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AoS 3rd - Idoneth Deepkin discussion


HollowHills

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Love these writeups and seeing you get more comfortable with the list! @13_rolls

 

Ok so for GS I generally actually go for hold more terrain pieces than my opponent (you can use on of the old CP markers to keep track if you want). Since my army is so much faster and tends to pin my opponent deep in their own territory, it's really super simple to ensure that of the 8 pieces of terrain on the table, I hold about 5 or 6. That being said, GS has actually only ever come up in one game where I held on to a 2 point lead against the 8th? place SCE list from the Austin GT in a tourney prep game. 

I would caution against beastmaster because, even though the turtle is quite hardy, losing it basically means you're looking at an enormous point deficit that can be extremely hard to come back from. I've also started using the turtle far more aggressively, as opponents tend to jump at the chance to kill it and then get subsequently rolled by sharks, who are actually far more efficient damage dealers for their points. 

The Soulscryer ability can be a little tricky. Even though it's only against one unit, you can still ENGAGE multiple units as demonstrated here: 

Spoiler

scryer.jpg.5d4cbf83370d0920c8b4dbc5762489f1.jpg

I declared the phoenix guard as the soulscryer target but was still able to engage the handgunner unit behind them (the eidolon killed like 15 before this picture was taken) and the Anointed on Frostheart. I really only ever use the soulscryer on turn 1 because at that point my goal is to absolutely engage one important unit and maybe a couple less important ones. What you don't want to do is yeet your whole army into multiple fighty units since you can lose the activation wars on turn one. If you go first on turn 2... yeet away since you're guaranteed to fight first with tide reversal. 

 

Deepkin absolutely struggle with objectives which is why it's important to pin your opponent with your fast fighty units so they can't get there. Alternatively, just kill everything. Deepkin are an army that tend to go down on points on turn one and then erase everything on turns 2 and 3, allowing you easy points afterwards. Against nurgle specifically, murdering the heroes is really important to stop the buffs.  I actually think I posted a writeup with pictures of my game against a nurgle demon army a little while ago that kinda goes into how to stop them. 

Here's a picture from that game that really demonstrates how to stop them getting to objectives.

Spoiler

nurgle.jpg.c339a2c4fbe39658e51feaf24a83fa74.jpg

 

As you can see, there's no way his plaguebearers can punch through to get to the central or far right objective. I took first turn in this game because I knew that if I got doubled, he still wouldn't be able to kill enough to get out of his deployment zone. The eels are there so that if glottkin made a run for the objective, I could fly over with them and murder his support heroes (which is exactly what happened). 

 

 

I'm a very aggressive turtle player because it really shines on turns 1-3 where its output is maximized. I also find that throwing the turtle into large groups of "elite" rend -1 infantry like phoenix guard, stormvermin, etc, etc basically ensures a very favorable trade. People are super scared of the 6 MW bites and don't like to risk losing monsters to the turtle which means that if I go second and get the turtle involved ASAP, I can guarantee 3 rounds of super favorable combats before the high rend stuff hits me. That's why I always go for Ancient as the mount trait. 

 

As for the auto run, that's a bit of a flexible decision and not obviously clear cut. I tend to do it on the Eidolon or Turtle most of the time, only really using it for sharks when I see a ridiculously good opening. Making sure to trigger the bonus bites shouldn't be too hard when you've got 20 reavers, the turtle, and generally 1-2 harpoon launchers. 

The turtle may seem slow but 10" + 6" auto run + 7ish" rerollable charge + 3" soulscryer buff +3" pile in is an insane amount of movement and I've never had any trouble picking engagements. Honestly though, the Eidolon is the best target since he doesn't lose shooting utility and his retreat and charge while healing is absolutely insane. People don't see it coming and it's won me several games on its own. 

Turn one, eidolon goes about 27" into a screening unit and erases it. Opponent turn one, they either ignore the eidolon or commit heavily to killing it. I pop cloud of midnight and relax. If I get turn 2, Eidolon retreats into the backline and murderizes everything. If I don't get priority, I still fight first with everything so he usually survives the attacks back, doesn't bracket, and then retreats on my turn and murderizes everything. 

 

And yes, the Eidolon and turtle tag team is insane. If you throw any combination of eidolon, turtle, and 2-man shark units into a target, it's generally gonna die horribly. 

 

I've got my league final this weekend where I'm actually not gonna take the turtle and instead take 7 sharks. I know I'll be playing tzeentch and expect to see Kairos and another lord of change. I'll keep y'all posted....

