AoS 2 - Hedonites of Slaanesh Discussion

[Fontixxx]

Guys I have 2 questions about AoS Summoning

1. When I summon a Keeper can I take additional spell from book in same manner as in a rooster?

2. After summoning a keeper can I choose a weapon or it should be the 1st one showed in table?

 

I tried to find any rules about summoning but I couldn't, maybe You can guide me where they are?

[Enoby]

9 minutes ago, Fontixxx said:

Guys I have 2 questions about AoS Summoning

1. When I summon a Keeper can I take additional spell from book in same manner as in a rooster?

2. After summoning a keeper can I choose a weapon or it should be the 1st one showed in table?

 

I tried to find any rules about summoning but I couldn't, maybe You can guide me where they are?

You do get a spell from the spell lore, and can choose your weapon when you summon it's because summoned models count as part of your allegiance and the allegiance gives you your spell

[Sorrow]

15 hours ago, azdimy said:

Grave guards have twice the output of Painbringers point for point. While their offensive stat is similar on a per model basis, the grave guard warscroll gives you 10 models against 5 for the pain bringers

I m hearing that they are a lot of synergy in the gravelords book but they are difficult to accomplish while hos is a struggle to find any. Gravelords can play magic dominance with Nagash if they want to play that way, we don t have that option so far (twins may change that)

Blood knights have enough allegiance buffs in the battletome (retreat and charge, permanent buffs for killing units) to edge out the slickblade for less points.

The army has access to cheap battleline, cheaper support heroes when do not.

Overrall,I feel gravelord players are in a much better place than where we are with their new battletome but time will tell

From various comments online, while some Soulblight players are indeed having worries, neither Soulblight nor Lumineth would trade their rules and cost for Hedonite rules and cost. I asked more than once, including some great tournament players in my local meta.

Also, I want all of us to realize that we are comparing the Crème de la crème of Slaaneshi mortal infantry armies, the Myrmidesh Painbringers with Grave Guards, who are per lore, raised from death into undeath in masses and are not the lore fitting equivalent of a Myrmidesh Painbringer. 

The fact that we are comparing them stat for stat, speak of how weak Hedonites truly are.

I could speak more, of what even famous reviewers have said, the sheer absence of new lore and story progression for Hedonites. Lumineth got full novels dedicated to them, Soulblight are getting a novel dedicated to them.

I hope to God that the Twins are not in BR: Kragnos only for Kragnos or Kroak to defeat them.

@azdimy Great post!

[Mangod]

1 hour ago, Sorrow said:

From various comments online, while some Soulblight players are indeed having worries, neither Soulblight nor Lumineth would trade their rules and cost for Hedonite rules and cost. I asked more than once, including some great tournament players in my local meta.

Also, I want all of us to realize that we are comparing the Crème de la crème of Slaaneshi mortal infantry armies, the Myrmidesh Painbringers with Grave Guards, who are per lore, raised from death into undeath in masses and are not the lore fitting equivalent of a Myrmidesh Painbringer. 

The fact that we are comparing them stat for stat, speak of how weak Hedonites truly are.

I could speak more, of what even famous reviewers have said, the sheer absence of new lore and story progression for Hedonites. Lumineth got full novels dedicated to them, Soulblight are getting a novel dedicated to them.

I hope to God that the Twins are not in BR: Kragnos only for Kragnos or Kroak to defeat them.

@azdimy Great post!

Now, I'm not sure if there's been any major lore changes for Grave Guard since WHFB, but aren't they supposed to be the Crème de la crème of skeletons? Ancient heroes raised into undeath as Wights with (most of) their martial skills intact?

[pnkdth]

21 minutes ago, Mangod said:

Now, I'm not sure if there's been any major lore changes for Grave Guard since WHFB, but aren't they supposed to be the Crème de la crème of skeletons? Ancient heroes raised into undeath as Wights with (most of) their martial skills intact?

"Armed with ensorcelled blades and clad in ancient relic armour, the Grave Guard are the elite infantry of tomb and barrow, skeletal champions who march and slay in perfect formation. Each killing strike from their cursed swords severs the chord between soul and flesh, dropping the lifeless bodies of their victims to the floor."

So yes!

[Yoid]

Painbringers are fine lorewise. 2 wounds 2 attacks 3+ 3+ -1 rend with 4+ rerollable save, exploding 6s and mortal wounds into 6s, there are few ways to make them even more elite. The main problem is their point cost and lack of good synergies.

Is not like the Slaangor Fienbloods, wich are extremely unnacurate to their lore.

[TimeToWaste85]

13 hours ago, TheArborealWalrus said:

Kind of a different question, but does anyone have any exalted chariot conversions? I was looking at the official model and it didn't feel very exalted. Thought about adding the body of the DoK cauldron to make a raised platform. Throw on some snake bits and figure out how to add the blender and steeds to the bottom on that base. It'll look fabulous. Wish me luck.

