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Sagittarii Orientalis

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Posts posted by Sagittarii Orientalis

  1. Time will tell, but Anvilstrike lists might become even less competitive in the near future.

    I recall a number of tournaments allowing longstrikes to shoot at 30" during hero phase, before the lastest SCE errata.

    Now that Longstrikes' range during hero phase is officially confirmed to be 24", prioritising target has become even more difficult. And  this might have repercussions for the performance of SCE.

    Good players will keep their valuable units more than 24" away from Longstrikes, if not 30". And Longstrikes will find hard time focusing their firepower on desirable target, being forced to split their firepower for at least a turn. And loss of focused shooting for even a brief moment is devastating to expensive and fragile Longstrikes. One turn of inefficient shooting can cost a SCE player an entire game. And there is only so much a few unit of aetherwings can achieve, as opponents can easily dispatch them even with minimal shooting and spells. 

    Longstrikes were already an easy prey to enemy shooting, and the difficulty of devastating high priority target in a single turn only exacerbates the issue. Mortek Crawlers were already tough for Longstrikes to deal with, while even a single missed save against Crawler's ranged attack mean 2.5 Longstrikes are easily gone. Orruk arrow boyz always threatened Longstrikes with their sheer volume of fire, even when Aetherstrike Force was present in former SCE battletome. And once Celestial Hurricanum enters within its 18" threat range, 3d3 mortal wounds decimates Longstrikes. At this point, I am not sure whether or not SCE can be dubbed as "shootcast" anymore.

    Granted, Evocators on Dracolines received hefty points cost reduction. However, they still face these issues in competitive games: opponents bring either units that are cheaper AND more mobile AND more powerful, or bring units that are cheaper AND more durable(be it better save or greater number of wounds per model). The former group include Morsarr Guard and Tzaangor Enlightened on Discs, while latter include Skullcrushers, Demigryph Knights, Mournfangs and Gore Gruntas. Evocators on Dracolines struggled to keep aforementioned enemy units in check before, and after the errata it is only slightly less difficult. The fundamental problem still remains unsolved. 

    • Like 1
  2. Presence of Aetherwings alone makes taking longstrikes over judicators a reasonable choice.

    Especially when so many units nowadays run and charge in the same turn, or use command ability to move twice and charge on turn one.

     

    And some people still complain shooting in AoS is too strong.:/

  3. 4 hours ago, armisael said:

    Just look at the KO changes. I hope that our warrior chamber will get the same treatment.

    More likely, we will see models from new chamber with fancy rules instead. Meanwhile the old warrior chamber will still be left to gather dust on the shelves, with further unnecessary nerf to their rules. Yes, I am looking at you Starsoul Maces.

    • Like 1
  4. 3 hours ago, Mark Williams said:

    As someone who plays Gavriel often, I can confirm the above statements. Although it’s one of the strongest plays we have, over time even my opponents who have learned to counter it eventually grow to hate playing it. The consensus in my own hobby group is that it creates “unfun” games due to the fact that your opponent has to play a defensive game and often gets punished for small mistakes. This eventually generates anger...

    That is actually quite ludicrous. So some players become angry because they actually have to play wisely in order to win against stormcast, instead of just steamrolling them?

    • Like 2
    • Thanks 1
  5. A bit out of topic, but how much is GW's decision making affected by reactions from facebook and reddit?

    I know one case from 40K where they quickly nerfed an OP faction after complaints flooded from reddit.

    Granted, some of the nerfs touched on trivial issues rather than the key element of the faction. I suppose it is because  many complaints were crying OP without carefully analysing exactly which faction rules made that faction truly OP.

    Whatever the truth is, I hope GW rules designers do not spend too much time looking through facebook or reddit. Most of these medias provide plenty of impromptu and "knee jerking" responses, with little depth.

    • Like 1
  6. 17 minutes ago, ledha said:

    Most of the most powerful and cancerous list backs then, either the warrior chamber, the old vanguard wing, the more recent gavbomb, or the full tp sylvaneth as well as the kharadron clown car were based around teleporting and kicking you in the nuts without any counterplay possile.

    Like others battleplans that favor sorcerers (and hinder armirs that don't have them) or the one that give bonus to monsters, it's a battleplan made to punish one-trick ponies lists that rely too much on something specific.

