AoS 2 - Stormcast Eternals Discussion

[ledha]

3 hours ago, ShepHammer said:

I'm seeing a lot of you are getting some tournament table-time and some success with our evocators!

I have a question about evocator weapon options.  Most of your lists aren't showing the weapon option mix selected. 40 pages ago on this thread, the collective wisdom was just to take all grandstaves in every unit. Is that still the way to go?

Does anyone mix weapons in their units?

I don't think mixing weapon is a good idea

Grandtsaves are better than the sword 90% of the time : against 4+/5+/6+, and are as good against a 3+

The sword beat them against a 2+ or when the ennemy start to have rerollable save (like a 3+ rr 1)

If you mix, it mean that when you fight "normal" opponents with a 4+/5+/6+ save, then your swords are just worse grandstaves. And when you fight a "specific" opponent (like a 3+ rr1 or a 4+ rr), then only your sword works and your grandstaves are useless.

From my test, it's better to keep them specialized

Edited October 7, 2018 by ledha

[Requizen]

Anyone done much with an Ethereal Stardrake? Yes, 2+rr is amazing, but ignoring Rend is pretty dope against a lot of things and we can even potentially take it in Hammers. 

[Mark Williams]

1 hour ago, Requizen said:

Anyone done much with an Ethereal Stardrake? Yes, 2+rr is amazing, but ignoring Rend is pretty dope against a lot of things and we can even potentially take it in Hammers. 

Ethereal?

[Mark Williams]

Day 2 of tournament. Two major losses.

Game 4: Death - Arkhan the black, zombie dragon, 40 skeletons, 4 morghasts.

Mission was Star Strike or Strike from the heavens something.

lost all my ground units turn 2. Dropped everything from scions and killed the morghasts. Double turned and finished the zombie dragon. Lost the game by 2 vps. Very disappointing loss and I made a bad mistake turn three that cost me the game.

Game 5: Seraphon. Toad on vortex, cogs, 3 engine of the gods, and a starstrike battalion.

Mission was total conquest.

Lost by 2 vps. He took first turn and summoned 40 skinks to flood his deployment zone, then teleported skinks around to capture objectives. Turn 3 summonned a dinosaur. I killed almost nothing non-summoned. Spent the entire game wading through mobs of skinks and being outnumbered on the objectives. Felt like I could do nothing to stop the flood of stuff hitting the board. Couldn’t get close to his base. Just bogged the board down in bodies. Meh.

Finished 12/20, 2 wins, 3 losses. About the same as previous tournament. Feels like about as good as SCE will do in my area. Competition is curiously strong with very competitive armies. SCE feels T1 to me. Have to play a perfect game and get lucky too. I enjoy the challenge and had fun, it’s just a bit disheartening not having anywhere to improve my list at this poin. I can always play better.

My feeling is sce needs something to offset their low model count in games. Maybe some allies of some type would fix the issue. Maybe a block of deepkin thralls or something.

[schwabbele]

@Mark Williams how did your prime do? Had he any game changing impact?

[Mark Williams]

21 minutes ago, schwabbele said:

@Mark Williams how did your prime do? Had he any game changing impact?

There is no game where he isn’t a game changer. I’m honestly not sure how I could win without him. The crossbows do a lot of damage, but nothing in my list actually captures objectives except the prime. The rest of the stuff is defensive in nature. His biggest weakness is having to wait until turn 3, which is the same point a lot of armies get to their best as well. I generally bring him out turn 2, as that’s when I make most of my “big pushes”. Generally speaking if I wait till turn 3, it’s because I’m losing and just trying to score some type of moral victory by killing something big. But even in that situation, at least I’ve got something fun to do rather than twiddling my thumbs.

I don’t really think the prime is overcosted as some people say, but I do think Stormcast in general have some glaring weaknesses that are basically exemplified in him. A single, high cost, elite model that dies quickly if anything looks at it. Basically sums up the entire army...

For such a low model count army, I think they should be more resilient. I’d like to see something like a bonus to save as the game drags on. Turn 3, +1 save. Something like that to combat the recent influx of armies that hit their stride on turn 3. 

[Requizen]

8 hours ago, Mark Williams said:

Ethereal?

Ethereal Amulet from Shyish, makes you ignore Rend. 3+ rr1 ignoring rend as an alternative to Staunch, basically. 