 

My list: Fuethan as usual

 

Eidolon with cloud

Tidecaster general with master of magic 

Soulscryer

 

2x10 reavers

1x10 thralls

 

3x2 sharks

1x1 shark

1x3 ishlaen

4 drops with 2 units of 2 sharks and the ishlaen unit in hunters. 

Might swap out the soulscryer for another shark to make it an even 8. Haven't decided yet lol. 

Edited by vinnyt
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Fantastic feedback, as always @vinnyt, I've got my tournament tomorrow so I'm cramming 😂. Few more questions...

Predator’s Domain

You could drop a ship outside of 9" if possible in your back corners to prevent teleport space, and garrison a ship with a Tidecaster to take that at the end to grab an extra terrain control. And you have two of those.
 

Quote

Defensible terrain features are controlled by the player who has any units garrisoning them (if a defensible terrain feature is not being garrisoned, then neither player controls it)

I might try this GS because I just feel like all the other ones are too hard to pull off. Good thought on it. Worst case, I am flying around in Rd 5 trying to grab as many as I can to get 5 of the 8 (maybe 4 of the 8 + 1 with the boat to take it).

Setting up Reavers/Thralls wrt Coherency / on objectives

I found myself unsure of where to place the Namarti foot troops. I ended up running the reavers/thralls to _their_ side of the objective to screen it off from the enemy to stop them from walking onto it which did work a bit until they died, buying me at least a turn. Is it optimal to hold the thralls on my side of an objective leaving space for bigger hammers to land? It would probably help with numbers on objectives for longer - but reduces their use as a screen. Do you generall screen them out in a single line, or two ranks 1" apart with triangles at the end? With Reavers, I'm always fighting the balance between 9" out to do unleash hell, and keeping them safe on objectives for numbers.

Rolling and Rerolling all those darn dice

Any tips on going faster? I have 2.5 hours per game and I have to roll SO MANY DICE with the double re-rolls it's crazy! I suppose memorizing war scrolls is my only shot, I'm working on that haha.

Other than that, I think I'm ready to roll :).

Edited by 13_rolls
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7 hours ago, 13_rolls said:

Fantastic feedback, as always @vinnyt, I've got my tournament tomorrow so I'm cramming 😂. Few more questions...

Predator’s Domain

You could drop a ship outside of 9" if possible in your back corners to prevent teleport space, and garrison a ship with a Tidecaster to take that at the end to grab an extra terrain control. And you have two of those.
 

I might try this GS because I just feel like all the other ones are too hard to pull off. Good thought on it. Worst case, I am flying around in Rd 5 trying to grab as many as I can to get 5 of the 8 (maybe 4 of the 8 + 1 with the boat to take it).

Setting up Reavers/Thralls wrt Coherency / on objectives

I found myself unsure of where to place the Namarti foot troops. I ended up running the reavers/thralls to _their_ side of the objective to screen it off from the enemy to stop them from walking onto it which did work a bit until they died, buying me at least a turn. Is it optimal to hold the thralls on my side of an objective leaving space for bigger hammers to land? It would probably help with numbers on objectives for longer - but reduces their use as a screen. Do you generall screen them out in a single line, or two ranks 1" apart with triangles at the end? With Reavers, I'm always fighting the balance between 9" out to do unleash hell, and keeping them safe on objectives for numbers.

Rolling and Rerolling all those darn dice

Any tips on going faster? I have 2.5 hours per game and I have to roll SO MANY DICE with the double re-rolls it's crazy! I suppose memorizing war scrolls is my only shot, I'm working on that haha.

Other than that, I think I'm ready to roll :).

Yeah it's pretty easy to get the predators domain and people have never actually tried to stop me getting it. 

 

Namarti positioning can be kinda tough to manage. I find myself leapfrogging them with my hammers after they've absorbed the initial shooting/any potential charges. I really never find myself needing them to screen after turn 1 and by holding them back, I can prevent cheeky deepstrikes from my opponent. I almost never run them as a single line. You're one arcane bolt away from disaster if you do that. I find that 2 offset ranks of 5 is more than enough to a) screen my hammers and b) prevent sneaky pile in from opponents that would love to pile in around units to engage high value targets. 

That being said, the next level play here is to use the Eidolon to BAIT your opponent into thinking you've made a mistake and then engaging the eidolon with an alpha strike hammer, resulting in you popping cloud of midnight and then erasing whatever engaged you on your next turn. I did this in my most recent stormcast game and it resulted in me losing a thrall unit and wiping out an Annihilator Grandhammer unit on turn one, both removing a hammer unit of his, and reducing his ability to contest objectives in the mid-game. 

