BillyOcean

I need enlightened for the battalion. And the enlightened will be backed by the fatemaster when they go into combat, which is probably even more powerful than the Shaman buff, at least if I want to strike first. Plus, I like having a hammer unit that can jump over my screens on their discs. Thats not to say 20 tzaangors is bad - I like them a lot, but just in a different list. And again, I'd probably make sure I had a Fatemaster around to buff them given that I tend to whiff the hit rolls on my greatblades!

Not sure if that was intended for my list above, or another one? But my list doesn't intend to summon any LoCs - I'm using the shooty acolyte cult, not the summoning one. I'll likely be using summon points to pop out blues for objectives or an exalted if something needs to get shot. I prefer LoC to Kairos in my list because he can get the -1 to hit trait and zappy stick artefact. If your comment was intended for someone else, plz ignore me! 😀

I share your desire to get the most of the acolytes. Easily my favorite basic models in the range, and I love the new warscroll and think they're quite well balanced at 100pts. The list below is what I've come up with, let me know what you think! Pyrofane Cult Lord of Change, General, -1 to hit by shooting trait (Pyrofane), zappy stick artefact (Pyrofane) - 380 Gaunt Summoner - 240 Blue Scribes - 120 Fatemaster - 120 30 Acolytes - 300 10 Acolytes - 100 10 Acolytes - 100 6 Enlightened on Disc - 360 Spell Portal - 70 Burning Sigil - 40 Witchfyre Coven - 160 TOTAL 1990pts; 5 drops The cult choice and witchfyre portion of the list builds itself I think. Pyrofane bumps all the shooting to 3s/3s and the 30 block hopefully gets to shoot in the hero phase, meaning that I'm putting out 80 quality shots per turn at medium range. The disc enlightened provide the main combat threat, with the mobility to apply the power where necessary. I'm always going to save destiny dice that sum to 9 to use for their charge, so they can get +1 attack to all their profiles. The main change I'd consider to this portion of the list is switching to 10,20,20 acolytes to give more options for the hero phase shooting, if my opponents are finding it too easy to manage the threat range of the single 30 block. As for character choices, there are two that directly synergize with the Witchfyre Acolytes. First, the Fatemaster with his command ability can really amp up the shooting from the 30 block, and seeing as it triggers in the hero phase it will give rerolls to both their hero phase and shooting phase attacks. He can also charge in with the Enlightened, making it much less important to wait for them to hit second and thereby mitigating their one drawback. Second, the Blue Scribes help all of my Acolytes get their -1 rend spell without committing destiny dice. In addition to making all the other casting more reliable and helping me rack up the summon points. They such a force multiplier that I can't see leaving home without them. Then I have two generically good character choices. Lord of Change with his trusty spell portal is an absolute sniper - he focuses on taking out support characters with Infernal Gateway, and now that he can dispel the portal for free when he needs to reposition, it feels much more worthy of its 70pts. The Pyrofane trait (-1 to hit) makes him more survivable in the unfavorable shooting matchup, and he's by far the best suited characterize to use the Pyrofane artefact. If I can keep him him in the Fatemaster bubble for a couple of turns, then I can reroll all the non-6s to hit, fishing for more 6s. With an average of 7 attacks and rerolls, he's kicking out 2d3 or 3d3 mortals at 18" in the shooting phase. In other words, his shooting attack has become a Storm of Shemteck, which is super good. And then Gaunt Summoner - at his current points cost, why not? 10 pinks screening the acolytes will go a long way towards keeping their shots flying further into the game. I had 50 points left, which could easily be any medium cost endless spell. I chose the Sigil because it seems fun and there are a couple of game-changing effects (eg another +1 attack on enlightened), albeit unreliable. There are likely more optimal choices, and it could even be an extra command point given that LoC and Fatemaster both have command abilities that I'll want most turns. Plus I'll probably want to keep 1CP in the pocket in case the 30 block of acolytes takes major damage. At this point, I'm not sure what to do with the extra artefact - suggestions are welcome. I'm leaning towards something to keep the Fatemaster alive given that his command ability is so clutch and he'll likely be getting into the thick of it alongside the enlightened.

