Elazar The Glorified

With the rumour engine do we know if we're expecting a Slaaneshi Warcry warband? The Shardspeaker and Blissbarb Homonculus have similar smokey bits but otherwise wouldn't be expecting anything for Slaanesh so soon after their book

This. But it's a perfect example of why we need FAQs because already as a player base we've tried to break it 😂

So they still count as Battleline but they won't count against your minimum requirements if that makes sense. Important in this season of the GHB as if they're Battleline infantry they will count as Galletian Veterans for example. They get just the Slaanesh keyword but they won't gain Euphoric Killers or the Host keyword or rules. So essentially you're looking for units that can operate well solo of the Hedonites rules and their own allegiance abilities if taken in Slaves to Darkness. Thankfully, I think there are a few units that will very much fit the bill and there's even some fun bonus synergy with the Warshrine's Slaanesh prayer to explore. Chosen, Varanguard and the Ogroids look like they could fill a role for us and then Warshrine and Sorcerer Lords stand out as maybe having some value to support them depending on how deep you want to go. My gut is the Warshrine whilst potentially funny isn't going to cut it but the Sorcerer buffing a block of Chosen look very good for tackling things our Twinsouls would rather avoid. The Ogroids could offer a bit of a glass cannon that can put out some decent damage into armoured units too. To confuse it you also have some units that might have some play as Allies (because they can't get the Slaanesh word to join us as coalition units) such as some of the Cultists for screening and chaff etc. I'm excited to try out some new stuff with their new book and our old one!

My priority was always the Grand Strategy and the Battle Tactics as that's a big part of how games are won and lost. I'm not 100% sure on where I am with the Grand Strategy. It's an interesting one certainly but it's going to be so dependent on the lists you're up against to score it so I don't think it does enough to make me want to move away from the 1-drop Battle Regiment at army building stage. The Battle Tactics are a bit more interesting with two that lean into how we might be playing our lists and one that feels a bit of a Hail Mary to me. Death by a Thousand Cuts if you're going for shooting list in particular should be doable as you can still spread around the wounds for Depravity but just split a few shots from each unit to pip those wounds to score it. Alternatively, there's usually at least one bad that needs to be dropped early in most enemy lists so this feels like it's a nice way to score for focussing down an enemy without having to guarantee the kill for things like Bring it Down, Broken Ranks etc so you can save those for more definite kills. Enrapturing Blur is more situational but it may as well be called 'Sigvald Gonna Sigvald' as it's what we want to do with him half of the time anyway so could have some merit although in the early rounds I'm more likely to be looking at scoring the movement and objective based battle tactics before the middle gets too clogged up so is probably going to be more for if Sigvald hangs on for long enough to go for something squishier later but I can definitely picture there are times I'd pick this. The Grand Feast is certainly thematic. But unless you're going for some harming your own units shenanigans I don't see how you ever justify going for this over any of the other Battle Tactics as it requires quite a turn to pull off. If they'd given us some extra way even as a one-off to generate Depravity - such as a Command Ability then this might have some (limited) value but as is...

Turns out the rumours of Slaanesh's demise are greatly exaggerated... Again 😂

Beasts of Chaos got a Battle tactic based on holding an objective with a summoned unit so I wouldn't be surprised to see us get something similar for that purpose

I personally really love the Depravity mechanic and how it works. I also think it is quite Slaaneshi as in the background lore for both Fantasy and 40k there's always been snippets about the Daemons of Slaanesh being the most active amongst the mortal followers of their god. Every great Slaaneshi character seems to attract a harem of Daemonettes as an example. But, I do see the appeal in Depravity being able to buy gifts to represent Slaanesh's favour if you don't want to summon. For Invaders this could be in the form of a choice of a malus for enemy units to demonstrate the impact of the escalating havoc of Slaaneshi forces in your territory. For Godseekers this could be benefits to action efficiency to represent them picking up a scent of Slaanesh and becoming more frenzied in their desperation to reach the god. So maybe extra movement, an extra move and maybe if you want a big choice of what to spend it on then fighting twice etc. Pretenders you could have loads of fun with and maybe have a table of new titles the Pretender can assume each providing them a further buff as their towering arrogance grows and grows. Those buffs should include something like a bodyguard ward save as the Pretender's followers throw themselves in front of the blades of the enemies etc. All of these could be tied to our starting army to stop it getting out of hand too

