Enoby

If it offers any hope, Daemonettes were changed for a very brief time when Wrath and Rapture came out, so let's hope Namarti get a change too despite not being a new model.

It should also be noted that current narrative play is very similar to matched play in that you use points and the unit restrictions are quite similar to the matched play restrictions. I'd say current Path to Glory is a lot more complex than most matched play games due to all of the steps after a game. I imagine, as @Neil Arthur Hotep said, when people say that most AoS games are narrative and that the devs play narrative, I think what they mean is that most games aren't cutting edge competitive or designed to be. The game is very likely mostly played at a 'build a 1k-2k point army you like the look of' level, and designed around that philosophy which is why so much can slip through (as well as time constraints and other pressures). It's not a 'narrative' game to make a story about Sir Ethal Brightshield, Lord Castellant and his 100% liberator retinue if it's played using matched play rules. It's a matched play list with a story and a theme, which from my experience is the most common way to play. Narrative, in a AoS design sense, is synonymous with Path to Glory, which is rarely played from my experience (though I do play it). While the argument might be "the people playing narrative styled matched play lists" don't care about balance, I don't think this is necessarily true. They may not play the most powerful thing, but they'll not enjoy it if their themed faction they've put a lot of love and care into gets obliterated turn 2. TL;DR - 'true' competitive is likely a minority, as is 'true' P2G narrative, but casual matched play with a theme is likely the most common.

I agree. Not to get too much into other games, but you're right that AoS is a wargame with objectives but doesn't really have units that interact with them (besides a few specific examples like SoB and Brutes). For those who don't know, in Malifaux, to score an objective it's very likely you'll need to do something active, and objectives are randomised per game (you get a set of 5 schemes and 1 strategy). You choose what you're playing after finding this out, and tailor your list to be the best at the given schemes (choosing 2 of 5) and strategy, as well as who can deny them. I'll try not to go too deep into the mechanics, but some schemes will have you run around to the opponent's side and actively use (using 1 of the maximum 10 per game) actions to put down a marker. Other schemes just need you to stand still in the middle and not die, while making sure no one else is near you. So you could have a very expensive, tough to kill, very damaging, fast model that's great in one situation but very poor in another. This gets even more complex with counter scheming. What this ends up meaning is, in general, most crews look different every time they are played - or at least different in small ways. In Age of Sigmar, usually when a unit is good, it's good in every situation because objectives are captured passively or battle tactics are won doing things you'd probably do anyway. For example, Broken Ranks requires you (preferably using a monster) to destroy a battleline unit. So long as you pick this at the right time, there's no downside to trying to go for this. Units that are already good at killing will be good at this, in the same way that units which are good at killing will be good at clearing and objective and taking that. In Malifaux, Outflank requires you to drop two markers using two models at the side of the board. This will often require three actions per model (so six overall). This means that cheap models have an advantage over stronger models because you can take more of them and each of their actions is 'worth' less compared to your general action count. On the downside, these models will be low impact in damage and often a lot easier to kill, and so would be much worse at a scheme like Assassinate (try to kill the opposing leader). To try and bring this back on the topic of Stormcast and their dragons, I think the homogenisation of what makes a good scroll in AoS is what makes Stormcast so hard to balance for as they have so many warscrolls. The Dragons, regardless of if they're "OP" or not, seem to have the overall best stats for their points in the book and fullfill the "best unit" role best. However I don't really see a solution to fixing this without a big rules overhall as it's quite fundamental to AoS's current design; even upping the points of the dragons won't solve the fundamental issue that SCE players face of a lot of their book being overshadowed by the next best unit. (Note, I should add that the Malifaux design isn't necessarily perfect and it can be very new/unskilled player unfriendly, whereas AoS is much more open and inviting as a game regardless of skill level. Skill certainly does matter in AoS, but the skill floor is much lower.)

Mostly to generate DP, but can be okay if you have a spare artifact on a KoS (or just want to take a MW on a summoned KoS who didn't get in the turn they were summomed). It's a pretty good scenery piece, and being able to summon from it helps a lot (especially as you don't really need it close if you don't care much about the +1 to hit so you can keep it tucked away). It's also easy to transport as it's pretty flat, which is great.

I've been playing a few other table top games recently (mostly Malifaux), and using AoS for narrative, but it's really made me aware of the difference in quality of some rules. That's not to say the other games are perfect, but it does feel AoS often gets loads more "what were they thinking" moments. In Malifaux, for example, there are overpowered and underpowered crews (armies) but the most powerful are along the "this needs toning down" lines and the least are "this isn't quite doing what it should be" and can usually be solved with a few tweaks. I don't think, in Malifaux's 3rd edition, there's been any crew that could wipe someone else out first or second turn. In AoS, we've had things like 2019 Slaanesh which was egregiously overpowered to say the least. A few OP things slipping through the gaps is understandable, but I am genuinly curious as to how some things get greenlit (e.g. 14" move, always strike last, double pile in, summon themselves and more Keepers). I don't know quite where the dragons fall, but in general it is quite telling when a consensus of best in battletome is developed so quickly. I don't think the rules writers are incompetent, but I do think they likely have limited time to write the battletome to the best of their abilities. In addition, it does feel like there's not a cohesive way battletomes are designed (but this may be changing in AoS 3). I do hope, in the future, the designers are given more time and space for playtesting, editing, and coalescing ideas for each battletome, rather than having each one as a separate project.