I'm not sure if I want to do my snake head conversion from my daemonettes (still WiP) to the herald. Kind of want a high priestess vibe from her which isn't quite served by the snake head I feel. Thoughts?

TLDR: Ideas/pictures for exalted chariot conversion would be appreciated.

Hope you all are having a good week. Cheers.

I used Syll on the backpack to build up the back area of the chariot. Swapped claw arm for a second whip arm. Eske became a daemon prince conversion. Still in stages, but looks pretty good at showing it’s special. 

[Sorrow]

1 hour ago, Yoid said:

Painbringers are fine lorewise. 2 wounds 2 attacks 3+ 3+ -1 rend with 4+ rerollable save, exploding 6s and mortal wounds into 6s, there are few ways to make them even more elite. The main problem is their point cost and lack of good synergies.

Is not like the Slaangor Fienbloods, wich are extremely unnacurate to their lore.

They need to come down in cost, hopefully GW reads through the survey we sent them.

Also, once again, I truly hope the Twins are not defeated by Kragnos or Kroak.

[Mangod]

38 minutes ago, Sorrow said:

They need to come down in cost, hopefully GW reads through the survey we sent them.

Also, once again, I truly hope the Twins are not defeated by Kragnos or Kroak.

Well, unfortunately, someone has to take the L, and if it's a triple threat between Krag, Kroak, and the Twins, it's 33% chance it'll be us.

[Sorrow]

21 minutes ago, Mangod said:

Well, unfortunately, someone has to take the L, and if it's a triple threat between Krag, Kroak, and the Twins, it's 33% chance it'll be us.

True, true.

Still, the Twins are basically demigods walking the Realms, then again Kroak and Kragnos are also deity level.

It appears story is going towards Siege of Excelsis in Ghur, we know Hedonites such as Sigvald and Glutos are moving there.

 

[Thor]

Howdy fellas. I am a returning hedonite player. Eager to return to the mortal realms and destroy my heathen friends. However I am a bit confused how to build our new book. 

Last time I player it was just after the first round of nerfs. And I have a semi large demon based army. Are mortals the way to go ? 

I usually go with powerful tried and tested lists. Lack of tournament result means I can't really emulate others. 

Anyone care to provide a quick rundown of the new units?

hosts / items ? 

 

or is the state of the hedonites in a standstill until the release of aos.3 ?

[pnkdth]

On 5/15/2021 at 12:19 AM, azdimy said:

Grave guards have twice the output of Painbringers point for point. While their offensive stat is similar on a per model basis, the grave guard warscroll gives you 10 models against 5 for the pain bringers

I m hearing that they are a lot of synergy in the gravelords book but they are difficult to accomplish while hos is a struggle to find any. Gravelords can play magic dominance with Nagash if they want to play that way, we don t have that option so far (twins may change that)

Blood knights have enough allegiance buffs in the battletome (retreat and charge, permanent buffs for killing units) to edge out the slickblade for less points.

The army has access to cheap battleline, cheaper support heroes when do not.

Overrall,I feel gravelord players are in a much better place than where we are with their new battletome but time will tell

Painbringers also bring exploding 6s, re-roll armour saves in combat but the point wasn't that they're identical but rather the battletome follows a similar pattern as HoS. With Slickblades, I think that comes down to preference but to me they've got incredible speed and a more reliable charge (and the permanent bonus is tied to a certain bloodline, it is not a Blood Knight ability).

Nagash got a price hike and now takes up nearly half of the army. No one is particularly excited about him.

As for heroes, many of them are redundant fillers and will never see play. Indeed, a big chunk of them are just boxed set heroes who seem to be put in there just to give the appearance of more rules. The vampire lord being one of the most boring choices in the army is a travesty. Quite sad that rather than creating cool new characters ourselves, we're forced to bring uniques for the really interesting rules (again, thinking of just how central Glutos is for many hedonite lists). Then again, you could just use the rules and make your own cool kitbash or conversion.

For me it is a mixed bag, much like the hedonites, but I definitely see some play since there's also a lot of fun stuff in the book. The tricky thing with hedonites, like @TheArborealWalrus wrote, is that if you price hedonites "fairly" then summoning will become incredibly broken. As also mentioned, you would have to nerf the summoning part to compensate. Something I'd be in favour of because one thing I dislike in the HoS tome is just how much you have to lean into DP/summoning. The mortal models are just so bloody awesome too.

[Enoby]

6 hours ago, Thor said:

Howdy fellas. I am a returning hedonite player. Eager to return to the mortal realms and destroy my heathen friends. However I am a bit confused how to build our new book. 

Last time I player it was just after the first round of nerfs. And I have a semi large demon based army. Are mortals the way to go ? 

I usually go with powerful tried and tested lists. Lack of tournament result means I can't really emulate others. 

