tripchimeras

Generally speaking are you building the list specifically as a counter to Slaanesh? I would say its probably not perfectly "optimized" as an all comers list, but if you think you can grind it out against most opponents and are anticipating a massive amount of slaanesh I guess the lesser number of multi wound models might be better then the traditional 18 morrsarr. Just due to not owning enough eels I played for a long time only using 1 block of morrsarr and while I definitely wouldn't say I felt completely overpowered, I definitely felt myself playing an uphill battle against most of the competitive builds I played against. I won an okay amount of them, but I wouldn't have trusted my chances to go 4-1 at a tourney, felt more like a 3-2 list if I played very well. With 18 morrsarr, I generally feel more evenly matched, though obviously against skaven and slaanesh I think that uphill feeling is going to be there no matter what. I've been playing the namarti corp + 2 eel block build the most out of the "competitive" builds we have, and I am pretty comfortable with it, so I definitely support namarti corp as a drop reduction strategy, but I do think you will be missing that second block of morrsarr. But again, I do think you may be right that this build has an edge over Slaanesh in comparison to our normal comp builds, so maybe its worth it. I think what you just need to think about is if potential improvement (haven't playtested something like this vs slaanesh so wouldn't know for sure) vs the 1 seed army is worth being worse against most everything else. With enough skill I am sure you can make it work, but I don't know if you are better off in general. You are going to need to win on the objective game with a list like this, you try to steamroll you are going to get bogged down and killed by most of top tier.

Its a problem of utility more then it is one of pts I think. We simply do not have access to the magic, shooting, or durability to build a competitive list that does not rely primarily upon speed, manoeuvrability, and raw hitting power. This forces our battle plan emphasis on combat and avoidance, and our ASF combat turn in particular given our relative lack of durability. There are only 2 units in our entire army that are geared towards this type of battleplan. Morrsarr and Sharks. Not only are Morrsarr our only real source of mortals, on top of that sharks have a really low attack volume, which make for high variance and hard to predict damage output. This makes them more difficult to use in a consistently successful manner, despite the raw damage output averages not being hugely worse. Add to this our horrible leadership and their lower model count, a unit of them is even more vulnerable then the eels to battleshock. Those 2 inches of move difference also don't help matters considering how much our battle plan relies on movement advantage. And because they fill the same role, if one is even slightly more efficient then the other there is very little reason to take it. So even if GW did manage to create a point distribution where sharks were slightly more efficient then eels you would just see the opposite problem, you would just see armies chalk full of Sharks. Because we don't do anything else better then most of our opponents, we are left needing to rely on our relative advantage in this one area, so even when we do design armies that puts more focus on support pieces (flip tide with 3-4 infantry units) our army still must revolve and function around our use of 18-21 morrsarr. All of this is to say, I don't think there is an easy points fix for this problem, our units are either too specialized or not specialized enough depending and too many of them are not good enough in their "specialty". We are supposed to be reliant on magic in the lore, but we have no casting buffs, and a bad spell lore. Our support units buff the wrong things, and don't go far enough to be useful, and our infantry beaters have 1 inch range and die to a stiff breeze; you can take advantage of them as relatively fast bodies that can pack a wollup on the charge, but you cannot rely on them as an army backbone. Reavers are great support units, but they are just that, support units. Points are not going to change these things. If you decrease a unit with inferior rules' points enough it becomes takeable only in that you have hit a point of critical mass where spamming that thing becomes your best strategy, but the underlying book imbalances are a form of function not cost. Morrsarr at 200pts are still going to be the unit which our strat revolves around, our army will just be worse. The solution is in validating our bad units with purpose, and pt changes won't give them that purpose, they will only continue to be mostly bad until they are too good. We need a viable alternative to how we win games in order to not need Morrsarr competitively, unfortunately that requires rule rewrites (and honestly more units). That is something that we are going to have to just wait and hope for in a new book. The reason we are in this position is mostly just because we were a new tome with limited units and our book is getting old. We weren't even technically released in 2.0 we were the pre 2.0 book with prototype 2.0 rules. We have survived in the competitive tier to this point off the backs of 1 unit, and without that unit we would have been relegated to the "desperately needs an update" bin a while ago.

