The Future of DEATH is AoS

[Sception]

On 10/4/2019 at 11:50 AM, pseudonyme said:

So more or less @Thomas Lyons WIP Nighthanut/Cities of Sigmar army project

Link?

Edited October 5, 2019 by Sception

[lare2]

Is anyone having any success whatsoever with death? If so, what's the secret of your success? 

Been a while since I've done a tourney but in my casual games I've been getting smashed. Got a 2 dayer tourney coming up and I'm not optimistic.

[pseudonyme]

1 hour ago, Sception said:

Link?

@Thomas Lyons is talking about it in the last Warhammer weekly 

 

 

[123lac]

On 10/6/2019 at 1:43 AM, Evil Bob said:

This trolling is in very poor taste.

Not trolling.

On 10/6/2019 at 1:43 AM, Evil Bob said:

Just that GW seems apathetic towards Death armies in general.  The FAQs  and Generals Handbook 2019 are proof of that.

How are GW apathetic towards death? LoN was top tier for a long time, Night Haunt are a brand new model range, Ossiarch Bonereapers are coming out. The current story of AoS is based around Nagash v Sigmar.

 

Seems like Death players will cry about anything tbh.

[Evil Bob]

On 10/8/2019 at 10:32 PM, 123lac said:

Not trolling.

Condescendly dismissing others points with and making a claim that can’t be back up by tournament record or even prevalent opinions locally.  Capping it off with an “LOL” didn’t help.

On 10/8/2019 at 10:32 PM, 123lac said:

How are GW apathetic towards death? LoN was top tier for a long time, Night Haunt are a brand new model range, Ossiarch Bonereapers are coming out. The current story of AoS is based around Nagash v Sigmar.

You’re seriously arguing narrative fluff over gameplay?  I stopped caring about the story after a major retcon that changed the game history because GW felt like it or was chasing another dollar.  The transition into splitting the undead into two armybooks was never a smooth thing.

I’ll trade all the garbage fluff for serious review and rules fixes.

On 10/8/2019 at 10:32 PM, 123lac said:

Seems like Death players will cry about anything tbh.

Ad hominem much?

[Overread]

Getting two fully fleshed out new factions, one of which features in multiple getting started focused sets and likely is going to be the magazine collectable focus in the new year (AoS equivalent of 40K Conquest). I'd say Death isn't being ignored by GW in the least. There's even ample space to consider Death might get one or two more armies - one focusing on the Vampiric line of models and another on the potential skeleton aspect (which could be rolled into Vampires or left out). About the only Death army doing really badly in the model front is Flesh Eaters and they were ruling the roost for broken overpowered at the start of the year. 

 

Death overall is in a good place. 

 

Destruction is the Grand Alliance in the weakest spot. Notably they got Gloomspite Gitz, but since then nothing major. The new Orruk release was a tiny bit of a flop in so much as they didn't get any terrain nor spells but they did get a very solid sounding Battletome. Meanwhile Ogres are hoping for a big update later in this year with at least one new model confirmed, a potential terrain feature (big pot) and likely a new Tome which is expected to combine Gutbusters and Beastclaw Raiders. 

[123lac]

2 hours ago, Evil Bob said:

Condescendly dismissing others points with and making a claim that can’t be back up by tournament record or even prevalent opinions locally.  Capping it off with an “LOL” didn’t help.

You’re seriously arguing narrative fluff over gameplay?  I stopped caring about the story after a major retcon that changed the game history because GW felt like it or was chasing another dollar.  The transition into splitting the undead into two armybooks was never a smooth thing.

I’ll trade all the garbage fluff for serious review and rules fixes.

Ad hominem much?

You're whinging about death being "ignored" by GW when that isn't the case in the slightest.

Of course I'm going to dismiss your concerns because frankly your concerns are childish.

Like I said, death will have received two brand new model lines (NH + OBR) within two years, a major narrative focus and more than ample rules that made LoN top tier until very recently.

If you think Death has it bad, try playing any of the other factions that didn't have a battle tome until very recently. They actually had it bad.

[Evil Bob]

1 hour ago, 123lac said:

You're whinging about death being "ignored" by GW when that isn't the case in the slightest.

Of course I'm going to dismiss your concerns because frankly your concerns are childish.

Like I said, death will have received two brand new model lines (NH + OBR) within two years, a major narrative focus and more than ample rules that made LoN top tier until very recently.

If you think Death has it bad, try playing any of the other factions that didn't have a battle tome until very recently. They actually had it bad.

