Frowny
-
Posts
603 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Gallery
Store
Downloads
Blogs
Events
Posts posted by Frowny
-
-
Taken down quickly seems false. 30LRL archers will do on average 6 MW to him if they get off their spell. If all he does is heroic heal each phase, they would take all game to kill him. 15 snakes doubleshooting will do 10 wounds. Again if he heals each turn they will take 3 turns. And these are some of the hardest counters i can think of, and they are just generally strong units that give many many other models of problems, Not specifically him. He also has pretty forgiving brackets.
Not saying he's amazing but only looking at his downsides is also a little unfair. He seems pretty sturdy to me.
Screens are also much worse in aos3 with the coherency changes since they can't string out as much. Smaller boards also will help him get stuck in faster. An 18 inch spread gives him a 50/50 first Turn charge with just a reroll. Maybe he only eats a screen but that's still points they don't have elsewhere and a big threat they have to deal with.
-
2
-
-
With the quintuple buffs of 1) Hero 2) Monster 3) 5 models on objectives 4) Points drop 5) Easy access to a 1+ save multiple ways) he seems much better positioned than he was even a little bit ago. Yes, he dies to mortal wounds slowly, but he can always heroic recovery back ~4 wounds per turn, so if you don't get him in one go, you have a lot of wounds to chew through. Easy access to a 1+ save and magic resistant will make him very hard to take down, while his charge. Plus he has natural anti-monster abilities, which go well into our future age of monsters.
He seems pretty worthwhile in the right list. Maybe in Ogres so he can hide amongst all the other monsters, who can also charge and clear screens for him., who usually have a 5+ if they need to resist his ally damage and with multiple ways to heal it off.
I think he has potential.
-
1
-
-
A few winners and losers, but I think when people remember that most things went up, its relatively balanced. Yes, Slaanesh were hit harder, but I think it will all even out after people see the new meta. Likely a lot more monsters and less infantry, and armies that can do that well will be stronger.
I can already see some interesting combinations. For example, knights of the empty throne seem interesting, as does legion of chaos ascendant. Belakor going down will be taken everywhere, both as strong model himself, but also to shut down the monsters people are now taking more of. Although maybe with more MSU he will be worse? Interesting to see.
Funnily, I see the ones complaining the most are the ones who started with the strongest army. I for example, won't miss endless eel spam out of IDK. So thats nice.
Biggest winners I can see-
KO- still lots of guns, only expected points increases, never really wanted big units anyway.
Skaven- While its true, they lose quite a lot in terms of coherency and reinforcement points, hiding weapons teams in clanrats is BONKERS good. I think this just hasn't been appreciated yet. This isn't really a 3rd ed thing though, more because of broken realms kragnos
Kragnos- Down points, useable in a lot of lists, benefiting from both monster and hero abilities and importantly, counting for 5 on objectives all make him way more interesting.
Legion of the First Prince- More command points help, and a list based around monsters will do especially well. Also, belakor
Slaves to Darkness- A reasonable number of cheap monster-heroes coupled with expected point changes. Built in rerolls go much futher when you have easy access to +1 save and +1 to hit. Also Belakor
Seraphon- I think we'll just see a lot of cheap pawn type units to take objectives like terradons or 10 man skinks, followed up by a lot of dinosaurs. Slaan are still great. Lists will look different, but no less deadly.
Soulblight gravelords- Lots of monster-heroes and lots of 3+ saves. Blood knights are amazing now that they can definitely retreat and charge. They already felt strong with AOS2 points, but with everyone else going up 10% they are even better positioned. Lists will focus on blood knights, vengori lords. Also manfred remains brokenly good, and is even better with free built in healing. You need to do 4 wounds to him per turn OUTSIDE OF COMBAT (since he can always flee for free) to even hurt him at all, with easy access to a 2+ save and counting for 5 on objectives. Will be stupid.
Cities of Sigmar- lots of reasonable shooting, monsters actually got slightly cheaper (although they were mostly bad before). I'm sure there is something here although I'm not clever enough to figure out on my own.
