AoS Seraphon Battletome 2023 Discussion

[JackStreicher]

1 hour ago, Alpidur said:

What kind of list I can run with slaan and Kroak? Maybe I put troglodon and also saurus warriors as battleline? 

Listen to their Warhammer Weekly, they’ve talked about it 

Link

[Austin]

4 hours ago, PJetski said:

Kroxigors

? No. Or at least, not by themselves so any additional comments would be helpful. 

[JackStreicher]

Kroxigors sadly didn‘t hit the mark.
They have stupid, weird rules that will never happen like getting +1 attack for the phase in which a Skink died.

They can’t issue commands to themselves.

Their wounds are 50% lower than expected.

Their attacks are too few to matter.

Their heavy scaly skin only protects against shooting (they have only 4 wounds fir christ‘s sake).

Their exploding 6s are only on a single weapon and the target has to gave 10 or more models

They are slow

They are overcosted

They’re also worse than rat ogres and they cost more

I‘d love to make them work somehow, but as sadly many Warscrolls in this tome there’s simply no saving them.

Edited May 5, 2023 by JackStreicher

[Arzalyn]

2 hours ago, JackStreicher said:

Their exploding 6s are only on a single weapon and the target has to gave 10 or more models

Actually both weapons get the exploding 6s vs 10 or + models units. It's probably their main saving grace they have, but delivering them to those units is still a problem, as you said. 

I imagine they could have some play in dracothion's tail with the staff, as it would give them a delivery mechanism. A unit of 3 could have a place as a infantry killer this way, but I doubt you would want more than a single MSU unit of them.

 

[PJetski]

19 hours ago, JackStreicher said:

Kroxigors sadly didn‘t hit the mark.
They have stupid, weird rules that will never happen like getting +1 attack for the phase in which a Skink died.

They can’t issue commands to themselves.

Their wounds are 50% lower than expected.

Their attacks are too few to matter.

Their heavy scaly skin only protects against shooting (they have only 4 wounds fir christ‘s sake).

Their exploding 6s are only on a single weapon and the target has to gave 10 or more models

They are slow

They are overcosted

They’re also worse than rat ogres and they cost more

I‘d love to make them work somehow, but as sadly many Warscrolls in this tome there’s simply no saving them.

Have you considered double reinforcing them and stacking defensive bonuses on top of their scaly skin? Something like this 

[JackStreicher]

2 hours ago, PJetski said:

Have you considered double reinforcing them and stacking defensive bonuses on top of their scaly skin? Something like this 

Seems like an awful lot of investment which cripples the rest of the army. It’s 555 points wasted and easily wiped off the table.

why not simply use 20 Saurus buffed by a scar vet and/or a skink priest? Add the Slann +1 rend spell and it’s a blender unit with 40 Attacks, hitting on 2s, wounding on 2s rend -2 and 6s deal mortals. In addition: 3+ save in your territory and near objectives.

Edited May 6, 2023 by JackStreicher

[Kitsumy]

On 5/5/2023 at 8:48 AM, JackStreicher said:

Kroxigors sadly didn‘t hit the mark.
They have stupid, weird rules that will never happen like getting +1 attack for the phase in which a Skink died.

I‘d love to make them work somehow, but as sadly many Warscrolls in this tome there’s simply no saving them.

100% this like i allready said. i know noone likes to hear crys, conplains etc about his new book. but new book havent lot of buffs or amplify rules so everything is really easy to meassure powerwise.

kroak list is maybe op and unfun to play against.

saurus blocks buffeds arent great but at least are ok

melee chikens and melee terradons are okish

every other scroll are totally bad or overcosted

Edited May 7, 2023 by Kitsumy

[JackStreicher]

I‘ve finally settled on a color scheme (It‘s more green than the camera can capture)

 

 

Edited May 7, 2023 by JackStreicher

[Flippy]

17 hours ago, Kitsumy said:

every other scroll are totally bad or overcosted

What about Skinks (cheap, irritating screen), Chameleons, Guards, Bastiladon (Ark), Astrolith Bearer, Oracle? These are all solid scrolls (some with specific roles) that seem good and playable.

[Kitsumy]

5 hours ago, Flippy said:

What about Skinks (cheap, irritating screen), Chameleons, Guards, Bastiladon (Ark), Astrolith Bearer, Oracle? These are all solid scrolls (some with specific roles) that seem good and playable

skinks are useless for me, compare them to skellys, same stats but they usually have rend, have 6ward and revive half deads every turn.... or zombyes,  more wounds per model, do more dmg and do plenty of mortals when die.

actual skinks would need an extra shot and go down to 70p, 85p for that scroll is the best example of absurded overcosted scrolls in book.

