hello fellow dakkaites.

Our gaming club have been playing 40k for some time now.
We have all decided to start fantasy aswell since we are getting tired of 40k atm.

I just would like to formulate my premise before my question.

I have never played fantasy at all.
I collected some models about 10-12 years ago and that was it since I didnt have anyone to play ageinst at that time.

Now i have settled on high elves since i alwasy wanted to play them if i got into fantasy.
I have been reading around for some time and have come to understand that teclis is seriously overpowered to a point of being silly.

I was excited to read that with a little luck we would get a new armybook within the year, but now i keep reading on this and other forums that alot of people are hoping teclis will be nerfed into oblivion,
and I have read on several occations people saying the hope he gets nerfed so hard he becomes unusable.

Now i have no problem understanding that he apparently needs a nerf (Bearing in mind i have still not played a game so i dont really know how he works :-P)
But it is clear to me that he needs abit of reworking to work more like the newer armybooks with less power in the SC.
But i do not understand why everyone keeps wishing him to be nerfed to crap so its impossible or just plain stupid to take him.
Someone has to be the best at for say magic like teclis atm is (altho not to the degree he apparently is).

If/when Teclis gets nerfed hard doesent that just make someone else the most powerful mage (altho with a little less of a gap to the next guy :-P) and he will get the greif instead?

Coming from 40k where you get hit by SC with great power all the time in many different areas its seems strange to me that alot of players would like to get rid of a character just because he is very good at something when there is alot of other characters good at other stuff?

Why do we want him to dissapear totally so highelves gets left totally without?

Hope this made sense :-D

/Ogard

There's a difference between being the best and being so blatantly overpowered I want to throw up everytime I read his rules.

Part of me wishing he's going to nerfed into full uselessness is all those HE players using him get a useless model sitting on the shelves, reminding them of their cowardice. Forever.

I don't think it's the fact the Teclis is the most powerful, but rather that he is so powerful that he becomes really rather broken. If he was just as powerful as the second best magic user in the game, with exact stats and abilities but was say, 20 points cheaper (therefore technically making him the most powerful) no-one would have any qualms.

Well that i get.
what i do not get is why he has to be nerfed into full uselessness like sigvatr put it.. why not just to a resonable lvl?

 Ogard wrote:
Well that i get.
what i do not get is why he has to be nerfed into full uselessness like sigvatr put it.. why not just to a resonable lvl?

He doesn't.

People are just angry that he's so good now and therefore want to see him suffer, i.e. become completely useless.

I don't want to see him be totally useless but right now he is retardedly OP. Slann are the most powerful magic users in the fluff so some supposed high elf magic user is like the king of midgets in comparison to a slann. Then you have the undead super slann which is basically like the emperor of mankind from 40k and actually hovers around with his spirit still controling his dead body and throwing magic around (yes he is basically a giant frog skeleton). My point being teclis is supposed to be some giant bad *ss and yet he shouldn't even hold a candle to a slann esp. the most powerful slann of all time which is now undead. Slann are the most powerful wizards since ever and to come even close you'd have to be nagash or some other super powerful wizard or even a god.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
My point being teclis is supposed to be some giant bad *ss and yet he shouldn't even hold a candle to a slann esp. the most powerful slann of all time which is now undead. Slann are the most powerful wizards since ever and to come even close you'd have to be nagash or some other super powerful wizard or even a god.

Slaan don't match the raw casting power of teclis, but for the same cost, you get a general and BSB, a ward save, higher toughness, more wounds, extra power dice to cast spells, make you discard sixes, the ability to force their miscast results onto you(Which teclis can't negate), reroll miscasts, and a loremaster.

It's a rather academic argument given that the High Elves have not had a new book... and neither have the Lizardmen, the comparison is again academic.

The imminent Demon book might give a clue to the way in which Teclis might go, as the Demon special characters were a large part of why Special Characters got such a bad name, and were banned from tournaments.

As for 'nerfing' the trend in 8th has been the opposite.

Slann are pretty annoying though you have to admit. The ability to be invulnerable against anything but magic attacks and having a +2 inv. save against magical attacks is pretty stupid. Btw i can imagine initiative test or die type spells or similar ('cracks call' and the 'brass orb') would totally destroy a slann. I also think their initiative is really bad. That said when you think about it pretty much the only other way to handle them is combat resolution them to death.

I still think teclis overall should look like some fool with a dunce cap on (his magic hat) in comparison to a tooled up slann.

 marielle wrote:


As for 'nerfing' the trend in 8th has been the opposite.

Wrong.

WoC took a hit with the nerfbat, Goblin special characters were nerfed (Skarsnik became totally useless), WoC magic was nerfed (mostly Tzeentch), VC were nerfed - etc.

 Sigvatr wrote:
WoC took a hit with the nerfbat, Goblin special characters were nerfed (Skarsnik became totally useless), WoC magic was nerfed (mostly Tzeentch), VC were nerfed - etc.

Oh no, they took out the broken stuff and made the named characters less effective. The new books are really balanced and offer multiple options. I remember playing the old WoC and VC books a fair bit. The fact that there are more options than gateway and Van Hels is an improvement. The fact that there are now multiple builds that work is also an improvement.

Oh, I do not disagree here. As stated multiple times, I consider the 8th army books (NOT the BRB!) pretty damn well balanced. It's just some things that don't fit the image such as e.g. Skarsnik being WAY too expensive (sad because I play a 100% Gobblin list...he went up 75 points for nothing...) or Chaos Marauders being way overnerfed into non-viableness or that VC blender beast (can't recall the name...hero choice, melee).

Overall, those are damn good books.

Special characters have been going down the road of "supplemental", instead of being "face-beaters". It's a good thing. If they made Teclis give the unit he joins a 5++ as a magical ward of protection, then allowed him to ignore his first miscast but he couldn't cast for the rest of the turn (following the spell he cast), it would be fair. He'd be altered a LOT, but he'd be manageable and not OP. He'd be a great buff to a unit (say Swordmasters or White Lions: S6, ASF, 5++=holy crap!) but he wouldn't be overpowered.

marielle wrote:

As for 'nerfing' the trend in 8th has been the opposite.

Not really. As others have said, the new WOC book basically balanced the army a lot more, so I guess we can expect similar things for other upcoming releases, such as High Elves.

timetowaste85 wrote:Special characters have been going down the road of "supplemental", instead of being "face-beaters". It's a good thing. If they made Teclis give the unit he joins a 5++ as a magical ward of protection, then allowed him to ignore his first miscast but he couldn't cast for the rest of the turn (following the spell he cast), it would be fair. He'd be altered a LOT, but he'd be manageable and not OP. He'd be a great buff to a unit (say Swordmasters or White Lions: S6, ASF, 5++=holy crap!) but he wouldn't be overpowered.

To be honest, all I think Teclis needs as a nerf is to get rid of the "Irresistible Force on any double rule". Even if the rule was something along the lines of "if you roll any double you may choose for it to be cast with Irresistible Force but would then take a miscast" and have some sort of tone-down on Teclis' miscast ignoring, then it'd be fine.

Remove his ability to ignore the first miscast each turn.

Add that he still casts IF on doubles but has to roll twice on the miscast chart and your opponent gets to choose the result or may add or subtract 1W3 to the miscast result.

 Sigvatr wrote:
Remove his ability to ignore the first miscast each turn.

Add that he still casts IF on doubles but has to roll twice on the miscast chart and your opponent gets to choose the result or may add or subtract 1W3 to the miscast result.

So basically you don't want Teclis to be a competent yet fair Wizard, but rather someone who blows himself up every time he casts a spell...?

 The Shadow wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Remove his ability to ignore the first miscast each turn.

Add that he still casts IF on doubles but has to roll twice on the miscast chart and your opponent gets to choose the result or may add or subtract 1W3 to the miscast result.

So basically you don't want Teclis to be a competent yet fair Wizard, but rather someone who blows himself up every time he casts a spell...?

Great power comes with great responsibility.

 Sigvatr wrote:

 The Shadow wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Remove his ability to ignore the first miscast each turn.

Add that he still casts IF on doubles but has to roll twice on the miscast chart and your opponent gets to choose the result or may add or subtract 1W3 to the miscast result.

So basically you don't want Teclis to be a competent yet fair Wizard, but rather someone who blows himself up every time he casts a spell...?

Great power comes with great responsibility.

Agreed. Teclis has a lot of responsibility and for that reason he wouldn't go recklessly blowing himself up, and his rules should reflect that.

Remove his "IF on double" rule then.

Personally in my mind there are 7 wizards in warhammer who should be the most powerful

Kroak Hes a FIRST FOUNDING SLAAN FFS
Slann yeah they master magic
Malekith THIS GUY is from the time of the original daemonic incursions his magic should be close to the power of a slann if not close to the power of lord kroak
Morathi: she INVENTED dark magic she was the first elf to MASTER it she should make teclis cry like a little baby and make Slanns worried by her appearing
Teclis should be not much more than a normal archmage except he has a special staff (and btw he had to use same stuff to beat malekith which involved breaking said staff so he shouldnt even have it anymore)
Nagash should be weaker than Morathi and Malekith as both Morathi and Malekith have noth masted and perfected Dark Magic
Kairos Fateweaver should be about the same level as lord kroak/ Morathi
Zachirus the everliving. He should be equal to Nagash sheer fact hes a vampire who has one of the books of Nagash who already was a powerful sorceror then he drank dragons blood.

Teclis will probably only get minorly toned down, but also get a price hike.

With his current statline, he should easily be 550+ points.


My guess as to what happens.


He gets another 50 points tacked onto his price and his ability to ignore miscasts becomes a once per game thing.

 Sigvatr wrote:
Oh, I do not disagree here. As stated multiple times, I consider the 8th army books (NOT the BRB!) pretty damn well balanced. It's just some things that don't fit the image such as e.g. Skarsnik being WAY too expensive (sad because I play a 100% Gobblin list...he went up 75 points for nothing...) or Chaos Marauders being way overnerfed into non-viableness or that VC blender beast (can't recall the name...hero choice, melee).

Overall, those are damn good books.

