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OBR: Nadirite blades vs Nadirite Spears


Hellstorm42

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I'm wondering if this is just me, but it seems to me that the Nadirite Blades are always better than the spears. I feel like the -1 rend would always be better than the 2" attack range, even if I'm fielding a full unit of Mortek Guard. As for the deathriders, the extra hits on 5s is nice, but its hard for me to think that its better than -1 rend.

Have I overlooked something? What are your thoughts on this?

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I'm wondering if it's worth it to run a two rank deep unit of 20 MG with blades, with a 2nd unit of 10 with spears acting as the 3rd rank. When charged, both units could pile in and attack. You could maximize the rend of the blades with the reach of the spears. 

Edited by KK9T
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It doesn’t help that most lists stop at twenty models.  With skeletons it was a lot easier to play off a worse to hit number because of battlefield placement.  If you cloud show more than half the swords weren’t connecting then you were probably better off with spears.

I drank the Rend Juice a long time ago.

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53 minutes ago, ACBelMutie said:

Try to kill a unit of sequitors or kurnoths without rend. It's almost impossible. 

Greetings 

Rend is king in AoS I will agree on that.

But I don't see mortek guard as the unit sent out to go kill some kurnoth hunters. They're more there to be the anvil and just tarpit something forever.

We have other stuff to go on proper killing with even better rend.

The cav is a different story, you want to go and kill stuff on them.

Also if playing petrifex you can always use the CA to give the spears -1 rend, then again you can make swords -2...

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18 minutes ago, ACBelMutie said:

Mortek Guard doesn't have Hekatos key, so they can't be buffed with +1 to rend by their own. They need a hero for that.

Greetings

The unit leader is a hekatos. As long as the unit fits in the 6" bubble of the unit leader then it can work, without any need for extra heroes.

Downside, it's a small bubble. So a unit of 40 mortek guard would be a no go again.

Edited by DioRa
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So Kavalos get exploding hits on 5+ when they charge.  4+ if you get the spell off.  What I think is amazing is that it goes from and "unmodified 6" to a 5+, allowing your bonuses to hit to actually kick off.  

So if you have the spears on a charge (5+) and you have the Bone-tithe Shrieker nearby... it becomes a 4+.  Add the spell and it becomes a 3+. Add the Helm of the Ordained and all hits (not 1s, which always fail) explode. 

While everyone is excited about the charging command ability for the Kavalos, the stacking bonuses to hit and exploding hits looks like the main damage source to me.

Theory-crafting at its best.  The helm may not work as well because it is a wholly within item, but the shrieker should be just fine.

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9 hours ago, Goddin said:

So Kavalos get exploding hits on 5+ when they charge.  4+ if you get the spell off.  What I think is amazing is that it goes from and "unmodified 6" to a 5+, allowing your bonuses to hit to actually kick off.  

 

Sorry dude, you've skipped over the 'unmodified' in the spell description , the spell states the roll changes to an 'unmodified hit roll of 5+ instead of 6', or 4+ if charging spear armed dearthriders. 

Would have been interesting but probably not intended. think i'll stick to swords over spears, with a liege kavalos helm of ordained and the command ability plus petrifex command ability they're looking quite nice.

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Swords seem to be definitely better currently unless you field Mortek Guard of >20 models, however there's something to be said about rule of cool and the everchanging balance in warhammer. If in a few months or years GW happens to make spears better than swords and you only took swords because they were stronger even though you liked the look of spears better you'll definitely regret it.

Personally I'm going with one unit of 20 with Spears and one unit of 20 with Swords (maybe even split them into 2x10) and for my 5 Deathriders I'll go with Spears as well.

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Swords are better than spears by a mile, however

I'm going to build my Guard as 40 spears and 20 swords because I intend to play using mainly Petrifex elite so they will be better than swords because it's the only way to run big unit whille making sure that most models will get to fight AND maintaining CA bubble from Hekatos, with swords you'll either have to miss out on attacks, or CAs or run a hero nearby just to trigger those CAs 

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I really don't see an issue with modelling them as spears and telling your opponent they are swords for gameplay.  I wouldn't do this if you wanted 2 units with different weapons though, that isn't really fair.  One unit or multiple units all armed with the same weapon?  Go nuts.

