Stormcast Eternals 3.0 - There is no "a" in Vindictors

[Nerdkingdan]

4 hours ago, Warbossironteef said:

I hear you, and I can see why it would be boring to some, not being able to kill much or go offensive. I feel like most 1 drop armies aren't the types that have enough bodies to fully block you on all objectives. 

Battle tactics and gargants seem like the biggest hurdle. I feel like when you do the math, Seqs arent that much worse than Libs or Vindictors. The 4+ armor is tough when compared to Libs and Vindicators but 4x Seqs is only 60 more points that 4x Vindictors. I think in this style of list the decision is Libs or Seqs. It's not like in other lists where the points matter more when your just using these slots to fill battleline. 

Maybe you say forget the 2 drop and take a more balanced list with some ranged support. You could go for an extra enhancement and do Call for Aid and Thunderbolt Volley:

Allegiance: Stormcast Eternals
- Stormhost: Hallowed Knights (Scions of the Storm)
- Grand Strategy: Hold the Line
- Triumphs:
LEADERS
Yndrasta, The Celestial Spear (320)
Gardus Steel Soul (150)
Knight-Relictor (140)
- General
- Command Trait: High Priest
- Artefact: Mirrorshield
- Prayer: Translocation
UNITS
10 x Judicators with Boltstorm Crossbows (380)
3 x Praetors (165)
5 x Sequitors (145)
5 x Sequitors (145)
5 x Sequitors (145)
5 x Sequitors (145)
5 x Liberators (115)
5 x Liberators (115)
TOTAL: 1965/2000 WOUNDS: 109

I play a lot of sequitors, the advantage of them is the access to sacrosanct buffs, evocators can buff them, solbright can buff them if hammers.   Damage to point without focusing on the sacrosanct you should be running vindictors.   Ultimately they are not the best choice at current points for this list.    If you are set on them you need to look into storm keep, I find you are  better with that when spamming them, the extra ward save near objectives, and the count as more models is more useful.   10 man units with empower for example while not great do ok, as a screen to evocators on foot, who will come in after softened by the 10 man, this was all casual play, it’s not optimal.  But it has worked for me going toe to toe with gargants.

That is my experience from playing them, if it helps.

Edited May 10, 2022 by Nerdkingdan

[CommissarRotke]

If sequitors were only 5 or 10 points above Vindictors, do you think they'd see more play? 

[Mattrulesok]

48 minutes ago, CommissarRotke said:

If sequitors were only 5 or 10 points above Vindictors, do you think they'd see more play? 

In the current meta? No. However if we continue to see more representation from armies like nighthaunt and BoC which obliterate save stacking and are unbothered by high rend (because they ignore it or their saves are so poor it already doesn't matter) they could see some play but I imagine they are always going to suffer somewhat from their ward save only working in the combat phase

[CommissarRotke]

17 minutes ago, Mattrulesok said:

they are always going to suffer somewhat from their ward save only working in the combat phase

Thought so  still doesn't make sense to me, why not at least the Hero phase if they're pseudo-casting it? Ugh...

[NauticalSoup]

It's the same problem they had in 2.0, their utility is just too narrow to be worth the extra points investment. 

And in a lot of situations they're just worse than vindictors/liberators because their base save is worse for some reason.

Their ward really should be something like 'always on until they activate weapons' and then it's off until the next time you make the choice.

[Dogmantra]

Sleeper use for Sequitors will be if Nighthaunt get real big with their new book, running the primes with a Redemption Cache means no coming back for units within 3". Will make them less sticky.

EDIT: also if the Lord Exorcist gets a points drop and the Knight Incantor a points raise like I think they probably should, Lord Exorcist is also gonna be pretty nice against the large number of "rally on 4+" rules we're seeing.

Edited May 11, 2022 by Dogmantra

[Colgado]

If sequitors were 130 (same as vindis) I think they would become a valid option, but as long as they're more expensive, vindis and libs just offer more efficiency.

[Dogmantra]

The thing that bugs me with Sequitors is how utterly lopsided the choice between a 5+ ward and exploding 6s is. I take the ward 90% of the time. If I was in charge I'd probably swap the effect on 6s between Vindictors and Sequitors, so Sequitors can choose a ward or MWs on 6s, and then Vindictors get two hits on 6s to represent the wall of spears.

I really like the idea of the sacrosanct chamber having these optional buffs where you pick which is best, but I feel like it's so often a non-choice.