 

chamaleons are among worst unit in all aos, 6w at 6+ for 130p????? wtf and only does like 4dmg without any rend. they should cost 70p at best, they need an extra wound per model an extrashoot with 1rend at those points.compare thm to eshin rats, gutter runners.... way cheaper also deepstrike and do more mortals and dmg in shotting, and then do same dmg again melee for 100p...

guards..... maybe worst bodyguards in game? we must use them because kroak is absurdly squishy, but they are useless, they should do exactly double his damage for those points, or go down to 110p or so. compare them to sc praetors? they do dmg closser to his point cost, and are tankier too for not so more points.

 

astrolith is great, could even get a raise in points, but again only for kroak lists to make him even more op, outside that he is bad, a 6ward with so little range is mostly useless, he is there only to be with mage castle and make them more op.

oracle is totally useless lol, a cloose to 300p monster that do an average 6dmg with 1rend, it should do double that dmg bare minimun. actual scroll cost 200p or so, it is only op with kroak list again since it is neded to do kroak spells, if not it would be as useless as prior edittion, where absolute noone took him, now is even worst since lost the +1 to cast and comet only for that -1to hit aura.

 

basti solar again, it should cost 200, since do less dmg than elite shotting units like slanesh blissbard for 150p... and it is counting he is a monster, not downgrade and save at 2+.

snake ones is mostly ok, dont do enough damage, but cant go down much more since his defensive stats would be too op.

agradons need a rework like i said. if not actual scroll should be 170-180, cant even start comparing them to vamp cavalry, and they are around the same as idoneth eels, that cost 180 and are a bad scroll in an allready bad book.

terradons are mostly ok,could be 10p cheaper, but are playable

rypperdsctils are totally useless. way too overpriced, arent too pricy as unit grabbing unit. they should do his mortal dmg every turn, not once per game, and go down to 100p

saurus are ok, only unit in book that can be buffed, still worse than similar units like chaos warriors, and they have way more buffs in book. still they arent being used too much, so saurus could be even 180-190p

kroxis... another joke rules. warspawn should get extra atacks for being closse to skinks, actual rule is useless and so they are overpriced.actual one should be 150-160p

both versions could get a raise in wounds or save since should be though, again cant even start comparing them to gitz trolls, that only cost 160p, with same stats plus 5ward and regen.... and doing more dmg than both versions of kroxis, with 2rend

normal kroxis are better and mostly okish, should get down to 160p or so. but can be played wuthout feeling cripled.

melee chickens are mostly okish, i would change his bonus to every charge instead only being in objetives, right now they arent good because cant be reinforced( untill they fix this stupid coherency rules), dont do enough dmg to kill units, and they are reaaaaly squishy with only 5 bravery.

ranged chikens could go down to 130p or so since has same stats as elite shotting units(10w at 5+, and around 9dmg with 1rend for 150-170), but need to work with a melee chiken, if not they are totally useless.

spawn... another example of totally joke scroll,need a total rework in his ability, if not it barely minimun need double shots and upgrade hit to 3+, and short profile changed to aply -1 save too on unit. again compare her to ogres cannon as dmg... it does like 4times more dmg for 50p more. or slanesh ranged cavalry, they always aply the -1armor since they will do it even on a 2+ save unit on average and again do like 4times the spawn dmg for again 40-60p more not sure. actual one cant cost more than 90p, and thats for his short range mode, only long ranged one would be 50p at best

my easy fix for book would be put those points( since can rewritte rules) and change kroak to not being able to cast in everyplace with triglodon, only 12" like others mages, and cap his spell to 3 times per turn. so kroak lists wouldnt be so opressives, but other lists could be playable despite not getting to top positions.

Edited May 8, 2023 by Kitsumy

[Flippy]

10 minutes ago, Kitsumy said:

skinks are useless for me, compare them to skellys, same stats but they usually have rend, have 6ward and revive half deads every turn.... or zombyes,  more wounds per model, do more dmg and do plenty of mortals when die.

actual skinks would need an extra shot and go down to 70p, 85p for that scroll is the best example of absurded overcosted scrolls in book.

 

chamaleons are among worst unit in all aos, 6w at 6+ for 130p????? wtf and only does like 4dmg without any rend. they should cost 70p at best, they need an extra wound per model an extrashoot with 1rend at those points.compare thm to eshin rats, gutter runners.... way cheaper also deepstrike but they do more dmg

guards..... maybe worst bodyguards in game? we must use them because kroak is absurdly squishy, but they are useless, they should do exactly double his damage for those points, or go down to 110p or so. compare them to sc praetors? they do dmg closser to his point cost, and are tankier too for not so more points.

