SBGL Battletome Update in December WD

[Liquidsteel]

So the fact Blood is getting pushed as well as the VLoZD, I really hope a Battalion allows us to fit more than one Commander level hero.

For example, Mortarch plus 1-2 Commanders and you get the Warlord effect.

I imagine hoping for a one drop battalion that can include 2-3 Commanders plus troops would be asking too much, but who knows.

As a side note, I really dislike 1 drops and the interaction with deciding turn order.

 

[Liquidsteel]

So the WD images are out and, they're not great.

Allegiance Trait "Deadly Coordination": After a friendly SBGL Hero that is not a Monster has fought, pick a Summonable unit wholly within 12" that is within 3" of an enemy unit, that unit may fight immediately after. This is okay, it would have been excellent if not for the non Monster restriction. Best use case is probably Radukar the Beast fighting to trigger a unit of Grave Guard second or something.

Legion of Blood Trait "Unparalleled Expertise": Your Vampire Lord heroes are either Martial or Arcane. Martial - VLoZD's add +1 attack to their Lance or Sword, foot Vamps add +2 attacks to their blades. Arcane - VLoZDs add +1 to their first Casting, Dispelling or Unbinding attempt each phase, foot Vamps add +2. This is pretty good, not to be sniffed at for sure.

VLoZD Mount Traits: Locus of Death increase the amount of units you can use Invigorating Aura on by 1, absolute garbage. Foetid Breath you can reroll the damage of the Pestilential Breath attack, very good!

Core Battalions: All are pretty ******. Radukar's Court is the full cursed city roster and gives you an extra enhancement but they're all unique so can't use it? Fellwing Flock is 2-3 Vargheists units and 2-3 Fell Bats units and gives you the Vanguard ability to auto run 6 or reroll a charge. Deathstench Drove gives you a free All out Attack or All out Defence and consists of 1-2 Corpse Carts, 2 units of Dire Wolves and 2 units of Zombies.

Grand Strategy Vampiric Conqueror's: Control more Grave Sites at the end of the game than your opponent, control being the same way as capturing an objective. It's okay? Prized Sorcery/Hold the Line likely still way better choices.

Battle Tactics: Callous Overlord pick a Summonable unit that is more than 3" from an enemy unit, complete it if that unit is destroyed this turn. Pretty good. Lust for Blood is completed if two or more friendly Vampire units use The Hunger/Mortarch of Blood to heal any wounds. The fact is says you must heal a wound and not just trigger the effect makes it worse, as you have to have wounds to heal to succeed. Unstoppable Armies you need to roll a 5+ to trigger Endless Legions, unclear if this benefits from the destroyed units improving the roll as it does not say unmodified, either way very unreliable and that's not what you want with a battle tactic.

 

Overall I'm a but underwhelmed, the battalions in particular, though we have some good stuff here. Radukar buffing and fighting in tandem with some Grave Guard got better, and the reroll damage on the breath is great. Extra attack in Legion of Blood is nice but not really amazing.

[Sception]

darn, I was really hoping for bodyguard black knights.  Still, I won't complain about a slight boost to generic vamp lords in LoB, though I sorely wish it applied to coven thrones and blood palanquins as well.  Still, it's a nice little boost to the 2+ save VLoZD that's already one of their more interesting options, especially when you throw in the damage re-roll for the pestilential breath.  I also like that it allows for some more variety between vampire lords if you happen to take more than one.  Like, you could run the new mace lord as a fighty vamp with +2 attacks, and Anasta, if you were lucky enough to pick her up, as a casty lord with +2 to the first spell she tries each round.  It's at least a nod to the kind of differentiation between vampire lords in the same army that would have liked to see a 'vampire traits' enhancement for.

Coordination is difficult to use outside of Radukar the Beast, yeah.  Honestly, I kind of wonder why they bothered adding it as a generic rule.  If we still had horse-mounted vampire lords... but we don't.  Still, foot vamp lords are still sometimes used in conjunction with zombie hordes or grave guard, and it could see some use there, particularly in LoB or Vykos where they're also bringing other buff auras and can have bonuses to cast pinions to help position for a charge.  Or alternatively a couple extra attacks in LoB.

a free charge reroll on vargheists is the kind of thing they'd like from a battalion - I've often said they'd be a much better unit (especially for LoN where they're supposed to be favored) if they had a charge bonus instead of deep strike.  But I'm not sure it's worth the cost of taking two units of them and two units of fell bats.  Deathstench is terrible.  None of these seem as good as the generic core battalions or hunters of the heartland at first glance.

One decent battle tactic is still one more to add to the pile, and the others could have their uses.

