J4yzor
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Posts posted by J4yzor
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Hey, i have a rule question. Our new LoB Comman Traid sais: "...Attacks made with meele weapons that target that unit score a hit on an unmodified hit role of 2+..." This mean even if my unit is debuffed with a -1 to hit it will always hit with every 2+. Is that assumption correct?
@JackStreicher I only played the new Vyrkos which was fun but no suggestions in regard of other legions.
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Would have preferred to See some changes for the used units to get the win rate better instead of adjustments to units that are not viable even with the drop in points.
My list is now 10 points more expensive because of the points changes to cogs and that does not feel fair compared to how hard it is to win.
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Hey, i could not find an answer to this: Are Blood Knights with riders of ruin allowed to "retreat" from the Incarnate of Ghur?
I would say yes because it is not a retreat.
Any suggestions? 😀
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6 minutes ago, W1tchhunter said:
Yeah I don't get the confusion, basically use it as your own unit during the combat phase so can pile in, fight etc. Unless it's within 3 inches of your army.
I would argue if being friendly to the skaven Player means it is automaticly an enemy to the other Player.
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18 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:
You are making it more difficult than it is. The rules don't distinguish between the effect of a spell and targeting anywhere. If you think that it is, you should be able to point to a rule to this effect. But you won't find it in the core rules, FAQs or battletome.
All the spells in the Gravelords tome are written in a way that makes it clear that targeting happens as part of resolution. It's always "This spell has a casting value of x. If successfully cast, pick a target...". So you need to first successfully cast the spell, then pick a target. And surely what happens after you cast the spell is resolving it.
Another instance where this comes up is in Tzeentch, where you get summoning points for casting spells. Tzeentch players will frequently cast spells even when there is no target even in range, just for the points. This would not be possible if target selection was part of the preconditions of casting a spell rather than resolution.
As for all the instances of "a unit cannot benefit from this spell more than once per turn", I don't know why they don't make sense to you. They seem fairly functional to me, preventing you from stacking certain spells on the same unit on a double resolve. That makes more sense to me if you can choose affect different units with a double resolved spell, if anything.
Ok then i will play it like that next time.
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16 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:
It does, though.
Take a look at the core rules about spell casting:
The language about casting spells includes a bunch of limitation, but notably not that you need to name a target or have one in range or anything of that sort.
Now look at a spell, for example Lycancurse from Belladamma's warscroll.
Notice how the effect, which happens after you successfully resolve the spell, is the bit that includes the range. The mechanics are clear: First you resolve the spell. Once you do so, you get to pick a unit and apply the effect.
Locus of Shyish allows you to resolve successful spells twice after rolling a 9+. The effect you get from resolving contains target selection. So you get to select two targets.
I am still not convinced because you resolve the effect twice not the spell and targeting is part of the spell not the effect. Imho The effect of it is that the target has -1 to hit. Otherwise i don't get all the discussions about the "can only benefit once" spells in the vampire lore.
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5 hours ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:
You can choose a different target. Target selection happens after the spell resolves.
I don't think it works like that because only the effect happens twice not the cast. 🤷♂️
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20 hours ago, swarmofseals said:
I've been trying to explore a lot of different Soulblight variations, so far focusing on Nagash and zombie apocalypse lists. Most people seem to be pushing character heavy lists, but I'd like to propose a different direction focusing on maximizing efficiency.