To be fair the last couple of these have had Warscroll rewrites but on the faction scenery piece. Certainly a possibility that extra rules can be baked into the Fane as it also adds some balance as it can be Smashed to Rubble. We'll have to wait and see but as my other army is Beasts of Chaos it was great to see such an elegant approach to how they've been buffed and if we get something even half as impactful we can be in a much better position. Don't underestimate how useful an extra few Battle Tactics might be as well. Even if in isolation they're not amazing there's always a use for more options, particularly in certain missions and match-ups where some of the core ones become very tricky to score without a turn to set them up first etc. Options to keep us scoring are always valuable. I'm going to hope for perhaps an allegiance ability to buff the Slaangor. That way they can dial them up a fair bit without worrying about them suddenly being awesome in other armies (or Beasts if they ever get round to fixing their keywords...) I'm going to sit here with everything crossed until this lands, hoping that they give them something insane like native fight twice on the charge or something. No, I won't dial back my expectations! 😂

I think a few of those things are synergy dependent. Lord of Pain is I think actually a really good support hero. If you're running Twinsouls he gives them their rerolls back on the turns they're getting their ward save thanks to his command ability and on the other turns he can be giving Glutos rerolls instead. That he makes your Twinsouls a Battleline choice is an extra boon, especially if you're using Sigvald as that means you're in Invaders and Lurid Haze and so having him as an extra general is a no-brainer. I've alternated running Blissbarbs as smaller units and reinforced and my preference at the minute is for one reinforced unit. It stops them being an easy pick for your opponent for Broken Ranks and if you're running Glutos you can benefit from his Battleshock buffs and/or Battle Rapture (not like there's a better mortal power to take for him really...). A unit of 22 Blissbarbs can focus things down fairly well with All-Out-Attack or spread around wounds if you're trying to farm Depravity. Twinsouls are one of our best melee units. They're not without their flaws but I still really value them. My regular opponents have learnt to be quite scared of these now! The Dread Pageant are one of our most cost-effective units for output. They're never going to be the best unit on the field but they're a perfect little toolbox unit and my next choice to go into the Mists with Sigvald when running Lurid Haze as left be they can score plenty of points and make a nuisance of themselves and if your opponent focuses on them, they're one of our cheaper units, can tank a bit through Vasillac and don't count against the battle tactics for you. Sigvald is a one-trick pony but it's a trick that keeps opponents thinking and that's always a bonus!

Yeah I should stress I hadn't seen the Blades of Khorne update and I'm not close enough to the army to know even having now seen it whether it would be of much help. I was optimistic for how well the Beasts one addressed some of the problems with the army and how much it's given my list writing with them a new lease of life. So yes, if we got a Beasts style update then coupled with those balance tweaks it might be enough. Typical GW managing to lower the bar always! 🙃

We definitely don't need any more of them! 😂

It's a unit that's had a wound allocated to it on the turn and is still there to generate the depravity, not a mini. Doesn't matter if the mini the wound was allocated to is still there or not, the trigger for Depravity in this case is the same thing that triggers the Split and Split Again rule in the first place - a wound or mortal wound being allocated this slays a model and it splits

