AoS 2 - Hedonites of Slaanesh Discussion

[Overread]

Lore is never manifest on the table. Heck Greater Demons spent almost all of Old World being only twice the height of a human (and then only just) and being way smaller than a giant. Yet lore wise they were vast beasts and capable of using incredible levels of power. 

AoS has literal gods on the table, which at the scales we play, even accounting for some creative concept of "one model equals 100 in reality"; our forces are still way too small. Nagash on the table should sweep anything that isn't a God on the other side away in a single hand wave. 

 

I do agree the Twins feel a touch weaker, but at the same time I think its so that they have cheap points and might pair up well; or functionally work well fitting into more armies without overshadowing Keepers. If anything one surprise is that they don't really have paired up rules; but then again that would likely make them feel like you'd have to always take both (to get their maximum point value) rather than giving you the option and choice to only take one or the other.

[LeonBox]

6 minutes ago, Overread said:

Lore is never manifest on the table. Heck Greater Demons spent almost all of Old World being only twice the height of a human (and then only just) and being way smaller than a giant. Yet lore wise they were vast beasts and capable of using incredible levels of power. 

AoS has literal gods on the table, which at the scales we play, even accounting for some creative concept of "one model equals 100 in reality"; our forces are still way too small. Nagash on the table should sweep anything that isn't a God on the other side away in a single hand wave. 

Absolutely. But I still find it utterly baffling that this "reflection of Slaanesh's godly arcane power" can't be a two-cast wizard (or at least one with some thematic way to get casting bonuses, à la the new Warsong Revenant). 

[Overread]

I will agree, 2 spells per turn at least would fit giving that character access to pretty much every Slaanesh spell there is. Having a huge toolbox but perhaps only getting to actually use a small number of actual spells per game is strange. Then again having a cheaper wizard who can fit any wizard role (support, debuff, attack) isn't bad either. A lot is going to come down to what points these two have. 

[Carnith]

I don't end up buying the whole "this book is designed for third!" because then what of the other 3 books? Were they not designed for third edition? If not, why just this one? Kind of crappy to just change design plans from 2nd with 3 books, to 3rd with the last. And if the others are designed for third in mind, then they clearly felt everything released was in line with it, including 600 point morathi. 

The twins needed some sort of buff if the other existed on the field. How cool would it be if Synessa gained bonuses to cast and additional spells if it's sibling was there. And Dexcessa could have +2 attacks or perhaps a feel no pain. Or imagine that they end up sharing a life pool and buffs. 

Overall, I just feel that we continue to get uninspiring writers. Though I am glad Dexcessa didn't get a +1 bravery buff.

[Carnith]

4 minutes ago, Overread said:

I will agree, 2 spells per turn at least would fit giving that character access to pretty much every Slaanesh spell there is. Having a huge toolbox but perhaps only getting to actually use a small number of actual spells per game is strange. Then again having a cheaper wizard who can fit any wizard role (support, debuff, attack) isn't bad either. A lot is going to come down to what points these two have. 

We know the points. 260 and 280. I want to say Dexcessa has 280.

[Overread]

Just now, Carnith said:

The twins needed some sort of buff if the other existed on the field. How cool would it be if Synessa gained bonuses to cast and additional spells if it's sibling was there. And Dexcessa could have +2 attacks or perhaps a feel no pain. Or imagine that they end up sharing a life pool and buffs. 

Overall, I just feel that we continue to get uninspiring writers. Though I am glad Dexcessa didn't get a +1 bravery buff.

Thing is if you give them abilities which only work when the other is on the field, then the point cost for them has to include those abilities as well. At which point there's the problem that whenever you take just one, you are paying for abilities that you cannot use. It starts to remove the choice of taking one alone and makes it a default "non-option" and makes the choice of "take both" into the default answer. 

The only way they could do it is if taking both came at a different point cost to gain the joint abilities; but that's a bit fiddly and AoS has never really gone in for granular unit based point upgrades like that. 

[Carnith]

Just now, Overread said:

Thing is if you give them abilities which only work when the other is on the field, then the point cost for them has to include those abilities as well. At which point there's the problem that whenever you take just one, you are paying for abilities that you cannot use. It starts to remove the choice of taking one alone and makes it a default "non-option" and makes the choice of "take both" into the default answer. 

