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

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

2 hours ago, Phasteon said:

RAW he absolutely can.

He is a Lord so he qualified for using the ability and thundering voice lets him „command a unit anywhere on the battlefield“ which lets him literally ignore any range boundaries - remember EVERY Command Ability has a range limit, so your statement doesn‘t make sense at all, because if a fixed range would disable his ability it would literally be useless 100% of the time.

If you insist this is RAW so quickly you are not taking the complexity of the issue seriously.

What is RAW is that more specific rules trump more general rules. But the range restriction on holy commands and Bastian's ability to issue commands anywhere on the board are the same level of specificity. So what trumps what is just not clear without an official ruling. You can argue that we should play it one way or the other, but it's not as easy as claiming your reading is RAW. The rules as written are ambiguous.

Also, Bastian's ability still makes sense if it gets trumped by command abilities that specify a range. It just allows him to issue generic commands anywhere, in that case, which do not have any range restrictions (and if they did, they would be trumped by Bastian's more specific rule since they are part of the core rules and his is a battletome rule).

[Phasteon]

1 hour ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

If you insist this is RAW so quickly you are not taking the complexity of the issue seriously.

What is RAW is that more specific rules trump more general rules. But the range restriction on holy commands and Bastian's ability to issue commands anywhere on the board are the same level of specificity. So what trumps what is just not clear without an official ruling. You can argue that we should play it one way or the other, but it's not as easy as claiming your reading is RAW. The rules as written are ambiguous.

Also, Bastian's ability still makes sense if it gets trumped by command abilities that specify a range. It just allows him to issue generic commands anywhere, in that case, which do not have any range restrictions (and if they did, they would be trumped by Bastian's more specific rule since they are part of the core rules and his is a battletome rule).

You just assume its complex, thats your interpretation of the rules, which makes it a matter of RAI.

I talk RAW here. 

1. Bastian is a Lord, so he is enabled to issue holy commands.

2. Holy commands are Command Abilities.

3. Bastian lets you issue commands anywhere on the board. 

Just because you (and others) want to make a discussion out of it, doesnt mean you guys got a point. 

I won‘t discuss the matter any further from here. 

[Dogmantra]

2 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

What is RAW is that more specific rules trump more general rules. But the range restriction on holy commands and Bastian's ability to issue commands anywhere on the board are the same level of specificity.

While I'm not as convinced that it's 100% unambiguous as Phaeston, I don't think this reasoning holds up. I would say that barring an official game definition of specificity, an ability granted to the army in general (i.e. the holy command) is less specific than an ability brought by a single model (i.e. Bastian's ability to command anywhere). Bastian issuing (e.g.) Thunderbolt Volley is a more specific situation than any lord issuing it.

That said, I think because of debates such as this, a generic "specific trumps general" rule is not particularly useful for determining what takes precedence. I mean, you could probably argue that Bastian can issue Thunderbolt Volley from anywhere because the range limitation and his ability to issue a command to anyone on the board are contradictory effects so you get to resolve them in any order you choose.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

24 minutes ago, Dogmantra said:

While I'm not as convinced that it's 100% unambiguous as Phaeston, I don't think this reasoning holds up. I would say that barring an official game definition of specificity, an ability granted to the army in general (i.e. the holy command) is less specific than an ability brought by a single model (i.e. Bastian's ability to command anywhere). Bastian issuing (e.g.) Thunderbolt Volley is a more specific situation than any lord issuing it.

That said, I think because of debates such as this, a generic "specific trumps general" rule is not particularly useful for determining what takes precedence. I mean, you could probably argue that Bastian can issue Thunderbolt Volley from anywhere because the range limitation and his ability to issue a command to anyone on the board are contradictory effects so you get to resolve them in any order you choose.

I mean, in the end I would just like GW to go on record and say "Order of specificity is core rules - battletome - warscroll." I suspect they don't do that because they want to play it a little loose at points, where sometimes the battletome gets to modify how warscrolls act and sometimes warscrolls break battletome rules.

In the end I think it's necessary for us as players to decide how we want to handle things, and letting Bastian use holy commands from anywhere is also the interpretation that I would favour. But we should be aware that while we might have good reasons for playing the rules this way, it's not objective. The logic of the rules permits more than one reading (in cases where two statements contradict each other, if we have no clear reason to give precedence to one of them, it's arbitrary which one we ignore), and I think this is worth recognizing. I find there is a tendency to make these situations out to be RAW vs RAI issues, when in actuality it's a conflict purely at the RAW level.

