Jump to content

Gwendar

Members
  • Posts

    1,700
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Everything posted by Gwendar

  1. 2 CC threats and 9 Jezzails.. interesting, I like it. I would swap the Engineer for a Clawlord though 100%.. you really don't need 2 Engineers when you only have 9 Jezzails and all they really need is a Warpspark. Giving the Stormvermin +1 attack is infinitely more valuable and if you combine that with Vigordust you'd be setting them up for greatness.
  2. Yep, luckily nowadays I have a guy I can get 30% off from so at the very least I can sell it for what I bought it for. Skaven have been my main army since I started and that will likely never change.. and I think Tzeentch is in the same spot. Being able to go Shoot, Magic and Melee heavy in endless combinations has been incredible and a refreshing break from Skaven who really only have 2-3 viable builds based around the exact same thing and generally have to struggle to pull those off. Next up is Sons of Behemat so.. I'm prepping my wallet there 🤣
  3. I do the same honestly.. but a lot of the time it's meant I play something for 3-6 months and find that I don't really care for the playstyle and no amount of theory-crafting ended up providing me with how it feels to play. I did this with Wanderers and to some extent FeC and OBR.. most recently I've been up in the air above selling off my Fyreslayers (that I just finished painting...) as well because I can't stand how they play either 😅. I should probably invest in some display cabinets and just hold onto stuff in case it gets expanded on in the future... Anyway, TTS has been huge for this as I can now test out armies and lists all I want before committing to anything with actual $$$. I'm with you on Pinks though.. I'm not big on them and really only like doing 10 but not more. That said a Hosts Duplicitous list with Multitudinous Host is absolutely a site to behold and difficult to deal with for most armies. I would never think to run it IRL because I would never punish myself to build, paint and transport that many Horrors.
  4. @RUNCMD I could probably give Thousand Eyes another look sometime, but if I wanted to run mostly StD then I would play StD 🤣 So yeah, for now I'll probably stick to Skyshoal + Hosts Arcanum and my magic\shooting based Pyrofane and Hosts Duplicitous lists. All for experimenting though, so if you want to play TTS just let me know.. I can always run Skaven or something else.
  5. So, I had the full intention of running Skyshoal tonight, but I've been pretty deep into making Cult of a Thousand Eyes work. Played against an experimental Skaven list but it wasn't long enough to do a full batrep.. so I'll just put some pictures below. Anyway, here's the list: I out-dropped and gave him T1 since I was out of range of any significant shooting; all he could do was kill 10 Kairics and give me 2 FP. I did what this list does best and that's pump 1 unit full of buffs and go to town, so I chose the Marauders. They got full Hit, Wound and Save RR's and then +1 attack with the agenda and 26 did ~45 damage after saves.. of course it was only Clanrats, so make of that what you will. VG killed a Doomwheel after fighting it twice and almost killed the Bombardier behind it. Enlightened went below average and killed 23 Clanrats. I got the double and he called the game. deployment + end of game (T1) pictures I like the idea of this, but even after 1 game I can see it struggling with pretty much anything top-tier. 3 VG just do not do enough for their points even when RRing hits and fighting twice. Swords and Spears math out differently but not by much.. either way I think I would be better off taking just one unit of 40 Marauders or 10 Knights with a Sorc Lord than trying to make Cult work with lots of these units. At that point you would mostly be running StD units anyway. All in all I think I can put the idea to rest, but it was good to get some play experience with it. I do still really like the idea of 10 Knights + Sorc Lord.. but when it comes down to it their tradeoff is 6 more wounds with a better save (especially with RRing all saves from the Sorc Lord) and a 5+ vs MW's but they are slower. In terms of power, both units want the +1 attack but even Enlightened without the +1 attack still do more... but only marginally so and you get a sturdier unit for 110 more points (counting the Sorc Lord) so.. make of that what you will, I suppose😉 Anyway, thoughts are always appreciated it. Next time I play I'll probably run the Skyshoal and see how it goes. EDIT: @RUNCMD looks like you posted the same time as me so I'll edit a response here. I enjoy Chosen, but I've only used them with a Bridge to deliver them where they're needed. 1st one is interesting.. generally we (or at least I do) build wholly into the Covens strengths. I can see taking Flamers in Arcanum, but in Pyrofane I would much rather but those points into more Kairics and Withfyre Coven if I wanted to make something shooty. I do the same thing with my Pyrofane of Strong magic + decent shooting + 1 melee threat (Chosen or Enlightened).. or you know, 6 Skyfires because I love them. The 2nd list is different for sure.. curious how it works for you. If I do Conflag it's just always 12 Flamers + Changehost and I can't really bother trying anything else🤣
