dekay

They are perfectly fine. Keep in mind that Stormcast were never meant to be human sized, they're huge in-universe. Compared to more, well, normal sized creatures, dark elves are fine. Also, they're still current models for Cities of Sigmar line.

Plus two separate methods of gaining extra CP, and all 3 warlord traits so good that it's an actual shame there's no method to take more than one (Hawk Eyed is so ridiculously good that losing it in game makes you feel like your shooters suddenly became underpowered and then you realise that you just got lowered to other cities' standard ;)). Yeah. we are a strong city. Just a less popular one ; ) Hell, with our movement bonus, charge re-roll banner and abundance of CP we are a city that can reliably make a 1st turn charge with infantry horde (black guard work the best here) and drop a +1 A aura on them in addition.

Personal theory: A lot of people work under false assumptions when choosing their city. Many living city players don't really play CoS Living City. They play Firestorm Living City. Because that's where Waderers were in previous edition. And they do *that* because they in fact play Wanderers. And they play Wanderers because, in all reality, they're just trying to still play Wood Elves. Anvilgard-Dark Elves and Greywater-Dwarves have similar paths. Doesn't matter that said wood elves might be better played under a different city. Tempest's Eye doesnt have this sort of legacy identity, especially because with removal od Swifthawks it's vastly different from its Firestorm version. So most people playing Tempest's Eye had to make a concious choice to play Tempest's Eye. No wonder there's fewer of them.

Order of the Blood Drenched Rose, first as the best ruleset for any horse mounted knight models we might have, second as a very effective shock unit. Kind of compete with Demigryphs, though.

You get one artifact + one extra for every warscroll battalion in your army (Some other skills and abilities may grant you extra artifacts too, but they're rare exceptions).

I've been wondering if anyone's linked @Double Misfire's articles yet. They're pretty much as comprehensive as it gets. As for the original post: Green is yes, red is no, yellow is 'conditions apply' ; ) Phoenix guard 1. Swordmasters -No. They are obviously executioners, or even greatswords ; ) 2. White Lions - eeh.. borderline. They are perfect wildwood rangers and passable executioners too. Shadow Warriors 1. Glade guard - perfect match. 2. High Elf Archers - my first thought would be darkshards, so no. They're basic, shooty elves and should be used as basic shooty elves. And they don't look sneaky. 3. Waywatchers - perfect. 3. Empire Huntsmen - no problem, especially in human themed force. Longbeards 1. Dwarf warriors -yup, no problem. They'd work as freeguild guard in dwarf themed army too. 2. Dwarf Miners - No problems here. Crossbowmen 1. Dwarf Quarrelers - yup, no problem. But I could accept them as irondrakes, too, as long as it's consistent through the army. 2. Empire/Brettonian Archers - again, as long as it's consistent, preferrably in no crossbow on any models in the army to represent more low-tech city. But yes. Handgunners 1. Dwarf Thunderers - I'd assume they're irondrakes at first sight, unless there are actual irondrakes on the table too. If there are, then all's fine. Dreadspears 1. Louthern Seaguard - No problem. 2. HE spearm elves - They're basically the same unit, no reason to complain. Wildwood rangers 1. White Lions -I'd accept them as executioners, too. No problems here. 2. Wardancers - no problems here. Corsairs 1. Freecompany - could work. But I'd probably just mix free company with sword guard. If you're avoiding any elf models in your army, i agree these would be your best choice. Luminark/hurricanum 1. War Altar - it's basically the same kit. 2. Anvil - Especially the old one, on wheels. Newer version too, but it could use some conversion to increase its mobility. Put it on floating platform or something ; )

They are quite reasonable on smaller units (10 for chaff, 20 if you want that hit bonus) you won't be using command ability at. Loss of extra combat attacks makes it not worth it. If anyone's planning fielding huge number of corsairs, 40 with 2 weapons and 2 x 20 with handbows might be a good option. Or even 2x10 if you're just aiming for requirements of beasthunters battalion.

Isn't that position hotly contested by wildwood rangers and drakespawn knights, with honorable mention of akhelian allopex? ; )

But that's great, actually. If a bit unweildy. The more dice you roll, more reliable the outcome is and you can do some planning based on that. Also, there's a strange joy in demoralising your opponent by declaring 'and now my 20 dudes attack 120 times'...

