Grimrock

Not much purpose outside of meme lists where you take 6 undivided ones and try to generate as many daemon princes as you can. He's a pretty good cheap wizard in a cabalist army I guess. Interesting note, since they made the dual axes 4+/4+ they actually have pretty much the same damage output as the weapon/shield (less if he gets his +1 attack for being near a hero/moster) so there's no reason to take dual axes. No idea why they didn't just leave them 3+/3+and let him be a half decent general fighter. Or make his Glory-Seeker something that benefits mass attacks instead of something that benefits higher quality attacks so he could be a hero hunter. Instead yet again we're left with one option that looks cool but is strictly worse than the other one. You'd think GW would have figured this out by now.

If you want a best-stick specifically I definitely wouldn't go for Be'Lakor. Due to his keywords/mark he has access to precisely 0 buffs from the army (legion of the first prince notwithstanding), and his base stats juts aren't good enough to carry him through. His average damage is about 4-6 against a unit with a 4+ save and all out defense so maybe, just maybe, he'll kill a 5 wound foot hero. If he's a little lucky. If you use all out attack on him then his damage goes up to passable levels but you're a lot better off using it on better units like knights or varanguard. If you're taking him you're taking him to use The Dark Master and that's about it, apart from that ability he's a mediocre monster that usually bounces off his first meaningful combat and dies ingloriously to a unit of chaff since high volume attacks just shred him. Don't get me wrong, he's a beautiful model. A joy to build and paint and perfectly acceptable to play. Just don't buy him thinking you're getting a combat monster like a mawkrusha because you'll be in for a world of disappointment.

Yeah Archaon is in a weird place right now. He's lost all the tools around him that made him really good without much to compensate. It is pretty big he can take slaanesh to run and charge or he can get a 3d6 charge from the spell, but once he gets stuck in he's not going to do a ton of damage against something with decent defenses. So he's fast and extremely resilient, but doesn't hit very hard. He just doesn't really provide anything for the army that you can't get cheaper and better elsewhere. For example a 10 man unit of knights has more wounds at the same save (albeit without the always on ward), is more than fast enough in legion of the first prince or with mark of slaanesh, hits way harder, and is about half the price. Personally I think he's no longer competitively viable. In theory that's fine because you dont need to only play competitive models right? Just play what's fun. The problem is he doesn't look fun anymore either. He lost a ton of his cool rules and a lot of synergy. Basically now he's just a huge bullet sponge that flies around the table being annoying and never dying. That doesn't sound fun for me to play or for my opponent to play against. Also as an aside I'm super annoyed that he can't get marks outside of S2D anymore. I originally bought him before I started slaves because I figured I could always find a use for him in at least one of my armies. Even if he was no good in slaanesh maybe he'd be good in khorne for example. Now without marks though he's essentially faction locked to slaves and it just sucks. I had a little while of him being mediocre but fun in a few armies, then the book came out and he was so overpowered I didn't want to play him because I'd feel bad for my opponent, and now he's just so... bleh and boring that I don't want to play him either.

Yeah the nerf to the shrine is probably my biggest disappointment in the new book. All they needed to do was get rid of the undivided prayer or limit it to only chant/target based on the warshrine mark. They didn't need to go and do all of that AND nerf the rest of the prayers into the ground. +1 to charge for a single khorne unit? Who in their right mind thought that was a valid buff? If it was +1D6 maybe, but as is it's not even worth the risk of maybe taking a mortal wound from rolling a 1, let alone the fact that you could put curse or heal on it instead. It's a shame too because it's a nice big centerpiece model for the army, but someone writing the book must have been done dirty by it in one too many games.

If I were you I'd wait on buying anything until after the book comes out and there's an errata/FAQ on the coalitions. Like @Agent of Chaos said technically the mark system is messed up right now. The current rules for the coalition are based on the old S2D book where the rules for giving marks were on the warscroll, but in the new book they moved over to allegiance abilities for the models and those specifically say that you only get the marks when you're taken in a Slaves to Darkness army. The coalition rules do say that you must give a S2D unit the mark when taken as coalition, but there's no legal way to do that right now. I totally expect them to just change the wording to say something like "2 in every 4 units in the army can be a coalition unit from the Slaves to Darkness faction that has the Mark of Chaos keyword. Those units gain the Khorne keyword" so it matches the beastmen rules, but it's not guaranteed. For example Archaon very specifically doesn't gain marks when added to the god marked armies (he doesn't have the Mark of Chaos keyword and he gains marks based off his warscroll rules, but only in a S2D army), so if they made him not get a mark maybe they'll do the same with the other units. I don't think he'll work particularly well in S2D. He's great in Khorne, but that's because he can easily get +2 attacks on Carnage and he can pile in/attack twice with the sub faction command ability. If you're taking him as an ally in S2D you won't have any ally points to take wrathmongers or the bloodsecrator so no attack boosts and obviously no double pile in. You're pretty much left with a slow, squishy, foot slogging monster that'll do 8 mortal wounds and then just die. Not overly exciting for 380 points.