-
@kitusmy not to be a debbie downer, but eels have been incredibly strong for ages. People have played 5 years of tournament winning eel spam lists. It will be nice to see other things.
It looks like the eidalons, especially the eidolon of the sea will be excellent. I'm also interested to see what people try with namarti reavers. You can get their 3 shots to +3/+3 pretty reliably, which will make them brutal if charged. Singleton sharks also look every solid as relatively cheap monsters which were already pretty good. I don't think IDK made out worse than others.
-
1
-
-
I think its more about what makes them good- handgunners and crossbowmen often relied on stacking +1 to hit (hurricanum, freeguild general) or +1 to wound (general, hawk-eyed in tempest eye) which is now gone, so they are bumped up less points. In contrast, darkshards don't, and don't need to be outside of 3' (unlike the crossbows) so fire at full strength if charged. A unit of 30 darkshards will be super brutal to charge.
I'm still pondering what to do with my brettonians converted to pistoliers... Pistoliers lost their amazing battalion, but they might still be good in the new edition. Or I could try them as something else... I'm unsure.
-
I actually think kurnoths might be better this edition. With easy access to +1 save as a command ability, their built in rerolls suddenly become incredibly good. Our faction command abilities still are terrible, so I see this as pretty easy to do if necessary. Also, having played ogres for a long time, counting for 2 on objectives is not-so-secretly amazing. +12.5% is pretty on par for most point increases, but the actual support for them has gone up. I think I'll try a unit of 6 and hope to make the charge t1 with the buffed spiteswarm hive.
I still wish we had viable support but we'll see how it all shakes out. The treelord ancient, even with both the heroic stuff and the monster stuff still looks just too expensive, although I do always appreciate his guaranteed summon. I might try alarielle again, just for the 3 cast to go throne-of-vines -> summon wildwood -> summon spiteswarm hive to get all my enablers down turn 1. I also still can't see the new horn lady worth her points. 275 is super steep for a 2 cast wizard.
Branchwraith may not be as much of an autoinclude now.
-
1
-
-
Seems like the things that were not great already (gluttons, gnoblars) went up a lot, while the things that were excellent already (stonehorns mostly) went up slightly but also gained a bunch of abilities. I think the tome will be well positioned after this in overall strength, but it would have been nice to reassess the internal balance a bit.
-
It seems to me that good ol' arkonauts are some of the bigger winners. +1 to hit is great on them, and unleash hell is also solid for them, especially if they are on an objective. 20 arkonauts will do 13 wounds to a 4+ save over 2 turns even if they are charged, and it is somewhat more if you do the math with the actual good weapons. You can also do things like all out defence on the ironclad and still unleash hell on the arkonauts inside to really make charging and damaging you a pain.
they also benefit from the extra d6 move, as they are a bit slow otherwise.
I'm always surprised I don't see more lists with 4-5 squads of them. They seem great to take objectives and give something for your actual ships to maneuver around.
-
I've always run ironguts in just 4's, and they have usually worked fine for me even there. I put them behind some gnoblars or dogs and with their 2 inch reach, can pile in and fight over them the first combat. Since I then usually have 2 combats before they take damage (first they have to kill the screen) they have usually killed whatever they are fighting even without the extra 4 models, and even with the screen, they are notably cheaper.
Interestingly, 4 ironguts with a screen will beat 8 over 2 turns if on the defense at least some of the time. 1'st turn the 8 man unit murders the screen, but takes ~10-12 wounds back, losing 2-3 models, 2nd turn the 4 ironguts take can be picked first (you are the active player now), kill another 2-3. The remaining ~2-3 ironguts from the 8 man unit fight back but now can be slowly grinded out by the still intact 4 initial ironguts over subsequent turns. The secret is positioning your ironguts 2.1 inches behind the screen. It's not a done deal, and can swing either way, for example if you have to pick some other critical combat first, but the fact that it is close when one unit combination costs 120 points less is still quite important to note.
4 man units do lose staying power that way though and are less good on the charge but better defensively, and the screens can sometimes be used doing something else if needed as well, granting some flexibility.