I'm not sure about the cost now but when i last fought marauders they were 5 pts a piece. Yes i am a skaven player but i feel a unit that is about 5 pts with flails even without armor and is initiative 4 and WS 4 is pretty freaking good. Clanrats for about 4 pts a piece with only light armor isn't that fantastic in comparison. Sure they're different armies and units and there'd be a comparison debate but 5 pts for one of those units with flails is still pretty sick esp. if they were given frenzy or something through 'mark of khorne'. Clanrats can't even take a magic banner. So yeah marauders were way good. Tacking on another point or so would've been a good thing i think but then i haven't seen the new book and the point differences so there ya go.

Marauders with gear are now in the 11-12 point range with no other real changes.

Marauders were too cheap before, nobody doubts that. Almost doubling the cost, however, was a hasty reaction that rendered them no longer viable. 10-11 pts for a model in a unit that has no armor and has to win the first round of combat or is likely to lose? Stupid idea.

8 pts would have been fine. 10-11 pts is too much.

 Sigvatr wrote:

 marielle wrote:


As for 'nerfing' the trend in 8th has been the opposite.

Wrong.

WoC took a hit with the nerfbat, Goblin special characters were nerfed (Skarsnik became totally useless), WoC magic was nerfed (mostly Tzeentch), VC were nerfed - etc.

Monsterous infantry was nerfed from 7th to 8th, but in terms of the game it wasn't, and the same applies to your examples.

You want to nerf Teclis? Get into close combat with him. He'll die extremely fast.

All the whining I see about him just floors me. The guy is super easy to kill. I probably lose him about 50% of the time I bring him, because he's such a boogey man that he's the #1 target.

Considering he will be in a group with likely 2 other models who can accept challenges and he has LoS you can't always simply just target him. Unless someone decides to run him solo and put him in the front of their army. And that has probably happened never times out of never.

Kairos is the right hand of Tzeentch. You know, the god of magic. He even knows things that Tzeentch doesn't. Perfect vision of the future, perfect vision of the past. Greater Daemon and the only thing that survived the well of eternity. I don't, it's hard for me to think of anything that should be better at magic. And as powerful as he is, I don't think he was too much. As he was a monster that sucked at combat. I think he'll get a big point reduction, but not sure what will happen with his magic. Probably be made a whole lot less complicated.

You can't LoS melee attacks.

However it is very easy to either just keep his unit out of melee or have 2-3 heroes int he unit to force him to the second rank.

Its hard to get to him.

 Grey Templar wrote:
You can't LoS melee attacks.

However it is very easy to either just keep his unit out of melee or have 2-3 heroes int he unit to force him to the second rank.

Its hard to get to him.

It gets extremely expensive to keep him in the second rank of a unit. At that point your doing an all eggs in one basket type of thing. Then if one of your heroes dies, not out of the question, he's got to step up, and your in a world of hurt. Smart opponents will not have much difficulty in getting to him.

Also don't forget a lot of magic can flat out waste him as well. Spells that test his toughness or str, he's most likely going to insta-gib.

Teclis has a giant glaring weakness, and it's the ease to kill him. And all to often that is over looked when people want to whine about his abilities.

Yes, he's easy to kill. if you can get to his unit.

O' and forget about killing him with spells because he WILL be in a unit with Banner of the World Dragon.

Then he'll just nuke your army from that mostly safe place.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Yes, he's easy to kill. if you can get to his unit.

O' and forget about killing him with spells because he WILL be in a unit with Banner of the World Dragon.

Then he'll just nuke your army from that mostly safe place.

Hardly, the best Teclis run I have is him buried in a unit of Swordmasters, and giving him Lore of Life. World Dragon would make that build completely useless.

 Grey Templar wrote:
You can't LoS melee attacks.

However it is very easy to either just keep his unit out of melee or have 2-3 heroes int he unit to force him to the second rank.

Its hard to get to him.

Yeah, exactly. And anyone with teclis will do that.

Not everyone, but those that see him as an investment worth protecting will.

Well the game isn't balanced around stupid people...

 Sigvatr wrote:
Marauders were too cheap before, nobody doubts that. Almost doubling the cost, however, was a hasty reaction that rendered them no longer viable. 10-11 pts for a model in a unit that has no armor and has to win the first round of combat or is likely to lose? Stupid idea.

8 pts would have been fine. 10-11 pts is too much.

No they balanced them with flagellants. Flagellants have flails and no armour and cost 12 points


Automatically Appended Next Post:
They also can't take command models except for a champion

DukeRustfield wrote:
Well the game isn't balanced around stupid people...

I'd beg to differ. I think this game is incredibly balanced around stupid people. It's the people who can figure out synergies and tactics and list building that break the balance. As soon as one person learns these things...

I am inclined to agree with Stoupe. GW desires that the players make no effort towards actually trying to come up with effective tactics.

Jayo'r wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Marauders were too cheap before, nobody doubts that. Almost doubling the cost, however, was a hasty reaction that rendered them no longer viable. 10-11 pts for a model in a unit that has no armor and has to win the first round of combat or is likely to lose? Stupid idea.

8 pts would have been fine. 10-11 pts is too much.

No they balanced them with flagellants. Flagellants have flails and no armour and cost 12 points


Automatically Appended Next Post:
They also can't take command models except for a champion

Which is still overpriced considering I sacrifice D6 now instead of D3.

Yes well as skaven none of my spells really attack one said guy. Also when i was playing a 2vs1 game i was fighting against somebody with teclis in a unit of archers in a building and he had other units basically surrounding said building. Buildings aren't easy to get into and if i skitterleaped a warlock over there i'd also need to cracks call the building just to destroy it. This isn't easy to do since i had to split my magic pretty evenly with my playing partner making my magic nearly crap. If skitterleap did go off and i couldn't get off cracks call the warlock would then be out in the open for a 360 degree archer volley. I also have no screaming bell so don't even mention it.

If you have teclis and know what you're doing he's not easy to stop. He shouldn't be in the front like a couple seem to suggest. He should be in the background somewhere. In the case of the building he could see over everything, the building was hard to destroy and even if we did attack into the building he could choose who fights in the fight so that teclis couldn't be targeted. If that wasn't enough even if he did flee since it is a building i can't pursue i can only take the building. My opponent was such a jerk for what he did he should've been taken into the back alley and shot (not to death though so he could suffer). What we hated is he also laughed about it and just mentioned that he only plays teclis against everybody once to show them how OP he is. He is very much OP and killing him in the hands of somebody that can use him correctly is seriously a pain.

For Skaven, the enemy hiding in a building is one of the best case scenerios too. Cracks Call or ringing the bell can make short work of a building.

 Grey Templar wrote:
For Skaven, the enemy hiding in a building is one of the best case scenerios too. Cracks Call or ringing the bell can make short work of a building.

Except i don't have a screaming bell yet and getting both skitterleap and cracks call when facing a high elf player with teclis while splitting your magic with an ally is pretty freaking hard to do. Chances are at least one of those spells would be blocked and he'd prevent me reaching said target or have one of my wizards out in the open like a sitting duck. This is not a preferable situation for me.

 Grey Templar wrote:
I am inclined to agree with Stoupe. GW desires that the players make no effort towards actually trying to come up with effective tactics.

I wouldn't find the game interesting to read if it was geared towards the 70 IQ (I'm 75). There's only so much they can find play testing and they FAQ stuff they obviously didn't find that some RAWhole decides to exploit. If they wanted it simple they'd have infantry and that's about it. I think if you took ten professional gamers. Like military-type strategists, and gave them a 2500 pt O&G army to build. They'd all come up with stuff that was about 80% different from one another and still pretty viable.

DukeRustfield wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
I am inclined to agree with Stoupe. GW desires that the players make no effort towards actually trying to come up with effective tactics.

I wouldn't find the game interesting to read if it was geared towards the 70 IQ (I'm 75).

You're joking right? I mean i found you to be pretty intelligent overall so saying that outside of sarcasm would surprise me. I mean i'm pretty sure IQ is based around certain questions that can leave out knowledge from certain fields but i sure hope that was sarcasm on your end.

One could only hope many armies have more than one successful build but i feel that at least a couple armies (esp. with old army books) need a serious re-working and only have some units which need to be taken. I think you guys have already stated that.

Forest Gump had 76 IQ in the book.

Life is like a box of chocolate dice.

Jayo'r wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Marauders were too cheap before, nobody doubts that. Almost doubling the cost, however, was a hasty reaction that rendered them no longer viable. 10-11 pts for a model in a unit that has no armor and has to win the first round of combat or is likely to lose? Stupid idea.

8 pts would have been fine. 10-11 pts is too much.

No they balanced them with flagellants. Flagellants have flails and no armour and cost 12 points


Automatically Appended Next Post:
They also can't take command models except for a champion

Not familiar enough with Flagellants, but as far as I can remember, they are Unbreakable and have their martyr bonus.

...and seriously, stop with that IQ discussion stuff. That just doesn't belong here.

Yeah if i remember flagellants can be pretty good with the boosts you mentioned sigvatr though they're also like special or rare if i recall correctly. Very expensive and normally don't sound too special outside of their rules but they are unbreakable and have that boost.

I don't think marauders with flails and a mark are as good as flagellants though even if flagellants are special or rare.

Tbh I dont give a damn if they nerf teclis but they need to make both Malekith and Morathi way more powerful at magic. Both of them are currently over priced (they are both Dark Elf wizards btw). I want to run malekith but I aint gonna run some 600 point investment who wont do a great deal that a dread lord and a level 4 couldnt do

 djones520 wrote:
You want to nerf Teclis? Get into close combat with him. He'll die extremely fast.

All the whining I see about him just floors me. The guy is super easy to kill. I probably lose him about 50% of the time I bring him, because he's such a boogey man that he's the #1 target.

Good luck getting there with dwarfs. In any case, all that's really needed to balance him, IMO, is to either remove the IF on any dobule rule, or make it so he also has a miscast on every IF he gets; the latter probably needs to be combined with removing/amending to once per game his ignore the first miscast rule.
Right now, I agree he's stupid broken. I fought a battle yesterday where he pretty much singlehandedly wiped out a 2500cpt dwarf army.

Sigvatr wrote:Remove his "IF on double" rule then.

Hooray! Sorted.

djones520 wrote:You want to nerf Teclis? Get into close combat with him. He'll die extremely fast.

All the whining I see about him just floors me. The guy is super easy to kill. I probably lose him about 50% of the time I bring him, because he's such a boogey man that he's the #1 target.

