Gailon

I agreed with this in theory when I started but now found that it completely conflicts with what I tend to prefer. I really enjoy painting, BUT I am not very good at it and I'm slow. So I enjoy getting a chance to sit down and slowly paint a few war dollies in the evening. I also have two small kids and a stressful job. This means my army progress is super slow, but very enjoyable for me. So my goal is to continue to have painting projects. I really enjoy the models I have finished and as I get closer and closer to having more complete armies. As a result I have resisted the 'fast paint' methods. I don't really want to fast paint my army, even though I do prefer to play with painted models and enjoy the immersion. Fast painting something is tough because it is just less enjoyable as a process. I am losing out on the peaceful and relaxing painting process and replacing it with something that feels more job like only centered on the goal. I think there may be more painting in the community if we encouraged people to enjoy the process, not because it results in a painting army or because it looks awesome, but because engaging with something creative is enjoyable. I often compare my painting process to knitting. I do it for my own mental health. I'm glad that I get a hat or scarf at the end of it, but if that became the point it would no longer be enjoyable. I say all this to point out that the big problem with painting standards is that the way people engage with the hobby is just way too varied to possibly standardize anything. Some people enjoy painting and have painted armies as a result. But I have found that I enjoy painting and have mostly unpainted armies as a result (although I just keep plugging away and that keeps changing, and now I show up to games and realize that without really noticing it I have almost entirely painted lists).

I've only really looked closely at the SCE book. I tend to prefer stronger faction abilities with weaker warscrolls, as I feel like that creates more flavorful army construction. Ogors or Seraphon are books that come to mind for me. If I see a Seraphon list I can tell you what subfaction it is 99% of the time, because the different subfactions have very different play styles - they feel unique. SCE didn't go this way, which was disappointing at first but probably makes sense for them. The Stormhosts aren't particularly powerful, and most don't require a certain playstyle. Perhaps a couple exceptions like Tempest Lords being the obvious choice for Dragon spam. Instead they have provides some very unique battleline options. It will be interesting to see how this plays in list construction. Making a list without any battleline 'tax' is interesting, as now a lot of elite troops can be made battleline. I know I will definitely be painting up a Dracothian dominated list. Personally, I'm encouraged. SCE just has so many warscrolls to write, but it seems like they tried to give reasons to take different units in different builds and metas. Even 'trash' like Liberators have a roll to be put on objectives in a Stormkeep - counting as 3 for objective control. I'm excited to make a bunch of different lists and try them out, and that's about all I can ask for from a Battletome. It's disappointing when there appears to be an obvious choice at every decision point. I think they did ok of having a couple artifacts that will at least make you look twice before taking the Amulet of Destiny. The removal of some extra abilities from warscrolls is a bummer. It seems like a lot of warscrolls were just trimmed back a bit, taking away retreat and charge from the Heraldor, taking away stopping pile in from Concussors among many examples. I get the simplification, and it definitely helps prevent players from being surprised by some ability their opponent's army has, which can be a feel bad gaming experience. I just enjoyed finding and using little options like that to try out new strategies. The biggest concern I have is that including Grand Strategies and Battle Tactics and Core Battalions in Battletomes is just asking for mistakes to be made. Those can't be fixed with points the way (most) army balance issues can be. So far it seems fine, but it's only a matter of time before a couple Battle Tactics or a Core Battalion slips by design and is very easy to abuse to give that faction a large advantage on a competitive scene. Of course I don't play competitive AoS, so I'm not sure why this worries me when I think about it....

All I wanted was the Pitched Battle profiles and he read for one hour forty five minutes and then said “eh, I’m not going to read these” and held up the page in a way that I definitely can’t make out the points. Is it against forum rules to share a readable screenshot of the points pages? Just trying to finish painting a PtG army and trying to figure out what fits.

I'm curious about this, because I'm not sure I see it. I'd like it to be true. Most people will take a Warlord battalion and take an extra artifact, but that seems equivalent to people taking a warscroll battalion, which seemed fairly common, Two extra artifacts requires 6 leaders, 4 of which have less than 10 wounds. Not sure how many people will push for that? (genuine question) And it pretty much concedes the choice of who goes first in most games.

