AoS 2 - Legion of Grief discussion

[Thalassic Monstrosity]

1 hour ago, AverageBoss said:

That would be because NH is a very low powerlevel book. It not only fairs poorly against Grand Host and Sacrament, but almost every other 2.0 and several 1.0 battletomes as well.

Really? Is that a new development? I' gotten the impression the opposite was true.

But I DO live under a rock, so...

[Undeadly]

1 hour ago, Thalassic Monstrosity said:

Really? Is that a new development? I' gotten the impression the opposite was true.

But I DO live under a rock, so...

Problem is, Nighthaunt are kind of a gambling faction. Sometimes, you roll perfect 10's for charging and roll nothing but 4's for saves, and Nighthaunt seem OP as hell. Other times, the inverse is true, and we get our ethereal butts kicked.

[Qrow]

4 hours ago, Undeadly said:

Problem is, Nighthaunt are kind of a gambling faction. Sometimes, you roll perfect 10's for charging and roll nothing but 4's for saves, and Nighthaunt seem OP as hell. Other times, the inverse is true, and we get our ethereal butts kicked.

Pretty much sums it up. I also get frustrated because on the rare occasion that you roll a 10+ and it actually matters, it has more to do with luck than it does skill or planning. A few of my opponents have gotten very salty and blamed their loses solely on me rolling extremely well, which is hard to argue against when part of your army revolves around having hot dice.

Another problem is that we dont have many survivable heroes; while an unrendable 4+ is great, 240 points for a 7 wound hero is a very high cost. Especially now that point and click mortal wound spam is everywhere.

We also suffer from being a pre-skaven/FEC codex, I swear that re-wrote all the rules when pointing out the heroes in those books. Compare kurdoss to a skaventide verminlord and try to explain how he is anywhere near as expensive as he is.

Edited May 28, 2019 by Qrow

[SleeperAgent]

1 hour ago, Qrow said:

Pretty much sums it up. I also get frustrated because on the rare occasion that you roll a 10+ and it actually matters, it has more to do with luck than it does skill or planning. A few of my opponents have gotten very salty and blamed their loses solely on me rolling extremely well, which is hard to argue against when part of your army revolves around having hot dice.

Another problem is that we dont have many survivable heroes; while an unrendable 4+ is great, 240 points for a 7 wound hero is a very high cost. Especially now that point and click mortal wound spam is everywhere.

We also suffer from being a pre-skaven/FEC codex, I swear that re-wrote all the rules when pointing out the heroes in those books. Compare kurdoss to a skaventide verminlord and try to explain how he is anywhere near as expensive as he is.

I have been fighting this battle since day 1. Everyone says unrendable is worth the extra cost. Im willing to just give up ethereal to cut the cost in half. 

Sidenote, people say Ethereal is so powerful and is included in the cost, ok then how about Ethereal Amulet is removed from the artefacts? Im tired of people who get 3+ saves taking it and mystic shielding. 

[Qrow]

14 minutes ago, SleeperAgent said:

I have been fighting this battle since day 1. Everyone says unrendable is worth the extra cost. Im willing to just give up ethereal to cut the cost in half. 

Sidenote, people say Ethereal is so powerful and is included in the cost, ok then how about Ethereal Amulet is removed from the artefacts? Im tired of people who get 3+ saves taking it and mystic shielding. 

I love ethereal myself, but its value is overstated when you only have 7 wounds. 7 wound mean you will likely lose it if you have to take 14 saves. Thats not much, and the bane of my existence the skaven warpfire cannon obliterates every one of heroes easily. I think people confuse our 7 wound heroes with their 14 wound, 3+ unrendable save with rerolling 1s; anything that big being unrendable is amazing.

Kurdoss is a particular hard point for me, more so than olynder. Olynder would be 100% worth her points with her abilities if she had more staying power, while she is weak to ranged attacks she does need to be killable somehow, but she need to be up close to get real work done and in 2000 point games she just dies first turn. But Kurdoss... no real synergy, a 1/3 chance of stealing a command point, average in combat, dies to a stiff breeze and no real 'fun' abilities, all that for 220 points? I know people that think the world of his rules, but he is not 220 points worth of anything in my opinion.