It's never going to be that straightforward. A half decent player will make sure it's as difficult as possible to get to Teclis. Maybe you will get to him in the end, in which case you will probably kill him. But by that point he's probably going to have wiped out too much of your army for it to make a difference.

djones520 wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
You can't LoS melee attacks.

However it is very easy to either just keep his unit out of melee or have 2-3 heroes int he unit to force him to the second rank.

Its hard to get to him.

It gets extremely expensive to keep him in the second rank of a unit. At that point your doing an all eggs in one basket type of thing. Then if one of your heroes dies, not out of the question, he's got to step up, and your in a world of hurt. Smart opponents will not have much difficulty in getting to him.

Also don't forget a lot of magic can flat out waste him as well. Spells that test his toughness or str, he's most likely going to insta-gib.

Teclis has a giant glaring weakness, and it's the ease to kill him. And all to often that is over looked when people want to whine about his abilities.

Same thing as above really. A good player will be able to make sure Teclis has done his job before he goes down, if he lets him do so at all.

I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

 AngelofBlood wrote:
I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

Competitive players disagree

 Sigvatr wrote:

 AngelofBlood wrote:
I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

Competitive players disagree

Competitive players can't take him as he is banned in most comp packs I believe.

 AngelofBlood wrote:
I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

Did you use 'lore of life'? Toughness 7 high elves and throne of vines for boosts is no joke. Lore of Life is more like Lore of Pain for opponents. Doesn't help he's casting most of this stuff irresistibly.

 thedarkavenger wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:

 AngelofBlood wrote:
I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

Competitive players disagree

Competitive players can't take him as he is banned in most comp packs I believe.

Hmmmmm. I wonder why........

 Sigvatr wrote:

 AngelofBlood wrote:
I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

Competitive players disagree

Bit of a curt reply, but yes, Sigvatr's right. Trust me, in the hands of a good High Elf Player, Teclis is certainly not a waste of points. Quite the opposite, in fact.

I'd rather have 2 spell casters and a Character who can kill dreadlords. I prefer the versatility of having a prince in the pocket. I don't use lore of life (shame on me no?) I prefer aggressive magic Heavens, Shadow, Death, or fire. He was killed by a hell cannon tuff 7 doesn't help much against that. I just don't like the idea of sinking 475 points on a single model that's a 30 man unit of Phoenix Guard or 50 spears

Captaintyrius wrote:
Personally in my mind there are 7 wizards in warhammer who should be the most powerful

Kroak Hes a FIRST FOUNDING SLAAN FFS
Slann yeah they master magic
Malekith THIS GUY is from the time of the original daemonic incursions his magic should be close to the power of a slann if not close to the power of lord kroak
Morathi: she INVENTED dark magic she was the first elf to MASTER it she should make teclis cry like a little baby and make Slanns worried by her appearing
Teclis should be not much more than a normal archmage except he has a special staff (and btw he had to use same stuff to beat malekith which involved breaking said staff so he shouldnt even have it anymore)
Nagash should be weaker than Morathi and Malekith as both Morathi and Malekith have noth masted and perfected Dark Magic
Kairos Fateweaver should be about the same level as lord kroak/ Morathi
Zachirus the everliving. He should be equal to Nagash sheer fact hes a vampire who has one of the books of Nagash who already was a powerful sorceror then he drank dragons blood.

In order
Nagash: He is an insane demigod who won't die and had truely immense power - I would say the only one who matched the Slaan in their power to change the world. It took another Demigod or later the full Council of Thirteen and ultra nasty Runesword to even put him down for a few centuries.
Morathi: hmm maybe she is extremly powerful and full of tricks.
Kroak is kinda dead and so was the most powerful but is a "ghost" of his former power - still great but not as he was.
Zachirus is a mere shadow of Nagash's power at its height.
Teclis
Malkeith's sorceryis not his major thing IMO

Demons are hard to factor as they are, especially in the case of Tzeentch just givent he appropiate amount of power to accomplish their task/s.......

 thedarkavenger wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:

 AngelofBlood wrote:
I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

Competitive players disagree

Competitive players can't take him as he is banned in most comp packs I believe.

Well naturally, as 8th needs restrictions for balanced matches. In unrestricted games, however, I cannot imagine any HE player going out w/o him and still scoring high.

 Sigvatr wrote:
Well naturally, as 8th needs restrictions for balanced matches. In unrestricted games, however, I cannot imagine any HE player going out w/o him and still scoring high.

I can. The unkillable archmage, or the book/shadow mage.

 Mr Morden wrote:

Captaintyrius wrote:
Personally in my mind there are 7 wizards in warhammer who should be the most powerful

Kroak Hes a FIRST FOUNDING SLAAN FFS
Slann yeah they master magic
Malekith THIS GUY is from the time of the original daemonic incursions his magic should be close to the power of a slann if not close to the power of lord kroak
Morathi: she INVENTED dark magic she was the first elf to MASTER it she should make teclis cry like a little baby and make Slanns worried by her appearing
Teclis should be not much more than a normal archmage except he has a special staff (and btw he had to use same stuff to beat malekith which involved breaking said staff so he shouldnt even have it anymore)
Nagash should be weaker than Morathi and Malekith as both Morathi and Malekith have noth masted and perfected Dark Magic
Kairos Fateweaver should be about the same level as lord kroak/ Morathi
Zachirus the everliving. He should be equal to Nagash sheer fact hes a vampire who has one of the books of Nagash who already was a powerful sorceror then he drank dragons blood.

In order
Nagash: He is an insane demigod who won't die and had truely immense power - I would say the only one who matched the Slaan in their power to change the world. It took another Demigod or later the full Council of Thirteen and ultra nasty Runesword to even put him down for a few centuries.
Morathi: hmm maybe she is extremly powerful and full of tricks.
Kroak is kinda dead and so was the most powerful but is a "ghost" of his former power - still great but not as he was.
Zachirus is a mere shadow of Nagash's power at its height.
Teclis
Malkeith's sorceryis not his major thing IMO

Demons are hard to factor as they are, especially in the case of Tzeentch just givent he appropiate amount of power to accomplish their task/s.......

From reading the skaven lore if i remember they gave nagash's great enemy the most powerful magical sword they could make which is none other than the fellblade (i think it was the leader of the pre-tomb kings since they were still alive at the time). Then the whole council of thirteen which is super powerful protected him and with a flick of his wrist he sent out a blast against their hapless willing pawn and several of the council fell dead just trying to protect the guy. Then after taking heart seeing he was ok he hacked the crap out of nagash with the sword and once he did he fell into a river and died somewhere. If i remember correctly they also destroyed all of his body parts except for a missing hand which crawled away ala adam's family style i bet. Somehow with just a hand he managed to come back eventually though weakened and got owned by sigmar and now he's back again if i remember but weaker than ever before. Hard to say how strong the guy is but he basically took down an entire skaven fortress that took shop in his previous stronghold. Most of the warpstone was mined out so the skaven didn't care and it's not like he could pursue them anyway.

I still find it odd the skaven managed to save the world even if they only did it so that they could conquer it instead. Gotta give the skaven credit they may not do too well with armies but when it comes to backstabbing, assassinating, treachery, plagues and spying they are mostly unrivaled in many of them with possibly one serious competitor in each (for plagues nurgle and most of the rest i'd say dark elves).

Its a good story in the varied army books as it is the novel Nagash / Neferata / Sigmar etc.

Skaven only stopped Nagash because he was going to kill every living thing on the planet including them. The spell failed resulting in the Tomb Kings....

Skaven are weird in my eyes. When it comes to killing dwarfs, lizardmen and possibly O&G they are really good at it. However when it comes to actually fighting battles against empire they only take down half of nuln with a huge army and then route from the battlefield. It's weird because after plaguing the crap out of the empire and most of the empire died they couldn't finish them off partly because of a stupid VC army that flanked them and partly because of emperor mandred skaven-slayer.

Anyway back to the story with nagash i think that the pre-tomb kings died before nagash left and then he took their leader as hostage. Later the skaven freed him. Still gotta find it weird they'd give the other guy the sword. Maybe it's because they knew the wielder would die using it. I say it's weird because nagash would still know it was probably the skaven that gave the guy the sword considering its make and the temporary alliance of both factions. Still though nice job skaven. Way to come out ahead.

Remembering all the old lore of the skaven kind of saddens me though. The skaven used to do so much more. I suppose they assassinated sigmar reborn or sigmar's descendant but the skaven seem to have done so much more in their history. Nearly destroyed the empire, taking 'the city of pillars' from the dwarfs, killing nagash and almost wiping out the lizardmen. A skaven/lizardmen starter set would actually be pretty cool btw. Now though we can't even beat high elves but give them a run for their money and we can only take down half of the empire city of nuln. Yawn. Some orc warbosses have lore that trumps that easily and they didn't have that much power backing a combined assault like that.

----------------------

Back on topic of wizard levels and power where would you guys rank 'the council of thirteen' (the 13 most powerful skaven clan leaders). Currently if i remember they have lived for an insanely long time and they are now each imbued with an aura of ruin and power from the horned rat himself. Not to mention some of the council are demi-gods in power.

Then there's the matter of the power of the vermin lords. Vermin lords don't seem to be very great from what i've seen and/or heard though they do seem to basically be a daemon prince. I suppose they could use a little tweaking before they show the utter horror and terror of the horned rat. It also mentions that a vermin lord is more cunning and possibly evil than any skaven. Imagine some super skaven except instead of cowardice they probably are more ferocious and rabid and probably use the lives of their skaven minions as below worthless only to die for them though not until they've proven their usefulness.

I'm also unsure if the exalted vermin lord from forge world/warhammer forge is even canon (i guess a stronger version of the vermin lord) but it's supposed to be pretty potent from its rules. I think it knows all 13 spells of the skaven and has like initiative 10 with ASF. It seems like everything the regular vermin lord failed to be.

Ahhh my friend you need to read Nagash

The reason the Skaven give the Hero the sword is that:

1) its a dangerous task and they would rather another did it - this is at the heart of the Skaven personality
2) The Sword kills the one who uses it.

Skaven are the best (IMO) GW creation - awesome and tricksy.

 thedarkavenger wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:

 AngelofBlood wrote:
I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

Competitive players disagree

Competitive players can't take him as he is banned in most comp packs I believe.

Only in places that ban SCs, which is far from universal.

 Grey Templar wrote:

Only in places that ban SCs, which is far from universal.

Fine, most of the bigger tournaments.

Again, not universally true.