This is a great idea, people are playing real games and we can all see how our theorycrafting works out. Plus, this game is huge. Looking online I'm realizing just how different other people's experiences can be because they play different armies against different armies with different styles. I played Sylvaneth vs. my friend's Beasts of Chaos army. We used the new leaked points. List building was definitely different. I found the new Core battalions more interesting than I thought at first glance. Because of the subcommander requirements I found it tricky to get the warlord battalion (my Sylvaneth lists don't run a lot of leaders with a few wounds). I went with a four monster list to try to take advantage of those rules, and Beasts went the other way, with TONS of small units and a couple units of Bullgor to do the damage. The game was GREAT. Continuing my theory that basement tier AoS is the most fun. Some thoughts: The changes to endless spells are interesting. Moving through them is a no brainer change that really helps keeping the flavor without having them just be movement blockers. Moving at the end of the hero phase is interesting, it gives that chance to try to dispel one before it moves. Rather than just being a thing that was there, I felt like there was interaction and back and forth with our endless spells (I had the glade wyrm and he had that freaking bull of course). Redeploy was amazing. I picked a battle tactic to destroy a particular unit of ungor. But when I moved up he redeployed 5" back. Out of range of treelord shooting and then I failed the charge. Then later, I thought I learned my lesson, picked another destroy unit battle tactice, but had a shooter that was definitely in range. moved up to 3" away. He redeployed 6" into obscuring terrain and I couldn't see the unit anymore to shoot it and now had a 9" charge. Failed. Unleash hell only came into play once, as the only shooter of significance was Drycha. It was definitely good when used. My opponent was able to keep her in combat though by dropping chaos spawns into her. He had so many units and his heroes turned into spawns on death, I think he was uniquely suited to this, more elite armies will have a harder time. One of the sneakier changes is the change to pile in. Being able to pile around a unit now, rather than just closer to the closest model, was critical at a couple points. This really opens up the ability to pile to objectives and to pile in a way that you clip another unit into combat. This rule also makes reach even more powerful. A 2" or 3" weapon can have a huge area it can reach now that the model it is on can pile a lot more freely. I was able to pile Drycha in a way where she killed a key unit that wasn't in combat, entirely because of her 2" reach. Of course he was able to pile chaos spawns around things to barely get within 3" of Drycha and keep her from being able to use unleash hell. The other sneaky change (by my eye) is that unit champions can issue basic commands. This really powers up ambush abilities. When he brought a unit in from ambush, or summoned one, now it didn't have to have a hero to use inspiring presence, which is really huge to keeping those units on the table. 10 besti/un/gor coming into my backfield was a lot tougher to get ride of. Generals are super important for generating those command points. This, combined with battle tactics for killing generals, may make it more important than ever to have beefy generals. After I killed his general he was hurting a bit for command points. The grand strategy ended up being critical to the game. If you get yours and they don't, that's the same point impact as a round where you get all the objectives and they get none. All in all, I loved the game. The hero abilities added a very interesting dynamic, the finest hour coming into play a few times. Choosing battle tactics will obviously be a huge part of the game that I'm already terrible at. I was too tempted to save the 'easy' ones for later, and I think I will start just picking the absolute easiest one to get.

Unleash seems like another ability to incentivize MSU. You can use unleash hell once in response to one charge. that's pretty overwhelmingly powerful if I charge with my eggs in one basket block of 20 ardboys or 9 kurnoth hunters. But is it lessoned if I have 3 x 3 kurnoth? I'm not actually sure, as deleted one of those units still hurts. 4x5 ardboys? certainly unleash hell is less powerful against that. of course the ardboys are a lot less powerful. I've only played one AOS 3 game so far. I had one powerful shooter on the board in Drycha. She used unleashed hell once, but had to do it to a unit with about 6 gor, as they charged first. then my opponent kept her in combat with numerous small units (chaos spawn!). I'm not a fan of the rule being added still, but I can see how and why the playtesters may have liked it and felt it added a lot of tactical decision making.

