AoS 2 - Ossiarch Bonereapers Discussion

[Skelebags]

By looking closer at the crawler, I've answered my own question.
Both of the special shots are one attack per battle.

[AHexInScarletRed]

If some of the units can be included in Legions is part of the FAQ to be released, no? When did the NH units become available to Legions? I wasn't around at that time. 

[Frowny]

I'm worried about the petrifex elite completely breaking the game, It is appallingly easy to get army-wide 3+ rerollable saves, given how easily you are getting the command points. They also have an excellent command ability, which is unusual for such a strong faction ability.

Mortek guard easily get to 2 attacks, 2's and 4's and -1 rend. This puts them as nearly the killiest units in the game for their price point, beating out evocators with the reroll. And they can easily move 7 inches per turn, which is incredibly fast for basic infantry.

And you have invested only 3 CP's, which is trivial to get every turn with kalvalos or 3 random wizards (who are already playable on their own), and don't even need a nearby hero. All you are using is the army-wide abilities. You could easily have this on 2 blocks of infantry per turn. 

Compared to pheonix guard in cities of sigmar (which many think are already very strong) they are 3 times as durable against rend 0, Still more durable against rend -2, 50% killier, Move 7 over 6.

On the stormcast side, They are about as damaging as evocators with reroll against a 4+ save while also more resilient than sequitors with a castellant and rerolling saves while being faster than both.

Compared to hag-nar witch elves with shields near a cauldron, they are twice as durable against rend 0 while still being just as durable against rend 2. Not quite as fast, but buffable to be almost as killy. 

 

People will suggest mortal wounds or shooting them, but remember, they are still 3+ save battleline infantry. Its not like they are even that expensive. They are also very easy to buff further with a range of low casting cost spells and other command abilities. with 2 attacks each and 2 inch reach they carry buffs like champs.

 

[Emissary]

I don't know if anyone has really tried to build an army list yet, but I've been fooling around with it and the points costs are an issue and is the limiting factor in the army IMO right now.  You aren't going to be hording anyone and just running them over.

[PrimeElectrid]

40 minutes ago, Frowny said:

I'm worried about the petrifex elite completely breaking the game, It is appallingly easy to get army-wide 3+ rerollable saves, given how easily you are getting the command points. They also have an excellent command ability, which is unusual for such a strong faction ability.

Mortek guard easily get to 2 attacks, 2's and 4's and -1 rend. This puts them as nearly the killiest units in the game for their price point, beating out evocators with the reroll. And they can easily move 7 inches per turn, which is incredibly fast for basic infantry.

And you have invested only 3 CP's, which is trivial to get every turn with kalvalos or 3 random wizards (who are already playable on their own), and don't even need a nearby hero. All you are using is the army-wide abilities. You could easily have this on 2 blocks of infantry per turn. 

Compared to pheonix guard in cities of sigmar (which many think are already very strong) they are 3 times as durable against rend 0, Still more durable against rend -2, 50% killier, Move 7 over 6.

On the stormcast side, They are about as damaging as evocators with reroll against a 4+ save while also more resilient than sequitors with a castellant and rerolling saves while being faster than both.

Compared to hag-nar witch elves with shields near a cauldron, they are twice as durable against rend 0 while still being just as durable against rend 2. Not quite as fast, but buffable to be almost as killy. 

 

People will suggest mortal wounds or shooting them, but remember, they are still 3+ save battleline infantry. Its not like they are even that expensive. They are also very easy to buff further with a range of low casting cost spells and other command abilities. with 2 attacks each and 2 inch reach they carry buffs like champs.

