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Ghorgon: M7 WS4 BS0 S7 T6 I3 A6 Ld10
Special rules: Bloodgreed (see the Beastmen book), Frenzy, Immune to Psychology, Large Target, Stubborn, Terror, Regeneration.
Devouring: The Ghorgon may forego all its normal attacks and instead make a special attack. The Ghorgon makes one attack against each model in the front rank of one enemy unit it is in base contact with. These attack has the Killing Blow special rule, but To Wound rolls of 4, 5 or 6 act as Killing Blow attacks, instead of just rolls of 6. To Wound rolls of 6 acts as Heroic Killing Blow attacks.

Strength from Flesh: Each time a Ghorgon causes a Killing Blow/Heroic Killing Blow with its Devouring ability, it regains one Wound that it has lost earlier in the battle.

Now. Before you comment, take in mind what rules and points cost the other recent monsters has. In any case, the Ghorgon and the two other monsters in the Beastmen book is overpriced. Should the Ghorgon have these rules, I wouldn't mind its cost, but as it is, I'd say it is worth max 225 pts.

Im all for the beastmen monsters being cheaper...

However heroic killing blow i disagree with, I honestly hate HKB and think it needs to be a very very rare thing...

Give the Ghorgon regen at 250 point cost and I would be all smiles.

I think that the special attack, combined with regen, that you propose should increese the point cost to at least 400. Throw the Ghorgon into a horde and it would dish out 10 attacks with killing blow, and just keep on living.
Being stubborn, and at Ld 10, it would just be a matter of time before it whipes the unit out, and continues unscaved.

The way I see it the special attack is fine as it is. It is made as a fun, if riscky, way to get rid of a bsb or general.

I think that the Jabber and Cygor, is in more need of a fix than the Ghorgon. I have yet to kill anyone with the jabbers aura of madness, or cause a miscast with my Cygor.

snapsepaven wrote:Give the Ghorgon regen at 250 point cost and I would be all smiles.

I think that the special attack, combined with regen, that you propose should increese the point cost to at least 400. Throw the Ghorgon into a horde and it would dish out 10 attacks with killing blow, and just keep on living.
Being stubborn, and at Ld 10, it would just be a matter of time before it whipes the unit out, and continues unscaved.

The way I see it the special attack is fine as it is. It is made as a fun, if riscky, way to get rid of a bsb or general.

I think that the Jabber and Cygor, is in more need of a fix than the Ghorgon. I have yet to kill anyone with the jabbers aura of madness, or cause a miscast with my Cygor.

Yes, I confess I tried to make it a bit crazy. And indeed, the ghorgon on 250 with reg would be absolutely agreeable.
The problem with the jabber and the cygor is that leadership tests is not that a threat with how good BSB:s now are. And considering how the casket of souls appears to be in the next book, it looks like gw knows that. What if the cygor's SR made the mages roll on 3D6 and the jabber's wasn't a ld test but just rolling against the ld?

3D6, do you mean to cast spells?
As for the Cygor I think that too much flavor has ruined the dish. I've always had a problem with the Cygor hurling rocks, yet being almost blind to anything but magic.
The way I see it you need to decide what you would want it to do. You don't need a monster to mess with mages, but it could still be a fun warmachine.

A movable stonethrower capable of defending itself, at a smaller price, is all it should be IMO.

I'm not sure what you mean by "rolling against the ld".
Perhaps a -2 penalty to the ld test could make it a factor in play. I was thinking about giving it a killing blow, to its shooting attack, and allow it to tarket charecters in a unit.

I can't help but feel, that the monsters were made with a set point cost in mind, and then they filled them with rules, to make the monsters fit the price. Istead of making a monster, and then fit the price to it.
But alot could be forgiven with a point reduction.

I'd give heroic killing blow to the jabberscythes tongue attacks, and either make him 225, or give the aura a -2 ld modifier.
Regen on the ghorgone at 275 would work for me.
Cygore should do multiple wounds D3 to all those things he re-rolls to hit against, and when centering the rock on mages/characters with magic items/daemons/undead he could re-roll the scatter die.

That would make the Cygore a specialist hunter that the fluff says he is, the ghorgone would be the juggernaught he should be, and jabber would get some utility too.
I'd like to see them all stay at 275, gives you a reason to use a giant.


-Matt

275 for a Ghorgon with regen! you must be mad!
Nah I'm not about to throw a fit over 25 points, and you do make a compelling argument, about a reason to take the giant.

The Giant seems to do alot of things, that the Cygor and Ghorgon does, only they are more reliable.
It would seem fair enough that the monsters compeeting with the giant should cost more, but the jabber could use a cost shave for what it does.

snapsepaven wrote:3D6, do you mean to cast spells?