-
I think its a little army dependent- For example, a big green tide or a horde of skeletons need to fit their goal- so 20 models is preferable. The unit size has to match the fluff.
From a personal perspective, I find units of 5 to be about perfect. Enough for batch painting, but not so many that I get bored of it or have to do too many batches. 10 model on 25 mm bases is fine too, although sometimes I get frustrated with the tiny details (I'm only an average painter). I also enjoy a few monsters to mix it up but don't like all monster armies- just like with all infantry armies. Since I like heavily converted armies, fewer bigger models is much easier to manage- you don't need to buy as many bits, for example and don't have to do as much total green stuffing.
I guess that goes with what I tend to play though- sylvaneth have a few blobs but also a few 3-6 man units of hunters. Ogres are typically in the 3-8 model range unit sizes. Both have a few monsters to mix it up. My cities is also mostly pistoliers in 5 man units with a few bigger monsters in support. I can't see myself playing a true horde faction, even if I think they look cool and appreciate that they exist on the tabletop.
I do worry that it is important that a block of infantry and a big monster can fight on approximately even footing. I'm excited by the new rules, but worried it goes a little too far- I think its cool and thematic when a horde of spearmen/halbreds takes down a giant/treelord/dragon, and I'm worried the rules don't allow that in their future iteration. But time will tell. The current edition has the opposite problem, where an awesome dragon has no hope against a block of random guys with axes.
-
I just finished building the Pistoliers/Aetherguard windrunners battalion but have only played them once in person d/t Covid. While there may still be some play to pistoliers, my army built around the fallback+shoot + charge is pretty dead. A little annoyed about that.
But I do think CoS will actually do pretty well. I think people are sleeping on living cities- they were prevously starved for CP since fire and fade is so good. While true that they can only use it once per turn, with extra CP's they can use it once per turn and still use CP on something else, like +1 to hit after they make their 3inc charge. Also, the 1w/turn heal is useful on monsters, who mostly all got a buff.
-
Ogors- Gluttons are hurt by both the reinforcement range and big bases + coherency. Ironguts do OK. The big monsters and especially the frostlord on stonehorn benefit a lot. We used to have basically no useful command abilities, but now have several, and also gain both heroic and monstrous actions. The whole faction is hurt by everyone else gaining extra objectives for monsters and multiwound units. No longer will be undisputed kings of objectives. 4 wound gluttons counting as 2 is barely an improvement over regular lists with 5 wound models counting as 2.....
Cities of Sigmar Pistoliers-I played tempest eye with the battalion and mass pistoliers for retreat+shoot+charge. Loss of battalions hurt this a ton, as this was a key part of it. The coherency rules also hurt them, since even though with their guns they will still do most of their damage, a lot of pistoliers utility was in tagging multiple units on corners to pin things, which they can't do. . Note that I think in general CoS did well, just my specific build seems basically dead. Sad because I just spent a lot of time painting them all nicely. I might try it to see if the new command abilities give it some legs, but seems likely to be dead on arrival
Sylvaneth- Still likely terrible, but mostly because the allegiance ability is still basically useless. In terms of actual changes, they may fare OK. The new command abilities are ages better than what we already had, so thats good. I think treelords, treelord ancients, durthu and drycha all get a buff as monster-heroes. Dryads do OK with their 2 inch reach, and kurnoths are fine in 3's or 6's with scythes, so should be fine. + 1 to save on them is excellent with the built in rerolls too. Still limited by their terrible allegiance and suballegience abilities, but at least I'm somewhat optimistic about how the actual book will go. New lists will likely be MSU tree reveants backed by hero monsters and kurnoth hunters.
Nighthaunt- Ahh how the lowest got even lower. An army reliant on blocks of infantry on 32 mm bases or bigger are just hit so hard- reinforcement points mean you can't take more than a few actual units, and coherency means they will never fight anything anyway. Most lists took what would now be 8-10 reinforcement points worth of units. No worthwhile monsters, and even the heroes are pretty bad in melee so don't benefit much from heroic actions. Nothing can use the +1 save. They have needed a rewrite for a while, but this just seals it. Clearly bigtime losers to an already losing faction.
