Spite Revenants Unbridled Malice Any Good?

[T10]

Their ability to cause successful battleshock  tests to be re-rolled is a pretty pointless against most units that have Bravery 6+ since it's impossible to fail so you'll just be rolling the dice twice  anyway, picking the second result.

How common are Bravery 1-5 units in your experience?

-T10

[King Taloren]

Outside of The verminlords, Skaven are all 5 and 4s .

But you may be thinking the bravery test wrong. You total the amount of models slain and then roll a d6. If that number is higher than your bravery that is how many additional models are lost. If you are only killing 1 model at a time then you wouldn’t get mich use out of this ability but aside from demons most units are bravery 6-7 and killing at least 3 gives a 50/50 chance of losing more models.

[T10]

So they are at least not entirely useless, even against Bravery 5 that's a second roll to hope for a 6.

I understand battleshock tests just fine. It's the re-roll failed tests that turn out  to be the problem since apparently re-rolls happen before modifiers.

-T10

[Landohammer]

Yea unfortunately, RAW, you are correct. Rerolls happen before modifiers period. So the Spite reroll is really only effective vs a very small number of low bravery units, and then only if they roll poorly. 

However IMHO the intent was likely different. We should definitely get this submitted as an FAQ. 

Further making this weird, is that most units CANT fail an unmodified bravery test. So they will be discarding their first roll regardless. So about half of the time, this ability would actually HELP the enemy unit. As a roll of a 5 or 6 could be rerolled into a 1 or 2. Ouch! 

 

[T10]

54 minutes ago, Landohammer said:

Yea unfortunately, RAW, you are correct. Rerolls happen before modifiers period. So the Spite reroll is really only effective vs a very small number of low bravery units, and then only if they roll poorly. 

However IMHO the intent was likely different. We should definitely get this submitted as an FAQ. 

Further making this weird, is that most units CANT fail an unmodified bravery test. So they will be discarding their first roll regardless. So about half of the time, this ability would actually HELP the enemy unit. As a roll of a 5 or 6 could be rerolled into a 1 or 2. Ouch! 

 

It probably hurts Bravery 6+ units a bit, but not in the way you describe. If only the Spire Revenant's Ability is in play, then the first roll is irrelevant. That 6 or 1 you end up with may both have been preceded by a 1 or a 6: it doesn't matter when only the last roll is applied. The result is for the unit is the same wether it is affected by the ability or not.

However, being forced to re-roll the first dice roll removes the players option to keep the first roll (obviously!) which matters a great deal if he has the ability to re-roll battleshock tests for other reasons - you can't re-roll the dice more than once.  The unit's own ability to re-roll is effectively lost, in the proper sense of the word: They still re-roll, but it's not to their benefit.

I guess this broadens the scope of units for which this ability can actually have a appreciable effect.

-T10

[Landohammer]

Good point. The re-roll is mandatory so it will trump any ability they have to opt for a reroll. 

However as a lover of Spite Revenants, (I use 40 in my list) I really dread the day my opponent rerolls a 6 into a 1 because of some bad wording. I know it will happen eventually 😭😭😭

 

 

[King Taloren]

There is a difference because it is not a modified roll as people think it is. There are modifiers to the roll like -1 bravery but the straight up normal roll of the battleshock dice is the model slain +d6 against bravery.  In this case before modifiers still included the models slain because it is not a actual modifier

Edited August 22, 2019 by King Taloren

[T10]

No, the actual battleshock roll is the roll of the dice. Then you add the number of slain models to the roll. This results in a modified battleshock roll.

The rules do describe benefits of having large units: This adds to the Bravery characteristic, resulting in a modified Bravery characteristic.

Or perhaps you feel that "re-rolls before modifiers" is a more fluid rule when it comes to other things than hits, wounds and save rolls?

-T10

Edited August 22, 2019 by T10

[King Taloren]

I feel that in the case of battleshock the rule might need clarification as to what is considered a modifier to the roll. Just because upon add the models to the roll doesn’t necessarily make it a modifier because it is a key component to determining a success or failure beyond anything that provides a +/- to the roll. Do note  that a +/-1 bravery is not a modifier to the dice roll but the characteristic and must be applied because it is not modifying the roll but the number the dice must reach. 

A bravery 5 with a -1 makes it a 4 before any modifiers to the dice roll are made.

Edited August 22, 2019 by King Taloren

[T10]

So the Battleshock rules' "add the number of models from the unit that have been slain this turn" might not count as a "modifier", but a Bloodwrack Medusa's Terrifying Beauty's "subtract 1 from hit rolls" does?