When I first heard of this update, I was most excited for the Path to Glory rules.  That changed when we saw that new battle traits were being added, but now that we've seen them I'm back to mostly being excited for the Path to Glory update.

Edited December 13, 2021 by Sception

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

1 hour ago, Liquidsteel said:

So the WD images are out and, they're not great.

Allegiance Trait "Deadly Coordination": After a friendly SBGL Hero that is not a Monster has fought, pick a Summonable unit wholly within 12" that is within 3" of an enemy unit, that unit may fight immediately after. This is okay, it would have been excellent if not for the non Monster restriction. Best use case is probably Radukar the Beast fighting to trigger a unit of Grave Guard second or something.

Legion of Blood Trait "Unparalleled Expertise": Your Vampire Lord heroes are either Martial or Arcane. Martial - VLoZD's add +1 attack to their Lance or Sword, foot Vamps add +2 attacks to their blades. Arcane - VLoZDs add +1 to their first Casting, Dispelling or Unbinding attempt each phase, foot Vamps add +2. This is pretty good, not to be sniffed at for sure.

VLoZD Mount Traits: Locus of Death increase the amount of units you can use Invigorating Aura on by 1, absolute garbage. Foetid Breath you can reroll the damage of the Pestilential Breath attack, very good!

Core Battalions: All are pretty ******. Radukar's Court is the full cursed city roster and gives you an extra enhancement but they're all unique so can't use it? Fellwing Flock is 2-3 Vargheists units and 2-3 Fell Bats units and gives you the Vanguard ability to auto run 6 or reroll a charge. Deathstench Drove gives you a free All out Attack or All out Defence and consists of 1-2 Corpse Carts, 2 units of Dire Wolves and 2 units of Zombies.

Grand Strategy Vampiric Conqueror's: Control more Grave Sites at the end of the game than your opponent, control being the same way as capturing an objective. It's okay? Prized Sorcery/Hold the Line likely still way better choices.

Battle Tactics: Callous Overlord pick a Summonable unit that is more than 3" from an enemy unit, complete it if that unit is destroyed this turn. Pretty good. Lust for Blood is completed if two or more friendly Vampire units use The Hunger/Mortarch of Blood to heal any wounds. The fact is says you must heal a wound and not just trigger the effect makes it worse, as you have to have wounds to heal to succeed. Unstoppable Armies you need to roll a 5+ to trigger Endless Legions, unclear if this benefits from the destroyed units improving the roll as it does not say unmodified, either way very unreliable and that's not what you want with a battle tactic.

 

Overall I'm a but underwhelmed, the battalions in particular, though we have some good stuff here. Radukar buffing and fighting in tandem with some Grave Guard got better, and the reroll damage on the breath is great. Extra attack in Legion of Blood is nice but not really amazing.

OK, hot takes:

Deadly Coordination is nice! You can view it as basically a free damage buff on a unit that has a foot hero babysitting it. Get those 4 attacks, 3/3/-1/2 in there! I think this is the utility buff that small combat heroes really want. You can now just basically treat them as part of a unit. Makes Kritza and Annika feel like a bit less of a pet choice (though still non-competitive, who are we kidding?).

Legion of Blood: +1/+2 to cast/unbind is good, it makes a huge difference to the math. The martial vampires are OK, too. It's a 50% damage buff on foot lords, which is decent, but probably worse than +2 to cast or unbind.

Mount Traits: +1 Invigorating Aura is a dud, you already have more Auras than targets/casts most of the time. Unless it allows you to pick the same guy twice or doesn't cost a cast? In any case, most list will only get one mount trait, and it will probably go to Pestilential Breath most of the time, which is a nice damage buff.

Battalions: I don't get them. Radukar's Court seems like a worse Command Entourage. Everything in the Cursed City box is already a sub-commander. Fellwing Flock is at least a way to get Vanguard without bringin a hero, so that's something if you were planning to run that many Vargheists and Fell Bats anyway. Deathstench Drove is the worst one. None of those units particularly want a single All-Out Attack or Defense once per game.

Grand Strategy; I feel like it could be worth trying, but having to camp Gravesites is unattractive. Kind of at cross purposes with what the army is trying to do otherwise: You don't want to have three unit hanging back on grave sites, not affecting the board (or alternatively, you don't want your grave sites right in the middle of the action where the opponent can claim/block them).

