Grdaat

There are many reasons I personally don't like AoS, but the biggest one is the lack of investment. By upping the scope of the setting they ruined the scale. Why should I care if a country-sized city is about to get destroyed? The setting could just timeskip ahead again so that there's 5 more. Why should I care about the alliances between races? Those can change on a whim to fit whatever drama GW wants there to be. Why should I care that an army numbering in the millions was destroyed, or that thousands of people were eaten by ogors? One book later their replacements have arrived. There's nothing to invest me into the story because it feels like there's very little real consequences to what happens, no matter how catastrophic the events are. In Fantasy if you're playing a campaign game and Karl Franz is killed, you know that's going to have a massive impact on the setting, because you know how The Empire works and what the reprecussions of his death would be. If Archaon gets shot to death then that too is going to have massive reprecussions, here though? If Archaon goes down he'll show back up later or another will just take his spot. Did the Celestant Prime go down? Guess he'll have to wait until next week to come back. Did your "Dwarf High King on Throne" die? Just use him again as a different one that looks identical, why not. What kind of blows my mind are the retcons GW makes to the lore, despite it only being 5 years old, and there's so many contradictions you can find within the same book that taken on its own merits, I cannot say the lore is well written by any stretch of the imagination, especially when most of it is just made up on the spot to make somebody else sound better (like having yet another character who killed Kings/Emperors we've never seen or heard of). As far as the actual game goes, I don't find it nearly as engaging. A lot of tactical nuance is lost with the system changes, along with a lot of the unique feel each army had, as well as their customizability (and this has only gotten worse in the most recent GHB, where artefacts available to the realms were cut from 84 to 7). That's also before we get into the absurd power creep you find in the newer books GW puts out, to the point where if you're running an older army you need either a huge handicap, or winning the lottery levels of luck even if you don't do anything wrong. This is before we get to the double turn issue, which in so many games is just an instant win for whoever went second. I also don't understand why people say it plays smoother or cleaner than Fantasy when the game itself has become much more convoluted. Sure on release and after the first GHB I could definitely agree, but before the game book was released you needed a flow chart and 4-5 seperate books to play the game (the core rules, malign portents, GHB, whichever book your scenario is in and then your army book, or more if you want to use allies) and even now it isn't much better. Anyone putting in the effort to go through all of that and learn which allegiance abilities, rerolls, allies, subfactions, wound negations, attack bonuses, Battalions and unit synergies are best for their force on top of the artefacts, endless spells and various terrain mechanics which best suit you could've easily learned WHFB, and I think people are assuming that game's a lot more complicated than it actually is. As of right now I'm pretty sure current AoS is even more bloated with special rules than 8th edition fantasy. The comparison gets worse when you look at 7th and 6th edition Fantasy which didn't have such ridiculous issues with their special rules.

So since the Sword of Judgement and Ethereal Amulet both no longer exist, what do people think is the next best item to use on the King?

I highly doubt it, but since these are all optional rules anyway that can only be used with your opponents permission, you might as well house rule in their keyword changes.

I think I figured out how to tweak my list to make it better and remove some of its disadvantages: Inspiring King on Hippogryph with Sword of Judgement Slann Starmaster Lord Ordinator Cogsmith 32 Men-at-arms 32 Men-at-arms 32 Men-at-arms 3 Cannons As before I'm at an even 2000 points, I can output a disgusting amount of damage with 3 Cannons, I can resist 4 spells from both the Slann and the King (and the Slann can unbind anywhere on the field). I've lost some Men-at-arms but anything I've lost I've gained in damage output, especially since the Slann will be used to gather Command Points to power up the sword of Judgement and has great spells himself.

Looks like I'll be expanding my collection. EDIT: could you add more? Those look great and I'd like to find them.

If AoS is going to mangle the lore and the faction, I might as well commit to it fully.

Something is wrong with their calculator, I just looked at it myself and the calculations it gives are very off, so I'll break down my own. Keep in mind this is the average: 8 attacks, hitting on 3's with re-rolls will give 7.111 hits. 7.111 hits wounding on 2's will give 5.926 wounds (rounding third decimal up). 5.926 wounds with a -2 rend against a 4+ save will give 4.413 unsaved wounds. Average D6 roll (3.5) will multiply 4.413 to 15.447 (rounding third decimal up). The re-roll on low damage takes that to Nearly 20 wounds. Even a below average damage roll of 3 per shot will have me doing 33% more damage on average than the damage calculator on Druchii.net so I'm assuming there's something wrong with it. Sword of Judgement King is great, but in my list I need the Men-at-arms to hold which is why I went with durability, though I don't mind changing that. By the way, no need to double space your paragraphs, TGA takes care of that automatically when you hit enter once.