Honestly not too pleased overall. CoS pistoliers is likely killed before I can really play it in person. Ogors seems likely to will reward the thing that was already good (ogor monsters) without adding diversity (better gluttons) but are at least playble, Sylvaneth might see new life but are still limited by terrible allegiance abilities that just don't make them feel like they play like sylvaneth, and nighthaunt then a dead horse that is further pummeled into a bloody mulch. I might turn the pistoliers into soulblight blood knights since all of my pistoliers are converted brettonian knights anyway.
-
1
-
-
People are commenting on huskards being better (which is maybe true) but the real winners seem like the things that were already strong- Frost Lords on Stonehorns.
Easy access to a 2+ save is excellent with either all out defence or finest moment. Similarlly, +1 to hit is excellent on them since so many of the stonehorns attacks hit on 4's. It makes the brand of the skald/ black clatterhorn less necessary too. Healing d3 is also excellent on such a sturdy model, and a free roar or d3 mortals as a monster is excellent too.
I always find my ogres have tons of extra CP sitting around since we have almost no useful command abilities, so getting some excellent ones is a big improvement.
Some other thoughts on improvements/nerfs
Winners-
Yetis- pile in 6 inches is still excellent, and even better to avoid enemies shooting you on the charge. They never wanted to be more than 3 anyway, so that's fine already.
Sonehorn Beastriders- as above, can now get +1 to hit from a nearby general to help out their inaccurate horns/hooves
Huskard on thundertusk- Maybe pending his points, might be useful. if points stay in the same ratio, still just worse than a stonehorn though
Frost Sabres- Little 2 man units lose nothing, having little small screens is now much much better than big long screens.
Losers
Gnoblars- without stringing them out they are just kinda useless. Might makes right tends to be better for taking objectives than giant blobs of infantry that are terrible when fighting anything and die to a sneeze.
Gluttons-Giant bases and 1'' reach are a huge problem. While its true, I seldom got 12 into combat, I could usually manage 8-10. Now I think it will be hard to get more than 7 without losing coherency, not to mention the unit size changes make taking them in bit units hard to do. It also undermines an entire part of our allegience ability, since as written, its hard to get more than 8 gutbusters in a unit. Only ironguts can even do it. Maybe point changes will save them.
Leadbelchers- same problem as glutton, just won't get many into range. Maybe MSU 2 man units running around could be fun.
All of this could easily be changed with expected point changes, so we'll see.
I wish they'd made an exception for mid-wound units like ogres. I understand that 60 grots strung out single file is a big much, but 6 gluttons in a row seems pretty appropriate and not at all out of place. I also don't like how 25mm bases are forever extra good just because 25mm < 1inch. seems super arbitrary for a system that doesn't formally have rules for base sizes (unlike say infinity which has a whole silouhette thing). Even with a point drop, I can't imagine gluttons faring well with all the unit size and coherency changes though.
-
I just finished painting and converting some old brettonians into pistoliers for CoS, but now that battalions are not in play (and the retreat and charge being one of the only reasons to use them) I'm considering using them as soulblight blood knights.
Anybody know what base size the new blood knights are on? I take it the 75mm chaos knights bases?
How tall are the blood knights and how would they compare height-wise to the old bret knights? I'd guess a big bigger.
I'm happy to put my cavalry jumping off rocks or over fences or something if that would fix the size difference.
I don't have much besides a few characters I can convert to lead them, ut on the other hand, an all blood-knight army is actually looking super strong in this new book.
-
Yeah. I kinda dislike the unit leaders giving commands as a possible change, unless it is only certain commands- It removes a whole layer of positioning for heroes and units and might further serve to make small combat heroes weaker, as they are already not that useful but reasonably want to be both near the front lines and are cheap enough to spread around a bit.
-
1
-
-
What I wish most of all is that GW had transparent and obvious discussions about WHY they make decisions and that it seems like they have some reason for doing them. My comparison to MTG is more about their communication and style rather than their actual balance.
