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Posted By Toreador on 05/05/2007 11:22 PM
I am still trying to figure out this hero hammer thing. Eldar heroes generally across the board suck

Since you think Eldrad sucks, you probably haven't been playing Eldar much with their new Codex.

I'm not sure what benchmark you're using to say he sucks.

Posted By Toreador on 05/06/2007 10:34 AM
Stands to reason that when a good chunk of the Company shows up for battle, that the company commander would be out there leading them. Or at least in my mind, so I don't see how it really equals hero hammer. The leader you choose influences what units are available to battle. Stands to reason to me. You are only forced to take either of those two choices if you wish to field the respective units as troops. Hero hammer is just the wrong word for it.

Every single time?



Even when you're playing a 1000 point game with about 1/5 of the Company?

Does the Company Master have bilocation so that he can be present in multiple locations at the same time when the Company is fighting in two places?

Does the Company Master personally supervise every single combat/recon patrol?

I just don't see it as an unreasonable thing. I do see how people see it again as a lack of options, because they are forcing you, but I just don't see it as an unreasonable to assume he always leads the company when it shows in force.. It ties certain heroes to their respective roles in a neat (to me) way.

I have been playing against and with the eldar since the book was out. He is the best of the farseers, but I see Autarchs on the field a lot more. Eldrad makes the army much more effective. He is not a powerhouse on his own. Anything gets to him and he is still dead. Not a powerhouse, but he makes the army so much more effective.

Posted By Mannahnin on 05/06/2007 6:32 AM

Posted By Moopy on 05/05/2007 11:46 PM
Ok, I've sat down and reviewed the codex and here are my thoughts. Yes, I have a copy of the final WD article

(cut long summary)

Posted By Red Thirst on 05/05/2007 

Do I agree with all the rumored changes to BA? Of course not. I don't think anyone will, but I do consent that there is more good than bad in the proposed rules.

Are people not going to the complete PDF of the WD articles Ghaz just linked to?  Everyone can download and print the whole thing.

I was not aware there was a PDF of the WD article w/ the new BA rules out there, till now anyway.  Missed Gaz's post completely somehow.  However it seems the link has been removed/broken.  However, might I ask  if someone with the WD article file please e-mail it to me?  I would like to see it personally.

Thanks, take it easy everyone. 

-RT-

Regarding heroes, the Eldar ones seem to be reasonably adjusted. The Pheonix Lords are pretty nice, but I don't see a no-brainer. Eldrad is indeed pretty good.

The thing I don't get is, why people simply don't use another model with the rules for the special character if they hate the style so much. I mean, I could say: "Hey here is awesomespecialsuper farseer jimbo from craftworld überkilly and he is so awesomesuperspecial that he can cast 3 powers a turn ect." Anyone would be offended by that?

Except for tourneys, where you could field an Eldrad model for wysiwyg-sake and be done with it.

Greets
Schepp himself

Generally because it means you can't field a different hero. For example in a 750 point game with Deathwing, if I have to take Belial, then I'm going to have a very difficult time fielding my normal Librarian and Chaplain tag-team as well, while still being able to maintain a solid focus on troops.

The link was working fine. I suspect they didn't have permission to post that.

I've heard a bunch of complaints about combat squads.... and believe me, I'm hating GW's new stance on a lot of things these days.... (Like Terminators only get one assault cannon cuz that's all we included in the box!), but if there are two marine armies that should NOT have combat squads.... Space Wolves is one, Blood Angels are the other. Sure... they're a strictly marine chapter, but every night before a battle, dozens of battle brothers fall to the black rage. Now... companies have 100 men in them... lets say you lose 10 to black rage... that means if you were able to sift through all of the paperwork of the men in question, and rearrange the ranks.... REARRANGE THE RANKS!!! the night before a battle.... you would only ever be able to have 9 men in the rest of your squads.... consider again that captains and commands count towards the 100 man policy..... and making people use combat squads goes STRICTLY against the fluff

Wow, when I was in the army we were able to just grab people and take them out on patrol. Didn't take paperwork to do it. You just grab em.