    Total Commitment was introduced in 2018 GHB, which was released simultaneously with new SCE battletome. So the dreaded Vanguard Wing was already significantly toned down when the mission was in play. 

     

    And I honestly cannot see how gavbombs deny counterplay.  Even factions with relatively expensive, few models could bring in cheap allied units for fodder to deny gavbomb from charging key units. And if I recall correctly, even before the 2018 GHB was released Kharadron Overlords were no longer the apex predator at the podium. 

     

    Funny thing is, while SCE are denied one of their few saving graces in Total Commitment, other armies have no problem using their movement shenanigans unlike SCE. Sylvaneth which you also mentioned have no trouble summoning and jumping through forests which do not count as reinforcements. Orruk Warclans have the spell Hand of Gork so that they can teleport anywhere on the board more than 9" away mid-game with no penalties. Seraphon without 2.0 battletome do it for free.

     

    I have had this discussion several months ago, and I read a memorable comment regarding Total Commitment. Quoting it would do more justice than explaining it by myself.

     

    On 8/22/2019 at 11:37 PM, amysrevenge said:

    It's another example of an attempt to force balance that only covers one thing and completely bypasses the top tier armies.

    Basically, in the game we've got variable battleplan or realm rules that will occasionally cripple reinforcement-heavy builds (Total Commitment), or  shooting-heavy builds (Ulgu) and many folks tend to say "Well, this forces you to build a more rounded force, not relying on any simple tricks". 

    But we don't have similar rules that will occasionally cripple combat builds or magic builds, allowing other armies to very consistently rely on their best simple tricks - there is no realm or battleplan rule that influences FEC army builds away from the main toughest choice, same for DoK, same for Slaanesh, same for other top tier armies.  SCE need to consider all the potential realms and battleplans when they build their lists, these others do not.

    I am fine in a world with Total Commitment and Ulgu, if it also includes optional rules that cripple pure combat builds as heavily as Ulgu cripples a pure shooting build, or T.C. cripples a reinforcement build.  Force EVERYONE to build their army as if the only thing they are good at could potentially be unavailable.  If it's only a small selection of them that have to do this, it isn't really fair.  Some people need to chin up/git gud/diversify away from their strengths, others can just ride on their strengths without a care.

     

    • Like 2
  7. I know it would be hard to generalise, but how many tournaments nowadays include Total Commitment mission in their rule packs?

    Despite having played and won fair number of games involving that particular mission, it always leaves me embittered.

    It adds salt to the wound when SCE battletome is already riddled with overpriced units and worthless artefacts.

    And now even one of the official missions outright denies key allegiance ability of SCE.

    It is as if the rules designers were genuinely worried that allowing SCE to use their allegiance abilities unhindered would make SCE utterly dominate the podium.

  8. 16 minutes ago, PJetski said:

    This is a terrible way to judge the state of the game. Stormcast (and Seraphon) are much better than the stats show. The stats should not be taken as objective truth - collected data is not the same thing as a fact.

    If collected data from hundreds of, if not thousands of, results across multiple countries are not suitable for drawing conclusion, then what would be? 

  9. 1 hour ago, Raffonerd said:

    LIberators and Judicators are standalone totally fine.

    The problems is that they have no discount on low number (20) and no sinergy wth the army.

    What about liberators make them totally fine? They might be "fine" in terms of points per wound or relative durability(as represented in re-rolling save rolls of 1), when compared to other non-battleline Stormcast units. But I do not think one-eyed person in the realm of the blind suddenly becomes "fine" when compared to people with both eyes. Internal comparison has little meaning when diagnosing Stormcasts' strengths in external comparison.

    Also, why would you ever want to take liberators above their minimum unit size? Because of their large base, short melee weapon range and poor offensive stats, I have rarely seen them used as anything other than cheapest screen(for Stormcast). The only time I have seen large unit of liberators was when pre-2.0 battle tome Vanguard Wing was considered to be overpowered.

    As for Judicators...they are expensive, and the only saving grace of the unit, the shockbolt bow, has damage output too random. I would rather take 3.2 freeguild crossbowmen/handgunners for 1 Judicator anytime

    • Thanks 1
  10. On a serious note, what do fellow players think Stormcast's forte is? 