The only way they could do it is if taking both came at a different point cost to gain the joint abilities; but that's a bit fiddly and AoS has never really gone in for granular unit based point upgrades like that. 

You can make it a battalion then that includes the two of them, granted, that might be going away, but it was an option.

[Overread]

2 minutes ago, Carnith said:

We know the points. 260 and 280. I want to say Dexcessa has 280.

Ahh I've not been keeping up. If those are accurate then they are probably about where I'd guess them. Not the power-house of a keeper, but an average regular leader point cost at the upper end. Keeping in mind our cheapest is a viceleader at 130

[Jaskier]

Their points are 260 and 280 respectively, I don't recall which is which exactly but I'd assume Dexcessa is the more expensive one. 

Now that we have the full warscrolls, Synessa feels even more gimmicky than she already did - unlimited cast range for two mediocre spells isn't exciting at all. Being able to use our short ranged healing spells, Slothful Stupor, Hysterical Frenzy, etc from afar would have been cool, despite how unreliable a 1 cast no-bonus wizard is in today's meta, but alas. Further, once you realize she gets no casting bonuses or extra casts to actually capitalize on that immense utility, it raises the legitimate question of what the idea was behind her - especially given how many casting and unbinding bonuses and raw number of casts/unbinds there are in today's metagame.

It's so blindingly obvious she is hamstrung by being in the price bracket that she's in; she'd be a decent wizard rather than a limited, gimmicky one if they'd scaled her up to the 400ish point mark and given her at least an extra cast/unbind and +1 to those rolls. As it stands, her ranged attack, infinite range command ability, decent melee stats, solid defensive profile and the usual Locus are all fine reasons to run her, but if you actually want a decent caster, look elsewhere. As an aside, that ranged profile is nasty, and that alone with the unlimited range command makes her worth taking in a Seeker Cavalcade list. 260 points looks to be perfectly fine for her, but man, what a waste of potential it is to not give us a good caster for a change.

Dexcessa has a much simpler role and thus is definitely the 'easier' one to see the value of, even if Synessa arguably has the better application with the ranged mortal wounds and infinite range command ability (which, as an Invaders player, I can tell you is an incredible ability.) You ideally want her charging into something weak and isolated on turn one to start powering her up immediately; keep a CP handy (or use her free one) for the automatic 6" run and you've got a roughly 25.5" effective threat range, which means she easily keeps up with Seeker Cavalcade bombs (who she has good synergy with...the Seekers, anyway.)

Alternatively, protect her with something slower like Fiends and aim for a turn two charge; the free command on a Daemon unit mostly looks like a cheap way to use the Lurid Haze command on herself or a nearby unit currently, but we'll see how 3.0 affects that. She's decently tough all things considered with an enormous threat range, and if she gets a charge on turn one then she'll scale up to a terrifying level if she's not dealt with. Pair her with a Keeper (summoned or not) and you've got yourself a pretty terrifying duo. 

Dexcessa definitely has less question marks/weird choices to her design than Synessa, but again, it would have been nice if she was at least a one cast Wizard like most of our other daemon heroes. That's just me though, Dexcessa definitely looks like a cool, fun unit to use with rules that feel fun and thematic, whereas Synessa's feel arbitrarily limiting, even if I actually think Synessa might be the more competitive one depending on how generic commands shake out in 3.0 - an unlimited range command that isn't keyword locked could have some incredible applications for us. 

In any case...I think both are a fair bit more competitive than many would believe. I think they should have been scaled up in power even just mildly so Synessa in particular didn't feel like an oddly 'gimped' choice in terms of execution of her specialty, but with full clarity and acceptance I'm very much back on the day-one train for these two. Both will fit very nicely into many of my tournament lists, and even for funsies, getting a fully powered up Dexcessa or unleashing a turn one Pavane on Sevirith/Inspiring a unit from across the table that my opponent thought was sure to flee will be my main goals. It sucks that Synessa isn't a decent caster, but oh well. 

@Enoby sorry to be a bother but you mentioned the Twins have shared stuff like a command ability they can use, do we have any more news on that? 

