AoS 2 - Stormcast Eternals Discussion

[Marcvs]

4 minutes ago, Mattrulesok said:

The more I think about the use of this battalion the more I think it's bad because IMO it's not going to be able to compete in a competitive setting, having so many points invested in a couple of units that can so easily be taken off the board in 1-2 rounds of combat by most good competitive lists doesn't compensate for the 1 round of board dominance you get. However in a casual setting I can't see this being anything but oppressive, like how aggrivated would you be if you turned up with a fun list just to have 30 liberators jammed in your first before the game starts completely ruining your chance to actually play out your armies rules and play out a normal game? 

100% with you on the casual setting. But that's true for most competitive builds. Even if it is only moderately competitive (3-2 stuff), I wouldn't bring my Starcast list to a casual game -just as I wouln'd epxect my opponent to come and delete my whole army in t1 with packs of flamers or salamanders. On this point, I think the garrison battalion might be very nice and thematic for a more relaxed build

[PJetski]

Putting a large block of Liberators on the doorstep is a good strategy unless you are playing against armies that can easily screen and tear apart 30 Liberators over two turns (Ironjawz, Fyreslayers, FEC, Slaanesh, COS, Seraphon, Tzeentch, Lumineth, Gitz, Skaven, OBR) any deep strike army (Kharadron, Idoneth, DOK,  BOC, Nighthaunt) and only if you are playing on scenarios that favour fast objective play.

Great strategy except for all those scenarios!

Edited November 20, 2020 by PJetski

[jeanfluflu]

3 minutes ago, Marcvs said:

100% with you on the casual setting. But that's true for most competitive builds. Even if it is only moderately competitive (3-2 stuff), I wouldn't bring my Starcast list to a casual game -just as I wouln'd epxect my opponent to come and delete my whole army in t1 with packs of flamers or salamanders. On this point, I think the garrison battalion might be very nice and thematic for a more relaxed build

THIS!

It's really fun and satisfying to unpack new rules and find the "secret ingredient" to maximize our army but most of the time we'll be playing against our friends.

From a relaxed point of view, well at least it's a reasonnable treat to dust off your liberators and plays something else with your friends. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

9 minutes ago, PJetski said:

Putting a large block of Liberators on the doorstep is a good strategy unless you are playing against armies that can easily screen and tear apart 30 Liberators over two turns (Ironjawz, Fyreslayers, Slaanesh, COS, Seraphon, Tzeentch, Lumineth, Gitz, Skaven, OBR) any deep strike army (Kharadron, Idoneth, DOK,  BOC, Nighthaunt) and only if you are playing on scenarios that favour fast objective play.

Great strategy except for all those scenarios!

I feel like you have not thought through all the implications of this battalion.

Depositing 30 two wound 3+ rerolling 1s bodies in front of the opponent turn 0 is definitely a good opener. You can combine this with low drops but you don't have to get the first turn, it's just that if you do you also guarantee you'll charge them turn 1. Yeah, maybe they will delete your Liberator block over two turns. But those are two turns that you gummed up their works and that the other 1500 points of your army can spend playing objectives.

If you are playing a deep strinking army just you will still tarpit their non-deep striking units. Or you can just not do this and dump 30 Liberators on a point instead or spread them out to zone out their deep strikes.

I want to stress that you can invest a lot of points into your Liberator alpha strike if you want. But you really don't need to. The battalion is cheap enough to include a big liberator tarpit in your list and still do another thing well.

[Marcvs]

5 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

The battalion is cheap enough to include a big liberator tarpit in your list and still do another thing well.

The battalion  with 30 liberators is 980 points, so it's half your army

EDIT: sorry, that's with judicators, with 5 libs (beyond the 30) it's just 930

Edited November 20, 2020 by Marcvs

[LordPrometheus]

7 hours ago, JackStreicher said:

An abusive auto win with no counter play whatsoever isn‘t nice, it‘s cheap, unfair and should not exist. 
„I deployed, you can give up now!“

What are you talking about? If you think Liberators charging turn 1 is an "auto win", you clearly haven't played very much with them.

[Mattrulesok]

1 minute ago, Marcvs said:

The battalion  with 30 liberators is 980 points, so it's half your army

950 is the cheapest you can do (30 libs + another 5 libs) but you're right half your army has to sit  within 12 of one squishy hero, if someone did this to my ogors I'd be ecstatic 

[PJetski]

I said "over two turns" to be generous but the reality is that if you put 30 liberators in front of the entire enemy army then it will easily be torn apart by the end of the first round. Against some armies (Fyreslayers, OBR, Lumineth) your liberators won't survive their own combat phase. Slaanesh players will thank you for your generous donation of 30 depravity points.

Melee alpha strike is not a good enough strategy; "alpha tar pit" is an even worse strategy.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

6 minutes ago, Marcvs said:

The battalion  with 30 liberators is 980 points, so it's half your army

I was not including anything but the Liberators and Lord Veritant in the cost, because the other units don't need to take part in the alpha, so you can have 1400 points running around doing their own thing if you use this strategy. But I see your point for  general list building.

