Requizen

Relictor with Translocation because it's always useful. I like his heal, especially if he can jump up to the Evocators to support them, and the -1 to hit is super useful. I think he's probably the best all-around Hero in the army, though he doesn't have a super role like some choices (Castellant with big units, Heraldor with Fulminators, etc). Prosecutors... honestly I just wanted another unit that shot and only had 110 points to play with. Like I said, work in progress.

Disagree on number of CPs and Vexillor. Gav with 1 extra CP is a 3" charge. Have a Vexillor there (easy to get in range with either a run or teleporting himself), and that's 3" with reroll, which is about as reliable as you can get (chance of rolling snake eyes twice in a row is pretty tiny, like .07% or something?). Even no extra CP with a reroll is a 6"rr, which is around a 92% success chance. Cogs + Wizard + Vex gets you Staunch and an artifact, sure, but Cogs are so hard to get off unless you're investing in other ways of getting it off, plus it buffs your opponents and stuff. I'm not really a fan by any means, though it might work for you.

I don't think Gav with Evos is a one trick pony, but I think it will evolve into something else. Rather than being something you build the list around, it might be one element of it. For example: Gavriel Ordinator Relictor Vexillor Judicators Judicators Liberators Ballista Ballista Ballista Evocators x10 Evocators x5 Skinks Prosecutors While not an Optimized list, definitely something I've been fiddling with. Enough drops to put Evos, Ballistas, Ordi, and Gav in the sky. You can do things like drop in shooting units first to clear the screen and create a "Drop Zone" so to speak, or you can drop the Evos first to charge in and use the shooting to clear up, or leave Ballistas on the table to threaten fast enemies/Alpha Strikes, or leave the Evos down to counter charge and drop the Ballistas to backfield snipe... less all in on getting the melee unit through on turn 1, though if you can, it's still just as strong. Could potentially drop some Evos for more bodies, but like I said, work in progress.

Who needs FLY to get past screens, when you can drop near the edge of one and run all the way around them to the things behind? If your screen isn't edge-to-edge on the board, or completely surround the thing inside in a perfect circle, you ain't safe from an average 25" charge. 40k went like this: Chapter Approved (GHB for 40k) changed points, big FAQ 1 tweaked any points that were really bad, big FAQ 2 only touched rules. Who knows what it'll be going forwards, but I doubt we'll see any point changes unless Evocators take all top 3 at a large event or something. So far, they're powerful but people haven't been complaining about them on Facebook, which is what GW reacts to.

+18" charge range on the drop, obviously ?

More or less yeah. Decimators have to have very good positioning and not be counter positioned to do their thing - if the opponent strings out correctly, you won't get that many swings per Deci. Meanwhile, Sword Evos are getting 4 attacks at the same profile all the time while also having their zappy hands, which are better on average than Starsoul Maces (until they get a lot of losses). The only Paladin unit that has uses is Protectors, and then only if you're going slow footslog and want the shooting protection from their Glaives. That's... it. They're also sometimes better against Monsters, I guess?

Looks interesting for sure. I think it has enough hitting power to do work, but it is a bit reliant on the shooting, which can be dicey against things like Sylvaneth, Idoneth, or DoK (though most people go Hagg-Nar now). Against Legions, just be wary about relying on the shooting. Getting the Ballistas in range might be tricky, since he can bubble out bodies really easily, and 3 Ballistas only do 7-8 wounds to Nagash per turn on average. However, if you get good swings, it could really do some damage, and crippling him early can change the tide of battle by quite a bit. Let us know how it does!

It is worth noting that the strengths of the Longstrikes really push their role. Hitting Heroes while not relying on a lucky Scions placement is something that Longstrikes do better than any other unit. Often those heroes will have 3+ saves or rerollable saves, so the -2 is important. If we were just talking pure math output, you'd never take them. But, sometimes you really need to put wounds on that Tzaangor Oracle behind the Skyfires, or Grot Shaman behind the screen, or Castellant that's buffing a unit of Sequitors. At that, Longstrikes are generally speaking the most reliable. Especially if you're running Anvils and pop off multiple extra shots with them.

It really depends. Hurricanes have weight of fire, Longstrikes have predictable punching power. Ballistas feel like the new hotness because they have a bit of both - they put out good number of shots in half range, while also having that important -2Rend. The damage is swingy, since it's not great hit rolls in half range and also is d6 hits, but when it goes off, it goes off. I will say, I think if you're looking for a mid-price investment that delivers consistently, 3-6 Hurricanes or 6-9 Longstrikes will put out more reliable results, and the Longstrikes can do so from a safe distance at all points in the game. However, you will have to live with their downsides (low number of shots and limited mobility on the Longstrikes, short range and swingy dice on the Hurricanes). Also, Aetherwings are still dope. People write them off, but they basically guarantee shut down at least one charge for each unit you take, which is not terrible for 50 points, and they still hold objectives and move fast, so they can't be ignored. Aetherstrike was really strong with them giving retaliatory shooting, but they're still worth the points imo if you're taking a reasonable amount of Raptors.

