AngryPanda

I hope so too, out of all the chaos gods Slaanesh has gotten the least amount of attention in the last decade of GW releases; both in 40k and AoS. It’s very refreshing to finally see Slaanesh get it’s time in the spotlight, especially as a center piece within the AoS storyline. However, I am a bit worried because of the recent winter FAQ that was released. It seems that GW brushed it off, and didn’t give it the attention that it deserved. Armies like BoC and Sylvaneth were left in the dust despite the much needed point adjustments or buffs. I’m hoping that the reason was because they are focusing their creative energies towards writing and developing the new battletombs that are releasing, and simply don’t have the manpower or time to focus on the FAQ due to the disruption that the coronavirus pandemic has caused; this is especially true in Britain with the recent restrictions that have been put in place. If the winter FAQ is a hint at what’s to come, then I would be concerned; but I’m hoping that when we finally get our release that it’s worth the wait and that Slaanesh finally gets it’s time in the spotlight.

The wait is killing me, and they’re taking their sweet time to release some rule teasers; I want to see how Sigvald plays the most. Thankfully February is almost here, and I have a feeling next month is going to be the Hedonites/DoK duel release that has been mentioned. As for the rules, how do you guys think hero buffs are going to play out? This release doesn’t have many mortal heroes, and in the parallel god battletombs there’s a distinct difference between mortals and daemon for the purpose of keyword buffs. My hope is that some of the daemon heroes, such as the Contorted Epitome and Syll'Esske, will have the ability to buff both daemons and mortals. Whereas the KoS and Heralds will probably be only able to buff Daemon units, and the new mortal heroes will only be able to affect mortals.

It’s a good way of looking at it. I’m low balling my prospects because despite believing that the Slaanesh release will be decent or above average, I want to be surprised on how awesome the rules will be. If it were 40k, I would have much lower expectations; for some reason GW has a very hard time updating codexes fairly and on time. Many armies in 40k have gotten very poor treatment with the new edition, and are desperate for updates (Tau, Greyknights, GSC, etc.) that sadly will probably not be released anytime soon. It’s such a volatile game system, that with the span of a few months your army can be top tier, only to end up at the bottom. From what I’ve gathered, Age of Sigmar is much more stable in terms of power levels, and GW seems to have a much better grip on balancing this system. I've been collecting Blades of Khorne since 2016, and to this day I feel my army is still very much useable and somewhat balanced. Even lower tier armies like Beasts of Chaos have the ability to punch way above their weight; this cannot be said for 40k. That’s not to say that there are certain armies and specified units that need to be buffed/debuffed, but generally I’ve been happy with how AoS has been balanced.

I’m really hyped about the Slaanesh release, and in preparation of the painbringers and Sigvald I decided to invest into the Vallejo Liquid Gold range. My plan is to paint a small and elite mortal force, then from their see what else I would want to add. I've never painted with this range before, and even after watching tutorials on how to use them, they’re still hard to get used to. I painted this number dial I’ll be using along with the coming Slaanesh units as a test run. I love the finish results, it legitimately looks like real gold; but using these paints is going to take some getting used to. I already made the mistake of pouring too much onto my pallet and lost a little bit of paint; because it’s alcohol based and is made from small pieces of metal it has a very low viscosity. This means that even if I were to add it to my pallet slowly with caution, I have to be careful otherwise I might add too much and ultimately waste paint.

The model is absolutely fantastic, it’s filled with incredible detail, depth, and character. This is one of those models that will take me at least a month to paint because of how much is on it. However, I’m not gonna hide that I also couldn’t help laugh at the BDSM halfling; it’s a nice touch but it’s pretty enjoyable to think that the first halfling we’ve been introduced to in AoS is wearing skin-tight black spandex across his body and face.

