Beer & Pretzels Gamer

So after ~24 Hours there is again a strong contingent who is agnostic but it is interesting that there is clear majority support for higher total attrition with no interest to date in the lower loss rates.

That’s where I’ve initially down and for similar reasons. One of my funnier AoS memories was teaching two players the game. One was playing Nurgle with GUO’s and Slimux plus his beasts of Nurgle buddies. The other was playing Legion of Azgorh centered around the Execution Herd and some artillery. As new players are won’t to do both raced out to the center of the battlefield... and then stayed there in a relatively straight line for next few rounds. Between Disgustingly Resilient and Black Shard Armor as well as some weak rolls when attacking it took “forever” for models to start dropping. Finally some beasts broke free to tip the VPs but I’d guess 75% of the models were on the table and the two were laughing every time the paltry number of wounds that went through only to be largely negated. “Oh No You Didn’t” became the default response to any wounds...

So got the full battle report up in Zoom League blog but thought I’d reach out to the more experienced Fyreslayer players out there on what I felt was my biggest missed opportunity - popping Berzerk Fury at the right moment. Clearly getting hit by a super profile Skarbrand meant I was going to be losing a lot of models. That I happened to have the -2 Rend Ur Gold Rune going at that moment makes it all the more painful I forgot it was activated in the Combat Phase itself, instead of confusing it with the Runesmiter on Magmadroths eating Ur Gold in the Hero Phase. Enough pain there that I am unlikely to forget again. My question though is, in my next match vs Bonesplitterz I think it may be tougher to identify the right moment to activate. Clearly if I can get the: into the Rogue Idol known as Pebbles it makes sense. But the rest of the army? Are the Savage Big Stabbas worth it? They’re much better into Monsters so not sure how many they’ll kill but making sure I get rid of them may be worth it. Doubt the 20x Arrowz can do enough in melee to merit it. And 10x Savage Orruks may not hit hard enough either. Thoughts? Don’t want to forget it 2x in a row and will have plenty of choices against Mawtribes a week after but will admit only see that one target and not sure I can force that opportunity.

Thanks to everyone who responded to my previous thread! I love my own local gaming group/Zoom League and my limited forays into the tournament scene have been almost entirely positive but it is still great to see the broader Age of Sigmar community. It is especially helpful to me to see beyond the extremes that some threads can gravitate too. Now if I’d been smart would’ve added this question to my original poll as I do think they rate of attrition people prefer and the amount of models left on the table are related. I also think both are correlated with how people feel about a lot of other issues such as battleplans, double-turns, shooting etc. But I also think there are some areas that this is question gets at that the former doesn’t. For example, while I’ve given my own fanciful interpretations of what each preference level might mean implicit in those comments are that the full five rounds are played through, regardless of the VP situation. There are of course plenty of other alternative interpretations. For instance I know players that are more than willing to concede once about half the models are gone if they feel that they have a good enough idea of whether or not victory is out of reach. If so they’d rather move on (pre-Covid) and get their next game going or (in Zoom League given late start times) call it a night. Alternatively I know players that want to play it out to the end, only conceding if completely tabled or the VP math isn’t just difficult, but objectively impossible. Another alternative, perhaps one for all our Alpha Strikers out there, is that you look for a close to 50% finish... BUT you expect the vast majority the surviving models to be your own. (Another way I think this question is distinct from my previous one.) Anyway, thanks in advance for voting and I look forward to reading everyone’s commentary on why they prefer a given level of survival when they play.

