Stormcast Eternals - 4.0

[CommissarRotke]

Figured I'd start the new edition thread with this question:

Are our Endless Spells a must-take now? Are there any generic Manifestations that we want to look at?

I like the new Regiment system for Stormcast a lot, I just wish you could use Warrior Chamber only lists. Hopefully with the battletome.

[rattila]

Our manifestation seems underwhelming (well i compare with the ossiarch ones). 
I do like the new regiment system too. 
I really like the new dracoth cavalry rules and the new celestant prime rules. He seems way stronger. But we lose a lot of unit…

Our magic seems weak.

[OkayestDM]

Our magic is weak, but our prayers are amazing, which seems thematically appropriate for a faction that is quite literally empowered by their god. 

I too found our manifestations a bit underwhelming, but the Dias has my attention. Having a lvl 2 wizard is pretty good, even if the extra unbind is the best part.

[Dogmantra]

Dais is definitely the most enticing of the faction manifestations. I was excited to see that you can pick a non-wizard to sit on it now, but unfortunately the heroes that I would most like to give a speed + toughness buff to already have fast fly speeds and a 5+ ward, you could give Bastian an extra 3" of movement but it doesn't seem worth it to me. It seems alright as a 5+ banishable ward for important foot heroes, and I reckon it could be quite powerful if the meta does settle on manifestations being super common to get a power level 2 wizard with +1 to banish, certainly a single Knight Arcanum would be hitting above its points cost.

The other two round out the lore as a counterplay focused lore which is a neat idea but it does make them situational. I used to play with the comet a lot in 3rd edition and one of the problems with getting it to work was that they might not have wizards at all, or when they did quite often they took the -1 to cast for a turn at most and then walked away from it, meaning you had to waste a cast dispelling your own comet to make use of it again. Obviously different edition and slightly different effects, but that certainly could happen again. Celestian Vortex's damage seems okay with the potential to spike but it's obviously strictly worse than something like Quicksilver Swords if you're not making use of the -1 to hit in shooting. I'd have to play with it a bit to see if 12" is enough range to properly make use of it. If so, again it seems like it could be a decent extra bit of defence.

For my money though I think there are more universally stronger & more applicable lores out there. I happen to have the Burning Head/Lifeswarm/Gnashing Jaws lore fully painted already so I'll be messing with that for a bit. The Burning Head I'm imagining using essentially as the old Arcane Bolt, chuck it out when you have nothing better to do and want to just ping some damage out there, Lifeswarm gives a bit of defensive utility, and Gnashing Jaws has the old-style pool of dice impact hit mortals which I think is pretty powerful. The Purple Sun/Suffocating Gravetide/Maelstrom/Shackles lore also seems really good. If I'm reading it right, after they've been out a turn the Sun and Gravetide don't even need to rely on charges to get into combat because they both have a bespoke MOVE ability that doesn't specify no entering combat. Those two are the real winners, but you also have the Soulsnare Shackles for a bit less situational version of the Everblaze Comet, and the Malevolent Maelstrom is also there.

I'm quite excited to try all three of these options to be honest, I'm sad many of my lovely wizards have gone to Legends but the one remaining foot wizard getting a boost to playing with Manifestations is very welcome to me.

[Dogmantra]

On 7/22/2024 at 8:06 PM, Dogmantra said:

If I'm reading it right, after they've been out a turn the Sun and Gravetide don't even need to rely on charges to get into combat because they both have a bespoke MOVE ability that doesn't specify no entering combat.

Just an update to this - yes the abilities don't say no entering combat, but both manifestations are flying, and the FLY ability says that flying units can't end a MOVE in combat unless that move specifically allows it. So if they weren't flying it'd be okay, but since they are, they do still have to charge. They can use the move to tap an enemy in combat then back off to 3.1" away but no floating straight into a fight.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

On 7/22/2024 at 5:00 PM, CommissarRotke said:

Figured I'd start the new edition thread with this question:

Are our Endless Spells a must-take now? Are there any generic Manifestations that we want to look at?