They fight in codex pre-arranged units. The tactics they use are based around it. Just like now, I am sure when they have the chance they fill up the squads or have a way to deal with it. Combat squads can be as fluffy or as unfluffy as you can justify it in your own mind.

2 assault cannons is just too much. It adds to all the AC spam out there.

Librarian AND chaplain in a 750pt game? Um... wow.

Posted By Toreador on 05/06/2007 12:12 PM
Librarian AND chaplain in a 750pt game? Um... wow.

Hey, you're the one that thinks that Belial and the Master of the Ravenwing fit well into 500 point games.

heh heh, I never said that. The lists are made for 1500pt games. Deathwing in 500? There might be a reason they did that

So...anyone with the BA rules PDF mind sharing (Via e-mail)? Just curious to see the new rules with my own two eyes is all.

Thanks in advance, take it easy.

-RT-

I have no problem with that, you can PM me your email address.

Thanks Boss, PM sent. Let me know if you didn't get it for whatever reason.

As for fielding special characters in a 500 point list,..yea...no-thanks.

I can speak from experience. I played in a 500 point tournament back a few years ago. It was warlords weekend, the 4th edition rulebook was just about to release and I went to the Memphis Battle Bunker with my Blood Angels. My friend Rob brought his Death Guard, and the two of us played in the Friday night 500 point tournament for one of the coveted resin life-size Bolter Shells. In a game that size you can't afford to bring one model that costs half or a third of your point total. I ran a cheap captain mini w/ a jump pack (That's right. NO chaplain *shock*) and ran two tactical squads (7 man and 8 man, one had a heavy weapon and no vet sgt, the other had a plasma gun and a vet sgt.) along with a 5 man assault squad, no upgrades, just 5 assault marines. I should note the FOC was in place and had to be adhered to.

Deathwing would not have been a viable army choice in that format, but you could field a couple of combat squads of DA's, with a terminator chaplain and a 5 man terminator squad and probably would have rocked the house IMO.

The characters nowadays are meant to be used in big battles, 1500+ points, probably even more so in 2000 point games. I like them as they are now, and tend to agree with Toreador on the mentality of having them present when a high concentration of these forces is used. You can field deathwing and ravenwing elements in any DA force, but when THE Deathwing, or THE Ravenwing mobilize, they are lead by their head honcho.

It makes sense to me anyway.

That's all I've got for now. Take it easy everyone.

-RT-

Now that I've taken a look at the BA list I'm a little disheartened.
I have no less than 5 models that I simply can't use anymore. The options don't exist. One is the second Assault Cannon Terminatior (not too big a deal I'll strip his paint and he can join the Deathwing) but the others are things that I laboured on and are some of my favorite pieces. I got off lucky with my Dark Angels army but I have to build entirely new HQ choices for my Blood Angels.
Currently my HQ's for my BA are:
Librarian w/Jump Pack, Force Weapon and Chainsword (Can't do it)
Librarian w/Jump Pack and Lightning Claws (No longer an option)
Chaplain w/Jump Pack and Lightning Claws (Nope)
SHP w/Power Weapon, Bolt Pistol and Combat Shield (This guy doesn't even exist anymore)
Every one a conversion. Heck the Lightning Claw Librarian has the claws from a chaos Raptor Aspiring Champion and the SHP is a Chaplain with Corbulo's grail arm. I sawed the snot out of four metal minis (not to mention that I had to buy the whole mini just to get the parts I needed) just to build those two guys.
I like most of the changes but the limiting of wargear options for characters is driving me nuts!

Lets add to that list:

I believe the Captain is the only one who can take a Thunderhammer now.
No more scout bikes
VERY little upgrades for your vehicles. I mean why make that "Spirit of the Machine" upgrade only to make it not available to purchase?
No more flamers for basic assaulters.  There go my conversions.

Limiting options really takes the fun outta customizing your lists. Makes fur duller games when every army looks like the half brother of the one next to it. :p

Posted By Toreador on 05/06/2007 10:50 AM
I just don't see it as an unreasonable thing. I do see how people see it again as a lack of options, because they are forcing you, but I just don't see it as an unreasonable to assume he always leads the company when it shows in force.. It ties certain heroes to their respective roles in a neat (to me) way.