I agree fully with @Enoby (who seems to consistently have thuoughtful posts here but also in many other places) that the design rules for AOS are different from those for MTG
But, their communication is independent of the actual balance. Balance aside, MTG does a way better job communicating with their community and explaining their design choices. They even sometimes admit they were wrong, when they notice decks too powerful, and have to explain why they are banning something or why one set has lower power than the previous one.
I would love love love if GW published articles about their design philosophy, explained how they arrived on things.
Another good example is the recent 40k druchari points changes. I think they did a good job toning down one of the most op armies they've released recently. All it would take is a 1-2 paragraph explanation to go along with their chapter approved to make that change really hit home, to make it seem like they are aware of the situation and fixing it. Because to their credit they were! and made reasonable changes quickly! They just need to sell it!
My problem is that right now, for much of AOS, feels like they don't have a design philosophy at all. Units like slaangors tell me that, where a casual player who doesn't play the army looking at the points and warscroll for 5 minutes with a spreadsheet can see it fits nobody. This contrasts with a model like kragnos who is probably overpointed competitively but at least is super cool and smashy, which is always fun. He bothers me much less. This contrasts with Allarielle, who is similar expensive. Not really that smashy, not competitively pointed, Kind of a general utility piece but without the cool combos doable with tecils (who is also competitively playable). It just leaves.me wondering what GW was going for. Given how.lbmuch work they put into designing, shipping and marketing these models, a little marketing of their rules design would go a long way, to me at least.
I do think they are moving slowly in the right direction, as the druchari changes show, but they still have a bit more to do.
-
1
-
-
20 hours ago, ZaelART said:
I think the answers pretty simple.
Balance will always be an issue with AOS. There will never be a stable settled point in the mortal realms for everything to fall into place and be tweaked ad infinitum. Why? Because there will always be new releases, and lots of them. And they need to sell them.
I disagree somewhat here, and the brand new warding revenant refutes a lot of them.
1) yes, balance will never be achievable, but at the same time, it doesn't always feel like they are even trying that hard. As i mentioned before, cross book comparisons in 15 minutes reveal it to be horribly overcosted. Just look for any other wizard in any other book at a similar price point and this is pretty obvious.
2) it's a gorgeous new model! They should want to sell it! So making the rules points for it at least playable seems quite important. But they didn't.
I totally agree with you that perfect balance is unachievable. Full stop you are correct. However, BETTER balance is very very easily achievable.
I think GW could learn a lot from MTG actually. Mark rosewater has an awesome series of articles about designing games, balancing them and creating them. They have whole different teams for design and development yo enable this possibility. GW could easily do similar. Or just hire 1-2 more guys to do fulltime playtesting and interbook balancing.
-
One of my frustrations is how obvious some of the balance stuff is. For example, the new sylbaneth revenant is a good warscroll but it is horrifically overcoated. 275 points for just 2 casts is an absolutely horrible deal.
Some comparisons:
belladonna Volga, released recently, has +1 save, +2 wounds, +2mv, +2 bravery, same damage output, a second unbind and a command ability. And she is 75 points LESS.
A skaven grey seer is 140 pts. 2 casts and unbinds, casts on a 3d6. Less sturdy, sure, but you can get 2 of them for the same price, easily equalizing the durability difference. And stand next to a warp hole for even better casting.
Or to a slaan, who has quite similar base stats but is a 3cast/3 unbind wizard, also has a useful command ability, and generates 2 CPS on a 4+. And costs 15 pts LESS.
Or to a contorted epitome. 2c/2d, a useful fights last aura, and 65 pts less.
All of the above also have something equal to or similar to the +1 to cast, and all just blow this out of the water. Even within the battletome itself you could get 3 branchwriaths instead, for 3 casts and unbinds.
it's true I picked some strong playable options as my comparison point, and things need to be balanced within a battletome. But at the same time, sylvaneth are clearly a weak battletome already and all of these comparisons are just so far ahead of her it's not even close. At 275 she is a hard pass in any serious list in an already weak book.
What's frustrating is that I didn't even have to try very hard for figure out this was hopelessly overcosted. I'd have hoped better from a multimillion dollar company tasked solely with making and designing a game.