Memorizing warscrolls is the number one thing. Deepkin don't really roll that many dice at once (outside of reavers) and your games tend to end a lot faster than other armies. Just memorize your army and practice practice practice! 

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Alrighty, league final against a VERY competitive Disciples of Tzeentch army. So of course I took 8 sharks because that's the way I like to live:

My List

Spoiler

1661861366_idkarmy.jpg.d89e8163c41d5f761d6ff510b223e069.jpg

 

Fuethan

Eidolon of the Storm with Cloud of Midnight
Tidecaster general with master of magic

2x10 Reavers
1x10 Thralls

4x2 Sharks with 1 net and 1 harpoon per unit
1x3 Ishlaen Guard

1940 points

That's right. No turtle. Only sharks.

These little rascals are point-for-point the hardest hitting unit in the deepkin codex and far outstrip the turtle in terms of speed and output per point.

Why would I need a turtle aura of +1 save or +1 to hit when I just hit someone with 8 sharks? Survivability comes from the fact that you have to kill 8 sharks that are absolutely killing you at the same time.

 

Tzeentch List

Spoiler

1557890847_dotarmy.jpg.d866db25bab2821cd69e895e579e1d8d.jpg

Host Arcanum

Kairos
Lord of Change with stuff
Changecaster with fanged circlet
Curseling
Blue Scribes

2x10 Pinks
1x3 screamers

Cogs
Umbral Spellportal

This list is the NPE experience personified. It's got a million spells, a million pinks that don't play by the rules of God or man, and it can summon more of them without any trouble. It is truly an immovable object.

But I have 8 sharks...

 

Deployment

 

Spoiler

depl.jpg.92f428f09dcf76cd77c538ff6a2d8c86.jpg

We roll up Veins of Ghur which is not ideal but honestly playing objectives is for suckers since my only objective is to throw 8 sharks directly into his army and see what he does.

Deployment is pretty straightforward. He castles up ok and I do think I see an opening to get to the chickens but Kairos auto-changing charge rolls scares me a lot and I know that a double turn would be reeeeally bad if he gets it.

So I let him go first.

 

Turn 1 (Tzeentch)

Spoiler

1611233380_dot1.jpg.1202c2e363a7cb002bfd6eeec4b54961.jpg

He ferocious advances his big birds and the changecaster.

He then casts 14 spells including spellportal and kills 6 reavers with Gift of Change. He also metamorphosis his changecaster for the bonus battle tactic point.

He summons his 6 screamers and they prepare to screen as best they can. He also helpfully suicides his screamers into the sharks, hoping they'll tie the sharks up in combat for a turn.

Sooooo the spawn and screamers die horribly and do nothing since he activated the screamers first. I do get to cheese some extra shark movement with the pile-in though which was cool.

He gets 3 points.

Score is 0-3 Tzeentch

Turn 1 (Deepkin)

Spoiler

idk1.jpg.ffb6594746d0288fb9f88501dfed8cd0.jpg

Ok time to get all up in his face. Tzeentch is the sort of army where if you play cagily, you lose to summoning and unending magic. You have to fully commit to killing the pinks and overwhelm their target priority so that they just can't deal with the threats.

To that end, I declare ferocious advance and immediately charge up the table.

Shooting is ok. I stop pile ins on the horrors and am able to make a bunch of charges. Unfortunately I get a little bit caught up on the horror screens but I sneak one shark into the backfield and do 4 wounds to the Blue Scribes, forcing him to use some destiny dice to keep him alive.

 

The Pre-combat phase looked like this:

Spoiler

prechargeidk1.jpg.234059fe135a70c7dd9b640bbf34d569.jpg



This is where things get suuuper annoying. Pink horrors don't count as being slain for some reason so sharks don't get the extra bite. They also get a flat -1 to hit if they're close to heroes which means that I'm hitting on 4s, rerolling ones. This is very bad for me since I have terrible luck and rely on rerolling everything at all times.

I kill 26 horrors from one unit and like 14 from another. The screamers all die horribly. I take a couple wounds in response across all the sharks. Also important to know is that the rubber fishing lures are blues and brimstone horrors because ain't nobody got time to paint all that.

I score 2 points

2-3 Tzeentch

I win priority!!!

Turn 2 (Deepkin)

Spoiler

idk2.jpg.7d9c40e9144a124cf4b1a50ca82bdadd.jpg

Allllrighty time to try and kill everything before his magic goes off and murders me. Objective comes in on my left.