Anyone care to provide a quick rundown of the new units?

hosts / items ? 

 

or is the state of the hedonites in a standstill until the release of aos.3 ?

I think daemons and mortals have their good and bad points, and you would be able to stick with daemons if you'd prefer

From my experience, the winners with daemons are the Kos, Contorted Epitome, the Masque, and I've heard others say they really like exalted chariots. That said, daemonttes, seekers, and fiends can find a place, especially with summoning (as can the infernal enrapturess if you summon her when needed).

I personally prefer the mortals, and in a competitive sense especially Glutos and the Slickblades. The big difference is that the mortals are more expensive points wise (and for some I would say too expensive) but usually more durable saves-wise and with quite a few mortal wound saves. I'd recommend chaos warriors for cheap battleline but you can also use daemonettes, who are more deadly and faster (though fold more easily).

On the new units, the stars at their current points are Glutos (often an MVP), Slickblade seekers (esp in Seeker Cavalcade), and Sigvald (in the Lurid haze to teleport him, esp with Keeper backup) - others have had good luck with the blissbarb seekers too. The units I think have a high potential but are currently a bit overcosted are blissbarb archers, the shardspeaker, and especially twinsouls and painbringers. Twinsouls are a personal favourite as they put out some really good damage, they just die a bit too quickly for them to be worth their 170 points; at 140 they would be a steal. Painbringers, if they come down to 120 or even 110 will be much better than Chaos Warriors for battleline. 

As for hosts and artefacts, I personally think Lurid Haze is best, not only for their teleport with Sigvald, but also for their unique command ability. When receiving an extra artefact, it's almost always better going for the Rod of Misrule to keep CP generation high.

While there's quite a bit of negative talk about the battletome, and some of it is justified (especially points), I've had a load of fun with this battletome and how experimental you can be with it. There's not much direct obvious synergy (as in "X unit buffs Y with +1 to hit") but the tactics come from the gameplay, with clever positioning and making up for weaknesses in some units with others and summoning. It's a very tricky army to play with little room for mistakes, but it's also very rewarding and I think makes me feel like I'm making tactical positions rather than just finding out the best way to buff unit Y. 

---

@pnkdth I agree with you that I've seen most people be pretty meh about Gravelords, including (like our book), some people deciding against picking up the army because of it.

It's a shame, but with our book, the new Lumineth stuff, and the Vampires, I think they're making a move to power down AoS3, which I don't mind, but it feels like they need to rerelease a lot of battletomes quickly to make sure the new battletomes don't feel 'meh' compared to the old. 

I also agree with you that the book is very fun. It's weird because I totally understand the criticism that the book is boring or that there just isn't enough synergy, and it can be frustrating making lists due to the current points and because there's not much inspiration from the rules (e.g. no special buffs for a unit that encourages a full army of it). But at the same time, I am enjoying playing this army so much more than the 2019 book or Slaves to Darkness (which has considerably more synergy but just doesn't feel right). I've played Lumineth, and Lumineth is probably a better quality book, but tbh I think they're the exception rather than the rule when it comes to GW's love and attention.

19 hours ago, Sorrow said:

They need to come down in cost, hopefully GW reads through the survey we sent them.

Also, once again, I truly hope the Twins are not defeated by Kragnos or Kroak.

If I were to take a guess with how GW usually goes about these things, I reckon that Kragnos will be the big winner here. Ever other title character in Broken Realms has been the winner, so I can't see that stopping now.

My prediction:

Kroak and the twins clash in Ghur, with both putting up a fight and some wins and losses, but the twins begin to win. Then, as chaos seems to be taking hold, Kragnos charges forward and beats the twins and Kroak, cementing Destruction as the king of this upcoming edition. 

This could be totally fine if written well. The last thing we want is standard GW greater daemon writing where they go "This daemon is really super strong we promise" only for it to get smacked around every time it shows up to show how strong another character is. But if all characters make gains and show their strength, then the ultimate winner is less important. 

 

 

[MothmanDraws]

Dont worry, kroak and kragnos wont beat the twins, Tyrion will do it off screen in a paragraph

[azdimy]

7 hours ago, pnkdth said:

The tricky thing with hedonites, like @TheArborealWalrus wrote, is that if you price hedonites "fairly" then summoning will become incredibly broken. As also mentioned, you would have to nerf the summoning part to compensate. Something I'd be in favour of because one thing I dislike in the HoS tome is just how much you have to lean into DP/summoning. The mortal models are just so bloody awesome too

My experience with the new summoning is that it is well countained and cannot really be abused. Getting depravitiy at the end of the turn while being able to summon in the movement phase, only one unit per turn, you still beed to make a 9 inch charge for the summoned unit to be relevant that turn. In the current meta, games are usually decided within the first 3 turns. Whith no way to summon turn 1. that s give us access to 2 extra units. I played against a tooled up Dok list last night and I was able to summon 10 deamonettes turn two and 20 on turn three to be then tabled and unable to summon from the fane as he had units around it preventing me to do so turn 4. I am already heavily leaning to slaves to darkness units in my lists to have bodies on the table and work around our current price of units . I really don't think pointing most of our units 15-20% less will break the game