I kind of suspect it's the opposite. If you play this game from a narrative or casual style then it is far more difficult to identify the broken aspects of the game. I play a lot of casual games where both sides work to build lists to match the game style we enjoy. None of us are spamming that key unit, we will often take our best or new paint jobs, and we heavily skew melee with some support ranged. So in our games I can already see that Unleash Hell won't be an issue, and in fact will be awesomely tactical. I suspect the playtesters may be doing too much of playing the game as intended, rather than doing everything they can to power game it and figure out how to win. Playing a lot of low powered casual games has really given me that perspective.

i could almost see trying the reverse as well. Where you can't use unleash hell if you get hit with the charge. Prevents you from just dropping a powerful shooting unit out there with a huge effective shield on it.

For some reason I thought there was a kind of core battlepack in the core rules. But there isn't? Are there no battle plans in the core rules at all? Or are there just battleplans in the published book, and not the free basic rules?

I certainly hope you're right and that makes sense, but we can definitely play with the new Stormcast and Kruelboyz, they come with the warscrolls and a couple faction abilities. It's not ideal, but you could team them up with other SCE or Orruks and play 2,000 points easily (as I think is being done by some Youtubers). So it wouldn't be a complete unplayable gap if they took awhile on the battletomes.

Played what will probably be my last game of 2.0 last night. Was super fun, but I was just constantly thinking about some 3.0 rules and how excited I am. We played 2x40 chainrasp list vs. a 2x40 saurus warrior list, as these unit sizes will be going away. During his movement I kept thinking about command abilities I could use, was really wishing I had heroic and monster actions for the carnosaur. Was seeing how powerful roar could be in the right spot. So many things. 2.0 has been so much, but I am pumped to see and play something a bit different and find the strategies in them (and be continually outplayed). Even if a lot of my collection won't be played now. I'm excited to make a million new lists and only get to play about one tenth of them and never play a single list enough times to actually get good at it. the more things change the more they stay the same.

No, but it's also not personal. It's not new, it's not a slight, it's not an attack, it's not a bomb. It's a thing that happens in games like this and it sucks and is a bummer. I guess just react like it's a bummer and with criticism, not like someone dropped a hydrogen bomb on you. The game is still playable, the game will be FAQ'd, the meta will change. Doesn't mean you can't be bummed. I mean, we aren't even being bummed about the rules, just pure relative power level, for a version none of us have played. But others are right, this isn't really the place for the discussion, sorry to egg it on.

Frankly, it's perceptions in the community like this that make me understand GW's aloof lack of responsiveness to the community. Because there are so many people and so many competing interests, and so many people that are going to engage in pure hyperbole that it's not worth it. If you feel like there is no pleasing people, then just make your product and close your ears. Hydrogen bomb? That's the equivalent? You typed that out and feel like that's the best analogy to this situation? Let's see if we can think of some better analogies: It's like being a Sylvaneth player and being bottom tier for ages and then not getting points fixes. Maybe it's like being a Beast of Chaos player and then having a game released in the realm of beasts and it not being clear that any of it will do anything for your faction. Maybe it's like being a Seraphon player and having one of the oldest AoS 2.0 model ranges in the entire game, then getting a new book that doesn't update a single model. I don't like the "but GW has always treated people like trash" argument. But I don't think that's what's happening. This is more just that in a game this complicated and large there are always basement tier armies and units. That's a given. Isn't that a given in any competitive game with a shifting meta? There are heroes that are unusable in LoL or in DotA, It is definitely tough in Warhammer, where models are expensive and time consuming. You can't just switch armies. But the complaints are all about competitive power level. This is where I just don't see eye to eye with the severity of the complaints. (having a weak army is a bummer for sure, but HoS players here are acting, well, like this is a hydrogen bomb). If you have a weak army, then try to play against weak armies. There are a lot of them, there always are. Someone has a collection of spider riders they barely get to play with. Frankly, that's the same situation for powerful armies. Maybe some people like smashing their opponents to bits, but people with very strong armies also need to seek out specific opponents with strong armies to have a good game. If the concern is with high level competitive play, that you want to take an army to a tournament and win, then it is difficult for me to believe that that type of player (where that is their primary enjoyment from the game) is stuck with only a HoS army as their option. I think GW thought HoS would be better in 3.0 than it looks like it will be. There are arguments for this (summoning is more powerful now, depravity points could be more numerous). In my opinion, they were wrong. Just like how Wizards is frequently wrong about the strength of magic cards, or any other company that makes any other complex game with a shifting power balance.