[Lexalopolis]

11 hours ago, Requizen said:

Anyone done much with an Ethereal Stardrake? Yes, 2+rr is amazing, but ignoring Rend is pretty dope against a lot of things and we can even potentially take it in Hammers. 

Ethereal is a solid choice, probably about even with Ignax Scales for the MW protection. I've found it very useful on a sorceress on black dragon so I imagine it would work on a Stardrake. What I've been considering is stacking MW on save abilities since the Stardrake is so huge and enemies have to attack in combat now. Lord celestant shield, smouldering helm, azyrite halo, and shield of thorns from an allied Sisters of the Thorn, plus warding lantern and staunch defender. I think my math test against 60 attacks with no rend did something like 80 mortal wounds back to the unit and 10 mortals back to everything within 3" while the Stardrake took 1 or 2 wounds.

[Requizen]

6 hours ago, Mark Williams said:

There is no game where he isn’t a game changer. I’m honestly not sure how I could win without him. The crossbows do a lot of damage, but nothing in my list actually captures objectives except the prime. The rest of the stuff is defensive in nature. His biggest weakness is having to wait until turn 3, which is the same point a lot of armies get to their best as well. I generally bring him out turn 2, as that’s when I make most of my “big pushes”. Generally speaking if I wait till turn 3, it’s because I’m losing and just trying to score some type of moral victory by killing something big. But even in that situation, at least I’ve got something fun to do rather than twiddling my thumbs.

I don’t really think the prime is overcosted as some people say, but I do think Stormcast in general have some glaring weaknesses that are basically exemplified in him. A single, high cost, elite model that dies quickly if anything looks at it. Basically sums up the entire army...

For such a low model count army, I think they should be more resilient. I’d like to see something like a bonus to save as the game drags on. Turn 3, +1 save. Something like that to combat the recent influx of armies that hit their stride on turn 3. 

What has your experience been on Total Commitment been? It's the one mission that makes me hesitant to take him (and Skyborne Slayers for that matter), since he can't power up. Starting on the table with 3 attacks is... Less than ideal. 

[Freejack02]

17 minutes ago, Requizen said:

What has your experience been on Total Commitment been? It's the one mission that makes me hesitant to take him (and Skyborne Slayers for that matter), since he can't power up. Starting on the table with 3 attacks is... Less than ideal. 

I haven't played it, but at that point I imagine he just becomes mobile artillery that can still threaten single heroes. Definitely overcosted in that scenario, but it plays so heavily against SCE strengths that I don't imagine many comps can expect a win. 

[IRifter]

Is there any kind of really competetive list for stormcasts yet?

My problem when building a list:
I cant really decide between taking sequitors + Lord Arcanum (Im not a big fan of Arcanum, every time i used him he did basically nothing all game) as my genereal(this is whaat bothers me the most tbh. I dont like having Lord Arcanum in the front, where i need staunch defender for extended fights.

Or simply just taking judicators. I think they are perfectly balance but spending so many points just to get a battleline thats range that cant really defend objectives well is not that good IMO.



Maybe im just playing some units wrong but what are your thoughts about that? Any tips you can give me?

Also how good is Lord Ordinator + ballista? And what do you guys think about the everblaze comet?

Edited October 7, 2018 by IRifter

[ShepHammer]

3 minutes ago, IRifter said:

Is there any kind of really competetive list for stormcasts yet?

My problem when building a list:
I cant really decide between taking sequitors + Lord Arcanum (Im not a big fan of Arcanum, every time i used him he did basically nothing all game) as my genereal(this is whaat bothers me the most tbh. I dont like having Lord Arcanum in the front, where i need staunch defender for extended fights.

Or simply just taking judicators. I think they are perfectly balance but spending so many points just to get a battleline thats range that cant really defend objectives well is not that good IMO.



Maybe im just playing some units wrong but what are your thoughts about that? Any tips you can give me?

Also how good is Lord Ordinator + ballista?

You've got lots of questions here. I think I can help a little bit. 

Question 1: Yes. The most frequently referenced well-performing list archetype for SCE has been what is known as the Gav-bomb. At its core it is Gavriel Sureheart, between 10-20 evocators and a knight-vexillor. I'm sure you'll be able to figure out what it does by reading all of their rules. I'm obliged to say that this isn't the only way to win (many will come and say they use a different strategy), but this seems to be the emergent 'strongest build'.

