Scurvydog

Yay new article, another one about book artwork, with mostly images we have seen, there is a few new ones though, some from the previous battletome as well https://www.warhammer-community.com/2021/08/20/which-battletome-has-the-best-artwork-stormcast-eternals-or-orruk-warclans/ Stay tuned for the next article where they highlight the Font selection process

That is just the cover of the GHB 21. The Chimera got reboxed in the Warcry box not long ago, so I doubt they would have done that if a new one was in the making unfortunately.

Gargants is one thing, but what madness compels anyone to get 3 dread saurians!?!?

Hmmm

There is yet another megaboss on foot after being subscribed for 1 year to warhammer plus. That Megaboss on foot you never use? How about another of that guy, in a year... yay! Now we got 3 different kind of orruks, wonder if even one of them will get any endless spells or a terrain feature as a last minute reveal. Bonesplitterz also got priests GW, how about invocations there? Anything? Did GW forget? Foot of Gork (or mork) would be the most obvious endless spell in the history of endless spells.

It is of course all just speculation based on the current rules. We do know though that storm breath for Dracothian guards is now an ability, so +1 to hit will have no benefit to them. Perhaps they remove the breath entirely. I need that man reads book soon, the wait is maddening

Mawkrushas is fine for their points at 495 and 14 wounds, you got much cheaper Frost lords on stonehorns with 3+ saves and 5 wards, Vampire lords on ZD with the same save and wounds and 6+ ward, not to mention Vengorian lords with 3+ save and -1 rend aura for 280 pts. We could go on, how about Gotrek at 430 with 3+ ward and reduce all dmg to 1? Leviadons with 2+ saves for 380 pts, Alarith 3+ save ignore rend 1-2? Reducing rend by 1 is just ok, Amulet of destiny is way better anyway for all monstrous heroes. If the Templar is 18 wounds and 4+ save with no build in ward he will not be used at any point if at 400 pts or above, unless he has some REALLY good abilities.

The Gatebreaker is not allowed to take an artifact from the Breaker Tribe, as you are playing Taker Tribe only your Kraken Eater can take artifacts from the allegiance. I'd recommend in that list to instead put the amulet on the gatebreaker and then give the Kraken Eater The Sandals as artifact nr 2 as he can take 2 due to very acquisitive, or possible give him the trait Old and Gnarly, as rerolling 1s to save can be pretty sweet. Other options include getting manticore venom on the Warstompers club (if you are aggressive with him and less aggressive with the Kraken Eater). Sandals on the Kraken is slightly better average damage increase, and rend 3 is also super important now more than ever though, the sandals also stack fine with finest hour. You could also give the stomper an arcane tome, so you have the option for flaming weapon as well as mystic shield, while also more often get some lucky unbinds or endless spell dispels. Flaming weapon is fine to take. You get 1 spell enhancment for free when making an army, so you can take flaming weapon from the universal lore no problem. You could take ghost mist or levitate on the other if you have an arcane tome, just in case you might want to use those.

Keeping an eye on dracothian guards for sure, I got 4 nice concussors that has done a lot of work for me before. Currently painting up that vandus model just to use as a lord celestant on dracoth. Those guys as battleline and then drake as well in an army is for sure hype. Also despite all the dragon hype, I really like vanquishers, so probably getting a box of those as well. Painted up 10 judicators recently as well, so hoping the 200 pts we saw make them a viable artellery unit, and no 2 shots alone wont make them worth 200 pts, perhaps if they all did d6 hits like the prime...

That does not promise well, auch 4+ save on the templar is terrible. For the champions and leaders of demigods they still do not really pack much of a punch. D6 attacks for the tail is also just extremely random. Not hyped for these guys right now, I hope to be proven wrong and they got some awesome other stuff, but if the 4+ save is true, the templar is for sure never going to be part of the army, unless he is MUCH cheaper. I wonder though if the new drake riders will be behemoths/monsters, if they are above 8 wounds, then that might very well be the case.

Every single spell and ability previewed has been keyword locked to the sub faction of Kruleboyz or Bonesplitterz. They even showed the new named guy on the bird along Ironjawz and Bonesplitterz while highlighting a spell, which is of course only beneficial to Kruleboyz. Nothing so far has shown they will not continue the trend with making a soup, yet having no rules interaction between the heroes or units. This is why I am very worried about that book. Not that it is not "strong" but that there is basically no point to having it souped up, besides simply having to release fewer books.