I guess it just shows the full scope of something like Age of Sigmar that so many people who play it can have such a wildly different experience than I do. Makes me very grateful for my local gaming group where we play and have fun. Imagine that.

I think Sylvaneth really benefits from the changes to all out attack and all out defense and mystic shield. A lot of Sylvaneth abilities let them reroll 1's to hit or to save (or reroll saves entirely). Now those abilities are way more useful. I think this may be where the Arch Revenant actually plays well. Put him out with some Kurnoth Hunters and an all out attack and they are hitting on 2's rerolling 1's then rerolling saves that might be boosted to 3+ by a mystic shield? Treelord Ancient's command ability is also improved under similar logic. I agree with you though, seems like these will bump Sylvaneth to mid tier, but we'll see. I can definitely see some lists surprising and occasionally hitting a podium.

Has any heard or seen any leaks about monstrous arcanum? I see that it was listed in the books section of the GHB, where it listed the books that are part of the game, but it's not clear to me where it stands points wise, as I didn't see dread saurian, troggoth hag, or rogue idol among the points for their factions. Would be very sad (and inexplicable to me, as GW seemed to figure out to just point them where they are not competitive and let people have fun with them if they want) if they were just squatted. Anyone seen rumors about their status in 3.0?

According to the internet right now there are a ton of people whose army is rendered complete garbage. You can't find any of them to play against and have a fun game? the two people I play the most against have a BoC army and a Nighthaunt army among their collection, and I have a Sylvaneth. All bottom tier armies that can play just fine against each other and have made for some perfectly enjoyable games. You're saying no one in your gaming circle has a Nighthaunt, slaanesh, BoC, [insert virtually every army here according to this thread] army to play against?

Based on the internet every army is worse, so I guess mine is fine? I'm glad that the rules and points have brought some serious balance to Seraphon. Playing Seraphon in a friendly environment has been a bummer. I need to make a list that isn't overpowered, and when I win the question is "did I bring an OP list?" Now I feel like I will finally be able to craft the best list I can make and have a fun and competitive game. I'm bummed for saurus warriors though. They were already bad an neglected, even saurus lists played knights instead. So they decreased the unit size and increased the points by more than they increased skinks. the age of the carnosaur has arrived.

This, a million times this. What the heck is wrong with people? 90% of this hobby is painting and crafting and lore and hanging out with cool people who share an interest. Are people getting some kind of amazing prizes for winning tournaments or something? Everyone seems to be responding to changes with "this rule sucks because it makes my particular list worse." or something. If you have an army that is generally weak, and a list that is generally weak, then get better friends. Because if you don't know someone is willing to bust out their sylvaneth, or beasts of chaos, or some jank build like StD without marauders or Fyreslayers with only magmadroths and vulkites, then. I don't know, find a nicer gaming group? This is all wild theory crafting to begin with, and we've seen the meta shift up and down. It is a bummer to have a book of rules that lacks synergy, lacks dynamic play, but it seems like everyone is just complaining about power level, when that's all just relevant anyway. Maybe I just don't get it. Personally I choose to enjoy a hobby that takes so much money and time.

I am going to get some hate for this, but hear me out - Lord Kroak. Kroak is super good within the game, but a lot of that is value, and in particular his value over the point cost of a Slann. But that is part of the disappointment. Lord Kroak is such a powerful Slann that his magic is still potent after death. On the table we get a better Slann, who is point costed in a way where basically the only reason to take a Slann is if you want a Slann AND Kroak. Korak-nado is also kind of boring to play. Rather than spells that impact the battlefield, and utilize terrain or movement or the fates, Kroak's main ability is murder facing support heroes that get too close (too close being a giant 22" bubble). It would be far more interesting and fitting to have a warscroll worth 500-600 points for Kroak. Giving a genuine decision between him and a regular Slann.