I can only speak for Europe, but the only "bigger" tournament that allows SC is the Throne of Skulls tournament. Most other tournaments use the ETC restriction rules (fortunately!) even smaller ones between gaming clubs.

This being said, I don't think SC are much of a problem. Teclis is a really bad example. Most other SC are, imo, pretty overcosted (Skarsnik is 285 points! Jesus! How am I supposed to pay for that? :`( ).

Just because something isn't universally true doesn't negate it's validity. Not sure why you're arguing that.

There are many Many tournaments that specifically disallow Teclis or otherwise restrict his abilities. So for people who spend a whole lot of time thinking about this stuff and have the most vested interest in creating a balanced game (more competitors, more money, more entertainment) they have made this decision.

There might be some tournament somewhere that gives every army 2 Teclises. The Really Short Tournament of Nosebend, Nova Scotia or whatever. But it's very widely accepted that it is not a competition-ready model. And a number of others aren't as well.

Teclis isn't that bad. I played against a list with one last week with my tomb kings. Got a Warkitty into his unit and used the thundercrush to hit im with s9 D6 wounds in the 2nd rank.

What Teclis is great at: making your pile of dispell dice useless.

What Teclis is horrible at: everything else.

He really is a one trick pony, and while it's a great trick, he costs a ton, is T2, and has no natural saving throw of any kind.

HE magic is supposed to be strong, if not one of the strongest. That's not from a fluff point of view, but a gameplay point of a view. Take away the whole "power overwhelming" mentality of the HE's, and what are you left with? A ton of super expensive T3 elves that fall to a stiff breeze.

AngelofBlood wrote:I'd rather have 2 spell casters and a Character who can kill dreadlords. I prefer the versatility of having a prince in the pocket. I don't use lore of life (shame on me no?) I prefer aggressive magic Heavens, Shadow, Death, or fire. He was killed by a hell cannon tuff 7 doesn't help much against that. I just don't like the idea of sinking 475 points on a single model that's a 30 man unit of Phoenix Guard or 50 spears

YMMV I guess. But seriously, kudos for wanting to be different

thedarkavenger wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Well naturally, as 8th needs restrictions for balanced matches. In unrestricted games, however, I cannot imagine any HE player going out w/o him and still scoring high.

I can. The unkillable archmage, or the book/shadow mage.

Darkavenger has a good point, the Book Mage is still pretty nasty.

Aipoch wrote:What Teclis is great at: making your pile of dispell dice useless.

What Teclis is horrible at: everything else.

He really is a one trick pony, and while it's a great trick, he costs a ton, is T2, and has no natural saving throw of any kind.

HE magic is supposed to be strong, if not one of the strongest. That's not from a fluff point of view, but a gameplay point of a view. Take away the whole "power overwhelming" mentality of the HE's, and what are you left with? A ton of super expensive T3 elves that fall to a stiff breeze.

In a way, that's like saying Malaria isn't bad because, although it's great at killing people, it's horrible at making a cup of tea.

Making your dispel dice useless, i.e. being able to get almost every spell off, is certainly nothing to be sniffed at.

Teclis may be able to be killed by your average unit champion, but he will be bunkered and hard to get to. By the time he is taken down, you'll have had units of Toughness 7/Okkam-ified/Enchanted Blades/whatever Elves rampaging throughout your battleline and have had whole units fall to Dwellers/Purple Sun/Final Transmustion/etc, all of which you're practically powerless to stop. Someone mentioned putting a pie-plate over Teclis' head as being a good way to squish him, again, not good, since you have the Look Out Sir Rule to get past first.

I agree that Teclis needs to be fixed, but if we are talking about nerfing magic casters, I expect/want/demand the slanns get a hit as well. There is a decent number of Lizardmen players at my store and one of the reasons I stopped playing Fantasy is the fact that they are quite overpowered as well. Fix them, Teclis and make magic not so powerful as it is in this edition and then I will return to the game of fantasy.

 The Shadow wrote:

In a way, that's like saying Malaria isn't bad because, although it's great at killing people, it's horrible at making a cup of tea.

Lol! Yeah, that's like going, pfft, all Ethereal does is make you immune to non-magic attacks. So why can't all my ogres have it?

 gmaleron wrote:
I agree that Teclis needs to be fixed, but if we are talking about nerfing magic casters, I expect/want/demand the slanns get a hit as well. There is a decent number of Lizardmen players at my store and one of the reasons I stopped playing Fantasy is the fact that they are quite overpowered as well. Fix them, Teclis and make magic not so powerful as it is in this edition and then I will return to the game of fantasy.

It's not really magic that's overpowered, it's only those than can abuse it, most namely Teclis. Say there was a unit with a good ranged weapon, and they were allowed to fire, I dunno, three times in a phase or something, we wouldn't consider shooting OP, just that unit.

There's a lizardmen special character named Tetto-eko who does the same "any doubles are Irresistable Force" thing, but only for the lore of Heavens, and with a 1/36 chance of backfiring and giving the enemy the bonus instead, on *any* lore.

He's a 255pts Hero choice.

At the end of the day, you can hate on Teclis all you want, but that isn't really what's happening.

What IS happening is that people don't like playing a magic phase where their opponent is better than them. The majority of players would prefer magic be a sort of "chance wheel", whereby each player stands on level ground for the odds of spells going off or not, with maybe a slight advantage to who evers magic phase it currently is (i.e, the current caster having more power dice than his opponent has dispel dice).

Players tend to be much happier when they have their lvl 4 mage vs an enemy level 4 mage, they each get an appropriate number of dice based on the luck of the roll, perhaps a single bonus power or dispel dice from a magic item, and then you cast and dispell as normal, where the higher value wins, double 6's are irresistable and cause a miscast, and anything else can be foiled by a simple dispel scroll or its equivalent.

So, what's really at hand here is a debate over those skills and abilities which circumvent the aforementioned "normal" course of magic casting. Players don't like it when their opponent has a significantly increased chance of getting irresistible force. They don't like miscasts to be ignored. They don't like being outside their comfort zone. The finality, then, is that they don't like that they don't have a caster or items with those kinds of abilities.

Teclis is a hard counter. He is completely offensive, and has beyond sub-par defenses as a result. If you're going to fight something like that, then fight it appropriately. Accept that your magic phase is going to be difficult at best, and your enemies magic phase is going to hurt you, a lot.

If you're going to "nerf Teclis", what you really want is the ability to ignore a miscast removed or made one time only, irresistible double's removed or altered, and (in general) for casters to be either universally powerful or universally average.

Which, if I'm honest, sounds to be about the most boring thing ever. A fantasy world where overpowered casters don't exist? I mean honestly, where is the entertainment in that? I happen to love the satisfaction that comes from watching my opponent break into feigned tears when I kill Teclis, super bunker or not. Sure, my units took a beating in the process, but who cares? I'm not playing Warfeather here.

Ranting complete. Teclis doesn't need a nerf, his flare and potency is well known and, if not enjoyed, properly feared. The world needs casters like that. He should, though, be much more expensive, on the order of 550-700 for him.

Magic is an entire game phase. An important phase.

If there was a character that could make all the enemy movement -3 and all your movement +3, no one would like it. You could use your logic of, hey, you give up the movement phase. Accept that. But unless you know you're fighting that unit when you go in, and if you have infinite money to purchase new models and paint them specifically to counter one guy, then you're kind of hosed.

40K does that all the time. You can simply look at lists and see who will win. If I look at two lists and I see 800 pts in hero/lord casters in one army vs. Teclis, the first army lost. I can say that with enough mathematical certainty that if I bet on it 1000 times I'd certainly make money. WHFB has taken great pains in 8th to move away from kind of deterministic stuff like that.

Something like the Hellheart is about a big a bomb as they got and it's single use.

 Mr Morden wrote:
Ahhh my friend you need to read Nagash

The reason the Skaven give the Hero the sword is that:

1) its a dangerous task and they would rather another did it - this is at the heart of the Skaven personality
2) The Sword kills the one who uses it.

Skaven are the best (IMO) GW creation - awesome and tricksy.

You're talking to a skaven player here that loves them to death. The one greater clan i'm not terribly fond of right now is clan moulder though that might change depending on upcoming war beasts in later years. That said the hellpit abomination is absolutely fantastic even if people think it's way under-costed in points.

What i love about the skaven is they're a fantasy race you see little to nothing of in other fantasy settings. Orcs & goblins have been done to death so many times as have elves and dwarfs. Lizardmen are also pretty clever i think as are beastmen. Then again a lot of these fantasy races are just animals in a humanoid form. Seeing some monsters which are evil in ethereal form would be nice. I suppose we have wraiths from VC but meh. I suppose you could say demons but i mean like some entity of massive undefined evil from another realm with no real physical form as quite a few other fantasy lores have them like possibly LotR and DnD (possibly because the person drawing them wasn't that creative and lacked artistic skill ;P).

All this said we're going off topic so if you'd like to continue we should probably do so via PM's so as not to p*ss off the mods.

Stuff that's done to death is popular.

I can't stand knights in shining armor. It's the most overdone thing in fantasy ever. Yet every single fantasy game has it. All of them. And they are usually very popular.

 Aipoch wrote:
Which, if I'm honest, sounds to be about the most boring thing ever. A fantasy world where overpowered casters don't exist? I mean honestly, where is the entertainment in that?

Right, because no one likes a Game of Thrones or anything.

 Aipoch wrote:

So, what's really at hand here is a debate over those skills and abilities which circumvent the aforementioned "normal" course of magic casting. Players don't like it when their opponent has a significantly increased chance of getting irresistible force. They don't like miscasts to be ignored. They don't like being outside their comfort zone. The finality, then, is that they don't like that they don't have a caster or items with those kinds of abilities.

Players want balance. Major casting powers need a major drawback and if one character is able to frequently cast without taking any risk, he is not balanced. That's why most people hate Teclis. He is overpowered. As hell.

Which, if I'm honest, sounds to be about the most boring thing ever. A fantasy world where overpowered casters don't exist? I mean honestly, where is the entertainment in that? I happen to love the satisfaction that comes from watching my opponent break into feigned tears when I kill Teclis, super bunker or not. Sure, my units took a beating in the process, but who cares? I'm not playing Warfeather here.

He can be super-strong and overpowered as feth in the fluff. Everyone's fine with that. Ridiculously overpowered rules, however, are a no-go. We are playing a game, not a history. Imagine chess playing with no queen while your enemy got one. Fun to some? Sure. Balanced? Hell no.

