The Winter Rules Update

[Joseph Mackay]

43 minutes ago, Zeblasky said:

To be fait about Blissarbs, they are a unit in a faction that has summons and can use those summons quite effectively at that, both for objective capping and opponent killing. Every unit in their roster costs around 25% more because of that, otherwise it would not be fair.

This. Slaanesh summoning is included in the points for every unit in that book

[Maddpainting]

As a BoC player I am both happy and mad at the same time. DO and Bullgors/Warherds are where they need to be at for their terrible rules, but it just makes Bestigors/Brayherd even more bad than it was before..... which was bad already. 

All my lists I am coming up with are basically 3 units of DO's, Bullgors, Cockatrices, and heroes. IDK if any Brayherd list is actually viable anymore compare to what we can take. 

Also the AoD change kind of makes me sad, they should have said anything over 9 wounds is a 6+++ and let us take it on smaller heroes to give them the ability to not die from 1 rock throw or 2 units of Sentinels. 

[novakai]

1 hour ago, Zeblasky said:

To be fait about Blissarbs, they are a unit in a faction that has summons and can use those summons quite effectively at that, both for objective capping and opponent killing. Every unit in their roster costs around 25% more because of that, otherwise it would not be fair.

I think the gripe has been why is Slaanesh the summoning army and can they just drop the summoning table and just make their unit costed appropriate without have them having be balance with that unit tax

[Jaskier]

13 minutes ago, novakai said:

I think the gripe has been why is Slaanesh the summoning army and can they just drop the summoning table and just make their unit costed appropriate without have them having be balance with that unit tax

They need to massively raise the summoning cost of each unit, then drop the points on everything. Slaanesh is also in dire need of an extra allegiance rule, as especially compared to Nurgle they feel so lacking; they are pretty much wholly centred around summoning, whereas for the other gods it's a nice bonus. They are fun to play in the sense they are a bit more challenging/demanding, but it's getting stale - and the cost to entry on them is worse than the other gods precisely because they are so reliant on summoning. 

[Beliman]

5 hours ago, Doko said:

and also we have these tournaments showing us as gotrek isnt in almost any 5\0 list.

But how do we know that Gotrek is not OP? I mean, data shows only a fragment of the whole picture:

• KOs are doing right (not the best, not the worst armies). A few 5-0, some 4-1, but 80% of this lists had a Gotrek.
• The other lists that don't have Gotrek are struggling a lot more, but the data is so small that the numbers are just anecdotes.

The thing is, KOs have good numbers in competitive and Gotrek will not take so many 5-0 spots. That's the result that I can see for so many other armies that are using/abusing Gotrek. Some of this armies can't even kill a Giant by themself and Gotrek allows exactly that, giving a tool (in other words, A LOT OF DAMAGE) to armies that are in need of update, but data will say otherwise.

 

Edited December 22, 2021 by Beliman

[Enoby]

Like a lot of people, I think I'm in the 'right direction but not enough camp'. On one hand, it's very understandable why they don't want to make massive earth shattering changes just in case it causes more problems than it solves. On the other, I doubt these changes will do much to help the weakest armies, who'll likely struggle to make use of the extra 10 points they've saved.

I do think this is another case where we'd have benefitted from a designer insight next to each change (so each Warscroll rewrite, rules change, and points change). At least then we'd know why certain changes seem so small or large.

Not a huge fan of the direction they're going with for coalition units in Chaos. S2D/BoC are hard to balance in god armies, true, but I think they'd be much better with different points values rather than just a blanket 'you may have bought Khorne BoC, but you'll now not want to use them'.

Overall, I would have preferred to see more effort working on the weakest warscrolls - I know they're a lower priority, but I think it's what a lot of game systems get wrong with balancing (they allow poor factions to languish as they're not as troubling as strong factions).  

[AaronWilson]

Think the changes they made are very good, but it would appear some of the min offenders (SoB, DoK , IJ, Stormcast) completely dodged the bullet. 

[Feii]

7 hours ago, Zeblasky said:

To be fait about Blissarbs, they are a unit in a faction that has summons and can use those summons quite effectively at that, both for objective capping and opponent killing. Every unit in their roster costs around 25% more because of that, otherwise it would not be fair.

Have you consider that Blissbarbs are bad at opponent killing and the summon mechanic is not good? How is it balanced for Hedonites to have below 40% winrate? 

 

1. Blissbarbs do not benefit from exploding 6s they really areńt much of the damaga dealers

 

2. Do you think it is balanced that other units for the same point cost will kill your army but with Blissbarbs you will get some points at the end of your turn that you cannot use till your next turn’s end of movement phase? 
 