Here's hoping for a decent point drop for the nighthaunt units in GH2019, it won't help the units that need a complete reword but it may at least make some others worth taking.

Edited May 29, 2019 by Qrow

[Joseph Mackay]

12 minutes ago, SleeperAgent said:

I have been fighting this battle since day 1. Everyone says unrendable is worth the extra cost. Im willing to just give up ethereal to cut the cost in half. 

Sidenote, people say Ethereal is so powerful and is included in the cost, ok then how about Ethereal Amulet is removed from the artefacts? Im tired of people who get 3+ saves taking it and mystic shielding. 

i think Ethereal may have been asigned a points cost thats too high, hopefully thats fixed in GHB19.

as for the Malign Sorcery artefacts, it has always been my opinion that those should be restricted to Grand Allaince armies only or armies that dont yet have their own Allegience abilities. they keep getting nerfed because of the top tier armies abusing them. no one complains about a Dreadlord on Black Dragon taking Doppleganger Cloak or Ethereal Amulet

[SleeperAgent]

6 minutes ago, Qrow said:

I love ethereal myself, but its value is overstated when you only have 7 wounds. 7 wound mean you will likely lose it if you have to take 14 saves. Thats not much, and the bane of my existence the skaven warpfire cannon obliterates every one of heroes easily. I think people confuse our 7 wound heroes with their 14 wound, 3+ unrendable save with rerolling 1s; anything that big being unrendable is amazing.

Kurdoss is a particular hard point for me, more so than olynder. Olynder would be 100% worth her points with her abilities if she had more staying power, while she is weak to ranged attacks she does need to be killable somehow, but she need to be up close to get real work done and in 2000 point games she just dies first turn. But Kurdoss... no real synergy, a 1/3 chance of stealing a command point, average in combat, dies to a stiff breeze and no real 'fun' abilities, all that for 220 points? I know people that think the world of his rules, but he is not 220 points worth of anything in my opinion.

Here's hoping for a decent point drop for the nighthaunt units in GH2019, it won't help the units that need a complete reword but it may at least make some others worth taking.

I do think most of the army can be made competitive with point drops. The only unit I believe NEEDS a rework is Glaivewraith Stalkers. But I do believe that all our Frightful Touch's needs to continue on as hits on top of mortal wounds. Thats basically what every army has now. 

 

EDIT: @Joseph Mackay I would wholeheartedly get behind Malign Sorcery artefacts being grand alliance only. Day 1 I was dealing with Maw Krushas and Durthus/Treelord Ancients with ethereal. Now that every army has gotten MORE mortal wound spam than Nighthaunt started with they all take Ignax's Scales.  

Edited May 29, 2019 by SleeperAgent

[Qrow]

1 minute ago, SleeperAgent said:

I do think most of the army can be made competitive with point drops. The only unit I believe NEEDS a rework is Glaivewraith Stalkers. 

Completely agree on glaivewraith stalkers, but there are a few other that I struggle with:

Chainghasts: Currently they are 40 points a model and half their use is dependent on being close enough to another specific hero, not worth it 99% of the time when the hero is flat out better for only slightly less. But if you drop them too much they would become OP very quickly, hard to make them usable without making them abusable.

The other is our elite infantry: reapers, harridans and revenants all fight for the same role in nighthaunt, with harridans lagging behind currently. I think LoG will give harridans a home, but in nighthaunt it is still 3 units with the same role. If they diversify them slightly more it may help create a choice that isn't purely dependent on 'damaged dealt + total wounds ÷ point cost'

[Qrow]

13 minutes ago, Joseph Mackay said:

i think Ethereal may have been asigned a points cost thats too high, hopefully thats fixed in GHB19.

as for the Malign Sorcery artefacts, it has always been my opinion that those should be restricted to Grand Allaince armies only or armies that dont yet have their own Allegience abilities. they keep getting nerfed because of the top tier armies abusing them. no one complains about a Dreadlord on Black Dragon taking Doppleganger Cloak or Ethereal Amulet

Not sure if this is a universal tournament rule, but where I play you MUST take an allegiance specific artifact for each malign sorcery artifact; so if you get 3 artifact you can only take 2 allegiance and 1 MS artifacts. It used to be that the first artifact you take must be from your allegiance and then free reign with the rest, but people abused MS artifacts even then.