I honestly agree with you on the infantry front. I think they are useful for objective holders and I think you can sacrifice 1 soulscryer and a unit or 2 of eels to make it happen. That's kinda where I was going with the list I posted other day when I was hopeful we could use PG allies (though the sharks obviously would get replaced with eels in a full comp list). I think having some bodies on the table is always useful, durable ones would be preferable, but in the absense of that even fragile bodies like namarti can support eels a lot. They often get ignored in favour of the greater eel threat allowing them to claim objectives, also as always the more screaners the better, and they make good screens to protect an eel unit so they can charge next turn. But like you said he won facehammer so obviously his list is not shabby at all and maybe the extra eel volume is better plain and simple. Regardless def agree that I think Volt + 1 scryer is the baseline to make the msu eels lists really fly (sorry couldn't help myself!).

From a fun perspective seems like a cool and fun list. From a purely competitive standpoint I don't know if there is much of a reason to take 2 tidecasters and the endless spell (or even 1 for that matter). Might be better off taking a soulscryer, "upgrading" king to volturnos and carrying in an extra command point for your attack spam turn 3. MSU eels seem like one of the times where you really want to use your king as a support bubble you want surviving to turn 3 and Volt does that role better then king. But again as far as fun list that will compete in a semi-comp environment seems cool. EDIT Reason for my preference towards less to no tidecasters in a build like this being, fliptide is not an option, our spells are not particularly effective, the teleport ability is guaranteed and better then anything our spells can accomplish, and against any army that is bringing a caster heavy build 2 completely unbuffed unbinds are not going to do a ton.

I think the key thing here is, you don't need to. Which scenario matters, but the unit has low movement and can't fly. You just chaffe it up and basically ignore it the whole game and focus on the rest of the army and the rest of the objectives. Not like this is some simple proposition, but it isn't like with the tipy top armies of the meta right now where this is not really an option. There is a reason fyreslayers are strong, but not OP. Sure that deathstar unit isn't going anywhere, but opponent doesn't need to make it go anywhere. You chaff it up, keep it at arms length, and go after every objective it isn't sitting on. It can only be in one place at one time, and can't fly.

Feels like an army that is on the slower side and going to struggle in objective game. Seems quite strong, but once this thing hits and people really get into it, my feeling is its not going to be slaanesh/skaven part 2. Might be a bit closer to FEC, where it can just roll certain matchups, but once you start to figure it out its not quite so big a deal. Honestly, not sure it ends up even being FEC, but think that is a better comparison point probably then slaanesh/skaven are. Obviously we will have to wait and see, but feel like a lot of the super uber power things are the type of stuff that ends up getting appended with "on paper."

Cautiously optimistic on balance front certainly. Seems like they have really learned some lessons since Skaven/Slaanesh. The books since (including what I have seen from ogres/bonereepers) seem to range from mid-range to strong, but not OP which is ideal. bonereepers had me worried with some of the early reveals, but their warscrolls make me less worried, points are going to be key, but seems like they won't be the next slaanesh. Hopefully this trend keeps rolling! Definitely seems like things, Slaanesh aside, are in a pretty good place.

This is the reason I asked. It seems dumb that simply because Cities is a new book no one can take them as allies... And since GW is so bad at faqs, its not like they would ever release faq updates for every army allied to Cities to include that clause in a timely manner upon release. Guess best we can hope for is something in the EoY updates or next GHB (or at that point maybe a new book for us).

I was worried that was answer; unfortunate. Think it would have been a really strong combo for us. Strange that no one can use cities as allies, though I guess all of their sub-faction keywords are already in allied lists so that would be why. Its just especially unfortunate as our only cheap infantry choice (Eternal Guard) are no longer cheap... I guess our good ally slots are down to just heartrenders... It was nice having a sub 90pt option though. Not that PG were cheap, but they at least have extreme durability which we lack, the cheap bodies that were Eternal Guard filled the same void (taking 2 units of 10 for 10pts more then 1 namarti unit was a pretty great option). Oh well. Still enjoying the MSU builds, almost took down a DoK Marathi build the other night