Edited November 4, 2021 by Neil Arthur Hotep

[Chronos]

So I ended up playing a game against Nurgle, which I lost, but it was a great game and close up until the end of turn 4 where I just made some mental mistakes. Super fun all around and a great learning experience.

I took:

Celestial Warbringers, Pillars of Belief, Thunderbolt Volley

Lord Relictor -General, A of Destiny, High Priest, Translocate

Knight Judicator

Knight Incator - Arcane Tome, Celestial Blades

Lord Imperatant

2x3 Annihilators

3x5 Vindictors

1x6 Vanguard Raptors/w Longstrikes

2000 points on the nose.

His list included GUO, Be'Lakor, Slopity, Spoilpox, 2x2 Beasts of Nurgle, 20 Plaguebearers, and 2x10 Plaguebearers to the best of my memory.

We played first blood. The highlight of the game for me was three Annihilators one-shotting Be'Lakor turn 2, I couldn't believe it, although he had already used his ability to shut down my Raptors for a turn. Raptors put in a lot of work other than turn two, I just saved TV until the next turn. Vindictors put up a pretty good fight in the middle objective but got slowly ground down, and the Annihilators were a great distraction, I think all six together took down Be'Lakor and then 20+ Plaguebearers which we was able to use to tie them up. Against Nurgle they did a lot of damage to themselves.

I was down by one going into turn 4, he won priority and was able to complete his objective and scored 5 points. Bottom 4 I picked Aggressive Expansion, which I easily would have completed as I had the KJ and hounds on an objective with only 3 PBs on it, and I Translocated the Raptors over to the other side with only Slopity on it(GOU was on the middle tied up by my Incantor). There were 11 plaguebearers who had finished off my Annihilators that could have made it into my raptors turn 5, but I elected to take a shot at the GUO which was not a good idea, even tough I rolled 5 6's to hit I still only did 9 wounds, so I really should have taken out the PBs because at this point he had nothing left except GOU, Slopity, 3 PBs and 11PBs although he would have summoned 10 more next turn.

Then, mistake number two, I charged the gryph hounds into the 3 other PBs and they killed one and I killed nothing in return, so I made myself lose the objective! Really dumb, but I think I just got over confident. Oh well.

I only scored one point, and we rolled off and he won priority, so I didn't really have a chance to come back.

Overall it was a super fun game, great opponent. I started back into Warhammer December of 2019, so to finally get an in person game in was really great(although I did play against my friend 10+ times). I cycled through more than a few armies, including Tzeentch and IDK, but I really like Stormcast.

Anyway, the Knight-Judicator didn't really do that much, so I will probably tweak my list to drop him, and honestly as much as I love Vindictors, 3x5 units of Liberators just frees up 45 points that I can then spend on 3 more Granhammer Annihilators, and I think that rounds out a pretty good all around army that can hold their own.

[Scurvydog]

Looking into this take on Hammers for an upcoming event in a few weeks, deciding what exactly I need to paint up. One of my main concerns is how to run battalions. Mostly coming down to taking the 1 drop, to either ensure an alpha or to take second, for a stronger position when dropping down Annihilators and counter punch, as a double turn would be crazy devastating with this list I think. 

Donwside to 1 drop is no hunters of the hearthlands, and that could hurt the dracoths and especially the annihilators a lot, they really want to have AoA to get their hammers worth. In addition with the 2 free commands between the imperatant and Bastian, I really want to be using commands all the time.

Thoughts?

Allegiance: Stormcast Eternals
- Stormhost: Hammers of Sigmar
- Grand Strategy: Hold the Line
- Triumphs: Bloodthirsty
Lord-Commander Bastian Carthalos (300)
Lord-Imperatant (175)
- General
- Command Trait: Master of Magic
- Artefact: Arcane Tome (Universal Artefact)
- Spell: Thundershock
5 x Liberators (115)
- Heavens-wrought Weapon and Shield
2 x Dracothian Guard Fulminators (230)
2 x Dracothian Guard Tempestors (220)
6 x Annihilators with Meteoric Grandhammers (480)
- Reinforced x 1
6 x Vanguard-Raptors with Longstrike Crossbows (480)
- Reinforced x 1
Holy Command: Thunderbolt Volley

Total: 2000 / 2000
Reinforced Units: 2 / 4
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 79
Drops: 7

 

[lare2]

Had a great game against Soulblight last night. First time running grandhammers with Longstrike. The power was nuts. It was very point and click - 1st turn, killed Belladamma, 2nd turn killed Mannfred, 3rd killed Vamp lord on dragon. Was deleting a key piece per turn but still lost as I just didn't have the board control. We were playing Power (Strength?) in numbers and my limited model count really hurt.