 

There’s also an artefact for soul masons which gives +1 to wound. 

the soul mason himself has a rr 1s to hit spell that he can attempt to cast multiple times. It also goes off on a 5.

the Petrifex CA is +1 Rend.

theres another spell that makes exploding 6s on 5s instead.

the liege kavalos has a +1 attack ability.

thats 3 attacks per model on 2s rr1s/3s/1/1, exploding attacks on 5s (effectively 4 attacks per model)

True that’s a lot of investment, and ultimately only 1 damage, but there’s a number of synergies going on in this book to unpack

Edited October 26, 2019 by PrimeElectrid

[Emissary]

Here's the first sample list I've created to show how everything looks great, but is really going to have to tempered against what you can actually bring at one time:

Petrifex Elite

Liege Kavalos

20 Mortek Guard

20 Mortek Guard

20 Mortek Guard

Soul Mason

Mortisan Boneshaper

Mortek Crawler

6 Immortis Guard

Shield Core Battalion

Bone-Tithe Shrieker

2000 points exactly

You'll notice that there is no named character, only 1 model that can bring models back or heal (though the 2nd artifact will probably be the one that lets the boneshaper heal or ressurect a 2nd time on a 4+) and only one crawler.  The Immortis Guard can be exchanged for Necropolis Stalkers, but I'm leaning towards the Guard because they make better use of Endless Duty an can get a bunch of mortal wounds off attacking twice with 3 shield attacks.

Balancing the RD generation against the healing/resurrecting ability with the units will be a tough balancing act.

Edited October 26, 2019 by Emissary

[Malakithe]

41 minutes ago, Frowny said:

I'm worried about the petrifex elite completely breaking the game, It is appallingly easy to get army-wide 3+ rerollable saves, given how easily you are getting the command points. They also have an excellent command ability, which is unusual for such a strong faction ability.

Mortek guard easily get to 2 attacks, 2's and 4's and -1 rend. This puts them as nearly the killiest units in the game for their price point, beating out evocators with the reroll. And they can easily move 7 inches per turn, which is incredibly fast for basic infantry.

And you have invested only 3 CP's, which is trivial to get every turn with kalvalos or 3 random wizards (who are already playable on their own), and don't even need a nearby hero. All you are using is the army-wide abilities. You could easily have this on 2 blocks of infantry per turn. 

Compared to pheonix guard in cities of sigmar (which many think are already very strong) they are 3 times as durable against rend 0, Still more durable against rend -2, 50% killier, Move 7 over 6.

On the stormcast side, They are about as damaging as evocators with reroll against a 4+ save while also more resilient than sequitors with a castellant and rerolling saves while being faster than both.

Compared to hag-nar witch elves with shields near a cauldron, they are twice as durable against rend 0 while still being just as durable against rend 2. Not quite as fast, but buffable to be almost as killy. 

 

People will suggest mortal wounds or shooting them, but remember, they are still 3+ save battleline infantry. Its not like they are even that expensive. They are also very easy to buff further with a range of low casting cost spells and other command abilities. with 2 attacks each and 2 inch reach they carry buffs like champs.

 

Eh this is a non-issues as the super high points cost curbs it. With the amount of heroes you need and a max block of Guard are over 400pts its not really a problem 

[IkedaT]

Purple Sun ignores those saves

 

[chosen_of_khaine]

Glancing at the Katakros warscroll, there's already clear typos that need errata. For his wounds suffered table, the tiers are 0-1, 1-3, 4-8, 8-12, 13+. What profile does he use at 1 or 8 wounds? It's not clear to intuit what they intended, as they were probably trying to have each companion have a different number of its own wounds. Come on, GW.

Edited October 26, 2019 by chosen_of_khaine

[Scurvydog]

The harvester is incredibly good. 200 points and very killy for that price with a total of 10 attacks with 2 dmg and rend 1 or 2, very nice, and either mortal wounds on 6 or reroll to hit against "hordes". The ability also just states any roll a dice for each model slain within 3", so both enemy and your own, so I can see this guy going along with some spear guards will basically return them on a 4+ when he is around, incredible.

The catapult is a real star too, 3 shots with 5 damage is decent and some sneaky alt ammo shots, I like it and it forces your opponent to come to you a bit more.

The immortis guard are obviously not as killy as stalkers, which is nice they are not just alt weapons but got vastly different roles. With all those support heroes they can be very handy, like running them next to Arkhan or basically any of your important heroes is worthwhile, considering how important heroes are.