Ranting complete. Teclis doesn't need a nerf,

With all due respect, but you're either a Teclis player or trolling.

 Micky wrote:
There's a lizardmen special character named Tetto-eko who does the same "any doubles are Irresistable Force" thing, but only for the lore of Heavens, and with a 1/36 chance of backfiring and giving the enemy the bonus instead, on *any* lore.

He's a 255pts Hero choice.

Ohh and he's Level 2

 captain collius wrote:

 Micky wrote:
There's a lizardmen special character named Tetto-eko who does the same "any doubles are Irresistable Force" thing, but only for the lore of Heavens, and with a 1/36 chance of backfiring and giving the enemy the bonus instead, on *any* lore.

He's a 255pts Hero choice.

Ohh and he's Level 2

Is he also Lore Master? And can he also choose what lore he's going to use at the start of the game?

 Sigvatr wrote:

 captain collius wrote:

 Micky wrote:
There's a lizardmen special character named Tetto-eko who does the same "any doubles are Irresistable Force" thing, but only for the lore of Heavens, and with a 1/36 chance of backfiring and giving the enemy the bonus instead, on *any* lore.

He's a 255pts Hero choice.

Ohh and he's Level 2

Is he also Lore Master? And can he also choose what lore he's going to use at the start of the game?

Loremaster of Heavens, only works on a 3+ on a 2D6.

Can reroll comet casts.

Redeploy D3 units, 5++, 2nd rank in skins.

 Sigvatr wrote:
Players want balance. Major casting powers need a major drawback and if one character is able to frequently cast without taking any risk, he is not balanced. That's why most people hate Teclis. He is overpowered. As hell.

There are definite drawbacks to taking Teclis, just not in the form you expect. He is a one man magic show, true enough. He can safely get off any single spell the caster would like without fear of just about anything, aside from the occasional feedback scroll or other rare anti-magic item. The drawback is that all that power means taking a second caster for utility is impossible; they will always be dispelled from your enemies overflowing dispel pool. He does have a fairly high point cost, and he is physically weak as hell. These are all drawbacks to taking Teclis, but I'm betting it's not enough.

 Sigvatr wrote:
He can be super-strong and overpowered as feth in the fluff. Everyone's fine with that. Ridiculously overpowered rules, however, are a no-go. We are playing a game, not a history. Imagine chess playing with no queen while your enemy got one. Fun to some? Sure. Balanced? Hell no.

Chess is not what I'd call a fair comparison for our game. It's an easy one, sure, and some links can be made of course, but in the end chess is a game of nearly perfect balance; each player is presented with an identical army in terms of both composition and play style. Warhammer is not this simple, not even when you talk about it in terms of hammers and anvils. As for the queen analogy, it's a fair one. A game of chess wouldn't be too much fun if one side started with a queen and the other did not. Again, though, to assume there is only one "queen" in all of Warhammer is a bit harsh. There may be only one Teclis, but there are plenty of other casters which have been mentioned that can be equally as powerful, just in a different way.

 Sigvatr wrote:
With all due respect, but you're either a Teclis player or trolling.

Nope, no trolling, and though I do both love and play my HE's, I rarely bring out Teclis, and if I do it's because TFG is at the shop and needs to be smacked down a peg or two. I enjoy getting to field, arguably, the most powerful caster in the game. In so doing, I don't feel as bad that my core choices are overpriced and utterly pathetic, my special choices are limited to about 3 viable options, I have no war machines worth their merit, and my dragons have been turned into completely overcosted cannon fodder that are utterly useless in a competitive environment. That being said, I still stand that Teclis should cost much, much more for what he does. I think he belongs in nothing short of a 2500 point game, so a price in the list of 600-700 for him seems much more appropriate than his current one; that he can be taken in a game under 2000 points is definitely wrong.

 Aipoch wrote:


There are definite drawbacks to taking Teclis, just not in the form you expect. He is a one man magic show, true enough. He can safely get off any single spell the caster would like without fear of just about anything, aside from the occasional feedback scroll or other rare anti-magic item. The drawback is that all that power means taking a second caster for utility is impossible; they will always be dispelled from your enemies overflowing dispel pool. He does have a fairly high point cost, and he is physically weak as hell. These are all drawbacks to taking Teclis, but I'm betting it's not enough.

His weak physical stats are a distractor. Imagine a baseball player being really bad at football. Does that influence his baseball abilities? Teclis' weak stats do not matter as he will never get into a situation where he needs to fight in melee (we're talking about good players here). The problem is that all those "drawbacks" do not balance his offensive power. The 8th BRB lores are very strong for the most part and are balanced out (well, GW tried...) by the major spells forcing you to take the risk of a miscast. Anything that bypasses that flaw needs to be compensated. The Cupping Hands of the Old Ones are still very strong, but at least have a one-time use and then disappear. Teclis can pull of a 6th without any risk every turn. That's one thing. The other thing is that he IF's a lot of spells due to his doubles rule, mostly negating the enemy's chance to dispel critical spells. LoL on Teclis gets really ridiculous. Another reason for Teclis' massive overpoweredness is his ability to pick his lore at the start of the game. And don't forget about his synergy with the rest of the army - d3 casting dice banner e.g..

Chess is not what I'd call a fair comparison for our game.

I did not use the chess comparison to compare Teclis to other casters. I used it to explain balance, mostly in Warhammer's magic phase. Teclis absolutely dominates the magic phase and breaks the "balanced" state thast's accomplished by the normal magic rules; i.e. the balance of IF coming with consequences and IF being a rare occurence unless you force it. The other thing is that magic is the most important phase in the game - or let's rather say that it's the most influential one as the melee phase can hardly be influenced anymore. If you absolutely dominate the magic phase, you're a lot closer to victory.

 Sigvatr wrote:
With all due respect, but you're either a Teclis player or trolling.

I do both love and play my HE's

I think he belongs in nothing short of a 2500 point game, so a price in the list of 600-700 for him seems much more appropriate than his current one; that he can be taken in a game under 2000 points is definitely wrong.

Agree. Make him 550-600 points and make his "avoid miscast" ability a one-time use. There we go.

Yep teclis is Hella broken, I can easily deal with him ( much the same way I deal with most super casters) fairly simply, but god.damn being able to choose what law you have after setup is the thing I.hate most about him, it's a crutch, it takes no skill to look at what your facing and choose the most effective law to beat it, I hate that about him haha, on the flip side though, I do use thorek ironballs alot... So I'm just as bad

Actually he'd probably be pretty manageable if it wasn't for the Immune to Magic Banner on top of it.

It's pretty much the combination of

1: High Ward Save units (For proper Bunkering against even warmachines)

2: Magic Immunity (For avoiding magic, and what it could do to him)

3: His power

So players want a balanced game with drastically different armies opposing each other.

In that spirit, what do HE's have going for them? Teclis, amazing HE only magic items, white lions, sword masters, phoenix guard, and ASF. If the magic power is taken away to the point that an Empire caster is on a level playing field with a HE one, then all we're left with are those very awesome, very expensive, and very fragile special infantry.

So which way would people most like it to go? Make his "ignore the first miscast suffered every round" a one-time only ability? Make him suffer a miscast on every IF he rolls from the doubles (not just double 6's)? Limit his ability on when he can choose a lore? Something else? All of the above?

And with those changes made, should he now cost a different amount? More or less?

I'd argue that if Teclis is in such a need of a nerf, and he's that overpowered, and that unbalanced, then don't even bother nerfing him, just remove him. His abilities have been well known and feared for over a decade. It boarders on insulting to think of him as something less than his former self. Let him retire as the bad-ass of the HE's of old, and give us our bad-ass dragons back in return !

Teclis is fine. His rules suit his fluff. He only really shows up in competitive games in casual games you've got the slann which is waaay worse. If your opponent takes teclis save your points that you would of spent on magic defence take more troops and leg it at the guy and smash him in combat

You can't change your points based on what your opponent chooses. That's the problem. If you show up to play a game, you have an army. You can't say, "hold on, I'm going to rebuild my entire list to counter your one broken unit."

 Sigvatr wrote:

I did not use the chess comparison to compare Teclis to other casters. I used it to explain balance, mostly in Warhammer's magic phase. Teclis absolutely dominates the magic phase and breaks the "balanced" state thast's accomplished by the normal magic rules; i.e. the balance of IF coming with consequences and IF being a rare occurence unless you force it. The other thing is that magic is the most important phase in the game - or let's rather say that it's the most influential one as the melee phase can hardly be influenced anymore. If you absolutely dominate the magic phase, you're a lot closer to victory.

The Magic Phase, like any other phase in the game, is certainly not balanced and it's foolish to say so. The movement phase is certainly not balanced. If I'm playing dwarves and my opponent has an (perhaps only almost) entirely mounted army, then I'm at a disadvantage, but I wouldn't kick up a fuss saying that everything over Movement Value X should be nerfed. The same goes for the shooting, close combat and, of course, magic phase. I can think of many examples for each.

However, if you're at a disadvantage in a certain phase, you'll most likely make up for it elsewhere. Lets take the previous example of Dwarves vs Mounted Army. Yes, the Mounted Army is much better in the movement phase but, as mounted models tend to be fairly expensive, the Dwarves will probably have the advantage of numbers. So, yes, being against Teclis does put you at a disadvantage in the Magic Phase, but you will almost certainly have made up for it elsewhere, from advantages you have over High Elves as standard, and advantages you'll have over an opponent who's spend hundreds of points on a single model. Teclis may be undercosted, but he's worth the same as a fair few Swordmasters...

Phases are not meant to be balanced. They balance against each other.


Magic>Big steadfast blocks>small elite units>magic

 The Shadow wrote:
So, yes, being against Teclis does put you at a disadvantage in the Magic Phase, but you will almost certainly have made up for it elsewhere, from advantages you have over High Elves as standard, and advantages you'll have over an opponent who's spend hundreds of points on a single model. Teclis may be undercosted, but he's worth the same as a fair few Swordmasters...

This implies every HE army without Teclis is at an inherent disadvantage due to some basic HE shortcoming. It also presumes that whatever else you are making up against Teclis doesn't involve magic of any kind. And that you didn't also spend hundreds of points on a single model, who is almost certainly suckier than Teclis.