  6. For me, they can typically delete a single 4-6 wound hero per turn which is often invaluable when these are huge force multipliers.. and with their 40" threat range, it's hard to get away from them. Afterwards they can still charge into something weak and take an objective. They won't be deleting 10-20 man units of Mortek Guard or anything, but they absolutely can take things away from Clanrats, Ungors, 10-20 Skinks, 10-man Vulkite units, etc. This is usually counting those tougher units taking BS though.. but they're often able to hit those unsupported units that are just holding backline objectives anyway. Like I said, I'll try both version out.. I have my reasons for liking Skyfires and I'm well aware I'm in the minority 🤣
  7. I don't disagree completely, but I've had Skyfires do a lot of work in terms of deleting an important hero and clearing weak horde units with no support. I already have 2 CC hammers in the list via Knights and Tzaangors so figured a dual-purpose unit would work out. That really was a point of contention for me... I also thought of swapping them out and giving Be'lakor the Rift to cast. I don't love the idea of using it without Kairos\LoC to auto-dispell it right away, but since there's so few wizards in this list anyway it isn't really a huge concern. So yeah, I'll probably see how that works out. Glad to see Tzaangors are working out for people.. I think I just wanted them to be a bit better so I could justify running 2 or 3x20 of them in a list so I just wrote them off 😅. Without the +1 attack agenda (that will likely go to the Knights) then they aren't going to be as good, but that's still a chunk of wounds with a 6+ DPR sitting on something. Dismantlement and Tides are both good alternate Agendas for them as well.
  8. That's just it though right? How many other units are grossly undercosted or punch above their weight? Plenty of factors to consider in that which is why I don't like comparing units between armies.. but just throwing it out there. I just feel like they missed a bit of a point with them but I believe what @Grimrock says is probably the truth. They hit hard enough now to cripple a unit and have the wounds to stick around for another 1-2 turns.. so yeah, I don't think I was giving them enough credit after looking more and more into them this morning 😉 For @RUNCMD and anyone else interested in an alternate Hosts Arcanum based list, I actually worked this up on lunch so it's in a very rough state and I think a lot more optimization can be had. Not sure what to do with the extra 40 points.. but you all get the general idea I think: Originally I had this as Cult of a Thousand Eyes, but for obvious reasons it turned more into "StD with a couple of Tzeentch units" rather than a more balanced mix of both since I had 80 Marauders in as well (to take advantage of the Coven ability to get hit RR's). So this rough version is really just 3 threats from the Tzaangor, Knights and Skyfires (wanted a long-range threat and something to take lightly guarded objectives since this list devoid of strong casting) while the Screamers and move as needed. Not sure what\if anything should change but always curious to hear your thoughts.
  9. I don't mean to undersell them, rather I don't find it worth the cost as you stated. I don't know that units of 15 would do enough to fix anything and all-in-all I would like them to go down to 160 at least.. but yeah, the lack of a Tzaangor coven that buffs them in some way is just really perplexing to me and instead they gave Acolytes 2 Covens? Mathhammer shows that just those 12 models in combat with +1 attack can pump out ~22 wounds vs a 4+ save which is pretty nice since they don't need any specific heroes to buff them. Bestigors are a good comparison, but you can do more with StD units I think. Chaos Knights, Warriors, Marauders and Chosen can all do far more for the same cost or cheaper, but that's not including the Sorcerer Lord and Chaos Lord\Mounted Chaos Lord needed to make them work. I dunno, I may get around to trying out a unit of 20 at some point in the Hosts Arcanum list.. I've just never been impressed with them in general.