Are you paying for the namarti batallion? Since you meet all of the requirements it is worth doing if you are not already. Aside from that I will give you some general army advice, but please know that since you are playing mostly casual, don't feel like you need to change your list until you have given it a chance. In a casualy environment you very well may do fine as is, and aesthetics/lore/how much fun you have are literally all that matter. That being said, Lotann is largely considered the weakest unit in the book, but his model is cool and he is cheap so if you are in love with model or lore on him, he won't break you in casual play. Generally speaking large units of thralls can have a hard time of it because they have 32mm bases but only 1inch range. This means units larger then 10 have a difficult time coming anywhere close to maximizing their attack frontage, and given that they are glass cannons that is not a great thing a lot of the time. Leviadon, especially in casual play are probably good enough, and Akhelian Guard are certainly their optimal synergy partner, and I can see using them to block up the enemies stuff until your ASF phase then coming in with Thralls to do the killing being a relatively successful strat in casual play. But just know that he is generally considered overcosted for a unit that is primarily a support piece with too few attacks to be a consistent combat killer. Without knowing more about your gaming group, what armies you normally play against etc, I don't want to tell you to change your list or that you really need to do X Y or Z thing. However, if you start playing with this list and find yourself losing too often, or feeling underwhelmed, the general rule of thumb is more eels = more competitive. Morrsarr Guard are by far the strongest unit in our entire book, and the more of them you include, generally the better. There are exceptions to this and obviously support units and infantry you may want in even a competitive list, but as you get going I would use that as your general rule of thumb. If you want to scale your army up to a more competitive opponent, add more Morrsarr. EDIT I just noticed you specifically stated you hate eels, the one idea that might work in casual is, if you find yourself lacking that speedy punch Morrsarr give you, and your opponents aren't taking crazy competitive lists, blocks of sharks (which are amazing models unlike eels) may do the trick. You have to be very careful as losing a 120pt models to a battleshock tests can be brutal, so you would want to keep them by characters to auto pass battleshock, but their combat ability while less efficient then morrsarr is not actually THAT much worse, so in a casual game may do the trick.

With all the back and forth, I thought it useful to actually look at the real numbers as best I could rather then all of us just stating better at x or y. How much better is relevant. Sequitors 26 ppm: offensive form- Base damage dealt: 1.90 Damage vs 4+ save: 1.15 Damage received base: .54 With Castelant: .29 Damage received rend 1 : .63 With Castelant: .54 Defensive form- Base damage dealt: 1.42 Damage vs 4+ save: .86 Damage received base: .25 With Castelant: .11 Damage received rend 1 : .44 With Castelant: .25 *Note that due to the mixed arm nature of the unit I couldn't just take the damage output of a single model, I had to take the proportion of the unit using each and add them together then divide by # of models. Also I am ignoring the healing associated with the Castelants ability because it requires a bunch of assumptions like a model having a single wound on it already when the attacks are made and the fact that it is capped effectively at 1 wound for the unit per attack sequence which means that its effect on damage taken is proportional to the number of wounds taken decreasing the more wounds taken. Phoenix Guard 16 ppm: Base damage dealt: .93 with annointed: 1.24 Damage vs 4+ save: .62 with annointed: .83 Damage received base: .25 Damage received rend 1: .33 *Note that Command abilities exist for rerolling 1's to hit and rerolling 1's on save. This is significant because Offensive sequitors don't benefit from the first and sequitors in any stance don't benefit from the second. This means that PG have ability to improve further in the comparison, while sequitors don't. On top of this comparison it should also be noted that with annointed PG are immune to battleshock and are battleline, and in general have +1 movement on sequitors. Additionally in analysing damage output, 3 ranks of PG are going to be able to attack while for the most part only 1 rank of sequitors will. So you are rarely going to get a full unit of sequitors attacking all at once, while with PG it is not improbable at all for a large percentage of a 30 man unit to get their strikes in. Additionally while 10 PG is a thing, 5 Sequitors probably is not due to SCE unit limitations in Cities. So we really should only be comparing a unit of 30 PG to 15 or 20 sequitors. I think the most common thing is a unit of 30 PG or a unit of 20 sequitors. The one big advantage here for Sequitors is not that their blocks are 30pts cheaper (I think PG are 30pts better) its that their last 5 only cost 30pts total. For me PG makes significantly more sense even with this consideration, due to all the intangibles and their superiority as an unbuffed unit that can just do it all regardless of situation. While Sequitors are slightly better in specific situations, they completely crumble in others, while PG are strong in all. There are definitely specific lists Sequitors may end up being better in, but as a generality I stand by putting PG as tier 1 of elite infantry, and think this bears it out. As @mmimzie noted too, PG do better in the slaaneshi matchup, while sequitor are going to make you cry. Given that Slaanesh stand at the tippy top of the meta, despite that being 1 specific matchup that is quite significant as well. EDIT In summary per block of 5 Seq vs block of 10 PG*: Wounds: Tie S - 10 vs PG 10 Sequitors Attacking: Advantage to PG Base SA- 9.5 vs PG - 9.3 (difference SA +2%) vs 4+ SA- 5.75 vs PG - 6.2 (difference PG +7%) Base Defense SA - .54 vs PG - .25 (difference PG+53%) Defense rend 1: SA - .63 vs PG - .33 (difference PG+48%) Sequitors Defending: Advantage to PG Base SD - 7.1 vs PG - 9.3 (difference PG +24%) vs 4+ SD - 4.3 vs PG - 6.2 (difference PG+32%) Base Defense SD - .25 vs PG - .25 (difference even) Defensse rend 1: SD - .44 vs PG - .33 (difference PG+25%) Sequitos defending with character vs PG with character: Very slight advantage PG Base SD - 7.1 vs PG - 12.4 (difference PG+43%) vs 4+ SD - 4.3 vs PG- 8.3 (difference PG+48%) Base Defense SD - .11 vs PG - .25 (difference SD+56%) Defense rend 1: SD - .25 - PG -.33 (difference SD+24%) *I admit using % difference isn't the best metric, as the smaller the number the less it matters most of the time. The fact that only 25% of damage is going through for PG vs 11% for sequitors, is less meaningful to the flow of the game then say 25% vs 50%. But I am getting lazy so, that's what I used because it seemed easiest. Potentially would have been better instead of going 5 vs 10 for damage to go 1 vs 2 as it compares easier to the defense differences.