The two big bits with this to me are that firstly, it's interesting to see GW trying something other than just points changes to adjust the balance in the middle of a season. I don't know whether it will have the desired effect but definitely one to watch. The other bit is this feels like as Hedonites players we'll feel the benefit of this only in a truly competitive environment. We might not have the tools to maximise the bonus points from this, but where we will potentially feel this more is that there are lists much better than ours at removing those units so that's potentially huge amounts of VP being given away by Dragon Spam etc against other good lists so as a result the meta will shift as people re-optimise lists to get the balance between taking the good stuff and not giving up too many points to other lists. Ultimately, at this point we don't know what the new meta will look like but there's a chance that the sorts of units that are on that list that we struggle with will have less presence on tables and that certainly can't hurt us. I think with that change though, if we could get a White Dwarf boost like Beasts of Chaos have and what potentially Blades of Khorne might feel from theirs then we might actually be in a decent position. Imagine if they gave us a couple of Battle Tactics around Depravity and/or Summoning in the way that Beasts did, a new Slaangor warscroll to make them actually useful and perhaps an extra allegiance trait. Ok, I've gone into dreaming but the first bit of this post still stands. The meta will shift (in a tournament setting) so there might be some improvement on how Hedonites perform there.

@Wordy9th Sounds like a great splurge with plenty for you to try out and see how you like it Based a little on my last list, maybe something like: Glutos Sigvald - General Lord of Pain - General 10 Symbaresh Twinsouls 5 Myrmidesh Painbringers 22 Blissbarb Archers 5 Slickblade Seekers I really like them in a Battle Regiment for being able to deploy them in one drop and hopefully controlling the choice of who has first turn, but if you wanted to use more of your other characters instead of the named ones then the other battalions start to have some use. Making them Lurid Haze to ambush Sigvald is probably the key to getting the best use out of him and because they're an Invaders force, Sigvald and the Lord of Pain can be your generals to benefit from making the two Warrior types Battleline and getting the extra Depravity whilst Sigvald is in the opponent's deployment zone. The Lord of Pain's Command Ability is great on the Twinsouls on the turns they don't have rerolls from their Fractured Souls ability and on the other turns if Glutos is in range he's a great target for the rerolls instead (or the Slickblades but I work to the assumption they're potentially more out on a flank). You've also got plenty of options from your Daemons for your summoning as the depravity piles up.

Great post @CeleFAZE, totally agree that this edition is often about making good choices around your battle tactics. I think it's a useful exercise to consider how your list might deal with scoring these as you're writing it as a priority and how you might mitigate against some scoring for your opponent as a secondary thing personally. Whilst some of the opponent's tactics can be considered at list building stage not all of them can be and to me that side is mostly about thinking on your feet to make whatever your opponent has chosen more difficult in whatever way you can. However, the Battleline point is definitely a good one to keep in mind and the more games I've played with Hedonites in this edition the more I've tended to reinforce my Battleline units so that there aren't any easy choices for my opponent early on. I've certainly pulled back on using Hellstriders as their main benefit was from screening etc and I think there are probably better choices in our Coalition and Allies choices for that than a Battleline unit that your opponent can get VP for killing. Otherwise though, I'm a big fan of making sure there's always a Command Point left for a key Redeploy etc to mess with any plans your opponent might have to get at a unit and kill it. From my experience that sort of thing can often be the turning point when your opponent is forced to either pass up those points or now over-extend to score them (which links to your point on making sure you can reliably kill a unit as the dice may be unkind etc. can your opponent do anything that will make it hard or impossible to score? Always factor in All Out Defence etc. But also, my game I posted about with Maggotkin a couple of weeks ago was an example of this. My main aim for the first turn was to neutralise the Glottkin but I couldn't bank on being able to do it with Blitzkrieg an option for them to charge themselves into the ambushing Sigvald or out to the flank and take themselves out of reliable charge range of everything else but units outside of Blitzkrieg range were more viable targets). This can look different depending on the circumstances and battle tactic they pick though, maybe it's healing your General with a Heroic Action or Rallying the remnants of a Twinsouls unit locked in combat that your opponent thought might be an easy Battleline kill without having to do anything. Be'lakor and Glutos can be quite good for these shenanigans too. We often talk about Be'lakor neutralising the biggest nasty in the enemy list but sometimes (especially those games that don't have an Archaon etc on the table) his ability to potentially stop a unit moving or fighting can be the difference between a tight game and a win/loss. Glutos is a bit more niche but if you have him as your General or you have one of our Hedonite Monsters within 12" of him you can put Gorge on Excess on it in your Hero Phase. It lasts until your next Hero Phase so can make these feel like less attractive targets. If your opponent is going second in the Battle Round and so has the chance for the Double Turn and is potentially committing multiple units to taking that target out it can have some value as they'll have to get their combat order choices right or risk you healing up off the squishier units they maybe put in to try and tip a combat. Bonus points if you can trigger this and be in range of a Keeper! Lots of planets needing to align to make massive use of it in this context but certainly not one to sleep on, especially if you're hoarding VP and have obvious targets for your opponent to pick in their turn! I do agree that the bonus Monster scoring can often feel like a trap and I certainly would only be trying for the Monster condition if my list was going to have one in anyway and it was a relatively risk-free bonus. I can't say I've been using Monsters in my Hedonites too often since nearer the beginning of the edition as the extra VP that's potentially up for grabs for each one that dies from Predators and Prey on top of any of the Battle Tactics and their bonuses for monsters often feels too steep a price to pay for what monsters can do. I think the armies that do Monsters best are usually the ones that can really lean into it (my other army is Beasts of Chaos so I can get my Monsters kicks there!) But also, don't forget yours and your opponent's Grand Strategy and all the other elements of scoring for the Battleplan. For a lot of them there's 3VP for the Primary Objective and 2 for your Battle Tactics on offer each turn. You've then got your bonus 3VP at the end for Grand Strategy to add on top. Ideally you want to be thinking a turn ahead as much as you can too. If you score the Primary this turn does it weaken you for the following turn etc? Are you better forgoing some of the 3VP on that to score a Battle Tactic that will also cripple your opponent's scoring the following turn? Can you mess up your opponent's Grand Strategy if you pass up on the Battle Tactics this turn? Will any of the Battle Tactics be viable next turn? If not can you max out your scoring this turn to prepare for a bit of a fallow turn the one after (and use that turn to disrupt your opponent's scoring to keep a net lead etc)? We'll not have long before we move out of the current GHB and need to rethink some of this though. Very curious to see what we end up with next and the impact that had in game and on our list building!