  10. It's odd really... there isn't really a Coven that does much for purely Tzaangors as Transient Form is still Acolyte focused with the added side effect of "oh and when one dies you can maybe add a Tzaangor to a unit on a 6! That's cool, right?" and that's it. There really needed to be a combat focused Coven that buffs up Tzaangors, Skyfires and Enlightened while Pyrofane was left to the Acolytes for an alternate shooty build. I think the faction has a solid ability to make something focused like that as a mini-BoC with more wizards, but it's missing the Coven to do so. You can run them in BoC but I mean... why would you when you could just run cheap Ungors and Bestigors instead? I'm not sure if I ever shared my Pyrofane list, but it's probably one that I enjoy the most next to the Hosts Duplicitous stuff. 2x30 and 1x10 Acolytes (and the Enlightened for the Witchfyre tax which aren't bad for 100 points) along with my standard Kairos + Spellportal and Changecaster + Balewind to sit back and sling spells. I run it with a Fatemaster, Curseling and Magister on Disc as well, but been looking at a Changeling and\or Blue Scribes to swap in.. only ran the list twice so far but it's been interesting. I always keep a CP ready for BS but I think that's a holdover from playing Skaven the last 3 1/2 years that I can't shake 🤣. I don't think it's great all in all, but it's a way to get a shooting heavy list that isn't "I'm going to delete 2-3 units per turn in a 1-drop" in the form of Conflag Flamers. Yeah, but I guess StD is meant to be mortals all in all so I don't know if we'll see unmarked daemons. I've looked at StD a bit recently but I just prefer inserting Chosen into lists and that's about it. Tzeentch is getting you DD which is a big reason you always see Tzeentch Archaon lists.. but aside from that I don't know how useful it is outside charge rolls. That said, 40 Marauders (who don't really need DD charge rolls to be honest), 10 Chosen or 10 Knights backed up by a Chaos Lord and Sorcerer Lord can put out pretty incredible numbers if you include the +1 attack Agenda. Having any of those units fight twice and RR all saves, hits and wounds is nuts, especially when you can use DD to just make the Sorcerer Lords spell go off and ensure you get that 9+ charge. Anyway, I've rambled too long and created another wall of text. Looks like you got me thinking again.. maybe at some point I'll expand on that Chosen idea but try out Knights and Marauders instead. Math isn't everything in a dice game.. but I like those numbers 😉. These are assuming each unit has the full RR's and +1 attack. The Knights I gave +1 to hit to via the CA from the mounted Lord\Karkadrak.. if you can get in a double-pile in (note the unit has to be within 3" of something per the CA wording) then you could easily delete 2 units, especially with the reach on the Knights.
  11. I mean, if I was going to only be shooting with Skyfires then sure, I could see merit in that.. but I don't do that and I have always used them quite aggressively as (contrary to popular belief) they do very well hitting 5-6+ save units first in combat and pairing that with Enlightened means you can tag the same unit with both units and then both get their RR's if they swing with that unit next. People grossly underestimate just how much those Discs can do 🤣 But yeah.. I agree completely. I would really prefer running 6 of each than splitting them like this, but I still think it could potentially be worth it for the MW's from the battalion. This does allow me to send them in opposite directions if needed and threaten more of the board and while the +1 to hit from the Shaman is nice, neither unit gain much from it in all honesty. Enlightened only gain about 2 damage on average by having the +1 to hit on the Spears and Beaks if they're getting the RR's.. but for Skyfires it's a marginal increase of 1 (or less than 1) and is better as a means to just counter Look out, Sir and let you use 4's on DD to at least auto-hit if you don't have 6's to spend. I really wanted to throw a unit of 20 Tzaangors into this but.. yeah, Arcanite Tzeentch just isn't in a great spot unless you're running 60+ Kairics in Pyrofane\Wytchfire. I can't fathom spending 140 more points for 40 wounds and 'meh' damage output compared to 50 wounds worth of Horrors sitting somewhere. I mean that's an entire wizard I would be losing.. if they were on a 4+ save and\or fought in CC a bit better than I would definitely think that cost is justified.. but not as is.