Your battleline problem: I'd like to point something out regarding the lord-arcanum.  You have probably noticed this fact, but I just want to highlight it. You mentioned that you don't like to put him in the positions that your other staunch defender generals occupy in your lines, but I'm curious as to why. His survivability is comparable to all of our other heroes, and his kit has been designed to function best mid-table.  He isn't a collegiate arcane fragile target in my opinion. If you just flatly don't like him, that is totally fine actually. I have observed that many Gav-bomb lists are designed with Lord-Arcanum and sequitor backup, and just as many are designed with a liberator/judicator mix. It doesn't appear that using sequitors as battleline is as important as using Gavriel or cogs.

Question on lord-ordinator and ballistas: In case you haven't done the math, once you take three ballistas, that is when the ordinator bubble is worth more than a fourth ballista, which is why you will most lists doing the 3 ballista 1 ordinator combo. In my own games, and in the experiences of some forum posters, it is proving to be extremely good. Its performance is tempered by the fact that it is only 4 models in a game where the number of models in a zone is how we win, so you need to couple this combination with high model count mobile units (skinks are the best choice here).

Tips: I should call this tip "How I learned to stop worrying and love the Gav-bomb." In matched play, one of the first issues I ran into with SCE was that we are full of 5-man units that cost 50-60% more than some comparable 10 man units. If the games were decided in a way that valued multi-wound models equally to single-wound models, then this wouldn't even be a discussion point. Our units survive well and kill well enough. When you face an opponent that simply floods objectives with summoned skeletons/blue horrors/skinks you aren't engaging in a fair and honorable duel.  I don't think it matters if you take sequitors or liberator/judicator combos as your battleline, because the real effectiveness of your list is going to be based on how well you counter objective flooding. Gav-bombing has been effective for me. Hopefully some other posters will share what tools they have used to counteract this fundamental disadvantage our faction has.

[IRifter]

5 minutes ago, ShepHammer said:

You've got lots of questions here. I think I can help a little bit. 

Question 1: Yes. The most frequently referenced well-performing list archetype for SCE has been what is known as the Gav-bomb. At its core it is Gavriel Sureheart, between 10-20 evocators and a knight-vexillor. I'm sure you'll be able to figure out what it does by reading all of their rules. I'm obliged to say that this isn't the only way to win (many will come and say they use a different strategy), but this seems to be the emergent 'strongest build'.

Your battleline problem: I'd like to point something out regarding the lord-arcanum.  You have probably noticed this fact, but I just want to highlight it. You mentioned that you don't like to put him in the positions that your other staunch defender generals occupy in your lines, but I'm curious as to why. His survivability is comparable to all of our other heroes, and his kit has been designed to function best mid-table.  He isn't a collegiate arcane fragile target in my opinion. If you just flatly don't like him, that is totally fine actually. I have observed that many Gav-bomb lists are designed with Lord-Arcanum and sequitor backup, and just as many are designed with a liberator/judicator mix. It doesn't appear that using sequitors as battleline is as important as using Gavriel or cogs.

Question on lord-ordinator and ballistas: In case you haven't done the math, once you take three ballistas, that is when the ordinator bubble is worth more than a fourth ballista, which is why you will most lists doing the 3 ballista 1 ordinator combo. In my own games, and in the experiences of some forum posters, it is proving to be extremely good. Its performance is tempered by the fact that it is only 4 models in a game where the number of models in a zone is how we win, so you need to couple this combination with high model count mobile units (skinks are the best choice here).

Tips: I should call this tip "How I learned to stop worrying and love the Gav-bomb." In matched play, one of the first issues I ran into with SCE was that we are full of 5-man units that cost 50-60% more than some comparable 10 man units. If the games were decided in a way that valued multi-wound models equally to single-wound models, then this wouldn't even be a discussion point. Our units survive well and kill well enough. When you face an opponent that simply floods objectives with summoned skeletons/blue horrors/skinks you aren't engaging in a fair and honorable duel.  I don't think it matters if you take sequitors or liberator/judicator combos as your battleline, because the real effectiveness of your list is going to be based on how well you counter objective flooding. Gav-bombing has been effective for me. Hopefully some other posters will share what tools they have used to counteract this fundamental disadvantage our faction has.

First of all ty so much for all that lovely information!