[Evil Bob]

I like how Chainghasts can make my opponents rethink what they are doing with their support heroes.

[Nevar]

Give me 'battleline' for Glaives and they are fixed in my opinion... otherwise they need a huge points reduction or entire reworks.

I think general point cost reductions can solve all of our issues, things like Kurdoss at 220 is only meh when his stats are how they are.  If his cost was reduced to 180 or so, then he would be a lot more attractive.  Reikenor is arguably better overall and he is cheaper than Kurdoss.

Immune to rend is less valuable than high saves in my opinion, and other factions being able to beef up their saves through terrain, spells, abilities, etc. is better than ethereal in my opinion as a lot of things that murder my ghosts have zero rend already.  Looking at your Daughters of Khaine.

But again, point cost reductions solves everything.

As to the 'role' of Bladegiests and Grimghasts... I think they are well enough seperated from each other.  Grims are made for grinding the melee, Blades are mobile hit and run specialists.  Really only the Harridans needed something, and LoG is their home I think.

[RuneBrush]

22 hours ago, Joseph Mackay said:

with Legion of Grief now a thing, from the looks of it, combining the best parts of the Legion of Nagash and Nighthaunt allegience abillities, i hope they remove Nighthaunt units from Legion of Nagash unless you run the Legion of Grief allegience.

i have a major fear that GHB19 is going to increase the points of certain Nighthaunt units (Grimghast Reapers) simply becease they werent costed with the Legion of Nagash abilities in mind. nobody runs Nighthaunt allegience (around here at least) because the units simply preform better under the Legion of Nagash allegience, and i think this is a massive problem that needs to be fixed

I'm hoping they don't remove the Nighthaunt units from Legions of Nagash armies as they plugged a hole in the Legion lists.  However as I said a while back, I think that when running in a Legion army, Grimghast Reapers should be increased in points and either have the horde bonus removed or be capped at 20 models in a unit.  Both would work thematically and from a game perspective.  Generically increasing the cost of Grimghasts would be detrimental to people running Nighthaunt allegiance.

2 hours ago, Nevar said:

Give me 'battleline' for Glaives and they are fixed in my opinion... otherwise they need a huge points reduction or entire reworks.

Never thought of that - genius idea!  Would love to see it come in as a "Battleline if the General is a Nighthaunt Hero" as this would also allow them to be run as Battleline in a Legion of Grief army too.

[RuneBrush]

So I've just looked at the collection of Nighthaunt models I'm working on and realised I really don't have any firm direction on what I'm going to do with my Legion of Grief - so passing the buck to see if anybody has any suggestions 😁

My intention is to do this as a brand new Legion - so not reusing any of the models from my existing Grand Host list - that means that I'm more than happy to pick up whatever miniatures I need.  Concept wise, I do like something that is thematic - but not a complete walk over when I put it on the table.

The model pile is as follows:
1    Knight of Shrouds on Ethereal Steed
1    Guardian of Souls with Mortality Glass
1    Spirit Torment
1    Tomb Banshee
1    Lord Executioner
1    Mortis Engine
2    Chainghasts
4    Myrmourn Banshees
9    Glaivewrath Stalkers
10    Chainrasp Horde
21    Bladegheist Revinants

Now I'm not expecting (or wanting) to use everything here.  In my head I would like to field the Bladegheist and Mortis Engine, but everything beyond that I'm more ambivalent with.

Battleline wise, I know I need two more units.  I may be able to rummage up another unit of Chainrasp but don't have an issue doing some skeletons (though preferably not a large unit).

I am pondering the viability of a Dreadblade Harrow as my general.  The option to zip across the board, pulling units back from the grave appeals - although I'm always cautious with 5 wound models as generals.  I am tempted with Reikenor in the list too (as it's such a cool model).

[Nevar]

6 hours ago, RuneBrush said:

21    Bladegheist Revinants

Justice for Garkhorr...  

