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DukeRustfield wrote:
How many average hits does a fireball spell cause? It's D6 for the base. If you said 3.5 you didn't include miscasts. And you didn't include not reaching casting value. The average hits of fireball has a huge, yet implied, disclaimer of IF YOU ARE SUCCESSFUL. I gave the average hits, if you are successful, of a grapeshot. I even said it in the first sentence. Every war machine has a misfire somewhere. A cannon does not do Str10 D6 multi wounds in your view because it only does that if it hits and doesn't misfire. It's true true statistical average is lower. It's exactly the same. But people are still going to give that value because it is implied you didn't explode. And it's simpler.

What you are going to do is make sure that when it does drop, it won't be getting back up.

Or, you're making sure that if it doesn't drop it never drops. That's not something you want to spend 40pts a model on. And it's every model in a unit. No ARMOR save, you can still get ward saves. So they still have a potential to resist the wounds but regen is guaranteed. And the regen stacks and gets better per application but the +dmg does not. If you did D3 wounds and then 2D3 wounds or something it would be even, but as I said this is the only ability in the game that can give something 1+ regen and you can only do it to enemies.

I mean it's a cop out to say, but I'm not the only person who thinks they really aren't that great now.

If you're comparing spells to spells, both need to be cast successfully. Both would run risk of miscast. If one had a higher casting cost, that would be mentioned in a comparison of what is better.
Fireball vs Fury of Khaine: Fury does 2D6 S4, fireball does 1/2/3 D6's. Fireball needs a 5/10/18, while Fury gets the discounted 8.
But you're not doing this, your comparing just part of a shooting phase to things that use different rules for shooting.

1+ regen is a 1 in 46,656. It's a non-issue. For perspective, failing an Ld10 check with re-roll is 1 in 144. You're more likely to see a dwarf army panic of the table than get meaningful regeneration.

I've I have seen is lots of people try flamers once, without much thought, and be surprised it doesn't work anymore. You actually need to carefully pick targets and think about your movement, and plan a list where the flamers compliment what you're running.

-Matt

1+ regen is a 1 in 46,656

Why are you coming up with BS #'s and hoping no one notices? Giving a 6+ regen is 1 in 6 on a wound. You will be making an enemy unit better 1 in 6 times you do anything harmful to them. Period. You mentioned shooting abombs who have a 4+ regen then conveniently switch to a unit with no regen when making your argument. "Meaningful regeneration" is anything whatsoever. 6+ is meaningful. Because it was just added to something that didn't have it. If 6+ regen is not meaningful, then play against an army that all has it and tell me how that goes.

You simply can't attack a huge swath of units with flamers. If you attack a ____star unit, such as a guttstar, you could make them vastly more powerful. Doing an average of 1/2 an ogre dmg OR giving them all 6+ regen is an insanely bad trade. Especially when they can lol and walk over and kill your only flaming units and thus have a perpetual ward. You can't attack tarpits because you're stuck attacking them forever to wipe off the regen as you'll never whittle them down with regen and flamers don't put out enough dmg to take out a tarpit anyway--and it's a bad use of them. Any unit with regen you're going to think twice about attacking if you question being able to kill them immediately. If you have 6 flamers all primed to fight you're more likely, but this ability works with 1 flamer just as well. What Flamers are now best at attacking is small-medium sized units who can be broken by taking a volley of shots and can't benefit from regen. Elite shooters having such restrictions on them is horrendous. They no longer have the combat skills to beat down stuff that engages them as well.

I'm a bit confused.. none of the stores around here got that WD.. but was there something added in it for the flamers about giving units regen? You guys keep mentioning a 1 in 6 chance of giving the unit you shot a 6+ regen?

If you cause unsaved wounds to a unit with ranged attacks: on a 6 you cause D3 more wounds or on a 1 give it 6+ regen (or increase their existing regen by 1).

If you're shooting a small unit or single target it probably doesn't matter much either way, since flamers are flaming. Or if the unit has a decent ward save. But if you're shooting something big, D3 wounds is inconsequential vs. giving them regen.

DukeRustfield wrote:

1+ regen is a 1 in 46,656

Why are you coming up with BS #'s and hoping no one notices? Giving a 6+ regen is 1 in 6 on a wound. You will be making an enemy unit better 1 in 6 times you do anything harmful to them. Period. You mentioned shooting abombs who have a 4+ regen then conveniently switch to a unit with no regen when making your argument. "Meaningful regeneration" is anything whatsoever. 6+ is meaningful. Because it was just added to something that didn't have it. If 6+ regen is not meaningful, then play against an army that all has it and tell me how that goes.