Realistically, you won't. But if you get 20, which is doable very easily, with proper buffs they still do damage and will have to lose 20 wounds before starting to lose effectiveness. And hey, they're cheap. If 20 from 40 fight, no one will cry that his 140 points are just serving as a wound buffer. Some examples I've just made up ; ) 1. aura of glory, at them, re-roll 1's to hit (be it azyros or command point). 4+ save opponent: around 19 wounds go through. aura is not unit specific, so corsairs aren't even taking those buffs away from anyone else. 2. aura of glory substituted for caustic spray: 25 wounds. 3. blood of the twelve, twin stone, re-roll 1's to hit, again, around 19 wounds. And so on. Compare it to their typical competition, freeguild guard: 1. 15 halberds, 8 swords. 2. 15 wounds, both halberds and swords. 3. 10 wounds with halberds, 5 with swords? Of course, guard have few extra things going for them: But you were taking that hurricanum anyway, right? access to hold the line (need to be static) +1 save in melee (swords only), access to rousing battlecry (for their possible +4 to hit if you're into redundancy and +1 to charge. Offset by corsairs being faster anyway). Compared with corsairs +1 to move, +1 bravery and the cheapest support character around. Oh, and also: freeguild guard attack on 2+ in large enough numbers, so get no benefit from hurricanum. Corsairs, with their 3+, do. Boosting them even further (above examples go up to around 24, 32, 24 wounds, respectively.) Again, I'm not saying corsairs are great, and all those buff sets require both command points, positioning and coordination. But I don't get how anyone can claim that they're bad while simultanously using freeguild guard. Corsairs are sort of a high commit unit: if you just charge them and spend a point at at 'em, yeah, that's a bit of a CP waste. But drop some spell on them, get them into another buffing auras on top of that, and they'll do things impossible for freeguilders.

They get a lot of mileage from caustic spray, then ; ). In general, they are not a top unit, that's for sure, but they have some potential utility in every city: Anvilgard: battalion filler for low drop lists, caustic spray is great for them. Hammerhal: blood of the twelve + twin stone is a great horde buffing combo, and they're a cheap horde. Plus wings of fire is an extra way to increase their mobility, apart fro mthe standard wildform. Tempest's Eye: speed, armour boost, and, most importantly, getting +2 attacks each from aura of glory. Hallowheart: as a horde, they like both warding brand and ignite weapons. Phoenicium: They're cheap and die easily, while getting some proper mileage from vengeful revenats once their units starty dying. Living City and Greywater Fastness, admittedly, don't do much for them. But still, cheap horde.

Oh, yeah, forgot about the bonus curse. I'd recommend either jutting bones on dragon, or acidic blood on hydra. As for the artifact - I mentioned it's a matter of preference here. Cloak on the dragon sorceress is a given, the other one is not all that crucial. Thermalrider cloak on foot sorceress to boost her mobility (short range on spray, yo), or Ignax's scales on Fleetmaster to make him live a bit longer or asphyxia censer for more offensive output... Best to find out what you need the most in such cases. Also, I forgot to mention a command trait on the fleetmaster: Slayer of monsters is pretty week, he won't kill a dragon by himself anyway. Both secretive warlock (one more potential spray caster?) and blackfang crimelord (drakeblood curse on all 3 monsters!) have their merits. Blackfang crimelord is a fun upgrade, because it's not tied to the general himself. Nevermind he got sniped, that hydra still has acid for blood.

