Save stacking - Menace or necessary?

[Zappgrot]

13 hours ago, Beliman said:

As a KO player, I'm fine with the mechanic but not for the whole experience (and design) of the game.

Imho, that's because we play a 3.0 game with 2.0 army's rules.
Some armies don't have the new buffed up stuff (save stacking being one of them), others can abuse them. That's my main issue and why I really want to see what's in the first 3.0 battletomes (if we takke a look at Gravelords, they seems to be fine and be good to play with and against, so it's not that gloom & doom as some people think).

Without lambent light, you are going to do 8-12 average. That's still a lot but imo, it's fine for a 450 points unit.

Depends. Against skaven gits or anny other swarm army  even whit Lambent light it's not a problem. Against stormcast, obr, or Slaves. Your just going to delete 300 points each turn the problem whit sentinals is that they make defences useless. And that sux a lot if you paid points for it. 

[zilberfrid]

4 minutes ago, Zappgrot said:

Depends. Against skaven gits or anny other swarm army  even whit Lambent light it's not a problem. Against stormcast, obr, or Slaves. Your just going to delete 300 points each turn the problem whit sentinals is that they make defences useless. And that sux a lot if you paid points for it. 

Even horde armies want heroes, well, at least Cities does.

[Liquidsteel]

I think save stacking itself is okay, as it allows those big monsters to actually be tough, and not get dragged down even under weight of dice from a buffed up horde.

They should be all but immune to chaff, in my opinion, just like in 40k where 2x Toughness puts  the attacking unit on 6s to wound.

My gripe is that instead of pushing rend (we could easily have -2 rend on many battleline units for more "elite" armies, and rend 3/4/5 on the biggest stuff) they have decided to go the way of dishing out mortal wounds.

Lumineth, new Kruleboyz, new Stormcast, all having access to MWs on 6s to hit even for their regular units is just silly. It would have been much better, I think, if they were either 6s to wound OR just 6s to hit are an auto wound, still allowing a save roll. They're also really pushing shooting, which combined with all these mortals has changed how the game is played massively. Getting big monsters to survive turn 1 and actually get in to combat is going to get even tougher I reckon.

[Beliman]

39 minutes ago, Zappgrot said:

Depends. Against skaven gits or anny other swarm army  even whit Lambent light it's not a problem. Against stormcast, obr, or Slaves. Your just going to delete 300 points each turn the problem whit sentinals is that they make defences useless. And that sux a lot if you paid points for it. 

Don't get me wrong, I'm with you that sentinels are really strong. My main issue with Sentinels is that they have so many things going on (ignore LoS, Mortal Wounds and 30" range). I just pointed out that 8-12 raw dmg for 450 points is not that big of a deal, for a few more points we have Gotrek.

Sorry by this offtopic, just pointing out what I tried to say.

Edited September 10, 2021 by Beliman

[Dolomedes]

I've only ever played BoC/Beastmen in AOS, so I don't have the opportunity to take one of these immortal save stacking units that people are concerned about. Even though I could ally one in via StD (Chaos Lord on Karkadrak with Chaos Sorcerer Lord), I don't want to, and here's why.

In Warhammer Fantasy 8th edition, the End Times let Beastmen armies take in other Chaos units as allies. The Beastmen/BoC balance was even worse in 8th edition than it is now - playing Beasts was pretty much a guaranteed loss. I jumped at the chance to get some units from other factions that didn't die immediately, and bought myself a Daemon Prince. Hero Hammer was worse in 8th edition than it is now - you could effectively write a separate list just for your hero's gear setup. After a couple of evenings of swatting over the books, I worked out how to make my Daemon prince practically un-killable. It was on a 3+ save, 4+ ward, -2 to hit, it regenerated wounds in combat, and it could heal itself more with magic. On top of all that, it was pretty scary in combat, and it would reliably kill most things it went up against. The 'Unkillable Nurgle Daemon Prince' wasn't far off some of the things we're seeing in people's tournament lists now in our 'hero hammer' meta.

17 hours ago, Mutton said:

Save stacking has literally ruined a number of 3.0 games in our group. It completely negates so many normal units and makes them useless against anything with a 3+ save or better. It turns the game into a slog, where high-defense units/heroes mosey around without a care in the world and never die, no matter how many resources you put into killing them. It's absolute nonsense that turns the game into the dark HeroHammer days of old.

This.

I took the 'Unkillable Nurgle Daemon Prince' for 3 games, then never played it again. Why? Because it consistently made my games unbelievably boring, and nobody enjoyed playing it. I decided to shelf it when it tanked a charge from a unit of 11 juggernauts of Khorne (they were terrifying back then), and held them for the entire game. Although I'd designed it with this opponent in mind (his unit of Juggernauts was crushing everyone in the local meta), it made for a rubbish play experience.

Like most of you here, I don't get all that many games in. If I'm really lucky I could probably play a decent weekly 2k game a few weeks in a row, but typically it's more like two a month; one of which ends early or changes to 1k due to time restraints. I really don't want to waste the opportunity for a good game by sticking something that's basically immortal on the board. You know what will happen. Your game will be boring. The same principle works the other way too. If you've got a point and click MW spamming unit deleting army, your already limited games will get dull real quick.