  12. Honestly it just sounds like dice weren't particularly in your favor and you did not deploy or zone out board edges well enough, which happens. That's a pretty high aggro IJ list that will 100% do what it can to charge you T1 which you found out the hard way. You need to be premeasuring threat ranges and understanding how far away you need to be to prevent getting charged\shot on their turn. Pre-measuring ranges and asking your opponent for their threat ranges ("Can any units run and charge? How far can any units shoot? How fast does anything move? Can it do any movements or teleports in the hero phase? etc etc) is totally okay and within game rules to do, so don't ever feel like you're being "that guy" for asking. If they get uppity over you asking, then they are being "that guy" 😉 As for the list, I would find a way to get those Stormvermin to 40; really no reason to have them any lower than that as they lose their horde buff even quicker and they really need it. To be honest, I don't think those Rat Ogres are going to do anything for you and you're pretty heavily invested into heroes compared to full size threats on the table. You can drop the Master Moulder and Rat Ogres, keep the HPA if you like it and put those 280 points into something else. I'm not sure how you feel about shooting or what models you have, but things like 6-12 Jezzails (or 2 WLC's like you have, but I vastly prefer Jezzails for consistency), 6 Stormfiends or 20 Acolytes are the most common shooting hammers we use next to the CC ones that are Monks and Stormvermin. HPA's are good, but I find that you really need 2 to get a lot out of them; they just die too easy and the random movement means they can have a hard time getting where they're needed.
  13. True, I suppose that would make sense and will make that change to the Screamers.. I wrote this when I was near going to bed and I was already on 4 hours of sleep so I was just kinda pressing buttons with my eyes half shut 😅 The Changeling was just an addition to use up points and figured a 2-cast wizard was the best bet, especially with the built in -1 to hit, effectively giving a unit -2 to hit against the Pinks or Screamers if he could keep up (or come in T1 with the free 6 Screamers).. but I see what you're saying. The other choice was a Curseling, but felt I could get more out of the Changeling, especially with 3 auto-unbinds per game. Still, I just feel like Screamers aren't exactly dishing out damage; even with the +1 to wound from the aura and -1 rend a unit of 6 will only do about 5 wounds against anything but a monster. Would RR'ing two d6 MW's spells be better than that though? Who knows. The better bet would probably be to give him Aspect for the DD replenishment.. but I wanted my Scribes to be more than just a RR battery. Granted, I also need to realize that this isn't my other lists that have 5 wizards standing around each other to even benefit from those RR's in the first place... he's really just acting as a 2+ means of getting off Firestorm and something fast to get summons out with. So there's a few things to experiment with here, for sure. Someone on FB suggested a Fatemaster to run along the Skyfires for the RR's, but after thinking about it I don't feel it's entirely worth that CP when I would likely need to spend it on Screamers or other things. If they really want to kill a hero, then I'll use 2-3 DD to get them 6's and deal out those MW's (another reason I should probably use Aspect of Tzeentch 🤣). I definitely think I will be giving your suggestions a try though just to make everything be a little more aggressive which isn't how I typically play Tzeentch (or anything really, I'm a very reactionary\passive player) but is most definitely how this need to be played. I'll definitely be sure to update you all with batreps if I can actually get some testing in this weekend... I need to actually practice these lists before I take them to tournaments for once.
  14. Been thinking about Hosts Arcanum + Skyshoal Coven tonight out of nowhere and just came up with this so it's a bit rough. General idea is reasonable MW output from all the Screamers (who are also cheap battleline, IE extra points on a lot of BP's) and you can give the Enlightened\Skyfires the pre-game move from Hosts. Skyshoal lets the Enlightened\Screamers throw out d3 MW's on a 2+ for each unit they pass across which works in conjunction with the Screamers 5+ MW's. The free 6 Screamers and free auto-unbinds are pretty neat too I guess 😉 Thinking I may run it in an upcoming tournament in a week.. not sure if it's a gimmick or if it could actually work.
  15. I would go with Vigordust and Deranged Inventor 100%. I don't think you'll get much out of making the Clawlord hit harder, especially when he isn't hurt. Deranged is a backup to allow your Acolytes to suck less in case you fail MMMWP and if MMMWP goes off then yeah, you can use it to move the Jezzails without losing firepower. Keep in mind you can use Vigordust Injector on the Stormvermin as well for the +1 to hit and charge. Oh, and yeah if I have the points I will always take a Bombardier over an Engineer, but the triumphs are pretty great so that's up to you really. All you're missing out on is a very swingy shot that can miss (90% of the time in my case), kill you, do 12 wounds or do 1 wound 😉
  16. It's interesting... I don't think you need Gotrek but he does what he does best. I've been enjoying running Vostarg with 2 Gunhaulers and 40 HGB and it's worked out the best for me lately giving me something to snipe off those 5-wound heroes. So long as you're within 3" of an enemy unit or made a charge move that turn then you can pile in when attacking that turn, period.