I feel like the people who are sort-of defending Teclis are missing... something. It's hard to put my finger on what, exactly.

Balance is based on a standard. Imbalance, either in overpowered-ness or underpowered-ness, is usually due to a difference in standard.

An example to illustrate what I mean by this: Lets say that a basic human statline (4M, 1W, 1A, 7Ld, and otherwise 3s across the board) is "standardized" to 10 points. You get a single model with a human statline at 10 points. For each point higher or lower somewhere on the statline, the cost for a model goes up or down appropriately. This increase or decrease in cost depends on the rules framework upon which the game is based - meaning, if movement is more important within the rules than strength, then an increase in movement will cost more than an increase in strength. And so on.

So, a human model at 10 points is "balanced" when compared to a demon model at 15 points because the demon model's cost reflects the total amount of increases and decreases that the model gets over and above (or below) what the human model is getting.

"Imbalance" comes into play usually because of a different standard, but this can be easier defined by saying that a unit is undercosted or overcosted. If that same demon model, which is balanced around the human statline standard, costs 13 points instead of 15 then we would say that it's overpowered or undercosted, which is basically the same thing. It is powered OVER the standard to which is it compared. What's really happening here, though, is that it's actually balanced against a DIFFERENT standard, one in which the stat increases are only worth 13 points instead of 15, and yet these two models are played in the same game with the same rules framework.

So, there are at least two major problems that can crop up in competitive games:

1) A unit costs too little for the benefit it brings, such that these benefits can be stacked higher than they normally would be. This is the "undercosted" situation.

2) A unit is so powerful that cost is irrelevant, as it stacks your chances of winning above 50% simply by its inclusion.

Imagine if there were a model with a special rule stating that you win the game if this model is still on the table at the start of your second turn. This model costs 1500 points and removes the normal force organization restrictions, so you can always take it as long as you're playing a game of at least 1500 points. Of course, tournaments are normally played at 2400 or 2500 points, so you've still got about 1000 points worth of protection that you can provide for this unit.

Would anyone ever not take the unit, in a purely competitive setting?

So Teclis ends up being a bit of both. He's undercosted for the level of power that he brings in a rules framework that (arguably) puts too much emphasis on the magic phase, and he's SO powerful that, if you CAN take him, you always will (assuming your primary objective is winning).

Essentially, the disadvantages of taking him are not large enough (or balanced to the same standard, if you will) to warrant disinclusion, and the increased chance of winning that he brings is not equivalent to the disadvantage that you incur by taking him (having less total models on the board because he's fairly expensive, or whatever).

In a game that I am playing (not a story that I am reading), I want to struggle for an equal chance at victory because my opponent is doing the same thing and we started on equal footing, and I want to hope and believe that through the application of superior skills (in whatever way I choose, be it magic, or shooting, or combat) I can tilt the scales in my favor and eventually end the game as the victor. Some people like extremely uphill struggles for this equal chance at victory, which ultimately boil down to an exercise in mathematics in which the odds are always stacked against you, but I am not one of those people and I don't play Wood Elves. Occasionally, I like this kind of game, and a win in a game like this usually feels more epic because I overcame even WORSE odds, but if I have to lose 5 games in a row before I win game 6 (and probably only because I got lucky and rolled like a beast while my opponent couldn't roll a 2 to save his life), then eventually I'm going to get... tired.

This is why I don't like Teclis, and/or a rules framework in which the magic phase is too important when compared to the other phases.

Sorry for the long post.

Captaintyrius wrote:

Malekith THIS GUY is from the time of the original daemonic incursions his magic should be close to the power of a slann if not close to the power of lord kroak
Morathi: she INVENTED dark magic she was the first elf to MASTER it she should make teclis cry like a little baby and make Slanns worried by her appearing
Teclis should be not much more than a normal archmage except he has a special staff (and btw he had to use same stuff to beat malekith which involved breaking said staff so he shouldnt even have it anymore)
Nagash should be weaker than Morathi and Malekith as both Morathi and Malekith have noth masted and perfected Dark Magic

Not going to argue the Slann, since they're obvious. I'd argue that Fateweaver should be on the level of Slanns, though. He's the Champion of the Chaos God of Magic, after all.

Now, on to Teclis. You do realize that there's current fluff in the High Elf Army Book where Teclis out-magics Malekith in a 1v1, yes? Furthermore, the Army Book speculates that Teclis is equal to Nagash in power. As such, we have to draw the conclusion that both Nagash and Teclis are more powerful than Malekith, and that Teclis exceeds the power of the Council of Thirteen combined, as evident by their fight against a weakened Nagash while supporting Alcadizaar.

Tangent, I can understand and agree with just about everything you said, but I think there's still a clear difference as to what different players expect when we play Warhammer.

In short, it sounds as if you wish to play a game vs. your opponent in which tactics and generalship will determine the victor for the day, or at the very least be the deciding factors.

However, I don't find that ever to be the case in Warhammer, not so long as you have different armies facing eachother. If you want that battle, then set up two identical armies, and I mean completely the same. Same army, same Lord, Hero, Core, Special, and Rare choices. Everything else (deployment, unit formations, etc.) are up to each of you. That is the only way tactics and generalship will be the deciding factor, because you KNOW you were put on a level playing field.

With army book publications spread out over a decade between printings, some as old as two editions ago, and the seemingly endless variety of different units and playstyles, no two armies are ever on "equal grounds" when it comes time to start a battle; one army is always favored to win over the other based upon what counters what most effectively. It's incredibly rare to have two complete strangers meet up for a match with different armies and have each one be a perfect counter for the other.

That being said, I'd argue that when playing a battle, you are going to be (largely) either fighting an uphill battle, or a downhill one. Including a character like Teclis just puts the odds comfortably in your favor.

As for other trade-offs, consider that I can take a lvl 4 book of hoeth archmage (offensively just as powerful as Teclis IMHO) AND my BSB for nearly the same price as just taking Teclis.

DukeRustfield wrote:

 The Shadow wrote:
So, yes, being against Teclis does put you at a disadvantage in the Magic Phase, but you will almost certainly have made up for it elsewhere, from advantages you have over High Elves as standard, and advantages you'll have over an opponent who's spend hundreds of points on a single model. Teclis may be undercosted, but he's worth the same as a fair few Swordmasters...

This implies every HE army without Teclis is at an inherent disadvantage due to some basic HE shortcoming. It also presumes that whatever else you are making up against Teclis doesn't involve magic of any kind. And that you didn't also spend hundreds of points on a single model, who is almost certainly suckier than Teclis.

That wasn't what I was implying at all, just because a HE army does not include Teclis, certainly doesn't mean it's at a disadvantages. What I meant by "advantages you have over High Elves as standard" is something relating to the army wide traits of the armies involved. For example, if I was playing against High Elves with Dwarves or WoC, I'd have an advantage in the sense that my troops are generally far harder to kill, due to a higher toughness and better armour. Similarly, if I were using Goblins or Zombie/Skeleton Heavy VC, I'd have an advantage of numbers.

@Tangent (not quoting, due to size): I do get what you're saying and I agree that taking Teclis will give you better odds of winning before you've even got to your match, and yes, if you really do want to win with HE, then you should take him. I'm not really defending Teclis as such, just giving my view on things, on both sides of the argument.

Aipoch wrote:
As for other trade-offs, consider that I can take a lvl 4 book of hoeth archmage (offensively just as powerful as Teclis IMHO) AND my BSB for nearly the same price as just taking Teclis.

Agreed. People always miss this. To be honest, if Teclis was made something stupid like 800-900 points, and the book was kept the same, people would just move on to complaining about the book. The book should not be underestimated at all, though I guess at least it doesn't come with Loremaster of a Lore you can choose after seeing your opponent's army.

That's a bad justification:

The game isn't balanced. You shouldn't expect it to be balanced. Therefore, when I use something imbalanced, it's okay. Also, I could use something that also might be imbalanced, which makes the other imbalance fine.

As for the argument that armies might be at disadvantages because of what they chose, you're right. But no one knows that. If you took all slow infantry and your enemy took all template-spamming war machines, spells, etc., the infantry is in trouble. But neither of you knew that. It could have been completely reversed. You can know you're facing Teclis; the player can walk up to you with a painted Teclis model; he can have it tattooed on his forehead. And he still has that advantage no matter what you do. No one minds facing random match-ups (some uneven) in a game with random dice rolls. No one will deny that happens. People are saying there is an imbalance beyond the randomness you face.

If you know your enemy has Mournfang [or whatever unit] and you do everything you can to prepare for it, and you both roll average, and he still crushes you. That unit is probably unbalanced.

It was like Desert Storm war. They knew we were coming. They knew what we'd be bringing. They knew when. It didn't matter. The US army was OP compared to the Iraqi army. If you were recreating that as a board game, it would really suck playing Iraqi forces no matter what the fluff says. "Hey, I lose another 15 tanks. Did any of your guys get PTSD at least?"

DukeRustfield wrote:


As for the argument that armies might be at disadvantages because of what they chose, you're right. But no one knows that. If you took all slow infantry and your enemy took all template-spamming war machines, spells, etc., the infantry is in trouble. But neither of you knew that. It could have been completely reversed. You can know you're facing Teclis; the player can walk up to you with a painted Teclis model; he can have it tattooed on his forehead. And he still has that advantage no matter what you do. No one minds facing random match-ups (some uneven) in a game with random dice rolls. No one will deny that happens. People are saying there is an imbalance beyond the randomness you face.

This is true, but not necessarily as a concern. You don't need to know that you'll be playing High Elves beforehand to turn up at the game with your goblins, see you'll be playing High Elves and think "Oh, well he'll dominate the Magic Phase, but I'll outnumber him 5:1". And finally, I'm not trying to argue that Teclis is not broken or unbalanced, he is. I'm just giving my opinions on the subject, though I guess you could say I'm arguing for the sake of it. That's irrelevant though, I find this topic interesting, so comment a lot I shall.

DukeRustfield wrote:
If you know your enemy has Mournfang [or whatever unit] and you do everything you can to prepare for it, and you both roll average, and he still crushes you. That unit is probably unbalanced.

It was like Desert Storm war. They knew we were coming. They knew what we'd be bringing. They knew when. It didn't matter. The US army was OP compared to the Iraqi army. If you were recreating that as a board game, it would really suck playing Iraqi forces no matter what the fluff says. "Hey, I lose another 15 tanks. Did any of your guys get PTSD at least?"