You simply can't attack a huge swath of units with flamers. If you attack a ____star unit, such as a guttstar, you could make them vastly more powerful. Doing an average of 1/2 an ogre dmg OR giving them all 6+ regen is an insanely bad trade. Especially when they can lol and walk over and kill your only flaming units and thus have a perpetual ward. You can't attack tarpits because you're stuck attacking them forever to wipe off the regen as you'll never whittle them down with regen and flamers don't put out enough dmg to take out a tarpit anyway--and it's a bad use of them. Any unit with regen you're going to think twice about attacking if you question being able to kill them immediately. If you have 6 flamers all primed to fight you're more likely, but this ability works with 1 flamer just as well. What Flamers are now best at attacking is small-medium sized units who can be broken by taking a volley of shots and can't benefit from regen. Elite shooters having such restrictions on them is horrendous. They no longer have the combat skills to beat down stuff that engages them as well.

1+ regen would be rolling a 1 on a D6 at the end of the shooting phase, 6 times. 1:6^6=46,656. I'm sorry if basic math is a problem for you.
Did you mean +1 regen, and not 1+?
+1 regen is not limited to daemons, Vampires get it too.

Ogres are actually an ideal army to take flamers against. Smaller units don't deal well with the shooting, larger units struggle to get fast skirmishers into a charge arc. Anyone outside of the generals bubble is at serious risk of panic. I've torn up ogres with dark elf shooting, and point for point, flamers are better at it.

And what's this about flamers being the only flaming attack in the army?
Maybe if you don't count:
Lord of Change
Blood Thrister with Fire Storm Blade
Daemon Prince of Iridescent Corona
Daemon Prince with mark of khorne and Firestorm Blade
Blue Scribe
Skulltaker
Herald of Tzeench
Disc of Tzeench
Burning Chariot of Tzeench
Herald of Khorne with Firestorm Blade
Pink Horrors

Do you not take any of these in any of your armies either?

Again, horrors work fine if you put some thought into a list, and use them as they are intended to be used (get in close and out of arc, park and shoot).

-Matt

Why on earth do you keep trying to point out how difficult 1+ is to get to prove it's not a bad thing? That's like saying a cannon is very unlikely to kill 10 ogres in a row so it's a sucky weapon. I merely pointed out you could get 1+, which I think is funny because it's the best buff in the game and you can only give it to enemies. Why not calculate the chances of getting 1+ regen on a million units to show how painfully low it is? The fact is 6+ regen is a really good buff.

Your list of units proves you're just being silly. No one takes DPs, they are horrendous. Almost no one takes LoCs, they are a min of 450pts. Bloodthirster has better options but is at least 475pts. Blue scribe is not going to ever be in CC. Skulltaker is a Special Character and thus not only a lone model, but banned from many tourneys. Heralds are your main spellcasters and suck at melee. Discs and Charriots are only on Heralds so that's redundant. Of all these, only Pink Horrors are something you conceivably want to put into CC with some unit you've screwed up and given regeneration to.

But, you know, that's kind of the point. You are giving units, generally the cheapest of which is >150pts, to counteract your own ELITE units attacking enemies and buffing them to the point you have to throw even more elite units at it to undo it. That's really bad. And it's not remotely worth a potential +D3 wounds. I mean think about that, if you could start every game and choose whether to roll on all of your units and take D3 wounds or have a 6+ regen (or +1), that's a good deal for anything that doesn't have a better ward. And if you would take it as a potential "punishment" then it's not something you want to be dishing out to enemies.

Flamers aren't meant to do anything other than I said, which is shoot at medium/small units with help from friends nearby. They are too expensive to go zipping off trying to flank, can't handle themselves in CC, and if you do attack something out of the way and don't kill it, you have the horrible potential of giving it regen.

But you know, if you think it's awesome, that's fine. We don't seem to be going anywhere. People can try it out and see.

I think Duke has a point: that giving your enemy Regeneration is a stiff penalty, and one that Daemons don't have a lot of easy ways to make up for.

I also think that Matt has a point: Flamers can still do their thing, and the D3 wounds makes them better at it, while the Regeneration thing doesn't make them worse at it.