[Beer & Pretzels Gamer]

1 hour ago, Mattrulesok said:

The more I think about the use of this battalion the more I think it's bad because IMO it's not going to be able to compete in a competitive setting, having so many points invested in a couple of units that can so easily be taken off the board in 1-2 rounds of combat by most good competitive lists doesn't compensate for the 1 round of board dominance you get. However in a casual setting I can't see this being anything but oppressive, like how aggrivated would you be if you turned up with a fun list just to have 30 liberators jammed in your first before the game starts completely ruining your chance to actually play out your armies rules and play out a normal game? 

Again, I’m new to SCE but I’d agree that my first impression of this battalion (given the cost to maximize points wise as others have pointed out) is that a list built around it is closer to 2-3/3-2 than 5-0.  Not that a good player with a bit of luck and a lot of skill couldn’t pilot it to a tournament win occasionally, just that more often than not after the first wave of build crests, the tide will turn against it.  Additionally, I would not be surprised to see those losses coming against factions in the lower win rate tiers.  That said I could easily see one of those wins coming against a list expected to go 5-0.   And to me...  that’s a good thing.  I like a “Rock, Paper, Scissors” meta over there being a few dominant builds out there at any given time.

So unless the definition of OP/Broken/Dirty is the ability to disrupt an OP/Broken/Dirty list’s playing style, while regularly failing against  less optimized lists, I think a lot of the “panic” the battalion is generating is simply due to lack of games being played.

Edited November 20, 2020 by Beer & Pretzels Gamer

[jhamslam]

2 hours ago, JackStreicher said:

Jeez, to use 44 Liberators is the TAME version. You can pick any Redeemer or Justicar units. Do the math yourself...

Well whatever if you are all still in full blown denial mode: Just play a game against such a list and have "fun". Opressive isn't even the right word for it, it's dirt if you max it out.

Bruh you can already put 30 libs in someones face with Skyborne Slayers, 5 inches away too and no battleshock for the battalion.

Where are all these Liberator heavy lists locking people down oppressively and winning? 

This is some peak SCE panic over what is arguably a B tier strat at best

[schwabbele]

50 minutes ago, Beer & Pretzels Gamer said:

I think a lot of the “panic” the battalion is generating is simply due to lack of games being played.

Sorry  had to fix that for you:

I think a lot of the “panic” the battalion is generating is simply due to people being afraid of SCE maybe having something stronger/viable .

/s 

 

[LordPrometheus]

7 minutes ago, schwabbele said:

Sorry  had to fix that for you:

I think a lot of the “panic” the battalion is generating is simply due to people being afraid of SCE maybe having something stronger/viable .

/s 

 

 You snark, but it's true, and so is what I said yesterday. This entire convo is living proof of why Stormcast players aren't allowed nice toys like every other army. The microsecond something MAYBE "B tier" comes out for SCE, the whining and crying starts. This is why Sequitors and Evocators got stupid points nerfs for no reason, and why our rules "updates" and White Dwarf battalions are mostly half-assed.

 The SCE Derangement Syndrome is ridiculously strong. I'm still just laughing my butt off that freaking LIBERATORS are being viewed as "op" now. 🤣If that's not proof of the Syndrome then I don't know what is.
 

[jhamslam]

8 hours ago, schwabbele said:

 

Fly, terrain, retreating, teleport, deeptstrike and gargants as Options against it. So i get your point but wouldn’t wet my pants just yet. 
 

edit: and 40 libs is also something most players don’t have. Especially the newer ones.

edit2: and you need to be in 12“ from veritant. So just Split your army problem solved. 

Oh also, how in Sigmars Name do 30 libs get into combat with anything. Are we forgetting that GW design dept. gave them all a 1 inch reach on 40mm bases?

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

7 minutes ago, jhamslam said:

Oh also, how in Sigmars Name do 30 libs get into combat with anything. Are we forgetting that GW design dept. gave them all a 1 inch reach on 40mm bases?

Give them +9 to charge with Gavriel Sureheart and tag multiple units.

[jhamslam]

2 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Give them +9 to charge with Gavriel Sureheart and tag multiple units.

Liberators can barely fight in two ranks, good luck getting 30 of those to fit wholly within 9 in two ranks

[firtahl]

5 hours ago, JackStreicher said:

Except you put forth almost no valid point. You mostly make assumptions about how you could counter, too bad you won't build your army to counter only  this build in a tournament. Even your "counters" are pretty weak tbh. You assume that you will get a spell cast or that you will do this and that which is mostly based on chance. The charging libs are not based on chance, they just will do what they do which is super-opressive.

LOL. My bad I forgot how out of meta Deepstrike, Changehost, Karadron, Seraphon, magic and mortal wounds are. Fun fact, if you read the post you'd see I already addressed what you say. Ill help you out and quote it.

 

7 hours ago, firtahl said:

If the argument is "what if their teleport doesn't go off", that means you're admitting they have a way out and maybe its not as bleak as you say.