I declare broken ranks on the more wounded horror unit because I'm convinced I can murderize them.

I move the reavers up and shoot a bunch of shots into stuff, softening up the horror units and freeing up my eels from combat so that they can charge into the big birds.

Combat goes and I BARELY kill the marked horror unit. My dice were not friendly and hitting on 4s with no rerolls is absolutely devastating to this army.

The eels do 8 wounds to Kairos who is apparently made of tissue paper. The Blue scribes die horribly.

I score 4 points for the objective and battle tactic.

 

Turn 2 (Tzeentch)

Spoiler

dot2.jpg.aafed1409129bdaaf610ad295eb3030a.jpg

He broken ranks the already wounded reavers.

And then it happens. He casts like 15 more spells, does 11 wounds to the eidolon, kills the eel unit, kills the reaver unit, and does some other stuff.

I should have used cloud of midnight but I a) didn't expect him to target the eidolon when there were so many sharks around and b) assumed that 2d6+d3+1 wound wouldn't result in 11 damage after a 5+ ward save...

He then retreats the chickens back and summons a horror screen around the unwounded Lord of Change.

Shooting doesn't really do much and combat results in the other pink horror unit dying.

He gets 3 points

It's 6-6 now and objectives are coming down.

But I win priority and my opponent decides to call the game since I'm gonna kill Kairos and all the characters except for the last lord of change.

DEEPKIN WIN

Edited by vinnyt
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On 12/11/2021 at 11:21 AM, vinnyt said:

Alrighty, league final against a VERY competitive Disciples of Tzeentch army. So of course I took 8 sharks because that's the way I like to live:

My List

  Hide contents

No photo description available.

 

Fuethan

Eidolon of the Storm with Cloud of Midnight
Tidecaster general with master of magic

2x10 Reavers
1x10 Thralls

4x2 Sharks with 1 net and 1 harpoon per unit
1x3 Ishlaen Guard

1940 points

That's right. No turtle. Only sharks.

These little rascals are point-for-point the hardest hitting unit in the deepkin codex and far outstrip the turtle in terms of speed and output per point.

Why would I need a turtle aura of +1 save or +1 to hit when I just hit someone with 8 sharks? Survivability comes from the fact that you have to kill 8 sharks that are absolutely killing you at the same time.

 

Tzeentch List

  Reveal hidden contents

May be an image of 1 person

Host Arcanum

Kairos
Lord of Change with stuff
Changecaster with fanged circlet
Curseling
Blue Scribes

2x10 Pinks
1x3 screamers

Cogs
Umbral Spellportal

This list is the NPE experience personified. It's got a million spells, a million pinks that don't play by the rules of God or man, and it can summon more of them without any trouble. It is truly an immovable object.

But I have 8 sharks...

 

Deployment

 

  Reveal hidden contents

No photo description available.

We roll up Veins of Ghur which is not ideal but honestly playing objectives is for suckers since my only objective is to throw 8 sharks directly into his army and see what he does.

Deployment is pretty straightforward. He castles up ok and I do think I see an opening to get to the chickens but Kairos auto-changing charge rolls scares me a lot and I know that a double turn would be reeeeally bad if he gets it.

So I let him go first.

 

Turn 1 (Tzeentch)

  Reveal hidden contents

No photo description available.

He ferocious advances his big birds and the changecaster.

He then casts 14 spells including spellportal and kills 6 reavers with Gift of Change. He also metamorphosis his changecaster for the bonus battle tactic point.

He summons his 6 screamers and they prepare to screen as best they can. He also helpfully suicides his screamers into the sharks, hoping they'll tie the sharks up in combat for a turn.

Sooooo the spawn and screamers die horribly and do nothing since he activated the screamers first. I do get to cheese some extra shark movement with the pile-in though which was cool.

He gets 3 points.

Score is 0-3 Tzeentch

Turn 1 (Deepkin)

  Reveal hidden contents

No photo description available.

Ok time to get all up in his face. Tzeentch is the sort of army where if you play cagily, you lose to summoning and unending magic. You have to fully commit to killing the pinks and overwhelm their target priority so that they just can't deal with the threats.

To that end, I declare ferocious advance and immediately charge up the table.

Shooting is ok. I stop pile ins on the horrors and am able to make a bunch of charges. Unfortunately I get a little bit caught up on the horror screens but I sneak one shark into the backfield and do 4 wounds to the Blue Scribes, forcing him to use some destiny dice to keep him alive.