Alright, so first a few disclaimers: 1. I'm not a specialist when it comes to Anvilgard, so it won't be ultimately optimised. 2. I don't like the 'throw out your every model and buy new ones' approach when rating someones army, so I'm trying to include as much of what you originally liked as possible (especially in the monster departament. I know how disappointing it is when recommended amount of a monster you wanted to field is '0' 3. fyreslayer support is added based on the contents of their start collecting set. Sorry for not managing to squeeze a magmadroth in, it's an awesome model. 4. I'm afraid we'll all have to wait for the next general's handbook to use drakespawn without gimping ourselves, their cost is just too high to justify them for now. But in few month's, hopehully... So, the list itself: Allegiance: Cities of Sigmar- City: Anvilgard (Illicit Dealings: Hidden Agents)Sorceress on Black Dragon (300)- Witch Rod- Artefact: Drakescale Cloak- Spell: Lore of Dark Sorcerey - Vitriolic Spray (Anvilgard Wizard)Black Ark Fleetmaster (60)- GeneralSorceress (90)- Spell: Lore of Dark Sorcerey - Vitriolic Spray (Anvilgard Wizard)- City Role: General's Adjutant (Must be 6 wounds or less)3 x Scourgerunner Chariots (150)10 x Black Ark Corsairs (80)- Vicious Blade & Repeater Handbow- City Role: Honoured Retinue (Must be 5-20 models)10 x Black Ark Corsairs (80)- Vicious Blade & Repeater Handbow30 x Black Ark Corsairs (240)- Vicious Blade & Wicked Cutlass30 x Darkshards (300)Kharibdyss (170)- Drakeblood Curse: Fell Gaze (Anvilgard)War Hydra (170)10 x Vulkite Berzerkers (160)- Pairs of Handaxes- AlliesCharrwind Beasthunters (120)Umbral Spellportal (70)Malevolent Maelstrom (10)Total: 2000 / 2000Extra Command Points: 1Allies: 160 / 400Wounds: 166 Some explanation: Part 1. Darkling Covens Sorceresses are here to cast spell portal and vitriolic spray (one of the best spells in the cities, in my opinion). Whatever gets sprayed becomes a much better target for both corsairs and darkshards. Sorceress on dragon is here to a) have some hitting power, and with the cloak she can take some wounds in return, too. b) have some mobility in case you're forced to cast the spray without portals. It's very short ranged and she's more likely to survive being mid field then her dragonless counterpart. Darkshards: They do what they do best, they run forward and shoot. They're good at that. Especially if their target has been sprayed. Plus they serve as sacrifice fodder for the sorceresses. Part 2: Charrwind Beasthunters battalion: vastly decreases your unit count for deployment, increasing the chances you'll get to choose who starts the game. Important. Gives you extra artifact, too but I't a matter of preference what and to whom you plan to give. Fleetmaster: He yells 'at them' to the large corsair unit, making them remarkably better at combat. If needed, he'll make them immune to battleshock. Corsairs: small units are chaff/support/objective grabbers. Large unit is your standard horde and should be treated as such. They're best buffed by the fleetmaster and with their target debuffed by a sorceress. Don't be too attached to them, they'll likely die. Just make them take something more expensive with them. As part of the battalion, they also get +1 to wound when fighting monsters, don't ever forget about it when something large charges them! Scourgerunners: fast, good shooting, cause mortal wounds. Everyone likes scourgerunners. Kharybdiss: with fell gaze it has a very strong bravery reducing aura. And it's a solid monster. Part 3,the rest: fyreslayers are here because you wanted them, and they're pretty solid in close combat. Also, they're two wounds each and can be used to block things wanting to charge your, say, darkshards. Overall not bad. hydra: it's basically a distraction carnifex. kharybdiss is more important here, so every shot that goes to hydra, makes kharybdiss live longer. And with hydra's passive regeneration, it can survive quite a bit. If it gets to the fight, all the better, it's pretty good at eating things. umbral spellportal: vitriolic spray is very short ranged. portal is here to help. malevolent maelstrom: it's 10 points. Why *not* take it if there's a place? Possible changes: illicit dealings. While extra command points are always solid, if you'd prefer another artifact or drakeblood curse, go for it. Also, fell gaze can be substituted tor acidic blood, whichever you prefer. I'm not saying it's a best army ever, but I don't think you'll feel heavily outmatched using it against other battletomes.