Anyway, if the list of tools in each army is so obviously wrong, why not just respond with a similar list showing everyone how wrong it is point by point. Saying there's no valid points and then providing no actual examples seems to me like some desperate grasping at straws. The reality is that basic tools like screening keep it all under control, but hey, if you want to pretend that teleporting tarpit units is somehow a brand new game breaking mechanic then I guess its your life to live.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

2 minutes ago, jhamslam said:

Liberators can barely fight in two ranks, good luck getting 30 of those to fit wholly within 9 in two ranks

Wholly within 9 of Gavriel? Correct me if I am wrong, but his command ability is within, not wholly within.

[jhamslam]

1 minute ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Wholly within 9 of Gavriel? Correct me if I am wrong, but his command ability is within, not wholly within.

its wholly within 12, not 9.

 

But yes it is wholly within, you might be looking at the GW warscroll in the box or on their website. The tome says different

[Mattrulesok]

25 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Give them +9 to charge with Gavriel Sureheart and tag multiple units.

I might be missing a trick here but how would you get gavriel wholly within 12 of the unit? He can't be redeployed with the battalion and stormkeep means no scions, he isn't fast enough to run to them. Vexillor for a guaranteed teleport? But now on top of minimum 950 for the battalion your up to 1180 with gav and a vex just to charge 30 +1 libs? Seems more efficient to just play old stormcast and drop gav with 1k of evocators. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

33 minutes ago, Mattrulesok said:

I might be missing a trick here but how would you get gavriel wholly within 12 of the unit? He can't be redeployed with the battalion and stormkeep means no scions, he isn't fast enough to run to them. Vexillor for a guaranteed teleport? But now on top of minimum 950 for the battalion your up to 1180 with gav and a vex just to charge 30 +1 libs? Seems more efficient to just play old stormcast and drop gav with 1k of evocators. 

I was under the impression that Gavriels ability way within 9, not wholly within 12. But I have seen lists that take the stormkeep hero battalion which can include the Vexillor as well. Since that gives you the extra command points you want for Gavriel there is synergy here. Put in a Catellant as well and translocate him up for a chance at 30 2+ rerolling Liberators.

If that whole build turns out to be too much investment, though,  there is still Astral Templars with their 6" pre game move as another option.

[Marcvs]

6 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

If that whole build turns out to be too much investment, though,  there is still Astral Templars with their 6" pre game move as another option.

Yeah, if it isn't FAQed I think the astral templars option is superior cause it will also allow you to move your gryph hounds and other stuff on other objectives

[CommissarRotke]

4 hours ago, Mattrulesok said:

The more I think about the use of this battalion the more I think it's bad because IMO it's not going to be able to compete in a competitive setting, having so many points invested in a couple of units that can so easily be taken off the board in 1-2 rounds of combat by most good competitive lists doesn't compensate for the 1 round of board dominance you get. However in a casual setting I can't see this being anything but oppressive, like how aggrivated would you be if you turned up with a fun list just to have 30 liberators jammed in your first before the game starts completely ruining your chance to actually play out your armies rules and play out a normal game? 

that feels like a problem with who you're playing against, not the ability itself though. which while related, is still a separate discussion from whether an army's rules are broken af

[JackStreicher]

Yep, the battalion is busted.

I like what they did to liberators though, yet it should have the same condition to get the +1 armor and +1 to hit as the iron golems rerolling to saves!

Edited November 20, 2020 by JackStreicher

[Beer & Pretzels Gamer]

2 hours ago, schwabbele said:

Sorry  had to fix that for you:

I think a lot of the “panic” the battalion is generating is simply due to people being afraid of SCE maybe having something stronger/viable .

/s 

 

Fair enough.

That said, while I’m new to SCE I’ve been following a lot of other factions threads here for a while and there does seem to be a broader new tome derangement syndrome to AoS where there’s almost always something new that everyone thinks will break the game each time a new tome is released.  Fair enough some of these do rise to the level of needing a FAQ nerf but all too often once the games are actually played, turns out to be not so game breaking.

I know in my own little Zoom League meta one player was absolutely convinced that the “counts as” for objective rule for Mawtribes meant that they were unbeatable, especially given the Stonehorn’s resilience.  Except of course there were plenty of Battleplans where even with three FLoSH the opponent couldn’t contest enough objectives early, and if they were separated and allowed for concentrated fire a FLoSH will go down like anything else on the table.

As to SCE specifically, as a newbie think the whole Gav sub-thread highlights part of the issue for outsiders when they look at SCE.  Know I showed a bit of arrogance when I agreed to play SCE in Zoom League without checking the models I had against the tome in any serious way.  SCE definitely has some interesting pieces but getting them to work together requires way more list management and trade offs than I think those who haven’t spent the time realize.   So yeah, if SCE could truly stack all the potential buffs and manage to get everyone piled in without going out of the bubbles, etc. etc. they’d be potentially OP.  But of course they can’t.