tripchimeras

I'm not a fan of "spirit of the game" either, but for slightly different reasons. I think the spirit of the game is entirely situational and should be considered more of a loose contract or understanding between two gamers trying to have a good time that changes slightly every time you play. I too am mostly a competitive gamer, and the strategy (whether that be list-building, or in game) is the biggest aspect I like in wargaming. If I am at a tournament for example this competitive spirit is clearly understood and everyone in attendance should know that going in. I am obviously going to try to ensure my opponent has a good time with me, but I will absolutely do my best to club him without mercy within the game itself, while still being as fair as possible. But if I go to a local shop playing people I don't know it makes no sense to take the same attitude. Playing a stranger, or even a friend for that matter, bringing a fluff list who isn't great at strategy and destroying them does very little to increase my skill as a player or my understanding of my list. It is not enjoyable to beat someone who isn't playing the same game as me and make for a bad experience for both them and me. If I am at a store I am going to always ensure I am very clear on what type of opponent I am playing and what type of list they are bringing. Its as simple as asking "are you competitive or are you more a fluff/hobby guy?" If the former, great we are playing the same game and your and my ideal playstyle will be what I do though keeping in mind that maxing out isn't really important and its still just a random game at a store. But if he makes clear he is a hobbyist first, new and learning, or a beer and pretzel guy I would be doing both myself and him a disservice by bringing the same attitude and "spirit" I bring to a tournament. If I am only there looking to hone my competitive skills I will either explain that to him and either see if he has a competitive build he can play in this one instance, and if not respectfully explain that I am only really looking for a certain type of game and move on. Otherwise I am going to bring out my own fluff and enjoy a break from my eel spam list or whatever. I'm not going to "take it easy on them" per say. but I'm also not going to worry about doing ticky tacky things, or virtually end the game top of turn 1 by sniping every hero in his army just because I can or whatever. I'm going to play fair and try to win, but within reason keeping in mind that the spirit in this situation is to have fun and do fluffy things, not simply to win, though I will still try to do so within reason. I might make that epic looking, but high risk charge, I wouldn't normally, or whatever. It need not be one or the other, and there is no reason not to try out the game from a different angle every once in a while (not saying you or anyone else doesn't do that). The reason the more casual crowd gets so touchy about competitive play and tactics, is because they have had competitive players come to their store, with no tact or situational awareness and be "that guy". This is a cooperative community based game at its heart, and not figuring out what your opponent is about before the game starts is does a disservice to both of you and is why those of us who tend to think mostly in terms of competitive play get lambasted online a lot. I know most of us do understand this, and I am sure you do as well, I am just saying this is why and the "spirit of the game" to me is always fluid and situationally dependent, and that's why I don't like discussing it, because I don't think there should just be 1 answer for anyone. As to you wondering about the big difference between card games vs tabletop gaming in the communities and approach, in my opinion it all comes down to the depth of the hobby. In a card game it is significantly more shallow (this is not a criticism, there are just fewer aspects to the hobby). A card game is meant to be played, there is really not much more to be done. There is collecting and trading or whatever, but its a lesser thing. Certainly you can build themed decks to a certain extent, but there is not the depth of customization and personal investment into said cards. You bought them, there are no conversions, or painting or personalization. In tabletop gaming the hobby is so much larger then just the game. Painting, converting, and putting together the models take up more time then actually goes into playing the game, unless you buy your armies fully painted (totally valid). The money and time investment leads to attachment, the lore is one of the key reasons to get into the hobby, not to say card games don't have lore, but its far more present in tabletop gaming and customizing it to your army in non tourney play is kinda the point, while the flavor text and portrait for any given card is set, kinda hard to change what that card is or represents. Its just a different beast and the two are not really comparable imo.

Not so long ago in whfb this was actually pretty much tourney standard (ETC comp), and Swedish the other primary comp system wasn't so very different in practice. I kind of miss the days of comp, those systems always did a much better job of balancing the game then GW ever did, but even at the height of 8th edition's broken balance they were controversial so I get it. Regardless each of those systems were perfected over time by committees of seasoned tourney players and were widely utilized in a significant portion of major events. So I agree with you in so much that in AoS there is no precedent for this, no structured and battle tested method to begin with, and no popular player support. House rules just in general do not work in tournaments. If its not RAW it has to be an organized and recognized comp system. No matter how much someone wants it to be otherwise it won't work if you want anyone to come, and you don't want mass confusion over list design and play.

Good point on the base size and character consumption. Hadn't thought about the getting into tight spaces to single models. That is definitely a bit of utility there that is nice. I assume sharks in larger units have to have some kind of leadership bubble following them, or you need to have command points at the ready. I definitely can picture 140pt (120 now) a model sharks just melting away on a bad roll after the first one died in combat lol. I prefer the versatility of flip tide so haven't gotten as many king focused games in, and theory hammer def only gets you so far haha. So definitely might try to use one for hero hunting in my next list and see if I prefer it to more eels.

Haven't read through all the new battle plans, but weren't most of the power builds already pretty movement intensive. If this puts even more emphasis on movement isn't this just going to make shooting heavy lists even less efficient, making things like FEC even stronger?