From Wikipedia 

Ad hominem (Latin for "to the person"), short for argumentum ad hominem, typically refers to a fallacious argumentative strategy whereby genuine discussion of the topic at hand is avoided by instead attacking the character, motive, or other attribute of the person making the argument, or persons associated with the argument, rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself.

-

All you do is insult people and pretend that enforces your position. 

Nighthaunt have a valid argument with neglect.  They were dropped at the same time as the Stormcast Eternals and didn’t get the same kind of AoS 2.0 respect.  All Death factions seem to get FAQ’d with both “rules” fixes and nerfs.  Don’t get me wrong some of the fixes are legit like setting unit summoning to the end of the movement phase.  But there is a serious lacking of fixes that address game mechanics like how Deathmarch was only nerfed or warscroll repairs like the problem with Grave Guard.

LoN haven’t been sweeping the tournament scene like you claim.  Nagash lists haven’t been doing good since before the General’s Handbook 2018.  That was over a year ago.  He wasn’t competitive at 800 then and he isn’t worth the current points.

Part of me hopes they give the new Death book all the AoS 2.0 goodness so the nerf-brigade go berserk.  I can always tone down my lists so those in my local club have fun.  Because we’re a healthy group of adults who try to foster a positive hobby.  The sad truth is there are alway other people out there who seem to thrive on dumping on and getting others forces nerfed.  It’s a terminal cancer on the 40k side.

Edited October 11, 2019 by Evil Bob

[Death1942]

On 10/5/2019 at 1:33 AM, Scurvydog said:

I would not be surprised if the next Death soup book got rid of a bunch of older models once again, until finally disappearing completely. I strongly believe the skeleton and zombie hordes of old will at some point disappear completely, so the endgame goal would look something like this:

I completely disagree with the skeleton horde, iconic units do tend to stick around even if they aren't easy to block copyright on.

I too would love to see Soulblight get some love (or at least decent rules) but it will be difficult to say how they can do that without a few new kits.  I also think a big thing people aren't considering is SKU creep.  We just saw the Cities of Sigmar obliterate quite a few kits, possibly to make room for new ones and it brought the overwhelming range down to a much more manageable grouping.   If a new player walked into a GW store today and saw the wall of death boxes would they really know where to start?  Contrast that to say the Bonereapers or Nighthaunt (newer factions) and it would be fairly easy to break down the army into an easy to bite off chunk.  I think if we do get an update to the legions book we will certainly see a few kits drop off but I also hope it opens up newer kits in the future.

[Sception]

Honestly none of this stuff is meaningfully copyrightable in terms of preventing cheaper substitute model lines.  Even something like the stormcast eternals - when you get down to it what are they?  Fantasy dudes & dudettes in beefy plate armor.  Some have swords & shields, some have staves, some have bows, some ride dragons, etc.  None of that is at all copyrightable.  Sure, a 3rd party couldn't get away with duplicating their iconography or distinctive helmets or shoulder pads, but you could absolutely put out an entire range of not-stormcasts that are still clearly substitutes for stormcasts that would absolutely hold up to wysiwyg scrutiny in any non-GW tournament that allows 3rd party models.

The wacky names & such aren't to stop knockoff models, they're to build a distinctive brand & setting IP, something that could still have licensing value when and if 3d printing takes the floor out of the miniatures market, something that maybe isn't 'right around the corner' but has certainly crested the horizon.

Personally, I expect skeletons & zombies will stay a thing in AoS, but will eventually get reworked into maybe a bit more distinctly age-of-sigmary a thing than they currently are.

Edited October 21, 2019 by Sception

[Overread]

Yeah the names thing is a about GW being the only ones able to sell and market Ossiarch Bonereaper models. Anyone can make their own copy-cat sculpts, they just can't call them the same thing. This basically affects googling and searching in the biggest way. If anyone could sell under the names then GW loses out; but if GW are the only ones then all the google hits (or at least the first page) will be GW store, community and news articles - all ripe for directing people to GW products. 

They can't stop 3rd parties, just hamper their google search result rankings under specific names. Rest assured if Raging Heroes wants to make female Ossiarchs with well developed chests, they can! 

[Death1942]

8 hours ago, Sception said:

The wacky names & such aren't to stop knockoff models, they're to build a distinctive brand & setting IP, something that could still have licensing value when and if 3d printing takes the floor out of the miniatures market, something that maybe isn't 'right around the corner' but has certainly crested the horizon.

Personally, I expect skeletons & zombies will stay a thing in AoS, but will eventually get reworked into maybe a bit more distinctly age-of-sigmary a thing than they currently are.