Most of us have probably succumbed to it at some point in our playing - that fear/obsession over one particular aspect of our opponent’s list that causes us to make choices in our turn to address it that ultimately prove sub-optimal in many other areas of the match and ultimately self-defeating as at best we delay what we are worried about, not entirely derail. The last time these two players had gone head-to-head it had been Mawtribes v FEC with the double pile-ins of Feeding Frenzy playing a big role in the game’s outcome. Given this it wasn’t surprising that Mawtribes was concerned about the Tyrant’s of Blood Battalion’s special ability if sequential Bloodthirster activation. Add in a battleplan with 8 objectives and a limited number of units to address them with and there was a lot of room for mistakes to creep in as the Mawtribes player tried to avoid giving Khorne the opportunity. Still, from the outside looking in it was clear that Tyrant’s of Blood was dictating the game on both side of the table. Mawtribes did manage to set up a solo activation with their Ironguts vs FURY that did go in their favor. FURY would fall to the Ironguts but unfortunately the Frost Sabres you see are an example of the type of mistake which was made because after coming out of ambush with Icebrow Hunter and thus being in range for Charge bonus they were sent into FURY instead of used against Skarbrand to force an activation and preventing him from using his ability to use his best Damage Table Profile the next turn. FURY’s fall had also come after an earlier mistake not to even try a medium-length charge with the Beastriders that would’ve likely wiped at least a unit of Fleshhounds. This set up Khorne to one shot them on their turn with RAGE. And after FURY’s fall Khorne took full advantage of Baleful Lord’s ability to let Bloodthirsters run & charge to set up exactly the Tyrants of Blood sequence Mawtribes had been fearing with RAGE into the Frostlord, super-profiled Skarbrand into the Huskard and WRATH on Irongut mop up duty. The Frostlord would survive with a single wound left and kill RAGE on their next turn but by that point Khorne had enough Blood Tithe to summon in a fresh Bloodthirster and it was just left for Skarbrand to do mop up duty. Until the last few turns on VP this one had remained close with Khorne choosing not to burn objectives when they had the opportunity but Mawtribes maxing out their chance post -FURY’s fall to get as many points out of it as they could. But ultimately in trying to avoid sequential activation Mawtribes gave up too much (particularly in the form of Damage on the Charge) to prevent being on the wrong side of the attrition by the late rounds. So now (with the upset?) Mawtribes and Khorne are both 1-1. The Fyreslayers vs Bonesplitterz match had to be postponed but can Bonesplitterz pull even when it goes down or will Fyreslayers pull into the lead? And can Mawtribes shake it off like new fallen snow against Fyreslayers in the final round before the table flip? Can Khorne carry their momentum forward against Bonesplitterz?

Good point! Gets to the yeah, I expect them to die but think that they may hit a bit harder than your average Blood Tithe MSU.

Completely fair. Though I’d note that designers also know that changes can quickly make the agnostic passionate in surprising ways, especially in as complex a system as AoS and thus it is unsurprising when status quo persists despite the passions of a minority for change. In other words the premise that those who don’t care won’t care has proven catastrophically inaccurate curate at times leading to a preference for first do no harm. Not saying that’s right approach just saying I know that risk exists and that type of thinking persists. As I am not secretly a designer for GW (though if you guys are reading this and hiring feel free to give me call 😉) I was curious to see whether the community was truly polarized on certain aspects of game play or not. Happy though to see what others get out of the poll.

Front-Loaded definitely the least popular option. But after reading, for example, the what people want in AoS 3.0, which turned for a while into a heated debate re:the double-turn it would not have been unreasonable to expect a very barbelled response. Yet agnosticism still in the lead suggesting that there is a not small contingent of players for whom alpha-strike or double turn isn’t the biggest area of concern...

Speaking of Khornegors (and yes, please!) I need 1-3 more Tuskgor Chariots to round out my Blood Tithe Bandits: Plan to run them in Brass Despoilers both as BoC and in Blades of Khorne. In the latter I’m fascinated to see their potential as both easy Blood Tithe (can get them into battle much quicker than say MSU Reavers) but with possibly better hitting power and potential for objective stealing. In the former not sure which Bray would give them the most benefit.

On that note I find the results after a little less then 48 hours very interesting. There clearly isn’t a consensus opinion, nor even an answer with close to majority support. Still holding onto a lead is agnosticism. To me this makes some sense given how many players run multiple different lists both within a given faction and across different factions. So while some of these players might not enjoy getting alpha struck or caught on the wrong side of a R1/R2 double-turn they’ve run an alpha strike list or two in their time and benefited from the double turn once or twice. More than that they appreciate the dynamism that comes from the game offering a variety of options and opportunities and accept the good with the bad, responding with equanimity to a less fun game knowing a more fun game is probably right around the corner. Closing the gap with agnosticism is a balanced game. Models are going to be removed but lots of different factors (my favorite in this thread again being able to keep a clean table by having time to put does a I in their carrier 😎) seem to make a steady pace preferable. Again, I think this is consistent with a lot of what I’ve read in the other threads that prompted this poll. Thanks again to everyone who has responded to the poll and in the comments. Finding this fascinating, particularly in comparison and contrast to how some other threads seem to lean into more extreme takes then the polls show.