The main problem I have with the Legion of Grief, is that 'Deathly Invocation' which is a massive part of the normal LoN is mostly missing.  It is a primary source of recursion in LoN from Necromancers and Vampire Lords.  In LoG we can now bring in Necromancers but lost out on Vamps.  I really wish they would move Deathly Invocation into an allegiance ability for all of your heroes instead of installing them into the unit profiles.

That said... you are going to want a Necromancer badly for Danse Macabre, as most factions have some way to fight twice.  Nighthaunt had Wave of Terror, LoN have Danse Macabre.  If you don't have a necro you can't do it.  That irks me a bit because he is slow and outside of my Nighthaunt theme, but if you are open to Skelebobs I can't see a Necromancer being an issue for you.

You could even make him a general and have him hang out in a blob of 40 Chainrasps.  The 4+ wound transfer plus his Deathly Invocation would make him a pretty survivable general, and chainrasps are as slow as he is so he won't get left behind.

Mine gets left behind too much because my Bladegeists go scooting off faster than he can run.

[RuneBrush]

1 hour ago, Nevar said:

Justice for Garkhorr...  

The main problem I have with the Legion of Grief, is that 'Deathly Invocation' which is a massive part of the normal LoN is mostly missing.  It is a primary source of recursion in LoN from Necromancers and Vampire Lords.  In LoG we can now bring in Necromancers but lost out on Vamps.  I really wish they would move Deathly Invocation into an allegiance ability for all of your heroes instead of installing them into the unit profiles.

That said... you are going to want a Necromancer badly for Danse Macabre, as most factions have some way to fight twice.  Nighthaunt had Wave of Terror, LoN have Danse Macabre.  If you don't have a necro you can't do it.  That irks me a bit because he is slow and outside of my Nighthaunt theme, but if you are open to Skelebobs I can't see a Necromancer being an issue for you.

You could even make him a general and have him hang out in a blob of 40 Chainrasps.  The 4+ wound transfer plus his Deathly Invocation would make him a pretty survivable general, and chainrasps are as slow as he is so he won't get left behind.

Mine gets left behind too much because my Bladegeists go scooting off faster than he can run.

I think the resurrection for Legion of Grief has been hamstrung a bit - I still can't work out if you can only pop gravesite resurrection once per hero phase (rather than once per gravesite) and as you say Deathly Invocation isn't that prevalent.  Having it as an allegiance ability would be amazing, but you'd then have quite a lot packed into the allegiances.  I'm hoping we may see a points reduction on the Wight King as that would add in a more affordable source of DI - plus he can have a horse.

Necromancer is a good shout, a mixture of ghiests and regular undead is fine in my books too 🙂  I was almost tempted to put a balewind in, but that would leave him pretty open to being shot!  The biggest challenge of having him as the general is his lack of mobility could hamper his ability to bring slain units back.

[Equinox]

19 hours ago, Qrow said:

Here's hoping for a decent point drop for the nighthaunt units in GH2019, it won't help the units that need a complete reword but it may at least make some others worth taking.

The issue with reducing points is that you create "model" creep with armies.  I would prefer GW raise the cost of the major offenders instead of just making the poor stuff cheaper.  In a 2000 point list, someone like Lady Olyander or Kurdoss should have a cost appropriate to their stature in an army.  By lowering their points, it sends the message that GW knows the model is not comparable to something else at the same cost, but that they are going to fix the problem by punishing players by them needing to buy more toys to fill the "free" space left by the point reduction.  Granted it could be argued raising points is a form of punishment as well, but the key difference is that a point raise doesn't require a player to buy more models.  A point reduction does unless they want to be handicapped in a different fashion.  

[Undeadly]

6 minutes ago, Equinox said:

The issue with reducing points is that you create "model" creep with armies.  I would prefer GW raise the cost of the major offenders instead of just making the poor stuff cheaper.  In a 2000 point list, someone like Lady Olyander or Kurdoss should have a cost appropriate to their stature in an army.  By lowering their points, it sends the message that GW knows the model is not comparable to something else at the same cost, but that they are going to fix the problem by punishing players by them needing to buy more toys to fill the "free" space left by the point reduction.  Granted it could be argued raising points is a form of punishment as well, but the key difference is that a point raise doesn't require a player to buy more models.  A point reduction does unless they want to be handicapped in a different fashion.  

