6+ ward for death factions, do we think ours will change?

[MotherGoose]

So with everyone and their nan getting access to mortal wound saves, death is feeling less unique in that regard.

Also soulblight is now the only death army still restricted when it comes to their mortal wound save (be near a hero or grave).

Do we think this will change? Personally I hope so... graves could be such a cool mechanic, already playing a pivotal role with ressurections, but what I'd like to see is a buff to our ward saves for being near them. Or maybe a 'ressurection' mechanic like necrons in 40k - let's say if you're within 12 of a grave and a model dies, you roll a dice and on a 5+ the model returns.

Just a thought after seeing FEC now getting 6+ ward without restrictions as before.

What do we think, will we be next to just have the ward?

[Evil Bob]

Ossiarch Bonereapers still have the wholly within rules, only it is more lenient with unit leaders counting as sources. FEC might have gotten the omni-ward save because of how grossly outdated and nerfed the book was. So SBGL might get it at some point if the tourney rankings tank and sales drop off a cliff.

A strongly conditional situation for a core army feature in Death books while everyone else gets their’s for just showing up really rubs me the wrong way.

[Honk]

On 6/30/2022 at 9:26 PM, MotherGoose said:

So with everyone and their nan getting access to mortal wound saves, death is feeling less unique in that regard.

I was depressed, when Nurgle got their 5+ ward, just because back in the days overybody got salty when I spiked a ward save roll.

I think the real issue is a reliable balance with the ward saves. And looking at GDubs record, I think I‘d rather be not the meta, than having three month of wonky Nagash rolf stomp, before things get nerf-hammered into gravedust again.

 

[Leshoyadut]

I don't think ours needs to change. It feels a bit sad having ward saves become so common, both thematically and game design-wise, but between getting them from both heroes (which we tend to want at least a few of, since we have some great support and offense options) and gravesites, our army is pretty easy to blanket with them. We're also in a decent place as far as balance goes and don't really need a buff or change, even as small as this one would be.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

I would welcome an unconditional 6+ ward. But only because it's a quality of life improvement. It's really easy to have it basically all the time already with the current rules, but it would be nice not to have to think about it. I fully expect us to just get it in the next book, the rules writers seem pretty good at removing those extra conditions that don't really matter in recent updates.

[Sception]

The change to FEC was framed as a 'balance change', and Nighthaunts were low performing before the new book.  If unconditional 6+ ward is being conceptualized as a balance change then I don't expect it to come to SG since we're not doing that badly.  I'd like to see it as a QoL fix, 6+ ward is not a good enough benefit to be worth the hassle of maintaining wholly within bubbles, but yeah, I don't expect it.

Especially since it would further undercut the relatively little value left in gravesites apart from as a deployment option.

[JackStreicher]

On 7/3/2022 at 10:34 PM, Leshoyadut said:

I don't think ours needs to change. It feels a bit sad having ward saves become so common, both thematically and game design-wise, 

They have to counter the avalanche of Mortal Wounds every peasant in the game can generate … 🤦🏼‍♂️

[Sception]

I would prefer both wards and mortals to become less common outside of specialized factions, even if it meant going back to the drawing board yet again for the zombie warscroll, but that's not the game we're playing these days.

Even if we were, though, 6++ would still not be good enough to warrant the hassle of wholly within bubble management, imo.

[magtchu]

On 7/3/2022 at 9:34 PM, Leshoyadut said:

I don't think ours needs to change. It feels a bit sad having ward saves become so common, both thematically and game design-wise

I agree. I would 100% prefer the game was slightly unbalanced than keep bleeding uniqueness and flavour, otherwise the game begins to just feel like some prolonged mathematical exercise and not a game of fantasy battles. I don't play SBG but if I did I would think it was COOL that their ward was conditional. It's quirky and makes them unique to other armies. I feel the same way about Skaven losing their ''push to battle rule'' and Gitz losing some randomness. Those quirky random rules are why I love the game in the first place, they make the lore and fluff a reality on the table and bring it to life, hate losing them just so the game can be marginally better balanced. Hate homogization. 

Edited September 16, 2023 by magtchu
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