-
2
-
-
19 hours ago, Mirage8112 said:
That 700-900 points of shooting models can remove a 540 point model (after summoning) in one round of shooting? That doesn’t seem squishy to me, that seems pretty damn reasonable.
I think this same data actually proves the opposite point. Carrying that same ratio forward, It implies that 2000 pts of archers would remove about 1000 pts of sylvaneth in one round from 30 inches away with no line of sight. Take that that to turn 2 and they have tabled you without breaking a sweat. It might be a problem with the archers, but I think is also a problem with allarielle. Those same archers only do 200pts of damage to dryad's or so, and about 250 pts to hunters. It's true that if you can't kill her, she heals quite a few wounds though, so maybe there is something to that.
She does seem better the longer the game goes as there will be fewer and fewer threats that can 1 shot her, and the she heals up.
-
1
-
-
@Ghoooouls note that the grave guard will be 10 models with 2 attacks each = 20 attacks. For similar points, hearthguard have only 10 attacks. While yes you are right on the other points, that is a very very significant difference to overlook.
Also, it is quite trivial to get them +1 to hit and wound, and not that hard to get +1 attack if desired. Compared to freeguild great swords they are far more buffable.
I think they are definitely playable. Maybe even strong in the right situation.
-
1
-
-
The warding revenant is a good warscroll but it is horrifically overcoated. 275 points for just 2 casts is an absolutely horrible deal.
Some comparisons:
belladonna Volga, released recently, has +1 save, +2 wounds, +2mv, +2 bravery, same damage output, a second unbind and a command ability. And she is 75 points LESS.
or compare to a skaven grey seer at 140 pts. 2 casts and unbinds, casts on a 3d6. Less sturdy, sure, but you can get 2 of them for the same price, easily equalizing the durability difference. And stand next to a warp hole for even better casting.
Or to a slaan, who has quite similar base stats but is a 3cast/3 unbind wizard, also has a useful command ability, and generates 2 CPS on a 4+. And costs 15 pts LESS.
Or to a contorted epitome. 2c/2d, a useful fights last aura, and 65 pts less.
All of the above also have something equal to or similar to the +1 to cast, and all just blow this out of the water. Even within the battletome itself you could get 3 branchwriaths instead, for 3 casts and unbinds. Sure you lose +1, but that seems far better and is still 35 pts cheaper. For only about 80 pts more you can get a branchwriaths AND an outcasts battalion to give an artifact to your wraith to make a similar 2 cast wizard and still have all the models from the battalion!
it's true I picked some strong playable options as my comparison point, and things need to be balanced within a battletome. We also have a great spell lore. But at the same time, sylvaneth are clearly a weak battletome already and all of these comparisons are just so far ahead of her it's not even close. She would be a strong competitive pick for a very weak battletome at 140 or so and I'd try her at maybe 200 since the spell lore is so good, probably with a Balewind vortex. At 275 she is sadly a hard pass in any serious list.
Sigh. What's frustrating is that I didn't even have to try very hard for figure out this was hopelessly overcoated. I'd have hoped better from a multimillion dollar company tasked solely with making and designing a game.
-
4
-
1
-
-
3 hours ago, Reinholt said:
I'm just going to leave this here: after one game using proxies for them, if the new Blood Knights are FAQ'ed and/or the wording of the movement phase changes in AoS 3 to make clear they can leave combat and then charge again, BKs are going to be very competitive and the source of a major power build for SBGL.
Yes. This. Retreat+ Charge is an incredibly strong ability to have, especially on durable hard-hitting already almost point-efficient units. They are also pretty easy to buff and benefit from a lot of different things. +1 sv, hit, wound and reroll1's of any sort are all great on them.
I think this will be the breakaway winner from the book if it turns out to be the case.
-
1
-
-
I see it as an inappropriate balance between doing too much, and not thinking things through and thus doing too little.