Was thinking of looking to ally in some chaff but was unclear on the rules. The core book says you can have an allied unit for every 4 SCE you put down. GH says you can have 400 points worth. Which is it? Or is it both combined? Thanks in advance. 

[dmorley21]

1 hour ago, lare2 said:

Had a great game against Soulblight last night. First time running grandhammers with Longstrike. The power was nuts. It was very point and click - 1st turn, killed Belladamma, 2nd turn killed Mannfred, 3rd killed Vamp lord on dragon. Was deleting a key piece per turn but still lost as I just didn't have the board control. We were playing Power (Strength?) in numbers and my limited model count really hurt.

Was thinking of looking to ally in some chaff but was unclear on the rules. The core book says you can have an allied unit for every 4 SCE you put down. GH says you can have 400 points worth. Which is it? Or is it both combined? Thanks in advance. 

400 points is the rule for the type of matched play almost everyone plays - the General's Handbook is a slightly different ruleset than the one in the core book. 

However, Power in Numbers means that models can't claim objectives unless they are battleline, so allies wouldn't help you there. And honestly there is decent mobile chaff in the book between Aetherwings and Prosecutors; even the Farstriders or Gryph-hounds are cheap and mobile chaff. 

[stato]

1 in 4 allied units is a core rule, i dont think it is disregarged in AoS3, it wasnt previously.  the 400pt limit is on top of this for Matched Play.  Stormcast do though have ways to add other units from Cities etc.

Note its 1 IN 4, so 1 allied unit per 3 stormcast, but youll likely hit 400pt limit first.

[lare2]

43 minutes ago, dmorley21 said:

Power in Numbers means that models can't claim objectives unless they are battleline

Huh, we completely missed this last night 😄

16 minutes ago, stato said:

Note its 1 IN 4, so 1 allied unit per 3 stormcast, but youll likely hit 400pt limit first.

Nice - very much appreciated. Know there's other ways but need allies as want to keep Scions for Annihilators. 

[Sir Mercury]

20 hours ago, lare2 said:

21 hours ago, dmorley21 said:

Power in Numbers means that models can't claim objectives unless they are battleline

Huh, we completely missed this last night 😄

ANY unit can claim an objective  in Power in Numbers but if an battleline unit is whitin 6" of an objective only battleline units can contest it. Right?

[Squark]

On 11/5/2021 at 5:05 AM, dmorley21 said:

400 points is the rule for the type of matched play almost everyone plays - the General's Handbook is a slightly different ruleset than the one in the core book. 

However, Power in Numbers means that models can't claim objectives unless they are battleline, so allies wouldn't help you there. And honestly there is decent mobile chaff in the book between Aetherwings and Prosecutors; even the Farstriders or Gryph-hounds are cheap and mobile chaff. 

Unless I'm missing a passage somewhere, Allied Battleline units are still Battleline. They don't count towards the minimum battlelines requirement, but nowhere can I find anything that says they lose their Battlefield Role. So they should be able to trigger the special conditions in Power in Numbers.

[dmorley21]

10 hours ago, Sir Mercury said:

ANY unit can claim an objective  in Power in Numbers but if an battleline unit is whitin 6" of an objective only battleline units can contest it. Right?

 

10 hours ago, Sir Mercury said:

ANY unit can claim an objective  in Power in Numbers but if an battleline unit is whitin 6" of an objective only battleline units can contest it. Right?

Yep, meant to write that. 

2 hours ago, Squark said:

Unless I'm missing a passage somewhere, Allied Battleline units are still Battleline. They don't count towards the minimum battlelines requirement, but nowhere can I find anything that says they lose their Battlefield Role. So they should be able to trigger the special conditions in Power in Numbers.

Good catch. You might be on to something there. 