 

[Yoid]

For Kragnos I expect chaos to "Loose the battle but win the war" in a similar manner to Be'Lakor. And I think this may be related to the new cover of the edition that show the Stormcast lady fighting the chaos unleashed in the realms. Like, there is no way for chaos to score a major victoy vs order. I bet Kragnos beat both Order and Chaos, but in such a way that accidentally unleash even more chaos into the realms (and the beast himself end in a bad spot). This will fit the new narrative of "Age of the beast" but also "A bigger focus into chaos inside the realms and fighting it" that they talked about in the new edition reveal.

Also, in BR, there dosn't seem to be clear winners, is a always a bitter win with some salty downside. Morathi become god but unleash Slaanesh. Teclis sacrifices countless lifes just to do a pointless flex in front of Nagash. Be'Lakor fail to impress the Chaos Gods but deeply wound Stormcast existence. I can see Kragnos crushing his enemies but accidentaly unleashing something bad in the process.

I don't expect the twins to play a big part in the story, but I may be wrong, we know almost nothing about them yet.

Edited May 16, 2021 by Yoid

[Enoby]

19 minutes ago, azdimy said:

My experience with the new summoning is that it is well countained and cannot really be abused. Getting depravitiy at the end of the turn while being able to summon in the movement phase, only one unit per turn, you still beed to make a 9 inch charge for the summoned unit to be relevant that turn. In the current meta, games are usually decided within the first 3 turns. Whith no way to summon turn 1. that s give us access to 2 extra units. I played against a tooled up Dok list last night and I was able to summon 10 deamonettes turn two and 20 on turn three to be then tabled and unable to summon from the fane as he had units around it preventing me to do so turn 4. I am already heavily leaning to slaves to darkness units in my lists to have bodies on the table and work around our current price of units . I really don't think pointing most of our units 15-20% less will break the game

 

I agree here to be honest. While I've not had a bad time with the army yet, I think the once per turn limit on our summoning and when we get points is already a self limiting enough that it can't be abused at the current values. 

I personally don't rate the Slaves to Darkness units much, besides Chaos Warriors for cheap battleline and marauders because they are just generally very strong. However, bringing a load of cheap Slaves models doesn't make the summoning too strong, like you said, and the exploding 6s doesn't matter that much for damage (certainly not 60pts worth). As such, the option for us to use loads of cheap units hasn't broken the army, and most of our overpointed hedonite units wouldn't suddenly become OP if they were cheaper - they'd just be more exciting to use as you could base your army around them properly. 

While we have confirmation from @Sorrow that they have read at least one email about the survey and it's been passed on, my concern is that the rules writers will take an 'arrogant' approach of "yes we know they're overpointed, but that's on purpose due to summoning" and not change anything, despite players knowing why the decision was made and not believing it is correct. 

On another note, this Talkin' video has some insight into using twinsouls and especially painbringers, for those interested:

 

 

[Nasrod]

At this point I unironically want the Twins to be auto win absurd OP levels of power. My playgroup has selective bias memory of "triple Keeper was unbeatable!" (I didn't purchase a single Keeper until last year, precisely because Keeper spam from the OG tome looked unfun to play against).

Watching Tzeentch, KO, LRL, and Seraphon players all tell me my book is fairly pointed because "you know the alternative" yet collectively shrug their shoulders at my IDK and DoK armies with near 100% win rate... I just have absolutely stopped caring. 

I have one friend in the group that tries to be the voice of reason and the poor guy is a Tau 40k player. The Tau player pities you, you know it's rough. 

So let me have a shiny new toy and curbstomp some friendlies with a meta list and then revert back to the pre Kragnos lists if for no other reason than to restore sanity to my local discussions...

[Enoby]

4 hours ago, Nasrod said:

At this point I unironically want the Twins to be auto win absurd OP levels of power. My playgroup has selective bias memory of "triple Keeper was unbeatable!" (I didn't purchase a single Keeper until last year, precisely because Keeper spam from the OG tome looked unfun to play against).

Watching Tzeentch, KO, LRL, and Seraphon players all tell me my book is fairly pointed because "you know the alternative" yet collectively shrug their shoulders at my IDK and DoK armies with near 100% win rate... I just have absolutely stopped caring. 

I have one friend in the group that tries to be the voice of reason and the poor guy is a Tau 40k player. The Tau player pities you, you know it's rough. 

So let me have a shiny new toy and curbstomp some friendlies with a meta list and then revert back to the pre Kragnos lists if for no other reason than to restore sanity to my local discussions...

