Competitive Destruction

[MKsmash]

I've played Aos for a while now, and few things have remained constant. The first few years of it's existence barely count for much considering how much change GW had to do to get Aos working. However, as a Destruction player, I don't know of I've ever been at the top of the heap.

There was a brief period where stonehorns were a top tier thing of their own, being close to unkillable by halving all damage. But other than this brief, FAQ'ed out phase, destruction has never been the best, or even close really.

Ironjawz originally were a middle-tier army that eventually fell a long way before getting to Orruk Warclans now. They're our best choice, but still would struggle to be considered an A tier army. When they were released they were powerful, but quickly fell because of tzeentch, OBR, and lumineth. Bonesplitters had some tricks with Kunnin'Rukk before but now they just suck. 

Beastclaw Raiders were a solid army for a while, but it took 4 YEARS to get a new book. Gutbusters didn't even get one until recently in Ogor Mawtribes. Speaking of which, Mawtribes is one of the worst battletomes I've ever seen. Terrible subtractions, completely unintuitive and bad scenery, and  warscrolls that desperately needed love and got none, rendering them useless (*ahem* gorgers *ahem*). 

Gits also had to wait a while to get a book, but when they did, they were rewarded with completely useless allegiance abilities and an army that required 180 stabbas to perform well, or force you to go with the randomness of the squigs. This could've been considered a "fun" army, but couldn't even get that. 

Finally, Sons of Behemat. Coming in the wake of overpowered armies of Order, Death, and Chaos, they were to be my great hope for destruction, their chance to break into the high A-tier/S-tier class....but they didn't. While there hasnt been quite enough evidence yet, they simply don't have enough tricks in the bag to survive KO's shooting, OBR's durability, Tzeentch's magic, or Lumineth's.....uh..... everything.

Does anyone else feel Destruction is the neglected child of the Aos family?

[Clan's Cynic]

2.0 was very much Death's time in the sun, having been sharing an almost identical position to Destruction for pretty much all of 1.0.

I wouldn't be surprised if Destruction see their time in the spotlight during 3.0. Obviously it's just a (semi-) educated guess on that front, but it's no secret that Death's in a much better place than it was - certainly sales will have improved for 'em too - so I don't see why GW wouldn't do what's already worked in 3.0.

[Graywater]

You aren't wrong in the sense that destruction doesn't receive nearly the attention that chaos or order get. I dont agree that they arent competitive though. There are some big waagh and mawtribes armies that have done well at events. They just don't have the broken aspects that take them over the edge like some of the shenanigans that those other high tier armies typically do. Id argue this is a good thing though. I always love a fight against a destruction army because it leads to fun games. They don't have the feels bad components that "s-tier" armies typically do *cough* skink spam, be'lakor, KO with warp lightning Vortex *cough*. People hate playing against my daughters because they feel like they can't do anything against them. Hagg nar daughters tank an unreasonable amount of damage and morathi can be a real bully. Its not always the most fun (even at an event where you are actively trying to place as high as possible) to arrive at a table and your opponent's first response is some form of "hagg nar? Really? This isn't going to be fun". Im looking at selling my daughters of khaine and switching to a destruction army for this reason alone. It isnt all about placement. Winning your games mean nothing if your opponent is complaining about some busted rule you have the whole time. And again, it isnt like some destruction stuff can't compete.

[Marcvs]

I don't play destruction, so this is only "reporting" to offer some data on competitiveness. Here in France destruction did pretty well in 2 of the 3 tournaments which managed to take place in between lockdowns (both were 5-games, 2 dayers with 30-40 players). These tournaments are part of the French Single League, so competitive stuff.

In one tournament destruction got 2nd and 3rd place, both Ironjawz, both with 4-1. Lists are here, page 36 and 37 https://www.aosff.fr/sites/aosff/files/2020-10/ListesSUD-OUEST.pdf

In the other, Orruks got 6th place, again with 4-1. List here at page 13 https://www.aosff.fr/sites/aosff/files/2020-10/Listes Coupe SE 3.pdf

 

[Kadeton]

Stonehorns are back at top tier, IMO. Mine have trashed pretty much every "competitive meta" list out there.

[LuminethMage]

15 hours ago, Marcvs said:

I don't play destruction, so this is only "reporting" to offer some data on competitiveness. Here in France destruction did pretty well in 2 of the 3 tournaments which managed to take place in between lockdowns (both were 5-games, 2 dayers with 30-40 players). These tournaments are part of the French Single League, so competitive stuff.