Edited May 29, 2021 by Jaskier

[LeonBox]

Upon reflection it's probably best that Synessa didn't get unlimited-range Slothful Stupor; that would be extremely feelsbad for our opponents and precisely the kind of interaction for which LRL is frequently criticised. Unlimited-range Pavane is actually very nice as I believe that spell is usually 6" and almost never sees use (at least not in my lists) because the only thing that would conceivably use it is always going to take a spell from the Greater Daemon lore. 

As it is, this is the perfect spell to cast on LRL fox archers. Rolling 24 dice and dealing MWs on 5s to those guys is going to feel very, very good indeed. 

[TimeToWaste85]

I haven’t seen anyone comment how the twins don’t degrade as they take damage...they’re ALWAYS at full power. 

[Enoby]

I still understand why people are disappointed, and I do agree that the twins could have been better and should be more powerful for their lore (Synessa should have been no doubt a double caster - absolutely crazy that they're not), but the more I look at them the more I warm to them.

They may not be what I hoped for, but they're what we've got and I think they may have some considerably more interesting plays in AoS 3. We have pretty decent CP generation, and I'm guessing that we're going to get more in AoS 3 with more interesting generic command abilities. I think Synessa could find their niche here if there are some great generic CAs they can use anywhere. I find it especially interesting that they mentioned command abilities that affect more than one unit, which I don't think we currently have access to. 

6 minutes ago, Jaskier said:

@Enoby sorry to be a bother but you mentioned the Twins have shared stuff like a command ability they can use, do we have any more news on that? 

Unfortunately I have no more info The leak I got this info from was in broken English so I think something got lost in translation

7 minutes ago, Jaskier said:

In any case...I think both are a fair bit more competitive than many would believe. I think they should have been scaled up in power even just mildly so Synessa in particular didn't feel like an oddly 'gimped' choice in terms of execution of her specialty, but with full clarity and acceptance I'm very much back on the day-one train for these two. Both will fit very nicely into many of my tournament lists, and even for funsies, getting a fully powered up Dexcessa or unleashing a turn one Pavane on Sevirith/Inspiring a unit from across the table that my opponent thought was sure to flee will be my main goals. It sucks that Synessa isn't a decent caster, but oh well. 

I agree with this. I think both twins are better than some are giving them credit for, though I totally agree that it sucks that Synessa is a poor caster. At least they have effective 30" threat range on what is a pretty brutal shooting attack. On some units this will be an almost guaranteed d6 mortal wounds, which is great for getting rid of most casters.

10 minutes ago, LeonBox said:

Upon reflection it's probably best that Synessa didn't get unlimited-range Slothful Stupor; that would be extremely feelsbad for our opponents and precisely the kind of interaction for which LRL is frequently criticised. Unlimited-range Pavane is actually very nice as I believe that spell is usually 6" and almost never sees use (at least not in my lists) because the only thing that would conceivably use it is always going to take a spell from the Greater Daemon lore. 

As it is, this is the perfect spell to cast on LRL fox archers. Rolling 24 dice and dealing MWs on 5s to those guys is going to feel very, very good indeed. 

Yeah, I was thinking on this and I agree. I think that at first it sounded like a really good option, but if we have a 50% chance to shut down nearly any hero without a chance to unbind then that is going to be no fun for an opponent. 

I think I'd have really loved this warscroll with two casts - lots of potential for toolbox plays. I'd be semi tempted to try run cogs. 

I'm hoping to play them both tomorrow to get a feel for them on the battlefield.  

[Jaskier]

18 minutes ago, LeonBox said:

Upon reflection it's probably best that Synessa didn't get unlimited-range Slothful Stupor; that would be extremely feelsbad for our opponents and precisely the kind of interaction for which LRL is frequently criticised. Unlimited-range Pavane is actually very nice as I believe that spell is usually 6" and almost never sees use (at least not in my lists) because the only thing that would conceivably use it is always going to take a spell from the Greater Daemon lore. 

As it is, this is the perfect spell to cast on LRL fox archers. Rolling 24 dice and dealing MWs on 5s to those guys is going to feel very, very good indeed. 