I do think there is some sort of resentment towards Slaanesh in the wider community due to our previous battletome, and some people think our current battletome should be weak almost as a punishment. The logic is really faulty, but hopefully the notion dies off quickly. 

On an unrelated note, I've been looking at painbringers again because I really want to find way to use them. I decided to compare them to Chaos Warriors, not just because they have a similar role, but also because I think most people are hoping that painbringers will be more closely costed to Choas Warriors. 

Regardless of points, chaos warriors and painbringers have access to rerolling hits and wounds. Chaos warriors get this from the chaos sorcerer lord, and painbringers get this from nobles of excess and the lord of pain. The Lord of Pain will likely be used much more if painbringers get a drop to make them battleline, and the nobles of excess may be worth it with the drop because the ability is pretty nice and fewer drops is great. 

As you can see, fully buffed 5 painbringers offer twice the damage of chaos warriors at everything but a 6+ and 7+ save, and importantly do a very respectable 6 damage against a 2+ save unit. This could be very important for later because more and more units seem to be given considerably better saves (look at those new big stormcast as an example), and +1 save is likely to be a charge reaction. 

Looking at twinsouls, they do provide much better damage with the same buffs against most saves, but I think painbringers will be nice for heavy armoured units and the twinsouls will be nice for low armoured hordes. 

To be honest, these stats do give me another perspective on the painbringer unit. If they get the points drop they need, I think they'll actually be amazing. Comparing them to chaos warriors with the same buffs, they out perform them so much there's no comparison. Chaos warriors would still have the use as the cheapest battleline, but if Painbringers could be 110 points (with the 'tax' of a LoP for battleline status) we could make a really solid list with them as the core. 

[Yoid]

14 hours ago, Enoby said:

I do think there is some sort of resentment towards Slaanesh in the wider community due to our previous battletome, and some people think our current battletome should be weak almost as a punishment. The logic is really faulty, but hopefully the notion dies off quickly. 

On an unrelated note, I've been looking at painbringers again because I really want to find way to use them. I decided to compare them to Chaos Warriors, not just because they have a similar role, but also because I think most people are hoping that painbringers will be more closely costed to Choas Warriors. 

Regardless of points, chaos warriors and painbringers have access to rerolling hits and wounds. Chaos warriors get this from the chaos sorcerer lord, and painbringers get this from nobles of excess and the lord of pain. The Lord of Pain will likely be used much more if painbringers get a drop to make them battleline, and the nobles of excess may be worth it with the drop because the ability is pretty nice and fewer drops is great. 

As you can see, fully buffed 5 painbringers offer twice the damage of chaos warriors at everything but a 6+ and 7+ save, and importantly do a very respectable 6 damage against a 2+ save unit. This could be very important for later because more and more units seem to be given considerably better saves (look at those new big stormcast as an example), and +1 save is likely to be a charge reaction. 

Looking at twinsouls, they do provide much better damage with the same buffs against most saves, but I think painbringers will be nice for heavy armoured units and the twinsouls will be nice for low armoured hordes. 

To be honest, these stats do give me another perspective on the painbringer unit. If they get the points drop they need, I think they'll actually be amazing. Comparing them to chaos warriors with the same buffs, they out perform them so much there's no comparison. Chaos warriors would still have the use as the cheapest battleline, but if Painbringers could be 110 points (with the 'tax' of a LoP for battleline status) we could make a really solid list with them as the core. 

There are some things to account tho. Full bufs for Painbringers/Twinsouls require a bigger point investment (A hero and a battalion) than Chaos Warriors (Just a hero that is also 40 points cheaper than HoS heroes). Lord of Pain uses CP (more reliable) while Chaos Sorcerer Lord use spell (less reliable). Although you can use a Viceleader to reroll 1s as a spell and you only loose rerolling 2s with the Painbringers (since they hit on a 3+), while Twinsouls already have a situational built in reroll all hits. Battalions may be out of matched play soon, we don't know.

A buff that i think you didn't account is fighting twice for a CP. Chaos Warriors have it in a 110pts 7w 4+save hero while HoS got it in a 340pts 14w 4+save hero that is also summonable for 12DP

And it is probably not fair to compare 5 Painbringers with 5 Chaos warriors due to point disparity, since 10 Painbringers cost 300 pts and 15 Chaos Warriors cost 270pts, even if Painbringers go down 20 pts this is still your best comparison to do, so you need to account x1.5 times the damage and tankiness value of Chaos Warriors in that chart (ignoring some other factors like bodies to capture objectives)

In the Painbringers vs Twinsouls comparison,  notice that Painbringers are still cheaper, and that high saves (2+/3+) with rerolling saves are way way more effective in reducing Twinsouls damage output than Painbringers. We don't know if the generic CA of rerolling save rolls of 1 stay, but if it stay, Twinsouls cannot even damage opponent with 2+ save (as rerolling gives them 1/36 chance of being hurt) while Painbringers get a good chance of still do something. Also Twinsouls are better defending vs -2 rend or MW, while Painbringers are better defending vs no rend and -1 rend. Except vs shooting, because Painbringers only reroll save rolls in mele, while Twinsouls got an additional 5+ aftersave vs shooting half the time.

