Mark Williams

I think my main issue with Gavriel bombs is that it’s being used to bypass screening units, or being used to get a big multi charge off in order to kill many units at once. I would like to see some reasonable restrictions put on the ability such as only allowed once per turn, or being forced to contact a specific unit first, or both of these. I feel Deepkin have some similar issues that need addressing too.

Enjoy this while it lasts.

Just be aware that the output of ballistas is very spikey, even with an Ordinator. It's good to have some kind of backup or additional 2nd strike coming from somewhere too.

For blood stalkers, I would like to see the errata keeping Morathi’s ability from triggering their mortal wounds redacted. Her command ability clearly says, “as if it were the shooting phase.” And the errata contradicts itself as there’s no faq that correlates to its wording. That simple change would make them more useful and make lists have more variety.

One way to interpret it, is that the spell is summoning the comet. The comet is a separate entity that has an ability that deals spell damage, but the damage comes from the comet, not the caster. If you read the comet’s warscroll, the spell description is just summoning the model onto the table. This way of thinking about it would line up with the errata that explains abilities like Morathi doubling spell ranges don’t extend to endless spells.

As a general rule all of the shooting units and the azyros go in the sky. I’m generally able to overkill whatever I choose to attack when they drop. The azyros gets an extra hit or so from each unit except the ballista, which is still very spiky - once per game, it does really well, but also totally blows once per game too. Biggest issue I’ve had so far is landing in a bad spot and not being able to extend threat and range to other areas of the board. You have to put a lot of thought into where you plan to be at the end of the game because the army has very poor mobility and threat range. I’ve lately found an excellent strategy is to just simply land behind my own lines and shoot over the heads of my foot troops. It seems to really ****** with people because they are waiting for me to expose those units to counter assault. To answer your question, the knight azyros seems to pay for himself every game so far, and works for melee units too. He’s crazy strong when combined with the celestant prime as he’s the only unit that can keep up with him in my list.

Prepping to go to a tournament next weekend. Just finished painting the last unit tonight. Picture attached, list below. There’s not much I can change at this stage, but I’m open to ideas. Allegiance: Stormcast Eternals- Stormhost: Hammers of SigmarMortal Realm: AqshyLeadersLord-Celestant (100)- General- Trait: We Cannot Fail - Artefact: God-forged Blade Knight-Azyros (100)Knight-Incantor (140)- Spell: Lighntning BlastCelestant-Prime (340)Battleline5 x Liberators (100)- Warhammer & Shield- 1x Grandhammers5 x Liberators (100)- Warhammer & Shield- 1x Grandhammers5 x Judicators (160)- Boltstorm Crossbows- 1x Thunderbolt Crossbows5 x Judicators (160)- Boltstorm Crossbows- 1x Thunderbolt CrossbowsUnits5 x Sequitors (120)- Stormsmite Mauls and Soulshields- 3x Stormsmite Greatmaces5 x Evocators (200)- 5x Grandstaves- Lore of Invigoration: Celestial Blades3 x Vanguard-Raptors with Hurricane Crossbows (140)3 x Vanguard-Raptors with Hurricane Crossbows (140)War MachinesCelestar Ballista (100)Endless SpellsEverblaze Comet (100)Total: 2000 / 2000Extra Command Points: 0Allies: 0 / 400Wounds: 107

In regards to battle line, I’m actually on the fence about crossbow judicators as compared to crossbow vanguard, in terms of which unit is better and more elite. Lately I’ve been thinking the juds are actually slightly better due to the special weapon and better hit stats. Basically I’m not sure there’s a better “elite” option in that battlefield role, and I can conceive of actually taking more of them in place of alternative units. As for liberators and sequitors, I agree that their main purpose is to die, and taking any more than the minimum you need to protect your troops is probably detrimental to your army’s effectiveness. But they serve a purpose nonetheless, and I have difficulty building a strategy that doesn’t involve them.

My current army cannot take them as battle line, and I have 1 squad of them in my list, so the answer is 1. They serve the same function as liberators in my army - they are just a "shell" to protect the center of my army. I don't expect them to do anything more than that. I'm only taking them because I have 20 points left over and nothing to spend it on.

Lord Celestant on foot CA gives +1 to hit and a knight azyros gives reroll 1s. That will simulate what you are trying to do. Wizards can also cast bless weapons, but that’s probably a waste of a wizard imo.