No, I meant for their Ld tests when seeing if they lost their concentration.

snapsepaven wrote:I can't help but feel, that the monsters were made with a set point cost in mind, and then they filled them with rules, to make the monsters fit the price. Istead of making a monster, and then fit the price to it.
But alot could be forgiven with a point reduction.

Yes, most likely. Yet, I find it quite odd that they choose the same points cost on all the three.

At herdstone, there wasa discussion about what the monsters should have in cost. The ideas was 225 for ghorgon (250 with reg I suppose), 175 for cygor and 150 for jabberslythe. I think that seems pretty concievable, would you be fine with playing against them on that cost?

I'm all for better monsters. I think they should just take out Heroic Killing Blow. So, no, I don't think it should be in. It doesn't need any stat changes. That 1STR doesn't do much. 6 Str is like the universal monster str. Star Dragons and Carinosaurs are 7, and I don't think a Ghorgon is that.

Adding regen is pretty crazy to a unit that can heal itself D3. It's not going to die. And it can still Thunderstomp. It would be nearly impossible to kill once in combat, literally. At any cost that's not realistic. It would be about equivalent to a Great Unclean One except -1 spell level +2 attacks -1I +1M -4W but +Bloodgreed/Frenzy/Swallow/Stubborn all for about 150 points cheaper. However many you could stuff in your army you would be wise to do so, because they would be godlike.

I would say a 5+ or maybe a 4+ scaly skin save would work. But regen/ward at 4+ is crazy.

War Machines are hard counters to Monsters. With regen and self-healing and heroic killing blow, this guy would have no enemies.

DukeRustfield wrote:I'm all for better monsters. I think they should just take out Heroic Killing Blow. So, no, I don't think it should be in. It doesn't need any stat changes. That 1STR doesn't do much. 6 Str is like the universal monster str. Star Dragons and Carinosaurs are 7, and I don't think a Ghorgon is that.

It would be nearly impossible to kill once in combat, literally. At any cost that's not realistic. It would be about equivalent to a Great Unclean One except -1 spell level +2 attacks -1I +1M -4W but +Bloodgreed/Frenzy/Swallow/Stubborn all for about 150 points cheaper. However many you could stuff in your army you would be wise to do so, because they would be godlike.

I would say a 5+ or maybe a 4+ scaly skin save would work. But regen/ward at 4+ is crazy.

War Machines are hard counters to Monsters. With regen and self-healing and heroic killing blow, this guy would have no enemies.

Again,

Saintspirit wrote:Yes, I confess I tried to make it a bit crazy.

So let us forget about the mad ghorgon rules I wrote.

Adding regen is pretty crazy to a unit that can heal itself D3. It's not going to die. And it can still Thunderstomp.

I highly doubt that it will make it into combat unless the enemy are pure combat and no shooting. Also, should it make it into combat just about everyone wil strike first if you want to make a swallow whole attack (which you will likely want to as it will lose quiet a lot of wounds without any save of any kind).
Besides, whats wrong with it (the usual Ghorgon) having regeneration? It has a extremely altered metabolism, both by eating minotaurs and also by expotion of the forests warpstone. Not that I say that a SS save would be wrong either, with it's possibly encysted skin.

Debating the fluff is secondary.

What's wrong with it is what I said: it would be godlike and wouldn't die. It would be cheap at 450 points let alone the miniscule cost it really is.

You realize that regen means that even IF something hits it, even IF it passes its toughness and wounds, it has a 50% chance of shrugging it of completely. For instance a Dwarven Crossbowman has a 50% chance to hit, then a 16.6% chance to wound then a 50% chance for that wound to be ignored. Or about a 4% chance per guy to wound.

But the warsphinx with T8, most likely a good armour save, can hit around 20 models with one attack, lower cost and also is a special choice, is not wrong?

Saintspirit wrote:But the warsphinx with T8, most likely a good armour save, can hit around 20 models with one attack, lower cost and also is a special choice, is not wrong?

From the GW web page, it has to roll to hit with that template, if it misses on that one attack, it doesn't place the 3" round template.
T8 is great, but W5 is less than outstanding.
Shoot a cannon at it, and it dies faster than any of the W6 beastmen monsters.
Add in crumble, and you could have goblins down that thing pretty easy should it miss it's single attack.

-Matt

It's funny because it totally makes sense to me to have Regen as standard for Ghorgons. It would be absolutely worth it IMO for 275pts - it would actually make me take it against shooty armies.