[King Taloren]

The simple reasoning is that without it, the rerolling successful tests is complete bunk for 60-80% of armies in the game. Because without the addition of the models slain then the reroll have absolutely no meaning unless you are one of the three-four armies with anything less than bravery 5. 

Compared to -1 to hit or wound; this ability actually has value and gains value for having an impact in the game. Even when an opponent can reroll fails it allows for those -1s to give something of a defensive power as it is intended and not buff an army with 16% or more dice to reroll as failures and end up with even more hits as if the -1 doesn’t exist.

 

Also from the FAQ:

Q: When a characteristic is referenced (Bravery, for example), does this mean the value on the warscroll, or the value on the warscroll including any modifiers?
A: The value including any modifiers.

Edited August 23, 2019 by King Taloren

[XReN]

There is a clear definition of what a failed BS test is:

From this information I think it's safe to say that rerolls to BS test are applied after modifiers

Edited August 23, 2019 by XReN

[T10]

@King Taloren: The only thing bunk here is the Designers commentary on re-rolls and modifiers. With regards to post-modifier conditions for re-rolls (success/fail) they introduced a solution no-one needed and it proves to have consequences beyond hit and wound rolls.

For this particular ability, it is still "bunk" in any "can't fail" scenario, regardless of re-rolls pre- or post-modifiers.

 

[T10]

@XReN: The quoted text says nothing about re-rolling. Could you explain how you came to your conclusion?

-T10

[XReN]

5 minutes ago, T10 said:

@XReN: The quoted text says nothing about re-rolling. Could you explain how you came to your conclusion?

-T10

This text defines what a BS roll looks like, if a roll considedred failed when the modified result exceedes modified bravery, than it's considered succesfull when modified roll is equal or less than modified bravery. That's when you force a reroll with unbridled malice

Edited August 23, 2019 by XReN

[T10]

I would agree to that, but the (in my opinion: inane) Designers Commentary insists on re-rolling pre-modifier, and even doubles down on this with an example where a dice roll is evaluated for success/fail against the known target value, but discounting (known!) modifiers.

E.g., a hit roll for 4+ with -1 counts as as success pre-modifier on a roll of 4, and cannot be re-rolled with a "re-roll failed hits" ability.

I am sure the people who came up with that "gem" didn't consider every and all instances where dice are rolled and re-rolled in the game, but it's nevertheless a general ruling with no exceptions.

Edited August 23, 2019 by T10

[XReN]

21 minutes ago, T10 said:

I would agree to that, but the (in my opinion: inane) Designers Commentary insists on re-rolling pre-modifier, and even doubles down on this with an example where a dice roll is evaluated for success/fail against the known target value, but discounting (known!) modifiers.

E.g., a hit roll for 4+ with -1 counts as as success pre-modifier on a roll of 4, and cannot be re-rolled with a "re-roll failed hits" ability.

I am sure the people who came up with that "gem" didn't consider every and all instances where dice are rolled and re-rolled in the game, but it's nevertheless a general ruling with no exceptions.

The one thing that sets BS test apart from most other rolls - the target value is also modified.

And it would be reasonable to houserule this moment, personaly I'm 100% sure that any of my local TOs would agree on that.

[T10]

That the target value is also modified just means there are more modifiers to ignore, sadly.

[Warfiend]

I think it’s pretty clear, most spells and abilities who deal with unmodifed bravery talk about a bravery characteristic, abilities that involve rerolls deal with modifiers by talking about failed rolls or any rolls.

In the battleshock rules posted by @XReN we can see there are three different aspect; 1: the battleshock roll, 2: the unmodified battleshock characteristic and 3: the battleshock test.

The first part of the rule for unbridled malice deals with an unmodified bravery characteristic, yet the second part talks about successful battleshock tests, it doesn’t talk about a battleshock roll. The rules for battleshock state a battleshock test deals with a modified bravery characteristic.

Therfore to me at least there is no and can be no confusion about the way this ability works.

Quote

Unbridled Malice: Spite-Revenants  fight with a vengeful fury,  filling the air with blood-chilling curses in unknowable tongues.
Subtract 1 from the Bravery characteristic of enemy units while they are within 3" of any friendly units with this ability. In addition, re-roll successful battleshock tests for enemy units while they are within 3" of any friendly units with this ability.