I think there is definitely a limit on that kind of work in AoS.  We just got Bonereapers who in my opinion are the more AoS version of skeletons.  Do we really need to rework skeletons to make them more AoS style and drive away players who like the current style?  I think the better option is to keep the old army (update a few kits of course) and then release a new faction instead for your rework.  The Cities of Sigmar book has shown their new approach to lines and I think it is correct, ditch some of the more outlandish and outside the box models, update a few kits (maybe) but keep the core style in tact.  Will Cities and Legions survive AoS 3.0 in a few years?  Who knows.

[Spears]

On the subject of using the Gt as an indicator I did qualify using NightHaunt and planned to attend with NH but in the end I had a nice lie in instead. The prospect of two days uphill struggle was definitely a contributor to this.

All that said I actually think we have reasonable tools to participate in the activation wars, wave of terror and soul cage both give us some answer to Slaanesh etc.  Unfortunately the core army mechanics all seem to be slightly worse than equivalents elsewhere, whether this is the range of our abilities or our subpar healing. 

Adding units from NH to LON has created an awkward balancing situation between the two factions which they then doubled down on with Grief. Ideally Gw wont repeat this with the bonereapers release.

 

Edited October 22, 2019 by Spears

[Evil Bob]

8 hours ago, Spears said:

snip

Adding units from NH to LON has created an awkward balancing situation between the two factions which they then doubled down on with Grief. Ideally Gw wont repeat this with the bonereapers release.

After reading the latest faction focus I’m convinced that Ossiarch Bonereapers are the Death AoS 2.0 army.  Everything else is narrative fun for gaming clubs or casual FLGS.  After the Generals Handbook 2019 and latest errata's GW has shown little real interest in fixing previous death army books.  Their focus has mostly been tapping down on what the tournament scene doesn’t like or properly fixing rule errors.

The only thing that can stop us now are monumentally crazy point values.  It’s dead obvious of the new stuff there are no cheap options for this army.  That is assuming the only unit’s making the jump are the big three already mentioned. 

[Thamalys]

20 hours ago, Spears said:

Adding units from NH to LON has created an awkward balancing situation between the two factions which they then doubled down on with Grief.

This is very true. I personally feel like having the option of including NH units into LoN is great: sure, the going got even tougher for NH when our beautiful Reapers became even more expensive than they originally were, but surely this is something that can be - dare I say it - balanced by acting on e.g. the allegiance abilities? For instance, access to the gravesites for NH would dramatically change the playstyle of many (well, myself for one...), in that suddenly you don't have too worry too much about positioning/screening/uber-carefully moving those glass cannons (Bladegheist Revenants, anyone?) but you can actually throw them into the throng with the beautifully reassuring knowledge they'll be back 1 CP later (assuming your squishy NH general would still be alive, but that's another story.)

 

20 hours ago, Spears said:

I actually think we have reasonable tools to participate in the activation wars, wave of terror and soul cage both give us some answer to Slaanesh etc.

I will have to disagree with this one. Wave of terror is not a thing, for three reasons: (1) Something that happens with a 16.67% chance is not something any competitive build can/should rely upon: that's very close to the chance of rolling a 6 on a die (%16), and any one of us know that's not something to bank on. I remember a Beastclaw Riders player soberly confessing to me once "yeah, most of my good stuff happens on a 6..." (2) Even when we actually get wave of terror (hurray!) it's difficult to wipe out either tanky units or heroes: my best pick at the moment is 10 Bladegheist Revenants with a Spirit Torment (re-rolling failed hits) and a Knight of Shrouds on Ethereal Steed (+1 attacks for 1 CP, which you can't use during wave of terror!), which means 40 attacks 3+(rerolling)/3+/-1/1. Impressive (-ish) but look at the amount of both luck and support I had to invest here! For way less points many factions have access to more damage without the need of wave of terror in the first place. (3) You got your wave of terror, and managed to wipe out those pesky plague monks (hey, anyone has their grudges, ok?) - excellent. However, next turn your precious unit will die because of the other unit of plague monks not too far away. Wave of terror is very often an eye for an eye situation, but you can't do much in AoS with that! Something as easy as having wave of terror on a 8 instead of 10 would give us a ~ 40 % chance - that, would be a bit more scary, but I am not sure would fix much.

Soul cage is so tricky: 12" is too perilous a range, given how squishy our heroes are you have to be in combat already with said heroes at the back to be close enough to cast it... and at that point, your Slaneeshi friend (?) has already wiped out whatever unit they were facing.

 

11 hours ago, Evil Bob said:

After reading the latest faction focus I’m convinced that Ossiarch Bonereapers are the Death AoS 2.0 army.  Everything else is narrative fun for gaming clubs or casual FLGS.