 

hedonites are the only new book to have sich a terrible winrate and an army that is bottom 5 in any competitive metric. 

[stratigo]

*Checks in*

Are KO still a trashfire?

Yep? 

Okay

 

*Checks out*

[JackStreicher]

2 hours ago, Enoby said:

On one hand, it's very understandable why they don't want to make massive earth shattering changes just in case it causes more problems than it solves

**on the other hand: They really had more than enough time to at least fix the obvious issues of some Battletomes.

This updates is very low effort, for no reason.

 

Though I am sure the designers know what they do, the latest update to Nagash feels incompetent.

Edited December 22, 2021 by JackStreicher

[Enoby]

1 minute ago, JackStreicher said:

**on the other hand: They really had more than enough time to at least fix the obvious issues of some Battletomes.

This updates is very low effort, for no reason.

 

Though I am sure the designers know what they do, the latest update to Nagash feels incompetent.

I think this is why a commentary after each change would help - if the designers said "we tried X, Y, and Z for Nagash and only found Y reasonable" then I think people would be more understanding and receptive to the changes. Currently a lot of people are left wondering "why did they do this and not this? Do they thing this army is okay now after a tiny points decrease? Are the rules writers incompetent/just don't care about AoS?" - this likely isn't true (there's a very good chance that the rules writers are good at their jobs, but rather their jobs are often done under wraps and we only see the confusing end result).  

[AaronWilson]

I mean whoever thinks a 10 points deduction on Skull Reapers makes any difference really needs a long hard look in the mirror. 

[JackStreicher]

A lore comparison

 

Nagash consumed the souls of hundreds of Death gods, yet he remains a joke wounding on 4s. Being the first Necromancer and God of Death, while having the experience to control the winds of magic for eons does not save you from miscasting as it seems. For some reason his title costs an additional 200 points.

Kragnos defeated and ate bones of mighty beasts

 

So eating some bones VS consuming legions of gods clearly results in eating some bones as the superior way to achieve superior godhood 😂🤣 while keeping the points low, wounding on 2s and for some reason achieving a 2+ save despite being a naked horse with a shield. Well…

Edited December 22, 2021 by JackStreicher

[Klamm]

  Quote

Coalition units included in a Blades of Khorne, Disciples of Tzeentch, Hedonites of Slaanesh or Maggotkin of Nurgle army no longer benefit from allegiance abilities.

Question about this. Does that mean that, say, a Slaves to Darkness Daemon prince with the mark of Slaanesh can't be given a Hedonites command trait? Or is this just allegiance abilities?

TBH I'm disappointed with how much GW has discouraged taking BoC/StD in mono-god armies. They struck a good balance in AoS 2.0, where allegiance abilities worked with the god mark but most command abilities required Hedonites/Maggotkin etc.

I should get more synergy from a unit of Slaaneshi chaos warriors in a Hedonites army than just allying in some Plaguebearers, but the only difference is I'm not limited to 400 points with the former. It's a bad change. 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

It seems there is a general move away from mixed armies this edition. First with the removal of Grand Alliance allegiances and now with the changes to coalition rules for Chaos.

I get why GW is doing this. While it suck for people to have the option to play a mixed, lore friendly army taken away, it sucks even more when the best way to play a certain army is to mostly run models from a different army. Plus, it must be a nightmare to balance S2D and Beasts units across 5 or so extra factions.

Ultimately, what I think is overall worth criticizing here is the change in direction: One moment you can build mixed armies and are even encouraged to do so, the next they are more of a "I guess the option is there if you want it, but it's not going to be good" thing. AoS is a hobby where you expect longevity for your armies. This is the opposite of that.

I have personally stopped including coalition units in any of my lists except in the most minimal capacity. Even in Cities of Sigmar, I don't really feel like including Stormcast or other coalition units is really all that stable. It feels like you are just setting yourself up for your list to break when any of the inidividual armies or the core rules are updated the next time. If I built a Living City list that contained Sylvaneth and Stormcast, that list could potentially break with the next Cities, Sylvaneth or Stormcast tome, as well as any other rule updates such as new GHBs or I guess Battlescrolls now. That's just too much of a risk for me.

[PrimeElectrid]

Feels strange that Nagash took such a complete hammering, but while Archaon lost his Tzeentch toxicity he’s still pretty strong with all the synergy buffs available within STD.

[Zeblasky]

8 hours ago, novakai said:

I think the gripe has been why is Slaanesh the summoning army and can they just drop the summoning table and just make their unit costed appropriate without have them having be balance with that unit tax

I can understand not wanting to play with a summoning army (all those extra models to buy and carry around can be quite taxing), but even now summoning potentially is extremely strong mechanic, as it gives you a unique ability to adapt your starting army both to your opponent composition and to the situation on the battlefield. This summoning flexibility is extremely underestimated.