Furthermore, it will probably make you a worse player in the long run. If you get used to relying on your Immortal God-tier units, then you won't be paying attention to all the smaller interactions on the board that really decide games. You'll get in the habit of over or under committing. You'll stop thinking about the most important fundamental stat that wins games - movement. Before you know it, you'll end up losing to some upstart with a naff list containing 500 points of chaff to fill out the points requirement. These lists are usually whatever the latest army release is, and often they'll end up winning because they fluked some bizarre new mechanic. Before long, you find yourself rage posting 'This new faction is OP! It beat my God army!'. 

Obviously what I've written applies to filthy casual games - the tournament scene will be different. I think the lesson will be learned though, and although save stacking/MW spamming are the meta right now, it's a matter of time until the correction comes. Don't get caught out.

  

 

[RuneBrush]

2 hours ago, Liquidsteel said:

It would have been much better, I think, if they were either 6s to wound OR just 6s to hit are an auto wound, still allowing a save roll. They're also really pushing shooting, which combined with all these mortals has changed how the game is played massively. Getting big monsters to survive turn 1 and actually get in to combat is going to get even tougher I reckon.

Or 6's to wound increase the rend of the attack by X.  No more book keeping than those attacks converting into MWs and still allows a save.

[Holy_Diver]

Simply cap abilities with the same effect. Period.

And give more rend -2 to unit that deserve that: Hellblades blast trough power armor in 40k, so yeah bring background back in strenght and let Khorne rise (example).

[Dankboss]

If we see less mega-monsters with 3+ saves then save-stacking is okay. Hopefully the new Mawkrusha scroll is a precedent for things to come. I don't care about the 6 wound hero on a 3+, but Archaon is an issue with a 3+.

[Zappgrot]

3 hours ago, zilberfrid said:

Even horde armies want heroes, well, at least Cities does.

 Well tough luck  against LRL acording to GW. But save stacking helps against everything else. A bit to much even and that is the problem whit how the games is at this time. Either your defences do nothing or they are overwhelming. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

32 minutes ago, Dankboss said:

If we see less mega-monsters with 3+ saves then save-stacking is okay. Hopefully the new Mawkrusha scroll is a precedent for things to come. I don't care about the 6 wound hero on a 3+, but Archaon is an issue with a 3+.

Lower saves on monsters might ameliorate the issue at some point, but it seems like such a bad approach. It will take at least two years, likely more, until all warscrolls have been updated, since GW only really updates them with new Battletomes. The Soulblight Gravelords tome just came out this year. It's full of 3+ saves, and even has a -1 rend aura. Those rules will be with us for a long time, potentially the whole edition, no matter what happens in other battletomes, and the more saves go down in new tomes, the more of a problem these rules will become.

I am also not convinced that the new books are evidence of a trend. Stormcast are getting 2+ save Annihilators as part of the same release, after all. I guess we will know once we see the warscrolls of the big dragons. If those are god-model rules, 3+ save units, then I don't approve of nerfing the save of Mawkrushers and Stardrakes, because in that case there is evidence that it's not happening in an effort to mitigate save stacking.

If GW actually sees save stacking as a potential problem to be managed, they should change the core rules. We are still in the FAQ period before the first battletome right now. The quicker GW acts on this, the easier it will be to write future tomes with the change in mind and include stuff like more "lower rend by one" insted of +1 to saves in cases where they actually want defense stacking. The ability to put big models on a 2+ save by itself is already enough to make them immune to chaff, especially with Heroic Recovery also present. They don't need to be able to stack rend reduction until they can become immune to hammers as well.

[Skreech Verminking]

4 hours ago, Zappgrot said:

Well at least there is one thing skaven might be good at theb. 

Actually, they would do pretty good against many-many faction-things.

Kharadron can loose in an instant against them,

cities will be having a hard time getting used to the new kragnos rules, that came for the skaven, and any daughter of khaine army will have to fear-fear the doomwheel, since those can remove whole block of bowsnakes with ease.

So currently I would even say that we are one of the top dogs, if some skaven players would start to think outside of the fiends box.

Edited September 10, 2021 by Skreech Verminking

[zilberfrid]

4 hours ago, Beliman said:

Don't get me wrong, I'm with you that sentinels are really strong. My main issue with Sentinels is that they have so many things going on (ignore LoS, Mortal Wounds and 30" range). I just pointed out that 8-12 raw dmg for 450 points is not that big of a deal, for a few more points we have Gotrek.

Sorry by this offtopic, just pointing out what I tried to say.

Getting Gotrek to hit things is hard, and he'll be hit as well. Getting Sentinels to hit things is easy, and they need not even be targetable by what they are killing.

Gotrek wouldn't even make it to the sentinels.

[Beliman]

4 minutes ago, zilberfrid said:

Getting Gotrek to hit things is hard, and he'll be hit as well. Getting Sentinels to hit things is easy, and they need not even be targetable by what they are killing.