So I've been giving a lot of thought to how to expand the below based on my last game (couple of posts up) before my next game (not sure what army I'm up against so thinking more of where are the obvious gaps for a balanced list) Lurid Haze Lord of Pain - General - Feverish Anticipation, Oils of Exultation Lord of Pain Sigvald 10 Symbaresh Twinsouls 10 Symbaresh Twinsouls 22 Blissbarb Archers The Keeper of Secrets is out so I have 425pts to play with. I feel like I'm hitting a bit of a wall for inspiration the obvious gaps are either a Wizard, something speedy for objective grabbing and rapid support, and perhaps an anvil unit of some kind as the Twinsouls can't be everywhere. My concern over the Wizard element is wanting something reliable as another character forces me to two drops - not a deal breaker but comes with its risks as I prefer the security of usually picking who goes first. Does anybody have any suggestions to try? Otherwise my instinct is to make room for Glutos again at the cost of one of the Lords of Pain as he does a couple of those jobs on his own and the trade off in hitting power from the constant rerolls is a little more durability from his -1 to hit bubble.

Meant to write about my game against Maggotkin last week. Used the below list... Faction: Lurid Haze Grand Strategy: Hold the Line Battle Regiment: Keeper of Secrets - Shining Aegis Lord of Pain - General - Oil of Exultation, Feverish Anticipation Lord of Pain 22 Blissbarb Archers 10 Symbaresh Twinsouls 10 Symbaresh Twinsouls No Battalion: Sigvald My opponent had something like: The Glottkin Bloab Rotspawned 10 Blightkings 5 Blightkings 5 Blightkings We rolled Marking Territory as the battleplan. It was immediately apparent that we both had lists that were going to lead to an absolutely brutal throwdown in the middle of the board. Spoilers - that's what happened! Not sure what the battalion layout was like for the Maggotkin but I know I had less drops with the 2 and I chose to go second. Sigvald disappeared into the mists to redeploy, declining to take any friends with him. My opponent's first turn was mostly spent pressing up. For my first turn I decided that Shock and Awe was the order of the day so went for Bring It Down as my Battle Tactic aiming for Bloab Rotspawned but it was fully my intention to get him and hopefully The Glottkin too if I could, or at least significantly hurt the big brute! There were a couple of challenges to that though. Firstly the Cycle of Corruption started at Nauseous Revulsion (-1 to charges and pile-in moves can't end closer to Nurgle units) also Blitzkrieg on The Glottkin was impacting my thinking perhaps a little more than it ought to... One unit of Twinsouls and the General moved up my left to go tackle Bloab (they had reroll hits for this turn) and the other unit on my right moved up to tackle The Glottkin (they had the ward). The other Lord of Pain and the Keeper moved up with them. The Glottkin had 15 Blightkings supporting and Bloab had 5 so decided that even though the Keeper wouldn't be supporting much this turn that's where the Twinsouls would need the most help. The Blissbarbs kept themselves at max range of Bloab to support the effort to score our Battle Tactic and Sigvald came on behind The Glottkin. So I had set up Sigvald and the supporting Twinsouls to trigger Blitzkrieg. I was less concerned about the Twinsouls as they were in range for the support they needed and didn't gain any massive bonus from the charge (beyond the impact that no pile-ins might have). Sigvald however really needed the drop on whatever he was going to fight. Thankfully the 10 Blightkings failed their charge at Sigvald with a reroll and the Glottkin failed his at the Twinsouls. Shooting saw the Blissbarbs take 8 wounds from Bloab and so when the Twinsouls went in there they were able to kill him and get my Battle Tactic. They took some damage