 

Edited August 23, 2019 by Warfiend

[Painbringer]

I agree with the @Warfiend
I think it is important to make a distinction between a modifier to the roll and modifier to the stat itself. Unbridled Malice speifies that the Bravery of enemy units is lowered by one while they are within 3" of the Spite-Revenants. This is a static effect, an aura - that is active during the whole turn. This does not affect the roll in any way - however, the roll is made using the already modified Bravery characteristic.

[King Taloren]

11 hours ago, King Taloren said:

Q: When a characteristic is referenced (Bravery, for example), does this mean the value on the warscroll, or the value on the warscroll including any modifiers?
A: The value including any modifiers.

Modified characteristics are not the same as a modified roll. You do not ignore the modifiers for battleshock purposes when determining the value of bravery. 

The modifier before rerolls is only referencing anything that actually modifies the dice roll itself.

Ex: Subtract 2 from the dice roll would be a modifier.

Subtract 2 from bravery is not a dice modifier and is not ignored.

I am fairly certain they meant to claim that a characteristic roll is different from any other roll in the game especially with how mich larger the numbers involved generally turn out to be.

Edited August 23, 2019 by King Taloren

[T10]

The issue here is not the  Bravery characteristic, but instead it is the modified battleshock roll and any re-roll you might be entitled to based on the success or fail.

The battleshock test involves a dice roll to which is added the number of slain models, yielding what the rules call the "modified battleshock roll". We can infer from this that the unmodified battleshock roll is the dice roll itself.

The Designers Commentary insists that re-rolls happen before modifiers, and that applicability of a re-roll condition of success/fail must be considered as if those modifiers did not exist.

That means that a unit with Bravery 7 that has taken 6 casualties and has 14 models remaining and rolls a 5 will fail its battleshock test and lose 3 more models: Modified battleshock roll is 11, modified Bravery is 8. But for the purpose of abilities that force re-rolls of successful tests (or allow the re-roll of failed tests), the  roll is always a success before modifiers: The roll is not going to be greater than 6 before modifiers and the Bravery characteristic isn't going to be lower than 7 before modifiers.

I can understand that this is hard to swallow, hence all the "I am fairly certain that this should be different" or "I feel this does not apply to the battleshock mechanic". 

If you don't want to apply this Designers Commentary to your battleshock tests, I am sure that's fine. But then you should be honest  and disregard it altogether.

After all, all the game rules that allow rerolls of success/fail are Abilities and the rules say Abilities take precedence over the normal rules, including the rules for re-rolling pre modifiers.

-T10

[King Taloren]

So the problem here is what is the difference between a battleshock test and rerolling failed rolls. 

The battleshock rules define that a failed/successful test is after all modfiers are applied. It is not hinges on the dice roll itself but the total of the dice roll plus models slain vs the modified bravery characteristic. The abilities do not say reroll failed/successful dice rolls but tests. Therefore rerolling something that cannot be determined as a failed or successful on the dice roll itself is not the intent of the rule. Orherwise 90% of the abilities that allow you to reroll successful or failed battleshock tests are worthless.

Abilities that mention failed/successful dice ROLLs on the other hand do indeed state that the DICE ROLL is what is the determining factor in what is being rerolled. So this obviously is a reroll before the modfiers are further included because it is an what has been stated in the core rules.

There is a precedence in this that tests are not equal to normal rolls because you cannot consider them successful or failures until you have fompared the modified results. Whereas a Hit/Wound/Save ROLL does have a prebuilt determination factor of success or failure because it can be seen as a result before modifiers are applied to further change the results.

In fact it might be prudent that instead rerolling battleshock tests you are forced to retake them instead.

It feels like you just trying to push your narrative about your dislike of a core rule and designer commentary instead of taking the rules as intended and written 

Edited August 23, 2019 by King Taloren

[T10]

1 hour ago, King Taloren said:

The battleshock rules define that a failed/successful test is after all modfiers are applied. It is not hinges on the dice roll itself but the total of the dice roll plus models slain vs the modified bravery characteristic. 

That can be said of hit rolls as well.

And the distinction between "roll" and "test" is a construct of your imagination, not something declared in the rules.

"Retaking" is not the word used anywhere, it is "re-roll" all the way.

And yes, I am pointing out the flaws of the Designer Commentary by taking them AS WRITTEN, and you should bear in mind that this is the document which has as purpose to clarify the designers INTENT.

-T10

Edited August 23, 2019 by T10

[King Taloren]

6 minutes ago, T10 said:

That can be said of hit rolls as well.

No because it is a Hit ROLL not a TEST. This is the very key difference between the two.

The roll can be determined without modifiers. A straight roll to hit is possible. A battleshock test can never be determined without modifiers 

Edited August 23, 2019 by King Taloren