While you're correct that it's incredibly difficult to balance with casual players in mind, I think it's a much larger discussion as to whether competitive players should be the goal of balance. I think it's very likely that pro players (and competitive tournament players in general) are the tiny minority of AoS players, and that casual 'pick up an army and play' are in the vast majority. It's also true that pro players, by virtue of being pro, likely know more about the game and how best to play. As such, if an army is strong in the pro scene then it's 'truly' strong - as in, it can beat other strong armies used at their best by people who are good at spotting strong armies. If an army is winning a lot at a pro scene then there's a good chance it will also be strong at a casual scene too; it's rare that a meta army will be too complicated to use at a casual level to good effect. Thus a nerf can work at the casual and pro scene when based off the competitive scene, which is how it currently is. However, the difficulty comes from armies that aren't good at a tournament level as pro players know how to effectively counter them with higher skill, but are a problem at a casual level. I'll call this the AoS 1 Thundertusk effect. For those not in AoS 1, the old Thundertusk could do 6 mortal wounds at 18" range on a 2+. Basically, it deleted little heroes. It could be beaten with not having important <6 wound heroes in range, playing the objective, or using chip damage to turn the 6 into D6. At a competitive scene, the army was a bit of a dud, but people hated it at a casual scene. If a unit is making the game unenjoyable for the larger player base, some would argue that it should be nerfed regardless of how "truly" bad it is. Others would say that people can just get better and use their improved skills instead of a nerf, or at casual games just ask people not to bring it. Personally I think the "ask not to bring it" argument is a dud as, while "casual games" invoke the idea of friends around a table, a lot of them are pick up and plays with strangers where you can't really have much of a say in their list. The argument of 'just get gud' is, in my mind, the stronger one but even then some people don't enjoy "getting gud" by changing up their playstyle (especially if they only play once every few months) and some people aren't really capable of it (especially when learning the game). On the other hand, a nerf to a 'truly' bad unit isn't fun for those few who want to use it at a competitive level and have now gotten even worse. Overall, looking at the Thundertusk, this was solved by changing what it did alongside the rest of the army. It became more of a horde clearer rather than a sniper and the rest of the army improved with it, helping both sides. I think, in the case of these awkward "AoS 1 Thundertusks" the best solution is a rewrite that tries to satisfy both crowds. Though for the dragons, that won't likely happen for some time. I've personally not played against them so I don't have much of an opinion, but I do think it's something that the design team really need to focus on in the future. I think first turn charge alpha strikes and high ranged mortal wounds have a very high chance of turning into AoS 1 Thundertusks, and should only be included in the game very sparsely because they become very hard to appease both crowds with.

I should be at a small tournament soon - no clue how nasty the lists will be, so I'm going to play something silly. I don't expect to win, in fact I may well go 0-5, but I want to take the opportunity to see what this ends up doing: - Army Faction: Hedonites of Slaanesh - Army Type: Pretenders LEADERS Glutos Orscollion (475) Keeper of Secrets (420) - General - Command Traits: Hunter of Godbeasts, Master of Magic - Artefacts of Power: Sceptre of Domination - Spells: Slothful Stupor BATTLELINE 5 x Hellstriders with Claw-spears (135) 11 x Blissbarb Archers (170) 5 x Hellstriders with Claw-spears (135)* OTHER 10 x Symbaresh Twinsouls (330)* 5 x Myrmidesh Painbringers (145)* ENDLESS SPELLS & INVOCATIONS 1 x Umbral Spellportal (70) 1 x Wheels of Excruciation (100) CORE BATTALIONS - *Hunters of the Heartlands TOTAL POINTS: 1980/2000 So basically I just hope that slothful stupor goes off on their big model! I've not used the wheels so I wanted to give them a spin. It's not a good list, but it's something different!