Thanks so much for pointing that out! Thats a great help.

Not as far as I'm concerned. I know some people like them to stand behind chaff walls to provide a little punch-back when the line gets hit. But losing the mobility to apply damage where and when its needed makes them lackluster in my opinion. Too bad we need them in Witchfyre because I had been running that battalion in the old book with disc Enlightened and really enjoying it. The extra tax of foot Enlightened makes it unappealing now. Theres no point submitting a FAQ about it right? You all think the intention is pretty clear that it has to be foot Enlightened?

It's an OK battalion I think. You'll generally be getting 2d3 mortals on a unit before charging it, assuming you attack in a double team of skyfires+enlightened to make the most of ordering and rerolls. The price tag seems a little high though, given how much the units alone will cost. Overall, after absorbing all this information, I don't really understand the pricing of the battalions. On the Arcanite side, there are numerous battalions that fit 3-4 units, and have rules that will make close to zero impact on the game. Yet they come in at just 20-40pts less than Changehost that can fit your whole army and lets you do one of the most powerful things in the game (teleporting) twice. Confused by the logic there!

Yeah, I'll likely only be summoning screamers or blues to help with objective play. Occasionally an exalted flamer if someone really needs to get shot.

Summoning is end of move phase, so he will be waiting to turn 3 to cast and move. Your best chance is that you go second, your opponent gets a couple of spells, and you can push the remainder of the 9 in your turn. If we have to wait for turn 3 for LoC to act, I feel like Guild of Summoners is relatively weak.

Thanks! Seems like one of those clarifications that needs to be moved to the general FAQ now that there are multiple things with that ability.

Question: Because the Lord of Change's Spell-eater ability allows him to dispel an endless spell "during the hero phase", does this mean he can do it at any point during the phase, and therefore dispel a spell that was cast in the same turn? This would be quite powerful, allowing us to use some of the riskier spells without putting ourselves in danger. Or, does this ability implicitly have to follow the "beginning of the hero phase" timing for dispelling, even though its not explicitly stated in the ability? Thoughts appreciated. Seems like it might be worth submitting as a FAQ question.

Unfortunately I think you have to run the Enlightened on foot in the Witchfyre Coven (based on my reading of a grainy picture from a video). I'd like to run a similar list to the one you wrote so am pretty disappointed!

Yeah, and I think they look silly ?. Mine were supplied with the smaller 40mm flying bases (don't know if thats usual?) and I based them on regular 40s instead to fit the rest of the army. Here's an old low-quality picture of my team, grinder at the back. I'll take a better picture of him for you when I'm home.

Well thats annoying. My soulgrinder is on the 170 oval as previously suggested, and it looks perfect. I experimented with the 160 wound it looked dumb and oversized. Also, screamers on 60mm rounds? That looks absurd.

I agree this is how its intended to work. But I think theres some clunkiness in the wording that makes it i unclear whether Blue Points count as Fate Points when determining whether the threshold of 10 is met, as well as when paying the cost. I'd really like for it to be clarified as I don't want to argue about it at a tournament table.

The way I play Tzeentch, blues and brims are critical as chaff walls. Clearly they are now too expensive to spend points on for that purpose, so I'm looking for ways to pop them out in front of the main line for "free". I was planning to farm a unit of pinks, probably with the quicksilver swords, to generate blue points then replenish the pinks with Fold Reality or fate dice on battleshock. This would allow me to drop 1-2 units of blues 9" away from my opponent turn 1, achieving the chaff effect nicely. Obviously, the new rule as written prevents that trick because I'm unlikely to rack up 10 generic Fate Points turn 1. So its important to get it clarified.