I agree with you’re conclusions, and what I really like about the new Slaanesh range is the balance between sexuality and depravity that the design team was able to achieve. It isn’t overly sexualized/deprived to the point where it’s very much overly R rated or edgy; they were able to strike a healthy balance. For a while I heard rumors that the design team was struggling to reinvent the new Slaanesh range because they wanted to keep it somewhat friendly, and I’m happy the time they spent into the redesigns seems to have worked out without removing the key themes of Slaanesh. To me, GW also probably borrowed some design and art features from the movie 300; the new Slaanesh mortals look like something straight from the Persian armies. When the Syll’Esske model was released, it immediately reminded me of King Xerxes; seems the rest of the mortal units have also taken inspiration from these themes.

This was mentioned, but for reference take a look at the background scenery of the battletomb; this might be the big lord of war that’s been rumored and that was seen in the background of the teaser video. It looks like a bunch of snake men carrying someone sitting on a throne. There’s also a lot of snake iconography centered around whoever is sitting at the center. GW always likes to hint at what’s to come, and I’m hopeful this is a teaser for something much bigger.

I agree that Fiends should get a buff, or at least a point reduction. As it’s been highlighted, the KoS is too good not to include, and causes the Fiends to be easily overshadowed. On paper, fiends look promising; they’re more tailored toward dealing with multi-wound units, such as elite infantry, cavalry, or monstrous creatures. The poison tail attacks have the potential to deal a lot of damage to larger models. However, in practice they fail to deliver. The additional rend will help them do what they’re suppose to do: hunt down high wound/tougher units. They’re weakness however, should be horde units that bog them down and take away their potential to cause high damage to single or elite targets. The KoS is the jack-of-all-trades unit that can be a menace to anything, but the negative is the high point cost. Fiends should be more tailored to fill a specific role, and therefore be cheaper. Hopefully the new battletomb recognizes this, and adjusts their profiles and points accordingly.

I agree; we were probably going to be released in January, but due to recent surge in the disease and Brexit the battletomb has been moved to February. For those who haven’t seen the official statement by GW, here’s the link: GW’s updates on release schedules This years Christmas is going to get a lot more exciting for me knowing that there’s going to be some teases, and I’m also hoping we get some hints at what the new battletomb entails. I really want to see how Sigvald plays. My guess is that, much like his fantasy counterpart, he’s going to be a high damage duelist/beatstick. I’m also hoping to see what the rest of the range looks like, especially the Slaangors and the rumored “lord of war” that’s to be released.

AoS has nailed a lot of concepts, but personally I’ve found the game’s approach to designing StD/Warriors of chaos to be underwhelming. Back in Warhammer Fantasy chaos warriors were melee powerhouses that could go toe-to-toe with other armies, even elite units. It made sense, as the lore described them as armored warriors who’s lives have been dedicated to war and carnage in the pursuit of personal power. When you played against them, you were suppose to feel intimidated. The lore for chaos warriors hasn’t really changed in this regard, but the rules are very underwhelming and are not reflective of the fluff. No longer do I feel that chaos warriors have the dominating presence they used to; they’re more akin to an armored wall that tickles its opponent. Other units like Mortek Guard, Saurus warriors/guard, Ardboyz, and some of the stormcast range have the ability to take hits and deal them back. Granted, these armies are very different, but they still incorporate “elite” units that have high saves and potential damage outputs. To bring warriors back into the spectrum of units that should be feared, I think their attacks should receive a point of rend , and maybe receive an additional attack or other buffs.

What are the options for the Twin Souls? Out of what I’ve seen in the releases, they seem to be one of the more diverse units in terms of weapon option, and perhaps their stats could be a hint at what they’ll offer us on the tabletop. For Blades of Khorne, the weapon options mirror their counterparts in AoS. An example are the Bloodwarriors that have the duel-wielding axes, a goreglave, and a gore fist option; all of which are represented differently in Warcry and on the table.