I´ve got a couple of questions about the gav_bomb strategy:
1. Who is the General in that list? And which Artefact/Command traits do I use?
2. How do i determine what the best target is to drop the "bomb" on?
3. When do i drop the "bomb"?
4. Do I use one big Evocator unit or do I split them up in 4 units or 2 units ?
5. Using the Warscroll builder the points for using Gavriel, Vexillor and 20 evocators are 1020. How do I effectively protect my own objectives? using lord arcanum + sequitors is another 600 points and doesnt feel quite powerful enough to me to defend the objectives on my side.

Lord Acanum:
I did notice the fact that his survivability is practically almost equal to e.g. a Lord Celestant on Dracoth. But in all teh games i´ve used him he just died very fast compared to others. That might be just bad dice luck since I dont ahve huge number of games played with him but he just feels kinda "meh" to me.

 

[ShepHammer]

23 minutes ago, IRifter said:

I´ve got a couple of questions about the gav_bomb strategy:
1. Who is the General in that list? And which Artefact/Command traits do I use?
2. How do i determine what the best target is to drop the "bomb" on?
3. When do i drop the "bomb"?
4. Do I use one big Evocator unit or do I split them up in 4 units or 2 units ?
5. Using the Warscroll builder the points for using Gavriel, Vexillor and 20 evocators are 1020. How do I effectively protect my own objectives? using lord arcanum + sequitors is another 600 points and doesnt feel quite powerful enough to me to defend the objectives on my side.

1. A Lord-Arcanum if you want sequitor battleline, anyone else if you don't care. You must select the Hammers of Sigmar stormhost rules if you want Gavriel's command ability to work on evocators. This means that you are forced to take a specific command trait and artifact.

2. That's an incredibly complicated multi-variable question. I don't think anyone will be able to give you a clean answer.

3. See answer 2 :). The short and vague answer is... As early as possible to maximize the value of their arrival. The later you drop down the more table area your opponent can deny through model spacing, and the more models they will have swarming objectives.

4. By far the most common build I have seen on the internet is one unit of 10 and one unit of 5. I have seen two units of 10, but the least common configuration is three units of 5.  I plan to try that version because I like the flexibility it provides (but have no play experience to support that idea). I think a lot has to do with the rules for scions of the storm. You will only have so many units that you can hold back to drop in.  Sometimes you might need to combine two 5-man units just so that they can arrive together.

5. Good instinct on those 16 models not feeling like quite enough to interact successfully with objectives.  The prevailing wisdom is to supplement that with two or more units of skinks. Skinks count as a deployed unit for scions of the storm so those 60 points allow for one more important SCE unit to drop in. Also they are movement 8" and bravery 10 for some ridiculous reason.  They are extremely well-suited to covering the weaknesses of the half of your army that will be starting on the table.

I hope that some of the more experienced Gav-bomb players will come in and add to this explanation.  Most of what I know I have learned through discussion with other players and through my own limited games.

Edited October 7, 2018 by ShepHammer

[IRifter]

1 minute ago, ShepHammer said:

1. A Lord-Arcanum if you want sequitor battleline, anyone else if you don't care.

2. That's an incredibly complicated multi-variable question. I don't think anyone will be able to give you a clean answer.

3. See answer 2 :). The short and vague answer is... As early as possible to maximize the value of their arrival. The later you drop down the more table area your opponent can deny through model spacing, and the more models they will have swarming objectives.

4. By far the most common build I have seen on the internet is one unit of 10 and one unit of 5. I have seen two units of 10, but the least common configuration is three units of 5.  I plan to try that version because I like the flexibility it provides (but have no play experience to support that idea). I think a lot has to do with the rules for scions of the storm. You will only have so many units that you can hold back to drop in.  Sometimes you might need to combine two 5-man units just so that they can arrive together.

5. Good instinct on those 16 models not feeling like quite enough to interact successfully with objectives.  The prevailing wisdom is to supplement that with two or more units of skinks. Skinks count as a deployed unit for scions of the storm so those 60 points allow for one more important SCE unit to drop in. Also they are movement 8" and bravery 10 for some ridiculous reason.  They are extremely well-suited to covering the weaknesses of the half of your army that will be starting on the table.

I hope that some of the more experienced Gav-bomb players will come in and add to this explanation.  Most of what I know I have learned through discussion with other players and through my own limited games.

Thx again for so much information!

I´ll have to try this to see if i like that strategy

[yarrickson]

Regarding protecting backfield objectives when using a Gavbomb. Best defence is a good offence in my opinion. If you can tie up most/all of the enemy army with Evocators/hammer unit of your choice then they can't even think about objective play. 