Yep, sorry I didn't mean to suggest you were panicking - that was just a throwaway line. I agree its useful to point out that this is how things work under the current language - we don't want any fellow Tzeentchians getting caught out by the rules lawyers! I was just trying to head off lengthy discussion of how bad Pinks are now - I think its a glitch in the language and we want to get it clarified first.

I agree that under the current wording, we cannot summon Blue Horrors until we have at least 10 of the generic summon points, even if we are going to use special Blue Horror points to summon them. HOWEVER, I think we all need to stop assuming that the wording of these rules reflect how the game is supposed to be played. If the AoS2 release has taught us anything, its that the design team is unable to translate their intentions into clear rules language - thinking of the whole 1st turn debacle among other things. I believe the intention is that if we are summoning Blue Horrors, the BH points substitute for generic summon points in all respects, both when paying the cost and determining whether 10 are available. So, lets all calm down and all of us email the design team at aosfaq@gwplc.com to ask for clarification. If the question is frequently asked, it will be answered!

Also note that many of the new Errata explicitly point out that command abilities cannot be used multiple times (e.g. Morathi). I assume this is instead of any blanket rule of 1. The is not such rule for the Lord of Change, so I assume its fine to burn a few command points to add +3 (or whatever you want) to all cast/unbind for a round. Its a pretty steep price to pay, but would allow us to compete with Nagash in the Magic phase. EDIT: Or maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. Perhaps the language "If he uses this ability, you can add 1" means that only 1 is added, however many times he used it. So a binary if / if not statement. Not sure.

Huh, also the errata to Screamers changes them significantly relative to how I was using them. Based on the old rule, I was assuming that 6s to hit the Screamers counted as 1s, as long as the Screamers were close to a hero. The Errata makes it clear that its actually 6s to hit the heroes that count as 1s, as long as the hero is close to screamers. Looking back at the old wording, I guess it was ambiguous which way it worked. How were others playing it previously, and do you think it changes their value at all? I guess it helps to prevent hero sniping even more, on top of Look Out Sir.

For sure. Using the word "nerfed" was a little tongue in cheek, seeing as he's still obviously better than he was before summoning became "free". Its just that since the new rules leaked, I think we've all been assuming he's elevated to God-mode - blasting pink horrors into peoples faces who can then blast with a spell of their own! It was obviously too good, so the change makes a lot of sense.

SIGH, Ogroid nerfed just after I finished painting him up for 2nd Edition.

I'm loving all the talk of Fatesworn Warband. I don't have nearly the models to field one myself (yet), but its interesting that such a new playstyle has now opened up. So, what do people think about using the Fatemaster in such a list? Allow me to remind you of a few details of this guy that would be relevant in such a list, which you might have forgotten because he's been hiding under a rock for all of 1st Edition: - His command ability. Roll a dice in hero phase. Until next hero phase, you can reroll all dice that match that number for Tzeentch Mortal units within 9". Generally considered to be pretty garbage, because if you roll a 4 or higher it won't really help with any hits or wounds, i.e. the majority of all dice rolls. BUT if we are spamming Acolytes, then any roll other 6 allows you to get get more bites at the 6+ shield shrug-save. Questionable whether its worth the command point, but if you cluster enough acolytes around him it might be. - He has a decent number of Rend - attacks that will benefit from the Fatesworn buff. - He is one of the best heroes we can bring to act as a summoning beacon. Can cover a huge amount of distance in the hero phase to pop out your summons wherever you need them. - The change to Mystic shield was pretty good for him. He can now become one of the best models in the game for tanking big infantry units that rely on huge numbers of low-rend attacks (looks at Witch Elves), with 2+ rerolling 1s in the combat phase.

The ministry of miniatures, I love it. "M'Lord it appears the Kharadron Overlords are rather overpowered this season". LOL

Agree. The cav look amazing.

Sure, but there's no need to take damage in your own turn (she retreats if in an unfavorable combat), so if you want to keep her alive all game there's not much the opponent can do about it. I'm not saying thats overpowered - we won't know until we see other rules and points. But its certainly quite powerful.