Something else to consider is a potential rework to depravity points. Much like how Blades of Khorne uses blood tithe to summon daemons or activity abilities that mess with the flow of battle, buff your units, or damage/debuff the enemy, I hope with the mortal release there will be a new list of abilities that doesn’t only involve summoning. Also, I’m hopeful that the archer horde unit that we will be receiving will be sufficient enough to target Kroak or other important hero units. The OBR catapult is a nasty unit to play against b/c of its damage 5 shooting attacks that can be buffed by increasing the number of shots; it’s a great tool for assassinating enemy hero units, or for causing general damage to whatever it fires at. If our spammable archers have the ability to cause mortal wounds because of the poison tipped description from the Warhammer Community webpage, than I would consider them as a potential option. If they don’t, and it instead confers a debuff (which I’m leaning towards what’s going to be most likely), you can use them to target the large blobs of Saurus Warriors to make them more manageable to deal with in CC.

Competitively yes, as I have observed a lot of the major strong lists are tailored towards emphasizing the use of our amazing KoS and support heroes like The Contorted Epitome. There are lists that can be made that are centered on using Daemonettes, Seekers, and Fiends that can preform well, they just won’t be “optimal.” For the new battle tomb/update, for me it’s going to come down to three factors that determine how powerful the mortals will be: rules, point costs, and battalions. A balance of these three concepts is going to tell me how viable they’ll be on the table. For even if the rules on the models are lackluster, a fair point cost and access to powerful battalion abilities can bring them up quite drastically in value. Nurgle Blightkings are a great example: poor rules by themselves, but when belonging to a battalion they can be very deadly.

It seems like we’re going to be one of the more diverse chaos factions in the chaos allegiance; if not one of the most diverse armies in the game. To give a brief rundown of what we currently have: - we have access to decent and above average melee with higher then average rend; we have abilities that increase the volume of attacks as well - abilities that alter the flow of combat/activation - access to monster creatures and/or heroes that are high-damage deathstars - very fast melee-orientated cavalry - decent magical abilities that can cause damage or provide buffs, and the ability to mess with others in the psychic phases - consistent and reliable casters - decent endless spells that mess with the opponent’s movement and/or cause mortal wounds - battalions and subfactions that allow us to outflank, buff our already powerful heroes, or increase our insane speed What’s rumored to be coming: - armored Elite infantry armed either with shields or more melee weapons; one may be suited for tanking/general use while the other may be more damage-orientated and specialized - cheap battleline armed with bows that can provide ranged support - cavalry that can shoot - monstrous/high wound and high rend infantry (Slaangors) - Mortal hero special character from the Old World that will probably be suited towards combat - possibly other, not leaked units that can provide buffs, damage, magic, etc. I’m super excited b/c of the variety will have in terms of building lists. Compared to other chaos factions that have less choices and are more tailored to specific play styles, it seems that will have the ability to make lists that will look very different from one another but still be (hopefully) viable.

I think it’s a Slaangor based on the claw and leg similarity to the current model in the Direchasm boxset. I believe it’s a different/strange pose b/c of Slaanesh’s influence, causing it to be very elegant and agile looking. I also think the color schemes for the potential Slaangors, much like Slaanesh daemons, are going to vary significantly in the form of dark browns, pinks, lighter grey skin tones, or other odd mixtures to give that Slaaneshy vibe that’s hauntingly “beautiful” but evil.

I noticed some mention regarding on the Warcry leak that the faction symbol for the new Slaanesh mortals is different from Slaanesh Daemons. I found this on the GW website for the description for the preorder: it looks like the additional faction keyword is going to be Sybarites. I also agree that this is in parallel with the other god-specific Chaos factions, and that Sybarites is going to be our new mortal keyword. However, the overlap of our new mortal units with the current daemon range in terms of buffing and synergy remains in question. I’m not sure about Tzeentch and Nurgle, but I know that Khorne has a deep distinction between Bloodbound, mortal, and daemon units. Perhaps the update/new battletome is going to be a large rework of our synergy capabilities? I can see certain buffs and auras becoming restricted, such as a KoS only buffing other daemons, but hopefully spell-based abilities will be able to support all units.