[feadair]

AoS World Championship (team tournament) lists are here https://aosworlds.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Two-pager-Public.pdf. I count 22 SCE lists.

[Dogmantra]

I call this list "World's Silliest Alpha Strike"

Allegiance: Stormcast Eternals
- Stormhost: Knights Excelsior (Scions of the Storm)
- Grand Strategy: Hold the Line
- Triumphs: Bloodthirsty
 

Spoiler

Leaders
Lord-Imperatant (175)*
Knight-Vexillor (120)*
- Meteoric Standard
Knight-Vexillor (120)*
- Meteoric Standard
Knight-Vexillor (120)**
- Meteoric Standard
Knight-Vexillor (120)**
- Meteoric Standard
Knight-Vexillor (120)**
- General
- Meteoric Standard
- Command Trait: Shock and Awe
- Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact)
- Spell: Lightning Blast

Battleline
9 x Annihilators with Meteoric Grandhammers (720)*
- Reinforced x 2
5 x Liberators (115)*
- Heavens-wrought Weapon and Shield
3 x Annihilators (200)**

Units
1 x Stormstrike Chariot (165)**

Core Battalions
*Battle Regiment
**Battle Regiment

Additional Enhancements
Holy Command: Steadfast March

Total: 1975 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 2 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 95
Drops: 2

If you don't win immediately, you don't win.
 

[stus67]

Anybody here think Vigilors are alright? I'm playing in a local AoS event and I'm trying my best to make an army entirely made up of the new models while still being decently playable. Vanquishers are completely out, but Vigilors seem to be a decent ranged unit.

[NauticalSoup]

They're just too expensive for what they are and can't reach the heights of longstrike/judicator shooting. They also require a judicator general to do a big blob which is how most people get judicators doing work.

But there are plenty of worse things you can bring.

[readercolin]

If Judicators and longstrikes didn't exist, vigilors might be playable.  Stick vigilors in another faction, and the other faction would probably be fine getting them.  They basically suffer from 4 problems:

Range.  An 18" range is less than the 24" range of Judicator or the 30" range of longstrikes.  This means that they have to either move closer to shoot, or get teleported if they want to do the hero phase shooting.

Damage.  On base, vigilors have the exact same shooting profile (besides range) as judicators.  However, judicators do mortal wounds on a 6 to hit, which means that on average they do more.

They aren't battleline.  Judicators are battleline on their own, which means 1 less squad of liberators/vindictors/whatever that you have to bring.  Vigilors CAN be battleline, but then you have to spend another 205 points to get a Knight-Judicator, AND you have to make that knight-judicator your general.

Points.  For all of the above reasons, Vigilors just aren't worth 195 points.  Not when you can bring judicators or longstrikes.  Additionally, if you want to bring them as a melee unit, you are going to suffer because they only have a 1" reach on their weapons.  This leaves you with the choice of having to bring MSU squads of them so that they can operate efficiently in melee, or bring reinforced squads of them to take advantage of thunderbolt volley, which just makes them more awkward to use.

Overall, Vigilors are suffering because they want to be both a shooting unit and a melee unit, but they do both those roles worse than other options.  If you want a dedicated shooting unit, you want to reinforce them, and it will cost more than judicators for the same role and perform worse.  If you want a dedicated melee unit, you would do better to run Vindictors which can reinforce better AND be tankier.  If you want both... generally stormcast do better by picking up units that perform their specific role very well than running generalists that can kind of do many roles.

Now, as long as you understand their limitations... which for the most part are comparative to other options within the stormcast roster, they aren't actually THAT bad.  You aren't going to run them competitively, but as long as you are ok with that, they can perform their roles reasonably well.  You just need to decide if you are going to run them as a reinforced shooting focused unit, or run them as MSU and try to take advantage of their dual roles.  Also, if you are bringing a Knight-Judicator to make them battleline.  If your opponents are also playing casually, you will probably do fine with them.  If your opponents are bringing competitive lists... you are likely to do significantly less fine.

[Vasshpit]

Stormcast up in sales and trade section. 

[Jaskier]

I'm thinking of adding a Tauralon to my Stormcast as I adore the model. I play Hammers of Sigmar so my question is should I build it as Aventis or as a regular Lord Arcanum? Having access to traits - particularly mount traits - and artifacts is a big deal for the LA, but Aventis has a lot of good bonuses to compensate, so I'm a bit stuck on which way to go. 