Using real life situations as analogies is often a bad idea. After all, the armies in said war didn't have to stick to the same point value, or make sure they weren't taking too many Rare Units. I'll say it again, I am aware that Teclis is OP, and will not try to deny that fact but even so, as with anything, you'll have advantages over an opponent who takes Teclis, even though, by doing so, your opponent has more advantages. Exploiting your advantages will often lead to victory (as always), and this is especially true if you know you'll be facing him. After all, you can, as with anything, prepare for him. Feedback scroll, anyone?

 Aipoch wrote:
Tangent, I can understand and agree with just about everything you said, but I think there's still a clear difference as to what different players expect when we play Warhammer.

In short, it sounds as if you wish to play a game vs. your opponent in which tactics and generalship will determine the victor for the day, or at the very least be the deciding factors.

However, I don't find that ever to be the case in Warhammer, not so long as you have different armies facing eachother. If you want that battle, then set up two identical armies, and I mean completely the same. Same army, same Lord, Hero, Core, Special, and Rare choices. Everything else (deployment, unit formations, etc.) are up to each of you. That is the only way tactics and generalship will be the deciding factor, because you KNOW you were put on a level playing field.

With army book publications spread out over a decade between printings, some as old as two editions ago, and the seemingly endless variety of different units and playstyles, no two armies are ever on "equal grounds" when it comes time to start a battle; one army is always favored to win over the other based upon what counters what most effectively. It's incredibly rare to have two complete strangers meet up for a match with different armies and have each one be a perfect counter for the other.

That being said, I'd argue that when playing a battle, you are going to be (largely) either fighting an uphill battle, or a downhill one. Including a character like Teclis just puts the odds comfortably in your favor.

As for other trade-offs, consider that I can take a lvl 4 book of hoeth archmage (offensively just as powerful as Teclis IMHO) AND my BSB for nearly the same price as just taking Teclis.

Yeah man, I get you. My point though, really, is something that Duke basically said in not-so-many-words. Essentially, I want to be tricked. I am trickable. If the game gives me an illusion of balance that is so good that I don't notice it's an illusion, then I'm fine with that and I would probably argue that the game is balanced. You know what MIGHT be overpowered? Imperial Guard infantry. I think they're balanced, though, and don't mind playing against them. You know what I KNOW is overpowered? Vendettas. As such, I don't like playing against Vendettas but I don't mind facing infantry.

I accept that there's an inherent unbalance in a game with so many factors, but I'm willing to suspend my disbelief (which I can't do on the internet talking about it but which I CAN do while I'm playing it) for a game that seems mostly balanced and is, ultimately, fun. It boils down to the outliers of balance that ruin the experience, and force me into a frame of mind in which the illusion of balance is shattered and I can't ignore the fact that the hill has an upward slope. Teclis is one such outlier.

DukeRustfield wrote:Considering he will be in a group with likely 2 other models who can accept challenges and he has LoS you can't always simply just target him. Unless someone decides to run him solo and put him in the front of their army. And that has probably happened never times out of never.

Kairos is the right hand of Tzeentch. You know, the god of magic. He even knows things that Tzeentch doesn't. Perfect vision of the future, perfect vision of the past. Greater Daemon and the only thing that survived the well of eternity. I don't, it's hard for me to think of anything that should be better at magic. And as powerful as he is, I don't think he was too much. As he was a monster that sucked at combat. I think he'll get a big point reduction, but not sure what will happen with his magic. Probably be made a whole lot less complicated.

Amon'chakai is stronger than Kairos, magically speaking, and not crippled in terms of physical combat either unlike the blind chicken. Here's to hoping he's finally back in the book (after all, he was mentioned in Warriors of Chaos for the first time in over a decade).

AngelofBlood wrote:I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

And what are those of us like my Wood Elves who don't have war machines meant to do? Fury of Kurnous (or whatever out 'charge 2d6" forward" spell is called) a treeman at him and hope to roll well?

High Elves get Teclis? I want Ariel back. She's supposed to be so powerful that she was too strong to be included in the tabletop game, after all...

 Furyou Miko wrote:

AngelofBlood wrote:I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

And what are those of us like my Wood Elves who don't have war machines meant to do? Fury of Kurnous (or whatever out 'charge 2d6" forward" spell is called) a treeman at him and hope to roll well?

High Elves get Teclis? I want Ariel back. She's supposed to be so powerful that she was too strong to be included in the tabletop game, after all...

More to the point, what are you supposed to do when the Teclis player's Great Eagles rip all the crew of the warmachines you did have apart?

 The Shadow wrote:

 Furyou Miko wrote:

AngelofBlood wrote:I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

And what are those of us like my Wood Elves who don't have war machines meant to do? Fury of Kurnous (or whatever out 'charge 2d6" forward" spell is called) a treeman at him and hope to roll well?

High Elves get Teclis? I want Ariel back. She's supposed to be so powerful that she was too strong to be included in the tabletop game, after all...

More to the point, what are you supposed to do when the Teclis player's Great Eagles rip all the crew of the warmachines you did have apart?

If your war machines are key to victory then you should probably protect them from said great eagles

Jayo'r wrote:

 The Shadow wrote:

 Furyou Miko wrote:

AngelofBlood wrote:I don't get why people use him. I just use a standard arch mage so I can still field a prince with my Dragon Princes. IMO he dies too easly too quickly anyone with half a brain puts all of their war machines on his bunker unit for the first turn or two. The one time I've used him he was dead by turn 3 (even with his awesomeness hes isn't immortal) IMO hes a waste of points to begun with.

And what are those of us like my Wood Elves who don't have war machines meant to do? Fury of Kurnous (or whatever out 'charge 2d6" forward" spell is called) a treeman at him and hope to roll well?

High Elves get Teclis? I want Ariel back. She's supposed to be so powerful that she was too strong to be included in the tabletop game, after all...

More to the point, what are you supposed to do when the Teclis player's Great Eagles rip all the crew of the warmachines you did have apart?

If your war machines are key to victory then you should probably protect them from said great eagles

Easier said than done, but here we go onto various tactics and counters to different units, a discussion which could go on endlessly. I guess it brings back the point about advantages and making the most of them. If you have war machines on your side, then you've got an advantage over a HE army, even one that uses Teclis, because Repeater Bolt Throwers are meh at best. Make the most of this advantage and you'll find it a lot easier to win.

 Furyou Miko wrote:
And what are those of us like my Wood Elves who don't have war machines meant to do? Fury of Kurnous (or whatever out 'charge 2d6" forward" spell is called) a treeman at him and hope to roll well?

You laugh at poor old Teclis as you have too many units for him to throw six dice at, which means he has a significantly lower chance of rolling a double meaning when he casts, he is just a plain jane level 4, vs your level 4 with wand of wych elm (the best dispelling item in the game).

 The Shadow wrote:
If you have war machines on your side, then you've got an advantage over a HE army, even one that uses Teclis, because Repeater Bolt Throwers are meh at best. Make the most of this advantage and you'll find it a lot easier to win.

I don't understand how my warmachines are counters to teclis. A good he player will only allow me to get max 3 rounds of shooting(more like two, but lets just argue that I get lucky and intercept his great eagles).

Empire:
cannon - averages 4-5 wounds per turn assuming no misfire
Mortar - str 2 now. Even if its a dead hit that's average 9 wounds.
Helblaster volley gun - why are you within 24" of this?
Helblaster rocket launcher - I think the average against T3, is about 6-9 wounds depending on scatters.

So two turns of firing will average about 40 wounds? Your defensive block should still have around 10 wounds left? Everything else is at full strength for the most part and teclis can now resume.

And if you say I'll do enough to flee, I'll ask you why the bsb isn't nearby.

My warmachines are great. They're an advantage to my army just like ASF is for you. But they are in no way a counter to teclis.

Stoupe wrote:

 The Shadow wrote:
If you have war machines on your side, then you've got an advantage over a HE army, even one that uses Teclis, because Repeater Bolt Throwers are meh at best. Make the most of this advantage and you'll find it a lot easier to win.

I don't understand how my warmachines are counters to teclis. A good he player will only allow me to get max 3 rounds of shooting(more like two, but lets just argue that I get lucky and intercept his great eagles).

Empire:
cannon - averages 4-5 wounds per turn assuming no misfire
Mortar - str 2 now. Even if its a dead hit that's average 9 wounds.
Helblaster volley gun - why are you within 24" of this?
Helblaster rocket launcher - I think the average against T3, is about 6-9 wounds depending on scatters.

So two turns of firing will average about 40 wounds? Your defensive block should still have around 10 wounds left? Everything else is at full strength for the most part and teclis can now resume.

And if you say I'll do enough to flee, I'll ask you why the bsb isn't nearby.

My warmachines are great. They're an advantage to my army just like ASF is for you. But they are in no way a counter to teclis.

They're not counters, I never said they were, they're just an advantage.

If you were facing Teclis, you'd be better off having, say, three stone throwers instead of an equal amount of points worth of combat troops or even ranged troops because, unlike other things, Warmachines can hit and kill Teclis from a distance. They might not be terribly successful (something that depends on numerous factors) but they're better than other things because those other things literally have no chance of hitting Teclis (without eliminating his unit first, of course). And before you mention fleeing, Warmachines can make the unit flee as well, so that equals out.

 The Shadow wrote:


If you were facing Teclis, you'd be better off having, say, three stone throwers instead of an equal amount of points worth of combat troops or even ranged troops because, unlike other things, Warmachines can hit and kill Teclis from a distance. They might not be terribly successful (something that depends on numerous factors) but they're better than other things because those other things literally have no chance of hitting Teclis (without eliminating his unit first, of course). And before you mention fleeing, Warmachines can make the unit flee as well, so that equals out.

Most armies can only field 2 Stone Throwers anyway as they are rare choices. They are, however, not a counter to Teclis at all, as you correctly stated, and aiming to kill Teclis with warmachines is terrible idea. First of all, you need to roll a hit, you then need to wound and then need to hope for your enemy to roll a 1 on his LOS and THEN hope for the 1d6 wounds to roll high enough. And if you bring a lot of war machines, watch Teclis deciding to bring LoH to the battlefield.

Teclis does not have a hard counter. Period. He can only be brought down by immense luck and / or special items such as Cupped Hands of the Broken Ones. If you're up vs. Teclis, luck is the most reliable thing to help you.

