Stormdrake Guard Are Beyond Absurd

[Joseph Mackay]

3 hours ago, yukishiro1 said:

IJ is different because you can do stuff against an IJ list - you will get crushed and lose T1 if you deploy badly, but once you learn that and pick what you want to sacrifice to absorb the initial charge, you can fight back because the army isn't super resilient and doesn't have the tools to just sit there tying you up. 

The problem with the dragon list is that literally the entire army can be on you T1 sniping your heroes with MW shooting that ignores look out sir before locking you down in a way that you can't break out of if you lack the right tools (i.e. copious non-magical MWs). It's frustrating not because you lose all your models immediately - you don't, the output isn't actually all that high - but just because there is literally no counterplay for a lot of lists. You get tagged T1, and then you lose. Game's over with no opportunity to do anything at all. And even the lists that can beat it generally do it by generating enough output to smash through, not by anything tactical. The whole game just comes down to whether your list rolls enough of the right sort of dice. And nobody really enjoys that. 

Three solutions that would work:

1. Remove conditional battleline.

2. Remove the hero phase move (and probably reduce the move to 10", too).

3. Remove the spell shrug and put them on a 4+ base. 

There are probably others too, but these are all easy and each would probably fix the problem on its own, albeit in different ways. Solution 1 retains their flavor but limits them in a way that stops the SCE player from being able to utilize spam to lock down the entire opposing army, solution 2 stops your ability to cross the entire board in one turn to tag the army in the first place, giving the opponent time to get out and start establishing board control prior to getting hit, and solution 3 makes them squishy enough that the alpha strike bunker doesn't work any more. 

My vote is for solution 1, but I doubt GW would want to do that because of the anger it would (justifiably, given how much GW hyped up the all-dragon army) create among people who have dropped hundreds of quid on an army they can't use any more. So I think more likely is that the scroll gets toned down and/or points go up again, which unfortunately probably ends in a place where nobody takes them except in spam lists. 

1. I don’t agree with, because gw marketed them as being able to run a full dragon list.
2. Hero phase move I can agree with, but why shouldn’t flying dragons move faster than dracoths?
3. 4+ doesn’t make sense as all Stormcast units with shields have a 3+ don’t they?. As for the 4+ spell ignore - give it to Krondys and Karazai too or take it off 

[zilberfrid]

3 hours ago, yukishiro1 said:

IJ is different because you can do stuff against an IJ list - you will get crushed and lose T1 if you deploy badly, but once you learn that and pick what you want to sacrifice to absorb the initial charge, you can fight back because the army isn't super resilient and doesn't have the tools to just sit there tying you up. 

The problem with the dragon list is that literally the entire army can be on you T1 sniping your heroes with MW shooting that ignores look out sir before locking you down in a way that you can't break out of if you lack the right tools (i.e. copious non-magical MWs). It's frustrating not because you lose all your models immediately - you don't, the output isn't actually all that high - but just because there is literally no counterplay for a lot of lists. You get tagged T1, and then you lose. Game's over with no opportunity to do anything at all. And even the lists that can beat it generally do it by generating enough output to smash through, not by anything tactical. The whole game just comes down to whether your list rolls enough of the right sort of dice. And nobody really enjoys that. 

Three solutions that would work:

1. Remove conditional battleline.

2. Remove the hero phase move (and probably reduce the move to 10", too).

3. Remove the spell shrug and put them on a 4+ base. 

There are probably others too, but these are all easy and each would probably fix the problem on its own, albeit in different ways. Solution 1 retains their flavor but limits them in a way that stops the SCE player from being able to utilize spam to lock down the entire opposing army, solution 2 stops your ability to cross the entire board in one turn to tag the army in the first place, giving the opponent time to get out and start establishing board control prior to getting hit, and solution 3 makes them squishy enough that the alpha strike bunker doesn't work any more. 

My vote is for solution 1, but I doubt GW would want to do that because of the anger it would (justifiably, given how much GW hyped up the all-dragon army) create among people who have dropped hundreds of quid on an army they can't use any more. So I think more likely is that the scroll gets toned down and/or points go up again, which unfortunately probably ends in a place where nobody takes them except in spam lists. 