In one tournament destruction got 2nd and 3rd place, both Ironjawz, both with 4-1. Lists are here, page 36 and 37 https://www.aosff.fr/sites/aosff/files/2020-10/ListesSUD-OUEST.pdf

In the other, Orruks got 6th place, again with 4-1. List here at page 13 https://www.aosff.fr/sites/aosff/files/2020-10/Listes Coupe SE 3.pdf

 

Just to add to this, here is AOS shorts tournament result compilation (incl. the ones you mentioned). If I'm not mistaken that was the last one, and after that there were only 2 or 3 more events in Oceania. 

If anything sticks out there it's Seraphon and KO. That's about it. 

If Lumineth start to pop-up as regular in 2021 as for the last few events shown there, then they might also get there. As far as I know they didn't play a role in the last few events that are missing from the table. 

[Rors]

I think the other side that doesn't come up in tournament results are there are a few armies that are very competitive but not player friendly. Witch elves for example are really good but you need hordes of them, it's a lot more expensive than most  lists to purchase, a pain to paint, and very samey to look at. I've heard there's similar things with bone splitters, who can be extremely competitive if you have the money and time to paint hundreds of naked orcs. When they do pop up they do well, but they get disprotionately low representation.

 

 

[Horus]

DESTRO LYF BABY

[broche]

I think graywater analysis is correct. I would add that bonesplitters is probably better that it seem because it's not much played. 

[Lord Krungharr]

I haven't gotten too many games in last year but the ones I did were with my Mawtribes and always with huge monster mash army variants.  My 5 Stonehorn 1 Thundertusk army only lost once vs Beasts of Khorne via daemon summoning.

While I agree in general Destruction doesn't have all the tricks and synergies of some of the other armies (that spell in a bottle thing is $*#*%)%) 2 of the armies have ways to make 1 model count as many.  That's powerful and has won me all the games I've won.  That and massive amounts of damage per attack!  When I've seen Big Waagh played (lost to them 3 times with my Chaos armies), they have OBSCENE amounts of buffs and stacking things; don't see how they're not top tier.  Saw a Goonhammer article about how Orruks can make a Rogue Idol fly like 200" or so in one turn if they get all their stuff off.  TOP TIER

[PlasticCraic]

@Lord Krungharr are you sure it was Goonhammer?  I published this one a while back where I got the Rogue Idol up to 180" movement (and that wasn't even the fastest unit in the piece):

https://plasticcraic.blog/2019/12/31/have-you-ever-went-fast/

I'm a big Goonhammer fan but I don't recall seeing anything similar on their site, would appreciate a link if I've missed it.

On 1/9/2021 at 6:26 AM, Lord Krungharr said:

don't see how they're not top tier.

I think what puts them a notch below top tier (imo) is their reliance on vulnerable support characters, in a meta that can surgically remove support characters.  They don't have the nonsense of big high-wound buffwagons like the Cauldron of Blood getting Lookout Sir; we're talking about idiots on 6+ saves in a lot of case here.  Not much dakka or magic required to lift them off the table.  Then your army has no buffs and a chronic battleshock problem.  

Tzeentch, KO and Seraphon are currently hoovering up the podiums (where there are actually events taking place), and all three match up well into Warclans.  They are keeping Warclans away from top tier in my opinion.

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2020/10/22/metawatch-warhammer-age-of-sigmar-1-list-building-with-dan-street/

Edited January 11, 2021 by PlasticCraic

[Lord Krungharr]

D'oh!  My bad; it was plasticcraic.  Hey, that's you

Excellent points though about the hero-sniping abilities of the shooty armies.  Guess the Wardokks and Wurgogs don't have the Ironjawz' iron.  Still though, I've been hit hard a few times by that teleporting super charging Ironjawz brute squad where the champion counts as a hero for stuff....nasty!

[Charlo]

Just to chime in, I think the Ogor book is deceptively strong and also pretty varied.

A lot of good players out there are using varying builds to great success both casually and competetively. 

It's very no-nonsense and honest, but the power is in there if you look for it.

I think the new Gitz subfactions from WD are decently good too - Jaws of Mork seems dangerous.

[C0deb1ue]

I got the impression that orruks were pretty consistently good and destructions top option. They often seem to place highly.

Ogors seemed quite sturdy when they first released and got a few results. Not sure what changed for Them.

I play gitz and they are pretty consistently poor and have been so most of T he edition. Even worse after endless spells were limited. The new white dwarf stuff was pretty mediocre and doesn’t address any of the issues. Just pushes you hard into narrow sub factions for a sort of side grade. Book needs a re-write but unfortunately it look like that will be another early new 3.0 release which is normally terrible for power-level.

Sons may be ok but seem very narrow in playstyle and I expect not very competitive (once they are worked out by opponents with more tournaments) but great in casual.

Edited April 18, 2021 by C0deb1ue