     

    As of now, I would not hesitate to call Stormcast generic battleline(liberators and judicators) as worthless. Liberators, possibly the only generic battleline ever taken in competitive games, have neither hitting power nor defensive merits. In terms of the former, there are plenty of factions with amazing close combat capabilities. Daughters of Khaine, Idoneth Deepkin, Cities of Sigmar, Mawtribes, Orruk Warclans, to name but a few. In terms of defensive stats, liberators have neither good saves and/or "ignore wounds on ~+" abilities nor they bring additional bodies through low points per wound. Liberators are only taken because Judicators are overpriced for their ranged damage output.

     

    Sequitors are much better than aforementioned units, but still pale in comparison to battlelines of other factions. Idoneth Deepkin have Morsarr Guard, Mawtribes Stonehorns, flesh eater court their terrorgheists and so on. The existence of counter-intuitive and out-of-date "re-roll failed save rolls" means Sequitors are still very vulerable to attacks with rend. Not to mention mortals wounds and abilities that activate at the start of opponents'  combat phase literally melt Sequitors like butter.

     

    For non-battleline units, Sacrosanct units bar Castigators are decent but still pale comparison to what many other factions can bring. Evocators on foot are expensive, slow, and still melt when they get charged by dedicated enemy melee unit. Using screens have limits because Stormcasts can bring so few bodies without the inclusion of allies. Even then, basic Stormcast units are too costly to include sufficient amount of expendable screens. Mounted Evocators are even more expensive, prone to even non-rend shooting(damage 5 ossiarch catapults for example), and are still vulnerable to "Always Strike First" abilities. Ballistas require serious investment and it is almost mandatory to deploy them dangerously close to the enemy units to maximise their potentials. Even then, their number of attacks are too random to rely on.

     

    As for non-Sacrosanct units, I think none are worth mentioning except longstrikes, aetherwings and desolators. The desolators belong to an exception only because other Extremis units are either comparatively overpriced. For the magic, artefacts, behemoths......Let me say the only time I would take Stormcast artefact is when I need to pick a specific stormhost to unlock command abilities. And I only take two Stormcast wizards, lord-arcanum and knight-incantor,  to bring battleline Sequitors and auto-unbind ability, not because of the spells. The only useful spell I see is one of the Evocators' spells that allows me to re-roll charge rolls. Stardrakes are too expensive for either their abysmal close combat effectiveness, random meteor attacks, and small bonus to casting rolls. It is durable when kitted properly, but that's it. If there is but a single clanrat or gobbo standing next to the Stardrake, it cannot even claim objectives. As for non-behemoth heroes, when was the last time you took lord-celestants, knight-venator, lord-exorcist,  lord-veritant, knight-questor?

     

    But surely, the Scions of the Storm gives great manoeuvrability, shouldn't it? Well, I would rather prefer command abilities or spells that allow extra movements rather than an allegiance ability that cannot be combined with spells or other abilities activated before the end of movement phase. And if we look closer, there are surprisingly large number of armies who could put powerful units as reserves or teleport them to other part of the board. Idoneth Deepkin, Fyreslayers, Sylvaneth, Skaven, Orruk Warclans, and even Seraphon without their 2.0 battletome. Scions of the Storm is also one of only two allegiance abilities that are outright denied in a specific mission, Total Commitment.

     

    I might be too pessimistic regarding the current status of Stormcast, but I can think of only seraphon, nighthaunt and kharadron as factions that perform worse than Stormcast in terms of tournament win rate if we consult AoS stats compile by Honest Wargamer. Two of which do not have 2.0 battletome, and one of which earned its battletome at the same time Stormcast battletome was released. I can only think of Anvils of Heldenhammer Longstrikes as the only remarkably strong element in the battletome. And even then it struggles to achieve 5-0 or even 4-1 constantly in multiple tournaments as far as I know. Do we need a revamp on our battletome? Or are there missing gems in our book?

    • Thanks 3
  11. 2 hours ago, Sedraxis said:

    The double turn is a big part of what makes AoS so good despites it's simplicity. Without it we'd have another 40k style game where winning by tabling an army through mathhammer is easier then actually scoring points through objectives.

    Really?

    Because I have seen players taking double turn ruthlessly wiping out the entire opposing army in AoS as much as I have seen Iron Hands or flyer-heavy aeldari list do in 40K.  