The Cygor as is could definitely use a price reduction. I agree with most other people that they often do more harm to themselves, lol.


Cheers,

I think those prices stem from some heavy wishful thinking.
The jabber is not a 275 pts monster, but it's more than a 100 pts better than a great eagle.
Though a Cygor often does itself in, it doesn't fall over or yells at a steadfast enemy.

Truth be told I think all the monsters belong somewhere within 200-250 pts as it is.
Trouble is that with 8th edition it became very hard to be a monster in the Warhammer world, and with beastmen it is not entirely due to bad or overpriced monsters (at least not the Ghorgon) that I tend not to use them. But rather that minotaurs are a better option when it comes to the killing.

That being said, if GW should ever offer a 25% discount, on the point cost for beastmen monsters, I would defend that tooth and nail.

You could honestly rename this to, make anything in the beastmen army worth the price to be honest...

Pretty much every unit in that book thats not a lord or hero needs a 15-20% point cut.

For an army that I envision as a horde army, it certainly isnt very big.

Most things could indeed stand for a small point-drop, but I think Beastmen is one of those middle-road armies, bigger than the elites, smaller than the hordes.

Well, I move that all monsters forever have a 5+ or better Scaly Skin save, to help them out against poison and whatnot. Anything that stands a reasonable chance of killing them will bypass this anyway.

Further, a Ghorgon with Regeneration? Reasonable. Quite so, in fact. He's still far from unkillable. He's actually pretty poorly equipped to deal with other monsters. And take it from me, as an avid Abomination fan; flaming attacks are far more common than you think.

The Cygor, though, he should have some reduced point-costs. Does he have 6 wounds, or 5? He should have 6, being a one-eyed, stone-throwing giant.

The Jabberslythe should see a reduction in points as well. Also, they should probably just roll 2d6 against the Leadership of any unit in the area, like the ol' Banshees, and do a wound-no-armour-save for every point they exceed it by. This would, of course, absolutely destroy Skaven. But they've got Warp Lightning Cannons and Doomwheels, so they're far from defenseless.

Not to say the jabber is great, but a Jabber, combined supported by the manbane (bestigors/BSB) and a Great Bray with death and hag tree is pretty sweet.

The great Bray can use the hag tree to re-roll to wound, then spit out a doom and darkness, or snipe generals/bsbs to cut down on leadership.
The Banner drops it more, and the jabber just avoids combat and Aura does it's thing.
In all honesty, dropping leadership is really good, having the Jabber around to pick up some free kills can help too.

-Matt

I guess the problem (or at least one of them) with the jabbers aura is how much better bsb:s has become in 8th edition, perhaps along with inspiring presence and all that.

That's why I think making it an attack versus an opponent's Ld, versus forcing a test, would be much better.

BSB's are already good enough; they can afford to lose a little utility here and there.

That is true. Though I still think it wouldn't be worth its points, even if it was changed into that.

One thing is though, if it would be an attack against every model within the auras range, or if it would be just as the banshee scream. If it would affect everything within range, then it might be worth it... Maybe...

Take a look at my first post; point drop plus an area of effect that works like the Banshee's Wail.

About the jabber:
Since this post, this guy has been nawing at the back of my head. I agree upon a fix to its aura of madness, and a reasonable pointcost, but how do you guys think of making it into a mount instead?
Say you could mount a beastlord on it, for 345 p. +100 p. worth of equipment, would this be tempting?

Guess I had that idea too, however it does not work very much with the fluff - as it says that the beastmen try to ignore it as much as they can, since they know how dangerous it is. Don't think a beastlord would be foolish enough to ride one, then... No, I think what Warpsolution said fits it best.

True, although fluff can be changed.
In all honesty I'm having a hard time even seeing the survival of the jabber. By which I mean that I don't think that we will ever see a model, and it wont be in any future armybook either.
Guess I got blinded by the prospect of an 18" inspireing presence.

The Jabberslythe is a shamless(ly cool) spin on the Jabberwock, of Lewis Carol fame. Thus, it should have jaws that bite, claws that catch, eyes of flame, possibly some kind of turglfying effect on forests, and it should definately burble.

Nice!!

How would you go about representing this?

How about making the aura a test on 3D6?

We're probably making this a lot harder than it is. I think the units are fine. They are just too costly. As a mental excercise, if they all cost 50pts, they would be the most godlike OP units in the game and people would scream at you if you played Beastmen because you were a cheese player.

So that's one extreme, ratchet cost up from there until everyone feels comfortable that they may sometimes be worth it, sometimes not, depending on luck/enemy/etc.

I think DukeRustfield has the right of it...