Soulblight Gravelords News, Rumours and Speculation

[Brodylan]

So I’m pretty happy overall, the ‘bats and vamp’ list I wanted to make I think will be pretty viable. Roughly at 2k I think I can fit:

VLOZD
Vengorian lord
3 x 5 blood knights
6 vargheists
3 vargheists
3 fell bats
3 fell bats
Fellwing flock 

Has some huge damage output when you factor in the kastellai command traits and artifacts. Very vulnerable but there’s some nice debuffs available. 
 

The only thing I was hoping for was being able to use the cursed city bat swarms

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

*looks at Mortis Engine conversion*

Good news, guys! You just got promoted to Coven Throne! 😎

[Enoby]

It's like I'm reading the Slaanesh thread again when their book was leaked

It definitely seems like the books were written by the same person, or at least made with the same design philosophy. There definitely seems like a big push to move some armies to a less powerful spot, and that leaves people feeling bad because, well, for now it's been armies that haven't really needed the nerf and the new books don't compare favourably to the other 2e books. 

It could be a transitional period or it could be that one of the rules writers sees it as their job to create a balanced tome that will not tear up the meta whereas the other rules writers are creating what they feel is right, with less regard for its impact on the meta. I don't think either design is better, but they need to be implemented universally otherwise you get situations like this, where people are much less inspired about the army because the rules look poor compared to everyone else's. 

[warhammernerd]

12 minutes ago, El Syf said:

I'm with you, there seems to be some pretty strong things the book allows you to do.

Yes I'm a bit hurt that standard vamps aren't the overblown killing machines they were in 8th Ed but there's plenty of other good stuff to compensate for that.

I think we will obviously have to adjust our playstyles from LoN but this doesn't appear to be the abattoir floor of a book I feared at any rate.

I’m actually good with this. Because, they are mad killing machines. Just not all of them, and nor should one small 32mm based model in this game be that nails. That’s what the bigger dudes are for. Otherwise we end up in an arms race of, my Chaos lord is as strong as your Ironjawz is as strong as your Beastman lord. They are all hard as nails. And ours, in the context of everything else is the book and game, for a little model is actually pretty robust.

[warhammernerd]

1 hour ago, Aren73 said:

My 100% favourite take so far is: 

"Hey bro, it's ok our army is bad bro because every army in AoS 3.0 will be bad bro" 

Yeah...

The same was said for 40k when points values went up. Turns out no, bad rules are bad rules. 

These rules are rad. 

[warhammernerd]

2 minutes ago, Enoby said:

It's like I'm reading the Slaanesh thread again when their book was leaked

It definitely seems like the books were written by the same person, or at least made with the same design philosophy. There definitely seems like a big push to move some armies to a less powerful spot, and that leaves people feeling bad because, well, for now it's been armies that haven't really needed the nerf and the new books don't compare favourably to the other 2e books. 

It could be a transitional period or it could be that one of the rules writers sees it as their job to create a balanced tome that will not tear up the meta whereas the other rules writers are creating what they feel is right, with less regard for its impact on the meta. I don't think either design is better, but they need to be implemented universally otherwise you get situations like this, where people are much less inspired about the army because the rules look poor compared to everyone else's. 

Disagree. That is a legit terrible book. This isn’t.

[warhammernerd]

So hype for sky high Vargheists, wolfen vampires, evasive Manfred, Luka Vai, Wolves everywhere and Blood Knights leaping over screens. We have a very fun couple of years ahead of us. Pure winz

[lare2]

2 minutes ago, warhammernerd said:

Pure winz

Your positivity is an example for us all. 

For me, however, I'm out. I'm not sold enough on the models and these rules simply do not do it for me. I'll continue to worship Nagash via the cold touch of the Mourning Bride.

Best of luck to you all. It's been great speculating with you all.  

[JackStreicher]

What the hell is this?

Black Knights lost their Lance ability?

Wight Kings Are the Pinnacle of uselessness?

Most units Are a copy and Paste while making them worst?

Giant bats are utter trash, WHY do they cost 40€ per 3?

Vampire Lords Are trash

Did they randomly determine point costs? The whole if cursed city was already too expensive at 650, yeah add another 12%!

they made the new models good to okay with minor exceptions (fell bats, wtf) while putting a gazillion special rules on the avengori Vamptaurs.

 

I won‘t buy this BT. I am out.

Edited May 13, 2021 by JackStreicher

[Clewzy]

I'm finding the pricing on fellbats baffling as well

[Tali182]

5 minutes ago, JackStreicher said:

 

The whole if cursed city was already too expensive at 650, yeah add another 12%!

 

Signs that cursed city was written with 2 ed points in mind and the book with 3 ed? I see no reason otherwise to be different. I hope I am right, general points increase across AoS would be great.

[JackStreicher]

27 minutes ago, Enoby said:

There definitely seems like a big push to move some armies to a less powerful spot

The old book was bad already. It was good, not broken when it was fresh. This new one is bland, the synergies are gone and the command traits and abilities were trashed as well. 
no one played vamp lords, and they just copy and pasted the Warscroll while removing all options. Also the models wears a club while her weapon profile is called „Soulbound blades“.

This Battletome must have been written ages ago, before they even had the models, in a time in which LoN was super good. Slapping us those trash rules with frankly stupid, unnecessary nerfs into the face is outrageous.

Edited May 13, 2021 by JackStreicher

[Tali182]

Those look like 4 blades to me on a club

edit: it is also a club

Edited May 13, 2021 by Tali182

[El Syf]

Kastelai Dynasty is mad good in my opinion. Double Dragon lists, shed loads of Blood Knights and FTW!