Battle tactics: Callous Overlord makes it easy to set up dilemmas for your opponent: Either they leave one of your units alive or they give you 2 VP. Better casually than in tournaments, where number of battle tactics completed might matter. Lust for blood is situational, but if the situation comes up it might be free. Overall good to keep in mind. Unstoppable armies seems to be literally just a dice roll? I suppose if you can complete literally nothing else, you get two chances per round to roll over a 5 (or potentially better if units dying affect the roll). I think all of these are situationally good, which makes scoring battle tactic easier overall.

 

 

[Ghoooouls]

Where does one find the pictures?

[frostfire]

Such a pity that Neferata is not a VAMPIRE LORD.

[Sception]

22 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Deathstench Drove is the worst one. None of those units particularly want a single All-Out Attack or Defense once per game.

I had a temporary brain toot where I misremembered all out attack as +1 attack instead of +1 to hit and was excited for a moment for how good that would be on zombies.  But yeah, back in the real world it's pretty terrible.

Edited December 13, 2021 by Sception

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

7 minutes ago, frostfire said:

Such a pity that Neferata is not a VAMPIRE LORD.

Same for the Coven Throne, sadly. Just the small guys and VLoZD.

[Lich King]

Coordination is very, very good. Pestilential breathe is a great bonus too.

Legion of Blood may be the best Bloodline now.

Edited December 13, 2021 by Lich King

[Doko]

In general a sligth more reliably dragon breath and thats all,the rest is useless.

A niche use with radukar(i havent him so i wont use it never)

A sligth buff tolegion of blood that wont do close to vyrkos\kastelai\nigth 

Battallions and tye rest useless.

So as i said other update useless as city of sigmar was,but this is better because we got a lesser upgrade to the dragon

[Liquidsteel]

1 hour ago, Lich King said:

Coordination is very, very good. Pestilential breathe is a great bonus too.

Legion of Blood may be the best Bloodline now.

A possible combo could be Legion of Night with the Coven Throne as the General, taking Unholy Impetus.

Coven fights first, proccing +1 attack to a nearby unit of Grave Guard, which the throne has buffed with its Command Aura.

[BaylorCorvette]

Speaking from a competitive side only:

-Allegiance Abilities are decent and certainly usable. 

-Mount Trait is a bit disappointing, as others mentioned a slightly more reliable Pestilential Breath. But for me useless since I run Prince V instead.

-Core Battalions are terrible (I was really hoping for a 1 drop battalion just in case GHB updates make it so we can only run 1 of the same battalion. I run double battle regiment currently)

-Grand Strat is OK, but still think Broken Ranks is the go to in most cases.

-Battle Tactics are actually decent. Although it is a shame that Unstoppable Armies doesn't proc on if you return a unit, RAW you have to roll a 5+ and cannot increase those odds, so only a 33% chance to get a battle tactic. OK if you literally cannot do anything else.

[Lich King]

We essentially have Sangsyron across the vampire lords Legion of Blood now. That’s pretty major. Combine that with your lord on for ( 6 attacks now ) fighting and then your entire zombie horde fighting right after ? That’s pretty major . The game has always been about combos and 1 and a half blenders going right after each other is very good .

Edited December 13, 2021 by Lich King

[Sception]

15 minutes ago, BaylorCorvette said:

-Battle Tactics are actually decent. Although it is a shame that Unstoppable Armies doesn't proc on if you return a unit, RAW you have to roll a 5+ and cannot increase those odds, so only a 33% chance to get a battle tactic. OK if you literally cannot do anything else.

The bonus to Endless Legions for destroyed enemy units is applied directly to the roll, not to the target number.  Unstoppable Armies doesn't say "unmodified", so the modifier to the Endless Legions roll for destroyed enemy units should still apply.  If you destroy two enemy units and roll a '3' on the die for Endless Legions then you apply the +2 bonus for destroyed units and get a final result of '5' for the roll.  That meets the 5+ target for Endless Legions itself, and it should meet the 5+ target for Unstoppable Armies just as well.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

11 minutes ago, BaylorCorvette said:

Battle Tactics are actually decent. Although it is a shame that Unstoppable Armies doesn't proc on if you return a unit, RAW you have to roll a 5+ and cannot increase those odds, so only a 33% chance to get a battle tactic. OK if you literally cannot do anything else.

Could it be that you actually get the bonus to the roll for destroying enemy units even for the purpose of the battle tactic.? It says that you "roll" a 5+, but is it clear that this means unmodified? After all, the bonuses you get are bonuses to the Endless Legions roll.

5 minutes ago, Lich King said:

We essentially have Sangsyron across the vampire lords Legion of Blood now. That’s pretty major. Combine that with your lord on for ( 6 attacks now ) fighting and then your entire zombie horde fighting right after ? That’s pretty major . The game has always been about combos and 1 and a half blenders going right after each other is very good .