I get that. In Zoom League been playing a lot more elite lists than normal in my more common narrative games. When it is a big chunk of your army hard to see that Frostlord go down or lose a Abhorrant Ghoul King on Royal Terrorgheist. But if they fall after doing “big things” the loss is somewhat assuaged. Been giving me the itch though to get Khorne mortals on the table where I can feel free to throw a bunch of Reavers into the whirlwind and reap the Blood Tithe.

Will have to wait to actually get the full flavor when the tables do flip but the mere knowledge that in a few weeks I’d be on the “other side of the table” piloting the Khorne list added a lot of flavor to my in game experience. Jumping to the conclusions: First, this was my first time playing Fyreslayers (opponents first time playing Khorne so even footing there) and I left the match feeling good overall about how I played but positive that there was still plenty of room for improvement in the next two rounds of the tournament. For example, I missed an opportunity to maybe draw the match to a close a turn early because instead of Berserk Fury I had Berserk Forgetfulness. My block of 20x Vulkite Berzerkers had been challenging some Fleshhounds for the Eastern Objective when the primary objective shifted over there in a later round. I’d managed to get the 6 on my Ur-gold Runes giving my army -2 Rend. With Skarbrand fully buffed then it wasn’t surprising that he charged in to them instead of immediately trying to break the Hearthguard Berzerker block in the middle again. At that point I knew my Vulkite’s time on the table would be limited. Perfect moment to pop Berzerk Fury and let them die fighting! Except... I completely forgot about it. Or more accurately I confused it with the Auric Runemsiter on Magmadroths ability to eat gold and give a Save bubble which has to be activated in the Hero Phase. By the time I realized it is actually activated in the Combat Phase over half my Vulkites were already gone... So, right there a simple way for me to get more out of this army in my next two matches (even if the Ur-Gold Rune buffs don’t line up nearly as well...). I’d still take Skarbrand down with my remaining Hearthguard Berzerkers in the next round but this was a clear missed opportunity and hopefully the painful memory will keep me sharper in games two and three. Second, while ultimately I won the war of attrition pretty decisively (Khorne conceded when reduced to a couple Fleshhounds, even with some Blood Tithe to summon because while all depleted I still had enough units on table to win objectives in last round) even without fully maximizing my own potential I still think I have a decent chance in a few weeks of winning with Khorne as there was a close call for me in early going and I think my opponent had missed opportunities too. With a two drop list my opponent made me go first. I’d expected this and accepted that realistically I could challenge one objective R1 with the bulk of my forces, two objectives R2 by bringing in my Runesmiter on foot and the 20x Vulkite Berzerkers with him in the tunnel) and MAYBE all three after R3 if I could afford to move the Magmadroths out as a separate unit. Got lucky when primary objective fell in middle so I was able to move up in force with my 20x Hearthguard Berzerkers, my Battlesmith and both Magmadroths. At the last minute I fortuitously ran the Auric Hearthguard in behind the Battlesmith. My base case is my opponent would claim the flanking objectives and position for a potential double turn with a fully enraged Skarbrand. Instead he decided to test hitting his Hammer against my Anvil as hard as possible, bringing in all three of the unnamed Bloodthirsters and a unit of Fleshhounds to boot. I guess this was about as good a test of my Hearthguard Berzerkers’ resiliency as I was like to get and I was really regretting that the +1 Save prayer hadn’t gotten off and I’d gotten stingy with the Runesmiter on Magmadroth’s Ur Gold first turn. Still, I had my Battlesmith in position (and I thought out of harms way) and paid my CP for All Out Defense (the Mystic Shield there to remind me of that as obviously no magic in this army). But I’d forgotten about RAGE’s axe dealing MW on unmodified 6s to Wound to all units within 8”. Guess who was in 8”? Yup, my Battlesmith whose buff I really didn’t want to lose before the real swinging even began... Thank goodness those Auric Hearthguard were there to eat 5 out of 8 MWs, preserving my Battlesmith. That was a huge difference in my survivability as the other Bloodthirsters activated. I understood why my opponent tried and had RAGE killed the Battlesmith we are likely talking a different outcome. But with the Battlesmith intact I weathered the storm and while VP was within 1 point back and forth for next couple of rounds after his Hammer broke on my Anvil I had a lead in the attrition battle that I could build on despite my low mobility. (Primary objective staying in the middle R2 certainly helped there too.) No guarantees but when the tables flip I think there was more ability to leverage Khorne’s big mobility advantage and an opportunity for better target selection. Given how critical a few Auric Hearthguard wound absorption’s were in R1 I’m thinking it won’t take too much going right for Khorne to tip the scales. -X-X-X- So at the end of the first set of matches Fyreslayers and Mawtribes are both up 1-0 and Khorne and Bonesplitterz are looking for redemption. Fyreslayers move on to Bonesplitterz while Khorne faces Mawtribes.