Yeah, that'd work well If you wanted more of a focus on Painbringers (over Twinsouls), I'd suggest this list: - Army Faction: Hedonites of Slaanesh - Army Type: Invaders LEADERS Lord of Pain (155) - General - Command Traits: Glory Hog - Artefacts of Power: The Rod of Misrule Shardspeaker of Slaanesh (150) BATTLELINE 5 x Myrmidesh Painbringers (145) 11 x Blissbarb Archers (170) 5 x Myrmidesh Painbringers (145) OTHER 5 x Slickblade Seekers (230) TOTAL POINTS: 995/1000 This will be quite a nice well-rounded list Summon-wise, your best units in 2000pts are usually (like 80% of the time) a Keeper of Secrets or 30 daemonettes. However, at 1000 points you may struggle to get these until turn 3, which may be a little too late. 10-20 daemonettes are still a good choice, but at that level I'd actually argue fiends are better against monsters, and the exalted seeker chariot is a good summon too (if you need some mortal wounds or a healing spell). I'd not recommend a KoS until you're sure you enjoy the army - they are a great summon and very consistently easy to summon, but they're a pricey model. You can build a lot on the above army, including Sigvald and Glutos as two very solid units if you like them.

Recently I've been looking around the other battletome threads in this forum, as well as Facebook groups and Discords, and one thing that's stood out to me is how many people think their battletome is poorly designed. The reasons for this differ, but it's rare to see people have a wholly positive opinion of a battletome (to the point where I can probably only name Daughters of Khaine as a battleltome where 90% of DoK players were happy with it). In addition, it's very common to see a "grass looks greener" perspective between armies. For example, I distinctly remember reading someone who said that their battletome was rubbish and considerably worse than Slaves to Darkness (which they believed was the best designed battletome), but when you look at S2D discussion threads the opinion is pretty mixed about the book (leaning on the negative). As we've reached our first three 3rd edition battletomes, I can't say I've seem much applause about them. Certainly they have good things, but the most common comments have been "Bonesplittaz have been nerfed and not much else has been changed", "Terrible internal balance with some units that stand out too much", and "overly bitty with very expensive units". Of course, the internet is likely to always go on a negative slant, but that brings me to the title question: If the vast majority of battletomes have very mixed reactions in the community, what makes a good battletome? Other questions would be, "What examples would you give of a good battletome?" and "why is it that so many don't meet the cut of generally been accepted as good - is it just bias?" Personally, I do think a lot of this comes down to the grass looking greener; that's not to say you should never compare battletomes, but it's easy to go in with blinkers on. For example, a lot of Slaanesh players (myself included) are disappointed thar we have much less synergy in our book, but other battletomes sometimes have so much synergy that it practically builds the army for you with clear 'correct' choices (I find this an issue with S2D). But on the other hand, there are definitely things that we like to see in a battletome: - a variety of sub-allegiances, all of which are viable and there's no clear winner - a large number of varied warscrolls, none of which outshine another - ways to have units work together (synergy) without feeling as if you have to take a particular model in 100% of games - an allegiance ability that feels useful in nearly all situations, but not overpowered or overly complex - for me, the most important thing is that the battletome feels narratively consistent with the faction - e.g. a Mighty Lord of Khorne should hit like a truck compared to being a 'lead from the back' sort of guy Of course, all of this is easier said than done. What do you think makes a good battletome, and do you have a battletome you'd say is as close to perfect as it can be? * Please note, when I say "battletomes", I'm also referring to the warscrolls

I'd really recommend the battlebox for a 1000 points list (minus the Slaangors) In general, all of our units are pretty decent (besides Slaangors) so we have the advantage of not really having one list that works. Something simple and cheap for 1000 points would be: - Army Faction: Hedonites of Slaanesh - Army Type: Invaders LEADERS Lord of Pain (155) - Glory Hog, Rod of Misrule OR Shardspeaker (150) - Glory Hog, Rod of Misrule BATTLELINE 11 x Blissbarb Archers (170) 5 x Hellstriders with Hellscourges (135) OTHER 5 x Myrmidesh Painbringers (145) (battleline with Lord of Pain General) 5 x Symbaresh Twinsouls (165) (battleline with Lord of Pain General) 5 x Slickblade Seekers (230) TOTAL POINTS: 1000/1000 The Shardspeaker variant would be cheaper as that comes in the box, but would leave you will less battleline (though she's probably a better support). With that variant, you'd only need to buy some Hellstriders (or find them on Ebay). You would likely need some models for summoning, but to save yourself money, at 1k points there's no need to dive into a KoS - I'd recommend the Start Collecting box (building the exalted chariot with herald). This should give a decent small summoning pool and also allows you to mix and match daemons into your army. Hope this helps!

Happy new year!

Is there a general consensus on the book? It seems to have just passed by and feels a bit forgotten at the moment!

++ Mod Hat ++ Gentle nudge back to the Winter FAQ as the topic at hand I'm happy to set up another thread for discussing the place of battleline in AoS if that interests people?