I wonder what the shield does; there isn’t a description of its characteristics on the profile. Perhaps it’s going to be similar to a chaos warrior’s +5 to ignore mortal wounds?

I’m a Blades of Khorne collector, and I have a pretty sizable Bloodbound army. I’ve been on the edge about what to start collecting next, and have been pretty uncertain since I like both 40k and AoS. As a chaos fan, I’ve yet to be disappointed with the AoS releases: everything that has come out has impressed me. But, the recent mortal Slaanesh reveal has me super excited, and is exactly what I hoped for! Personally, I’ve always been a huge fan of Slaanesh, and I’ve told myself that if Hedonites were to receive a mortal followers release, that I’d collect the army. Not only are they bringing Sigvald back (one of my favorite characters from fantasy), but they’re also releasing some amazing Warrior of Slaanesh equivalents; both the twin-souls and painbringers look equally incredible. I’m definitely going to pick up a mortal Slaanesh army when the models drop, as they’re going to pair very nicely against my BoK.

I’ve also thought about what direction they’re going to go for the model range, and I too have thought about what it would be like if they added chariots, and especially archers. Part of the reason why there is a lack of ranged units for death is b/c undead hordes lack the individualism and are simply reanimated vessels; but each mortek construct is an individual with its own consciousness and personality. I could definitely see it as an opportunity to introduce new models to further diversify the roaster. But I agree that most likely we aren’t going to see any new models for a while. Maybe the new models we get with Warhammer Underworlds that were teased via the bone scythe pic will introduce something interesting and new, but I have my doubts.

I agree with your analysis, as the Petrifex were always the obvious choice in terms of maxing an OBR army’s potential; they were the #1 choice by far, especially in competitive gaming. Now that they’ve been nerfed it gives the other subfactions a chance to shine.

I feel like this is an unpopular opinion, but I’m pretty happy about the faq. I’m a Crematorian and Katakros/Mortis Praetorians player, so I’m a bit biased when it comes to the changes. What I was most worried about was the potential changes to Mortek Guard going up in points; I’m now very relieved that they stayed the same. It’s also a nice surprised to also see stalkers, guards, and Morghast get a point reduction. Granted, the Soulreaper and Vokmortian should have seen reductions in point costs to make them a lot more viable, but I was more concerned with the potential negative changes as opposed to the positives. The Petrifix Elite deserved a nerf. The default +1 save to every unit in the army was too powerful, especially combined with their command ability that gives additional rend. However, rerolling save rolls of 1 in melee only is a too draconian; it should have been “ignore rend of -1”or rerolling to everything, not just melee. Yet they still have the -1 to rend strat, one of the more powerful abilities in the game, so I feel like they still have some merit when it comes to potential on the board.

I haven’t gotten my hands on the Anvil of Apotheosis rules yet, but from what I do know is that Ossiarchs have much more efficient and consistent means to heal themselves/restore models. Unless you’re going for a narrative play style and not a competitive one, I’d drop the Orb of Shaping spell and figure out another means to improve his capabilities.

I have a feeling that even after the inevitable Petrifix Elite nerf, OSB are still going to be a top tier army. The army is still strong in many other regards (good armor saves, the ability to bring models back from the dead, common rend, etc.), and if the rumor is true that units aren’t changing in points, then I’m confident we’re still going to see OBRs on the top of tournaments. I predict that Katakros is going to be far more common in lists though, as he still provides that +1 save and a number of other very useful benefits.

I second the 6 stalkers, they can be brutal and super punishing if used correctly

In general, what armies do you guys feel are the best/worst matchups in terms of factions against OBR? I know it’s very open-ended and usually based around the list, but I want to get some generalized opinions on what armies counter us the best, or which one’s we have the easiest time beating.