Hard to say. He got a fair bit more resilient, but he lost a few things around him that pushed him over the top (oracular vision, daemonic power, and the chaos lord fight twice all got nerfed/removed). His turn command ability was also nerfed to once per game and is no longer secret and he lost his eye of sheerian ability for it. Marks also got weaker for him as he was always the general so he always had the full buff. Also lost the bonus command point for some reason. Overall I think it he's definitely gotten weaker, but it remains to be seen if he'll be worth keeping around or not. Personally I'm not overly excited to try him out. Losing most of his interesting/unique tech just makes him seem... kinda boring honestly. Pretty much every change he got was a nerf other than the wounds/ward. He'll be super hard to kill, but his offensive power will suffer as he's prone to whiffing and not doing enough damage without the re-rolls. If you have a good game where you roll well he'll still feel as good as before, but a couple 1's and you'll really start to wonder why you paid 860 points for him. I like the idea of stacking as much as you can into those 8 attacks, but I don't think the Eye of The Gods parts work on him. The Chaotic Conduit spell requires that the target have the EYE OF THE GODS keyword and the prince doesn't have it. Unfortunately the undivided mark only gives it to mortal and ogroid units. Yeah GW seems to have an aversion to making good combat characters in AoS. I tried a daemons army out the other day and ran a daemon prince not expecting much but he absolutely slapped. If you want the most egregious example I can think of look no further than Be'Lakor. In 40k he's an absolute terror, -1 to wound, -1 damage, no rerolling to hit, buffs for units, excellent spells, and his weapon can be either ap -4 damage d3+3 with no invlunerable saves or make twice as many attacks at ap -3 damage 1. Be'lakor in AoS is just such a disappointment combat wise. Better now than he was at the tail end of 2nd edition due to all out attack, but his overall damage output is really depressing. I would have much rather they nerfed/got rid of The Dark Master and leaned more into giving him a good profile.

The thing is the claws 8 attacks are definitely intended for dual claws, I don't think they're just going to give those to the other profiles because then the 2 claw loadout wouldn't make any sense. If they're going to change anything it'll probably be the heroic actions or command traits/artefacts.

I don't know, I think there's definitely some tech there. Maybe not top tier, but they obviously have some place in despoilers. A khorne prince that has the monster/+2 wound trait being 14 wounds with monstrous actions and healing while in combat is super tanky. If they let you take the 'hero only' artefacts/traits then conqueror's crown would combo nicely since he's so hard to kill. Follow him around with a Nurgle prince that has the healing trait and you're pretty much invincible. Sure you probably won't kill a ton, but you should win the attrition game 99% of the time. Also interestingly people have been fawning over karkadraks and chaos lords on daemonic steeds, but the prince compares pretty well to them. He's 25 points more than a lord on steed but he's faster, has fly, has a better attack (no mount though so probably a wash), has more wounds, has a blanket 6+ ward instead of a 5+ only against mortals, and trades the strike first/chain with knights for a unique hero ability that can be pretty powerful in the right circumstance. Compared to the karkadrak he's definitely worse in combat, but again faster and more resilient for 25 points less. In both cases princes have access to much better command traits and, currently, the same artefacts.

Yes, if you watch one of the reviews you can see the infernal treasures are in the 'Artefacts of Power' section of the book. They're on the page immediately after the Trophies of Conquest and Chaos Esoterica. The section is on the Facehammer review around 25:08. I definitely think it has a use in the late game for repositioning the slower troops, but on turn 1 I don't think it'll be very common. Since the unit can't move after being teleported now and the range is only 9" you can usually get similar movement with a run, and if there's a place you absolutely need to be you can always just spend a command point for the auto 6". The only exception I can think of would be taking advantage of a big flaw in my opponent's deployment (like they heavily overweighted one side of the board), but that probably won't come up very often.