LRL are a good example of too much done poorly, independent of strength. Formations, Double activations, Weird pile-ins, elemental themes, all units are wizards and in addition,, somehow collecting stuff like dwarves, also animal themes. At the end, I'm not really sure what their thing is. This is just confusing. In addition, they are pointed very competitively for a lot of feels-bad rules. In addition, a lot of their warscrolls have outrageous numbers of rules backed up by lots of 'in additions' and more hidden rules, just like my paragraph above. Its a lot, and not in a good way. I'm not even sure LRL is a balance problem- you could easily point them correctly to be overall balanced with a few iterations of +/- 10-20 pts here or there, but you'd still be left with this incredible complexity creep for not much gain.
In the fat middle, you have excellent books like IMO DoK or Idoneth. Interesting interactions, but not too many, a good set of allegiance abilities that do interesting things, but not 4 sets of allegiance abilities like LRL. Almost every unit is playable and has reasonable in-faction interaction. A few things could be nerfed slightly (like eels or maybe the bow snakes+morathi combination) but overall, good internal and external balance. And the FEEL like they are supposed to and play like they are supposed to. The tides are *chefs kiss* in terms of FEELING like a nautical army, power level aside.
On the mid- lower end of things are Soulblight. While Soulblight, I think is appropriately balanced in terms of power, there are a bunch of things that are just odd. Like why is the werewolf-type faction also the best wizards.... I thought they were the most feral? Why do they buff summonable units? Why are all the cool cursed cities models locked behind a useless include-them-all-for-800 pts thing? Why are zombies so outrageously fast and sneaky with their 6 inch pile-in and attack? It feels like they didn't read their own fluff when writing their own rules in a lot of situations. That isn't to say it isn't a reasonably strong book- models like Manfred are absolutely brokenly incredible, while lots of other things like wolves, blood knights and Vargheists are all somewhere between strong and useful role-players. Much of thecan be strong and interesting in the right situations. Its more that numerous aspects of the battletome don't seem to make sense or interact with each-other. However, there are still interesting warscrolls, the complexity isn't overwhelming and you can definitely do some cool stuff.
On the bottom of the barrel are armies like Sylvaneth and Slaanesh. Sylvaneth allegiance abilities and terrain are basically the same thing, leaving them with really only 1 thing. All of their suballegiances are variations on rerolling 1's WITH a condition that hardly impacts play. Most of the warscrolls are themselves OK, but without meaningful allegiance or suballeignace abilities, they struggle to actually do what they are supposed to do. You could keep dropping their points and eventually they'd be a strong army, but they would never FEEL like sylvaneth without a battletome rewrite. Slaanesh seems similar.
Note that these thoughts are all mostly power-level agnostic- you could drop the points of sylvaneth until they are strong army, but it wouldn't feel like a sylvaneth army. You could also change the LRL points until they are a very weak army, but they'd still be incredibly complicated and with a lot of negative moments. 30 inch, no line of sight, MW only archers are hard to make fun for the opposing player.
-
6
-
-
I love that this conversation all ended up in a respectful debate about the history and future of war games and GW. What a nice forum!
Back to rumors, I'm actually quite worried about these new cruel boys model complexity for a horde ish army. The level of different colors and details on kragnos' tiny effigy will be brutal and unpleasant to paint if you are needing dozens of them on little figures with robes/armor etc. As well.
It's kinda like the new zombies-i like the models and the detail but will never ever play or buy them because I don't want to paint 120 of them. I'm worried the kruel Boyz will be similar
-
1
-
AoS 2 - Sylvaneth Discussion
in Sylvaneth
Posted
I haven't tried them yet, but i still think hunters will be good. Easy access to +1 save is really really good when you have a rerollable save. It's what broke OBR on release. I think a block of 6 scythe hunters to lob upfield early on will be very strong.
I'm thinking
Drycha
Durthu
TLA
Branchwraith
Dryadsx20
Dryadsx20
Revenants x5
Revenants x5
Hunters x6
Spite swarm hive
Might have to drive some dryads or revenants. Gives me 3 strong threats(durthu, drycha and hunters). Goal is to autosummon the woods and get lucky with the hive for a turn 1 strike with the hunters, who then sit on a rerollable 3+ and make a mess of my opponents. While everything else goes and takes objectives on the sides.
At least would let me try out the Heroic actions and monster actions a lot.