I like the new Regiment system for Stormcast a lot, I just wish you could use Warrior Chamber only lists. Hopefully with the battletome.

Stormcast are not very good at magic, but if you want to play the Manifestation game at a basic level you can bring the Knight-Arcanum, which is not the worst choice. If you do, I don't know you are taking the Stormcast manifestation lore, though. I don't really see the play patter. Summon the Dais turn 1 to give the Arcanum a cast bonus turn 2 to do... what exactly? Or alternatively, give another foot hero a movement boost with the Dais, but I don't think there is a good target here. Personally, if I am bringing the Arcanum I think I am looking to summon the Krondspine or Gnashing Jaws with it.

Krondys is the other real choice for magic in the faction currently (sorry Lorai), and I think he is quite good. 2 cast is solid and +2 to cast is actually great in this edition. I still don't think I would be taking the Stormcast lore with him, though. I don't really rate the hammer hurricane, comet seems OK, and as I said above I don't know who you are putting on the dais. It's just a hard sell over Morbid Conjuration, Primal Energy or Krondspine.

[Vakarian]

It’s a pity the comet is toned down so much, it would be great to have a solid manifestation to cast every turn with the Knight Arcanum as on the dias, and he could still cast a solid support spell too. 
 

I generally agree Morbid or Primal seem to make the most sense. I think with time I am actually shifting to Primal as my main focus, because we can probably make pretty good use of Lifeswarm and the Jaws are very solid. But Morbid is across the board good. 

[Freejack02]

I've been gone for a couple years, but wanted to get some opinions on the new book - I expected this to be a very large thread with lots of discussion. So... what happened? Is the new edition not at all popular, or are these forums just really dead?

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

The forum overall still seems pretty active, but I think a lot of the mechanics-related discussion takes place elsewhere at this point.

Anyway, personal opinions on the new book:

I think Stormcast look pretty good. For casual play, there are many fun options and the bloat has been reduced to managable levels. Competitively, I think lists that run Krondys or Karazai are looking pretty scary. The Stormcoven gave Stormcast an extremely welcome now unit for the current magic meta and the Stormreach Portal really helps, too. I think the armies of renown are not better than the regular list, but the Bastian Carthalos annihilator spam army looks pretty scary.

Personally, I am excited to get into Stormcast this edition. I think they will be a fun, more relaxing play experience compared to Cities of Sigmar.

[AdamR]

Celestant Prime vs Yndastra

Why is Yndastra seen as soooo much better than the prime? I agree that 3d6 charge is awesome, but with 12" move, is it really only key charging from a 9" deep strike?

Yndastra is stronger vs monsters, but the Prime is stronger vs everything else. And has 2 (3 with the ward) extra wounds. And is cheaper...
 

So school me! One of them is going in my list for a tournament next month.

[Dogmantra]

3d6 charge is the main one and it's pretty huge, both for viable deep strike charges and just lowering the chance of flubbing a charge with your important 300 point hero as well as opening up more hero sniping by charging over screens. Yndrasta also has a smaller base which is a minor but tangible benefit for squeezing into smaller spots and being wholly within for various buffs. She also brings a little bit of utility with the no control score reduction which against some armies can be quite useful since SCE struggle for control score whereas Celestant Prime is pure damage. Her shooting is more average damage to anything with a 4+ or worse save although of course it's not nearly as reliable for pinging that last one point of damage off a unit like the Prime's is.

It really is just that 20 points isn't a huge difference so you might as well spend extra unless you have an extremely tight combo with no points to spare at all, and the 3d6 charge is amazing compared to the insultingly bad improved deep strike that the celestant prime gets that doesn't even work with a lord imperatant.