Sorceresses both need darking coven units to function properly, and are great at boosting said darkling coven units. Without any of those, they are a bit wasted. Compare to, say, battlemages, who work well regardless of army composition, and hurricanum is one of the best force multipliers availible. Chariots get way better if used in units of 3. They get cheaper and one of them gains +1 to hit. Corsairs are best taken in large units, with both fleetmaster's and anvilgard's command abilities supporting hordes best. Drakespawn are... well, I *want* to like drakespawn, but they are very expensive for what they do. They certainly not make the list more competitive. Additionaly, by going so monster heavy you end up with very few bodies for claiming objectives. What traits, artifacts, curses, spells and so on do you plan to use? As for why Khorne and Stormcast may seem OP compared to your army, consider the following: Special rules for Cities give you boosted endless spells, which you don't use in current list. Spell portals combined with caustic spray are a very good Anvilgard combo. Special rules for anvilgard involve, among other things, command ability giving battleshock immunity - makes sense only if you have at least 2 big units. You have none. Anvilgard battalion is not bad if you have models, and you lack just 10 corsairs to be able to use it, get extra command points and artifact, and increase your chance of deciding first turn. So if they seem stronger then you, it's partly because you're not using all your availible bonuses. It might change if you optimise the list a bit.

Wouldn't be hard to get a lot of cheaper, 3rd party chariots and supply them with elf crew, though. Way more viable economically ; )

I liked my mounted mage and his furycorn too much to let him go, so he's getting a new function as we're lacking non monstrous mounts for our characters. There is, however, something that still has both wizards and horses on a single base and it's immensely useful. Guess what this will be, and why does everyone get +1 to hit all of a sudden. Yes. The storm cometh.

..I legitimately didn't notice the price was for *20*. Yeah, it looks much better now. And as for original phoenix guard - i mourn the loss of 6th edition metals, they looked much better.

It's either elves with halberds from momminiaturas: https://www.momminiaturas.com/miniaturas-fantasia/elfos/ Or dragon guard from last sword: https://lastsword.com/en/producto/dragonguard-regiment/ (expensive as hell, though ; ))

"Weak" might not be the best word. It works like that: Every city has its theme with which it's supposed to work best. Some of them (Hallowheart) have themes that allow many different army builds. Some (Hammerhal) are just universal. Some (Tempest's Eye, Living City) tend to work well with other builds outside of their theme. And then there are some (Phoenicium, Greywater Fastness and, well, Anvilgard) that more or less want you to take their theme and invest heavily in it. Playing Greywater without artillery or Phoenicium without proenix temple contingent, while possible, leaves you with rules that don't support your force all that well. For Anvilgard, their rules support pirates and monsters. So if you want to play Anvilgard, you sure as hell have to like their pirates and monsters. Like, you can play Tempest's Eye without any griffons, pistoliers and kharadrons. And it will, possibly, work. But if you build Anvilgard list without any monsters, you have nothing to put your free drakeblood curse on and you get nothing in exchange. Also, there's a matter of battalion: In some cities, their battalions are basically a support element: Hallowheat's is a bunch of wizards. You take that, and then you build the rest of your army. Anvilgard's is 3 battlelines, a hero and several support elements. It's basically a core of your army. If you take Anvilgard's battalion, well, that's how the main portion of your force will look like. And it's all fun as long as you *want* your force to be built around corsairs, scourgerunners and so on. If you don't, well, that's where Anvilgard seems weak.

I really don't get one thing. Without a hint of irony, i really don't understand it. Being represented completely aside. Like, out of the picture. It's worth noting there's a sizable group of white males who'd like more female models because they like well designed female fantasy models. And currently they can't get as many of them as they'd like. And it's not even a little bit deeper for them. Really. Like, most of the people who bought out new sisters of battle. It wasn't sudden influx of women who were waiting to be represented - many people who bough them did that because they thought models were neat. Some are willing to sacrifice this potential in the name of not yeilding before SJW's... and, really does ANYONE win if that happens? If more female models show up, everyone is free NOT to buy them. Those who want to be represented WILL buy them. So will those who want more plastic women on their table for no deeper reasons. General result: Group 1: 0 female models wanted/0 owned. Group 2: 1 wanted/ 1 owned. Group 3: 1 wanted / 1 owned. On the other hand, if the defenders of gender purity win, and we get no female models: Those who don't wan't them won't have them (the exact same result as 'not buying them' if they are made), and other two groups don't get them despite wanting them. Results: Group 1: 0 wanted / 0 owned. Group 2: 1 wanted, 0 owned. Group 3: 1 wanted / 0 owned. Congratulations, you just made others' life a bit worse while not making yours in any way better. But... GW not making female models is a problem! My personal problem at least. And I'd guess there are others. I'd like to have more female models because I think that'd be neat. Anyone pushing political agendas on me for that clearly does thet to force their own, because if they didn't that'd be a discussion about worldbuilding and aestethics only.