I have been playing against and with the eldar since the book was out. He is the best of the farseers, but I see Autarchs on the field a lot more. Eldrad makes the army much more effective. He is not a powerhouse on his own. Anything gets to him and he is still dead. Not a powerhouse, but he makes the army so much more effective.

You don't see constant price increases as an unreasonable thing Toreador - we don't expect any less.

And you're assuming that the company always 'shows in force'. 40K fluff has shown time and time again that different companies will have parts of them selves seconded to certain task forces. You could have four squads of Deathwing led by the Deathwing's Company Chaplain are seconded to the 3rd Company for a small campaign, or in support of a larger Imperial contingent. You could want to play a mission where the Chaplain leads the Deathwing in a 'First Strike' to clear the landing zones.

But you can't. Belial has to come with them.

BYE

You can still field 3 squads of Deathwing and 3 squads of Ravenwing show in a mission. Seems little different to me.

I am not going to argue pricing with the people that turn around and say WM is so much better priced. Then turn around and buy FW stuff. It's just money and toys. Yes, I will pay more for something better. The Empire troops to me were a lot better. So yes, I will go with that. But don't take what I say out of context. I don't like all price increases, especially in old product or reboxing of product.

I had a few DA models I had to redo. But I noticed a bit of the options you can take. It seemed to balance out a lot of the different characters. There are reasons to take each against the others, and options are a part of that.

I don't see why flamers were taken away from assault troops though. I can't say that I have used assault troops for quite some time though. Was it an option people took? It looks like it was a viable option. Any reasoning?

I loved flamers in my assault unit (1 only fielded 1 unit of jump packers and plan on MAYBE adding one more unit but that's it). They softened up bugs, guard, eldar and orks, and made everything else mad. Now we get plasma pistols at 15pts a pop. I really can't see the logic behind that; those things were hardly over powered.

At one time wasn't it only pistols not flamers? It's interesting they added it back in for BA vet squads.

I can see why some things were nixed because of the proliferation, or how much better vs other options. That one I just can't figure out...

Yea, Flamers in BA assault squads are very very nasty, and I for one am disappointed that they were removed from the unit as an option. I LOVED putting flamers in my lone assault squad, they were just so damn useful in so many situations, and really helped soften the blow against enemy troopers in cover.

Ce-la-vie. No big deal though, as I'm rebuilding my BA's at the moment, so I'll just put a single plasma pistol in there for good measure.

By the way, Thanks Boss, I got the e-mail just fine, I appreciate it

Take 'er easy everyone.

-RT-

On the subject of required HQ and stripped down armory choices/fixed unit sizes, anybody else wonder if the rules dev has been playing too much Warmachine? :-)

So much for getting rid of Codex Creep with the new DA's.

Certainly this list isn't as bad as the old BA list, but it easily proves that the Red Space Marines are much better than the Green Space Marines.

Fortunately I play the Blue Space Marines, who still have the best and most versatile rules (and I'm not talking about the Tyranic War Vets).

I got the rules before they took them down, and while they are certainly better than DAs, they still got hit with a NERF bat while falling from the NERF tree and hitting all the NERF branches on the way down.

As best I can figure, you'll be able to squeeze maybe 40 jump packers and 3 BAAL preds into a 1750 Point force. That's without a librarian or any othere support (no land speeders).

This is what I came up with real quick.

Lemartes- this guy is pretty good now. Only 5 points more than a standard chap w/ jump pack for +1 wound, ld, and deathmask

8 Death Company- jump packs

1x 8 Veteran Assault Marines- 2 flamers, 1 powerfist
1x 8 Veteran Assault Marines- 2 meltas, 1 powerfist
1x8 Veteran Assault Marines- 2 plasma guns, 2 plasma pistols, power fist,

2x5 Assault Marines- powerfist

3x1 Baal Predators

43 Jump Packers and Three tanks at 1750 points. You could fiddle with the options a little to tailor it to your metagame. An interesting note... Veteran assault squads and Honor Guard can take bolters instead of chainswords... they lose an attack but gain that rapid fire goodness... could be useful in limited circumstances (punking harlequins)

Yes, but the old list needed to be beaten over the head by an enraged Jervis using an uprooted Nerf Tree.