Appreciate the clarification, especially the insight into what you perceive as the problems as it gets to one of the points I made in original post in that there does seem to be a correlation between how people feel about attrition rates and their perspective on other issues in the game from the double turn to power creep or MW spam, etc.

I guess to help clarify using the points to balance doesn’t mean always two evenly pointed armies with some fluff stuck on top. For example we had one narrative match which took place at the field hospital the Swifthawk Agents had set up after taking so many casualties in the prior battle. A new infection at the hospital attracted Nurgle’s attention and a Great Unclean One and his minions were sent to collect it. The intent was for it to be unbalanced with Nurgle having a stronger force but the Aelves having the benefit of being entrenched (giving them +1 Saves) and a chance each turn to potentially heal a unit and bring it in as a kind of reinforcement. The obvious question then was by how much Nurgle should out weigh the Aelves? We ball parked it at ~300 pts above expected reserves entering game. Another example was a personal favorite “Sky Cutter Down” where a Sky Cutter had crashed in a Sylvan Grove. The crash had attracted the attention of the Spiderfang Tribe and its bevy of Arachnarok Spiders and Spider Riders who now assaulted the Grove. At the start of game there was ~1k of Sylvaneth on table and 1.5K of Spiderfang. Each side also had a table of six units. At the end of each turn the player ( through the first three rounds) would roll to see which unit was going to come on and which of the three board edges it would come from. We reversed the ratios of points for these reserve tables BUT across the six options points were very un equal so maybe the Spiderfang would get a Rogue Idol or maybe they’d get a small block of Stabbas... for Swifthawk the balance was generally between a unit likely to be able to get to the grove faster such as another Sky Cutter or a slower but potentially more powerful unit? Again, in both cases points were helpful but not definitive.

List building is a component of the game and deployment can certainly slow or accelerate model attrition. But to keep it positive and on track again this thread is about the idealized rate of attrition. No models can actually be lost in those phases and I’m going to go out on a limb and guess most players “ideal game” doesn’t involve their opponent bringing a bad list and deploying poorly.

While we will use match points to help get the balance we were looking for pre-COVID our gaming group was mainly narrative style matches. Outside of a few weeks in the fall where we’d practice lists for a local tournament we’d have some ongoing narrative. COVID disrupted our Khorne narrative where Khorne Mortals and Khorne Daemons were competing to see who could secure the most skulls for the skull throne that would’ve culminated in an 8k total points match at the end. A highlight of one narrative was a unit of Swordmasters (pre-squat) that just kept surviving and thus earned a “regiment of renown” style buff as a result. One opponent got so flustered by them that they committed the bulk of their Nurgle forces to just killing that unit in one game.