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On 11/5/2019 at 1:13 AM, Mohawk_Monkey said:

Sorry dude, you've skipped over the 'unmodified' in the spell description , the spell states the roll changes to an 'unmodified hit roll of 5+ instead of 6', or 4+ if charging spear armed dearthriders. 

Would have been interesting but probably not intended. think i'll stick to swords over spears, with a liege kavalos helm of ordained and the command ability plus petrifex command ability they're looking quite nice.

I see that in the spell description, sorry I missed that.  I don't see it in the actual ability on the Kavalos wascroll.... probably an oversight and may get an FAQ.  I would have said it was a great design choice but the spell description undermines that quite a bit.

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On 11/5/2019 at 7:59 PM, Death1942 said:

I really don't see an issue with modelling them as spears and telling your opponent they are swords for gameplay.  I wouldn't do this if you wanted 2 units with different weapons though, that isn't really fair.  One unit or multiple units all armed with the same weapon?  Go nuts.

I do.

Different weapons on the battlefield are a key way to differentiate between units. If I saw spears behind swords, I'd process them as different units as I evaluate the situation, even if I were told I should ignore what I'm seeing.

 

In a 3D miniatures game, the appearance of the models matters.

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On 11/3/2019 at 6:23 AM, DioRa said:

Rend is king in AoS I will agree on that.

But I don't see mortek guard as the unit sent out to go kill some kurnoth hunters. They're more there to be the anvil and just tarpit something forever.

We have other stuff to go on proper killing with even better rend.

The cav is a different story, you want to go and kill stuff on them.

Also if playing petrifex you can always use the CA to give the spears -1 rend, then again you can make swords -2...

Mortek guard can absolutely maul just about anything.  With budgeon and endless duty it's 3 attacks with rend 2.   Even the kurnoths will have to honor that.   I have had them almost one shot a loonbiss in Mangler squigs (he passed 6 armor rolls needing a 6 on 16 dice leaving him at 2 wounds) and one shot 2 morghasts last night and would have killed 3.  Don't dismiss them as only an anvil, especially in a petrifex army.

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I finally got to sit down with the warscrolls today and really think about them for the first time (had been in full tournament prep mode until tonight).

After reading them, I am reminded of an old discussion about more bows that are cheaper vs. fewer crossbows that are better (or some such). 

The idea is that no matter how good 1 attack is, it can't kill as many models as 2 attacks (simple version).

I think that the discussion here is an indication that the balance between the two options for each of the two units is pretty good! That said, I'm leaning toward spears on both units unless it's a small unit of Guard. It's just great to be able to kill more models. No matter the rend difference, more spear attacks in the third rank of foot or more double hits in mounted models means more possible kills.

 

Plus, spears look so much cooler!

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I would only ever consider spears in a 30+ size unit, in 20 man units or less, swords will in most situations always win out, especially once casualties start setting in, yes at absolute peak 20 man full unit, all spears might just do a tiny bit more against low saves, but against 4+ and especially rerolls swords are much better all around. 

For example imagine fighting sequitors using their save rerolls, 20 Mortek with swords and a hekatos, we assume only 10 are within 1" so will dish out 21 attacks (for ease we assume no greatblades for exploding hits). The reult of this is an average of 3.89 damage. Now we imagine this was 20 mortek with spears and all of them can attack, this is then 41 attacks, which on average should result in 4.27 damage.

So spears have a very slight edge when the unit is completely fresh, but once you lose just 5 guys, the spears will drop to 3.23 damage, while the sword are still 3.89, maybe even better with a better pile in later on. 

Againstn o save rerolls it looks better for spears, and petrifex +1 rend for them is a huge increase in output, and this is felt if all can attack. We just have to remember this is an anvil unit, they will take casualities and should be expected to be grinded down. If you get charged and lose 10 out of the 20 guys, the swords will greatly help when doing a counter punch, so just comparing them at full strength will not reflect actual in game usefulness over an entire battle.

I'd still say for Mortek Guard if in doubt use swords unless running 30+ units of mortek guard.

For Kavalos swords all the time, even when charging the swords still beat spears, unless you run 10+ units and have some guys really out of position despite access to a 6" pile in.

 

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