From what I can tell, a Sequitors unit is never tougher... They are identical toughness against no rend, everything else a phoenix guard unit has the better save. And phoenix guard are getting double the models for 30 points more and on smaller base sizes (I think? I just assume all stormcast are 32mm). You may be talking about 2 wounds when you are talking about their toughness, but less models with the same # of wounds is a weakness most of the time, especially when talking infantry, and would only make them tougher if their wounds equaled more then the PG at their relative prices, when instead their wound counts are identical, particularly since PG are going to be ignoring Battle shock most of the time... Their damage output is worse as well, all for only a 30pt discount... I just don't see the comparison here. PG feel like the better play most of the time, army composition obviously matters here so I will concede there may be occasions those saved points are meaningful, but I am not sure the losses you take switching are worth it most of the time... I could be missing something or mathing bad though, totally possible. EDIT Yep I'm forgetting Castellant… I see where you are coming from now. But that changes the cost breakdown I think, because now you are adding a 120pt character who mostly exists to buff the sequitors, vs the PG who can operate almost completely independently of their support character at near optimal efficiency, and that character (assuming they are phoenix mounted) are independently strong and desirable from the PG. This def gets into list creation preferences, but In essence the Sequitor are more expensive then the PG (depending on how you want to argue whether the castellant should basically be baked into their cost) and still are really only marginally stronger defensively, still significantly worse offensively, and Fd vs mortals etc.

My general experience with Tournaments are that unless GW has their hands in it, most tournament organizers are pretty liberal with their conversion or counts as allowances. I think the big key is that it is clear, obvious, and does not serve to confuse your opponent/give you undue advantage in the game. Using one army that is in use as another army, at least in the 8th edition days where I saw it attempted once or twice, is generally frowned upon unless it is lovingly converted and clear. Generally speaking rule of cool is almost always going to sway an OT (and the players you face) to your side. If it looks awesome, people are going to want to let you use it. My rule of thumb on this is you really want to always ask a TO well in advance via email with attached photos about acceptability of counts as. Again I would say 9 times out of 10 they are going to OK it, unless it is a case of blatant laziness, or something that is going to cause extreme confusion (calling executioners greatswords when they are in the same book and both legal, or using a unit that is a valid allie as a different unit in the book without any attempt at conversion). In the case of using disposessed/high elf/empire/bretonian/wood elf models that did not make it into cities themselves as a unit in cities you are probably absolutely safe. In some cases (high elves) some of these models are actually technically still legal within the game (swordmasters, dragon princes), however considering the clear indication they are on their way out, the roughly 0% chance you will still see them as is on the table, and the fact that they are not valid allies for the city book, the chances of confusion are essentially 0, and in most cases they look very similar to the unit they are parroting. If TO oks it, but you are still concerned about it, a very helpful thing I have seen some people do in the past is make tokens with the correct name of the unit they are "counts as" clearly printed and keep it next to the unit throughout the game and as always regardless of whether you do this be clear in explaining your list before deployment and as you deploy units, even in tournaments many players do not know every single unit in the game. TLDR every TO is going to be different, so always ask, and don't be shocked if they say no. But in the case of vast majority of cities of sigmar "counts as" models I have seen discussed I would be surprised if most TO's said no.