One thing I think is getting overlooked for Tzeentch is the ability to move wizards in the hero phase. Taking a couple wizards and letting them reposition to get into range could be really strong, and even if we don't have the best lore we still have access to some good endless spells. I could definitely see a tzeentch sorcerer lord on manticore as a general with Master of Magic being teleported around to land Winds of Chaos. It does suck a bit that Tzeentch does next to nothing for units, but the mark you give your models doesn't have to line up with how they're painted. You can always just paint and convert them up to look how you like and then just give them whatever mark you feel is the most thematic for your force. Got a unit of warriors that prefers to sow change through assassination? Give them mark of Khorne to represent that. Got a unit that has been gifted wings or feathers or a disk of tzeentch? Give them the mark of Slaanesh to represent their increased speed. Tzeentch has gifted your knights with the finest armor? Take the mark of Nurgle to represent the way enemy attacks are mutated to be weaker on contact. All sorts of options as long as you don't get hung up on the technicalities of what's written down on your list.

Got a chance to get a game in so I figured I should share my experience. I ran knights of the empty throne with bounty hunters and a warlord battalion for everything else: Chaos Lord on Manticore 270 - General, Death Dealer trait - Conqueror Crown - Khorne Chaos Lord on Karkadrak 220 - Khorne - Arcane tome, burning blade Chaos Sorcerer lord 120 - binding damnation - Nurgle Bloodstoker 80 10 Knights 460 - Khorne - banner - bounty hunter 5 Knights 230 - Khorne 5 Knights 230 - Khorne Varanguard 290 - Khorne - ensorcelled weapons - bounty hunter Iron golems 100 I was up against a Nurgle army with 4 units of blight kings, two units of plaguebearers, one unit of nurglings, bloab, festus, and a lord of afflictions with the usual kit. Very slow but very tanky and can do a ton of damage on the counter strike. Mission was 'Won't back down'. I won't do a full report but some thoughts: - Knights of the empty throne feels amazing. I was running and charging all the time and it let me dictate my engagements. Of course this was against a footslogging nurgle list so it might be different against something faster, but I really felt in control of the game. It's cool to have a sub faction that opens up a totally different build/way to play. - Chaos Knights feel really amazing now. I don't love hitting on 4's, but they're super tanky and they can absolutely get the job done on the charge. Riders of Doom makes a 10 man unit work pretty much seamlessly and with a couple buffs there's almost nothing that can stop them. They absolutely felt like they should and I'm so happy they got this update. - Eye of the Gods was much more active this game and I got five rolls on it by turn three giving the karkadrak lord +2 rend and the manticore lord a 6+ ward, +1 rend, and a snub. Definitely an improvement from the old system. - It felt really nice to not have to worry about bubbles for the marks anymore. The extra attack on the charge actually made a pretty big impact throughout the game and multi profile units like the karkadrak and manticore just loved it - I was a little worried about the manticore lord but he turned out really solid. Speed 12 with fly and run/charge gave him a huge threat range and his attack profiles are really solid. I kept him back for the first turn then on the second gave him daemonic power and used the bloodstoker to launch him at a bloab sitting 25ish inches away. He proceeded to pretty much one shot bloab, then go on to wreck the backline. Iron-Willed Overlord even came up top of 2 where it turned a redeploy of a 2 into a 6 meaning a unit of blight kings was stranded for the rest of the game. I don't know if I'd take him outside empty throne, but he definitely has a place there - Daemonic Power is still stupid strong, but with the overall buff to the army it didn't hurt as much when I failed to cast it - The bloodstoker is just dumb with the army. Way too strong with Knights of the Empty Throne and I'm sure he won't be in there for long. I wouldn't be surprised at all if the winter errata changes the keywords on the stoker and bloodsecrator to only affect Blades of Khorne units. Enjoy them if you have them but I wouldn't be making any purchases. - On that note, the army definitely felt a bit overtuned. It hits like a truck and even the basic unbuffed 5 man knights were a threat and could pick their engagements very well. I used the speed to put all the pressure on the left flank and just sort of muscled my way through all opposition while retreating from the right. It left the slower force struggling to get any favorable combats in and stranded some units that just couldn't keep up. It was a probably a really bad matchup for the Nurgle player, but I wouldn't be surprised if we see a few nerfs going forward - Finally, it was so cool putting all that cavalry on the table and it's just night and day how much better this is to play compared to the last book. No worrying about finicky ranges, combos that actually work with no arbitrary restrictions, solid stats that get better with buffs instead of needing buffs to function at a basic level, army rules that were actually used... just so much better. This is a fantastic book.