Morghasts is the only source of fly, and a point increase makes sense considering the great buffs they get from all the synergies. Anyhing in Petrifex ups the value a lot, and they can also use the command abilities, giving them a clear role in the army.

The Cavalry and the cavalry heroes also got clear roles, I like the heroes give 1 extra relentless point and have a decent command abilitry (which you will have more use out of then other armies). With their base 3+ saves they will also be rather tough. The basic cavalry is also decent, although the spear option is a bit underwhelming and I am leaning towards blades, especially with their command ability getting them in range will be easier than normal.

The spell lore and spells for the wizards are also really in the support department, and puts emphasis on the theme of the army, that you really need to work out synergies and have a clear plan, no single unit, spell or ability will let you crush anything alone, you got to set up those combos and chose the right spells for your list. The odd one out to me is the soulreaper, as his spell is rather weak, but I guess he has a place in especially meeting engagements, as he can fight a bit too. 

All in all I love the allegiance abilities, and this army really pushes the legions, so running a non legion list seems like madness. The abundances of discipline points to use makes this feel like a real army, instead of some warscrolls to just brute force things with. This takes planning and you have something to consider and do in every phase of the game. At the same time the army avoids the worst power creep, such as activation wars stuff and I do not see any single element here that will be super frustrating to play with or against.

As such I doubt this will end up as a tournament sweeper and feels like it is closer to Gitz than Slaanesh on the scale. They do not have any fight again abilities, no fight first or last abilities or spells, no teleports/ambush, no summoning, no rerollable "feel no pain" saves. So they stay clear of basically all the current top meta game winning stuff.

I do not think Nagash is worth his points here though, will be just about impossible to earn home those 880 points with what he has available, but I think Arkhan is a far more reasonable prospect and giving him some immortis guards sounds like a good idea.

My initial 1k meeting engagement list will probably be something like:

Petrifex Elite (duh)

Spearhead: 1 liege kavalos, 1 unit of deathriders.

Main body: 20 mortek guard, 1 boneshaper

Rearguard: 3 stalkers + Shrieker spell or 2 morghasts (mostly due to movement)

Total 1000 or 980

Edited October 26, 2019 by Scurvydog

[Arcian]

30 minutes ago, Scurvydog said:

As such I doubt this will end up as a tournament sweeper and feels like it is closer to Gitz than Slaanesh on the scale. They do not have any fight again abilities, no fight first or last abilities or spells, no teleports/ambush, no summoning, no rerollable "feel no pain" saves. So they stay clear of basically all the current top meta game winning stuff..

 

I'm more all in on the looks for them, and their neat synergies. How do you think they will compare to LoN or other death factions? 

[Overread]

I feel that the army is quite well rounded all told in that most models do have a very clear place and role. The only one that sort of stands out is the alternate Morghast version that has a longer charge range instead of a mortal wound save. Personally I'd have prefered if it were an option on a single model and that the build didn't matter; but with all the mortal wounds being thrown out and how Morghasts are already fairly fast  I think the extra save version is going to be the one more commonly used. 

 

Weapon choices are a big thing though - we've got swords and spears for mortek guard and riders. 

[Scurvydog]

Another note is we got cheap battalions, and remember for Bonereapers they give a discipline point each turn besides the artefact.

2 of them, the deathglaive and aegis immportal are just 80 pts each, and use 2 units of 4 arm dudes and 1 variant of morghasts, so this at least gives some extra consideration to what you prefer. I can see this being handy in a caster heavy list, you can run morghasts next to Arkhan for example, and guards next to other wizards.

The kavalos lance is great, although funny enough less interesting for the Stallarch lords who already have access to retreat and charge, still being able to do so for free within 12" of the hero and also a free use of their charge skill is great. 

The Shield-corps looks good if you prefer a caster heavy list, if you run with a Liege and other heroes, you should otherwise have enough discipline points, as all the battalion does is give 1 free use per turn.