Well, the solution is to make models more powerful, but the problem with changing unit rules too much means that suddenly, that rulebook you own is worthless, and that you need to carry around and remember all the errata for your book. The ideal is you need neither, because the book is good from the start, but that rarely happens, nor can it stay that good in a shifting meta.

The best situation is that the units get cheaper in the GHB, but when the book comes out, they get a buff and a points hike. Nighthaunt is a newer book, but as a death player, I'm fine with lots of models, so a decent price drop would be fine with me.

[ledha]

1 hour ago, Equinox said:

The issue with reducing points is that you create "model" creep with armies.  I would prefer GW raise the cost of the major offenders instead of just making the poor stuff cheaper.  In a 2000 point list, someone like Lady Olyander or Kurdoss should have a cost appropriate to their stature in an army.  By lowering their points, it sends the message that GW knows the model is not comparable to something else at the same cost, but that they are going to fix the problem by punishing players by them needing to buy more toys to fill the "free" space left by the point reduction.  Granted it could be argued raising points is a form of punishment as well, but the key difference is that a point raise doesn't require a player to buy more models.  A point reduction does unless they want to be handicapped in a different fashion.  

I agree. Consistently point drop of everything that isn't good is the road to powercreep

[Qrow]

I would prefer that the model be raised in power to match their point cost, rather than be dropped in points. But lets be honest, that would require GW to constantly update the rules of every single model in the game to ensure they fit their role and cost, which is unreasonable.

Don't misunderstand me though, I only want point reductions as a bandaid until we get a new battletome, which may be quite a while away as we are actually fairly new. that's all the GH is and should be, a bandaid between battletomes to ensure each army can keep up at least a little better against the newer armies. I would prefer the mourngul be a 300 point powerhouse, but with his currently rules he simply isn't, so until they get around to a nighthaunt update drop him to what he is worth with his current rules.

I think this bandaid treatment is especially important right now, as GW seem to have set an entirely new baseline of power in the latest codexs.

Edited May 29, 2019 by Qrow

[Undeadly]

5 minutes ago, ledha said:

I agree. Consistently point drop of everything that isn't good is the road to powercreep

Key word is consistently; I personally think pure Nighthaunt needs a lot of work, both unit and allegiance wise, so as to form a cohesive army that works as an actual army, but until then, I'll take some point drops to ensure that we can stay competative and play the army of our choice until the update. Legion of Grief feels like another whack at Nighthaunt rule wise, with Endless spells that make sense with Nighthaunt, Terrain that heavily benefits us, and a allegiance that actually plays to Nighthaunts strengths, rather than an allegiance that hopes we roll high. Sure, we loose some speed, but we still have Gravesite deep strikes from our Dreadblades,  and no less than 2 new Endless Spells designed specifically to help movement, and 2 more designed to do bravery debuffs.

[Rumblefish]

Raising points also means that a player will have now 'wasted' money on models that no longer fit in to the army.

GWs current model only really allows for points changes. I wouldn't mind an entirely seperate book every year that changes points and profiles as needed, but I understand that that would irk some people as well.

[Equinox]

28 minutes ago, Rumblefish said:

Raising points also means that a player will have now 'wasted' money on models that no longer fit in to the army.

GWs current model only really allows for points changes. I wouldn't mind an entirely seperate book every year that changes points and profiles as needed, but I understand that that would irk some people as well

 

Not really as that player can still use those models in their army by simply choosing to include them over other models they already own.  In contrast, an army that is now ~200 points deficient in models only has two choices, play with a deficiency or buy more stuff.   I agree with others that rules changes are the preferable route, but I don't think point drops are a good bandage either for NH.  (Sorry for sidetracking the topic)

Returning to LoG,  I feel like there are some viable builds that I am eager to try, but nothing I feel is going to be meta changing or the second coming of NH.  I love the concept of an army that attacks through bravery, but FEC can do the same and maybe better (speculation on my part).  I think for me, the joy in LoG will be that I can mix death models (skeletons and ghost) in a fashion not possible outside of generic death before with some decent rules to support the army.  