Basically at 1500 points, they're not that bad. They're still very good, but they're not quite what you could do with other lists. It's pretty entertaining actually, since they have so much potential, but the Combat Squads and everything else is so expensive, that you literally can't fit it all in at 1500 points.

Now when you go OVER 1500 points. They get dangerous, very dangerous. I mean damn, if you were to come up against say a 2500 Point Blood Angels army, just say NO.  I can see the Blood Angels doing very well at next years Adepticon where the tournaments are at like 2k points.  That's where you're going to see a lot of BA Pain.  Fortunately most tournaments are around 1500 or 1750, where the BA are far more limited.

A great example is Mephiston. Mephiston is their cheif pissed off librarian. He's essentially a 225 point Demon Prince who has to take a Psychic Test to fly (and can use all his powers a turn, including the force weapon). He's so good that when going to make the jump between say a 1500 point army list and a 1750 point army list, he's probably worth being the only addition - he could chew through squads at a time, with T5 to be instant killed AND he's I6, with 5+1(Charging)+D3 S5, Force Weapon Attacks per turn, and he's still not a MC and can't be targeted if he's not in a squad and he's not the closest model.

Fortunately (and I'd never think I'd say this), the Death Company limits the ability to take Mephiston. You don't have to take a Chaplain or the Death Company, but you're essentially paying for the DC with every squad you take, so you're stupid NOT to kit out on one of the best squads in the game (they give Harlequins a run for their money). So you're stuck paying about 120-125 points for a Chaplain as the near default HQ, and then if you've got an extra 225 points laying around, you take Mephiston as your second HQ choice.

They do lack anti-tank, and if you dedicate the normal Dev squad layouts with Combat Squads to them, you really cut into the points needed for all those jump packers.

And yes, I was going to kit out for a stock Chaplain, but for the extra 5 Points, Lemartes is going to be the default chaplain in every new BA list.

I agree with Voodoo...most BA armies will probably run Lemartes. The Vet's look very nice. I think I'd field all 3 slots. Also, they may only be taken in groups of 5 or 10. But having the option for 2 special weapons and up to 3 powered weapons is destructive, but at a high price. I'm thinking about constructing an all jump pack force with too many power fists for its own good. Vets are also only 10 points more then standard assault sqd, but everyone has 2 attks and it has way more options.

The Honour Guard isn't too bad. Doesn't take up a force org slot and it's pretty much the same points as vets. Dante is pretty pricey...but I like the option of using his standard to give all BA's +1 A that are within 12 inches.

BA's are definitely toned down, but...they still appear to be very powerful. It almost reminds me of SpaceWolf units...being that a whole lot of power weapons can be fielded.

No, Vets don't have to be 5 or 10, they can get mixed numbers so that magical "8 MEQ's" per squad will likely get fielded. 1 Power Fist, 2 Meltas, and 8 Vet assault marines come to about 295 points, which is hefty. And that's not even using all the special options (which admittedly they should be taking 2 fists instead of the dual meltas, coming in at 300 Points for 8 MEQ's).

I think most "troops" in the BA army will be minned out Assault Marines with just a PF on the sarge and that's it. They fill the FOC slots, give you a decent, if somewhat disposable threat, and they give you free DC members. After that if you want more assault, you take more DC or Vet Assault Squads, if you want shooty, you take Devs.

At 1500 you'll be trying to fit things in like crazy, but the increased costs on things like power fists and the inability to get plentiful cheap heavy weapons in tac squads really does add a whole lot of balance to the SM List.

So who did put that pdf up there and where'd they get it from?

A PM will work if you're afraid of the spiez!

Posted By malfred on 05/07/2007 8:41 AM
So who did put that pdf up there and where'd they get it from?

A PM will work if you're afraid of the spiez!

Ditto.