Now that I think of it, maybe that is why Painbringers are seen as unworthy right now but Twinsouls are seen as working well, because their defense work vs shooting in a shooting meta.

Both Chaos Warriors built in reroll saves (while 10+ models) and Chaos Sorcerer Lord Oracular Visions (free buff each turn that make you reroll saves) work vs shooting. This make Painbringers clearly loose the comparison as a worthy anvil.

Edited May 17, 2021 by Yoid

[Enoby]

45 minutes ago, Yoid said:

There are some things to account tho. Full bufs for Painbringers/Twinsouls require a bigger point investment (A hero and a battalion) than Chaos Warriors (Just a hero that is also 40 points cheaper than HoS heroes). Lord of Pain uses CP (more reliable) while Chaos Sorcerer Lord use spell (less reliable). Although you can use a Viceleader to reroll 1s as a spell and you only loose rerolling 2s with the Painbringers (since they hit on a 3+), while Twinsouls already have a situational built in reroll all hits. Battalions may be out of matched play soon, we don't know.

A buff that i think you didn't account is fighting twice for a CP. Chaos Warriors have it in a 110pts 7w 4+save hero while HoS got it in a 340pts 14w 4+save hero that is also summonable for 12DP

And it is probably not fair to compare 5 Painbringers with 5 Chaos warriors due to point disparity, since 10 Painbringers cost 300 pts and 15 Chaos Warriors cost 270pts, even if Painbringers go down 20 pts this is still your best comparison to do, so you need to account x1.5 times the damage and tankiness value of Chaos Warriors in that chart (ignoring some other factors like bodies to capture objectives)

In the Painbringers vs Twinsouls comparison,  notice that Painbringers are still cheaper, and that high saves (2+/3+) with rerolling saves are way way more effective in reducing Twinsouls damage output than Painbringers. We don't know if the generic CA of rerolling save rolls of 1 stay, but if it stay, Twinsouls cannot even damage opponent with 2+ save (as rerolling gives them 1/36 chance of being hurt) while Painbringers get a good chance of still do something. Also Twinsouls are better defending vs -2 rend or MW, while Painbringers are better defending vs no rend and -1 rend. Except vs shooting, because Painbringers only reroll save rolls in mele, while Twinsouls got an additional 5+ aftersave vs shooting half the time.

Now that I think of it, maybe that is why Painbringers are seen as unworthy right now but Twinsouls are seen as working well, because their defense work vs shooting in a shooting meta.

Both Chaos Warriors built in reroll saves (while 10+ models) and Chaos Sorcerer Lord Oracular Visions (free buff each turn that make you reroll saves) work vs shooting. This make Painbringers clearly loose the comparison as a worthy anvil.

Hey, I don't think I was clear enough in my previous post

You're totally right that, at the moment, Painbringers don't have a place because they're too expensive compared to warriors and don't do as much as twinsouls who are only a little more expensive. 

You're also totally right that, currently, buffing painbringers up to be that much better than warriors is a much higher investment. Both Nobles of Excess and a Lord of Pain just to buff these rather overcosted models? No thanks.

My point was that, if Painbringers come down by a significant margin, this all changes. That's doubly so if the LoP comes down to his original 120 points. 

Imagine if the Painbringers were 110 points - only 20 more than warriors. As we've seen, they're a considerably better recipient of buffs. While the Lord of Pain and Nobles of Excess together are more pricey than just a Sorcerer lord, they would no longer be tax - who wouldn't want to put down a battalion that gives you a single drop of all of your battleline and heavy hitters at once, or spend some points on a hero that would make two actually good units battleline (and we have access to a host that could make him the general but give command traits to another)? 

My point was more to show the potential of Painbringers if they just got a points drop. Their average damage is actually really good for our chaos warrior equivalent (compare it to blood warriors especially), we're just priced too highly

So at the moment I'm optimistic about Painbringers because I see they have potential within their warscroll and within the book. They will likely always be a worse screen than chaos warriors, or dedicate tarpit, but in general will be better because they have a bite, and a tarpit usually needs to win a fight (I'm not sure if anyone has used mass chaos warriors, but they usually end up like a speed bump - they keep something in place for a few turns and die without leaving significant damage).

[Yoid]

1 hour ago, Enoby said:

Hey, I don't think I was clear enough in my previous post

You're totally right that, at the moment, Painbringers don't have a place because they're too expensive compared to warriors and don't do as much as twinsouls who are only a little more expensive. 