This is the thing though, as funny as it would be to cast Pavane on a Fox - and I really want to see it happen - that converts to an average of 8 mortal wounds, for 5 inflicted after negation rolls. Even against something like a Keeper, it averages roughly 5 mortal wounds. Those are the absolute best case scenarios for Pavane, and it's cast on a 7. It's neat, but especially on a caster with no bonuses, it's not going to set the world on fire by any stretch. Keep in mind that you're completely wasting Synessa if you try to keep her back out of unbind range, especially if she fails her casting roll, and you're probably not getting that spell off against your average Lumineth list. Her unlimited range on two spells gimmick unfortunately just feels really weak. 

And even on Slothful Stupor, again, if you're out of unbind range then you're banking on your zero bonus wizard getting a 7+ spell off, and staying out of unbind range may also mean you're not taking advantage of her Locus, ranged attack, etc. It'd still be powerful for obvious reasons, but it'd be unreliable at best. 

Edited May 29, 2021 by Jaskier

[Enoby]

4 minutes ago, Jaskier said:

And even on Slothful Stupor, again, if you're out of unbind range then you're banking on your zero bonus wizard getting a 7+ spell off, and staying out of unbind range may also mean you're not taking advantage of her Locus, ranged attack, etc. It'd still be powerful for obvious reasons, but it'd be unreliable at best. 

I think that would almost make it more of a problem; if you could use Synessa to sit right at the back and have a 50% chance to do shut them down or do nothing, it would be very sink of swim which is almost more frustrating as it has some hope attached to it. 

I don't think they'd be too powerful, but I think this would be very frustrating for both players. 

[Jaskier]

That's what I mean though, it'd be too unreliable to waste a 260 point model on, so then at least there'd be unbind potential assuming you pushed her forward so she could contribute in other ways. 

I'd honestly have just rathered they did away with the unlimited range thing and just made her cast like a Contorted Epitome, because her casting rules currently are too weak precisely because they're tied to a really restrictive gimmick that doesn't look useful at all. They had a cool idea but forgot to put it on something that could actually take advantage of it. 

Edited May 29, 2021 by Jaskier

[Enoby]

Just now, Jaskier said:

That's what I mean though, it'd be too unreliable to waste a 260 point model on, so then at least there'd be unbind potential assuming you pushed her forward so she could contribute in other ways. 

I'd honestly have just rathered they did away with the unlimited range thing and just made her cast like a Contorted Epitome, because her casting rules currently are too weak because they're tied to a really restrictive gimmick that doesn't look useful at all. 

No I agree, I was just saying it wouldn't be good - but it would be even worse of an experience because it'd totally rely on chance, and not even really a reliable chance. Kind of similar if there was an ability that instant killed a model at range on an unmodifiable 6 - it would be a bad rule because too much relies on luck, even if it realistically wouldn't be too strong.

 

I am curious about their command related abilities, mind. Not so much now, but for AoS 3

[Jaskier]

Yeah I see what you mean. Hopefully they change her, because I actually quite like how Dexcessa functions, whereas Synessa feels like a bit of a botched attempt at a new way to use a wizard. 

I'm really hopeful that shared command ability and unique spell (for Synessa presumably) are real, as it would mean there's an extra page of Slaanesh rules besides them and the battalion. 

[Enoby]

3 hours ago, AngryPanda said:

A couple weeks ago I stated a theory of mine that at least one or more writers either feel salty about Slaanesh’s first release, aren’t fans of the army or simply don’t like them, or both. I took a guess from the numerous rumors that there was drama/debate behind the scenes when releasing our somewhat recent disappointment of a battletome, and this confirms it somewhat more so. However, I feel that Dexcessa is actually pretty decent, and can be considered a cheaper replacement to a KoS or a more reliable Sigvald. 

Yeah, I think you may be onto something here. I don't know if it was malice so much as whoever got to right the Slaanesh book just wasn't a fan of Slaanesh. Not even disliking them, but just don't care much either way and so couldn't think of much inspiration. 

I've said it a few times, but I don't think our rules are bad. I think we have some good play and most of the issue is the points. I've really enjoyed games with the book far more than when I played our first book, Slaves to Darkness, or certainly Blades of Khorne.

