Baron Wastelands

The second list, I think, of the two. The gunhauler really isn’t worth it, you’d be better taking a khemist to buff the riggers or the thunderers. As general advice, I wouldn’t take a variety of special weapons in your arkanauts units, focus on one role with each. You will have spares from the endrinriggers unit.

I always read the warscroll (at least on the app) as tenderiser OR stumps and cauldron. I don’t think you can take tenderiser and cauldron, as it says “some butchers instead fight with a pair of stump blades... whilst dragging a cauldron ...” Anyway, @Warbossironteef, welcome to the firepit of hope 😄 Pull up a pile of meat.

On a frostlord, absolutely. Don’t forget you also get a free run in there too, as the stonehorn can run and charge.

Generally I’d say take the Pelt. Can heal 1-6 wounds per turn when coupled with the blizzard speaker healing (with an average of 2), can help to keep those snowballs coming. Bleeding skull is decent too, if you’re facing a bit of magic. Useless against none and lots/buffed magic though.

That it doesn’t quite know what it is. The stonehorn is good in melee, the huskard isn’t really. Bit like a frostlord on Thundertusk (in reverse) 😃 I agree the linebreakers ability is nice, but it’s a bit situational, in that it is not always easy to get when you want it, and you need a unit of 4 mournfang to really start to do much damage, so it’s quite a lot of points to commit to the same or very close combat in order to pull off. The jorlbad can make it more reliable on the charge, and a eurlbad can help the huskard into a more melee-effective unit (as well as making more hard hitting mournfang), the latter being where I’ve used one most; can get some good moshes, but both battalions are quite restrictive.

Alternatively, if you want ships, Barak Zilfin will allow you to set up one ship in reserve and deep strike it, filled with passengers and hangars on. I run a double ironclad list at 2k without battalions, one drops on the table the other is in reserve. This will fit your arkanauts, battleline at least, and characters, a unit of thunderers if you want them, and as many balloons as you like. It’s a very mobile army, even if not as good at the alpha strike as it once was.

Your hunter is the slowest unit in the army (barring troggoths), so by the time he gets to an objective, he often won’t be able to take it. Equally, he won’t be killing many heroes, at least not quickly, unless you get lucky with a spear throw. His main use is as an ambusher, so he can tie up war machines, etc. He’s better at this with some sabres, in a skal. Also, you’ll find it hard to alpha strike heroes with your FL. Actually you want to get him (charging) into monsters, as he is more resilient against higher damage attacks, and can dish out a good amount on the charge. Your Thundertusk is for sniping buffing heroes first, and then knocking damage tables down a couple. Or shooting expensive elite (armoured) units. Keep it out of combat if you can, and don’t forget the huskard’s ability to heal. Mournfangs are kinda your utility unit, so yes, depends on the scenario. They’re not great at objectives because their number count is always low, but they’re mobile, fairly durable, and a bit more adaptable than the big beasts. Their damage output is often a bit disappointing, but they can sometimes do better against hordes of cheaper troops. cats, when not ambushing, can just be used to get in the way.

That looks even better 😁 I understand you’re running 2x2 mournfang to fill battleline, but depending on what you have coming in the mail, I’d recommend trying them in 4s. They start to become more of a threat, and battleshock hasn’t really been a problem for me. The hunter is a also a bit lacklustre outside of a skal, for me.

Looks good. Maybe a little heavy on the tzeentch for BCR? 😉

I don’t play in a super-competitive environment, and enjoy different modes of play. But in the ‘competitive’ games we do play, I think there’s something to be said for playing to your strengths. BCR are certainly not going to win a magic war, even with allied wizards. On the other hand, an allied butcher with cauldron can add more than just a spell and a dispel to BCR, and thus is a common and useful ally choice. As for as many monsters as possible, while I like playing those, they do struggle with the objective game/board control. Also, at 2k, you can still only take 4. That said, in order to test your suggestion, how about going big on frostlords. Say: FL on stonehorn x 3, Thundertusk beastriders, 2x2mournfangs, 2x2 sabres.