I really like Justicar Conclave (3 units of Raptors + 3 units of Aetherwings). It's all units I would want to take, plus rerolls, a CP, and an Artifact. But, it's a bit expensive and does limit your army composition. Angelos Conclave is an ignorable ability... but if you're going Vanguard anyways, you're taking 3+ units of Hunters and 1+ units of Palladors, so... I guess it's something?

https://whc-cdn.games-workshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/AoS2_GHB19_Hidden_Agendas_Download-1-1.pdf New official secondary missions for Matched Play, secretly chosen at the beginning of each round. SCE perspective: Secret Mission: If you think you can get away with not having it, you can literally just Scions a Hero onto your opponent's back line if they leave room. Otherwise, a Gryph Charger Hero using Ride the Winds or the Aquilor CA can do this easy. Ancient Heirlooms: Should be pretty easy if you're running a tanky hero like a Stardrake or one that's hiding like an Incantor with a Staff. Otherwise, it depends on the matchup/mission. Terrify: Eh. Will anyone use this? I guess if you're playing against Grots or something and they don't have enough CP for Inspiring Presence or something? Invade: Fairly solid choice. Sequitors, Evocators, Paladins, and sneaky Judis/Libs are good candidates, as are sneaky allied Skinks. Seize: Highly depends on the matchup. We're not particularly great at holding multiple objectives unless we're also smashing the opponent due to our low model count, so I think this will be less common to use. Defend: Super hard, but maybe if you're playing a slow footslog army and have stuff like big Sequitor/Liberator walls to keep them back? This seems like one of the less likely ones. Might take it on Knife to the Heart against certain matchups, I guess. Slay: If you're running stuff that can hunt Heroes easy - Longstrikes, MW ranged spam, etc - then this is great. But with things like Look Out Sir and Heroes becoming tankier in general thanks to Malign Sorcery, I would think most armies with an expensive Hero will be hard to score this on. Occasionally it'll be an easy get against like pure Grots or something, I guess. Conserve: If you're playing a tanky, grindy army, this might be a good go-to. Armies that rock lots of 3+ or 2+ saves and then face off against things with no MWs? Easy pick. Attrition: We're fairly solid at killing things. If you're running Evo bombs, this is likely a good choice unless they're super MSU and spread out. Linebreaker: Too variable to really judge in general. 20 Sequitors or 30 Liberators (or Judis hiding in the back) will be good at the surviving part, but the killing part really shifts depending on what the opponent has. Centre Ground: Less dependent on the enemy, more on the mission. If you're playing Focal Points, you can drop a shield wall around a tanky character and just grind it out. But, since it's objective holding, I think this'll be a rare pick. Sacrifice: Good mind games here. If your opponent is good at Hero hunting (Skyfires, Kharadron, certain Wizard armies, etc), just take this and play aggresive as heck with your Hero. Obviously never run if you're doing Stardrake. I like these overall. There's no easy one that I'd just take every time, but I feel like each one is achievable except in certain circumstances.

It's fairly solid imo, though it plays much different. Good that you have that many Palladors, I think you can run a 6-9 man unit as a strong anvil unit, especially if you have an Aquilor following them around with Staunch. They don't kill well, but for the points they're fairly hard to kill, and if you constantly use the Aquilor CA to teleport them off and then charge back in, you're getting a lot of use out of Shock and Awe to make them even harder to shift. Do you have any Longstrikes in that set? 6+ of them on the table is still quite scary for many armies to face.

Prime gains whatever Stormhost your army is. Downside to the Prime is that he is more or less dead weight when you do Total Commitment, which every tournament does.

My current hesitation with the Stardrake is how to take Battleline Sequitors and him at the same time. If you want that, you need an Arcanum to be the General, which means Staunch is only on the Stardrake while the Arcanum is hugging him. Which isn't... bad, but it's also really awkward (and expensive).

For the price of 20 you can get 10 Evos who are better in every way except defensively. We're an elite army, so an elite unit that's worse than all other elite units is either Battleline or benched. Just like Decimators, Desolators, etc.