from the Blightkings escorting Bloab but nothing substantial as they were slightly too far away before their pile-in to maximise their attacks thanks to the angle they took to get to Bloab. Sigvald and the Twinsouls both made their charges into the Glottkin. Sigvald would drag both units of Blightkings on that side into combat with him due to the narrow gap he had to charge through but with a natural roll of 10 he was able to put a lot of wounds onto The Glottkin who was rendered relatively ineffective as a result and thanks to their ward saves the Twinsouls remained effective enough to wipe out his remaining wounds. Siggy then tanked a lot of attacks from the Blightkings but maxed out his Disease counters so was took a pasting from those but survived on a couple of wounds. A decent trade-off to get the brothers Glott out of the way before they could do anything impactful! The first turn shock and awe did exactly that so it was always going to be a bit of an uphill struggle for my opponent after that but I'm very impressed by Blightkings in general. They take a punch, dish out plenty of attacks and with the various avenues they have for delivering Mortal Wounds, I was never able to truly stretch the game beyond my opponent but because he couldn't quite get away from me either I was able to cap objectives with summons and the support characters skirting around the edges of the huge melees between Blightkings and Twinsouls and was able to grab the auto-win on this battleplan. Probably my last time using the Keeper in a starting list. Between it failing to cast anything and my reluctance to commit it into combats as I knew it wouldn't win it really didn't contribute much other than an Excess of Violence (that might have been key had the main victory condition not been triggered) that allowed my Twinsouls, fresh from killing The Glottkin and some summoned Nurglings, to pile-in to the Blightkings that Sigvald had been entertaining to kill a unit and get my Battle Tactic that turn. The only wounds the Keeper took were from its miscasts (yes plural, ugh!) and Disease tokens but it didn't do a great deal otherwise and that I still had no confidence in it at 420pts is the final nail in its coffin I think. Sigvald can be a bit hit and miss but when there's stuff like The Glottkin on the board he's such a great piece for trading up! He was abnormally tanky in this game between All Out Defence, Finest Hour and some very fortunate dice rolling so he looked after 15 Blightkings for a while whilst my Twinsouls worked their way into the combat. The Twinsouls hit like a ton of bricks (even missing rend) and having the two Lords of Pain was really useful for making sure both units were always rerolling in every combat. What there isn't a substitute for is the turns they don't have their ward saves as that's when the Blightkings could really press their advantage in the combats. Speaking of the Lords of Pain, as far as cinematic moments go. The final combat we resolved was the non-General Lord of Pain surrounded by about 8 Blightkings by that point. He gave a decent account of himself and there's nothing like the sheer weight of dice being thrown at him there to see the benefits of the Share The Pain rule! I found that unlike my first game against the new Maggotkin, I didn't accrue much depravity with this list. I managed to summon 10 Daemonettes who were key in just sitting on an objective in my opponent's territory that he couldn't get back to. Everything tended to die if it was taking damage, certainly on my side and there weren't many units on the board to begin with. Quite enjoyed the list, it's a little one-dimensional in what it does but was fun going toe-to-toe with an opponent a little more than I normally would other than with Glutos! Will have to tweak it for the next game but not sure what direction to take with the points saved on the Keeper...