Is it a 1 dayer or 2 dayer? This can be pretty impactful, because they have different wrinkles in terms of organization issues. 1 dayers are obviously easier, but they have their own unique issues too (I actually think time is a bigger issue for them). Food is extremely important. Ensure that there is a food option available for lunch on tourney days. Depending on where the tournament is being held (Gaming Store, neutral venue etc) I would see if you could arrange a food truck to park outside for lunch, or if at a store see if they would be open to ordering pizzas and drinks and selling them at a slight markup. Its less of an issue (depending on the size of your tourney) if it is held in a shopping center or there are a ton of fast restaurant options near by. But often there is not time for a super long lunch break, and ensuring that there is an option on site can releave a lot of stress and headache. On this topic, if its feasible an hour for lunch is much preferred. I have seen tourneys that try to squeeze it in in 30-45 minutes and it has always been chaos. The longer you can manage the betterthe better. I have hosted a single tournament (it was back in WHFB) with my club, and similar to yours, we hosted it without any prior experience aside from attending tourney's ourselves. I can tell you, both from hosting and from going to tournaments, that food can become quite the contentious issue if the tourney organizers make no plans. Especially if you have out of towners sending info about suggested food options in advance is very helpful. Another thing to consider if you are planning on enticing out of towners I highly suggest either organizing a hotel block, or at the very least providing information about the closest hotels to the venue and how far away they are. People can do this for themselves, but it is helpful and makes the event feel more accessible (it also signals that you want out of towners there by providing that info on invites or whatever). Be very careful and plan the award/closing ceremony in advance. The award ceremony is far more difficult to execute then one would think, and I have been to many tournaments where it caused a lot of confusion and quite a bit of anger/hurt feelings. In the tournament I helped host, we calculated everything right but handed our chosen presenter the list out of order in our haste to get it started and it caused a moment of embarrasment as the wrong club winner got announced, and it made it look like we were making fun of them. It wasn't a big mistake and it was immediately corrected, but it still left a sour taste in one clubs mouth, and it sucked. Do not rush to the podium however tempting it is to do so. People will be milling around and if its a single day tournament it will likely be late and people will want to get home. And if its a 2 dayer out of towners are going to be wanting to get on the road/to their flights and in towners will be fatigued from 2 days of gaming. Either way you will be under pressure to wrap things up, but plan your schedule around the fact that it is 100% of the time going to take you longer to calculate the final results and double check them then you think. Be strict with your time limits per round and stick to the schedule. No matter what people say to try to get an extra turn in, even if its table 1. In general apply all of the rules as written in the rules pack evenly and completely. Do not make exceptions even if it seems like it makes sense to or is reasonable. We made 1 such exception, because in the moment it seemed like an edge case we had not intended, but it was a mistake and we were lucky it did not end up effecting our results. Same goes with paint judging, be very careful to spell out your rubric in detail and precisely, and be ready to show your work after the fact. Go by the rubric, even if you realize one army looks better then another subjectively, if you didn't account for it properly in your rubric you have to go by the rubric. You can only use the eye test/personal preference in ties. I agree with others that you don't want to do house rules. We used comp in our tournament, but that was in the days of fantasy 8th edition and it was a more or less universally accepted reality of the game, and it was a well established comp system that most tourneys in our region used. AoS does not operate under such conditions, and as such unless you use a major tourney's variation which most are familiar with, stick to the base game even if you don't love things about it. Other then that I just can't emphasize enough to be consistent, and always support whoever your TO's are. You have given them final word on disputes, so their decision is final (in that vein make sure whoever you choose really knows their rules). Also the more money you can put towards the prizes and plaques the better. People like to be able to see their money in action, and that is where it is going to be most visible. A cool plaque like a sword or something goes a long way. EDIT: One last thing I highly suggest on top of the crazy long post I have already made, is to request list submissions in advance. Far enough in advance to give your club time to check ALL of them. Nothing is more sour then the discovery of an illegal list half way through at a top table. EDIT 2: Always have a ringer. If someone rage quits half-way through the event, or someone can't show on day 2, you need someone to fill in. It is extremely important for that ringer to take a very middle of the road list, play it well, but not be a top table guy. He is going to be playing at one of the bottom tables if needed and it is important, that the opponent A. have a good time, B. not feel penalized that he is facing a ringer but C. in the unlikely event it ends up affecting results it was deemed a fair game.

I definitely agree with this. The GHB can't solve the biggest issues through points. I think GW severely underutilizes FAQ's to fix things. Idk if its that they are afraid of admitting their mistakes or they are afraid including too many pivotal things will confuse too many people or if its just that they only see FAQ's as a way to clarify rules rather then fix them, but given the prevalence of online rules/ epub versions this should become increasingly less of an issue in my mind and they should use FAQ's to fix badly designed units and unforeseen consequences. GW needs to be much more willing to make significant changes through FAQ. It would be so easy to fix the biggest FEC issue with a pretty strait forward change in a FAQ for example. I know they've made pretty sizeable changes from time to time in FAQ, but I think they are far too rarely used to do this. The FAQ's over the years have consistently dissapointed and been conservatively/lazilly implemented imo. I guess we will have to see if that trend is changed when the next set get released.