 

astrolith is great, could even get a raise in points, but again only for kroak lists to make him even more op, outside that he is bad, a 6ward with so little range is mostly useless, he is there only to be with mage castle and make them more op.

oracle is totally useless lol, a cloose to 300p monster that do an average 6dmg with 1rend, it should do double that dmg bare minimun. actual scroll cost 200p or so, it is only op with kroak list again since it is neded to do kroak spells, if not it would be as useless as prior edittion, where absolute noone took him, now is even worst since lost the +1 to cast and comet only for that -1to hit aura.

Skinks - the natural comparison would rather be something like Hobgrots. The skinks are squishy and deal almost no damage - but they are fast and can redeploy really effectively (and for free in the right army). For 85 points that is ok.

Chameleons - just use the 90 points variant. Their power is in mobility alone - you can move them almost anywhere, every turn.

Guards - they are a bit weak offensively (similarly to normal warriors), but they can protect any nearby hero and can be easily raised with cosmic power (starborne) or get substantial buffs (coalesced). Anyway, 10W with 3+ save for 130 is not bad.

Oracle - its the combination of abilities that looks interesting.

Serious question - do you judge everything based on the damage output per point cost value?   

[Kitsumy]

1 hour ago, Flippy said:

Serious question - do you judge everything based on the damage output per point cost value? 

nope i math up everything, abilitys, other heros buffs in army, army rules etc. so my statement above is pretty acurate im sure. and that is only to make those units barely balanced far from good. 

i compared same role units that has same unit size and same wounds, literally same units but in other books. skinks role is being tarpit, having 2 dices and chossing one isnt very helpfull there, those undeads do a better job as tarpit stoping units for longer.

but move and shenanigans are okish, but when units are way overpriced and havent any real source of dmg in the list you cant win a game.

i had this same arguments on idoneth tome release, where i explained the reason why new book was really bad and way worse than prior one despite being a 1.0 one, and people who didnt know maths replied how i didnt know how to play aos, i wasnt right, i was a troll etc etc... almost 2 years laters? turn out idoneth has been among the worst factions for whole edittion, rigth now being at lowest point, always around 44-49win and barely 1 tourney win in every generals.

im totally sure that without any chaanges seraphon will be among top positions( dont think they will be op neither) with kroak list.

koatls saurus blocks list will be second best list without kroak, being on B tier 3/2 or 4/1 positions, with a really lucky tourney win even maybe, where idoneths are right now. and every other list will be totally unolayable in competitive scenes

Edited May 8, 2023 by Kitsumy

[Beliman]

Maybe I'm wrong, but as a KO player, movement shenanigans and how to deliver dmg or pressure on the table is the most important thing in the game. More than just having raw stats.

[Kitsumy]

no,kharadrons has huge movility( not only chossing among 2 dices on redeploy lol), fly high. has really high thoughness and high enough ranged dmg to kill off treaths and enough melee dmg to kill what they charge.

reason why they are the most op army right now is that. they have everithing too good besides magic

[Beliman]

21 hours ago, Kitsumy said:

reason why they are the most op army right now is that. they have everithing too good besides magic

You missed a few points like we are one of the few armies that can use bridge and move (btw, pretty sure that it's not intended), a ranged battleline (reinforcements!) that can be buffed with once-per-game abilities and as you said, we have Fly High that again, it's once-per-game movement shenanigan as I said.

21 hours ago, Kitsumy said:

no,kharadrons has huge movility

Yep, that's exactly my point!

Edited May 9, 2023 by Beliman

[Arzalyn]

1 hour ago, Kitsumy said:

nope i math up everything, abilitys, other heros buffs in army, army rules etc. so my statement above is pretty acurate im sure. and that is only to make those units barely balanced far from good. 

but move and shenanigans are okish, but when units are way overpriced and havent any real source of dmg in the list you cant win a game.

May I ask how you math non-combat related stuff like movement shenanigans?

While don't doubt your calculations and I agree that Seraphon don't has a good combat damage source outside of fully buffed saurus blocks and raptadons in objectives/arcane terrain, I fell you are undervaluing the ability to concentrate this okey-ish damage with movement abilities. This is mostly talking about the Starborn side tough, as Coalesced don't have as much mobility (I'm considering the slann teleporting spell will be FAQed to work like any other teleport). I think this is the point @Beliman is trying to make, projecting damage with movement can compensate it being lower in general.