Not too sure myself on this. Cities was/is after all one of the most fun and flexible books of 2nd edition. Orruks get a soup book as well, which sadly looks bad right now, with no synergy at all, so all it does is really save real estate on book pages. I would imagine the same happening for other "soup" armies. The silver lining here is that GW needs to release less books, which means faster update cycles. AoS is becoming bloated, especially on the order side of things, and with GW releasing maybe 2-3 tomes every 3 months, it takes years to update all the factions for any edition, it is not an optimal system at all. It does remove a lot of charm, and as any Orruk play can attest to, it does not mean better updates or equal content or more frequent model updates. Last time they souped together 2 orruk factions which had their own books in 1.0, but only giving them half the sub factions and options of full tomes, like Ogors got.

Bonereapers really need more battleline options to become interesting, even conditional battleline would be welcome. Their legions need a huge rebalancing, it is the worst internally and externally balanced lineup of sub factions I have seen. The RDP system needs to be reimagined from the ground up, it has no identity of its own in AoS 3.0 and right now is almost more of a liability, making the army feel extremely limited in options. I hope they get a new monster. The harvester i more a support piece. AoS 3.0 is the time of the hero monsters, so some kind of monster construct with sentience would be cool. Can't help but look at the nexus and imagining that big guy with the huge sword coming to life. I do not think that will happen though, I am pretty sure it will just be a book when it arrives at some point.

It was FAQ: The remaining part still stands as usual: It is no longer a "normal move" as per 2.0 terminology, so now it is any move (So it can now retreat over a unit for example). It basically acts like a flying model as long as whatever it moves over is 4" or less tall as stated, although it does still say it can not finish a move within 3", I do really think that is just poor GW FAQ skills, forgetting charges are just moves as well, so that final bit makes no sense anymore, but completely RAW it would not be able to use the rule for charges.

It was stated under the subfactions before yes, but now they made a catch all rule in 3.0:

It is an allegiance that includes both command traits and artifacts, meaning the general HAS to take that trait and the first artifact MUST be from that allegiance. New battalions make it super easy to get an artifact enhancement though. With my same list I would just go for 2 megas in bosses of the stomp for an artifact and then the last gargant and 3 mancrushers in footsloggas, so would again end up with 3 drops and simply an artifact more than before. This gives a few options, as I would always take the glowy lantern and amulet in that list, so the enhancement would allow either a different command trait or another artifact. Many choices are super close here, but I think my priority would be: 1. Kraken sandals (ups kraken eater average output by about 2,5 damage). I considered manticore venom for the stomper for +1 wound on the titanic club, however it only increases hit output by around 2 and these attack degrade, the kraken eater stomp attacks do not degrade and makes him a larger threat and rend 3 is super important now too. 2. Arcane tome on the stomper. Unbinds are great to have, also found I almost always wanted a mystic shield up on the kraken eater, so having the option for flaming weapon is cool on the stomper. Against non super caster armies this will really increase his output significantly. 3. Trait for the Kraken Eater. With an extra artifact you can choose not to go very acquisative for the amulet (best artifact ever on a mega), so you can choose a different one while keeping amulet + glowy lantern. Here I would go with the -1 to be hit in combat, or perhaps reroll 1s to save, which also helps against all the shooting going around.

A new model for Titanicus revealed, so perhaps that was it for today.

Yea I think in that context it works. Bravery is just overall busted due to GW believing demons and undead always needs 10 no matter what kind of unit it is. As such battleshock and every other mechanic that interacts with bravery will often be way too powerful or do absolutely nothing at all. Just see things like heroic recovery how skewed it is to death and chaos (and Gotrek!), while destruction can just disintegrate to bravery bombs. Who knows, maybe stormcast gets some further allegiance stuff that affects bravery too, although all these bravery bandaids are not really healthy for the game. Otherwise bring Yndrasta I guess with 12" ignore battleshock 😛

Surprised the lord celestant is only at 7 wounds compared to a Karkadrak at 9, it seems odd he is at the same wounds as a lord imperatant, which is just a guy on foot, but I guess his gryph hound is considered, but even then only 1 more than a basic dracothian guard seems low. Nice changes overall, will have to see about any breath attack though. Also got to see the abilities of the individual weapon options to really get the full picture, but I like they seem to become more elite, as the heaviest of heavy cav. I still do not understand how these elite stormcasts riding basically dragons only have 7 bravery, that just makes no sense at all.