If by pure shooting you mean no combat troops of any kind that don't also cast spells or shoot, from a purely competitive perspective, probably not? From a more casual perspective I am sure you are going to blow some people out of the water, but will struggle mightilly against others. It might be viable with like living cities or tempest where you are packing a lot of speed and manoeuvrability in your shooting units, the traditional pure unmoving gunline without combat screens to mop up, maybe not so much. But I think you are going to be better off having at least a couple units of tough screeners/combat troops to compliment everything else in general, regardless of your approach (PG, hammerers, eternal guard, a horde of cheap infantry etc). Usually competitively themed armies without enough consideration for balancing weaknesses end up scewing a little too far to ever really have good shot at good results without a lot of luck in matchups. If you pile on units like pistoliers, scourgerunners, gyros, and shadow warriors, there might be some builds that work without any combat specific troops. But then again a few of those units, like pistoliers kinda straddle that line as they are basically combat suicide bombers. EDIT: What I will say again is casual is an entirely different world, and do whatever floats your boat there, as long as you are playing with people of a similar mindset. Though I will say that no one enjoys playing against the guy that brings a static gunline. A high manoeuvrability shooting army is a bit different, but the static gunline (8th edition dwarf style) is something no one appreciates whether good or bad.

Dumb question I can never remember answer to, but us being listed as allies in Cities goes both ways right, or would a faq need to add them to our list as well for us to take them as allies? If answer is yes as would make sense, anyone else thinking about Phoenix Guard as strong ally choice going forward? If I get a positive answer on them being legal, going to bring 20 to a game tonight against DoK. Just a casual game with a friend so want to bring at least a few weird things, though we play rough tourney lists most of time, so can't go too light. Thinking of riffing on that MSU eel list that won facehammer GT. Something like: Volt Soulscryer with cloud of midnight 1x6 morrsarr 3x3 morrsarr 1x3 ishlaen guard 1x2 sharks 2x10 or 1x20 Phoenix Guard If I was going full competitive obviously the sharks would get kicked to the curb for more morrsarr units, but for a casual game gotta bring something fun, and the doubles tourney I brought them to got me hooked on them despite their flaws. If PG not legal, will add back a 4th morrsarr msu unit and probably add 2 units of heartrenders instead, but I will not be nearly as excited haha (though may end up being better competitively)

Forgot they got the lore spell too. I still prefer Phoenix Guard, but if you are already taking the Thorn I see your point. I forgot how decent Thorn are. That does change it.

But its not just a 130 point investment anymore... Now you are also paying for Sisters of the Thorn to buff them, and expending the spell to do it. Maybe you take sisters of the thorn anyways, idk, but regardless it is no longer JUST 130pts you are talking about 260pts of models, one of which you are taking more or less primarily for a spell that STILL leaves the unit worse off then Phoenix Guard against all attacks except those that do not have any rend with only 1 battlefield purpose that cannot be altered, vs a unit that can pretty much function in any capacity depending on the whims of the battle. I just still don't really see it. All the other units we are talking about in these upper tiers of elite troops do not need all of these very specific circumstances to succeed. Maybe I prove wrong, as again it is very early to be discussing good vs bad, but with all the caveats I have trouble seeing it in practice.

Thanks for putting in the leg work. Super good stuff! I think I would disagree with some of the conclusions you came to in your original post though. Mainly on Executioners I feel like they are worse then blackguard for only 10 pts less and fill the exact same role so why would you ever field them competitively? I also think we all need to be careful when looking at the buffs. Think Eternal Guard also are being overrated here.. For me I think elite infantry seems to be fitting into 3 tiers based on early observations and the mathhammer I have seen so far for competitive play, obviously very early goings but: Phoenix Guard seem to be alone at the top tier and can basically function in any city or build without a lot of buff bubbles needed imo. Hammerers, Greatswords, and Blackguard are tier 2, with being potentially the most efficient unit for a role but very much being city/army dependent. Then there is tier 3 which is basically everything else in the elite infantry mould (infantry that is not default battleline and over 100pts). What about eternal guard you may wonder? The list of conditions needed to make them competent I think are just a bit too oppressive and restrictive to make them worth the price of Hammerers and on par with anything in the top 2 tiers, I just don't think there is a good enough reason to preference them in almost any situation that will appear regularly. Remember that there purpose is not to charge, which means they represent a purely defensive role. The opponent has no obligation to engage them if they can avoid it, or they will lose the singular bonus that puts them in the conversation. Additionally their complete lack of rend hides a significantly weaker damage output then the stats first suggest. Against a 4+ save opponent they do less damage standing still then every other elite unit I have mentioned above AND Executioners. Defensively they are purely worse then phoenix guard, offensively they are worse then all the other elites against something with any armour, all of this for a unit that can't move so long as it wants to be effective. Not great imo.