 

3 hours ago, Feii said:

Have you consider that Blissbarbs are bad at opponent killing and the summon mechanic is not good? How is it balanced for Hedonites to have below 40% winrate? 

 

1. Blissbarbs do not benefit from exploding 6s they really areńt much of the damaga dealers

 

2. Do you think it is balanced that other units for the same point cost will kill your army but with Blissbarbs you will get some points at the end of your turn that you cannot use till your next turn’s end of movement phase? 
 

 

hedonites are the only new book to have sich a terrible winrate and an army that is bottom 5 in any competitive metric. 

And yet some competitive lists for Hedonites included both Archaon and 30 Blissbarbs. And honestly, even on paper they are quite good right now. They now cost the same as Irondrakes now, and sure, they can't get buffed hard, they have worse to hit and their save is bad, but they are faster, have better range, don't need to stand still to have 2 attacks and they can run and shoot in a roster that is all about dealing damage. Seriously, do you need them to be more cost effective that Irondrakes damage wise while being much more mobile and with much better overwatch?

Edited December 22, 2021 by Zeblasky

[Joseph Mackay]

5 hours ago, Beliman said:

But how do we know that Gotrek is not OP? I mean, data shows only a fragment of the whole picture:

• KOs are doing right (not the best, not the worst armies). A few 5-0, some 4-1, but 80% of this lists had a Gotrek.
• The other lists that don't have Gotrek are struggling a lot more, but the data is so small that the numbers are just anecdotes.

The thing is, KOs have good numbers in competitive and Gotrek will not take so many 5-0 spots. That's the result that I can see for so many other armies that are using/abusing Gotrek. Some of this armies can't even kill a Giant by themself and Gotrek allows exactly that, giving a tool (in other words, A LOT OF DAMAGE) to armies that are in need of update, but data will say otherwise.

 

If the army using Gotrek is purely Duardin (Kharadron, Fyreslayers, of Disspossed/Cities) then it’s fine. Everyone else using him is an issue 

[Joseph Mackay]

1 hour ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

It seems there is a general move away from mixed armies this edition. First with the removal of Grand Alliance allegiances and now with the changes to coalition rules for Chaos.

I get why GW is doing this. While it suck for people to have the option to play a mixed, lore friendly army taken away, it sucks even more when the best way to play a certain army is to mostly run models from a different army. Plus, it must be a nightmare to balance S2D and Beasts units across 5 or so extra factions.

Ultimately, what I think is overall worth criticizing here is the change in direction: One moment you can build mixed armies and are even encouraged to do so, the next they are more of a "I guess the option is there if you want it, but it's not going to be good" thing. AoS is a hobby where you expect longevity for your armies. This is the opposite of that.

I have personally stopped including coalition units in any of my lists except in the most minimal capacity. Even in Cities of Sigmar, I don't really feel like including Stormcast or other coalition units is really all that stable. It feels like you are just setting yourself up for your list to break when any of the inidividual armies or the core rules are updated the next time. If I built a Living City list that contained Sylvaneth and Stormcast, that list could potentially break with the next Cities, Sylvaneth or Stormcast tome, as well as any other rule updates such as new GHBs or I guess Battlescrolls now. That's just too much of a risk for me.

I was building a Grand Alliance Order army of Duardin just before AoS3 released…

I can *sort of* still do it via Cities Of Sigmar-Tempests Eye, but the restrictions mean how I wanted to do it doesn’t work anymore (for a start, Fyreslayers were supposed to be the majority of that army, or at least a 33% even split with the other Duardin)

Edited December 22, 2021 by Joseph Mackay

[Aeryenn]

I'm delighted that GW listened to our advice. I asked for rules update online on this forum since I remember. Warscrolls and points. Very happy to see this coming.

[AaronWilson]

The impression I got from the phrasing of the article as well was this will be a regular thing, so if can move to a quarterly update with small increments and decreases and subtle warscroll changes I think that's the best the game will be in regards to updates and balance. 

[Feii]

6 minutes ago, Zeblasky said:

I can understand not wanting to play with a summoning army (all those extra models to buy and carry around can be quite taxing), but even now summoning potentially is extremely strong mechanic, as it gives you a unique ability to adapt your starting army both to your opponent composition and to the situation on the battlefield. This summoning flexibility is extremely underestimated.