Weapon choices in general is tough, so I guess they are ok balanced. If in doubt I'd say Mortek guard units of 20+ use spears and Kavalos 10+ unit use spears. Even then for Kavalos it is close, as they can possibly pile in 3" more with their ability (mad to charge and NOT use it), so getting those swords in range is easier, and you also want those horse attacks too. Rend 1 is a big deal and getting exploding hits on a 5+ on the charge with spears for the cav is not a huge bonus, but worth considering.

As for legions the Petrifex elite are quite powerful, and will probably be the goto for many armylists. The +1 save to everyone and the actually very good command ability to add 1 more rend is great, that can really up the oomph of a Kavalos charge or similar. The trait and artefact are meh, but not a waste.

Mortis praetorians are a matter of if you are bringing Katakros or not, if not, don't bother. But I suspect we will see Katakros quite a bit, that cheeky ****** is great and looks so fun and thematic.

Stalliarch lords and the null myriad are the situationally powerful ones, although I will say the Kavalos battalion really makes me question the stalliarch lords. The Null Myriads are just a big middle finger to casting armies, the most hated opponent for Tzeentch of all time, for 1 point you can just ignore spells on a 2+ and there will be few 2k armies not generating at least 4 discipline points a turn minimum, yikes.

The Ivory host is just poor I think, a sort of unreliable and iffy +1 hit -1 save rule, which you can then also spend points to just be good old boring +1 hit. Both the trait and artefact are also the worst so doubt I will ever use this one.

The Crematorians are those death players who wished they played Gitmobs  well, I can see some fun combos with the harvester, but the command ability, trait and artefact are all terrible, so this will probably be a "for fun" legion.

[Sception]

On a competitive end, yeah, I doubt they'll be top tier out of the gate, what with being somewhat inefficient overall and lacking the major game breaking mechanics like strike first, summoning, etc that might otherwise make up for it.

That said, while nothing seems super points efficient, nothing seems unusably inefficient either.  Everything has a distinct role it's at least competent at - with the arguable exception of the morghasts, but as pointed out they're the only non-hero flying units, so even they have something.  And coming from LoN that's a big deal because it means every unit can be useful, you don't have any situations like in legions of nagash or cities of sigmar where half a dozen units are doing the same thing in the same way so only one will ever be good at a time.

Balance is less good in the subfactions.  Petrifex should probably be 'reroll saves of one' not +1 to saves.  As is they're far and away the best mechanically, though in casual games I'll still probably run the Myriad for the lore.

...

Almost no changes to Nagash and Arkhan, except... did I hear right that their invocations now work on summinable OR ossiarch units?  Does that mean they can invoke themselves when fielded in ossiarch armies?  If so, that's pretty neat.  Petrigash with a 2+ save, rerolling ones from his CA, 4+/6+ vs mortals, auto healing himself 3 wounds every turn before you touch any other healing spells or abilities, plus immortis guard if you want extra protection?  Sounds almost runnable.

Has arkhan's command ability been rewritten not to stack with itself?  If not, with all the discipline points the army generates that could make for some surprisingly long ranged spells.  Vokmortian's signature spell is a lot more threatening at 25" range than it is at 1", so I could see the two of them being good friends.

 

All in all, while I don't think it's meta redefining in the competitive sense, I'm still loving what I'm seeing for just casual funtimes play.  I'm thinking Null Myriad, Arkhan & Vokmortian, some immortis guard to protect them, couple infantry blocks, cav with a fighty hero general, extra support caster or two, and a catapult?  That's probably pushing 2k already, with no battalions either.  Hrm.  Maybe Arkhan OR Vok, depending on points?

 

Eh, plenty to tinker with.

Edited October 26, 2019 by Sception

[Skelebags]

3 minutes ago, Sception said:

Has Arkhan's command ability been rewritten not to stack with itself?  If not, with all the discipline points the army generates that could make for some surprisingly long ranged spells.  Vokmortian's signature spell is a lot more threatening at 25" range than it is at 1".

Unfortunately Arkhan's Command Ability is now once per hero phase. Also, Vokmortian's spell specifically says its range is unmodifiable.