Forgot to include my loadout, but it was exactly the same as your go to, Gyrstrike and born from agony. It's not particularly exciting, but it helps extend his survivability to get into some of the more important rounds, and gyrstrike pretty much guarantees 2 polearm attacks get through with a good shot at all 3 going. Guaranteeing 6 wounds on the charge against most things is pretty important as I often find myself using him to dash towards lightly defended objectives in the backfield, or as a non-monstrous character hunter. Nothing is more disheartening then getting him into a 5-10 man objective defense force and only killing like 2 models... Can't imagine not putting born from agony on him either if he is general, because getting him to turn 3 is obviously super important. I feel like a case could certainly be made to make him fully defensive, and put one of the warding artefacts on him (Ignax's Scales seems like potentially a good choice, because for me he is almost always getting killed by mortals when he does dies), but as far as offensive output goes, as boring as it may be Gyrstrike is pound for pound the best offensive realm artifact in the game unless your character is already hitting on 2+'s. Rageblade would maybe be the runner up? I think depending on how you are using your list a case could also be made for Ankusha Spur or Thermalrider cloak, 17-18 inch movement is absolutely nothing to joke about, particularly if you are depending on him for his various bubbles, though if you are primarily using him in that role Vulternos is probably going to be the choice so... idk I just always keep ending up back at born from agony and gyrstrike when I take him as general, which admittedly is not particularly often, though lately I have been choosing him or volt more often the more I notice turn 2 ASF not being as necessary as I used to think and often creating a "trap" scenario that encourages rapid engagement when more and more often I am finding that is not what we want to do (particularly against top tier lists). I still think tidecaster general gives you more flexibility and encourages you to take a good amount of reavers which is definitely a good thing, but I find far too often I do not have the self control to use fliptide judiciously, and taking the king instead forces my hand to play more conservatively. I've been thinking to use him as training wheels lately. Especially later on in a tourney, when I am starting to get tired it is so easy to over-endulge in early game shenanigans with fliptide. Hoping that using King or volt and generally wanting to play avoidance for first couple of turns trains me to less often use kneejerk aggression early on in my fliptide lists haha.

I am a proponent of Comp, and it certainly was the only reason 8th edition had such a thriving tournament community. Between Swedish, ETC, and multiple other rule variants in between we were spoiled with a large variety of tournaments that all felt unique, while also maintaining a degree of competitiveness that just didn't exist in the base game. That being said, the majority of people who feel this way have moved on to 9th, and as new players come in and for those that are left I think the historical 40k attitude towards comp (no) is going to continue being the prevalent attitude in AoS. So feel like its not really worth much discussion at this point. Luckily AoS is in a much better place then 8th ever was in terms of balance. It could use quite a bit of improvement, much of which is quite fixable via some form of comp, but I think quite a few mid tier armies are viable at the top of the scene (ie if played by extremely skilled players who know the ins and outs of their armies). I think when it comes to tournament play, most don't choose to go this route, but those people you are talking about who want to be competitive with one singular list, can absolutely achieve that (unless we are talking about a true bottom tier army) if they are willing to put in enough practice and continually bang their heads against that wall of the top tier. The game just has so many movement nuances and is so dependent on precision and the single minded pursuit of objectives and what exactly you need to do to maximize them, that I think the combat imballances are a bit less important then they seem for many of us. However, getting to that level of skill, where it stops mattering quite as much seems to be a place that is hard to reach. I certainly am no where near it. But I have seen people who have gotten their (think people like the Seraphon player who won Adepticon).