 

And yet some competitive lists for Hedonites included both Archaon and 30 Blissbarbs. And honestly, even on paper they are quite good right now. They now cost the same as Irondrakes now, and sure, they can't get buffed hard, they have worse to hit and their save is bad, but they are faster, have better range, don't need to stand still to have 2 attacks and they can run and shoot in a roster that is all about dealing damage. Seriously, do you need them to be more cost effective that Irondrakes damage wise while being much more mobile and with much better overwatch?

You mean the competitive lists that haven’t 5-0 any bigger tournament since the battletome release? The army that has one of the worst winrates in the game? The army that will be still most likely relying on Archaon after his change/nerf as the best unit they can have? 
 

You can be wrong, nobody is takong that right from you, but ignoring objective metrics is foolish.

 

 

Slaanesh summoning as a mechanic is in a very bad spot. Does it have potential to be broken? Yeah give us 2 KoS for 2 DPs and it is broken. The thin is the me hanic is such an insane tempo loss. If you get doubleturned you basically have a mechanic that doesnt do anything for 2 turns. You have points you cannot spend and have to wait 2 opponents turns to summon them at the end of your movement phase. 
 

 

170 points for 5-6 wounds at rend 1 18 inch range per turn seems not ideal when you compare it to other shooting units because there are no other rules to layer on top of it. It´s just vanilla attack with no further empower available. 
 

Should they make them cheaper? No! You dont want to have another marauder incident when they will become so cheap so the best way to play the book is to spam them because no other unit in the book is interesting or worth it. I have big problem with them lowering the points in order to compensate for the lack of rules. 
 

I dont want to play 90 point symbaresh twinsouls. Make them 160 but give them adequate rules. 
 

the whole summoning mechanic is currently as it stands bad and it has negative impact on the whole book. Nobody wants to field 200 point liberators because they have some other mechanic in the book that increases their cost. It is a bad feel moment. (Funny that only summoning mechanics apparently warrant point increases across the whole army but something like miracle dice which is one of the strongest mechanic in the game and singe handedly forced the Archaon change doesn’t warrant point increases. Insane to think that strong mechanics cannot be interpreted in points) 

 

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

47 minutes ago, Joseph Mackay said:

I was building a Grand Alliance Order army of Duardin just before AoS3 released…

I can *sort of* still do it via Cities Of Sigmar-Tempests Eye, but the restrictions mean how I wanted to do it doesn’t work anymore (for a start, Fyreslayers were supposed to be the majority of that army, or at least a 33% even split with the other Duardin)

This is the kind of thing I am talking about.

I really think GW should start to get more conservative with giving and taking away to access to mixed armies right about now. Every time they allow players to take units out of faction, there are a few people who will build their army around it, and whose army will break once the ability is taken away, potentially to the point of being completely illegal to play. I find that more harmful than not allowing us to mix armies in the first place. I hope they draw their lines now and make it clear that you are expected to stick to your own allegiance most of the time, and everything else is just a "nice to have" thing you are not supposed to lean into.

During the transition from AoS 1 to AoS 2 it was understandable that certain soup options would become unavailable. Not all factions had real AoS 1 rules, after all. Now that everyone has a tome, though, it would be better to commit. I think the Nurgle tome and this Battlescroll signal that mixed chaos armies are not the intended play style anymore. You are supposed to stick to your own units, and for everything else you just get what's on the warscroll, so don't expect any interesting interactions. I would expect the same for other mixed armies in the future. Death and Destruction are already pretty segregated, but a lot of Cities of Sigmar armies are in danger of being invalidated if the next tome changes how their coalition works.

 

 

[MothmanDraws]

The core issue with hedonites and their summoning is while other armies get the beneift of summoning key pieces and be flexible to opponents slaanesh is trying to summon its starting army into a working force. People dont summon in fiends/masque/infernal enrapturess to counter opponent, tbey are desperatly spamming daemonettes and bodies because they cant stick around on the board.

The blissbarb archaon list is closer to how army should work with a big spooky threat to keep aggro off the blissbarbs who can just farm dp. The issue of pure slaanesh is blissbarbs are having to pull double duty of farming and killing units so our flimsy mainline doesnt just flop.

Like what happens if you rock up vs 4 gargants, slaanesh will get 4dp, our units wont survive in fight vs one to keep dp on our side. So that 20-40% overcost will get us 12dp by turn 3, barely enough for anything useful. We are priced assuming we are in our perfect match up and perfect play. I think current slaanesh would work with just a few extra bits of crowd control, like give easier use of the locus. Or a spell that just activated the locus of diversion.

Edited December 22, 2021 by MothmanDraws

[NauticalSoup]

5 hours ago, stratigo said:

*Checks in*

Are KO still a trashfire?

Yep? 

Okay

 

*Checks out*

The quintessential experience of trying to maintain some interest in 3.0 for about 2/3rds of the game's armies.