I'd say limit the amount of units of a single warscroll to, say, 4. This prevents all spam lists.

[yukishiro1]

That wouldn't stop the dragon spam list, they don't take more than 4 separate units of SDG anyway. You could even limit them to 3 and it wouldn't be a big problem for the list, they could still do 2 sets of 4 and one set of 2 (or a single if they prefer taking a foot hero in addition to the KD), with the 3" coherency you still cover enough of the board that way. 

Implementing a rule of 3 style thing in AOS has lots of problems because of how divergent different factions are in terms of the options they have. I'm in favor of the general concept, but the details get problematic quickly. 

Edited January 14, 2022 by yukishiro1

[jjb070707]

I'd propose simply giving them a keyword akin to "flyer" such that opposing units can move through them and don't count as engaged with them on their turn unless they stay in engagement range in order to take away the debilitating lockdown of the unit. There is still a potential for a large unit to position itself in such a way to try and prevent a unit moving in a specific direction, kind of like an endless spell, but one would have to choose to do this instead of fighting as effectively. 

Such that one can fight and engage with the dragon as they wish but aren't required to (since the dragon is flying/doing a flyby as modeled where other dragons such as the zombie dragon appear to have landed. Perhaps other units such as kharadron ships could have a similar keyword since having a flying boat lock down a unit is also somewhat silly)

Alternatively, one could go a step further in treating these like a flyer and require them to keep moving and specific turning distances or crash, so someone could stay engaged with them and get to hit back on their turn, and on the following SCE turn they have to move a certain distance taking themselves potentially out of engagement range or something if they are still oppressive. Taking away tactical flexibility could go a long way in keeping them off tournament tables as spammed units while still preserving their hitting power and use as a single unit that is attractive, as well as a themed list that feels strong enough to compete without being oppressive. That or just take away their ability to contest objectives so they can quickly reach untouched objectives but won't both lockdown and out-contest other units.

Edited January 14, 2022 by jjb070707

[Rachmani]

All solutions targeting dragons specificly would not prevent the next spam, regardless if dragons need it or not.

To stop spam AoS needs the rules to stop spam or make it unattractive.

[Joseph Mackay]

1 hour ago, Rachmani said:

All solutions targeting dragons specificly would not prevent the next spam, regardless if dragons need it or not.

To stop spam AoS needs the rules to stop spam or make it unattractive.

Yeah this. A lot of solutions seem to be specifically targeting the Stormdrakes but completely ignore the other things that would be hurt if it applies to everyone (eg limiting duplicate warscrolls), or make no sense as a specific nerf only for dragons (eg the flyer idea above, why shouldn’t all flying units have this? Also no, I disagree with the idea that you can just walk away from anything, retreating from combat needs to have a consequence-no shooting or charging)

[feadair]

12 hours ago, Kasper said:

Its an interesting discussion though, what do you reckon is best for the health of the game? That casual games are fun and enjoyable or that everything comes down to rock-paper-scissor balance at a 5 game tournament level? Ensuring people dont get utterly crushed at your "Average Joe" level does not exclude top level play being fun and somewhat balanced.

We might be able to learn from MTG. Essentially there are two ways of balancing.

Most formats are competitive. For these, WOTC observes the format health based on information from competitive play. If a deck is both played a lot and has a high win rate, WOTC will likely take some action against it. On the whole, over the years, this has worked tolerably well, I think.

Then there is EDH or Commander, which is a casual format, so there are no similar competitive data available. It is managed by an independent Rules Committee. The Rules Committee recommends that different play groups agree on their own power level based on the kinds of games they want to play. It also creates its own ban list, which provides the benchmark for when people play outside regular groups for example in a Convention. The Rules Committee ban list is not necessarily seen as comprehensive, but rather seeks to offer examples to players and play groups of the kinds of cards that should not be played. It does not stop individual players from breaking the game or curb stomping casuals with a fully tuned competitive deck.