Also, may I ask if you are taking the Coalesced damage reduction on the calculations as well? I imagine that for coalesced they intent was for it to play has a grinding force, with the damage reduction helping it survive over multiple turns and keep applying damage over this time.

24 minutes ago, Beliman said:

Maybe I'm wrong, but as a KO player, movement shenanigans and how to deliver dmg or pressure on the table is the most important thing in the game. More than just having raw stats.

It may also be biased has I mostly play factions with movement tricks (Sylvaneth, KO), but I value those pretty highly as well. The problem here may be that those tricks apply just to half of the army (Starborn), while Coalesced has the damage reduction as a trade-off. I do wonder if having those balance to radically different fronts isn't the cause for all this discussion about damage and units abilities.

[Flippy]

56 minutes ago, Kitsumy said:

i had this same arguments on idoneth tome release, where i explained the reason why new book was really bad and way worse than prior one despite being a 1.0 one, and people who didnt know maths replied how i didnt know how to play aos, i wasnt right, i was a troll etc etc...

I do not question your maths. I have IJ, KO and OBR to compare with Seraphon and it is rather obvious that the lizards somewhat lack in their damage output. 

As for the rest, I guess we should first differentiate between the Starborne and the Coalesced. These are effectively different armies.

Coalesced will probably be Saurus based with some very strong magic support (Slann / Kroak). I like this idea - but I am also not a big fan of huge models and so I haven’t really checked the thunder lizard ideas.

Starborne - the abilities are cool. Magic, cosmic power, teleports, summoning. However, the only consistent source of damage is Kroak, and that is not a very entertaining way to play. Moreover, if you want to really benefit from the summoning you are forced into very specific build (Kroak, Slann, Astrolith…).

[Flippy]

47 minutes ago, Beliman said:

Maybe I'm wrong, but as a KO player, movement shenanigans and how to deliver dmg or pressure on the table is the most important thing in the game. More than just having raw stats.

It’s easier with the KO, as the mobility and punch are rather obviously linked. In Seraphon, the really mobile units either have no punch at all and/or are very fragile. So it’s more for surprise objectives control and forcing awkward choices.

[Arzalyn]

25 minutes ago, Flippy said:

As for the rest, I guess we should first differentiate between the Starborne and the Coalesced. These are effectively different armies.

Coalesced will probably be Saurus based with some very strong magic support (Slann / Kroak). I like this idea - but I am also not a big fan of huge models and so I haven’t really checked the thunder lizard ideas.

Totally agree that we should differentiate between the two while we discuss things, they change a lot how the army play/which units they favor.

On the Thunder Lizards part, I expect it to become the faction for lists that don't want to spam warriors/agradons while still playing coalesced. AoS Coach had a nice video talking about coalesced where they show a list like this (will link it bellow). I imagine those kinds of lists would favor using bastiladons, troglodons and carnosaurs, not spamming them, but mixing them with saurus to diversify what they can do. I still think this is probably our lowest hanging fruit, sub-faction wise, do to stegadons being overcosted, but I think it should perform well enough for a 3-2.

 

[Kitsumy]

5 hours ago, Arzalyn said:

May I ask how you math non-combat related stuff like movement shenanigans?

it add some points to the total, per example skinks with normal move and no skill would cost 60p or so, higher move and that 2 dice thing make them 70 for me.

i know lot of guys have the mantra "movement wins you games" but it is false. movement wins you games once you have enough damage to kill things and sturdy enough to not diying to a breeze. and on a game with double turn it gets even less important since you have 50% chance of having 2 moves before rival can do anything

moving 80" dont enables you to kill that block of 30 chaos warriors saving at 2s, ward of 5, -1to wound etc etc above the objetive.

if movement would be the most important stat we would have seen armys full of rypperdactils since are the fastest unit, but they are useless, i only use 1 at most to grab an objetive and die. or idoneth, one of fastest army moving 6-14 on everything. would be among best armyes. 

but they are among worst one because they dont do enough damage to kill things before they die and are overcosted. again like i said move dont means anything without enough damage to kill things. 

 

Edited May 8, 2023 by Kitsumy

[Craze]

17 hours ago, Kitsumy said:

it add some points to the total, per example skinks with normal move and no skill would cost 60p or so, higher move and that 2 dice thing make them 70 for me.

Sorry to say that, but that doesn't sound like math at all, more like guesswork and personal preferences... 🤐

[Kitsumy]

well weighting like a 15% increase only for sligthy higer move than most units, and the ability to choose 1 dice of 2 on redeploy is allready being too generous.

how would you weight move or bravery? it isnt so easy to math up as damage or sturdynes( save and wounds).