You're also totally right that, currently, buffing painbringers up to be that much better than warriors is a much higher investment. Both Nobles of Excess and a Lord of Pain just to buff these rather overcosted models? No thanks.

My point was that, if Painbringers come down by a significant margin, this all changes. That's doubly so if the LoP comes down to his original 120 points. 

Imagine if the Painbringers were 110 points - only 20 more than warriors. As we've seen, they're a considerably better recipient of buffs. While the Lord of Pain and Nobles of Excess together are more pricey than just a Sorcerer lord, they would no longer be tax - who wouldn't want to put down a battalion that gives you a single drop of all of your battleline and heavy hitters at once, or spend some points on a hero that would make two actually good units battleline (and we have access to a host that could make him the general but give command traits to another)? 

My point was more to show the potential of Painbringers if they just got a points drop. Their average damage is actually really good for our chaos warrior equivalent (compare it to blood warriors especially), we're just priced too highly

So at the moment I'm optimistic about Painbringers because I see they have potential within their warscroll and within the book. They will likely always be a worse screen than chaos warriors, or dedicate tarpit, but in general will be better because they have a bite, and a tarpit usually needs to win a fight (I'm not sure if anyone has used mass chaos warriors, but they usually end up like a speed bump - they keep something in place for a few turns and die without leaving significant damage).

My point was something similar, just in a negative way instead of a positive. I mean, my point on exposing Painbringers weaknesses while compared to Chaos Warriors is to justify a bigger point drop in them. Realistically they gonna go down 10 to 20pts but that is not enough because they aren't that good compared to other choices, and that is something to keep in mind while talking about their potential in a positive way, otherwise there is the risk of finding them "good enough" or "almost there" and GW interpreting that as "a 10pts - 20pts drop will suffice".

It would be different if somehow StD didn't exist, because then we would simply accept "Slaanesh is designed to have overcosted anvils and cheap *otherthings*", but that is not the case.

[Enoby]

6 hours ago, Yoid said:

My point was something similar, just in a negative way instead of a positive. I mean, my point on exposing Painbringers weaknesses while compared to Chaos Warriors is to justify a bigger point drop in them. Realistically they gonna go down 10 to 20pts but that is not enough because they aren't that good compared to other choices, and that is something to keep in mind while talking about their potential in a positive way, otherwise there is the risk of finding them "good enough" or "almost there" and GW interpreting that as "a 10pts - 20pts drop will suffice".

It would be different if somehow StD didn't exist, because then we would simply accept "Slaanesh is designed to have overcosted anvils and cheap *otherthings*", but that is not the case.

 

**Edit** This is apparently my 666th post on this thread

Ah I get you. I think Painbringers need to come down 40 points do be optimal; at 100 I think they'd be a little too cheap, but at 110 I'd love to try relatively large numbers of them. I agree that at 130 or 140 it still wouldn't feel enough - I'd be willing to give them a chance at 120 though.

My preferred points for the footsloggers would be 

Painbringers: 110 (-40)

Twinsouls: 150 (-20)

Lord of Pain: 120 (-30)

Blissbarbs: 130 (-30)

To show the difference, I'll use this suggested list from a Slaanesh tournament player revolving around Nobles of Excess:

Current points

Lord of Pain (150)

Syll'Esske (200)

Keeper of Secrets (340)

10x Twinsouls (340)

10× Twinsouls (340)

5× Myrmadesh (150)

5× Myrmadesh (150)

11× Blissbarbs (160)

Nobles of Excess (140)

1970/200

My preferred points

Lord of Pain (120)

Syll'Esske (200)

Keeper of Secrets (340)

10× Twinsouls (300)

10× Twinsouls (300)

5× Myrmadesh (110)

5× Myrmadesh (100)

11× Blissbarbs (130)

Nobles of Excess (140)

1750/2000 (saving of 220 points)

(Enough for a combination of another 10 Myrmadesh, 5 Twinsouls, another caster, or an extra command point, or some endless spells)

I think these suggested points decreases would massively help the army, making it feel like we have much more choice during list building. 

Edited May 17, 2021 by Enoby

[Thor]

On 5/16/2021 at 4:09 PM, Enoby said:

I think daemons and mortals have their good and bad points, and you would be able to stick with daemons if you'd prefer

From my experience, the winners with daemons are the Kos, Contorted Epitome, the Masque, and I've heard others say they really like exalted chariots. That said, daemonttes, seekers, and fiends can find a place, especially with summoning (as can the infernal enrapturess if you summon her when needed).

I personally prefer the mortals, and in a competitive sense especially Glutos and the Slickblades. The big difference is that the mortals are more expensive points wise (and for some I would say too expensive) but usually more durable saves-wise and with quite a few mortal wound saves. I'd recommend chaos warriors for cheap battleline but you can also use daemonettes, who are more deadly and faster (though fold more easily).