Applying this to AoS, it seems that there may be a need for two different approaches: one for tournaments that relies on objective statistics gleaned from competitive play and another for the casual side that reflects the wishes of different individual groups of players. The casual side should primarily be balanced by the individual groups and players themselves, based on the simple premises that it is a douche move to come and destroy casuals with a tournament list and that there may be some lists that should not be played because they create a terrible experience for the other player.

Edited January 14, 2022 by feadair

[Zappgrot]

12 hours ago, Zeblasky said:

Well, then why are you fine with Idoneth (can run, shoot and charge their whole army across the board), Ironjaws (3 units, including Mawcrusha), Living City (ranged deepstrike plus 1 unit charging)? It's not something new.

Did i say that i was fine whit them?  Obviusly if i think design that does not allow the opponent to have meaning full counterplay is not good design. That goes for everything where that is a problem not just the dragons.  Of the things you mentioned i think  the Ironjaw mawcrushers clearly cross the line. As  does the living city command ability.  The idoneth not so much while fast they are not  cross the whole board fast.  I think the mawcrusher might be the worst since it can potentionaly move 3 times in a row. Makeing it's positioning pointless.  But at least that is just one model (or 3 if you go for double move) But stormgaurd can go for a whole army. That is just not cool. 

[azdimy]

I m finding the rally CA with them, fulminators or other similar units can be quite game breaking

[Yondaime]

17 hours ago, Doko said:

Yes this is the best answer to the original post

But when stormcast has it you bring out the pitchfork

 

I swear, at last wait for some tournament results before whining,

 

20 hours ago, yukishiro1 said:

IJ is different because you can do stuff against an IJ list - you will get crushed and lose T1 if you deploy badly, but once you learn that and pick what you want to sacrifice to absorb the initial charge, you can fight back because the army isn't super resilient and doesn't have the tools to just sit there tying you up. 

The problem with the dragon list is that literally the entire army can be on you T1 sniping your heroes with MW shooting that ignores look out sir before locking you down in a way that you can't break out of if you lack the right tools (i.e. copious non-magical MWs). It's frustrating not because you lose all your models immediately - you don't, the output isn't actually all that high - but just because there is literally no counterplay for a lot of lists. You get tagged T1, and then you lose. Game's over with no opportunity to do anything at all. And even the lists that can beat it generally do it by generating enough output to smash through, not by anything tactical. The whole game just comes down to whether your list rolls enough of the right sort of dice. And nobody really enjoys that. 

Three solutions that would work:

1. Remove conditional battleline.

2. Remove the hero phase move (and probably reduce the move to 10", too).

3. Remove the spell shrug and put them on a 4+ base. 

There are probably others too, but these are all easy and each would probably fix the problem on its own, albeit in different ways. Solution 1 retains their flavor but limits them in a way that stops the SCE player from being able to utilize spam to lock down the entire opposing army, solution 2 stops your ability to cross the entire board in one turn to tag the army in the first place, giving the opponent time to get out and start establishing board control prior to getting hit, and solution 3 makes them squishy enough that the alpha strike bunker doesn't work any more. 

My vote is for solution 1, but I doubt GW would want to do that because of the anger it would (justifiably, given how much GW hyped up the all-dragon army) create among people who have dropped hundreds of quid on an army they can't use any more. So I think more likely is that the scroll gets toned down and/or points go up again, which unfortunately probably ends in a place where nobody takes them except in spam lists. 

Yeah lets totally obliterate another stormcast warscroll, its not like they have already 90% useless scrolls

How many games did you do vs dragons and with what lists?