 

The Pre-combat phase looked like this:

  Reveal hidden contents

May be an image of 1 person



This is where things get suuuper annoying. Pink horrors don't count as being slain for some reason so sharks don't get the extra bite. They also get a flat -1 to hit if they're close to heroes which means that I'm hitting on 4s, rerolling ones. This is very bad for me since I have terrible luck and rely on rerolling everything at all times.

I kill 26 horrors from one unit and like 14 from another. The screamers all die horribly. I take a couple wounds in response across all the sharks. Also important to know is that the rubber fishing lures are blues and brimstone horrors because ain't nobody got time to paint all that.

I score 2 points

2-3 Tzeentch

I win priority!!!

Turn 2 (Deepkin)

  Reveal hidden contents

No photo description available.

Allllrighty time to try and kill everything before his magic goes off and murders me. Objective comes in on my left.

I declare broken ranks on the more wounded horror unit because I'm convinced I can murderize them.

I move the reavers up and shoot a bunch of shots into stuff, softening up the horror units and freeing up my eels from combat so that they can charge into the big birds.

Combat goes and I BARELY kill the marked horror unit. My dice were not friendly and hitting on 4s with no rerolls is absolutely devastating to this army.

The eels do 8 wounds to Kairos who is apparently made of tissue paper. The Blue scribes die horribly.

I score 4 points for the objective and battle tactic.

 

Turn 2 (Tzeentch)

  Reveal hidden contents

No photo description available.

He broken ranks the already wounded reavers.

And then it happens. He casts like 15 more spells, does 11 wounds to the eidolon, kills the eel unit, kills the reaver unit, and does some other stuff.

I should have used cloud of midnight but I a) didn't expect him to target the eidolon when there were so many sharks around and b) assumed that 2d6+d3+1 wound wouldn't result in 11 damage after a 5+ ward save...

He then retreats the chickens back and summons a horror screen around the unwounded Lord of Change.

Shooting doesn't really do much and combat results in the other pink horror unit dying.

He gets 3 points

It's 6-6 now and objectives are coming down.

But I win priority and my opponent decides to call the game since I'm gonna kill Kairos and all the characters except for the last lord of change.

DEEPKIN WIN

You should show up to Tournaments with the Jaws Theme playing.

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So a few more practice games in and things are stabilizing for me. One constant however is my Eidolon of the storm seems to be weaker in combat than I always expect. It is hardy, with the 5+ ward and all the healing it always is around being useful, but it’s not the hammer I keep expecting. The +1 to wound aura is hugely important - but am I missing something with its attacks?

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On 12/19/2021 at 11:12 AM, 13_rolls said:

So a few more practice games in and things are stabilizing for me. One constant however is my Eidolon of the storm seems to be weaker in combat than I always expect. It is hardy, with the 5+ ward and all the healing it always is around being useful, but it’s not the hammer I keep expecting. The +1 to wound aura is hugely important - but am I missing something with its attacks?

The Eidolon really wants all out attack and rerolls from Dhom-Hain, Fuethan, Akhelian King, etc.  If you give him arcane tome and flaming weapon he's pretty good at killing most things, for bigger units and the tougher hero's you definitely want him in with something like Morrsarr, Sharks or Turtle though.

Edited by Drofnum
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Eidolon is always on the brink of being a Big Damage Dealer but never really makes it. Maximizing his output with Fuethan and possibly all out attack will put you on 2srr1/2s/-2/3 with the big spear, 2rr1/2s/-1/1 with the little spear and then the fish attacks. That's pretty much the most he can do and it is a LOT but not quite mawkrusha level. 

His main utility (IMO) is the ability to do moderate to severe damage and then retreat and charge into ideal targets. He doesn't solo big stuff but rather goes in with a shark unit and kill it together. 

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12 hours ago, vinnyt said:

Eidolon is always on the brink of being a Big Damage Dealer but never really makes it. Maximizing his output with Fuethan and possibly all out attack will put you on 2srr1/2s/-2/3 with the big spear, 2rr1/2s/-1/1 with the little spear and then the fish attacks. That's pretty much the most he can do and it is a LOT but not quite mawkrusha level. 

His main utility (IMO) is the ability to do moderate to severe damage and then retreat and charge into ideal targets. He doesn't solo big stuff but rather goes in with a shark unit and kill it together. 

Retreat and charge of 12" flying is unreal.

Also his healing ability and ward just got a bit better now that the FAQ came out.

I just started finishing off my IDK, can;t wait to get some games in.