On the new units, the stars at their current points are Glutos (often an MVP), Slickblade seekers (esp in Seeker Cavalcade), and Sigvald (in the Lurid haze to teleport him, esp with Keeper backup) - others have had good luck with the blissbarb seekers too. The units I think have a high potential but are currently a bit overcosted are blissbarb archers, the shardspeaker, and especially twinsouls and painbringers. Twinsouls are a personal favourite as they put out some really good damage, they just die a bit too quickly for them to be worth their 170 points; at 140 they would be a steal. Painbringers, if they come down to 120 or even 110 will be much better than Chaos Warriors for battleline. 

As for hosts and artefacts, I personally think Lurid Haze is best, not only for their teleport with Sigvald, but also for their unique command ability. When receiving an extra artefact, it's almost always better going for the Rod of Misrule to keep CP generation high.

While there's quite a bit of negative talk about the battletome, and some of it is justified (especially points), I've had a load of fun with this battletome and how experimental you can be with it. There's not much direct obvious synergy (as in "X unit buffs Y with +1 to hit") but the tactics come from the gameplay, with clever positioning and making up for weaknesses in some units with others and summoning. It's a very tricky army to play with little room for mistakes, but it's also very rewarding and I think makes me feel like I'm making tactical positions rather than just finding out the best way to buff unit Y. 

---

@pnkdth I agree with you that I've seen most people be pretty meh about Gravelords, including (like our book), some people deciding against picking up the army because of it.

It's a shame, but with our book, the new Lumineth stuff, and the Vampires, I think they're making a move to power down AoS3, which I don't mind, but it feels like they need to rerelease a lot of battletomes quickly to make sure the new battletomes don't feel 'meh' compared to the old. 

I also agree with you that the book is very fun. It's weird because I totally understand the criticism that the book is boring or that there just isn't enough synergy, and it can be frustrating making lists due to the current points and because there's not much inspiration from the rules (e.g. no special buffs for a unit that encourages a full army of it). But at the same time, I am enjoying playing this army so much more than the 2019 book or Slaves to Darkness (which has considerably more synergy but just doesn't feel right). I've played Lumineth, and Lumineth is probably a better quality book, but tbh I think they're the exception rather than the rule when it comes to GW's love and attention.

If I were to take a guess with how GW usually goes about these things, I reckon that Kragnos will be the big winner here. Ever other title character in Broken Realms has been the winner, so I can't see that stopping now.

My prediction:

Kroak and the twins clash in Ghur, with both putting up a fight and some wins and losses, but the twins begin to win. Then, as chaos seems to be taking hold, Kragnos charges forward and beats the twins and Kroak, cementing Destruction as the king of this upcoming edition. 

This could be totally fine if written well. The last thing we want is standard GW greater daemon writing where they go "This daemon is really super strong we promise" only for it to get smacked around every time it shows up to show how strong another character is. But if all characters make gains and show their strength, then the ultimate winner is less important. 

 

 

Thanks a lot for the reply, it's helped me a ton figuring out the army. and with much dilberation and thought, i think ive got a better grasp of the army now. definitly seems like a finesse army now. with no obvious powerplays or abusable mechanics. 

Ive become hooked on Sigvald, Glutos, and playing atleast 2 shooting units. i think understanding how to generate the large amounts of DP whilst focusing on objectives will be key to victory. 

[Enoby]

2 hours ago, Thor said:

Thanks a lot for the reply, it's helped me a ton figuring out the army. and with much dilberation and thought, i think ive got a better grasp of the army now. definitly seems like a finesse army now. with no obvious powerplays or abusable mechanics. 

Ive become hooked on Sigvald, Glutos, and playing atleast 2 shooting units. i think understanding how to generate the large amounts of DP whilst focusing on objectives will be key to victory. 

No problem It's definitely a difficult army - no doubt there - but you always learn something when you play, regardless of if you win or lose. Because we have such a wide range of models and potential summons, there'll be a lot of times where you think "oh that didn't work, but maybe this will" and you can try it and see what did and didn't work about it. 

For example I tried a list of pretty much only Twinsouls with Glutos and a LOP to make them battleline. The twinsouls did a hell of a lot of damage, but I was too light on bodies to survive a big hit, and was too slow to threaten the opponent. In the future I'll make sure to bring more screens and split the twinsouls into smaller units so they can spread their threat around. 

Thankfully Sigvald and Glutos are both good, with Glutos being a fantastic distraction for some armies who waste their entire turn trying to kill him. Sigvald is great in Lurid Haze. 

One thing to say about our army is, from the experience I've had, it really helps to have a variety of units. Too many shooters and you can't capture objectives properly, too many footsloggers and you can't provide enough threat, too much cavalry and you struggle to cap objectives. While we could use a points drop, the core of the army is fun to use, it just requires experimentation and, due to a lack of direct synergy or buffs, you end up doing best with a varied list.