Struggling to make some of it out (in particular the Battle Tactics) but what I can read looks very promising! The Herdstone changes look particularly good and my Ghorgons feel like they'll enjoy all the extra Rend they can stack between the Herdstone and their unique Rampage! Bullgor can openers at Rend -3 ftw! You can Rampage out of combat can't you? Handy for building up some PC points for monsters not yet in the fight too!

That there were no Pestigor with Maggotkin makes me wonder if they're holding onto them for Beasts and the Slaangor will get refreshed rules there as they probably just need starting over as you would for a new Battletome... But this just my blind optimism that the potential negative here is a bigger positive down the line in the form of a decent Beasts of Chaos refresh!

Been quiet on here as not gotten a game in for a little bit with the joys of Covid and lots of extra work. But been keen to try something along the lines of the below as a cross between stuff that we've seen have some success and some bits that I've been enjoying using and finally got to use it against a Maggotkin army (probably last ride for the current book) Godseekers Prized Sorcery Battle Regiment Glutos - Judgement of Excess Infernal Enrapturess 5 Hellstriders 5 Hellstriders Battle Regiment Keeper - Amulet of Destiny, Slothful Stupor Contorted Epistomeb - Flaming Weapon, Speed-Chaser 11 Blissbarb Archers 11 Blissbarb Archers Mesmerising Mirror My Opponent played Rotigus Great Unclean One Great Unclean One The Glottkin Plague Priest Sloppity Bilepiper 10 Plaguebearers 10 Plaguebearers 10 Plaguebearers I won't do a full battle report but we ended up playing the Vice and some recap and some conclusions below. I have mixed feelings about The Vice from a Hedonites perspective in the couple of games we've had this one come up. Playing on the narrower, longer deployment and with the objectives starting in the corners impacts the beginning phases of the game substantially. As deployment tends to end up quite deep in each half and also quite a wide spread (but over a narrower space) this means the speed of units like the Hellstriders becomes more useful in one sense but I've tended to find it difficult to flank with that speed as there's a need to concentrate objective holders wider out. The other big impact is some of the 'easier' Battle Tactics in other battleplans become tricky or impossible as there are no neutral objectives and the objectives your opponent holds are usually behind their strength. Lurid Haze can potentially do some more here to counter that although if I did have ambushing units I think it'd actually exacerbate things as a savvy opponent will just hold back until the objectives move up rather than capping and moving on. As it was I deployed the Hellstriders to hold objectives in the corners so they could then quickly catch up to the main battleline after the objective was claimed. The Contorted Epitome and a unit of Blissbarbs went on my left flank, I refused my right flank (other than the corner Hellstriders that side) and the Keeper, Glutos, Enrapturess and second Blissbarb unit deployed just back from the line in my centre in a bit of a funnel created by the scenery and faction terrain aligning there. I know the Nurgle force had some boosted movement plus the run and charge when catapulting off their tree so weren't slouces but equally they weren't shifting anywhere near as fast as I could when needed. As I'd made sure to be pulled back a little for range on spells etc I let my opponent go first and they went first in the second battle round so up until my 2nd turn it was mostly skirmishing with his Plaguebearers pushing up towards the centerline, one unit on each flank and one through the middle. Rotigus was making his way up the flank I had refused. My Blissbarbs and the Infernal Enrapturess did some work chipping away at Plaguebearers on the left and centre for some depravity. I used the Mesmerising Mirror in my last game but had been set to use it in its old form instead of the new so fluffed it all up. For this game it was phenomena for chipping away and filling the depravity reserves and just forcing my opponent to have to react. My turn 2 began with the Contorted Epitome managing to drop this in the sweet spot where it would trigger Gaze Not Into Its Depths on the 2 GUOs and the Glottkin and cause a Mortal Wound on each which whilst I knew they'd be healed back up was some welcome Depravity and it would do further when they pushed up as my opponent was unlikely to