PrimeElectrid

Yeah this is the problem I was trying to explain. I think GHB20 makes it worse and pushes those early game dominate lists even further, or else scoring will quickly get out of control with all the bonus VPs. This is bad for SCE for two reasons: 1) SCE units aren’t very good at the job they are being asked to do 2) Those builds rely on taking min 5 Libs to free up points elsewhere, which is practically auto loss in Better Part of Valour. All an opponent needs to do is take the first turn (easy enough for most armies as they have viable battalions to reduce drops) and remove one unit of 5 Libs to be up on scoring. Thats trivially easy for anyone with access to a decent ranged component (OBR, LRL, Tzeentch, Seraphon, KO, Cities, ironically other SCE) or who can get across the board t1 and smack them (Fyreslayers, Orruks, DoK, FEC, Ogor).

So these lists seem to highlight the SCE dilemma, expressed in two scenarios: Shifting Objectives and Better Part of Valour. One gives bonus points to battleline units within 6” of an objective (restricting deep strikes if you want to take advantage of it), and the other requires battleline to destroy other battleline. In melee. And this is the rub with Stormcast in GHB2020. Total Commitment removes a whole allegiance ability. Two battleplans punish armies with bad battleline. 3 reward armies with good (>5 wound, tanky, mobile) leaders, 1 with good monsters. If you have units that fit more than one of those categories (eg battleline monsters, or monster heroes) then all the better. This means 3/12 battleplans, 25%, are straight up awful for SCE, and 4 more present serious problems. That’s over half which are already an upwards struggle, not counting any other tough scenarios. Ive really no idea how to go about building a good list in this meta. Everything that isn’t Leader/Battleline/Monster feels like dead weight due to scenario scoring, and it’s not like non-L/B/M units in the SCE book overperform to make up the difference. I wonder if lists need to stick to those three unit types (eg battleline Sequitor blobs supported by Stardrakes I guess?), or go all in on other units that seek to overwhelm instead (which I suppose is just the Longstrike build these days). edit: FYI as a comparison, my OBR list is Katakros, Liege Kavalos, Mortek Guard, KDR, Crawler, Harvester. Every single unit in that list scores bonus VPs or can seriously contest ABPoV. How is SCE meant to compete with that on just scoring, let alone when it comes to actually fighting?

Going second is already more appealing because of the potential for a double turn*. Additionally, in turn 1, many spells/abilities will be outside range at the top of turn 1.* *Unless you have an alpha strike army that can circumvent the range limitations.

Points updates for the last 8 armies released.

Sequitors went up by another 40 points to 480. That is partly offset by the discount to Lord Arcanum but not fully.

Welp, after all that excitement over points drops, GHB20 kicks SCE in the balls with the battleplan changes. * Total Commitment is still, inexplicably, a thing. You know, just in case you wanted to build an army that actually uses the SCE alliegance ability. * Bonus points or objective requirements for battleline units. Yes, GW seriously expects you to defeat Mortek Guard, Vanari Wardens, Witch Aelves, etc, in melee with Liberators and (now more expensive!) Sequitors. Lol * Bonus points for leaders. You know, those 5 wound support heroes who can’t fight their way out of a paper bag and drop dead at the sight of Crawlers and Sentinels. * Bonus points for Monsters/Behemoths, all 4 of them of which only one is barely playable. Meta for 2020-21: does your book have good battleline? Do you have good leaders (preferably tanky or which are monsters)? Can you spam good/cheap monsters? Then you’re good!

I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if the only change was cheaper Libs and more expensive Longstrikes. Maybe we’ll see some tweaks to stuff that got missed before? Judicators, Castigators and Paladins come to mind.

Look at the screenshot, the realm rules have been massively reduced

Thermal rider cloak 😮 Take that, Keepers! Also note you roll off to decide what realm to fight in, with the winner picking.

Oh that. Yeah we don’t know the detail of how that works or if Teclis can fit inside it yet.

No? +1 save from Aetherquartz gets him to 3+ but no other boost, and the -1 to hit is limited to enemies within 12” of a (300 point) mountain spirit. Of course he can be ethereal too and rr1s with BRB CA. Endless spells are a different matter. seems like ranged MW or mass shooting is the way to go. Something will get through eventually and as you say there are no heals available.

The Evocator warscroll states they can only cast Empower, but the Battletome states they can take a lore spell too and this was confirmed in FAQ so there is precedent. The only oddity is that Eltharion doesn’t have any rules saying he is a wizard on the scroll 🤷‍♂️

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for those who aren’t aware, German pictures of the lumineth battletome have hit Facebook

Nope We know that there will be another battletome (due to the tease of 3 unopened chambers in the current one), and we can infer that as their flagship line they will come as frequently as a Space Marine book. As there was an SCE BT 2 years ago then they are probably due this summer, but after coronavirus who knows. This assumption was also made before 40k 9th was announced and as that is this years cash cow, SCE may not be until next year (which may coincide with AoS 3.0).

That it was down for 2 days and nobody seemed to notice is a bit telling of the state of AoS at the moment.

It already has.

As of today, it will have been two full weeks since WarCom published any exclusive AoS content. (exclusive because that Chaos Gods one applies to both system) Guess they read this 😉

No AoS article for 11 days

This has been repeated every year for the last 20 years.

Yeah the real controversy here is why everyone in the Realms isn’t walking around with massive pikes.

There’s actually 3: Ruination, Covenant, Logister. They all sound awesome including the last if only because it suggests some sort of logic-wizard.

Deathriders, Mortek Guard and a Harvester so far. Arkhan the Black!

I’ve just been through the first two rounds with SCE vs OBR and recommend the following adjustments if you are not using troggoths: * Give every enemy unit troggoth regen (heal d3 wounds on a 4+, or d3 models if 1 wound each). Call it reinforcements or shyish/ghyran magic or whatever. * If the enemy unit does not have a shooting attack then ignore the “far” table (>12”) and just use in combat/close instead. The distance between units is such that far means the enemy unit does nothing half the time if they can’t shoot, but using the close table means trying some long charges.

Christ that was dull. Models we’ve already seen. Teaser for something we already knew was coming.