[PJetski]

Hey everyone please check out our Battletome Review for the 4th edition Stormcast Eternals

 

[AdamR]

Is that really a 7 hour runtime?! 😮

[PJetski]

6 hours ago, AdamR said:

Is that really a 7 hour runtime?! 😮

Not even our longest video 

Our review of thr Seraphon 3rd book was over 9 hours

[AdamR]

Question time....

If I can only fit one in my list...

Questor Soulsworn and Celestant Prime

OR

Stormcoven and Yndastra 

There's already a Knight Arcanum in the list for manifestation shenanigans.

Thoughts?

[Dogmantra]

On 12/1/2024 at 9:46 PM, AdamR said:

Question time....

If I can only fit one in my list...

Questor Soulsworn and Celestant Prime

OR

Stormcoven and Yndastra 

There's already a Knight Arcanum in the list for manifestation shenanigans.

Thoughts?

Depends what you need imo. Questor Soulsworn are good for holding objectives and will give you more bodies which is often what SCE sucks at, so I'd lean towards that, but I don't think you can go wrong with Stormcoven & Yndrasta.

 

Also -- those with the stormreach portal model, do you have approximate dimensions? I'm thinking I'm going to try to art-attack one.

[Marcvs]

1 hour ago, Dogmantra said:

Also -- those with the stormreach portal model, do you have approximate dimensions? I'm thinking I'm going to try to art-attack one.

I am going the same route, mainly because I felt I was "forced" to buy a big slab of plastic just to use the rules in my battletome. So, from the Stormkeep discord:

• 14.5cm wide, 17cm long. Height 16cm from base to top of roof, 22cm from base to tip of top spike.
• If you remove all stairs: Length: 12cm Width: about 8cm Height: about 14cm to top of roof, no ball and spikes. If only removing stairs poking out: Length: 14.5cm Width: about 10cm

To have a more precise idea of the dimensios of the base (since it's not a rectangle):

And here's the current state of my own arts&craft project for an homemade Portal

[PJetski]

14 hours ago, Marcvs said:

I am going the same route, mainly because I felt I was "forced" to buy a big slab of plastic just to use the rules in my battletome

What do you mean?? It's free

https://youtu.be/3682_SSVIcg

 

Edited December 5, 2024 by PJetski

[AdamR]

Having bought what seems like a million old citadel woods for 1st ed Sylvaneth, I'm actually not that bothered by having to buy a stormkeep 😜

[Marcvs]

29 minutes ago, AdamR said:

Having bought what seems like a million old citadel woods for 1st ed Sylvaneth, I'm actually not that bothered by having to buy a stormkeep 😜

Understandable, it's all very "personal feelings" based.

[Dogmantra]

Played a local one dayer this weekend with the Heroes of the First Forged army of renown. It's fun, has some cool tricks but I'm not sure I'll be rushing to come back to it. I was running Bastian, Krondys, Celestant Prime, Knight-Vexillor, 6 Hammer Annihilators, 3 Shield Annihilators, and 3 Praetors. Two close losses and one crushing victory meant I scraped into the top half. I'm not disappointed with how I played but I feel like both of those losses could have been wins if I'd maybe played a bit safer and meticulously. A couple of gambles didn't go my way and one charge was foiled by the fact Krondys couldn't actually fit into the space I needed him to charge to.

Anyway thoughts on the army as a whole, it's an alpha strike list. It alpha strikes hard and fast and then hopes that a solid wall of good saves and high health can outlast what's left of your opponent's army. And it's so slow once you're fully dropped. Annihilators at a 4" move is painful, and Krondys is often slowed down by the fact that the Praetors have to keep up with him. There's a big caveat here that I don't have a Stormreach Portal, which I think is a must here. With no access to Translocation or any chaff units to keep in reserve it felt like I committed hard early and just got stuck. Game 1 was against IDK and we played super cagey, barely any fighting, and I just got outmanouevred, 4" move can't compete with 14" when it comes to retaining objectives. I think with good foresight and a Portal I could have at least had a turn of throwing the Vexillor off somewhere to take an objective, the threat of it would at least have meant my opponent couldn't leave objectives totally undefended.