Took my SoB to a tournament this weekend, pretty competitive event with some experienced players around. Lists and results: https://tabletop.to/battle-of-copenhagen-summer-30. Did not have the new battalions of course, so I played taker tribe with Kraken eater with glowy lantern, GB with amulet, Stomper and 3x1 man unit of mancrushers. Had some really tough matches, but managed to score all battle tactics every game for 4 wins and 1 draw to win the tournament in the end on Strength og Schedule Tie breaker to nr. 2 who also did 4 wins with all secondaries (5 battle tactics and 1 grand strategy complete for max 6 points per game in addition). Game 1 (Power Struggle): I was super nervous about, as this was Scarbrand with 3 bloodthirsters and a demon prince of khorne, to combo that 18" half run/charge debuff as well as his own 16" aura of pile in and engage within 6". A max angry scarbrand with a bloodsecrator and fight twice (reapers of vengance) is 32-64 MW in output, not to even consider his other dmg 3 weapon, so I knew megas would get 1 shotted by this guy. Due to the demon prince and redeploy I could not hope to charge anything important, without scarbrand simply doing a pile in counter. Also the 2 insensate rage thirsters would blow up mancrushers just with their 8" 4 MW explodes alone, so I chose to spread out as much as possible. With a good reposition at least I could force a charge, and if charged I could at least try to roar to prevent 2 combat activations and possibly fight back before dying. In the end it ended up 30-24 points, as I managed by round 3 to kill the demon prince as I had focused all my shooting possible on him, with the gatebreakers big rock hitting his smug face at last Game 2 (Tooth and Nail): Came up against the previous tournament winner with a Morathi + 2x15 bow sneks list. This started out BAD, I tried to engage in a cheeky way with my Kraken Eater BR 1, but ate a horrendous amount of mortal wounds from unleash hell, whiffed everything and by my oppoenents turn ate hero phase and regular shooting as well as a 6 MW spell from little morathi. a dire miscalculation. I managed to turn it around, having 1 mancrusher and a gatebreaker left in the end, winning on points. Morathi is just a beast, but his list was hurting to get out there and capture points in time. Game 3 (Tectonic Interferrence): Faced of against a StD Archaon (mark of tzeentch for reroll 1s save) list here, this was the most simple win, he did not really do much besides kill 2 small gargants with Archaon, tank everything turn 1 and then when turn 2 came he did not have as many save buffs as the first time, with roar going off and mystic shield unbound by the kraken eater (yay wizard gargant) and he already used finest hour, he was only at +1 save from warshrine prayer, so quickly folded to a buffed up gatebreaker. The rest of the list was easily dealt with. Game 4 (The Vice): Opponent played KO with a kitchen sink style of list, with 2 ironclads and Gotrek, endrinmaster, navigator and 3 arkanaut units. He tried to brind down my warstomper which was the most isolated on the flank, I had anticipated this and used finest hour on him. He put down both ironclads behind some terrain, blocking them off with arkanauts from 1 boat and getting gotrek to run to stand next to the rear of the boats with the terrain at the flank. His shooting only managed to do 16 damage total to the warstomper, due to finest hour and all out defence, he had 3+ save against everything. I gamled on my turn, getitng mystic shield and finest hour on the gatebreaker, I sent him up to the back of the boats with Gotrek, charging him in to take the unleash hell+last word, which did 0 dmg (3+ save and 5+ ward + whiffs). Warstomper went into the arkanauts, rest of the army spread out to begin grabbing objectives everywhere. Gatebreaker charged gotrek, but with pile and reach he could get everything into the boat, with all out attack and finest hour the boat got crushed. Warstomper cleared out the front pretty well too. Gatebreaker even with mystic shield and finest hour and 5+ ward ended up with 13 wounds left after Gotrek had his way. KO got the turn and he went for broke to get the warstomper down with broken ranks tactic, putting his final boat into him and charging (with my MW ram endrinworks), but failed to do more than 6 dmg total, the boat took 11 dmg back, putting him in a dire spot. Gotrek of course wiped out the gatebreaker, taking 1 dmg himself (which he healed later). After finishing the boat the game was mine, even though Gotrek managed to catch my warstomper with a 12" charge and kill him AND a mancrusher. I won big on points and all battle tactics. Gotrek at full wounds having killed 2 megas and a mancrusher (much balance for 430 pts). Game 5 (Marking territory). Extremely tough opponent, despite him having a weird list with 8 scourgerunner chariots, hurricanum, Celestant prime and you guessed it, Gotrek. I had the upper hand in the beginning, with my mancrusher mucking up his center and sneaking up behind, my Kraken eater sneaking up and holding 1 of his backline objectives, moving in on that last objective to instant win. All I had to do was not lose any of the 3 megas at full wounds, and then in BR 3 if he took the turn, I could simply burn his and instant win, if I got the turn, I could simply run on his objective and win. In his turn he managed to make a 11" charge to my Stomper and outright slay him, making me lose that point... So the game dragged on, he blocked the board with chariots all over, I just kept clear of Gotrek as much as possible. In the end it was a draw I had 2 megas left and he had gotrek (he almost killed the gatebreaker as well, but I retreated him) and 4 chariots left. Final thoughts Sons are very strong now, the new commands and finest hour alone is great. Glowy lantern was great too, mystic shield allowed me some great plays and unbinding a mystic shield as well allowed me to take Archaon down way easier in game 3 especially. I loved having 3 units of just 1 mancrusher in taker tribe, they are super flexible and the 3 big guys are good enough to not need more hammers. They still manged to do damage though, especially with a nice charge in game 2, 1 mancrushers killed 7 snakes and 5 ran to battle shock, magnificent almost 500 pts worth of unit dead. Amulet of Destiny is a MUST, it is so so good on megas, going on the gatebreaker he can tank so much more, I cant imagine doing a competitive list without it. Glowy lantern was also much better than if I had -1 to be hit in combat, I used the Kraken eater more as utility in most games, being the last to engage with anything tough. With the new battalions I could see going for an artifact more instead of lower drops, choosing either arcane tome for the warstomper, or possibly manticore venom for +1 wound on his club, to make his output more reliable. 2 models brought me no end of pain and annoynce though. 2 games I faced a demon prince of Khorne, that 18" half charge and run aura is so painful and annoying. Of course Gotrek is the second, 430 pts and he could easily solo an entire Sons army if he wanted without breaking a sweat, it is so incredibly overpowered that it is no wonder 3 lists in the top 5 of the tournament had a Gotrek along. Unfortunately I think stomper tribe is a bit left in the dust, it hurts bad to not be able to use regular commands on the general, reinforcement limits and meta also makes it even less likely to face hordes for the dmg bonus. Breaker tribe will be viable again with the enhancement battalion, so they can get amulet of destiny (as they need to take the first from sub faction, 27.4 core rules). Breaker is not as needed as before due to all out attack and titanic duel, but still nice to have, especially if you bring little guys to the party, which makes them much more reliable. Counting for 10-15 or 20-30 did not really make much difference from Taker, I cant think of a situation where it ended up making the difference at least. Some images from Game 3: Archaon clearly compensating for something: Game 5: So many chariots It might look dangerous with all those big guys with nothing but pistoliers and chariots in the way, but there is a little guy on a 32mm base that can easily kill them all!:

Khorne has some nasty anti melee builds with scarbrand, princes and unfettered fury combos, however any decent ranged list will cripple this right away though, but powerful vs sons. Order by account of Gotrek can have a chance to go toe to toe with the sons any day. Sons are really good now, but they do not have as many surefire tricks as other armies, less denying of other peoples rules and not the most reliable output, but they sit tight on objectives and the battle tactics are good for them.

Showing up happy with Sons of Behemat to an event. Opponent places down 6 of these things: Nod in understanding and concede 😛

It's like being a kid again and watching your mum baking a cake, but for some reason she is just standing there for weeks, why does it take so long? who knows. At first you are impatient, then frustrated, then at some point you hardly think about the cake but become increasingly worried for your mums mental health. You wake up, it was all just a dream, a slice of cake has been placed on a plate next to your bed, you laugh, how silly you were to question your mum. You bite down... and CRACK your tooth breaks as it crunches down on a primaris lieutenant stuffed inside the cake. With tears in your eyes you hear your mum cackle downstairs, as she sends the real cake out weeks in advance to youtube content creators, while she forces your dad to sue them for stealing the flavor of her cake.

Great now I just have mental images of warhammer geeks in baby chairs being force fed spoons of green liberators, thanks I hate it

Liberators can score as much as they want on objectives, if I no longer need them to fill battleline they will be dangerously close to be thrown in the bin (not literally though...). Of course it boils down to the stormhost rules, but it does seem like they look far more specialized now, somewhat like Gravelords are doing. As a dracothian guard fan and stardrakes, I just want to go with the list with as many beasties as possible, preferably dracothian guards, stardrake, the drake cav og possibly one of the new named dragons or something. I do like the look of the new vanquishers though, far far cooler than liberators and basically made me not bother painting my vindictors from the dominion box, when will I ever use those guys?