To begin, I'd like to illustrate the efficiency gap between Blood Knights and the Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon. Math ahead:
Two units of Blood Knights, charging:
- 28.44 rend 1 damage
- 7.4 rend 0 damage
- 84.38 expected wounds assuming an average incoming rend of .75 with Deathless Minions, 67.5 without
- Cost: 390 points
Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon, charging:
- 8.83 rend 2 (12.38 with Sangsyron)
- 4.66 rend 1
- 37.8 expected wounds assuming an average incoming rend of .75 with Deathless Minions
- Cost: 435 points
Overall damage comparison (BK, Sangsyron, VLoZD base kit)
- vs. - : 35.84/17.04/13.49
- vs. 6+: 34.6/17.04/13.49
- vs. 5+: 28.63/16.26/12.71
- vs 4+: 22.66/13.42/10.47
- vs 3+: 16.69/10.58/8.21
- vs 2+: 10.71/7.74/5.97
- vs 2+ +1: 5.97/4.9/3.72
- vs 2+ +2: 5.97/2.48/2.25
Despite being cheaper, the Blood Knights vastly outperform in every category the minimum damage difference is +60% vs. vanilla VLoZD and +22% vs. Sangsyron. The maximum difference is +166% vs. vanilla and +110% vs. vanilla. Defensively, the Blood Knights have +123% more weighted effective wounds with Deathless Minions and +79% more without.
Of course, the VLoZD does have advantages: it's faster until it takes quite a bit of damage, can heal and perform heroic actions, shoot a little, and is a monster. But that gets counterbalanced some against the Blood Knights being able to "retreat" and charge and sprinkle mortal wounds in the process.
The Blood Knights also scale equal better off of nearly every buff. +1 Damage to rider weapons and +1 Attack all scale the Blood Knights better than the VLoZD. Bonuses to hit and would and exploding 6's are roughly equivalent.
The VLoZD clearly has better activation efficiency, but I'm not sure that this is as much of a benefit in 3.0 as it was in 2.0. I know people are still in the mindset of "hit as hard as possible with one thing, charging with more just gives your opponent the opportunity to swing back," but I think people haven't fully absorbed how the new command abilities change the dynamic. If you charge one enemy unit, your opponent gets to use all-out defense to significantly soften the blow. If you charge multiple enemy units, your opponent has to pick where to use AOD, and the thing they don't pick is going to get hit a lot harder. So now it's a lot more attractive to charge multiple targets, particularly if you can charge with at least one more unit than your opponent has in combat. If you charge 3 into your opponent's 2, your opponent can soften the blow on one thing and then you use AOD on whatever they choose to strike first on, thus allowing you to get two activations against a soft target to your opponent's 1 (and that 1 being with a damaged unit at that). Hitting multiple targets also carries the benefit of pressuring battleshock, which is a real thing in 3.0.
So in the end I see lists running one or more dragons and can't help but wonder if they wouldn't be better off running more and more Blood Knights instead.
So what heroes might a Blood Knights focused list want to run? None of the options are at all competitive with BKs for actual combat efficiency, but how much value do buffs add? Let's explore it (more math!):
Here's the % increase in damage output achieved by various buffs along with the absolute rend weighted damage output increase per unit of BKs buffed:
+1 Hit OR Wound: 26.4%, +5.98
+1 Hit AND Wound: 60%, +13.6
+1 Damage to riders: 42%, +9.52
+1 Attack: 33.3%, +7.55
Exploding 6's: 26.4%, +5.98
Units that can buff BK's include: Belladamma, Radukar, Mannfred, Vengorian Lord, Coven Throne, any non unique hero (Rousing Commander, Sword of the Red Seneschals, Unholy Impetus)
Of the non-unique heroes, I don't think it's worth considering the regular Vampire Lord as it's so easy to snipe. The Vengorian Lord, Coven Throne, and VLoZD are worth considering as they can all keep up with Blood Knights relatively well. A Necromancer is also worth considering because it's cheap and might have additional usefulness, but one must keep in mind that keeping in buff range will be MUCH harder.
Lets look at a ton more math on these options. What I'm going to try to do here is calculate the total combat value provided by different options between their innate combat ability and the value of the buffs they provide.
NOTE: One unit of charging Blood Knights unbuffed has a weighted offensive value of 22.67 at a cost of 195 points, for a WOR (weighted offensive rating) of .116.
- Belladamma is mostly being taken for her casting profile, but her exploding 6's buffs does provide .03 WOR per target.
- Radukar the Wolf alone has a base WOR of .047 (self buffed) and provides an additional .05 WOR per buffed target.