Obviously there'll be caveats to that, a few annoying armies like Sylvaneth will just retreat/teleport away from your bomb. But they're the exception rather than the rule. 

Failing that you can't go wrong with skinks or 5 man-regenerating-the-unit-on-a-5+-liberators

[Prexxus]

Hey guys my escalation league is moving up a notch and I'm trying to build my army for the 1250 rounds. This is what I have so far. Please note I have access to a stardrake, celestant prime, fulminators, Gavriel and a knight venator at this moment. I could get some liberators and remove the lord arcanum as not to be forced to sequitors as well.

Allegiance: Stormcast Eternals

Leaders
Lord-Arcanum on Gryph-Charger (240)
- General
Lord-Relictor (100)
Knight-Azyros (100)

Battleline
5 x Judicators (160)
- Skybolt Bows
- 1x Shockbolt Bows
10 x Sequitors (240)
- Stormsmite Mauls and Soulshields
- 4x Stormsmite Greatmaces

Units
10 x Evocators (400)
- 10x Grandstaves

Total: 1240 / 1250
Extra Command Points: 0
Allies: 0 / 200
Wounds: 77
 

Would you guys do anything differently? Thanks guys!

[IRifter]

Sorry for asking this again, but i didnt get an answer last time.

What do you guys think abnout the everblaze comet? Worth it?

[Lexalopolis]

9 minutes ago, IRifter said:

Sorry for asking this again, but i didnt get an answer last time.

What do you guys think abnout the everblaze comet? Worth it?

It's situationally useful, not an auto-include but worth considering. It gives you ranged force projection outside of unbind range and does small amounts of mortal wounds over a wide area, and to use it consistently requires two wizards: one to dispel it and another to cast it again. A smart opponent will run out of its pulse range and ignore it to force you to waste a spell dispelling it. I've used it against Death and Seraphon armies, with mixed success.

Edited October 7, 2018 by Lexalopolis

[IRifter]

In my experience the comet can be either a game changer or pretty useless.

In one of my games, where the deployable zone was farily small I managed to nuke half of my enemies army with that comet, because he mainly had 1 hp models and could do nothing about mortal wounds. But that was before people figured out how good lens of refraction is. 

Still unsure including it in a list is worth it

[Mark Williams]

19 minutes ago, IRifter said:

Sorry for asking this again, but i didn't get an answer last time.

What do you guys think about the everblaze comet? Worth it?

I love the model, but in all honesty I'm not sure it's worth it. In casual games where your opponent maybe isn't prepared for it, or they haven't seen it before, it's amazing. But as games go up in competitiveness, the spell goes down in performance. It basically has an inverse effectiveness. The "top tier" armies all have multiple dispells and bonuses to casting, so it's almost impossible to get off sometimes....

I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with it, and I'm a bit torn on what to think of it. It's fun to use, however.

[IRifter]

I asked about a competetive list earlier and the answer i got was gav-bomb.

Are there any other good lists out there? I dont really wanna buy 10 more evocators for 1 strategy

[yarrickson]

The ever blaze comet combos well with (sorry for bringing it up again) a decent Gavbomb. Any decent opponent will try and clump up and hide behind whatever chaff they have to avoid taking evocators directly to the face. So that's when you smack them with the comet from outside dispel range, opponent has to shuffle his army away from comet and then you drop the Gavbomb into whatever gap opens up. Beautiful. 

[IRifter]

1 minute ago, yarrickson said:

The ever blaze comet combos well with (sorry for bringing it up again) a decent Gavbomb. Any decent opponent will try and clump up and hide behind whatever chaff they have to avoid taking evocators directly to the face. So that's when you smack them with the comet from outside dispel range, opponent has to shuffle his army away from comet and then you drop the Gavbomb into whatever gap opens up. Beautiful. 

That's actually a really good use for the comet. But its still countered heavily by a lens.

[yarrickson]

1 minute ago, IRifter said:

I asked about a competetive list earlier and the answer i got was gav-bomb.

Are there any other good lists out there? I dont really wanna buy 10 more evocators for 1 strategy

There's  still what was called the 'Les Martin TM' list, Stardrake, 2*2 Fulminators, relictor, castellant, 2xjudicators, liberators, prosecutors, incantor, vexillor, heraldor. 

Just a really well rounded army that does well at most scenarios/types of game?