dupe post delete

dupe post delete

Came in first at a fun doubles event the other day where I took my deepkin and my partner took nurgle. I did not gain all that many insights into our singles list building from it, but it was a lot of fun and thought I'd share some of the fun moments with my fellow deepkin. Super obvious take away of the day:putting massed bodies that are tough as nails to kill in a screen in front of a bunch of eels, results in exactly what you would think it does... First 2 games were pretty straight forward + matchups for us where there wasn't a ton our opponents could do baring lots of luck or mistakes on our part, though the games were fun anyways (it was mostly a casual tourney where everyone were trying to take a bit of ridiculousness). First was a skaven + nighthaunts teammup on starstrike; that was a lot of fun. Moment of the match where my partner was worried about a unit of 20 skryer acolites, backed up by the skryer character, with me committing my big block of eels elsewhere. "No worries friend, baby eels on the way". Both he and my opponent were doubtful that I could kill the whole unit before they fled down the gnarhole they were sitting on reappearing behind us. I, however, was quite confident, and sure enough exactly 20 unsaved wounds later there was much rejoicing and anguish depending on who you were. Second round we played Khorne + Tzeench, with Skarbrand on scorched earth, which pretty much forced them to push with khorne stuff. SKarbrand forced to commit into 30 plague bearers, doing something insane like 26 mortals + whatever other combat damage, yet 5 still survived. Plague bearers flee, and I charge in with eels, and that was pretty much beginning of end. It was a bad matchup for them, and on top of that we had the luck in the game. It was basically just a giant string of combats at the center of table, and scarbrand combat with eels allowed maurauders to get behind their lines to start burning objectives. Our last round where it was the only 2 lists that had full objective points was the really really cool one though. We played a legions of grief + FEC pairing, and ofcourse the FEC player had the king on gheist combo... It was honestly the one and only list at the tourney (12-14 teams) that I think had a + matchup against us and we honestly should have lost. The entire game my big unit of eels and his terrorgheist were basically engaged in a multi turn stare down contest where they each just kinda sat just out of charge range of the other and waited. We both knew whoever got the charge would likely kill or cripple the other. We were playing the orb scenario and that, I think, was our only saving grace. Because it is so waited towards steeling objective from our opponent, we won each of the first 3 priority rolls and each and every time gave priority to our opponents, doing just enough in our phase to steal the objective from them, and then once the objective moved disallowing them from stealing from us, we did the same thing all over again. Even with all that luck, we were still likely going to lose, but turn 3 they finally committed the gheist, and it looked like they were going to be able to lock up the eels in the process, but through a series of pile in shenanigans that included my partner breaking coherency on a unit of 30 plague bearers (losing 10) I was able to jailbreak them for a turn 3 charge with all of the accompanied extra attacks from my king. Gheist of course torched them back on death frenzy, but with what was left on the table our objective advantage was too much to overcome. (EDIT: I should also mention time was a contributing factor here, and last 2 turns had to basically be talked through. So if we had full time for game, maybe they would have still found a way to win last 2 turns, as we were basically just theory hammering it as it was a casual event). For me the most exciting thing was that I finally got to bring my 2 sharks to an event. I had a blast with these guys, whether it was the complete ineptitude of their shooting, that brought joy to everyone around the table, or their surprisingly strong combats that were nearly on par at times with the eels. I think they are definitely better then I give them credit for, but they just aren't as good as eels, so I will still likely never field them competitively. My list was: King 6 eels 3 eels 2 sharks (in 1 unit) My partner's list (aproximation don't have it in front of me): 30 plague bearers 20 plague bearers 40 maurauders 2 caster characters (1 had the wand thing that doles out bubbled reroll 6's to hit or wound to enemies)