    I am not sure what kind of mission you use when playing 40K, but maelstrom missions and latest chapter approved  missions are quite far from winning by tabling an army. Scoring at the end of battle round or the start of the turn makes players to think ahead, and maelstrom cards reward taking objectives over destroying enemy units in many cases. ITC is often criticised for emphasising kill points over objectives, but ITC is not the only way of playing 40K. Chapter approved missions exist, and ETC adopts maelstrom cards. Even then, it does not mean ITC awards no points for taking objectives.

    Granted, I do admit there are instances where one side quickly wipes out the opposing army even in missions I just mentioned. For example, Iron Hands will have little problem decimating Grey Knights or Chaos Space Marines in many cases. But I can also argue exactly same things happen in AoS. Take Hedonites of Slaanesh, Skaven or Flesh Eater Courts against, say, Slaves to Darkness or Nighthaunt.

    Double turn does very little to prevent stronger armies wiping the floor with weaker armies. At best, the double turn allows weaker army to do a bit more damage compared to when not having double turn. At worst, the double turn allows stronger army to decimate the opposing forces even more efficiently. Hedonites of Slaanesh showing tournament win rate of over 60 percent and being foremost outlier in the meta for half a year cemented my belief.

     

    P.S. 

    What you want to point out about 40K would be the alpha strike issue, rather than simply tabling an army.

    And yes, it has been an enduring problem in 40K since 8th edition launched.

    But the sensible solutions would be placing more terrains that block line of sight, and using missions where players score victory points at the end of battle round or at the start of turn. The latter gives more control over objectives to players going second, as they can react to the manouevres of players going first and can actually deny their victory points. 

    Double turn does not solve alpha strike issue.

    It simply shifts the disadvantages to players going first as there is literally no downside for those going second.

    Beta Strike, If I can address it this way.

    If you do not get the double turn, it is typical IGOUGO and unexpected or abrupt problem rarely occurs.

    If you do get the double turn, congratulations. Go wipe them out. 

  12. Typical power creep, as can be expexted from GW's tendency during last few years including 40K and AoS. 

    Just a year and a few months ago, people rightly appalled at the 200 points 5-man Evocator unit.

    Nowadays even large Evocator unit struggle to make its points back with prevalence of expendable screening units and "Always Strikes First" abilities.

    After spending last four years playing both 40K and AoS, I simply gave up hopes of GW freeing itself from the vicious cycle of power creep. I instead focus on painting models while having hiatus. Maybe I will start playing again when the new battletome is released.

  13. This thread leaves sour taste in my mouth.

    It is because reading the suggestions above makes me feel as if Stardrake is much more useful when used without stormcast battletome.

    While Staunch Defender is not a shabby command trait on its own, it seems to be dwarfed by options provided by the Cities of Sigmar allegiance abilities.

    Nowadays, I struggle to use stardrake competitively in Stormcast list. 

    It is too expensive and requires several supporting heroes to improve mobility and defence.

    And yet its offensive capability is worse, compared to its iteration in Cities of Sigmar list. 

    Comparative lack of cost-effective bodies(e.g. greatswords, demigryph knights, hammerers) only adds salt to the wound.

     

    • Like 2
  14. 1 minute ago, Maturin said:

    Yet his warscroll is clear : Instead of setting up this model on the
    battlefield, you can place it to one side and say
    that it is set up in the Heavens as a reserve unit.
    If you do so, at the end of your movement phase
    you must declare whether this model will remain
    in reserve or strike from the Heavens.
    If this model remains in reserve, add 2 to the
    Attacks characteristic of Ghal Maraz until the
    end of the battle.

    Then it is contradictory in my opinion. 

    Leaving the original text without adding the latest commentary would have been much clearer.

    The commentary however seems to add unnecessary confusion as it can be interpreted as enemy turn contributing to Celestant-Prime's attacks.

  15. The latest Designer's Commentary for SCE states that Celestant-Prime adds 2 to his attacks characteristic for every turn he stays in reserve.

    Since the text does not specifically state "friendly turns", I believe this means Celestant-Prime can add 4 to his attacks characteristics when he stays in reserve for a full battle round. 

    Below is the original text for your information.

    "Q: Does the Celestant-Prime’s Retribution from On High Ability add 2 to the Attacks characteristic of Ghal Maraz for each turn that the Celestant-Prime remains in reserve? A: Yes."