Nice call. But I will say that it really depends on how much going second is actually important to you I think as Deepkin are one of the few armies that are less affected by first turn priority. Its also not quite as simple as +100 pts for all of those benefits. Its really +220pts if you take the min shark as min shark is still next to useless, and if you plan on making the sharks actually useful it becomes a little more complicated to determine the lost efficiency of replacing a unit of eels of 1 type or another with multiple sharks. That is a considerable investment, and its not as simple as to calculate. Additionally its not just whether 220 is worth the points (I agree with you that unlike before it probably is), its A. Can I fit it to begin with without sacrificing the integrity of my list strategy B. Is it better then what I could include if I'm not bound by it. I think it depends on the list and your goals. If you take a king list its certainly easier to fit then if you run traditional battleline, but I think the need to go second in the king list is not so great. So imo from the perspective of power building its probably still not something worth taking. From the perspective of things we can take while still being moderately competitive I think you make a good point that this is much more an option post GHB then it was prior to it. I definitely think we can chalk this as a list building win for us. If you aren't looking to win the whole tourney but want to be competitive in your games, or just want to go toe-to-toe with competitively minded friends, I definitely think our options have been opened a considerable amount, which is definitely more positive then the rule changes initially seemed. As an aside on my previous post about new builds that are exciting me more then previously, I realized why I liked the build I listed more post release then I did pre-release. I think I was making an analytical mistake in focusing too much on the fact that the build I liked was legal before too. Yes, it was legal, but the point costs were more heavily weighted towards the support units in the list before, making it seem like an unaffordable indulgeance, while now with the power build costing more, the point costs are more heavily weighted then previously towards the offensive units. So while the list is the same, you are giving up less for it in comparison to the other builds then you were before. Something to keep in mind with the changes, that I missed in my previous post. Still don't think the list is a power build, but like using a full akhelian Corp. I think it is competitively viable which is better then before.

Lots of talk on general threads about ghb pt changes, and my opinion and consensus seems to be that almost nothing has changed for us. Power builds basically lose a soulscryer or 3 eels and that's about it. However, it hasn't stopped me from trying to re-examine all of our underutilized units in the hopes of finding anything new that works competitively at the new points. Anyone finding new wrinkles they plan on trying for deepkin now that they weren't considering before? My thoughts on one is below. While I think the sharks are close, they really only work in the exact same massed role Morrsarr filled, and the Morrsarr still fill it better. So while I think you actually might be able to fill a moderately competitive list with them now, I think they make less sense then some of the things that got less help, since you are not actually altering your army construction, you are replacing one unit with another, slightly worse one, that fills basically identical role. I keep trying to make an infantry heavy list with soulrenders since they got such a big point drop and everytime I look at it, it looks like a logistical nightmare that would not play well on the table. I just can't wrap my head around thrall units larger then 10 with the 32mm base size combined with short attack range. Ironically the only list I've come up with so far that I don't instantly hate involves either an eidolon or a leviadon interchangeably, and in both cases (hilariously) the list was already legal before the ghb changes and in fact was slightly cheaper... Why I didn't like it then, and like it now? I have no idea, probably just desperation to play something a little different in my competitive focused group, and a renewed desire to make the underused models work. Tidecaster (general) soulscryer 10 thralls 10 thralls 10 thralls 6 Ishlaen Guard 12 Morrsarr Guard Leviadon Allies: 10 eternal guard Cost before GHB: 1990 Cost after GHB: 2000 ( I know, it baffles me that this list sounds better to me now that it is actually more expensive haha) OR remove the allies and the leviadon and add in the eidolan, the 2 essentially fill the same role in the list (make it harder to kill my stuff) with different pros/cons. I think on first thought I like it a little more for leviadon, though the eidolon was the model I most wanted the GHB to make playable (I love its rules). It is honestly same basic structure as the current flip-tide power build. You are basically losing 9 morrsarr plus some change for 6 ishlaen guard and a leviadon or eidolan. I think if you go Leviadon, there is a case for reducing morrsarr to 9 and kicking ishlaen to 9 since its buff is made for them, but idk, that will come with playtesting. What I like about this list variation is mostly that it has more balance. There is a little more going on, there are more strategic ripples then traditional power builds for us. It is lacking in raw power, and I think ultimately it is worse for that, but I think its good enough to be moderately competitive, so I may very well try it. Unfortunately though for me this exercise just went to show that, aside from helping me to look at the book with new eyes and maybe giving me a new thing to try while I recover from morrsarr fatigue, these changes have essentially done nothing to alter what the competitive builds look like in the book to my eyes. Anyone else got any interesting builds the new pt changes have caused them to re-examine? Even if that build, like mine, turns out to have been legal all along haha. Would love to see if anyone thinks there is something new worth trying that we couldn't do before.

Interesting so you go all Ishlaen and no morrsarr? Have you tried spamming to death massive morrsarr units with deepstriking and using turn 3 as more of a luxury? Wonder if that might work out just on sheer weight of mortals and models? Volturnos is pretty useful even without relying on the command ability, and while morrsarr are better off with ASF, if you have enough of them I would think you could weather the combat to still get the killing in. Haven't tried it myself but I would imagine against a lot of opponents it works. I think the risk you run is getting bogged down, and if you don't kill enough you are pretty much screwed. Alternatively maybe throwing them out in waves might work? Holding back your biggest unit with volt perhaps holding some objectives on your end, to come in and finish things off on turn 3. Like if you have enough of them, using them as suicide bombers isn't such a bad thing, they are durable enough to force the enemy to devote resources to killing them even after the charge is over. Assuming you are always taking volturnos and 1 soulscryer (assuming new ghb pts) that gives you 1590 to spend entirely on eel spam. That's 27 morrsarr. Ram a unit of 9 in through deepstrike on turn 1 and do as much damage as you possibly can, force opponent to put attention immediately on dealing with them, turn 2 maybe come in with 6 if you need to keep them distracted or need to cover your primary force, then turn 3 come in with 2-3 units of 6 depending on what you did on turn 2 and volturnos since with asf you don't need to worry about i go you go. Idk something like that. Only reason I might split them up a little like that is for objective coverage. Seems like itd be pretty good, maybe a little too point and click for my tastes, but I feel like if you are going to go the king list route, just going all in on raw voltaic power might serve better then trying to cover yourself with the high armour, play the strengths of the combo to the max and hope the strengths are so strong that the extreme weaknesses don't even come into play lol. edit: The reason I haven't tried the entirely eel spam build personally is just a lack of models. I have 18 morrsarr right now, so can't pull this off, and I haven't seen any tourney results or streams that had a deepkin going morrsarr spam this hard. Most I've seen 21 morrsarr. The king lists I've seen have had some ishlaens in them to hold the enemy in place, and I'm meh on it, but that's why I wonder if maybe just going all in offense, no holds barred might end up working better