Let's not get too excited about the +2 attacks on normal guys. It's only ~2 extra points of rend -1 damage.

[Sception]

I'm inclined to think the +2 to cast for a spell each round is the bigger bonus.  A reliable mystic shield or pinions could be a pretty big deal.

[Nightseer2012]

I always liked the foot Vampires for their command ability already, letting them cast on a +2 is pretty awesome, and just reinforces my taking them for LoB. 

4 attacks on a Deathlance for the VLoZD is nothing to sneeze at, especially with those charges, but it sticks around so if he gets stuck in he at least has some more killing power.  Martial+Soulbound Raiment+Flaming Weapon+Premeditated Violence (Or just stick with Aura of Dark Majesty for more resilience)?  Then stick Foetid Breath on the mount, and your VLoZD will be doing a few more points of reliable damage a turn.

[BaylorCorvette]

13 minutes ago, Sception said:

The bonus to Endless Legions for destroyed enemy units is applied directly to the roll, not to the target number.  Unstoppable Armies doesn't say "unmodified", so the modifier to the Endless Legions roll for destroyed enemy units should still apply.  If you destroy two enemy units and roll a '3' on the die for Endless Legions then you apply the +2 bonus for destroyed units and get a final result of '5' for the roll.  That meets the 5+ target for Endless Legions itself, and it should meet the 5+ target for Unstoppable Armies just as well.

That's a good point, I hadn't fully digested that yet. I still don't like a battle tactic relying on a single dice roll but it's just another option in the arsenal at this point. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

7 minutes ago, Sception said:

I'm inclined to think the +2 to cast for a spell each round is the bigger bonus.  A reliable mystic shield or pinions could be a pretty big deal.

Not to mention +2 to unbind! That's what I think will really make an impact. It really levels the playing field against casters with big bonuses. Big bonuses to cast are great because they increase your chance to get spells out in two ways: By helping you meet the casting value, and by making the spell harder to unbind. If you have a bonus to unbind that is as large as your opponent's bonus to cast, most spells become coin flips pretty much. Lumineth will hate it, that's for sure.

[Nightseer2012]

2 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

Not to mention +2 to unbind! That's what I think will really make an impact. It really levels the playing field against casters with big bonuses. Big bonuses to cast are great because they increase your chance to get spells out in two ways: By helping you meet the casting value, and by making the spell harder to unbind. If you have a bonus to unbind that is as large as your opponent's bonus to cast, most spells become coin flips pretty much. Lumineth will hate it, that's for sure.

Real shame that Neferata doesn't seem to benefit.  Getting another attack on any of her profiles, or even another +1 to cast Dark Mist would be nice.

[Sception]

6 minutes ago, BaylorCorvette said:

That's a good point, I hadn't fully digested that yet. I still don't like a battle tactic relying on a single dice roll but it's just another option in the arsenal at this point. 

Two die rolls, isn't it?  Battle Tactics are chosen for the combat round, and per the Errata Endless Legions is now rolled in both player turns, not just yours.  So two chances at a 5+, with +1 to the roll for each enemy unit destroyed that turn.  Probably not your first choice in battle tactics, but if you expect to destroy one or two enemy units in a battle round, and you've already claimed the tactic that would directly reward you victory points for destroying those specific units, then this is a decent follow up option.

[Sception]

4 minutes ago, Nightseer2012 said:

Real shame that Neferata doesn't seem to benefit.  Getting another attack on any of her profiles, or even another +1 to cast Dark Mist would be nice.

nope.  She's not a vampire lord.  Named heroes tend not to benefit from this sort of thing anyway.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

Just now, Sception said:

Two die rolls, isn't it?  Battle Tactics are chosen for the combat round, and per the Errata Endless Legions is now rolled in both player turns, not just yours.  So two chances at a 5+, with +1 to the roll for each enemy unit destroyed that turn.  Probably not your first choice in battle tactics, but if you expect to destroy one or two enemy units in a battle round, and you've already claimed the tactic that would directly reward you victory points for destroying those specific units, then this is a decent follow up option.

I wondered the same thing, but sadly it says "this turn" in the rules text, so only one attempt.

[Sception]

Just now, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

I wondered the same thing, but sadly it says "this turn" in the rules text, so only one attempt.

Boo.

[Skreech Verminking]

16 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

I wondered the same thing, but sadly it says "this turn" in the rules text, so only one attempt.

Well, the secondary objective, where you have to basically throw away a unit of summonable, seems pretty great.

so in total we are already better of then most armies with a white dwarf update 

Edited December 13, 2021 by Skreech Verminking