 Sigvatr wrote:

 The Shadow wrote:


If you were facing Teclis, you'd be better off having, say, three stone throwers instead of an equal amount of points worth of combat troops or even ranged troops because, unlike other things, Warmachines can hit and kill Teclis from a distance. They might not be terribly successful (something that depends on numerous factors) but they're better than other things because those other things literally have no chance of hitting Teclis (without eliminating his unit first, of course). And before you mention fleeing, Warmachines can make the unit flee as well, so that equals out.

Most armies can only field 2 Stone Throwers anyway as they are rare choices. They are, however, not a counter to Teclis at all, as you correctly stated, and aiming to kill Teclis with warmachines is terrible idea. First of all, you need to roll a hit, you then need to wound and then need to hope for your enemy to roll a 1 on his LOS and THEN hope for the 1d6 wounds to roll high enough. And if you bring a lot of war machines, watch Teclis deciding to bring LoH to the battlefield.

Teclis does not have a hard counter. Period. He can only be brought down by immense luck and / or special items such as Cupped Hands of the Broken Ones. If you're up vs. Teclis, luck is the most reliable thing to help you.

Honestly, if my War Machines made Teclis take Heavens, I'd think that they'd done their job already. There are far scarier things Teclis can be doing with other Lores. Obviously he's still nasty, but still...

And like I say, Warmachines aren't a great option but they are an advantage because at least you have some chance to hit Teclis.

 The Shadow wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:

 The Shadow wrote:


If you were facing Teclis, you'd be better off having, say, three stone throwers instead of an equal amount of points worth of combat troops or even ranged troops because, unlike other things, Warmachines can hit and kill Teclis from a distance. They might not be terribly successful (something that depends on numerous factors) but they're better than other things because those other things literally have no chance of hitting Teclis (without eliminating his unit first, of course). And before you mention fleeing, Warmachines can make the unit flee as well, so that equals out.

Most armies can only field 2 Stone Throwers anyway as they are rare choices. They are, however, not a counter to Teclis at all, as you correctly stated, and aiming to kill Teclis with warmachines is terrible idea. First of all, you need to roll a hit, you then need to wound and then need to hope for your enemy to roll a 1 on his LOS and THEN hope for the 1d6 wounds to roll high enough. And if you bring a lot of war machines, watch Teclis deciding to bring LoH to the battlefield.

Teclis does not have a hard counter. Period. He can only be brought down by immense luck and / or special items such as Cupped Hands of the Broken Ones. If you're up vs. Teclis, luck is the most reliable thing to help you.

Honestly, if my War Machines made Teclis take Heavens, I'd think that they'd done their job already. There are far scarier things Teclis can be doing with other Lores. Obviously he's still nasty, but still...

And like I say, Warmachines aren't a great option but they are an advantage because at least you have some chance to hit Teclis.

The chance for him dying via a miscast is higher than killing him with any warmachine...

 Sigvatr wrote:

 The Shadow wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:

 The Shadow wrote:


If you were facing Teclis, you'd be better off having, say, three stone throwers instead of an equal amount of points worth of combat troops or even ranged troops because, unlike other things, Warmachines can hit and kill Teclis from a distance. They might not be terribly successful (something that depends on numerous factors) but they're better than other things because those other things literally have no chance of hitting Teclis (without eliminating his unit first, of course). And before you mention fleeing, Warmachines can make the unit flee as well, so that equals out.

Most armies can only field 2 Stone Throwers anyway as they are rare choices. They are, however, not a counter to Teclis at all, as you correctly stated, and aiming to kill Teclis with warmachines is terrible idea. First of all, you need to roll a hit, you then need to wound and then need to hope for your enemy to roll a 1 on his LOS and THEN hope for the 1d6 wounds to roll high enough. And if you bring a lot of war machines, watch Teclis deciding to bring LoH to the battlefield.

Teclis does not have a hard counter. Period. He can only be brought down by immense luck and / or special items such as Cupped Hands of the Broken Ones. If you're up vs. Teclis, luck is the most reliable thing to help you.

Honestly, if my War Machines made Teclis take Heavens, I'd think that they'd done their job already. There are far scarier things Teclis can be doing with other Lores. Obviously he's still nasty, but still...

And like I say, Warmachines aren't a great option but they are an advantage because at least you have some chance to hit Teclis.

The chance for him dying via a miscast is higher than killing him with any warmachine...

Yes, but it's still better to have that little extra chance than not.

As a 40k player with no knowledge of Fantasy I can't talk to this thread very well but I can note GW does not do named characters well in general.

All these calls for the nerf at also need to be balanced with an appreciation of what change brings. Spending years collecting and painting an army only for new rules to be released that dramatically change the viability are not desirable. In 40k vehicles got nerfed hard and fliers proved to be hard to dwalmwith when 6th Ed came out, which sounds similar to the increased importance of magic and decreased power of Calvary in Fantasy 8th?

So as a bystander my view is sure, tone him down so you will see a mix of other HQ choices in competitive HE armies besides Teclis, but wanting him to be wiped out is not a great solution, same as it would not be for any army.

Anything that encourages GW to make whole existing builds obsolete in one swoop should be avoided.

I heard rumours that Teclis will still be good (as befits his fluff) but he will be priced out of lower points level games.

Acharon is still in. He's the guy who is supposed to end the world. If Teclis can slap him around you'll always have a footnote at the bottom of every bad guy*

*this guy is only powerful if Teclis is too bored to kill him.

I think the Teclis hate is somewhat justified, but he's a caster written for an edition where magic was substantially less potent. GW seems to shy away from heavy re-writes in FAQs so he was always gonna bring the hurt. Teclis isn't op cos he's badly written/play tested etc he just benefitted from chance. Come next month when the book is re done he will be back where he should be, on a par with the best casters in the game.

 John Rainbow wrote:
I heard rumours that Teclis will still be good (as befits his fluff) but he will be priced out of lower points level games.

Just make him 601 points and he is perfectly balanced.

 Sigvatr wrote:

 John Rainbow wrote:
I heard rumours that Teclis will still be good (as befits his fluff) but he will be priced out of lower points level games.

Just make him 601 points and he is perfectly balanced.

I think you mean 626 points

 Flashman wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:

 John Rainbow wrote:
I heard rumours that Teclis will still be good (as befits his fluff) but he will be priced out of lower points level games.

Just make him 601 points and he is perfectly balanced.

I think you mean 626 points

Nah, standard size in my meta is 2400.

 Sigvatr wrote:
Remove his ability to ignore the first miscast each turn.

Add that he still casts IF on doubles but has to roll twice on the miscast chart and your opponent gets to choose the result or may add or subtract 1W3 to the miscast result.

You really hate Teclis a lot , You realize there is a item called BOOK OF HOETH which is equally as powerful.

Just some background for Teclis - Most powerful spellcaster alive (Kroak is technically dead)

Teclis defeated Malekith in a wizard duel

Teclis Brought Magic to the old world and helped start the eight colleges of magic for the empire

From the Rumours Teclis isn't changing to much and from what I have read is even getting cheaper, whether or not he will keel IR or not on doubles is still up in the Air.

Also he's not impossible to fight against, Ive seen him popped by cannons are warmachines all too often.



Write a letter if you feel offended so much by Teclis.

 pities2004 wrote:

 Sigvatr wrote:
Remove his ability to ignore the first miscast each turn.

Add that he still casts IF on doubles but has to roll twice on the miscast chart and your opponent gets to choose the result or may add or subtract 1W3 to the miscast result.

You really hate Teclis a lot , You realize there is a item called BOOK OF HOETH which is equally as powerful.

I hate game-breaking stuff. Teclis is game-breaking. Do the math.

Just some background...

Worthless. Fluff has nothing to do with balance.

Write a letter if you feel offended so much by Teclis.

Write a letter if you feel offended by people looking for balance.

You realize fluff is irrelevant, right?

Khairos is the greatest spellcaster alive or dead or daemonic by a long shot. He is the right hand of the god of magic, is made of magic, was thrown into well of eternity that the god of magic fears, can see the future and past in perfect detail, knows every spell. The winds of magic that Teclis manipulates is what Khairos is actually constructed out of. Yet Khairos is a weaker wizard than Teclis. So you'll have to do better than fluff. Fluff can always be rewritten to fit the game balance.

If fluff was relevant, Slann could just move the planet closer to the sun and kill everyone. And Khairos could see exactly what numbers, units, position you are going to deploy and what every die roll will be so there's no need to fight at all. That's fluff. But you're not fighting fluff vs. fluff or it would be really boring.

 Krellnus wrote:

 Furyou Miko wrote:
And what are those of us like my Wood Elves who don't have war machines meant to do? Fury of Kurnous (or whatever out 'charge 2d6" forward" spell is called) a treeman at him and hope to roll well?

You laugh at poor old Teclis as you have too many units for him to throw six dice at, which means he has a significantly lower chance of rolling a double meaning when he casts, he is just a plain jane level 4, vs your level 4 with wand of wych elm (the best dispelling item in the game).

Actually Lore of Heavens hard counters Wood Elves and every unit they can take, chain lightning on your MSU, thunderbolt gives treemen a 6+ save and no ward, comet can wipe out waves of treekin and dryads, and the attribute will passively kill all your eagles with no effort involved.

You can literally take almost any list possible, deploy your army with its back facing the WE and have a decent chance to win. But that's more of a WE thing.

As far as nerfing Teclis goes, he breaks the game as is. The point people are trying to make that is going over everyone's head is, armies are supposed to be balanced, balanced by weaknesses and strengths. high armor low move, high ranged damage but poor defences, High Elves have their weaknesses and strength AND Teclis, you could argue about whether HE are underpowered due to poor balance of their strengths and weaknesses, Teclis could fix that theoretical problem but he's a poison as no army should rely on a SC just to stand a chance. You would think most people are under the assumption that it's bad mannered to take SC without both players agreeing, I wouldn't play against a Teclis list, I'd be polite about it but I'd still be packing up.

In that regards he's kind of like a Slann. Lizardmen would be a tough but not uber army. When you add Slann, just about everyone labels them top tier. In fact, it's a given that you take them. So in that regards they probably need to be reworked. And even if you buy everything they got they aren't Teclis.

Don't think he needs to be nerfed "to oblivion," but i would definitly say he is overpowered and in need of some rule reworking....