So much this! I understand why its the combo that occures to everyone first, but turh 3 is so very far away and our list is so glass cannony. To make it work you have to put all of your eggs in that one basket with very little space for contingency, and I am just not convinced at all that that the combo is even needed for the most part. The eels are killing almost everything with few exceptions without the kings help. That being said I think maybe the real benefit to that list is being able to skip the thrall/reaver battleline entirely and just go all out on eels. I am of the opinion that flip tide list is the stronger competitive play. There are situations when the no thrall eel spam is better, but for the most part those situations exist in a space where the deepkin flip tide list has the advantage as well, just not as big of one. The flip tide list is far more versatile in my opinion, and gives you contingencies when you run into something unexpected. For example in the situation you mention where third turn high tide is prefered, you just don't flip the tide. Your 18 -21 eels are still going to be nearly as deadly as the all out eel spam was. And I think the thralls/reavers in your backline are great for holding objectives on your side of the board and there are situations where the thralls are going to be much appreciated (hordes). Its just more balanced and especially in a tourney setting a little bit of balance is needed for to stay competitive in marginal/coin flip matchups. Edit: also note that the last deepkin list to take 1st in a tourney was a flip-tide list. If anyone is interested to see it in action I know the Dimensional Cascade youtube channel streamed table 1 of that tourney, and the deepkin list that won just so happened to be on table one for the last 3 games, so you can see how he used it. I think the fyreslayer matchup was the most impressive, as I think that is a negative matchup for us normally. He def lucked up on not drawing FEC as a matchup, but everyone (including FEC) has a matchup like that, so winning a tourney is always going to require a little matchup luck. He was a really good player regardless and I learned a lot from watching those streams.

I'm sure your friend is playing in good faith as well, and just wanted to use cool models, but the competitiveness of your lists are not even close unfortunately. FEC is a rough matchup for Deepkin to begin with, but on top of that he is playing a list that sits much closer to the FEC power builds then your list is close to the deepkin power builds, so a fairly bad matchup is made much worse by the list construction gap. You would need him to make some mistakes and for everything to go right for you to have a shot in this game. I know its narrative play so list construction tips are probably not what you are looking for, but you may want to harden your list a bit if terrorgheist ghoul kings lists are what your opponents are bringing. As for what you can do, like others have said you gotta focus in and isolate his heroes as early as possible. If you are interested in hardening up the list specifically with the idea of hanging with the FEC list a little longer I would say first off you are never going to make it to high tide as things stand to use the king combo, so I would run the mage as your general and split up the thralls into 20/10 to stay legal with fliptide at minimum against him if you want to use same models, king can still aid in killing the heroes, and honestly the 20/10 split is going to likely help you in objective game. If you have the models I'd then either flip the ishlaen for morrsarr for a small change to be a little better against your friend, or keep the ishlaen and flip the king for morrsarr and if you need extra points to do so get rid of the shark as well to make the room. If you really want to give him a run I would remove the king, the shark and the ishlaen for 2 units of 6 morrsarr, flip the tides with the mage, and try to time the charge so the morrsarr both hit the gheist on turn 2, good chance you kill it. If you manage to do that with most of your army intact you will likely win. You still have the turtle then to keep the army semi fluffy :). Edit: the problem with just playing keep away till turn 3 for the comboing, is 1. that is easier said then done 2. that whole time he is going to be summoning, widening the gap in army strength, and if he has some skill likely dominating board control as you flee and depending on scenario taking hefty objective leads that are going to be extremely difficult for you to come back from if you have to spend turn 3 trying to finally start whittling his army down. On top of that the king combo is really best with morrsarr, the ishlaen will benefit from it much less, and while its great with the thralls they are the unit least likely to successfully play keep away till turn 3.

Interesting rankings, don't completely agree but AA is prob where slaanesh belongs. As for the statistics, their win percentage is certainly putting the book in the top 4 or 5, though that is a bit misleading as they were doing extremely well before the new book came out; I wish honest wargamer would seperate out their stats pre and post book releases. Especially in regards to the # of high tourney placings they have had most of the 2.2 placing's they got were actually before the new book came out. They are certainly a strong book, but I wouldn't call them broken. They have potentially 3 or 4 top 3 finishes in the 2 months since the new book came out, 2 of which came in the exact same 33 person tournament, the other being a 3rd place finish. They also had a 1st place finish the week after the book was released in a 22 person tourney (EDIT: confirmed that this 1st place occured under pre-tome rules so it doesn't count). That is simultaneously a very small sample and not nearly as impressive as FEC, LoN, and DoK in same timeframe. Heck even the Khorne book you were saying was so much worse, has only 1 less top 3 finish in the same time frame. Seems pretty balanced to me in comparison to the other new books that have come out this year. They are clearly a very strong book, but I think your definition of "OP" is a bit too broad. Edit: I would absolutely put them in the AA tier, but I would not define that tier as broken. S is where broken books belong. Also There is no way Nurgle and SCE are at the same level as deepkin or fireslayers, Both of the latter should be at the AA tier with slaanesh imo, while A tier should be expanded.