[JackStreicher]

6 minutes ago, Tali182 said:

Those look like 4 blades to me not a club

It‘s a mace by definition. I guess she was intended to wield two swords.

 

Nagash‘s Warscroll is a copy paste as well, but spoiler: HE Doesn‘t have his books anymore, teclis destroyed them.

Edited May 13, 2021 by JackStreicher

[Tali182]

1 minute ago, JackStreicher said:

It‘s a mace by definition. I guess she was intended to wield two swords.

blade

/bleɪd/

 

noun

 

1. 1.

   the flat cutting edge of a knife, saw, or other tool or weapon.

    

    

    

   Blade don't mean sword for what it is worth

[Tali182]

3 minutes ago, JackStreicher said:

It‘s a mace by definition. I guess she was intended to wield two swords.

what it does mean is any vamp model including the crimson court has a weapon that can be seen as soulbound blades  

Edited May 13, 2021 by Tali182

[Beliman]

6 minutes ago, JackStreicher said:

The old book was bad already. It was good, not broken when it was fresh. This new one is bland, the synergies are gone and the command traits and abilities were trashed as well. 
no one played vamp lords, and they just copy and pasted the Warscroll while removing all options. Also the models wears a club while her weapin profile is called „Soulbound blades“.

This Battletome must have been written ages ago, before they even had the models, in a time in which LoN was super good. Slapping us those trash rules with frankly stupid, unnecessary nerfs into the face is outrageous.

There are some things that become useless (or I can't see how they can be played), others that changed their role and others that become strong. I can see kastelai being strong, monster smash being playable, some combos being really good.

Fellbats seems to be the losers of the whole battletome, awesome models, ****** rules. Vampires still gives +1atk (something that wightkings and LoB lost, that makes them a bit more unique). Coven Throne seems to have some shenanigans with shrudder and I can see some +2 to +4 spellcasts around the table (even if I the lores are a bit hit and miss for me).

I didn't finish all the rules, and I'm still doing maths, but I can see some winners and some losers. But I agree with some bland rules (mainly not having spells for every blood line, artefacts and some abilities).

[JackStreicher]

A

4 minutes ago, Tali182 said:

blade

/bleɪd/

 

noun

 

1. 1.

   the flat cutting edge of a knife, saw, or other tool or weapon.

    

    

    

   Blade don't mean sword for what it is worth

This thing isn‘t designed to cut but to smash, because that‘s what a mace does. Otherwise the edges of her armour are also blades.

[Elmir]

Vampires only give +1A to summonable units now... no more hypercharged blood knights afaik, they are stuck at 3A.

[Erdemo86]

So im thinking a very viable and competitive list would be:

prince V

v lord on dragon

corpse cart

rest Blood knights 

[warhammernerd]

20 minutes ago, JackStreicher said:

What the hell is this?

Black Knights lost their Lance ability?

Wight Kings Are the Pinnacle of uselessness?

Most units Are a copy and Paste while making them worst?

Giant bats are utter trash, WHY do they cost 40€ per 3?

Vampire Lords Are trash

Did they randomly determine point costs? The whole if cursed city was already too expensive at 650, yeah add another 12%!

they made the new models good to okay with minor exceptions (fell bats, wtf) while putting a gazillion special rules on the avengori Vamptaurs.

 

I won‘t buy this BT. I am out.

But there are lots of other ways to get their damage and wound rolls increased, plus they are battle line now. An improvement.

Wight kings have seen a points drop. And in AoS 3.0 buffs can’t be stacked, so +1 attack would be wasted as the vamps do it. Therefore, this is an improvement.

Disagree, think the rules have made clearer distinction between battlefield roles.

Bats have move 14”, and work nicely within a new batallion. They almost never saw action before, now they will. Improved.

Vampire lords is a very wide category, I for one am ok with Named vamp lords having unique and thematic rules. The bog standard vamp lord, is just that. No problem with this change. Oh, they got a +1 save, a more reliable damage output and better heal. Improvement.

The cursed city points is a bit of a moot point given availability. But that’s not a good reason for questionable points. But, I happen to think that’s quite reasonable for what you get. 

The spread of new rules is fairly even, all sub factions get the same amount plus artefacts. Some are better than others. Actually, for once I’d say there isn’t a stand out. Which is great. All the sub factions seem nice and quite different.

With new models, comes new rules. And I think you might be suffering from being blind to the rules that already are great or ones which have had a tweak.

It’s boring af, but in a nutshell. 
 

The following are way better:

Blood Knights, zombies, Vargheists, Mortarchs, sub factions, artefacts, spells, batallions and most important rules interactions. 
 

But sure, I couldn’t give a dogs dinner about those who wanna sulk and feel it’s all terrible. As I said prev, all feelings are of course valid, but there is AS ALWAYS those amongst us who massively overreact and fail to see the good and instead wanna focus on the negative, which in this case I hand on heart can say is very little.

[JackStreicher]

Vyrkos‘ allegiance battle traits are crazy good. Yet looking at other Bloodlines... well

[Tali182]

1 minute ago, JackStreicher said:

A

This thing isn‘t designed to cut but to smash, because that‘s what a mace does. Otherwise the edges of her armour are also blades.

Why can't the weapon do both? Also if she used he armor as a weapon then yeah they would be blade by definition.

In the end I try to be positive but if all you want to be in be negative and pick apart every word they print well power to you. Each to their own, try to enjoy the rest of your day anyway.

[Malakithe]

So far for me im thinking Prince V with Blood Knights or Manny with Vargheist spam

Too bad the Lore of Vamps is trash but the Deathmages spells are great.

And if battalions are going to stay then Red Banqueters will be good.