I wouldn't necessarily rule out everything else, some strong LoN builds are still possible (he said confidently). I don't know, maybe I like my undead stuff so much I can't really see is not competitive anymore, but I'm not sure. It's not easy to put together a list that can cope with the latest filth, but I like the challenge! 

[AHexInScarletRed]

As Nagash and Arkhan join in with Bonereapers, what do we suspect to happen to old school Death? Vampires, Skeletons and Zombies - I could see them being phased out, but I guess the Reaper's Battletome will shed a bit of light in terms of Ally Rules, mentions in the lore and such. 

[Panzer]

I don't think they'll phase out zombies etc.
If they'd do Death would kinda lack the mindless horde aspect as neither FEC nor Nighthaunt nor Bonereapers would fill that role. Vampires and Skeletons I could see since Bonereapers do have some of the "individual and autonomous" aspect of Vampires and are also bone-boys, but only if we ignore that Vampires are still regularly featured in novels.

So really only Skeletons maybe as they kinda overlap with what zombies would be (cheap horde-ish infantry you can keep resurrecting easily) and with Bonereapers for obvious reasons.

[Evil Bob]

11 hours ago, Thamalys said:

snip

I wouldn't necessarily rule out everything else, some strong LoN builds are still possible (he said confidently). I don't know, maybe I like my undead stuff so much I can't really see is not competitive anymore, but I'm not sure. It's not easy to put together a list that can cope with the latest filth, but I like the challenge! 

It’s certainly true old builds can’t be completely discounted.  FEC won a significant tournament right before they had a new book drop.  Area meta and player competency count for something.  Downunder had KO take second place in the biggest gathering AoS has there.  He had a shot at #1 if not for the loss of a deciding priority roll.

Personally I tend to lean more to the data side of statistics.  If numbers indicate something is off I accept it and either adapt or move on.  Matt Ward helped get me out of 40k for years after running the game into the ground.

Playing for narrative has always been an option for AoS.  It was the first and only one at launch.  With the local club we play all kinds of lists at varying difficulties.  It all works out when it is the community having fun.  Personally not a big fan of the competitive scene.  It tends to ruin the game like how in 40k they nerf many things without carefully reviewing it.  I worry that kind of derangement will infect the AoS side.

Kudos to you and everyone who enjoy climbing those mountains.

[Craze]

Just one idea: 

Arkhan will be part of Bonereapers, Olynder is already part of Nighthaunt.

What if the "target" GW is pursuing for Death would be to have a separate faction for every Mortarch? Neferata could lead some kind of Vampire troops, while good old Manny will lead the more feral parts of the undead troops or the hordes of Skeletons and Zombies, while Nagash can be part of every single army of these. In Morghasts there are also regular troops included in the new army (same as with NH), this could also happen with future armies, where some of the existing range will get distributed.

 

About the competitiveness of Death armies: In the stats from thehonestwargamer.com from July 19, of the armies with a meaningful Meta%, #2 (FEC) and #6 (LoN) are Death armies, so I think it is quite fair to say that Death armies had a very strong meta-Position, at least until GHB19.

[Panzer]

They already said that you can take Arkhan and Nagash as part of a Bonereaper army. Not as ally, but as a proper part of it.

The "can take" and the fact that Bonereapers already have their own Mortarch implies that neither will be part of them by default. It's just an option.

Edited October 24, 2019 by Panzer

[Thamalys]

12 hours ago, Evil Bob said:

Kudos to you and everyone who enjoy climbing those mountains.

To be perfectly honest with you, if I would have access to a regular-enough narrative setting (I'm simply missing the time and the people) I would probably let the tournaments go... or not - after all, I have only met incredibly nice people along the way up to now, and some crazy lists (steam tanks only, anyone?) you can only get at tournaments, I guess.

 

54 minutes ago, Craze said:

What if the "target" GW is pursuing for Death would be to have a separate faction for every Mortarch? Neferata could lead some kind of Vampire troops, while good old Manny will lead the more feral parts of the undead troops or the hordes of Skeletons and Zombies, while Nagash can be part of every single army of these.

I'd love that! The Nagash + Mortarch combo comes at a failry steep price (1190/1230 pts - and, for what matters, 113 GBP...) but other than that I really do hope something along these lines would actually happen... I'd be all in for both factions, Nef and Manny alike! Who knows, maybe  plastic kits for blood knights / vampire lords and new models for direwolves as a start?

On a related note, it must be real hard for GW to balance what they think is going to be most fashionable for death players in the near future with the knotty mass of models/factions/lore that they themselves have generated throughout the years... I guess that in order to transitioning smoothly from what we have to the next big thing they'll have quite a few hard boundaries to deal with. Or not , we shall see...