I think you're ok with spawn in beasts for now. I'm pretty sure they got rid of the shared warscroll thing in third edition when armies started being reckoned by books instead of keywords. Pretty sure the beasts spawn won't change until the beasts book does. Be'lakor is a solid ally. I think he's pretty self contained since most of the slaves buffs are focused on mortals, and that hasn't really changed since he got the new model. Being able to just turn off something like Teclis or Archaon for a turn or two is super strong I've seen him taken in a number of different armies so you should be good to go if you want to run him.

It's not mind blowing, but for 175 points it doesn't really need to be. 16 wounds in despoilers and the top bracket command to really take advantage of that toughness seems pretty sturdy. The attacks aren't crazy good but assuming he kept the +1 to hit for being near his master I think it could do a good amount of damage. Also combining the khorne command for mortals on the charge, a stomp, and being out of range at the end of combat you could put out 3d3 mortals which is pretty solid for a single command point. All things considered I could definitely see taking one in a list.

Ok, that all sounds pretty decent. I was expecting marauders to go down to complete chaff so no surprises there. I'm just glad I only painted up one unit, people who bought 90-120 of them for the current book must be fuming at this point. Too bad about the myrmidon though, no synergy with the theridons should mean they lose out to chosen or varanguard most cases. I'm really happy to hear about the soul grinder though. Their points going down slightly and getting that much better is really intriguing. 230 points for 20 wounds is a pretty good deal by itself and throwing in nurgle would make them reasonably tanky for their cost. I haven't seen the new leaks but I think the biggest problem before was the 4+'s to hit, however now with all out attack and mark of khorne they could really slap. I don't know if I'll buy any as I just hate that the kit doesn't come with a base, but it does make Makes me slightly hopeful the Slaughterbrute/Mutalith Vortex Beast might see some improvements too. Edit: I was thinking more about the marauder horsemen and I'm really liking the change. Five man oval based units are pretty much the only viable screening unit type left in the game, but they're usually too squishy. Incidental ranged attacks can often kill a few models off and open up a charge around the screen. Giving the horsemen a -1 to wound from ranged is a really excellent buff for that screening role and means they might be able to survive long enough to ensure your key units don't get charged. I can definitely see taking one or two units in most lists.

Not a bad thought, but it should be mentioned that the rotmire are the exception not the rule. The majority of cultists were total throwaway units nobody took unless they were proxying for marauders. I'm hopeful that GW figured this out and have them all meaningful updates in the new book but only time will tell. I'd love to start seeing some warbands start making their way to AoS.

1) This is contended because spell lores are part of the allegiance abilities, so the question is whether the warscroll gives them access to the lores despite the fact that the model isn't being taken as part of the allegiance. I think the answer is absolutely yes and they should get the spells since the rule is on the warscroll and warscroll rules win in the case of conflicts (sidebar on section 1.6 of the core rules), but it wouldn't be terrible to get an FAQ to clear it up. 2) Yup, that seems correct assuming that adding the extra dice doesn't count as a modified roll. Also, holy moly I didn't realize that the shrine doesn't specify Slaves to Darkness as a target anymore, just the relevant mark. That makes them really interesting as an ally for Nurgle at least. That +1 to wound would be extremely effective on a number of Nurgle units. Edit: Added clarity on first point

Just a quick thought on this one, based on the images in the preview I'm thinking chosen are still on 32 mil bases. If I remember daemon princes are on 60, then ogroid would probably be 50 and in the pictures the bases look a fair bit smaller than the ogroids, so that would be 32 to me. It's tough to be sure though, but even if they aren't they finally gave them 2" on their weapons so it should be pretty easy to get them all to attack. I agree with your point though, need to get the models on the table and see how things play out. Edit: actually now I'm looking at them again and I'm less sure, they do seem a little small on the base of they're 32mil. You might be right and they're on 40's, still the reach should help but that does make things a bit trickier for 10 man units.