- Radukar the Wolf plus bodyguard has a base WOR of .068 (self buffed) and provides an additional .031 WOR per buffed target
- Radukar the Beast has a base WOR of .084 (self buffed, includes summoned Dire Wolves but does not assume they are buffed) and provides an additional .024 WOR per buffed target
- Mannfred has a base WOR of .07 (self buffed) and provides an additional .036 WOR per buffed target.
- A Vengorian Lord (Clotted Deluge) has a base WOR of .046 (self buffed) and provides an additional .021 WOR per buffed target. Unholy Impetus adds an additional .027 WOR per buffed target. Rousing Commander changes self WOR to .06 (self buffed) and adds an additional .034 WOR per buffed target.
- A Coven Throne has a base WOR of .031 and provides an additional .044 WOR from its buff. Sword of the Red Seneschals adds .019 WOR per target, Unholy Impetus adds .024 WOR per target, and Rousing Commander changes self WOR to .048 and adds .031 WOR per target
- A VLoZD has a base WOR of .048. Sword of the Red Seneschals adds .014 WOR per target, Unholy Impetus adds .017 WOR per target, and Rousing Commander changes self WOR to .053 and .022 WOR per target.
- A Necromancer is mostly being taken for casting, and is unlikely to be able to get Unholy Impetus or Sword of the Red Seneschals to work, but Rousing Commander adds .076 WOR per target.
A few conclusions from this:
Both versions of Radukar are good bets to be offensively "profitable" at least the turn they charge. As long as you're buffing two units of Blood Knights with the command ability (which should be easy given the 18" radius), you're getting more WOR than you would if you had invested the points in more BK alone. Furthermore, these options aren't actually bad on defense either. Radukar the Beast + his wolves has a defensive efficiency of .16 (albeit at the cost of a CP), and Radukar the Wolf with 2 Nightguard has a defensive efficiency of .118. Blood Knights have a defensive efficiency of .207, so you're giving up some defense but less than in comparison to most heroes.
Mannfred is pretty easy to make profitable as well. If he can buff two targets (which isn't trivial but should be doable pretty often) he'll exceed the WOR value of pure BK. He also has the benefit of being a 2 wizard and a monster hero along with superlative mobility. His defensive profile is a bit hard to pin down due to uncertainty around how many woulds his armor will negate. At minimum he's just below half efficiency compared to BK, but at just 3-4 wounds negated he starts pulling even with Radukar the Wolf.
The Vengorian Lord can plausibly break even or exceed on WOR but it's not easy. With Rousing Commander plus either his spell going off or Sword of the Red Seneschals, all hitting two targets he's solidly in the black. But with RC being a once per game thing he's going to have a tough time breaking even most of the time. Defensively he's OK, particularly in melee, and he has the benefit of being a monster hero.
The Coven Throne lags pretty far behind except when using Rousing Commander, which when combined with the command ability gives us an easy total WOR of .154 with something getting +1 save in addition. But again, that's once a game. It's not going to be easy to make Sword of the Red Seneschals work here at all, so Fragment of the Keep is a more likely artefact choice. I could see this as an option that is more oriented toward providing defense with a splash of offense. That +1 save is worth a bit under half a unit of Blood Knights in defensive efficiency, assuming the enemy actually attacks the buffed unit.
The VLoZD does just a hair better than breaking even with both Rousing Commander and SoRS buffing two targets, so I don't think this one is going to get there based on efficiency, especially given that it is far behind on defensive efficiency.
If you can actually manage to buff two things with Rousing Commander on a Necromancer you're getting well ahead that turn, but it's going to have a hard time using an artefact effectively except for possibly the Grave-sand Shard.
Belladamma isn't going to get there on offense, so if you take her you are doing it for her magic prowess. That said, I'm not really sold on Belladamma in this kind of list. She's very helpful against shooting, but I don't think shooting armies are going to be particularly problematic for a list that is just spamming bodies that are efficient on both offense and defense and are reasonably fast. Furthermore, to make her reliable as a caster requires significant extra investment.