want to keep so many expensive monsters as a rearguard! It was dispelled by my opponent in their 3rd turn and put back down in mine in a similar location to similar effect but the next time as things were packed in with combats Gaze Not Into Its Depths killed the Plague Priest outright. It was also a really useful blocking tool as the big bases of the Glottkin and Great Unclean ones and the placement of scenery and faction terrain meant I was able to bottleneck stuff really well. Mileage may vary but certainly against my opponent's list that seemed to be about multiple overlapping auras, spells and command abilities it was very useful as there were always at least 3 heroes in range for it and the Depravity generated was crucial. Rotigus only managed to get Deluge of Nurgle off the once all game but it again contributed tremendously to my Depravity total so I was very grateful to Uncle Nurgle for his bountiful gifts. Rotigus being on my refused flank ended up being pretty key to my eventual victory (spoilers!) My opponent had obviously planned to tip the game in their favour by putting a significant amount of presence over that side and flipping my objective to be able to extend a bit of a lead on the VP instead my Hellstriders conga-lined in front of the big boi and his Plaguebearers and just held them up so that they never got involved and my Blissbarbs moved across to ping some depravity off of them. Glutos led a charmed life in this one. He spent a fair amount of time on his last wound in the end but I'd accepted I'd lost him so focused my efforts instead on preserving my remaining characters. Although not before going for the Hail Mary on Gorge on Excess on a Great Unclean One. I knew the Keeper would need to make him fight twice so that the GUO could go down to the second batch of swings so I'd be able to claw back a few wounds at least. My concern was he wouldn't manage to actually finish him off even with the some help from Blissbarbs. So, inevitably Glutos rolled well and my opponent rolled horribly and he killed the GUO exactly with his first activation. As I say, just kept him as an annoyance after that but the combination of other threats going in and my opponent not wanting to waste too many resources meant he ended up surviving on 1 wound when the game was called. With so many monsters, Fiends were my go-to summon. They did exactly what I needed them to. One unit tied up the Glottkin to keep them away from the centre and the other unit helped the Keeper finish off the second generic GUO. I'm glad there is a use for them even if it's just toolbox summon as they're some of my favourite minis! The Contorted Epitome was quite interesting to use. Haven't played with them since the last book before the serial nerfing. In the end for this game the Epitome ended up only fighting Plaguebearers. I had been prepared to send them into the Glottkin but in turn 4 I needed to have them help me score Savage Spearhead and decided not to risk them in combat. Horrible Fascination worked well at frustrating my opponent as the Plaguebearers that charged it were instead forced to fight Blissbarb archers but also the Locus of Diversion meant they couldn't do that effectively and Glottkin was delayed because the Plaguebearers added to the obstruction that my Blissbarbs and Epitome started. Otherwise the 2+ ward seemed to put my opponent off of targeting them for the Battle Tactic through other means. The Keeper of Secrets did a job. Mostly it was letting Glutos fight twice regularly but it also contributed with a well timed Slothful Stupor to leave the second GUO unable to boost itself to win or survive its combats. It was targeted for Bring it Down so I ended up using Redeploy to move it back behind Glutos so there was no room for any of the Nurgle Big Nasties to reach it but that kept it as an observer so it dropped back a little further to grab Monstrous Takeover before it pushed back up to finish the second GUO and hold the objective once we were down to the one. After that my opponent called it as they were going to struggle to shift me and would have been chasing for their 4th and 5th turns with very little options left for Battle Tactics to score. The Infernal Enrapturess didn't do a huge amount but between healing themselves with their heroic action and taking wounds of the fane and getting some depravity from shooting it certainly contributed to the overall effort. As ever the only time the reroll to casting from it actually made a difference was taking a casting roll of 5 up to 11. Don!