Hmmm. I’ve just reread that, and you’re right, you can’t. It only works in mixed skaven or chaos lists. Apologies. I’m worried now that I’ve done this in the past! Anyway, I almost always use a minimum of 3x3 stormfiends in skryre lists, so I don’t think you need acolytes, and personally don’t use them.

Buying 3 boxes is what I did. I’d definitely build 3 warpfire, 3 shock gauntlets. Then probably 3 grinder, because the utility can be great and they’re not bad in combat. I like 3 rattling too, but not everyone will agree and they need to pick their targets. Generally running the same thing in 3 is good, the only variation for me is occasionally putting 1 grinder fist in to move a unit around, but it is hard to do so without limiting the unit a bit - even in melee units (e.g. shock gauntlets love a packmaster, but if you tunnel them away you end up out of range). I don’t use acolytes personally. Their main bonus is that they are cheap little units. Don’t forget you can ally in clanrats as battleline, though Of course you can use stormfiends anyway in a skryre list.

Save is the same? the extra big names give you more utility, of course, but then you don’t get to use the damage increases and they fall further behind. not saying ironguts are better, necessarily, just that most of the time will do more damage. 😁

I should say I do take multiple tyrants 😁 On the plus side, they have a smaller footprint, are automatically immune to battleshock, and having a back up bully is useful. So am just trying to inform the debate, really ☺️ Damage output doesn’t take into account range either, of course - a tyrant with 2 or 3” range can stand behind/ in the middle of other units and hit with impunity, which is also useful. I do think 5 might be too many, however, based on the analysis ... *edit* @Kramer sorry, posting at the same time! Good point that ironguts diminish whereas a tyrant keeps swinging, too.

This is precisely what happens when they change something in the matrix. Yes, double clubs will outdamage other builds unless you take traits and artifacts. The average damage against 4+ save is: double clubs with brawlerguts 5.9 wounds; double club with giant breaker 7.1 wounds (MONSTERS ONLY); double club with any other big name 4.7 wounds. massive club with brawlerguts 5.5 wounds; massive club with giant breaker 5.9 wounds (MONSTERS ONLYJ; massive club with any other big name 4.2 wounds. gutgouger with brawlerguts 5.8 wounds; gutgouger with giant breaker 5.5 wounds (MONSTERS ONLY); gutgouger with any other big name 4.1 wounds. The order is still the same for 3+, 5+ and 6+ saves in each case. In addition, while I’m very cheerful about this talk of multiple tyrants, I feel compelled to point out that the msu 3xironguts will generally do more damage that any of the tyrants without traits/artifacts, and have more wounds. The only tyrant build (without traits and artifacts) that pulls ahead very slightly on damage is double-clubs with giantbreaker (and therefore only against monsters). 3 Ironguts do 6.7 wounds on average against 4+ save.

While I am a huge advocate of packmaster buffing stormfiends armed with shock gauntlets, I’m not sure it’s worth it for 1, and it doesn’t add much to the warpfire thrower fiends. You could try swapping out the clan rats for giant rats, but again, in a unit of 40, the packmaster’s to hit buff is overkill. So I probably wouldn’t run a packmaster in this list. Also, the mortar teams are generally a bit disappointing at present. You could swap the packmaster and mortars for a second WLC, which would give you a more reliable battery. Or another block of 40 clanrats/giant rats if you can find the extra 20 points. Alternatively drop the second engineer as well and add another unit of stormfiends.

It used to have a short ranged grapeshot, so it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch. I can certainly see chariot with short range blast, but I think that’s a longer term solution! All the more reason to run a spare tyrant, eh? 😉

Yep, the skull cannon is an interesting example. Agree that the move/wounds trade off is roughly equivalent. And it has a better cannon - easier to hit, and with a chance to fire in the combat phase too. (It does take an artillery slot, but as you say, can take multiples). So the skull cannon is currently 150 points. If the ironblaster were 100 pts, you could take 3 for 2 skull cannons ... if 80 pts, then almost 2 for 1. Hmmm, coupled with the fact that the ironblaster has something most chariots don’t (an occasional cannon shot), maybe 80 is a bit low then; but then we’re back to: how many people would realistically include an ironblaster at 100 pts, even in pure Gutbusters? Of course, we could suggest dropping the skull cannon a bit too ☺️