Overall, I think the two heroes that are clearly at the top of the pile are Mannfred and Radukar (either version). The Vengorian Lord and Coven Throne could both work but are pretty marginal and clearly behind the two unique heroes. The VLoZD is substantially worse, and I don't think Beladamma makes much sense for the reasons mentioned above. The Necromancer is a bit of a wild card.
So that leads me to the question: could it really be optimal to just forego a command trait and artefact? I really think it might, depending on the list. Mannfred and Radukar both are just better than what the trait and artefact provide on any hero for this kind of list, so it only makes sense to dip to a non-unique hero if you're already taking Mannfred and Radukar. I suppose a hero package of Mannfred, Radukar the Wolf and a Vengorian Lord (810 points or 905 if you take nightguard) could make some sense, but that's really more points than I'd want to be spending on heroes. Mannfred and Radukar the Beast is a more palatable 695, or wolf at 530/625 depending on nightguard.
As far as subfactions go, I think it's pretty clearly between Kastelai and Legion of Night. I get that Vyrkos can build a very strong VLoZD with Hunter's Snare and either amulet or Sangsyron, but I wonder if that is a trap.
Kastelai has the benefits of an easier grand strategy, better performance on battleplans that care about battleline units for scoring, and the uncertain value of Might of the Crimson Keep. I think figuring out how useful that last one is will take a lot of test games.
Legion of Night has the benefits of redundant generals and an easier path to actually resolving spells through a Necromancer carrying Morbheg's Claw. But you'll need three battleline units that aren't Blood Knights (which isn't necessarily a bad thing, as having some blocks of zombies could be useful for counterbalancing the otherwise low model count for objectives.
Here's a few lists:
Basic Kastelai
Mannfred
Radukar the Beast
6x5 Blood Knights
1x10 Dire Wolves
Probably Battle Regiment + Hunters of the Heartlands or 2 Battle Regiment
52 models, 384.53 weighted effective wounds
Kastelai with bats + zombies
Mannfred
Radukar the Beast
5x5 Blood Knights
1x3 Fell Bats
1x40 Zombies
Again probably Battle Regiment + Hunters of the Heartlands or 2 Battle Regiment
80 models, 371.1 weighted effective wounds
Go Wide
Mannfred
Radukar the Wolf
Necromancer
4x5 Blood Knights
2x40 Deadwalker Zombies (or 1x40, 2x20)
1x2 Kosargi Night Guard
Can be Legion of Night or Kastelai. Lots of battalion possibilities, but Battle Regiment + Hunters or Battle Regiment + Vanguard or double Battle Regiment probably best.
105 models, 335.1 weighted effective wounds
The first list is just crazy raw efficiency. The damage potential is very high and the effective wound count is insane, but the body count is relatively low.
The second list is like the first list but compromises effective wounds slightly for more bodies.
The third list has significantly fewer effective wounds but a ton more bodies and it can also potentially be Legion of Night to leverage Mannfred and a Necromancer into legitimate casting threats with Morbheg's claw. The gain in defensive efficiency from Mystic Shield, Overwhelming Dread and/or Fading Vigor could easily offset the loss of effective wounds. Mannfred, Radukar and the Necromancer all are crazy good at scaling the zombies up if the opponent focuses too hard on the Blood Knights.
Perhaps more later.
Hey thank you for sharing this!
What about Vhargheist in Kastelei? I realy like the deep strike ability and that they get the Kastelei buff.
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Hey Guys. I have a question where i had not found an answer yet.
The rules for the spears say: exploding on a 5+ instead of 6.
Does that mean it can be modified now?
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Soulblight Gravelords Discussion - 3rd edition.
in Death
Posted · Edited by J4yzor
Thank you for the detailed analysis. The spell really looks good. For the casters i guess only ANDTORIAN LOCUS are allowed to use the lore. That are only the vampire lord and Necromancer.