We're trying to keep it civil in here, and some people like their presidents, plus it's not relevant to the subject of this thread. Apart from that, nothing, in my parts it's been basically a national pastime ever since democratic system had been implemented ; )

oh, *neutral*. You wrote 'natural' before. Gender neutral is not an ideologically charged term, though, right? It's not really controversial. As for the president thing - different thread, different people, would you kindly leave this out of here?

I remember beardless masks being mentioned in one of the novels. Someone else would have to help with reminding which one was it, though ; )

I add Anvilgard as a contender - Due to possibility of squeezing up to 9 chariots into their battalion they can make a chariot heavy force very low on drops. Plus added +1 to wound against monsters - situational, but good to have. And you get access to 'remove saves' spell, great when so much of your damage dealing potential lies in no rend crossbows. You pay for that in the form of some forced chaff units of corsairs, though, so you won't build *pure* chariot list in Anvilgard. Two battalions of min everything/max chariots cost you 1740 points with 6*3 chariot units, 6*10 corsairs and 2 fleetmasters. You get enough points for some magic support or whatever else you might like.

I really don't wan't to drag this off topic, but luckily, I think I found a relevant example: Coming up with a brand new character is, of course, fine, but it requires estabilishing a new character from scratch. Your audience doesn't know anything about this character. Pulling a Dread Pirete Roberts, and passing the idenitity of an estabilished character gives te audience something recognisable. Yeah, it's not a spiderman we know, but we know what spiderman is about. This new character is a different person, yes, but we know how he works. But, putting him into a new context refreshes the story possibilities! He has new way of thinking, new side character cast, and we wonder 'how this one will interact with all this'. Changing the scenery or changing something about the character opens new possibilities, while remaining familiar. For example, a kid now has spiderman's powers and responsibilities, how will he fare compared to previous, more experienced incarnation of the character? Or let's place the character in the Noir setting, what changes? Now, to said relevant example, let's talk Gotrek. Gotrek was deeply rooted in the Old World. He also, a bit ambiguously but still, died there. And now we have new novels with Gotrek in Mortal Realms. Could GW have created a new dwarf character for their AoS books. Sure. But we got Gotrek. It's not the same Gotrek we know - everything around him changed and how he's pretty much defined by his 'this new world is dumb, fyreslayers are posers, and what even is a duardin' attitude. And it's only possible because they've taken some elements from the old books and changed others. Creating new character from scratch wouldn'tve been bad by definition, but it would be impossible to achieve what is currently happening in the tale of Gotrek. If, in some parallell universe, Old World never ended, we'd still be getting books about Gotrek in the Old World and in one of them Gotrek died only to be replaced by his long lost niece? That would be interesting as well, and would open avenues original Gotrek didn't have. 'how can a young girl be a chosen of grimnir?' asks some rando. And she installs axe of grimnir in his face because that's what slayers do when someone makes them angry, while Felix tries to calm her down. Yeah it's not overly ambitious scene, but it's a scene that would've been impossible if Gotrek hasn't ben replaced by his niece. And if Gotrek's niece just started her own story alongside Gotrek books, without replacing him, it would be needed to fully contextualise her - no familiar elements like chosen of Grimnir, the axe or Felix to help us. Plus, all the people complaining that she's too similar to Gotrek anyway and why do we even need two series of Slayer books. This came out way less coherent than I intended it to, sorry, but in short: I believe that changing some aspects of the story/character/setting/whatever has its own set of interesting advantages over starting a new one from scratch. Do you really need to write this in every single thread where Cities are mentioned? ; ) We don't know that. Genestealer Cults have been updated after nearly 20 years of silence. Squats started to show up again. But yes, regular human troopers in AoS is where GW draws the line ; ) I don't thing anyone mentioned 'gender natural' or insulted anyone's president in this thread. You'll find, if you don't like this one, there are many other threads you might enjoy ; )