Sad for no 1/3 to kill anything from 7" away ;c

But I guess that would be a little too much, anyway.

[Sception]

Bah, oh well.  Honestly it's probably for the best.  Can Vok's spell be used through the spellportals?  That doesn't change the range, just measures it from somewhere else.  With the recent points increase it's probably too inefficient to use on a spell that only works 1/3 of the time even after you successfully cast it, but still.

Edited October 26, 2019 by Sception

[Skelebags]

6 minutes ago, Sception said:

Bah, oh well.  Honestly it's probably for the best.  Can Vok's spell be used through the spellportals?  That doesn't change the range, just measures it from somewhere else.  With the recent points increase it's probably too inefficient to use on a spell that only works 1/3 of the time even after you successfully cast it, but still.

I guess rules as written it can

[Scurvydog]

Looking at artifacts did anyone notice that sweet helm for Lieges, adding +1 to hit for all bonereapers wholly within 12", well that is going to be the auto include a LOT...

The soulmason also has an artefact giving +1 to wound in a 9" bubble against anything but death armies. I also like the soul resevoir for him giving +2 to cast until you first get a 10+ cast, great for getting of endless spells, and combine that with the terrain giving -1 to unbind on a 2+, nasty stuff.

[Nasnad]

1 minute ago, Scurvydog said:

Looking at artifacts did anyone notice that sweet helm for Lieges, adding +1 to hit for all bonereapers wholly within 12", well that is going to be the auto include a LOT...

The soulmason also has an artefact giving +1 to wound in a 9" bubble against anything but death armies. I also like the soul resevoir for him giving +2 to cast until you first get a 10+ cast, great for getting of endless spells, and combine that with the terrain giving -1 to unbind on a 2+, nasty stuff

They have some tasty artifacts, but having to take a battalion to get that extra artifact, after taking the mandatory sub-faction artifact, makes it harder to get all the good artifacts

[Grdaat]

Seems to me that Morghasts got a buff just by being given the Ossiarch Bonereapers keyword. Not only can you increase their save to 3+ by default but you can also give them +3" movement with the generic Command Ability the Ossiarch's have access to.

[Scurvydog]

7 minutes ago, Grdaat said:

Seems to me that Morghasts got a buff just by being given the Ossiarch Bonereapers keyword. Not only can you increase their save to 3+ by default but you can also give them +3" movement with the generic Command Ability the Ossiarch's have access to.

yea against a 4+ save, the stalkers with the +1 dmg and rend will dish out 10,4 average damage, while the Morghast archai with halberds will do 6,6 damage on average. The stalkers can use a point to reroll charge/run and pass terrain, decent. The Archai get a 5+ mortal wound save, -1 bravery aura and +3 movement and fly. You can argue that the Archai also requires to take a bit more damage before they lose output though.

Both units got the Hekatos keyword, so they can use the advance ability and any from a legion, for example the +1 rend from petrifex elite, in case you need -3 or even -4 on the falchions! They also give themselves the 6+ deathless save, and since they enjoy going of on their own at times, this should not be overlooked either.

I might give the slight edge to Stalkers due to sheer output and versatility, the +1 dmg and rend for stalkers is what takes them up so high, as simply rerolls to hit would give them the same output as the morghasts.

Both fun to run next to a harvester as well.

[DioRa]

This army has been tempting me from a visual style. But now that we kinda have all the warscrolls and point values it makes it a real tough army to fit in toys even some toys in.

As with any list I make I start of with selection of battleline units. Now if you want more toys, you can always go bare minimum with 3 units of 10 mortek guard, but that is just silly. On the other hand I do feel the unit of 40 mortek guard is a trap. Yes, it's hard to remove a unit of 40 from an objective with all the healing and all. But their speed is still terrible to get on an objective and such a large unit will be hard to make work with all the abilities that require a unit to be wholly within. Which is a shame, because visually a unit of 40 mortek with spears would look amazing.

Also I have been pondering about the Soulscream bridge and Lauchon. Now Lauchon is hard to pull off with a big unit. I do feel the bridge might have a use for the mortek guard, depending on the size of them.