[Tizianolol]

Guys teading the book i have seen an interesting rule about celestial vindicators,  when they charge they got wxploding 6s to hit, but its until your NEXT HERO PHASE not end of the turn, like many similar rules. Thats very interesting! What do you think?

[Lucur]

Finally got my dominion box on the way plus some grand slammers, building a list, in KE, thunderbolt volley:

Impertinant (AoD), Castellant, Relictor (high priest, translocate)

6 Grandslammers, 3 Annis, 10 Vindictors, 6 Longstrikes

have 105 pts left. Castigators or Aetherwings+triumph? Something entirely different? And what to do with magnificent, extra relic for tome or another command? Curious what you folks think

Edited November 6, 2021 by Lucur

[Dogmantra]

1 hour ago, Tizianolol said:

Guys teading the book i have seen an interesting rule about celestial vindicators,  when they charge they got wxploding 6s to hit, but its until your NEXT HERO PHASE not end of the turn, like many similar rules. Thats very interesting! What do you think?

They've been my go-to since the book came out because I like the rule. The fact it lasts into your opponent's turn is nice and certainly makes it better, but it's not super powerful. Your opponent has a lot of initiative to decide what engages with your buffed unit on their turn, so often I have found that yes, I do have a unit with double hits on 6s, but it does nothing in my opponent's turn because I already destroyed the target and they just don't attack me, or worse, they do attack me and kill or neuter my buffed unit before I can fight back.

If you're going to play with it I'd recommend trying to build your list so you have at least two or three units able to put out somewhere around 20 attacks at least, which is where it starts to feel like a reliable buff. I've used it on the Celestant Prime out of necessity a couple of times and with 5 attacks it often does nothing at all, which relative strength aside is just a feels bad moment.

[PrimeElectrid]

On 11/2/2021 at 9:03 AM, ledha said:

The people who cried about translocation will now have to face stormcast gunlines and fulminator/drakes all day. I bet they are very happy.

Of course they won’t be.

We can only hope that the outrage over Stormdrake Guard and Translocation overshadowed Longstrikes and Fulminators when the winter FAQ was being written. 

 

[Tizianolol]

@Dogmantrai think its interesting try with 6 anniehalators with great hammer!:)

[Dogmantra]

I think 6 grandhammer annihiliators is one of the most compelling reasons to pick celestial vindicators for sure, they have a decent number of nasty attacks, and on their big turn they're not going to be on the board during the hero phase so you can't just take a different stormhost and use Bless Weapons* on them instead for the same effect.

 

*I know that using Bless Weapons requires a Lord Relictor but like... it's the lord relictor. It's a great model, and Translocate is not the only prayer. Bring a second one if you want translocate as well

[lare2]

37 minutes ago, PrimeElectrid said:

Of course they won’t be.

We can only hope that the outrage over Stormdrake Guard and Translocation overshadowed Longstrikes and Fulminators when the winter FAQ was being written. 

 

We don't need any more nerfs but I can totally see points increase across the board. GW, leave my longstrikes alone!

[lare2]

19 hours ago, Squark said:

Unless I'm missing a passage somewhere, Allied Battleline units are still Battleline.

On that, the AoS still puts them down as Battleline. 

[Tizianolol]

Guys if I put my general on the sky and not in the battlefield.. can I do that or general has to be on the battlefieldat start of the Game?

[PJetski]

The Stormkeep #11 is live now!

More lists for Stormcast Eternals, this time with the October 2021 FAQ/Errata in consideration. Featuring 3 lists made by The Stormkeep community discord

 

[Dogmantra]

1 hour ago, Tizianolol said:

Guys if I put my general on the sky and not in the battlefield.. can I do that or general has to be on the battlefieldat start of the Game?

You can put your general in reserve if you want, but you will lose out on the 1CP they generate per hero phase until they are on the battlefield, and obviously you will not be able to use any of their abilities. Up to you whether it's worth it.

[Squark]

1 hour ago, Dogmantra said:

You can put your general in reserve if you want, but you will lose out on the 1CP they generate per hero phase until they are on the battlefield, and obviously you will not be able to use any of their abilities. Up to you whether it's worth it.

Just to add one more thing; The Heroic Leadership action also only gives you +2 to the roll if your general is slain, so you're going to really struggle with CP generation while your General is in reserves, even moreso than you do after your general dies.

Edited November 7, 2021 by Squark