing of course. 

My question  to you is, would you assume then that Syl allies in another army can use the Verdant Blessing spell? (And therefore summon trees and dryads and teleport)

That is my understanding but I have never seen anyone in any tournament scene or battle report perform such action. 

Anyone, feel free to chime in. 

This got sorted out a while ago in this thread. I will summarize:

The paragraph granting verdant blessing to "all Sylvaneth Wizards" is actually in a subsection of the codex under "allegiance rules".

So while it doesn't explicitly clarify that it IS an allegiance rule, the intention is pretty clear when taken in context. 

Personally I also look to the fact that no other faction's warscrolls gets any kind of "implied" bonuses from their codex when fielded as allies.  And notice that even blatantly obvious spells such as Arcane Bolt and Mystic shield are specifically written on each  and every wizard's warscroll. So there really is no reason to think that Sylvaneth allies would be special in this regard. 

 

 

 

[Predien]

26 minutes ago, Landohammer said:

This got sorted out a while ago in this thread. I will summarize:

The paragraph granting verdant blessing to "all Sylvaneth Wizards" is actually in a subsection of the codex under "allegiance rules".

So while it doesn't explicitly clarify that it IS an allegiance rule, the intention is pretty clear when taken in context. 

Personally I also look to the fact that no other faction's warscrolls gets any kind of "implied" bonuses from their codex when fielded as allies.  And notice that even blatantly obvious spells such as Arcane Bolt and Mystic shield are specifically written on each  and every wizard's warscroll. So there really is no reason to think that Sylvaneth allies would be special in this regard. 

 

 

 

Hey! I wanted to push back a little on this. I recently got into a discussion about this and had do to some deep diving into the tome because I kept getting mixed results from looking it up online. Here are my thoughts on it... The book says that "Sylvaneth wizards" know Verdant Blessing + any other spells they know. In the Sylvaneth FAQ, it states that the Vesperal Gem cannot be used on Verdant Blessing but the Vesperal Gem's rules say it can be used on the Lore of the Deepwood spells only. By this logic, Verdant Blessing isn't part of the Lore of the Deepwoods.

"Sylvaneth Wizards know the Verdant Blessing spell in addition to any other spells they know," since they stop the sentence there and follow it up with, "In addition, you can choose or roll for one of the spells from the Lore of the Deepwood table for each Wizard in a Sylvaneth army, I would read this as you get Verdant Blessing + your warscroll spell and then if you're in a Sylvaneth army you get access to the lore. Since it doesn't explicitly say that you have to be in a Sylvaneth army to get Verdant Blessing, like it does the Lore spells, I think you could argue that Sylvaneth allies get access to this spell outside of a Sylvaneth army.

Thoughts?

[AthelLoren]

i wish. I don't think it would work that way - first, the spell would be on the Warscrolls, second, it would be altogether too good to be true.  Then again, it would allow anyone allying in Sylvaneth to get a Wyldwood without taking a Treelord Ancient, so I hope it gets clarified to be that way. In that case, a Branchwraith would be good choice, being able to summon a wood and then throw down dryads.

[Landohammer]

16 hours ago, Predien said:

Hey! I wanted to push back a little on this. I recently got into a discussion about this and had do to some deep diving into the tome because I kept getting mixed results from looking it up online. Here are my thoughts on it... The book says that "Sylvaneth wizards" know Verdant Blessing + any other spells they know. In the Sylvaneth FAQ, it states that the Vesperal Gem cannot be used on Verdant Blessing but the Vesperal Gem's rules say it can be used on the Lore of the Deepwood spells only. By this logic, Verdant Blessing isn't part of the Lore of the Deepwoods.

"Sylvaneth Wizards know the Verdant Blessing spell in addition to any other spells they know," since they stop the sentence there and follow it up with, "In addition, you can choose or roll for one of the spells from the Lore of the Deepwood table for each Wizard in a Sylvaneth army, I would read this as you get Verdant Blessing + your warscroll spell and then if you're in a Sylvaneth army you get access to the lore. Since it doesn't explicitly say that you have to be in a Sylvaneth army to get Verdant Blessing, like it does the Lore spells, I think you could argue that Sylvaneth allies get access to this spell outside of a Sylvaneth army.

Thoughts?

So I 100% understand your logic, and I actually pled the same case a few month's ago. 

But like many other players, I get my rules from websites online rather than buying the codexes. And when you read that sentence out of context, it absolutely implies that the spell is available to any Sylvaneth Wizard.

However, within the book, the rule clearly resides under "allegiance abilities". So the intent is quite clear. And  even if you go the RAW route, you are going to have a hard time getting someone to ignore that heading.

Also no other faction can draw on abilities outside of their warscroll when fielded as allies. So the precedent is also clear. 

Is it ambiguous? Absolutely. Can you get away with it in pickup games? Probably.

But if you bring a Branchwraith ally to a tournament and start throwing forests on the table, you really need an air-tight ruling. Because I guarantee its going to be questioned, and the typical avenues of  discrepancy resolution (RAW, RAI, and precedent) are not in your favor.