If your opponent is turtling his army, then you don't bring the gav unit out and just move your smaller units forward and fight with those. At some point, either their formation will break up, or you drop your gav unit behind your own units, and set them up to counter-charge your opponent. Short answer - it's okay to set up behind your own screen, rather than trying to land and charge. That's playing a tactical game, and it's okay for you and your opponent to be strategic. That's a good balance imo. As for taking out screens early, I'd prefer to use ballistas to do that, but raptors would work too.

I can't think of a reason why it would be invalid. It just seems fishy to me because it's a unique situation that didn't seem intended when making the scions rules. It feels like trying to get around the limitations of scions, which exist for balancing purposes. If there's no FAQ against it, there's nothing stopping it I guess. I just would like to ask a designer if it's meant to be played that way.

I regularly play against someone who runs 6-12 dracolines. On the whole he gets very good results, but the army's entire strategy is just "run forward and attack". It does great until it hits something stronger, then it just folds like paper. He's got a very good win record, but we both agree that the army is very small, and is weak to horde. The dracolines are expensive, and it's difficult to hold and capture objectives with them as a result. The best thing about them is that they allow you to expand your army's reach, as well as it's reaction distance. You can spread your army out more and still hit a small area with focused attacks. I've found that with a balanced list (shooting + assault), I'm generally able to table him.... both of us have spoken at length about the conundrum being that in almost every case that you can think to bring a unit of dracolines, normal evocators are a bit stronger and cheaper, with mobility being the only drawback, which if you play well isn't a drawback at all. Short answer - they are good, just not great due to the fact that they directly compete with normal evocators.

The “free” gryph hound counts as a second deployment for putting another unit in scions? That seems fishy.

Vandus Hammerhand is pretty independent too. I’ve had the same argument about the prime. As near as I can tell, there was some rumor started on a forum, video, or podcast somewhere during the intitial round of battletome reviews, and it circulated as truth. I only see argued amongst “more informed” players, who read Internet forums. Have zero issues with people who just read the rule in the book and use common sense. There’s some kind of weird, bad “whisper game” going on with this and I’ll be glad when it goes away. I don’t even see a case to be made for it, unless I take my glasses off and drink a few beers first. It’s rules lawyering mixed with a bit of, “I heard someone say it works this way, and I trust them because it helps my army so it must be true.”

I did sit down a while ago and tried to come up with a vanguard list. I think it would actually be possible to build a decent list (not great) with them, but you probably don't want to put anything more than the minimum points into the hunter troops. Also keep in mind you need the lord acquilor if you're going to go down the route of a full list. I wouldn't mind experimenting with them before I actually bought any models... Biggest issue is they seem like they have low damage output for their points so you might have some trouble lasting long.

It's just a longer one-handed mace, right? I mean you basically just have to find a way to extend the handle, I think. Surely there's enough parts in the box to make something that looks like it.

Sounds good to me. I’m sorry to have said anything different. Cheers for pointing that out!

I stand by my opinion. I think you have to stay 3” away, unless you’re in combat already, in which case you have to “flee” and get 3” away (but not roll an extra dice to flee). Until FAQed, I’d prefer we roll a dice to settle it. Bare in mind I play SCE too and use these units. It feels a bit beardy to do that to people to me. I think the intention of their ability is to make it more difficult to charge them by flying away, or to fly away from a combat. Flying into a unit in order to prevent them from charging just feels wrong to me, and saying you can do it because it doesn’t say you can’t, even if you win the semantics debate, will not win you many friends... My rule of thumb is to not do shady stuff until a FAQ or clear ruling allows it. IE. err on the side of your opponent rather than your own.

Not sure if you’re joking, but I actually agree, and same for liberators. I thought it was an error in the unit description when I first started building my army. as it stands, you’ll have to do a conversion.

My gut says that the core rules for movement would apply in this situation, and it would fall under the blanket of a “normal move.” Meaning you would have to stay outside of 3”.

I put them behind and in counter charge distance of a unit of libs. They in turn are surrounding my commander. I use them as a base guarding team to defend.

You won't be able to use vandus' command ability. Or will you?

Issue is that list can’t take sequitors as battle line.

I think it’s possible to make a good list around him, but as others said, the moment he gets focused, he’ll probably fold. Gotta make him count.