  17. I'm not sure there's ever been a particularly clear answer on it. As written, yeah you can do these at any point in their phases simply because they all are worded as "in X phase" rather than "at the start of X phase" or some other requirement.. although I don't think it's intended. Generally I always tell people beforehand when it comes to the shooting and I treat it as something that I need to do before I shoot with a unit. For the casting RR's though I generally only use a spark when I fail the cast. All command abilities are used from heroes (or whatever unit has a Command Ability on it's warscroll unless stated otherwise, OBR are a fine example of this); it isn't like 40k where you can just use stratagems from nowhere and on whatever unit. So yeah, the Masterclan hero would need to be the one saying they're using it in order to get the CP back on a 5+.
  18. I used to play against Seraphon nearly every week so I'm also quite familiar.. but more-so now that I've played against every possible list configuration for months now against players better than myself 😅. Zone denial is something that's been ingrained in my playing for a long time to the point where I have issues now with zoning out board edges against armies who don't even have any means of a teleport because I'm so used to doing it. I don't know if I agree with the Flamer route being weak; you don't usually go after Kroak with it, you just kill everything else right away. I've watched this be done by some of the best tournament players on both sides of the table, multiple times while they streamed their games on TTS. Generally in these lists you also have a Spellportal as you mentioned and Changecaster with a Balewind so you have a reasonable chance at killing Kroak or his little band of helpers like you said. Honestly though, I've found that a lot of the time he can just be ignored. If you wipe everything else off the table easily and then just sit and summon things for an early lead then there isn't really anything he can do. I think Seraphon\Tzeentch is a balanced matchup, all things considered. Kroak is the biggest issue just because of the board-wide unbinds coupled with multiple +'s to casts\unbinds.. hence one reason Flamer spam works well at just deleting all their scoring units off the board right away. My magic based Hosts lists would struggle a bit more potentially, but those lists also have Be'lakor in them to shut him off as needed.
  19. Yeah, they have that as well but I can't remember what gives it.. generally I don't see that as much as the above lists and trust me I've seen it all playing against so many tournament guys on tabletop simulator. The teleporting is seldom the issue honestly.. for me it really is just the amount of power they can put out in shooting alone and for how cheap everything is, they can easily have 4-6 threats on the board at a time which is absolutely absurd. A lot of buffs aren't even spell casts, but just straight up abilities or things spent with CP of which they will have a near infinite supply of with Kroak\Starmasters who will be safely tucked away in a corner of the board to where I can seldom even have 30" range Jezzails able to hit him; not before they get blown off by similarly long-ranged Bastiladons. I've taken a break from Skaven as Kroaks spell alone makes it near impossible to do much as he can easily just kill off all my 5 wound wizards if they get a double turn which cripples my biggest hammers. Anyway, I don't want to rant about Seraphon as I've kept it pretty much to myself... people know what the problem with them is, but thanks to COVID we haven't had any real tournament info to go off and GW don't look at Tabletop Simulator despite some pretty large\major tournaments happening there where they've done exceptionally well, as well as KO. I know their rules writers are numerous and I often wonder how the communication is in the office.. far too often it seems things get fixed for Faction A but then Faction B's update has basically the same thing for better or worse just like you're describing... Oh well. I think as Tzeentch, we honestly have a good set of tools to deal with them, especially since we can usually beat them on drops and strike first.