I agree battleshock immunity is a problem. A single command point should not invalidate an entire phase of the game, it should be re-roll plain and simple, and no army should have countless special rules eliminating the phase either. It should be a rarity in the game, units like Phoenix Guard being one of the few instances where it makes sense. Particularly in armies where leadership issues are clearly intended to be primary weaknesses (most greenskins, skaven etc) yet in each case there are widespread army rules that nearly completely invalidates the leadership problem, this becomes emersion breaking. Either eliminate battleshock entirely, or eliminate the prevalence of rules that break it. That being said with the exception of Skaven, nothing in the top tier is particularly affected by this, so as much as it is a major GW rules blunder, I don't think it is particularly meaningful to the game's biggest balance issues. As far as the wide prevalence of ASF/ASL abilities, and the ability to double strike/get extra pile ins and attacks out of phase. I think these things are anti fun and against many armies that don't have them potentially game breaking. I think part of the fix to both of these things is to change the combat phase ordering. I think when GW first ran into this problem IE the wording of ASF for deepkin vs the wording of ASF for FEC they implemented a solution that they thought would keep things simple, but also allow them to pretend the wording of ASF for FEC was not a mistake. Since then their wording for these abilities has always been in the FEC wording, which makes what I propose as the solution more difficult, but no less necessary. The phase sequence needs to be Start of phase combat abilities (mostly passive ones) always occur before attacks (things like mortal wounds/impact hits should all be occurring within the charge phase, so voltaic blasts and the like should be moved to then), THEN ASF attacks, THEN normal attacks, THEN ASL attacks, and anything that allows an additional pile in/attack phase should always occur at the tale end of combat. With the crazy power level of AOS combat in the game I really don't think out of phase pile ins (DoK) should be a thing at all. I think this fixes a lot of the problems with these rules, and I think Cities is promising in this regard, because it has multiple rules that dole out additional attack phases etc but all of them place those at the end of combat or after the death of a model. I think this is the way forward here. Overall though I honestly think the game isn't doing that bad. Per my earlier post, I think the biggest issue is just list diversity. The last tourney I went to was a blast, and I saw some great players using some generally underpowered armies to good effect. You are always going to see meta chasing, and even moderate advantages are going to lead to a disproportionate number of a couple of armies, but I think there are a good number of books right now that in the hands of an expert player seem entirely capable of winning a tournament. I would like to see Slaanesh taken down a notch, and I think as far as summoning goes they are the extreme example where they just made it too damn easy to gain summoning points. I think it made a lot of sense thematically and in terms of fun gameplay as a self flagellation fettish style thing where you get summoning points for basically killing yourself. I think where it falters is getting basically double, for killing your own tough models AND your opponents. It needed to be 1 or the other. Some of the others are a tick too powerful, but in general I think if they follow the Tzeench/Khorn model as mentioned by @kuroyume summoning isn't nearly as big of a problem as it feels at the moment.

I think for the most part people don't actually want balance. They want diversity. These are not the same things imo, but they are adjacent. With balance, the more balanced a game is, the more homogeneous. The more variance in function, rules, and stats from side to side the more imbalance that is introduced. There are of course degrees and various ways to mitigate some of this, at least in part, but if you have a varied game system with lots of different units and abilities 9 times out of 10 you have a game system rife with imbalance. I'd say that there are few tabletop gaming systems with quite as much variety, breadth, and customization as GW affords its players. This has a price and it is balance. If you have ever played Kings of War, you will see the price they have payed for a much more balanced system: their units are vanilla, the lore in game is non existent, and there is significantly less to think about in terms of army comp etc. For some this is fine and ideal, for me personally, if I wanted that I would play chess. But I think when people talk about balance in relation to AoS tourneys, they are really talking about build diversity. That the top tier is too small. It is possible to have a game about as balanced as AoS is now, but with completely acceptable army diversity. The problem is, and this is where balance and diversity very much intersect, for diversity to be possible I think the balance issues can't be that of phase function, but instead unit function if that makes sense? The balance issues need to be more weighted internally towards specific books, rather then externally toward specific styles. Hordes, elites, fast/alpha strike, avoidance, shooting lists all need to valid and potentially strong as they work as counters against one another. This is going to support list diversity which projects the appearance of balance. What we have right now at the top is a play-style that is vastly under-represented. Shooting/avoidance. Shooting is the #1 counter for both FEC and Slaanesh that I have seen mentioned continuously online. Yet it is also the playstyle most under-represented in the top tier. The result? List diversity is shot and you see a crazy amount of FEC and Slaanesh (I think DOK is more of an "internal balance" problem and is just a book that needs a desperate re-work in general as their strength is not so easily explained by meta representation imo). Cities very well may serve to help begin the remedy for this idk, but I think the major source of "imbalance" ruffling the feathers of so many AoS gamers right now is more a diversity issue then a balance issue. There are always going to be balance complaints, and balance quality will ebb and flow, but I really think tourney list diversity is the #1 reason for outsized complaints in the AoS community. Real balance is not something AoS or any other table top game that puts a premium on lore and personality are ever likely to achieve much of, and I am absolutely okay with that, as long as skill remains extremely important and capable of overcoming a lot of the imbalance. List diversity is my big issue, and I hope that a couple of the new books shift the meta enough that we will see that at the top of tournies again here soon.