Even without decimals those calculations are suspect to me, without the re-roll on the damage dice I'm still averaging nearly double what your program says. Which program are you using, if you don't mind me asking? As for Teclis, that is pretty insane. On the plus side a cannon and crew are a single unit, so I'll at least be able to survive 4 mortal wounds each without any loss in performance from them (1 on the crew and 3 on the cannon), which is why I'm not scared of Nagash's portal. Even so, I'll need to see what it's like playing against him directly, and whether the cannons + king are enough. In that matchup I might bring out the sword of judgement instead of the Ethereal Amulet just so I can pile on the mortal wounds once he's hurt.

I'm waiting untill their book comes out before I decide anything on the Lumineth, but as for your math I don't think you did it right. How exactly do 4 cannons have a 0% chance to deal more than 18 wounds when their max output is 48? Remember that each cannon fires two shots, not one and as a result they average more than double what you say with a Cogsmith and Lord Ordinator. Which program are you using? I might be underestimating Nagash, but while I've yet to try this list on him I have killed him with cannons (and other ranged) before, and a screen of 32 or 48 bodies is a huge blocker for him, he'll never be in range to Hand of Dust anyone unless I charge him first. I can also shoot the Immortis before Nagash to deny them the multiple attempts at saves, and choosing to stay close to them will slow Nagash by a lot, potentially getting me two or three rounds of shooting with the cannons (or four with a few if I'm very lucky).

I've done the math on it, three auto-hitting Trebuchets against units with a 4+ save on average deal 11.6 wounds, whereas 4 cannons and a Cogsmith deal 18.7 (you can increase that to 22.2 wounds with a Lord Ordinator), that's a massive difference. Even 4 auto-hitting Trebuchets only cause 15.5 wounds, so by filling out your artillery slots with them they'll underporm compared to cannons (and cost 880 points vs 620, or 760 with the Lord Ordinator). Yes they have a longer range, but when the range gets over 30" you shouldn't be out of range anyway. If you'd like me to go over the math in more detail I will, but the end point is that Trebuchets are very over costed. As for the rest of my army, I wouldn't call the Cogsmith easy to kill, anything that's a threat to him can get wiped by the Cannons, and even if they do reach me, they'll have to chew through 48 Men-at-arms who are immune to battleshock before they can get to the Cogsmith or the cannons. Even if I want that huge unit to move up, they'll still be forced to go through 32 wounds, and that's assuming the cannons couldn't get them first. As for Nagash, correct me if I'm wrong but last I checked the portals could only be used once per phase, and even if he did get to do D3 MW with it, that's not enough to kill a cannon, and at absolute best he can take out a single cannon crew. If he doesn't get the 10+ (or 7+ for him) then not only does he fail to hurt me in any meaningful way, since cannons still fire twice with two crew, but he's now completely open to every one of my cannons. This is all assuming he gets the first turn, because otherwise I could just shoot him straight off the bat and bring him halfway down (or more than that if he isn't Petrifex). Even if he goes first, if I get a double turn, or if he doesn't move backwards, he'll die in the next phase. If he's with Immortis Guard I'm still not very bothered, the cannons make mincemeat of those types of targets and that's also more than half my opponent's points in two units. Even assuming a lot of Immortis Guard are sacrificed to save Nagash, I can kill him by drowning him in Men-at-arms by that point, or finish him off with the king, or win with objectives. My protection against MW was just to bring more bodies, since the regular protection is very unreliable, and I've found there's little point to investing in magic unless you want to build your list around it. One bad magic roll will cost you the game, even in those cases, and it's so easy for your enemy to shut it down, either with gimmicks, their own wizards, or 4 cannons with a Cogsmith and Lord Ordinator pointed at them. This is one of the reasons I brought up Teclis earlier, regardless of which wizard(s) my opponent brings, I should be able to kill them.

Trebuchets are so much worse than cannons, they're over 50% more points than the cannon, have a worse wound roll and can't re-roll the damage (not to mention they have a minimum firing distance). For the same cost as 3 Trebuchets you can get 4 Cannons and a Cogsmith, plus 40 more points of stuff. The cannons heavily outperform the Trebuchets because of this, even though the Trebuchets can automatically hit.

I'll come back after I play a game with it, I figure it should help since that sort of setup puts out so much damage, it kills petrifex elite Nagash in two rounds of shooting, same with Archaon, same with Teclis, and same with any other super unit you can think of.

So after some theory crafting, I figure I either go with Teclis and automatically win, or I go with the following list: King on Hippogryph with Ethereal Amulet Lord Ordinator Cogsmith 48 Men-at-arms 32 Men-at-arms 32 Men-at-arms 4 Cannons This brings me to an even 2000 points, the Ordinator lets the cannons hit on 3's, the Cogsmith lets them re-roll hits. Some of the Men-at-arms can go hold down objectives while the King prevents any of them from running away. I would've liked to use Trebuchets, but the cannons are 80 points cheaper and you get so much more out of them for it.