I think this is a good point, and very fair. However, the response to this though is that once that book is released and all that data is come in far too often GW does literally nothing about it. They rarely use FAQ's the way they should, and even when big updates like GHB do come out, far too often very little actually gets fixed. This gives the impression GW has no idea what they are doing, doesn't know how to play there own game, and never play tests. GW needs to be more transparent with their rules development, they need to be far more willing to make sizeable adjustments in the post release faq's with the benefit of those thousands of games they could not get before its release, and they need to either have more frequent GHB style updates OR they need to be much bolder in the pt updates they do have. I think GW runs with the attitude of well WE already know what the next 6 books are going to look like and once they are out this will not be an issue and the meta will have passed this by. Well the problem is that in the meantime, we the players do not know this, and we have to play with it for the 6 months before those books have come out, and in the meantime there is potential for each and every one of those books to introduce something just as if not more problematic then the issue they know will get fixed. If GW made clear that they were aware of their issues and made good faith fixes once the data existed to do so, there would be much more trust and fewer people would be under the mistaken impression the designers don't know how to play their own game. I really don't think the meta is in that terrible a place, I remember the end times, in comparison the current state is amazing. But I still get pissed off everytime GW lets these glaring issues fester when it would be so easy to release a faq 3 months later to fix the issue, especially given that the designers ARE going to these tournaments and know they exist. It absolutely is possible to release too many updates too quickly, but GW has NEVER been in danger of even coming close to approaching that point.

Problems with the Khorne book do not make the slaanesh book bad, particularly since due to their releases they were being worked on at the exact same time so slaanesh cannot be seen as a response to khorne, its rules were set in stone right around the same time Khornes were in all probability. In fact they likely were being play tested around the same time, it would certainly have made sense then as such to have done so in conjunction with the two books and ensure each were strong where they should have been in comparison to one another. This honestly just goes back to what I was saying about GW needing to create the rules for their books more by committee. By assigning each to a different author without huge overlap, things like this occur. However, the slaanesh book is, for the most part, both internally and externally balanced, it has multiple ways to play, contains many subtle and interesting rules, and is powerful without their being the 1 singularly OP build. And the way it plays feels true to the god it portrays. The Khorne book not working as intended is not a reflection on Slaanesh, but on Khorne and its writer. Again the fact that GW does not craft its tome rules by committee or at the very least have the same team tackle like tomes in tandem, particularly with something like the chaos gods, is unfortunate. But its the way GW has always designed army books, so saying slaanesh sucks because its better then khorne at what khorne is supposed to be the best at when slaanesh itself is not unbalanced, simply means khorne is bad. That being said I do not think Slaanesh is better at fighting then khorne, they are complete glass cannons and get slaughtered if there is anything left after they hit, and since nothing in the army flies your ability to pick and choose how and what they hit is by no means limitless. I dont think that is there best play style. I also don't think Khorne is quite so bad as many act like they are, they are a bit worse then they should be most definitely, and don't quite function the way you would expect khorne to, but they are not off by a huge margin.

I think the idea of a narrative pts floor makes a lot more sense of the "why" for a lot of GW's point changes, as well to explain why for so many years they have continuously baffled with many of the pt costs in their armies. Definitely something I haven't thought much on in the past. This is hard, because the narrative of the game defines the roles of units, but there are plenty of narrative roles that just have no purpose within the confines of the real world game rules. Additionally there are plenty of narrative dictated unit mechanics that are next to useless in the actual game but are assigned point costs non the less, something that GW feels they probably have to do, but reduces the usefulness of a unit. I think GW could do a better job in the future of spending more time in army construction with tying the narrative to the game mechanics rather then the other way around, but at the end of the day the majority of AOS players are not competitive. The online community is going to be scewed towards that, but I would guess most are more concerned with the narrative then game balance, because that is what GW has always produced a narrative focused game first. So I think there will always be units in books that are not competitive and never really can be, and honestly that is okay. They will always find a place in narrative play, but GW needs to recognize this in list building. I think to some extent the company understand their own limitations, but they spend a lot of time I think trying to pretend they don't exist and that is the problem. If GW would recognize the holes in their rules, and that they have a narrative game at the core they essentially must retrofit for competitive play I think they could be significantly more successful at balancing it. Instead I think sometimes they want to pretend the competitive game is something different then the game they made (making assumptions that people will always try to take combined arms lists because that's what they wish people would do rather then what their rules actually encourage people to do, seems to be a common theme in unit design and pt allocation as an example). The other thing is for diverse ranges its okay to have hyper specialized units that only see play in open and narrative play, but for the ranges that are small there is no room for this type of unit. In my opinion, I was very encouraged by the slaanesh book as the last major release. I think it hit all the notes of what a strong, but balanced book should look like. This is in stark contrast to FEC, deepkin and fyreslayers in the higher tiers which have terrible internal balance and each have "that 1 build" and precious little else. Skaven is decently internally balanced, but horrifically externally balanced breaking all of the rules followed by pretty much everyone else. DoK I think wasn't a huge problem minus morathi having a terrible rule mechanic that should have gotten canned in development, they just were largely undercosted in a fixable way and definitely have a couple of overly specialized units, though I think there range is large enough to bare them. And they just happened to be released at a time that allowed them to go a full year without point fixes, think the new GHB might actually have fixed them to the point where they are just good, not broken though. So I think GW just had a bad run of army books in the first half of this year which has caused a lot of the issues that has everyone on edge. But Khorne is definitely not broken, though perhaps uninspired, and the two preceding FEC were definitely not broken (though potentially underpowered, but GW has never figured out how to make greenskins good so what else is new). I wish GW would release more of these books "by committee" because the quality variations from book to book are honestly probably the most problematic thing. Every edition of fantasy you would see a slew of well written books that worked well, only for a baffling release to hit that completely f***ed the meta, which GW then would overreact to for a couple of strait books causing intense power creep, before trying to reign it all in again near the end of an edition far too late. 7th edition daemons, 8th edition chaos etc. There was a reason nearly every competitive player in the US that didn't live in the midwest had switched to almost exclusively playing comp by the end of WHFB. Aos has been better in that regard thanks in large part to the advent of the GHB, generally smaller book ranges, tighter rules and regular pt adjustments, but if GW starts routinely making fec and skaven tome mistakes they are very quickly going to start running into the same exact issues that helped lead to the death of fantasy. I understand why they switch authors every book, but the rules and pts at least really need much more colaboration then in the past, because there is still far too much variation in quality and design principals from book to book.