 

recently i cant really stand people whining about balance, specially about dragons when there are like 5 armies with more unfun and broken lists, and when (for now at last) there are no evidence of it dominating the tournament scene (no list did 5-0 for now)

 

Edited January 14, 2022 by Yondaime

[Yondaime]

7 hours ago, Zappgrot said:

Did i say that i was fine whit them?  Obviusly if i think design that does not allow the opponent to have meaning full counterplay is not good design. That goes for everything where that is a problem not just the dragons.  Of the things you mentioned i think  the Ironjaw mawcrushers clearly cross the line. As  does the living city command ability.  The idoneth not so much while fast they are not  cross the whole board fast.  I think the mawcrusher might be the worst since it can potentionaly move 3 times in a row. Makeing it's positioning pointless.  But at least that is just one model (or 3 if you go for double move) But stormgaurd can go for a whole army. That is just not cool. 

The Maw its not broken, it was the 15 pigs following him that were the problem, and even if did good recently it was a good tier a, because it counters very well certain armyes but its easily countered by others

 

Imho there are 2 units atm that are problematic at high levels

Sentinels and Morathi, simply for the fact that they ignore 2 of the most important core rules (los and wound counts)

Edited January 14, 2022 by Yondaime

[whispersofblood]

1 hour ago, Yondaime said:

The Maw its not broken, it was the 15 pigs following him that were the problem, and even if did good recently it was a good tier a, because it counters very well certain armyes but its easily countered by others

 

Imho there are 2 units atm that are problematic at high levels

Sentinels and Morathi, simply for the fact that they ignore 2 of the most important core rules (los and wound counts)

That isn't a very good metric of problematic, most units that do even those specific things aren't problematic at all. Sentinels aren't even problematic at high levels...

SDG Spam is getting a lot of pushback because it hits both player archetypes. The typical combat experience types like VV, who probably would love the idea of piloting it, but then would hate it because of the play experience. And, the people who see a game of AoS as a problem solving exercise, because the solution is relatively obvious but hidden behind very specific factions. Which means its a bad experience for those types as well. SDG could do 100% more damage and I wouldn't care about them. The answer is boring, it doesn't produce a new way to play or see the game, and that is what makes them problematic for me personally.

[Ganigumo]

19 hours ago, zilberfrid said:

I'd say limit the amount of units of a single warscroll to, say, 4. This prevents all spam lists.

Please no. 40k does this and I hate it. It doesn't even stop the problem, all it does is limit the amount of your army which is allowed to be broken or OP (when it should be none of it.)
Lets just balance the scrolls and stop making units that do everything (fast anvil-hammers with shooting). Spamming isn't a problem if the unit being spammed isn't broken.

[Ganigumo]

18 hours ago, Rachmani said:

All solutions targeting dragons specificly would not prevent the next spam, regardless if dragons need it or not.

To stop spam AoS needs the rules to stop spam or make it unattractive.

 

16 hours ago, Joseph Mackay said:

Yeah this. A lot of solutions seem to be specifically targeting the Stormdrakes but completely ignore the other things that would be hurt if it applies to everyone (eg limiting duplicate warscrolls), or make no sense as a specific nerf only for dragons (eg the flyer idea above, why shouldn’t all flying units have this? Also no, I disagree with the idea that you can just walk away from anything, retreating from combat needs to have a consequence-no shooting or charging)

As far as I'm concerned spam isn't a problem. literally nobody is upset at the guy running a silly 80 squig hopper list. It becomes a balance issue when the scroll being spammed is broken. So the obvious solution is just to not make broken warscrolls that do everything (speed, durability, power) and/or cost those units at a premium to encourage diversity.

We shouldn't be asking for a bandaid fix when the obvious problem is just poorly balanced/tested warscrolls that are overtuned. We should be asking GW to actually fix the problem and rewrite the warscroll or point them appropriately

[Joseph Mackay]

42 minutes ago, Ganigumo said:

 

As far as I'm concerned spam isn't a problem. literally nobody is upset at the guy running a silly 80 squig hopper list. It becomes a balance issue when the scroll being spammed is broken. So the obvious solution is just to not make broken warscrolls that do everything (speed, durability, power) and/or cost those units at a premium to encourage diversity.