     

  16. I must first confess that I have been exclusively playing Stormcast Eternals since the match play was launched in 2016.I view the missions in the general's handbook rather positively, as many of them seem to emphasise manouevres and board controls to a fair degree.The missions themselves seem to be improving for better gameplay. For example, the change to the movement route of objective in Relocation Orb.

    There is however, one mission I am struggling to find worth in terms of gameplay - Total Commitment. Now, many of you might instantly point out I am not feeling pleasant with this mission because I play Stormcast, and all that is needed is for me to "get good". However I always expect to play this specific mission, and hence prepare my list and tactic to adapt to it. So far playing Total Commitment and actually winning was far from impossible, at least in my local club where the meta is rather "casual".

    This however does not stop the mission from leaving sour taste in my mouth, regardless of the outcome. The mission invalidates nearly half the allegiance ability of the Stormcast, which already suffer from general lack of mobility even with the Scions of the Storm.  Meanwhile, the mission gives almost no disadvantage to the opposing player unless the game is a mirror match between stormcasts. And stormcasts are not the only faction that is seriously penalised in the mission. Nighthaunt is another faction which allegiance ability imbues army-wide reserve deployment.

    Thus in my view, Total Commitment heavily punishes very few specific factions without actually providing tactical challenge to the other opposing factions. The fact that most of the large-scale tournaments almost always include Total Commitment in the rulepack exacerbates my frustration, which stems from feeling that my faction is being unfairly penalised.

    I cannot stop thinking that this mission is devised under the notion that army-wide reserve rule is extremely lethal to the gaming environment, thus requiring an extreme form of limitation via mission rules. If this is true at all, then I believe it is an oversight.

    Most of the reserve rules have "more-than-9 inches" restrictions, and in many cases units in reserve must be set up on the board by battle round 3. With relatively cheap "screening" units and careful deployment, denying enemy reserves from being set up on ideal position is far from difficult. Crucial charges from big unit of evocators can be denied with a fodder unit of grots, or prevent ballista batteries from shooting 4 shots per model at my important unit.

    However if army-wide reserve rule is still deemed terrifyingly strong so that a special mission is required to rein it back, I believe forcing reserve units to be set up until the end of battle round 2 would have sufficed.  I believe an outright prohibition of core allegiance ability is a limitation too extreme. Imagine a mission where summoning is strictly forbidden, or where units with fly can no longer do so. I see Total Commitment no less harsh and unfair than these examples.

    Initially, I attempted to send the feedback to the games workshop via AoS facebook. However, I thought it would be better to listen to how other players with different factions view the mission before sending the feedback. Perhaps there might be more to the mission than I am aware of.  So if you still believe this is only a tantrum thrown by an immature stormcast player, then please feel free to enlighten me on the value of the mission I might have missed. Thank you.

     

     

    • Like 3
  17. 4 hours ago, Naem said:

    I like the list and play a similar one sometimes, but without the allies. In this context I wonder if you have enough meele dmg output, as the only hard hitting units you have are the evocators and fulminators. Of course if the Ballistas do enough dmg you might be fine. But they will be subject to a lot of pressure and as you want them to be buffed by the Ordinator, they will much likely be located close to each other. So I see a risk of them being shut down early by enemy shocktroops/fliers/teleported units. 

    The best I can do would be hampering enemy movement with gryph-hounds and tree-revenant.

    The latter can be parked in my backfield to prevent enemy units from set up in my deployment zone for a while.

    Your remarks on ballistas being forced to cluster remains valid however.

     

    2 hours ago, GlanceOnASix said:

    The biggest issue I find with running lots of listas (which I've been doing quite well with recently, got 8th at a 120 person tourny!) was the large footprint of reletivly immobile listas, and not not having good bodies for taking objectives.

     

    I'm playing my test games going down to 3 from 4 as 'enough shooting' so I can fit in more boys/tools to reach across the table/take objectives.  When I play the anvilhammer snipers, I have no issues killing characters, but the ballistas with their hitting on 5's, just dont cut the mustard.  So I've been looking at answers like the Comet (same cost as 1 lista) to be a tool to help cut down those 5 wounder heros so the listas can shoot things they are more effective at.  