This right here is so important. All of your posts on this topic have been very good, I don't agree with absolutely everything, but its the single biggest factor in list building. I've seen a lot of people discuss for instance that they think eels aren't THAT good. Well, on paper, you are right. It is the role they fill both internally and externally in combination with the other rules within the deepkin book that makes eels so good. The other truly important consideration for stuff like this is the rule of exponential returns. The more eels you include the more effective their rules are. The vultaic blast in a vacuum is meh, but if you mass it over many eels and are selective with its use it becomes one of the most important parts of the army. The role a unit plays in terms of list building importance cannot be understated. All of the tourney stats are there for us to see, like wispersofblood said, there is no need for anecdotal evidence. When playing competitively you need to determine 2 things off the bat, A. what armies are brought most to tourneys and B. what lists are most consistently at the top. The answers to these 2 questions form the basis of how you need to build a tourney list. You must take something built to beat the common lists in the early rounds, and the most successful lists in the later rounds. All other list types must be planned for in the margins, and that is all you can really do. As an example I think Sharks are well pointed for what they do at 120pts. If you take their combat prowess and add the shooting they do on top of that based on counterparts in each you probably do get a unit worth about 120pts. The problem is what is their role? The answer is that I don't really know, and that is the problem. I think they are more a combat unit then they are a shooting unit, and at that price point in combination with the generally poor state of deepkin as a shooting army you have to ask yourself is it possible to get almost any use out of their shooting in a game? I think to even be capable of sniping the odd character, or killing a chaff unit or 2, they would either need to be paired with reavers (or god forbid leviadon) or you need to take 4+ of them. In either event they are absolutely not worth their points for such a slight task/purpose. The result? You basically must discount the shooting attack from their profile entirely when considering their purpose within your army, which means you are no longer paying 120pts for their combat AND shooting, you are paying 120pts for JUST their combat ability. And here, once again, we must ask ourselves what is their role in combat? They provide no mortal wounds, they have worse movement then eels, they are less durable then eels, they do less damage and have less wounds then thralls, if taking more then 1 in a unit they require leadership bubble attention to prevent 120pt a pop deletions in battleshock far more so then anything else in the army. Again the result is no matter which way you turn there is something more efficient at that role. So to balance the sharks we either need A. a universe where their shooting role accomplishes something which does not exist in the deepkin book as constructed and/or B. a pt cost in which their combat role is justified. I think at 80-100pts they become more valuable in combat then thralls and eels on a pure combat basis. I think the mortal wounds and movement speed makes eels still potentially better, but here at least is a world where I can invision taking 4 of them at which point the shooting may actually now provide some minor value, perhaps even enough where they can finally have a defined role and use worth their points. But thematically 4-8 sharks running around the table does not make much sense, and thus we get back to now the unit no longer providing what GW envisioned, which is perhaps game breaking in a wholly different way. This goes back to how damn difficult it is making dual purpose units balanced and usable, I really don't know what the answer is, but I do know going back decades it is something GW has never been able to crack.