Deep striking 3" away from an opponent's unit sounds wonderful. It is amazing to drop that block of hammer Annihilators so close to their target, but unfortunately redeploy exists, and you don't need an amazing redeploy roll to a turn a 3" charge from something almost guaranteed into something a bit more dicey. It's a real gamble and when Longstrikes exist it does feel like you're trusting a lot to a couple of rolls going your way for not much benefit.

The other battle trait not to do with deep striking is neat, one unit of infantry can charge while in combat and move through units while doing so. I think you really want Yndrasta's 3d6 charge to make the best use of this. I felt like the potential is there for some cool tricks, and I did feel clever using it to leapfrog an enemy manifestation and grab an objective. What bugged me a bit though was that this is the only real battle trait that the army gets once it's fully deployed and it's your charge phase only. I don't think it would hurt to let it apply to counter-charge too, you're already spending 2cps and gambling on getting a decent roll to actually make something of it.

I did learn a good lesson about using the shield Annihilators though. I think previously when I had brought them in 4th ed I was trying to use them too much like their 3rd edition counterpart and that's just not what they're for anymore. They're for castling up, deep strike them for a little bit of chip damage and threaten strike-last on anyone who charges. One 6 on 3 dice is a bit over 40% chance of success but it's enough for opponents to think twice. I'm looking forward to trying them in the less restrictive main list.

I've got some Prosecutors to paint, Vanguard-Palladors to build (I swear I'm not meta chasing I've loved them for ages but never found a good deal until recently!), and a Stormreach Portal to DIY. Hopefully I can use all that as palette cleansers in between the slog that is painting up my Kharadron Overlords.

[AdamR]

I went to a one dayer at the weekend too - which represents my 2nd to 4th games of 4E!
 

Wanted to steer clear of a full on meta list so avoided dragons/longstikes/palladors.

Managed to go 2-1, probably could have managed 3-0, but I played T1 in my last game like a total goon, then got double turned and punished🤣
My opponents played Daughters (no morathi, 50 snakes) Maggotkin (GUO, beasts, plaguebearers, blightkings, blightlords - a real mix) and Ogors(My loss - 2 stonehorns,1 Thunder tusk, Butcher, Mawpit, 2x2 frost sabres and everything else mournfangs)

My list was

No Dragons, No Longstrikes 1990/2000 pts

Stormcast Eternals | Sentinels of the Bleak Citadels

Drops: 4

Spell Lore - Lore of the Storm

Prayer Lore - Prayers of the Stormhosts

Manifestation Lore - Manifestations of the Storm

General's Regiment

Celestant-Prime, Hammer of Sigmar (320) • General

Prosecutors (280) • Reinforced

Questor Soulsworn (230)

Reclusians (280) • Reinforced

Regiment 1

Lord-Terminos (150) • Quicksilver Draught • Envoy of the Heavens

Vanquishers (220) • Reinforced

Regiment 2 Lord-Relictor (130)

Vigilors (130)

Regiment 3 Knight-Arcanum (120)

Vigilors (130)

Faction Terrain Stormreach Portal

 

Liked playing it, so I'll try to get more games with it before I change much - depending on what happens with Battlescroll obviously!
Didn't really come up against any wizard heavy armies, so the Arcanum was enough (especially after using the Dais to make her a 2 caster).
Portal was used to alpha strike buffed Prosecutors every game, but I think other than that I used it once to do a seize the land objective, and that was it!
Vanquishers were a bit underwhelming - against blood sisters they got struck first mostly rinsed, and then they used their 1/game fight twice to finish off the stragglers at the end of the turn. The sisters were fully buffed though.
In game 2 they kept whiffing in a 4 turn combat with the blightlords, despite starting off at rend 2 damage 2! And in game 3 I faced an army with basically no infantry and zero units of 5+🤣
However, I do see them having a use and I really wanted at least 1 10 man blob in the army so they're staying for now!