Gotrek wouldn't even make it to the sentinels.

Yes, that's why I was talking only about raw dmg. Not the whole Sentinel pack

[Skreech Verminking]

33 minutes ago, zilberfrid said:

Getting Gotrek to hit things is hard, and he'll be hit as well. Getting Sentinels to hit things is easy, and they need not even be targetable by what they are killing.

Gotrek wouldn't even make it to the sentinels.

Gotrek may not, yet 3warpfire thrower weapon teams and three rattling guns all, hidden in a single unit of 60clanrats that are set up in deepstrike with the warpgrinder team, would turn one.

and believe me.

that is a combination no Lumineth player wants to face.

My last elf-things opponent had to learn that in a hard way

Edited September 10, 2021 by Skreech Verminking

[Drazhoath]

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2021/09/10/metawatch-which-warhammer-age-of-sigmar-armies-contested-the-top-tables-at-the-warhammer-open/
 

Seems they are pretty proud about the save stacking. So I give up the hope of removing it by GW…

[Lord Krungharr]

5 hours ago, Skreech Verminking said:

Gotrek may not, yet 3warpfire thrower weapon teams and three rattling guns all, hidden in a single unit of 60clanrats that are set up in deepstrike with the warpgrinder team, would turn one.

and believe me.

that is a combination no Lumineth player wants to face.

My last elf-things opponent had to learn that in a hard way

Wait wait wait, you can hide weapon teams in clanrats?!  I haven't ever heard of such a thing.  Is that a new Skaven thing from Broken Realms or something?

[Skreech Verminking]

1 minute ago, Lord Krungharr said:

Wait wait wait, you can hide weapon teams in clanrats?!  I haven't ever heard of such a thing.  Is that a new Skaven thing from Broken Realms or something?

Yes!

and I haven’t met a guy who didn’t spread the musk of-of fear, after they had their first fight against that trick.

Ps: I should also probably mention that with the way the rules for hidden weapon teams are written, they currently are not considered a drop, and thus do not follow the rules for setting up a unit or that of a reinforcement unit being set up later in the game.

they currently a considered a no drop unit

[Lord Krungharr]

WOWZAH, I wonder if my Sons of Behemat might be in for a Skaven sneak attack this weekend then....going to a 3000 point tournament, 5 games over two days.  Should be amazingly brutal.

[Skreech Verminking]

1 minute ago, Lord Krungharr said:

WOWZAH, I wonder if my Sons of Behemat might be in for a Skaven sneak attack this weekend then....going to a 3000 point tournament, 5 games over two days.  Should be amazingly brutal.

I didn’t know that 3000points is now the preferred size for a tournament game.

sounds like fun

edit: I hope so too, yet many skaven players, seem to have gone the fiends route, which really is just booooooo…………

 

 

 

 

…ring.

 

Edited September 10, 2021 by Skreech Verminking

[GrimDork]

11 hours ago, Lord Krungharr said:

WOWZAH, I wonder if my Sons of Behemat might be in for a Skaven sneak attack this weekend then....going to a 3000 point tournament, 5 games over two days.  Should be amazingly brutal.

Your sons will be pretty safe from warpfire throwers as they roll a dice for each model in target unit, each 4+ is a MW. 
Look out for overcharging warp lightning cannons tho!

[Skreech Verminking]

25 minutes ago, GrimDork said:

Your sons will be pretty safe from warpfire throwers as they roll a dice for each model in target unit, each 4+ is a MW. 
Look out for overcharging warp lightning cannons tho!

That is true, but have yiu seen what rattling guns can do when buffed with overseer of destruction and a piece of warpstone?

A skaven player could easily field 5-6 weapon teams in an army and still have enough points to add more more more fun stuff in it.

even after he upgraded his hordes.

those weapon teams can really hurt a lot

Edited September 11, 2021 by Skreech Verminking

[Kadeton]

2 hours ago, Skreech Verminking said:

That is true, but have yiu seen what rattling guns can do when buffed with overseer of destruction and a piece of warpstone?

Ooh, let me guess! Is it... explode?

[Skreech Verminking]

24 minutes ago, Kadeton said:

Ooh, let me guess! Is it... explode?

That depends.

Are you a skaven player 🤔

[Kadeton]

59 minutes ago, Skreech Verminking said:

Are you a skaven player 🤔

Off topic, but: sadly not any more. I had a massive Skaven horde in WHFB but didn't have the heart to convert them to round bases after the End Times. I sold them, which I often regret.

But back then, mostly what the Skaven warmachines did was explode! So just a guess from past experience.

[Skreech Verminking]

18 minutes ago, Kadeton said:

Off topic, but: sadly not any more. I had a massive Skaven horde in WHFB but didn't have the heart to convert them to round bases after the End Times. I sold them, which I often regret.

But back then, mostly what the Skaven warmachines did was explode! So just a guess from past experience.

Well they don’t explode as often as back in the days, yet the possibility is there.

rolling a double when overcharging your rattling gun usually means that it win’t be there after it took his shoots