I was once fortunate enough to be in France at the right time of year in a particularly feculent season that allowed me to partake in a tasting menu where every dish featured truffles. This seemed not quite Slaanesh level but still decadent right from the start but of course given their normal rarity it was quite enjoyable the first few dishes to see truffles so prominently featured. By the end of the meal though, while I wouldn’t say we were bored of truffles we were certainly sated from a truffle flavor perspective and would’ve been happy to have seen something else more prominently featured. Kudos to the truffle pig creatives at GW that they keep digging up new rare truffles to serve as in our war scrolls whether that is on the offensive side or defensive side. The issue always seems to be that having added that truffle to one dish (say Wound and MW negation) they always seem to say well if you liked it there what about here? And here? How about over there? Until it’s pretty ubiquitous (and so many units are shrugging woundsleft and right). Of course then the dishes that didn’t get it feel too simple and plain (uncompetitive) so that have to get something to balance out that so they find a new truffle for one of them (say MWs on unmodified 6s) and the process just repeats. So in a faction with limited access to MWs (believe Magmadroths only other on WS MW option and those a little trickier) I’m okay with “seasoning” one weapon option for one unit with said buff. Similarly in a faction with limited access to negation (Grimwrath I think the only other on WS negation?) I’m okay with lseasoning” one unit with a pretty good negation option. Now should one “dish” get that much “seasoning”? Maybe. Maybe not. But to your point in going too far when you start looking at factions where MWs or powerful negations are getting handed out like candy on Halloween... Then you’re definitely worried about things tipping too far from “normal” mechanics.

Shame. Does look very cool but found plenty of threads complaining about balance for it as I started digging. In any non-static game balance seems to be a chimera. Chasing it just gets more difficult as variables are added.

Cool. I’ll have to look deeper. When I went to their store didn’t see that wide of a selection but maybe was looking in wrong place.

One of my all time AoS highlights was teaching my daughter and two of her friends to play. I’d set up a Khorne vs Sylvaneth match (based on the description of the fantasy characters they’d said they’d liked with one girl asking for the biggest baddest Deamon I had). The two girls playing Khorne were super into it and after picking up, admiring and commenting on how cool a mortal unit looked she put it down on the table and charged it right into Durthu shouting “Get out there and die Meatshield!” Thought to myself, now there’s a kid who gets it. Both tactically (throw those mortals out as chaff until you bring the Bloodthirster in) and attitude wise (have fun with it).

Not terribly familiar with Malifaux but my basic understanding is it has a fraction of the unit types of AoS. And, to me at least, both the numerator (point spread) and the denominator (number of units that need to be accommodated by that point spread) both matter. A simple example from an army I don’t play but play against is Gors in BoC. The BoC thread is filled with commentary on how there just isn’t enough point differential between Ungors and Bestigors to create enough “value” for Gors in a list. So simply put the more units you need to account for and differentiate the more difficult a narrow spread becomes. AoS is cramming a whole lot of units in between 100-200 points. There are well over 100 units just in Chaos alone (stopped counting in GH at 100 and still had most of Skaven and StD to go...) Where I do think we are in agreement though is the issue of quantifying value in isolation. I think the points system is fine for exploration because it is a “good enough” guide to result in most exploration games being reasonably balanced with minimal communication. I don’t think, given how massively multivariate AoS is with numerous different feedback loops, that any point system could be refined enough to satisfy the solvers. As far as penalty for multiple units this runs into both battleline and breadth of faction issues. Not that there aren’t questions that can’t be raised about those but some factions only have one baseline battleline (to which at most you can add 1 more via your General or taking a sub-faction). So I’m not sure it’s the indicator you think it is. Regardless though it is just evidence that you can’t “just” change one aspect of the game without making changes in a bunch of other areas.

Too funny because I frequently raise my eyebrow at some MW on unmodified 6s to Hit but when I saw it on Flamestryke Poleaxe I just went - “of course if you just took a flaming brazier to the face you’d take MW” but if it is just the chains or pole that hits, yeah, not as likely to Rend or do Damage as that two handed axe over in the other Hearthguard Berzerkers’ hands. And I guess that’s always how I’ve mentally reconciled it. Certain weapons are going to do Damage if they land. As long as I understand the logic I generally take it for what it is. Which isn’t to say that GW hasn’t become a wee bit generous in their allocating of these abilities but that I’m not sure the principle of MW from Hit Rolls is in and of itself problematic.

Gotta respect another player that keeps a clean table!

Percent absolutely may have been a better way of phrasing the question. Modified Bell Curve like you describe an enjoyable game from experience.

So you want a Big Bang but are pretty agnostic about which round it occurs? Coming from historical gaming I get that approach.