But at the same time, I don't feel the book or warscrolls were a work of passion. Whether it was due to being rushed or fear of our first battletome, I think our battletome ended up being less than it could have been. While I joke about writing the Slaanesh rules myself, in a way I think I could have written a more exciting battletome even if the balance was awful. Whereas I think our current one is 'serviceable' - someone wrote it but didn't care loads for our lore. 

I think the twins are actually on the more creative end, even if they're not fantastic or how we would have wanted them, but again they don't "wow". This could well be a more AoS 3 design considering all of the rules in BR Kragnos, but again it feels like a fan would have created something the rest of the fanbase would have enjoyed more.

I do try and keep positive - not only do I think it's generally a healthier mindset for things you can't immediately change, but I also think it's easy to throw the baby out with the bathwater and declare "everything is trash" which I see a lot of people on Twitter and Discord do without even really reading the scroll properly. But I can't deny that it's disappointing that our Slaanesh release was close to perfect before the rules - there was loads of hype for the models and lore, and even when we found out depravity had changed for the better, but a lot of that fell off when the points were revealed and the warscrolls were just okay (sans a couple on either end of the spectrum). 

I suppose it's sad because Slaanesh had the opportunity to become really popular, I think. I saw a lot of hype that I think fizzled out with the reveal of the rules and I think this might have crippled the popularity of the army, and the chance we see things in the future. My worry is that the Hedonite sales did not meet expectations, and instead of looking at why, GW will just give up on the army like before.   

[TimeToWaste85]

Chronomatic Cogs are pretty close to a requirement in a Slaanesh list. This twin gets use out of something we were already running with. Granted, most of the time we wanted the speed...but now both sides of cogs are useful for us. Not going to lie, nuking the hyper-fox from all the way across the board then doing something like shutting down the mountain cow...as many Luminoth players seem to be out there, I can see us royally pissing off the pointy ears. 

[Jaskier]

1 hour ago, TimeToWaste85 said:

Chronomatic Cogs are pretty close to a requirement in a Slaanesh list. This twin gets use out of something we were already running with. Granted, most of the time we wanted the speed...but now both sides of cogs are useful for us. Not going to lie, nuking the hyper-fox from all the way across the board then doing something like shutting down the mountain cow...as many Luminoth players seem to be out there, I can see us royally pissing off the pointy ears. 

Being perfectly honest, I've never once used Cogs in a tournament game with Slaanesh. I find they're just not necessary, but yeah, a list built around Synessa would probably want them handy. 

[LeonBox]

2 hours ago, Jaskier said:

Being perfectly honest, I've never once used Cogs in a tournament game with Slaanesh. I find they're just not necessary, but yeah, a list built around Synessa would probably want them handy. 

I've used them a fair bit in the past (useful for guaranteed turn 1 charges) but we're already so fast that they're often not necessary. They will be fantastic with Synessa, though. 

[Yoid]

The warscrolls are not that bad, im gonna feel good playing them, but there are many problems with how they ended.

First problem, the lore don't match the warscrolls. You can say whathever you want about them being born from a chained diminished god. But that is not how the mortals reacted to it in the story. Remember they were so delight they gathered all around the mass of the newborn, lots of them dying from pure bliss. They protected this form with zeal as if it were the reborn of they long lost god, this was depicted both in Broken Realms and in some of the short stories in-between. In the end they are quite small (10 wounds no caster and 9 wounds single caster, 280 and 260pts). Now I can see how they maybe tough of "Well, but together is 540pts for 19 wounds and a single caster" I still don't get the single caster thing... but well. Certainly they don't degrade, so you got to kill 9-10 wounds from one of them to effectively degrade this twin-form of the god.

Then, I can see what they tried to do with each of the twins, and I feel good about playing them because not everything was poorly done. But is like if they miss at the end of every one of their designs, like needing an extra something that is not there.

They dosn't have the Greater Daemon keyword, so no good locus for them. What were they thinking?

They got better survability than people think 10-9 wounds on a 4+ with an innate -1 to be hit is not bad. They don't degrade with damage in any shape or form. Almost there, but Dexcessa is not a caster and Synessa is a single caster, so you cannot self-heal with them.