Alternatively, if I build it as Aventis do you think I would be able to use it as a regular Lord Arcanum as well? That'd be ideal but I'm not sure if he's aesthetically different enough to where that might be an issue for WYSIWYG (I mostly play at tournaments so this is crucial.)

Edited June 9, 2022 by Jaskier

[Mattrulesok]

4 hours ago, Jaskier said:

I'm thinking of adding a Tauralon to my Stormcast as I adore the model. I play Hammers of Sigmar so my question is should I build it as Aventis or as a regular Lord Arcanum? Having access to traits - particularly mount traits - and artifacts is a big deal for the LA, but Aventis has a lot of good bonuses to compensate, so I'm a bit stuck on which way to go. 

Alternatively, if I build it as Aventis do you think I would be able to use it as a regular Lord Arcanum as well? That'd be ideal but I'm not sure if he's aesthetically different enough to where that might be an issue for WYSIWYG (I mostly play at tournaments so this is crucial.)

I would be very surprised if anyone looked across the table at Aventis and knew which one it was without you telling them.

Ultimately WYSIWYG is going to be up to your local scene. My scene has people playing named heroes as the generic version all the time, no one cares as long as you're clear what they are but that's My scene and maybe yours is particularly picky.

[lare2]

On 6/9/2022 at 9:44 AM, Mattrulesok said:

I mostly play at tournaments so this is crucial.

Each tourney is gonna be wholly dependent on the TO. If you do go Aventis, you'd have to check with your TO before each tourney. If they say you can't run it as an Arcanum... then you can't. It would be a gamble but I honestly can't see many TOs ruling against you. Due to the below...

On 6/9/2022 at 9:44 AM, Mattrulesok said:

no one cares as long as you're clear what they

Will second this. 

[PJetski]

What if all our infantry could fight in two ranks like Skaven? 

[CommissarRotke]

10 hours ago, PJetski said:

What if all our infantry could fight in two ranks like Skaven? 

"Shield of Civilization" trait would finally be a reality  and that would rock

[readercolin]

Then I would totally run that 15 man block of sequitors and see what happens.

Would it be good?  Probably not.  Would I run it?  Yes, without question.  They still need to drop a few points though...

[OkayestDM]

Not for nothing, but if the rumors about the way the next GHB rules will work is true, Vanquishers in a 10-15 block would suddenly actually be able to bring their ideal killing power to bear while also still being a reasonable threat to units or models that they don't get their extra attacks against.

I don't know if it makes them good, but at least it makes them functional.

Edited June 14, 2022 by OkayestDM
Clarity

[Fuxxx]

So what do you think about the changes in Battleline strength with the newest ghb? Vindictors can still hit in two ranks but - the one more rank to fight only applies to models that are within 1/2 an inch of a model that is within half an inch to an enemy. If I'm not mistaken that means liberators, vanquishers, retributors... All that 1 inch range stuff hugely profits while the 2 inch models don't gain anything, right?

[Mattrulesok]

43 minutes ago, Fuxxx said:

So what do you think about the changes in Battleline strength with the newest ghb? Vindictors can still hit in two ranks but - the one more rank to fight only applies to models that are within 1/2 an inch of a model that is within half an inch to an enemy. If I'm not mistaken that means liberators, vanquishers, retributors... All that 1 inch range stuff hugely profits while the 2 inch models don't gain anything, right?

Correct it does nothing for Vindictors.

I think we're going to struggle into this meta a little more, we have more pieces for killing big monsters than hordes and I'm not sure we benefit hugely from the battleline improvement s but it will be interesting to see what we can change, Maybe an ally has pieces we can use?

[NauticalSoup]

Should've been a core rules update. After this season 1" infantry blocks go back to bring nonfunctional trash. Lame.

[Kaptinskaggy]

I think these changes make sequitors and vanquishers better, as well as the 5-man non-protector paladin squads (I think Decimators could potentially be insane?), though I'll be curious to see how they mess with the points. Vindictors definitely become less good though. Liberators I think might be less useful as well because they don't really gain much utility from being reinforced. Maybe Vandus Hammerhand will become good for buffing redeemer Veterans?
This definitely creates a "should I bother looking into vanquishers if they're just gonna go back to being useless in a year" conundrum.

If only there were a way to make evocators battleline...