  20. Well, it's interesting I'll give you that 😅. I just don't think there's enough punch to get much done.. although I'm starting to think that we may see a Warpseer come back into lists. Had one I've been thinking about with the only 2 threats being Stormfiends + Grinder Team and 40 Monks.. if I actually get a chance to play it this weekend I'll get a report up, but I've been pretty stuck on Tzeentch when I have been able to play the last 3 weeks. For your list though... I mean, who needs a Warpseer when you have 4 Bells? If you really wanted him then statistically you have a decent chance at bringing him on anyway 🤣
  21. That's about the best way to describe it, yes. Generally that's what you need to do; on paper the units aren't great but the buffs make them great. The biggest lists going around now are usually run + double-shooting Bastiladons, large units of Skinks buffed to throw out 20+ damage each in shooting alone (the majority of those being MW's) and of course your typical howmanysalamanderscanIfitinasinglelist type builds... although these seem to be losing popularity for the above, but you'll still see people take at least 1-2 units of 3. Lucky for us, Bastiladons are easily killed with MW's... unlucky for us, with most things being a Chaos Daemon they do more damage against us. The issue for me generally stems from Kroak\Starmaster who sit in a the corner of the board somewhere and you'll find it difficult to get to them and they'll just sit back there and throw out unbinds at you all day since it's board-wide for them 🙄. The best lists I've seen against them have literally just been your standard Changehost Conflag lists with Flamers which basically just tried to outdrop them and do to them what they're going to try to do to you; blow as much stuff off the board as possible early on so they can't score. And yes, they can teleport out of combat.
  22. Been using him a lot recently (see list above) to great success.. and yeah, with Kairos it's a pretty great spell and you have something else that can kind of fight in CC if needed. To be honest though, I've mostly made up my mind about dropping him for the time being as he doesn't really do anything for the lists I run him in and while the spell is quite good, it can also be very swingy and Treason of Tzeentch tends be good enough for horde-clearing. Just note that I speak from a competitive\tournament point of view with mostly anything I say so.. if you don't care about that then don't mind me 😅 For your 2nd question, no.. missile weapons are only used in the shooting phase. And no to the 2nd part of that question as you can never re-roll a re-roll. To be honest, if you want to include a punchy Slaves to Darkness unit, 10-20 Chosen are really good, especially if paired with a normal Chaos Sorcerer Lord on foot as he can give them re-rolls to all saves, hits and wounds.
  23. I think it's fine.. I would try to get some games in and see how it works for you; a net list can only take you so far and if you only play locally then it may not work as well as something more tailored to your meta. This is normally what I use, but I've been experimenting with dropping the Manticore and 10 Acolytes for a unit of 10 Pinks and a Magister on Disc for another spell that can throw out a Chaos Spawn. The Manticore is really just there to give the casting RR's for all the other Wizards on top of being a decent beatstick in combat that things can't run away from.. but potentially throwing out 2 Spawns a turn will keep a lot of things held up anyway and then all I'm losing is an anti-horde spell, but the Skyfires and Treason of Tzeentch usually take care of weak hordes anyway 😉
  24. Pretty much. Geminids are nice and I tend to use them now over the Daemonrift when I run Be'lakor or a Sorcerer Lord in my magic based Hosts Duplicitous list. The thing with the Changecast is he's.. more or less the hero-killer. On that Balewind he's throwing out 2 different d6 MW spells (and an Arcane Bolt if you cast one of the former on a 9+'s which give's him another Spellcast) from 24" away.. which works out nicely with the Blue Scribes RR's if you choose to use it. Be'lakor works in this setup to just shut off something threatening, but I generally like the 2 Wizards paired with the tabling ability of 12 Flamers. My "main" Hosts Duplicitous list is a little more grindy in the sense that it uses Geminids and Be'Lakor and other means to give things -1 to hit or wound so you can shut off a lot of threats while you generate FP to summon in Blues with every turn.
  25. You don't need bridge for Changehost\Eternal Conflag to work, I was just saying that I prefer having it but that's personal choice. The template for Changehost is pretty much that list above; 12 Flamers, 1-2 Exalted Flamers, LoC and 1-2 other Wizards (usually a Blue Scribes and Changecaster) and Pinks\Blue\Brims as needed to fulfil the battalion requirement. Fatemaster works well in that list if you want to go that route in place of the 2 other Wizards. Usually Changehost just revolves around tabling your opponent while zoning out any surviving threats with Horrors; it's rather point and click and having a Soulscream Bridge just makes it even more-so, but it isn't a requirement. I do like Be'Lakor a lot but never ran him in Changehost\Eternal Conflag lists.. Daemonrift is great, you just really have to be careful with it. Luckily, a LoC\Kairos can dispell it right after you cast it to make sure it doesn't fly back at you.
×
×
  • Create New...