The damage output seems decent on both. Dexcessa hit hard as soon as you start stacking attacks, but forcing you to start combat turn one is bad. I guess you can charge into a screen taking advantage of retreat and charge and fly in the next turn. Synessa is a cannon of mortal wounds, im glad with that, I always felt like Slaanesh can use some kind of artillery piece. 1/6 chance of missing and 1d3-1d6 MW is not that bad, but it is an almost there again. Why not simply to deal 1d6MW without any more complexity? Won't be that bad, you can still roll a 1 and the attack dosn't have oppresive range. Speaking of wich, Synessa got 3 attacks with the talons and Dexcessa only 2... uh... unnecesary nerf to Dexcessa, they were afraid of her scaling with too much extra attacks, but feels like an "almost there" again.

The casting... they completely missed the point. Dexcessa should be a single caster just for the purpose of self-healing and Synessa a double caster (or a single caster that always cast with 10 instead of rolling the dice, something like that). She should have infinite range in every spell and not just two.

On the other hand, they seem clearly design to play around CAs and not spells. Both abilities are really good, free CA each turn and unlimited range in CAs. I know we still got to see the new edition, but they are clearly design with new edition in mind and to exploit CAs gimicks.

Dexcessa is a natural distraction carnifex, if you dont deal with her in the early turns when she is weak she become a murder-monster, but is not such a big of a threat to justify hard focusing her in the beggining, can work well if you unleash her as an ever-scaling dangerous distraction. Since she dosn't degrade and cannot be tar-pit, you got no way to diminish her unless you fully comit to killing the whole character.

Synessa is... way worst. You gonna miss her spell more than half the times due to lack of +to cast and the meta spell-doms unbinding. She is not a bad cannon (potential 1d6 ranged MW wounds, in a 12 movement + 18 range = 30 range threat) but cost way too much for that.

Ok one thing I just realize that make Synessa more viable. The staff do not target or use the attack sequence at all. I was gonna say "If you could use the 3 attacks of the talons every turn and then retreat to not be forced into shooting that enemy similar to Dexcessa rule of retreat and charge" But the staff don't work like a missile weapon at all. You pick 1 enemy unit within range and visible, so you can shoot out of your own combat Rules As Writen. You cannot retreat and shoot tho, but you can fight with the talons and still shoot other things in other places meanwhile. Not that bad damage output for her then.

If the ladies don't die in the last turns of the game they gonna show good utility. Non-degrading 12 move with flying may work to grab some late-time objectives. Even with 1-2 wounds left they can deal a good amount of damage to clear a place (especially Dexcessa in late turns) and move to importan areas. Free CA or unlimited range CA may work to change some run rolls into 6s, unless that CA is no longer in 3.0.

Last note about Synessa. A 3.0 CA that give +1 to cast or +1 to number of spells cast can really improve her. Higly doubtful, but who knows.

Edit: Dexcessa described as a Greater Daemon in today WarCom article, despite not being a Greater Daemon in the warscroll...

Edited May 29, 2021 by Yoid

[LeonBox]

 

31 minutes ago, Yoid said:

Last note about Synessa. A 3.0 CA that give +1 to cast or +1 to number of spells cast can really improve her. Higly doubtful, but who knows.

Is there *any* chance at all that 3.0 will feature any sort of rework to basic Hedonite mechanics? It seems unlikely given how recently our book came out, but  something like "spend [x] DPs for +1 to cast" would be really awesome. 

[Yoid]

40 minutes ago, LeonBox said:

 

Is there *any* chance at all that 3.0 will feature any sort of rework to basic Hedonite mechanics? It seems unlikely given how recently our book came out, but  something like "spend [x] DPs for +1 to cast" would be really awesome. 

I don't think so. There is a 1 in 1 million chance the new GHB come with updated allegiance abilities for everyone like it used to do with every army that have no battletome, but i don't think so because they keep saying that our current battletomes wll be 100% compatible with 3.0.

The new GHB will update every army point cost for 3.0, but maybe not us because we are too recently updated. With such a massive game-change, they may do the jump and update every allegiance ability that dosn't fit the new rules. Probably not.

[LeonBox]

I've just noticed as well that despite Dexcessa wielding the "Scourge of Slaanesh" (which I assume is a whip), it actually seems to be the Synessa model that has anything resembling such a weapon. 

Dexcessa 

Synessa, with what looks like the whip.