But the ironblaster has a 7” move, everything else you cite has 3-4”. I agree they are better at being artillery, I’m suggesting that the ironblaster is more of an ogor chariot, really, and since GW have asked for points adjustments (only), I’m trying to define it and cost it on its current profile. Would I take more shorty but slower, for current cost, if that was on offer? Absolutely! From your examples, I also think the SC ballista is under-costed currently. The squig gobba is an interesting example, though; as it’s first warscroll was so bad, the joke at the time was that it should cost minus points in order to take it. It got fixed, and it’s one of a small number of warscrolls that got fixed without a new book. So maybe we should be comparing the two as much as possible!

While it would be nice (and fit the model!) if the cannon was more useful, all the suggestions about increasing shots or damage start to make it both a tanky chariot and artillery, in which case its points should probably increase ... and we’re into a big rewrite for it. Think that is likely when we get the Gutbusters battletome (😉) but in the meantime, I think @James S suggestion of 80 pts is probably the best shout. Compare it with chariots in e.g. greenskins, BoC, even StD rather than with large artillery pieces, and it starts to look better value for the role. Now, the fact that we need a long range artillery piece more than we need a chariot makes it maybe harder to swallow, but that shouldn’t affect an objective costing, particularly when you think about a mixed destruction list (I.e. at what point cost would you take the ironblaster over say a greenskins chariot? At 80 pts each, every time).

It’s very unlikely, and doesn’t happen often without a new book. Think the only one in ghbs past is the grundstok thunderers, and that was a nerf, not a buff. Possible with a book of course - BoC made some changes to rules and options in quite a few units.

I think 80 points makes the ironblaster a very attractive option. Part of the issue is that we want it to be a cannon. It isn’t really, it might do a tiny bit of ranged damage occasionally in a battle. But as an 80 point chariot that can just occasionally add something at range - take a monster off top wounds, or chip away at a horde - it starts to look really tanky, and a bit objective-holdy. It’s never going to do the job it used to. But with a bit of a rethink about what I should expect it to do, and an accompanying points drop, I could be convinced to take them again. I want to be convinced to take them again.

I think part of the problem is that you can’t address the challenges BCR faces with points alone. One of the key challenges is low model count. To really address this with points, you’d have to slash the cost of mournfangs or yhetees, both of which become too powerful/resilient for the cost, or make taking large numbers of cats a viable option by making them cheaper either at base or when in large units - but cats in skals become too useful in that case. The other challenge is that abilities traits and artefacts don’t help much, and buffs are hard to come by (expensive battalions notwithstanding). Lowering the cost of big beasties doesn’t help significantly with either challenge, but does potentially make them too good as allies. Maybe lowering battalion costs is a reasonable shout, as some of the bonuses are worth having, especially if slightly wider ranging. But again, to cost them at such a level that you can take more significant units overall would have to absolutely slash their costs, making them potentially unbalanced. Tough one. New book is the only solution 😉 Right after Gutbusters, that is 😁

So, with the ghb 19 callout for points adjustments, I don’t personally feel Gutbusters are in a bad place at the moment, pointswise. I mean, we would all fast for a week for a new battletome, or even just some allegiance abilities, but I’m happy with most of the costs. So my only question to the faithful is really: at what points cost would you play an ironblaster (or several)?

Honestly, I read it as 2, RAW and RAI. It doesn’t say ‘if you have a summoning ability, use it twice, if you don’t, have this one.’ That would be harder to interpret. What it does say is ‘if this model is chosen to use a summon ability, use it twice. If it doesn’t have one, give it this one.’ the second conditional isn’t intended/written to affect the consequent in the first conditional, just the antecedent. It amounts to ‘if this model is chosen to use a summon ability (use the gk one if it doesn’t have one), use it twice.’ That’s RAW, and it looks deliberate to me?