 

Edited May 29, 2019 by Equinox

[Qrow]

22 minutes ago, Equinox said:

 

Not really as that player can still use those models in their army by simply choosing to include them over other models they already own.  In contrast, an army that is now ~200 points deficient in models only has two choices, play with a deficiency or buy more stuff.   I agree with others that rules changes are the preferable route, but I don't think point drops are a good bandage either for NH.  (Sorry for sidetracking the topic)

Returning to LoG,  I feel like there are some viable builds that I am eager to try, but nothing I feel is going to be meta changing or the second coming of NH.  I love the concept of an army that attacks through bravery, but FEC can do the same and maybe better (speculation on my part).  I think for me, the joy in LoG will be that I can mix death models (skeletons and ghost) in a fashion not possible outside of generic death before with some decent rules to support the army.  

 

I feel we will have to agree to disagree on this point. If, theoretically, if someone has a 2000 point army on the dot and nothing more, then raising the poimt of a unit could leave them in a similar situation. Say a 300 point unit gets increased to 350, then they are 50 over that 2000. So they either have to not play with it and have a 300 point gap of models to buy, or they drop something else, which could also leave a gap that they would have to fill. whether up or down, point cost could force someone to buy more models. Unfortunately, if they are to try and maintain balance (which they should) someone is going to get the bad end of the stick. It would be better if they had a solid benchline for power and didn't creep it up over time, but if things don't seem interesting then it won't sell.

On to LoG, I have had 4 matches with them now and I really like them. Basically trade movement and potential hitting power for bravery debuffs and solid recurrance. Banshee screams are pretty damn amazing when the opponent has a -6 or more bravery modifyer and harridans are actually really solid, though I can't imagine ever running more than 1 unit, as you need to layer the debuffs on some units and relying purely on spells to do so is not the best idea.

Skeletons are amazing and using the new soulscream bridge to get them on the objective turn 1 is also amazing. Slowly beginning to like the bridge more than the horrorghast honestly.

Edited May 29, 2019 by Qrow

[Undeadly]

Forbidden power is up now in Warscroll builder! May the list speculation begin! Here is a more all comers list, built around using Skeletons and Grimghasts to pin down the enemy, while Bravery debuffs are casted. Some subsitutions could be for a Corpse Cart instead of a second banshee, or more Harridans,

Allegiance: Death
Mortal Realm: Aqshy

Leaders
Dreadblade Harrow (100)
- General
- Trait: Tragic Emanations 
- Artefact: Ignax's Scales 
Reikenor the Grimhailer (180)
- Spell: Shroud of Terror
Necromancer (110)
- Spell: Dread Withering
Tomb Banshee (80)
Tomb Banshee (80)

Battleline
10 x Chainrasp Horde (80)
10 x Chainrasp Horde (80)
40 x Skeleton Warriors (280)
- Ancient Blades

Units
30 x Grimghast Reapers (360)
2 x Morghast Archai (220)
- Spirit Halberds
5 x Dreadscythe Harridans (90)

Behemoths
Mortis Engine (180)

Endless Spells / Terrain
Soulscream Bridge (80)
Horrorghast (60)

Total: 1980 / 2000
Extra Command Points: 0
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 144

[Evil Bob]

23 hours ago, RuneBrush said:

Snip

Battleline wise, I know I need two more units.  I may be able to rummage up another unit of Chainrasp but don't have an issue doing some skeletons (though preferably not a large unit).

I am pondering the viability of a Dreadblade Harrow as my general.  The option to zip across the board, pulling units back from the grave appeals - although I'm always cautious with 5 wound models as generals.  I am tempted with Reikenor in the list too (as it's such a cool model).

So as heretical as the following may be small units of skeletons should seriously be considered.  Treat them like a pointy stick (lined up) and poke the bravery debuff banner at enemy units while minimizing contact zones for enemy attacks.  If penny-pinching points is the game go zombie.  Either way let your elites and heroes take advantage with their bravery linked BS.  The major downside is with summoning/regen going for the valuable elites the cheap battleline units will need to be written off as near guaranteed losses.

I like Reikenor because of the funny-fail over the LoG spell casting levels.