You are underrating Deepkin's place in the meta I think. They are a top 6 army, tourney wise. Not sure you can ask for much more from a book that is well over a year old now. I don't think our competitiveness is at issue here, I think our list diversity has always been the issue. I really like the 30pt increase to soulscryers, what they did was undercosted and it almost makes up for the fact that the 10pt increase to morrsarr does not change much. All the 30pt increase means is you will probably stop seeing 2 soulscryer tourney lists, and may even see some no deepstrike experimentation at the top. which isn't a big deal and is probably for the best. I think overall the deepkin changes were much more positive then I was expecting based on the community article. 30pt decreases to leviadon, 20pt decreases to sharks, 10pts for all the infantry, 20pt decrease to soulrenders and the aspect of the sea, all Okish starts. Assuming that we are moving to 3-6month release schedules I think we are 1 release away from getting the list diversity in tourney play our book has sorely been lacking. Already I am seeing some interesting combos with the new points getting posted on twitter that were not possible before, not sure we are in competitive territory yet with most of these units, but we are much closer then the community article made it seem. I think infantry are just about where they need to be (though reavers probably need another 10pts discounted in the future). The sharks are actually pretty close with the 20pt decrease, think they probably need 10-20pts more, but I very well may start experimenting with them some more, which is more then I could say before. The leviadon is still probably 30pts away from being competitive, but the 30pt decrease is 10-20 more then I was expecting from community article so I'll take it at this point. Aspect of Sea needed a 40pt decrease I think, but 20pts might be just enough to make it competitively viable as its rules really are quite good. Overall I understand why you choose to break down point costs as percentages, but I think you are doing yourself a disservice by looking at it from a % of unit cost alone. At the end of the day the power build increased by 70-100pts, but that is significantly less then the hit DoK took which is one of our prime competitors at the top. Looks like FEC, fyreslayers, and skaven are going to get dealt with next month too, so if all of them end up increasing more then us, which I suspect they will, its a net positive. Additionally that 100pt increase suggest that the previous power build is still our best build, and I think the core of it still is. What I now wonder about is whether it doesn't make sense now to use the 100-200pts that were previously going to soulscryers on something else now. In a lot of games I found that the deepstrike in the aggregate really wasn't even necessary, it was just point efficient and made your opponent sweat. Certainly the psycological element was very nice, but I wonder if there isn't now a more efficient way forward, given that you were already pretty much able to hit with the morrsarr on turn 2, which is when you need them to with tideflip anyways. I think this update definitely introduces some nice ripples, and will lead to some experimentations we weren't seeing before, which is a great start. If there is going to be another update in the next 6 months, I think if they go in the same direction (increasing eels another 10-20pts) and continuing to widdle down points on the units they decreased this time we are going to be golden. Not quite what I wanted, but quite a bit better then I was dreading 24 hours ago. edit: also swordmasters are absolutely not better then thralls...

I agree with most of this, particularly that the single biggest reason why 10-20pt changes on eels aren't enough to change lists being internal balance dictates that they are our only offensive choice. I really do think thralls have something, its just that to your point the support they need is either too costly or too inefective with the bubbles. I think the Eidolan of the sea doesn't even need to be comprably costed to its like models to be taken in a competitive deepkin list. I think you shift Eidolan of sea even 40pts down it becomes quite viable, even now I am tempted by it daily. I think with the multiple debuffs it can deal out combined with the artifact that gives 2 turn effect on one spell and it really opens up some of the armies options. Problem is at current pts you aren't left with enough points to work with to make that effective. Leviadons and sharks suffer the age old GW problem of being dual purpose. GW ALWAYS overvalues these units. I suspect GW is putting a 60-80pt valuation on the leviadon's bow, and a 30-40pt valuation on the shark's. And if you compare them in utility to the ~100pt artillery pieces you can understand why they reached this valuation. But this is why the method GW points units becomes problematic so often. On paper, yes an leviadons ranged weapon is about 2/3 as effective as a bolt thrower. But in reality bolt throwers are only worth their points massed, and you can't mass leviadons. In theory an allopexes ranged attack has some worth, but allopexes are nie useless in either combat or range if they aren't massed, and they are far too expensive to mass them. Its just like the problem High Elves always had with Sea Guard. In theory their bows are worth 2-3 points. But in reality they are no better then spearmen in combat for 3 pts more, and significantly worse then archers at shooting for ~1 pts (memory fading on whether archers were 11 or 12 in 8th) more. GW games are all about critical mass, almost always. Even balanced lists need enough of each phase in order to build a critical mass in them. So the more efficient option in each of those phases is almost always going to be preferred when looking for a solution in said phase. As such for Dual units to be effective, that calculation needs to be taken into account, they are going to be less effective then equivalent options that specialize so a discount on their stats and abilities need to be taken into effect. In this case the turtle needs to be 300-320 and the allopexes need to be in the 110-120 range. At those price points, they become competent in the right builds. But I am sure they violate GW's logic for points, and most of them just don't have the competitive mindsets to get it for whatever reason. Thralls with a 10pt decrease I think are right in their sweet spot though, so happy about that.

Everything in moderation I say. Both can be fun depending on mood and circumstances. For better or worse I think it can be difficult not to scew negative with GW though. The sting of betrayal left after 8th edition, even 4 years later, has never fully healed... The little we've seen from the GHB point reveal feels a lot more like the GW of old in terms of lack of understanding of their own game, but as others have pointed out obviously we know little, and small changes spread out can end up making large differences.

But what are forum discussion's for if not to dissect the minutest detail of leaked info, without any big picture for reference, preferably through the most negative lens possible? That's why we're all here isn't it 😉? Seriously though, I find baseless speculation fun. Sure, I end up looking like an idiot about 75% of the time, but every so often I get to feel like a prophetic genius, rare but occasionally it happens.

All I wanted was to be able to finally take my Allopex spam list with a sea turtle and an Eidolan for support. Is that too much to ask? Anyone.... Okay I admit I may have had my sights set just a tad high for this ghb release, but still a guys gotta be able to dream. Kidding aside I was really banking on Eidolan getting a significant cost reduction in the wake of so many like characters since being so damn cheap. That was really all I wanted out of this, and it really looks like that is def not happening.