We shouldn't be asking for a bandaid fix when the obvious problem is just poorly balanced/tested warscrolls that are overtuned. We should be asking GW to actually fix the problem and rewrite the warscroll or point them appropriately

I think There are enough units in the game that are problematic when spammed, that we can say spamming is a problem 

[zilberfrid]

1 hour ago, Ganigumo said:

Please no. 40k does this and I hate it. It doesn't even stop the problem, all it does is limit the amount of your army which is allowed to be broken or OP (when it should be none of it.)
Lets just balance the scrolls and stop making units that do everything (fast anvil-hammers with shooting). Spamming isn't a problem if the unit being spammed isn't broken.

Oh, it's absolutely better to consistently write better rules, but I don't really see GW going in that direction.

Spamming stuff isn't good either, and I say this as someone that technically still has a one drop Aetherguard TE army (so mostly Pistoleers and Outriders). There are other ways, like limiting points percentage for a warscroll, but I thought that would be harder to work out, and a lot harder to keep working with points changes.

[Ganigumo]

16 minutes ago, Joseph Mackay said:

I think There are enough units in the game that are problematic when spammed, that we can say spamming is a problem 

Name a single unit with balanced rules that is problematic when spammed.

You won't be able to, because there aren't any.

A unit doesn't just mysteriously become broken when somebody runs more of it, what actually happens is that the unit was already broken and tough to deal with, but a small number of them is manageable to beat because you can either ignore it, or commit way more resources than that unit costed to deal with it. That's not balance, and to enforce limited numbers of units is a bandaid fix that does nothing but obscure the problem.

1 minute ago, zilberfrid said:

Oh, it's absolutely better to consistently write better rules, but I don't really see GW going in that direction.

Spamming stuff isn't good either, and I say this as someone that technically still has a one drop Aetherguard TE army (so mostly Pistoleers and Outriders). There are other ways, like limiting points percentage for a warscroll, but I thought that would be harder to work out, and a lot harder to keep working with points changes.

I don't expect it either, but we shouldn't cry out for mediocrity (even if we've been conditioned to expect it). GW really needs to just get in the habit of rewriting warscrolls during balance updates. Also limits on spamming stuff is a bit hard to implement in aos with some ranges as small as they are. We don't talk about it as much, but just as many armies spam the only solid-average scroll or two in the book as armies spamming the broken scrolls in the book.

[Beliman]

33 minutes ago, Ganigumo said:

You won't be able to, because there aren't any.

Knight-judicator is the only one that comes to my mind. Maybe BOC with that chicken that spams mw but not sure enough.

[yukishiro1]

Even if every faction had the tools necessary to beat dragon spam, it still wouldn't be a good game experience, because matches would still come down to rock-paper-scissors re: whether you spammed the counter tools or not. That's the fundamental problem with skew lists. Typically skew lists aren't *that* big a problem in AOS because damage spillover and the lack of a toughness stat means that everything is at least relatively good at killing everything else. An entire army of 9W flyers with a 3+ save that cross the whole board in one turn while spamming ranged MWs and locking down your whole army are so skew, though, that they end up overwhelming the ability of the mechanics to cope. You need to tailor against the list to have a chance (or have a list that just naturally does the counters). 

If everyone is having to list tailor to stand a chance against a particular list, that's a good sign there's a problem with the list. And of course, in this case, most factions can't tailor to beat dragon spam even if they wanted to. 

I think the comparison with gargants is actually interesting. There were a lot of complaints about how gargants introduced a DPS check to the game, and that is true, they basically do - but at least there are multiple ways to pass a DPS check against models that are on a 4+ whose survivability is really just based on a high wounds characteristic, because all forms of damage basically work against that profile. There are far fewer ways to pass a DPS check against models on a 3+ with a 4+ spell shrug that cross the whole board in a turn, especially when they can also put out 10-15ish ranged MWs a turn to snipe out whatever pieces you do have that could help you against that profile. 

 

Edited January 14, 2022 by yukishiro1

[Ganigumo]

18 minutes ago, Beliman said:

Knight-judicator is the only one that comes to my mind. Maybe BOC with that chicken that spams mw but not sure enough.