I do feel that the mortek guard will be an auto pick over the other battleline unit: kavalos deathriders. Now I like these too, but I just don't think they have the durability of the Mortek guard, thanks to their shieldwall. And I also feel that just a unit of 5 would be a waste of points. If I would take this it would be in a unit of 10, and at that price point I don't see myself taking more than 1 unit.

Now after selecting a durable battleline core, the next priority would be all the heroes and such. Which feel quite important support pieces to make these battleline units more efficient. But after all that, I feel there is very little points left for fun things like mortek crawlers, stalkers, morghasts or harvesters. I just feel we have to sink in a lot into the battleline and heroes to make this army work.

Another thing I'm curious about is how many ways we debuff the enemy bravery. I feel we can easily reduce a bravery 6 unit to a bravery 2, without much extra hassle! Wonder if something can be done more around that angle...though hard to say.

So what are other peoples thoughts so far on list building?

 

[Sception]

Taking a closer look at arkhan, here are his changes:

1) invocation can target bonereapers in addition to summonable units, range increase to 24", healing increase to flat 3 instead of d3 with a reroll.

2) command ability limited to 1/hero phase

3) curse of years never wounds on better than a 2

4) 3 casts/unbinds per turn instead of two!

5) does not know spells of other nearby death wizards

6) instead my attempt to cast arcane bolt & mystic shield any number of times even if already attempted by another wizard.  Nagash can also do this.  If they really want a hero dead, between the two of them they can nuke it with 11 consecutive arcane bolts, from 24" away with Arkhan's CA.  Am I reading that right?

7) in a bonreaper army he gains the bonereaper keyword (so can invoke himself) and knows all the bonereaper faction spells.

 

losing the ability to borrow other wizards' spells is sad, as is the nerf to curse of years where its way less likely to deleye entire units, but invoking himself and an entire extra cadt/dispel per turn goes a long way towards making up the difference and justifying the points increase.  Will still prob need the guard unit to keep him alive, but they're a respectable unit in their own right so that isn't necessarily a terrible drawback.

[PrimeElectrid]

Katakros 
soulmason
20 mortek
10 mortek
10 mortek
Gothizzar harvester 
6 stalkers

both Petrifex of course

feels like a solid base, leaves 270 points spare. Probably want at least one more support hero and then endless spells. There’s at least two lore spells that are worth taking (5++ shrug and 6s explode on 5s). Maybe another harvester.

could swap Katakros for a liege kavalos, Boneshaper and 2 mortek crawlers instead. The Boneshaper and liege kavalos have some of Katakros most important buffs (+1 attack and heal 3), and this way you get to use the Petrifex command trait for a tanky general.

of course, WhatsApp chat pointed out that you can stack the kavalos command ability, so 15 of them can roll 2,3,4,5,etc times on the mortal wounds...

 

Edited October 26, 2019 by PrimeElectrid

[Skelebags]

27 minutes ago, DioRa said:

*snip*

So what are other peoples thoughts so far on list building?

 

I'm with you that massive mortek squads is likely not as great as it sounds. The extra rend the swords have makes them a really tempting choice in petrifex where you can bump them to -2, pretty much every other battleline in the game has at best a 6+ against that unless they can ignore rend.

I'm probably going to go with at minimum 2 mortek guard squads, sizes depending on points, and try and squeeze in a harvester whenever possible to amp up that survivability even more. Bubble the harvester with 1 or 2 layers of morteks, and your opponent has to chew through a 3+ rerollable, a 6+++ shrug, and then if they do kill any mortek, on a 4+ the harvester just pops a new one right back into the squad. Arranging them like this does limit the harvester's offensive ability but its a tradeoff. The harvester hits like a truck on its own anyway, as far as I can tell the spike fists are just better, ossiarchs have so many sources of +1 to hit that getting another one against 5 or more models is kinda pointless compared to 6s to hit doing 2 mortal wounds instead of normal damage.

I agree that trying to fit all the puzzle piece characters and units into a list that works together is difficult given the points costs.