[Dogmantra]

1550/2000pts
2 drop(s)
Battle Formation: Sentinels of the Bleak Citadels

Yndrasta, the Celestial Spear (330)
    1  x  Gardus Steel Soul (170)
    6  x  Prosecutors (280)
    3  x  Prosecutors (140)

Lord-Relictor (130)
    10  x  Liberators (200)
    3  x  Stormcoven (210)
    6  x  Gryph-hounds (90)

Stormreach Portal

I'm almost finished making my DIY stormreach portal and I want to do the above as my next list to try. Pretty standard concept really with my own twist - start Gardus & Yndrasta in the sky, big prosecutor block next to the portal, then buff them up with +1 attack from bless weapons, strike first from the stormcoven's warscroll spell, 5+ ward from the subfaction, and finest hour, then teleport them 9 away, drop yndrasta and gardus with them, gardus pops his saintly assault for +1 to charge and +1 attack on all three units. You now have two units charging 3d6+1, 30 attacks on the prosecutors, yndrasta with 3 & 6 attacks, and gardus is there too. Even vs a redeploy from 9" away, 3d6+1 is a 65-ish% chance to make the charge which is a bit gambley but it's decent odds and of course you should ideally be able to get angles on two units.

Anyway long story short obviously there's a 450 point gap in the above list and one slot left in Yndrasta's regiment. I am keen to keep it at two drops because I think being able to force your opponent to go first gives you a really good chance to charge ritual points on their turn to make it very likely on your turn. So what would you put in the remaining slot? Reinforced longstrikes seems like an obvious pick, leaves you at a nice 1950 for the extra CP but also I don't want to do that because longstrikes are kinda boring. I was thinking reinforced Concussors but I'm really not sure, I'm not convinced by Dracothion Guard this edition.

[AdamR]

If your rolling is anything like mine, be prepared to bemoan the waste of CP as every time you use magical intervention you get a 1! 🤣

If you're keen on staying 2 drop and don't want longstrikes, how about a reinforced unit of Vigilors? Then reinforce your other unit of Prosecutors ?

OR

3 chariots, just to confuse your opponent! 😜

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

With the recent point drops and changes to bonus heroes, the list I am looking to build changed a bit.

Stormcast Eternals
Sentinels of the Bleak Citadels

Lord-Vigilant on Gryph-stalker (180)
[General]
[Shock and Awe]
- 1 x Lord-Terminos (150)
[Quicksilver Draught]
- 6 x Reclusians (280)
- 6 x Prosecutors (280)
- 10 x Liberators (200)

Lord-Veritant (120)
- 3 x Stormcoven (210)
- 6 x Stormstrike Palladors (380)
- 10 x Liberators (200)

Stormreach Portal

[Lore of the Storm]
[Prayers of the Stormhosts]
[Krondspine Incarnate] (or realistically anything that has one valuable spell, because this list is not flooding the board with manifestations)

2000/2000pts
2 drops

 

I think as far as a casually-competitive list goes, this is pretty solid. It's just two Skaventide boxes plus Palladors. There are two really solid combos in there, with the Prosecutors getting fight twice from the Lord-Vigilant and the Reclusians getting strikes first from the Terminos. I think the plan will probably be to start with the Lord-Veritant, Liberators, Stormcoven and Prosecutors on the board (still have to puzzle out how that would work with the regiments), and then drop in the other stuff when it is convenient: Lord-Vigilant when the Prosecutors are about to charge and Lord-Terminos and Reclusians on an objective, ideally. Not really sure how to handle the Palladors yet, but I think they could be pretty valuable late game if any of the warrior chamber units die. Might be worth positioning the Liberators pretty aggressively to make that happen.