Cockatrice is a bit of a meme, they're dirt cheap now, but they only have 10" range on the MW ability that does d6 on a 4+, so they're not really sniping any important pieces, and the damage is super unreliable.

Are knight judicators broken when spammed though? I mean you'd have enough shots to gun down support heroes, and I guess you could do a bunch of the mortal wound splashes, but spamming a 205 point 5 wound foot hero seems like it has some pretty significant drawbacks that make it more of a cheese strat than OP.

[Doko]

I dont get this discusion yet.

Dragon spam list havent got any 5\0 or won any tournament yet so it isnt broken at competitive.

Dragon spam that is a competitive list wining vs casual lists isnt nothing new as every other competitive list of every army stomp casual lists of other armys.

I dont get the problem,if dragon must be nerfed because they are too much strongth,then following tournament data we must nerf as other 20 armys before that have got any 5\0 because they are more broken that a army that his best result is a 4\1. And if dragon must be nerfed for stomp noobs or casual lists then we must nerf the competitives lists of every other army also.

As these fix wont happen then the topic havent sense and dragons are fine or even overcosted if arent spammed at competitive and for casuals nobody care because never gonna be balanced a good list vs a bad list

[yukishiro1]

It's been carefully explained many times in this thread already why SDG are especially problematic when spammed (even if they don't regularly go 5-0 because the lists that do counter them are strong counters precisely because there's so little actual play in the SDG spam list - it mostly wins or loses at the stage of comparing your two lists, there's little room for player skill to influence things either way) - if you don't agree that's a problem, you aren't going to agree, and I don't think anyone repeating it a fifth or sixth or tenth time is likely to make any difference. 

Edited January 15, 2022 by yukishiro1

[Ganigumo]

2 hours ago, Doko said:

I dont get this discusion yet.

Dragon spam list havent got any 5\0 or won any tournament yet so it isnt broken at competitive.

Dragon spam that is a competitive list wining vs casual lists isnt nothing new as every other competitive list of every army stomp casual lists of other armys.

I dont get the problem,if dragon must be nerfed because they are too much strongth,then following tournament data we must nerf as other 20 armys before that have got any 5\0 because they are more broken that a army that his best result is a 4\1. And if dragon must be nerfed for stomp noobs or casual lists then we must nerf the competitives lists of every other army also.

As these fix wont happen then the topic havent sense and dragons are fine or even overcosted if arent spammed at competitive and for casuals nobody care because never gonna be balanced a good list vs a bad list

Consistent 4-1's is the sign of something being too strong, not 5-0s. The difference between 4-1 and 5-0 often just comes down to luck when you take all 5 games into account, so in general its acceptable to lump 4-1 results and 5-0 results together when talking about the top lists.

[Zeblasky]

40 minutes ago, Ganigumo said:

Consistent 4-1's is the sign of something being too strong, not 5-0s. The difference between 4-1 and 5-0 often just comes down to luck when you take all 5 games into account, so in general its acceptable to lump 4-1 results and 5-0 results together when talking about the top lists.

Then let's wait for a lot of those 4-1 results. I'd say a lot of people running those full dragon lists right now are doing this not because dragons are too strong when spammed, but just because those models are so freaking cool.

[yukishiro1]

26 minutes ago, Zeblasky said:

Then let's wait for a lot of those 4-1 results. I'd say a lot of people running those full dragon lists right now are doing this not because dragons are too strong when spammed, but just because those models are so freaking cool.

Which is problematic itself, because there's no way to reign in that list short of deliberately playing really badly. It's impossible not to stomp everybody unless they have the tools to beat it. The guy who's just playing dragon spam for fun is going to have a harder and harder time finding people willing to play him once they realize how unengaging and lame the experience of facing that list is. Which is going to ultimately mean he doesn't enjoy it either, except maybe in the very short term. 

It really isn't good for anyone to have powerful faceroll lists (whether or not they go 5-0). It's like the SoB problem but worse. It's not good for the competitive game, and it's not good for the casual game either. 

Edited January 15, 2022 by yukishiro1