Not sure. I think gunline lists work best when you have things that are high rate of fire that you can buff into being reliable, like with Kunnin Rukk or Freeguild. Since most of our guns are low rate of fire but medium to high reliability, it's not really the same. You can make Longstrikes or Bow Judis more reliable, but they still won't get a game-ending amount of shooting out. That was the power of Aetherstrike, getting a reliably powerful shooting unit to fire 2-3 times per turn was no joke. Anvils can sorta do it, but with the CP system, it's not as much as before, and lacks the retaliation threat that Aetherstrike leaned on. To go a traditional gunline with weight of fire, you'd need max Ballistas and multiple Judi/Hurricane Raptor units, which is not only expensive, but also fairly short ranged. I think it could work, but it would take a lot of testing and tweaking to find the perfect balance of shots, bodies, and buffs. Additionally, we don't really have a way to make Wounds more reliable from shooting - from what I can tell, the only thing that buffs Wound rolls from a range is Evocator Empower spell on Ballistas or Castigators, which you wouldn't do probably because of the cost of Evos and how expensive the list already is. I think once the upcoming tournament is over and I get more time to practice test lists, I'll try this out some.

How reliable do you find the Ballistas? Do you mainly use them as backfield long range or do you play aggressively and rapid fire them? I generally don't rate them without an Ordinator but lately I've been thinking of dropping him for points.

They for sure are not a subtle unit. Their speed gives them some finesse, but for the most part they just want to run in and hit things, which they're fairly good at. They could probably stand to come down in points, at least a bit.

If you choose Anvils, you can't have Staunch or Ignax's Scales, you have to use the Trait and Artifact from Anvils. It's not a bad list, but if you're trying to do the Anvils Longstrike thing in 1000 points, I'd drop the Palladors and take a Castellant, a unit of Aetherwings, and go down 50 for an extra CP.

It's anything but a "Normal Move". The rules state a Normal Move is made during the Movement Phase, and those rules only apply during that time. So Watchful Guardians can be used to move into melee range, since it is not a Normal Move.

Yes. A unit of Skinks, or an Archmage, can be placed first and then you can place a Scions unit in the sky. Additionally, there are a couple ways to place things off the table without using the "half on" rule. The Celestant Prime, for example, can be placed off the table as your first drop, as he uses his own deployment rules. Skyborne Slayers can also still be placed off as an entire battalion on your first drop.

Battalions are really screwy in the app. It has points in GHB2018 and you can find it in Grand Alliance: Order, so it's legal. It is very strong right now, by my estimation. 5" charges are insanely reliable now with the CP reroll (I've had games with Skyborne in the past where I failed multiple...), and Battleshock Immunity is always, always good. While Sequitors > Liberators and Evocators > Paladins, neither choice suddenly became bad and getting 10 Paladins into nearly anything is still really, really strong. The buff to Crossbow Judicators also makes them a reasonable choice to take in it. It has many of the same weaknesses it had before, of course. All units have to come in at the same time and in a small location, reducing some of the tactical flexibility, for instance, and it's not very good at playing certain missions. However, the reduced price on the Battalion helps with some of that, since you can bring more supplemental units to bear alongside it. I think it's a worthy choice for a competitive build. It was already before - few things in the game can stand up to 15-20 Paladins charging them, and the #HordeMeta makes Decimators and XBow Judicators a more interesting choice than previously. I think you could easily make a solid list out of it - though I've been wondering about using a Stormhost alongside it. Dropping down and getting the double turn with Anvils would be... disgustingly beautiful, though Skyborne doesn't get much out of the Passive and Artifact. Vindicators would be quite solid, as the Command Ability and Passive are both quite good for your Alpha strike. I... agree with some things in here, but man, this is 3.5 pages of wishlisting for an already powerful army. A lot of the changes are unnecessary and will just push Stormcast into a really hated position, if not make them busted altogether.

1) Doesn't matter, the minimum buy in is way above 2000 points anyways, so you can't take it at that point level. The "mega Battalions" are generally reserved for Narrative or "Apocalypse". 2) The +1 cast from Sacrosanct only affects a Lord Arcanum.

Each use of his command ability gives +3" to the charge for everything within 12" of him. You can use his Command Ability multiple times as long as you have the Command Points, so for 3 Points you can get 3" + 3" + 3" = 9" extra on to your charge. Considering you can Scions of the Storm 9" away, this will guarantee your charge. Using it twice gets you 6", which means you need to roll anything except double 1s on the charge (not counting any debuffs). That's all but guaranteed in many eyes. Start of the Combat Phase. Wholly within 9" of a Hero or wholly within 18" of general: +1 wound against HERO targets.

Azyrite Halo is excellent on a Stardrake or blob of Sequitors/Liberators. The +1 to wound and reroll charge spells from the smaller table are also quite useful overall.