    Your tournament record is very impressive. 

    Do you mind if I ask the list you took, and whether or not the 2019 Handbook was used?

    I personally find three ballistas underwhelming for inflicting truly devastating damage, even with support from Lord-Ordinator.

    Hence the inclusion of fourth ballista in my list.

     

    I rarely rely on the Comet as spell with casting value of 6 is far from reliable.

    This is even more so since stormcasts do not tend to have many casting bonuses.

    Celestial Warbringers' command ability and Staff of Focus come to my mind.

    Unfortunately, both options force me to pick rather underwhelming stormhost or entirely forgo stormhost bonus.

     

    Come to think of it, if I wanted to take shooting units with reliable yet devastating damage output Anvils raptors might be a better option.

    But as of now I plan to make quad-ballistas work due to lower points per wound,  i.e. better durability.

  18. I would like to ask opinion on using maximum number of ballistas at 2,000 points game. 

    I heard about lists using Astral Templars rules to maximise damage output against monsters, but I chose to run other stormhost since I do not always encounter monsters often.

    Below is the draft I have written so far.

     

    Stormhost: Celestial Vindicators

    -Leader

    Lord-Castellant(General, Command Trait: Single-minded Fury)

    Lord-Ordinator

    Knight-Heraldor(Artefact: Stormrage Blade)

    Knight-Incantor(Lore of the Storm: Azyrite Halo)

     

    -Battleline

    5 Liberators(Grandhammer, Warhammers & Shields)

    5 Liberators(Grandhammer, Warhammers & Shields)

    5 Liberators(Grandblade, Warblades & Shields)

     

    -Artillery

    Celestar Ballista

    Celestar Ballista

    Celestar Ballista

    Celestar Ballista

     

    -Others

    10 Evocators(Lore of Invigouration: Speed of Lightning, 5xGrandstave, 5xTempest Blade & Stormstave)

    2 Fulminators

     

    -Allies

    5 Tree-Revenants(Scion, Glade Banner Bearer, Waypipes, Protector Glaive)

     

    Total: 2,000 points

     

    The idea of the list is to inflict heavy casualties at range with ballistas while liberators, evocators and fulminators stall enemy advance. I chose to run Celestial Vindicators to maximise damage output of close combat elements, so that they can destroy enemy close combat units more effectively.

    The odd five tree-revenants exist solely to gain more board control, especially when playing Total Commitment mission. As most of you are aware, Total Commitment totally negates Stormcast Eternals' hallmark allegiance ability: Scions of the Storm.  In order to hold objectives in enemy territory, or at the least force the opponent to deploy conservatively in order to retain their objectives, I wanted to include at least one unit with "teleportation" ability. 

    For  Stormcasts, there are several means of "teleportation" which allows me to remove a friendly unit and set it up anywhere on the board more than 9" away from enemy units.  Knight-Vexillor's Hurricane Standard and Stormhost Prayer Translocation are popular options. However I did not have enough points to bring the former, while the latter is too unreliable as it only activates on 3+ with no ways to boost it with re-roll.

    5 tree-revenants however are cheap enough to barely include in my list, and they can use "teleportation" ability every turn. Their ability Martial Memories means I can re-roll one of the dice for the charge roll, increasing the chance of making successful charge after teleportation even without support.

    I have yet to collect tree-revenants and the  fourth ballista, although buying these will take less than a month. Meanwhile, I would like to ask suggestions on my list. Thank you.

  19. If the alleged point leaks discussed so far are true, then those are in line with what Jervis Johnson revealed at March issue of White Dwarf: most point changes are in range of +/-10~20 points. I am not too surprised about 20 points increase on Evocators and 10 points increase on Celestar Ballista. In fact, I would consider it more mild than I expected, judging from seething anger against SCE by my friends at local club. Some of them were vehemently demanding straight 40 points increase on the Ballista!

    Anecdotes aside, these changes bring little to my current lists. Points increases are offset by decreases from other units, for example Lord-Arcanum and vanguard units. One exception is the Stardrake list: I either need to forego one of the heroes in order to keep the Stardrake and supporting units: Ballistas and Evocators.  Time will tell, but I need to start tweaking lists more than before.

    P.S. The aforementioned leaks show Desolators as being 220 points. Does this mean Desolators' points cost has not changed?

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