Idoneth represent a very low percentage of tourney army representation across the board, but their win rate is very high and they are widely considered right their with LoN and fyreslayers as just below the top tier,behind fec, dok, and skaven. The tournaments you do see a power build eel list in they are almost always in the top 5-10. The main problem for them is they tend to be a 4 win army because their are certain builds their power list has no real answers for (fec). But just last month a flip tide eel spam won a major tournament in Seattle. Its not just how good eels are in comparison to other armies though, its the internal balance of the book. They are so much better then anything else in it at the role they play, and with the advent of the power creep of the last 3-4 books, make no mistake the role they play is essential at this point. Even at 200pts I suspect you would still see a decent number of them in competitive builds, that is how good they are due to the tides and the constant stream of rerolls to mitigate bad luck. Now I would never advocate such a steep increase in price without equally steep decreases in price for the same units you mention in your post, but I think they have to go hand in hand in order to both balance the book internally and externally. If you just change 1 or the other, the book either becomes unplayable or too powerful depending.

If the ones advertised are indicative this is looking like 10-20pt cuts/increases are all they are really doing (mostly 10pts). So realistically thralls are going to likely be 130. Thats a 40pt difference. Thralls were already pretty decent before, a lot of people think the power build is all cav list, but from what I have seen the tourney lists that are actually top tier almost all run the flip tide list which means they are taking 2-3 thralls already depending on whether they take any reavers (prob 1 max). Depending on how many points reavers dropped into comparison to thralls, I don't see any reason you need to stack more thralls on top of the 20-30 you are already taking without a reason to go slow/support on rest of your list. It doesn't seem like any of our support units/big bad units are getting anything near the point reduction they need to be effective. As such I don't think that reason to not have Eels fill the role they do diminished at all. Without a significant reduction in either A. Soulrender cost B. Reavers and thralls BOTH getting a ~20pt reduction and/or C. The 300pt+ units getting super heavy reductions I really don't think the "net" list changes very much even with the now 40pt difference. But I would love to be wrong.

I was just editing my original post with my price thoughts and was saying the same thing for morsarr and the levi, eidolon, and allopax. I do disagree however that the list doesn't have viable rulesets combos other then eel spam. If they had been willing to take somewhat more aggressive pricings they really do have some interesting things. The caster eidolon actually has a really strong ruleset at 360-380pts I think it would be quite strong. Allopex taken as units of 3-4 and not as solo creatures could pack quite the punch (especially if you consider combining them with a king and/or the leadership buffs aplenty in the book to avoid sharks dieing to leadership). Most importantly I think thralls are far stronger then most give them credit for, but are overshadowed by eels in pt efficiency. If adequate decreases occurred, with eels being properly nerfed I think there are quite a few competitive, but not OP, builds to be had. But right now none of those combos are viable due to overpriced everything.

As far as deepkin go this is extremely disappointing if it encompasses all of the changes. A 10 pt cost increase to morrsarr means nothing in terms of army composition. They will be taken in exactly the same quantities and formations 60pt increase for 18 is not even close to enough. Oh no I'm going to miss out on that second unit of eternal guard allies! 20pts may have been enough to shift army composition at least some, but the power builds had about 140pts of non-essential stuff in them so I am not even sure that was enough. I know GW doesn't like to overreact, but a decent sized chunk of the poorly pointed units in the game are off by far more then 10-20pts especially in Deepkin. Especially for units that cost over 300pts 10-20pt changes are basically a drop in the bucket. If I wasn't taking a Leviadon at 380 I am not taking a Leviadon at 360 and I sure as well am not taking one at 370. It wasn't getting left out of lists because we couldn't quite find that last 10 pts to fit it in. It was getting left out of lists because it isn't efficient at its price point. For Deepkin Thralls or reavers could maybe be fixed by a 10-20pt swing, but that's really about it. I want to wait for the actual release before final judgement, but this saddens me. The fact that Allopexes aren't even mentioned is extremely disheartening, I really hope they went down in points. I really was convinced that at the very least the idolon would see reductions considering how criminally overcosted they are in comparison to the newer heroes of the same utility, but again 10pts wasn't going to cut it. Ugh. I'm sure its the same across the board for the other armies too. Please don't mistake me, Deepkin are a near top tier army. However, they are a boring as hell top tier army to play, with only 1 way to really play them successfully, but they are a book with some really cool rules and abilities and with point reductions there are some really cool combos that could be fun for both the player and their opponent. I didn't want massive price reductions across the board for Deepkin, what I wanted was a competitive reason to play anything other then tideflip morrsarr spam and unfortunately that required some pretty hefty price drops elsewhere. I was fine with eels getting shafted, But in order to properly shaft them a lot of the book needed help, much more help then you can do with 10pts. Edit: I am sure this is far too early, but based on the "highlighted" point changes I find it hard to believe they have almost any large point changes to reveal. To clarify what I was thinking in rant above: I think 130 for the numarti was all i was expecting and am happy with on second thought. Would like to see a price increase on the caster, soulscryer, and volturnos. A price decrease on soulrenders was in order. Allopex need to be 120pts probably. Leviadon needed to go down 40-60. And finally the idolon each needed a 60-80pt reduction. Ishlaen guard are more or less fine as is, Morrsarr should be ~180-200pts.