I think it does stop coalition units using host artifacts as I think enhancements are part of an allegiance ability, unfortunately. However we're okay to summon from them still:

It does seem like, for the God of Bloodshed and Violence, Khorne has some of the most limp wristed warriors around. I used to play Khorne, and knew three others who did, and every single one stopped playing Khorne because of how poor the warscrolls are, and how it felt narratively disjointed to have the red tide so easily beat back. In fact, one of the ex-Khorne players said the book made them go off AoS in general it was so disheartening. They had a narrative army in mind of a one man army cutting through hordes as he got stronger and stronger, but good luck doing that with a Mighty Lord of Khorne. It was very disappointing to see his lord crumble to basic threats, and it's totally understandable how they'd be put off the game. Losing S2D is a big blow, but we can only hope that it spurs the next rules writer to give the Blood God's warriors some actual damage without five cheerleaders giving them encouragement. It was said before (but I can't find who said it), that it feels like Khorne is playing the "bad guys" as if they were an NPC faction designed to make someone else look good. In all honesty, Khorne in early AoS's narrative was written abysmally, and their rules have really reflected the theme of tides of chumps ready to die to a stronger opponent. It's a massive shame because BoK should be an easy faction to get right (they did with Warclans), but they've consistently been disappointing. I'm really hopeful for a new battletome that will reignite some of the passion for Khorne.

The Battlebox is a really great way to start the army - even if you never use the Slaangors, with a Lord of Pain you have a complete and pretty decent 1000 point HoS army With your daemons, you can bring that up to 2000 with leftovers for summoning.

They're in a really weird position - I think all models have a role when they're first designed, and should be judged on that role. For example, no one says Pink Horrors are bad because their damage is low, they're good because they hold an objective really well. Slaangors are meant to be a glass cannon, but fundamentally fail at this role because of their very poor damage. To take another example from our book, Slickblades are also glass cannons but actually have decent damage (but perhaps not worth the cost). Something like Slickblades could well be worth it should their points be reduced a little because they have the opportunity to be successful at their role. Slaangors on the other hand will never be a good glass cannon because of their pitiful damage and middling speed. Even if Slaangors cost 100 points, they may do okay damage for their points at that level on a charge (and better with a LoP buff) but realistically they wouldn't complete their desired role and would just be non-battleline cheap chaff that can sting a bit. So I think the answer to "when are they worth it" is "when do they beat out the other forms of cheap useless screening chaff"? To give you a greater look at my reasoning with some numbers: unbuffed, their average damage vs a 4+ save is 3.8. On a charge it's 5.3. On a charge when rerolling all hits (an extra 150 pts investment), their average damage is 7.3. To compare, 10 Daemonettes have an average of 4.67 against a 4+ save. That's not to mention they are faster, battleline, and much higher bravery. They have 5.83 when on +1 to hit. In the most common cases, daemonettes are better in all ways including damage. As such, Slaangors can't really be "good" at any level for their role of an offensive unit, but rather "good" in that they can become about as cheap as gors and we use them for the same purpose - chaff. I have no clue how they messed this warscroll up that badly. It's one of life's great mysteries...

Think it was all of the Hedonites (barring Glutos, Sigvald, Painbringers, and Twinsouls). The latter three were announced before, and Glutos announced on New Years Day.

I think this is why a commentary after each change would help - if the designers said "we tried X, Y, and Z for Nagash and only found Y reasonable" then I think people would be more understanding and receptive to the changes. Currently a lot of people are left wondering "why did they do this and not this? Do they thing this army is okay now after a tiny points decrease? Are the rules writers incompetent/just don't care about AoS?" - this likely isn't true (there's a very good chance that the rules writers are good at their jobs, but rather their jobs are often done under wraps and we only see the confusing end result).

Like a lot of people, I think I'm in the 'right direction but not enough camp'. On one hand, it's very understandable why they don't want to make massive earth shattering changes just in case it causes more problems than it solves. On the other, I doubt these changes will do much to help the weakest armies, who'll likely struggle to make use of the extra 10 points they've saved. I do think this is another case where we'd have benefitted from a designer insight next to each change (so each Warscroll rewrite, rules change, and points change). At least then we'd know why certain changes seem so small or large. Not a huge fan of the direction they're going with for coalition units in Chaos. S2D/BoC are hard to balance in god armies, true, but I think they'd be much better with different points values rather than just a blanket 'you may have bought Khorne BoC, but you'll now not want to use them'. Overall, I would have preferred to see more effort working on the weakest warscrolls - I know they're a lower priority, but I think it's what a lot of game systems get wrong with balancing (they allow poor factions to languish as they're not as troubling as strong factions).

Yeah, I think if they really wanted to push the battleforce box, they'd have just rewritten Slaangors rather than giving them a points decrease.

Potentially yes, but it's also not as if it's hurting the army either - or forcing you to buy the box. It's better than nothing and the drop on Twinsouls and Painbringers is welcome.

The points:

At least we see some updates - still wouldn't take Slaangors for that amount, but it shows they're looking into it at the least

While the points changes aren't out yet, I am a little disappointed there's no warscroll rewrite for Slaangors