There's definitely some interesting findings. As I expected there are quite a few I don't agree with but like @KrispyXIV I'm particularly surprised by Blissbarbs as agree they're a real staple of my lists. I think the big challenge is most perception of points costs is based on what other factions get for less and that's not always a great indicator because it doesn't mean that other unit is correctly costed or take into account the value of a unit within a faction. In hindsight would be great if we had a metric for how many collective games this opinion is based on as still think from a lot of the discussions on here that there aren't that many games going on and people are still getting their heads around Battle Tactics and the new battleplans which ought to be the context for the value of units. Ultimately there's a concern about the army clearly so it needs some tweaking - which points wise will come in time. To my mind the biggest concern is stuff like Slaangor (who might get fixed if BoC get some attention) and Shalaxi (who probably won't be fixed without a new book) as the intent of the mini isn't clear or doesn't play out in practice and points are unlikely to compensate well enough to fix.

@Enoby Thank you for all your work on this! Will have to have a more detailed read through as really curious to see some of the comments but guessing this has been a monumental effort!

@ibel @azdimy Not sure I fully agree there. I think for the points outlay Glutos shouldn't go into your list purely for his offensive output as there are better choices on a points:damage ratio, but it's worth pointing out that on average he out-performs Slickblade Seekers for example so he is one of our better options for things like the Keeper's Command Ability, but I agree it is for his tankiness, debuff and general holding the centre that he should go into lists primarily. Twinsouls outperform him (although not against 2+ saves) and the obvious concern with him is his damage drops off as he tanks stuff for you but he has decent access to healing and his Command Ability stacks nicely with the Keeper to get him some big healing when timed well. I think the big concern I'd have if using your list @azdimy is that Glutos is having to do a lot of the heavy lifting and I'd be tempted to look at ways of sharing some of that workload (especially when it comes to dealing with large units etc) but perhaps your summoning can do some of that for you. However, you do have multiple ways to shut things down in your opponent’s army and perhaps that will allow a greater level of tankiness and control play. I do wonder if you could perhaps get more leverage out of some different spells though. Particularly the Endless Spells maybe something like Wheels of Excruciation for helping clear some numbers or Dread Visage for the Always Strikes Last and helping maximise your output in key combats. Either way curious to hear how you get on with the list. It certainly has a fun Big Hero-hammer look to it! 🙂

@Sigmalthus Interesting list, you'll have to let us know how it plays. Certainly got some bits like Glutos and The Dread Pageant that I always find useful wheb I've used them. If the cogs are just filler (and my gut is 2 Endless Spells is a lot for us unless taking at least 3 casters and even then the points can be tight to justify it) maybe try it without for a stronger chance of getting the Triumph. Inspired will help offset a bad set of dice rolls on a crunch combat each game if you get it. Particularly if you need your Twinsouls to go through something with half-decent saves or to make either your Bladebringer or Glutos punch that little bit harder for a second time (Finest Hour gives them each their first go). @Enoby obviously has some useful suggestions also for how to get something with more leverage out of the 2nd Endless spell if you wanted it. Either way if you combined two units of Twinsouls into a 10 you could potentially consider dropping the Hunters battalion and putting the units into the Battle Regiment to get you to just the 2 drops and more chance of controlling the first Priority roll - which might help maximise the Cogs if you did want to keep them with having more control over whether you go first to get them up and alpha strike or pull further back and go second and use the extra speed to make up a little of the ground etc and if they've pushed up a fair bit you might be able to place them for auto charges etc. Whether you stick or twist for the tournament there's definitely some play there and there are definitely some tweaks you can make to finetune it further down the line depending on how it feels to use. Good luck! 👍

Let's hope so as currently you can't even take them in a Beasts of Chaos army!