[Jaskier]

Movement isn't just about how fast you are, it's also important to consider any abilities that interact with it, and to remember that positioning is key above all else. The old Lumineth Fox spam list didn't win events by wiping armies, it did so by preventing them from doing anything meaningful by pinning them. You can screen out an entire armies' gimmick (the old Living City ambush, for example) with just three units of 5 Vindictors and controlling the turn order; source, the now three-time Australian Master did it to me and it forever altered my perspective of positioning importance even for elite armies. The old Sons of Behemat book, and to a lesser extent the new one, often won comp games by just playing the mission and engaging only if needed; to wit, I beat a horrific matchup for Sons - a pure Troggoth list with 12 of each type (meaning no save stacking) by just refusing to engage and building up an early points lead - I expressly told my opponent I didn't bother charging them because it would serve no purpose other than kill my own army quicker. 

The idea that you can boil all army balance down purely to maths, especially in an asymmetric game, is just laughable and completely removes so many internal and external factors from the balance equation. 

 

Edited May 9, 2023 by Jaskier

[Satyrical Sophist]

On 5/9/2023 at 5:07 PM, Kitsumy said:

well weighting like a 15% increase only for sligthy higer move than most units, and the ability to choose 1 dice of 2 on redeploy is allready being too generous.

how would you weight move or bravery? it isnt so easy to math up as damage or sturdynes( save and wounds).

I'm very curious as to how you are "mathing" things out, not intending to be rude genuinely curious. 

On a more potentially rude note, do you play age of sigmar often, and if so, what's your personal win rate like? I play varying amounts and do pretty well locally, but don't travel too much.

Some of the comparisons you are making feel a bit like you have some unusual views of the game. Being disappointed in Saurus not having the damage output of Greatblade Graveguard is a ... very odd take, since Saurus are so dramatically better defensively, even leaving aside starborne or coalesced, 14 grave guard would be the same points as 10 Saurus, for 6 less wounds, and a 5+ with 6+ ward Vs a usual 3+ (home territory or contesting objective is not a strenuous challenge for Saurus). It's just not a useful comparison.

Counting skinks as a "tarpit" is a really odd choice as well. There are two main roles I see for skinks, both very good. One is as a skirmisher unit, fast movement and boosted redeploy along with minor shooting is a very worthwhile unit, able to threaten objectives and steal any unguarded ones is very powerful. I feel people often undervalue redeploy, mathematically it makes charging them very difficult. 

The other main role I see for them is the screen, which does have some over lap with the previous role. Screens exist to basically buy time. You ideally want them as cheap as possible which skinks dang near are. So I looked though all the point values and unit options for all the armies in sigmar, and there is very little suitable for a screen below 80 points. Giant rats for skaven are about the cheapest (60 points for 6, which is probably too small a unit for it), but the most common is definitely 80. You can get cheaper on a point per model basis sure, but that locks you into bigger units. The job of a screen is to take the hit so a more important unit doesn't. Interestingly redeploy can be useful for a screen as well, since redeploy doesn't specify that you need to end further away, you can move to block better. 

I'm not saying that tarpits are not useful! They are very useful units, but screens are not always tarpits!

 

I think I might have rambled on a bit too much on this topic, but I really am interested. I'm going to make a post in the general forum about benchmarks, which I think is an interesting way to look at things. How reliably does a unit do damage to different targets, or even take damage. Like, do you expect to be able to clear a unit of liberators off a point in one phase? What about a unit of 20 zombies? I was playing a game today where approximately 1500 points of Kharadrons failed to kill a Lord of Afflictions with finest hour and all out defense that tagged their ironclad.

You absolutely have a point about mobility not mattering if your enemy has the points and can't be forced off them, but I feel you zero in too hard on that being the game state already and on worst case scenarios, often in a game you won't be able to take a particular point, but it doesn't matter because there are multiple, and you only need hold one, hold two, hold more.

[Skreech Verminking]

On 5/5/2023 at 8:48 AM, JackStreicher said:

Kroxigors sadly didn‘t hit the mark.
They have stupid, weird rules that will never happen like getting +1 attack for the phase in which a Skink died.

They can’t issue commands to themselves.

Their wounds are 50% lower than expected.

Their attacks are too few to matter.

Their heavy scaly skin only protects against shooting (they have only 4 wounds fir christ‘s sake).

Their exploding 6s are only on a single weapon and the target has to gave 10 or more models

They are slow

They are overcosted

They’re also worse than rat ogres and they cost more

I‘d love to make them work somehow, but as sadly many Warscrolls in this tome there’s simply no saving them.

So they are like halve of the skaven range😂