Definitely considering Teclis, especially since he gives the save that they should already have, but I'm passing on the Loremaster since in my experience spellcasters are extremely unreliable unless, like Teclis, they have extra rules.

I know, this was the exact reason I decided to make this topic. I forgot about Teclis, I might have to use him to get the damage and saves I need, especially since he essentially gives the ward save they should already have. I had read his Warscroll previously but hadn't realized that protection protects more than Lumineth. As for Battlemages, some of them do have unique spells, but none of them are good enough for me to consider. It's so easy for your opponent to stop and the spells themselves provide very minor buffs/debuffs. The only exception is the Loremaster, but as I said, he's easy to stop and that's assuming you even get the spell off.

They're all close like that, but I don't recall Tilean's or Estalians romanticizing the steeds they think they're riding like the FEC do, that's one of the reasons it scoots over into imagining they're Bretonnia for me.

Like I said, the FEC never imagine the parts of life that aren't a party, they never actually get to the bit where they have to govern. They're either out on a crusade, or at a ball, or at a feast, or some combination of the three whereas Bretonnian nobles did have to go through the parts where they had to deal with their peasants needs directly. If we want to use some examples, I could point to Ghoulslayer as a time when a FEC thought their peasants didn't want to be a part of their realm anymore, and their reaction was to crush them with extreme prejudice, to the point that at the end they were just going to raze what they thought was the most grand city they'd ever seen out of spite and didn't even consider allowing them the ability to surrender (once they'd gotten set up for the attack anyway). I completely agree here, however like I said I'm not going to play as if I have it because I don't want to rub newcomers the wrong way. Also part of the advantage of the lance was fewer counterattacks (especially against hordes) so it would need some weird wording to work in AoS.

FEC still have nobles and peasants without any mixing between the two, they just never imagine the parts where life isn't a party and they actually need to govern their lower class. That being said, there are several examples I can think of in their battletome where the FEC are isolationists, and if they stopped living the high life they're imagining they'd absolutely be segregationists. Basically they do what Bretonnians do whenever they don't actually have to govern: imagine themselves to be magnanimous rulers while living so high up above their serfs that they've completely lost track of where they are. I've thought about that, but I'm trying to be as true to the rules as possible in case I'm playing somebody I'm not familiar with. Rushing house rules on a new opponent isn't a good idea and you should at least play a few normal games with them first.

That's what I'm trying to avoid, I'd just like to play the same points as my opponent.

Here's the big difference: Bretonnia is what the FEC imagine they are, and FEC are the type of thing Bretonnia would fight against.

I posted about this within the Bretonnia thread, but I've been looking for any units within the Grand Alliance that have good cross-faction synergy, and I'm having a hard time finding any. It seems like everybody has been locked within their faction with very few exceptions, so I'm looking for any advice in case I missed them. Does anyone know of any units or heroes that have abilities that buff units outside of their own faction? I'd like to make certain armies stronger (Bretonnia right now, but also other armies like the Dispossessed) and I think I've hit a dead end. EDIT: before anyone points it out, yes there's a pinned thread with abilities that affect the Order keyword, however it's extremely out of date and almost nothing there is accurate in regards to the current game.

Yeah, I've noticed that. The power creep's so extreme the games just aren't fun. You get ridiculously cheap units for the damage they put out or summon spam, that seems to be the main go-to for the new stuff and it's really been turning me off the game in general. Getting back to my question for just a moment, what's the point of a Grand Alliance if nothing in it supports each other? The rules feel more divisive then back when they were first released.

I should probably also mention I've tried out the judgement lord, but it seems like everybody's super-monster has a way to shut him down and he's not so great against summon spam.

Hey everybody, as a lark I figured I'd try using my Bretonnia stuff in games again, but they're just so bad. Power creep has left them far behind and I'm struggling to find any matchup they do well in, so I tried looking for outside sources. Does anyone know of any buff abilities that are used by other models that can affect Bretonnian troops? I remember for a while Chaos had a sorcerer Lord who was able to do that across faction lines, but I can't find anything in order that does this. Despite being part of Grand Alliance: Order it seems like there's not much synergy in this alliance. Failing that are there any other models that can help support them? I'm talking models like Gotrek that can be taken either as allies or as a part of the force. Are there any mercenaries that give them a noticeable benefit they were lacking? I was thinking of maybe the cannon group, but I haven't used them with Bretonnia before.

Hang on, there's a bunch here that isn't quite right, the War Altar and Hurricanum/Luminark don't have the same model or use the same kit, they didn't have the same rules, you're ignoring the Flagellants when you look at how many models they had (not to mention Warrior Priest variations) and there's a few other factions in CoS who have even fewer models than the Devoted did. Even as far as the resin models go, they've replaced many instead of getting rid of them from the game, so there's no reason they can't replace those too. Just like they did with the Fimir- OH WAIT. ******, the rules are already written by GW so putting the burden on Forgeworld means you don't know who's writing what.