I'm not going to waste a ton of time digging up 3 rules for you, but I'll give you one simple one. Shooting a unit with ranged attacks. In the core rules you pick a unit in section 13.1. Then in 13.1.1 the first line of the second paragraph says: The target of a shooting attack must be within a number of inches of the attacking model equal to the Range characteristic. You don't pick up the target unit and put them into range of your ranged attack. The target doesn't magically change to be in range of the unit because the rule says they must be in range. The rule is saying they must be in range in order to proceed with the attack. Same thing with the coalition rules. There the rule is saying that the unit must be given the Tzeentch keyword, not that they are given the keyword. If they aren't given the keyword then you don't get to take them in your list using the coalition rules.

Last post from me on this. From my reading the current rule in the Tzeentch book doesn't grant the keyword, it makes a requirement that the unit must have the keyword in order for it to be included in the army. Those are two very different things. Units aren't included in the army arbitrarily, they are only included if they can meet the requirements laid out in the coalition rules. If it says they must be given a keyword but there is no way to give them that keyword then they don't just magically get the keyword. It's just like any other rule that stipulates a requirement, if the requirement can't be met you don't just get to do it anyway.

I'd disagree because the Mark of Chaos keyword won't do anything outside of the S2D allegiance. The current coalition rule doesn't grant the Tzeentch keyword, it stipulates how the current Mark of Chaos rule on the warscroll must be used if the units are taken in a Tzeentch army. It says they must be given the keyword, but the mechanism for giving keywords outside a S2D army won't exist. Maybe it's just me being picky on wording, but if they changed the Tzeentch rule to something like 'Slaves to darkness units taken as a coalition unit in a Disciples of Tzeentch army are given the Tzeentch keyword' then it would work properly.

Well, rend -1 yeah but they also have mortal wounds which balances out the more average rend on the base stats. When I worked out the damage against a 3+ save the chosen came out slightly ahead of the Ogroids, but it could shift a bit depending on how bad the save stacking gets. They also have the once per game ability to attack twice if needed which is far superior offensively speaking to a once per game +1 attack.

The rule in the Tzeentch book currently says: 2 in every 4 units in the army can be a coalition unit from the Slaves to Darkness faction that has the Mark of Chaos keyword. Those units must be given the Tzeentch Mark of Chaos keyword. That works with the current rules for Marks of Chaos because they're written on each individual warscroll and aren't reliant on being taken in a given allegiance, the keyword is assigned at list creation step regardless of what army you're playing. In the new book they dropped all the warscroll rules and moved it to an allegiance ability specifically for the S2D faction. Once the new S2D book releases the current rules for S2D coalition units won't be valid anymore due to the conflict of being forced to take something that is impossible to take. If they want to give S2D units the relevant marks in the different god marked books (which is pretty likely honestly) they'll either have to fix the coalition rules in the god marked books and make an exception, or change the rules in the S2D book to add a clause for giving marks when they're taken as coalition units.

Unfortunately the way the Marks of Chaos rule is written currently in the upcoming slaves to darkness book units only get marks when taken in a slaves to darkness army. It says: ... When you pick a Slaves to Darkness unit that has the Mark of Chaos keyword to be a part of a Slaves to Darkness army, you must give it one of the following keywords: Khorne, Tzeentch, Nurgle, Slaanesh or Undivided and write it down on your roster. Not impossible that they FAQ it and change the wording later, but as it stands now slaves units brought into Tzeentch (or any other got marked army for that matter) will get precisely nothing. Might still be worth it as chaos warriors, chosen, and knights are all significantly better than they were before, but it'll be a tough call for sure.

I think the reason I'm a little cold on them is the comparison to Chosen. They fill similar roles as a high damage hammer unit, and their damage is similar (chosen are a little better on average if my math is right) but Ogroids are significantly more fragile and miss out on potential buffs like the Ensorcelled Banners or Daemonic Power. That being said I could see a list where you take a bunch of cultists and Ogroids and just swarm the board, but I don't really love spamming so I don't usually go that route. We also haven't seen all the scrolls, so if they get something good off of the Myrmidon then they could definitely be more attractive.

So grab a unit from anywhere on the board you can see and set it up within 9 of the caster, then it can move and charge? Yeah that's definitely going to get an FAQ. Worst case that's like a 15" free move when teleporting warriors or knights. Guaranteed turn 1 alpha strike easy. Even better late game for repositioning for objectives.