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1 hour ago, Chronos said:

Retreat and charge of 12" flying is unreal.

Also his healing ability and ward just got a bit better now that the FAQ came out.

I just started finishing off my IDK, can;t wait to get some games in.

Okay this all helps my train of thought. He’s a agile, specialty piece who primarily buffs and with cloud of midnight distracts and tarpitts. I think it’s a good piece for the army. I don’t see a viable replacement, that +1 to wound is huge.

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I am having a hard time finding the points for him frankly.

The +1 to wound is great but it does not really justify the 330 points for me. When I last played IDk I ran double-turtle lists most of the time and that did a lot more for me than Stormy. 

And running two Leviadons AND an Eidolon is unfortunately out of the question.

Edited by DocKeule
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21 minutes ago, DocKeule said:

I am having a hard time finding the points for him frankly.

The +1 to wound is great but it does not really justify the 330 points for me. When I last played IDk I ran double-turtle lists most of the time and that did a lot more for me than Stormy. 

And running two Leviadons AND an Eidolon is unfortunately out of the question.

I don't know... +1 to wound for basically the entire army is pretty great. The utility of the 5+ ward, healing, flying, and retreating and charging, plus taking Orb, it;s a lot of utility. Also no diminishing warscroll, but no monstrous actions on the otherside.

I definitely think the Eidolon is worth it, but can see how taking two turtles would be worth it as well.

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I think the Sea Eidolon is pretty appealing now, if you dont need the damage from the storm.  If the Storm cant charge they do pretty similar damage actually, although on the charge the Storm does quite a bit more and you will generally be charging with him.

Survivability is the same, but the -1 to hit may be really nice as more books get updated since they seem to be removing a lot of the +1's to hit. The heal spell on a turtle could go a long way as well. I think it definitely makes it a harder choice now.

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45 minutes ago, 13_rolls said:

My opposition to sea is he’s just too swingy. Everything on the warscroll says D3 this or D6 that. Points can’t really make up for reducing risk of that kind of rng.

He has an additional attack that is D3 attacks, otherwise his only other variable attack weapon is the exact same as the Storm's. Definitely dont agree that that makes him far more swingy than the Storm.

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Yeahh so the storm is way way way better than the sea. 

Output:

Storm NOT charging has 4 attacks at 3/2/-2/2, 4 attacks at 3/2/-1/1 that gives a flat conditional +1 to hit against a little hero, and then 2d6 at 4/3/-/1. You gotta remember that the +1 to wound buffs himself too!!!!

Sea has 3 attacks at 3/3/-2/2. 3 attacks at 3/3/-1/1, and 2d6 at 4/4/-/1. D3 shooting attacks at 3/3/-2/2 isn't reliable enough to do what you need him to do and bravery aura is pretty irrelevant for the MSU deepkin who don't really deal with bravery. 

Role in army:

What deepkin want to do is kill things very quickly. +1 to wound means the majority of your army goes from a 3+ to a 2+ which is the magic number of erasing everything. That increase is a 100% relative increase in the success rate of wound rolls (you go from failing to wound on a 1 or 2 to failing a wound only on a 1). The stats may not seem intuitive but that's how it goes. 

The storm also heals when it does the thing you want it to, which is very very important. You want them to charge and when they do they get lots of bonuses! Synergy! The sea has anti-synergy. You want it to cast reliably, but when you reroll the casting roll, you don't get to heal. You also don't even get to heal in your opponent's turn since his ability only procs in YOUR hero phase. I love the warscroll spells of the sea, -1 to hit on enemies is great! But it's a random number of affected units, and goes off on a 7, and you don't get bonuses to cast (and rerolling means you can't heal).

There's really no place for the sea in a deepkin army that wins through fast overwhelming output, while the storm not only contributes to the WHOLE ARMY via his aura, but also can get stuck in and fills the flying retreat and charge healing beatstick role that deepkin otherwise lack. 

Easy alternative to the Sea:

Meanwhile I can just use a tidecaster to reverse the tides, speeding up my entire army and increasing their output (SYNERGY)! While also having him put an enemy unit at -1 to hit, just like the sea! And with master of magic, he can reroll his cast and dispel, just like the sea. He's not as good at it, obviously, but he's super cheap and actually adds the enormous army wide buff of tide reversal while also letting me take extremely fast shooting screens as troops (SYNERGY)!!

TL;DR:

The sea just kind of sticks out like a sore thumb of "man, I wish this was good because I own the model and it looks sweeeeeet but it really doesn't help my army do the stuff it wants to do".

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