It's weird, because the Regeneration applies to every model in the unit, ka-bam, where the multiple wounds obviously only apply to one model, if it matters. But then again, multiple instances of multiple wounds adds up just like the Regeneration does, and the latter doesn't stop the former from being effective.
Kinda seems like the best targets for Flamers are units you can keep out of combat, and thus keep shooting with said Flamers.

Stick a khorne herald in a unit of blood letters. He swings first and strips regen if any. The rest of the unit is going to murder most things with magical S5 killing blow attacks at WS5 and re-rolls to hit. It's a solid unit, with or without flamers.

I left Fateweaver off the list as well.
Daemons have plenty of good options (many special characters, but not all) of dealing with regeneration. That lets you design a list that can bypass the penalty of the warpflame while still keeping the benefit.

Don't drop your last 200 points on flamers and think it's a good idea. You can drop 500 points on flamers successfully, if you plan for it in your list design.

-Matt

Firestorm Blade on a Herald is the best option, no doubt. He's pretty much all-around awesome. Despite not being able to explode chariots anymore.

Yes. Fateweaver will totally be mopping up in CC the mistakes of your Flamers. He's merely 625 points and has one attack at WS1, is your army general, and is the last thing you want in combat. He'll be all like, "screw you LD bubble on an Unstable army, I have to go try and punch someone that suddenly has regen." That's an excellent idea! I'm not sure how anyone could doubt that Flamers giving regen is a bad thing when all you have to do to counteract it is throw the most expensive, worst melee Special Character at it. It's a non-issue. Like the space herpes I contracted on Mars is a non-issue as long as I cut myself in half and throw away everything below my belly button.

Your other idea of using at least a 250pt backup army to protect your ELITE Flamers also proves Flamers are a super good idea. Because what better way to show that 250pts isn't wasted than by requiring them to have another 250pts of a different unit be available to save them? With that other unit, of course, being vastly more versatile, defensive, offensive, and all around non-regen-giving.

If you're going to go that route, you would be vastly better just buying Horrors and having them do whatever it was your Flamers were attempting. The Horrors have more wounds, more attacks, more defense, can spell, can dispel, and don't suddenly dorf up and make your enemy unbeatable.

Ok- I think we are probably done, rules-wise here. Great debate though.

We can pick it up in Tactics if need be...

I'll drink to that.

I would definately not call Flamers unplayable, yes they can boost regen to your opponents unit but it you shoot at high priority targets or smaller units, they are still effective since they can by pass the buff they give, and just as often as I buff i have gotten extra wounds. They were just too powerful before but as a daemon player, who hates tzeentch since 8th edition ruined the omg wizard smash. They really are about just right now. And sure they get -1 to hit now, but they still shoot a good amount of time and have a nice BS to begin with. The range is a little short but they definately make it work still. Also like others have stated they have a good amount of reliable firepower that cannot explode in your face.

Compare 'em to leadbelchers. An army that is also (super) elite infantry but has the option of Ironblasters and scraplaunchers.

DukeRustfield wrote:
Compare 'em to leadbelchers. An army that is also (super) elite infantry but has the option of Ironblasters and scraplaunchers.

Leadbeltchers can move and fire, BS3, 24" range, -1 for long range.
Move 6 and hit on 5+ for long range (target that started 30" away) or hit on a 4+ for a target that started within 18".
Flamers have 18" range, but can move 12" and fire, -1 for long range, -1 for multiple shots, -1 for moving, but BS4.
Move 12 and hit on 6+(for target that started at 30" away) or 5+ for enemy that started 21" away, or 4+ if within 9".
Flamers take more to hit penalties, but can stand and fire, and are much easier to position with a much smaller foot print. Over the course of a game, I think you'll find you get more shooting out of flamers than out of leadbelchers.

As for fire support, scraplaunchers are laughable now, a small S3 template just doesn't cut it. The Iron Blasters are awesome (as is any cannon).
While daemons Don't get cannons, they do get the next best thing; 140 points for a level 2 lore master. A few shadow lore masters can more than make up for the loss of a cannon or two.

Shooty ogres are pretty scary.
@2500 I ran Slaughtermaster (maw magic), Bruiser BSB, 2x8 Iron Guts, 4x10 Gnoblars, 2x8 Lead Beltchers, 3 single cats and 2 iron blasts. Leads would walk just within range and both fire on the same unit, which would be good for ~18 or so S4 hits, then back away and fire again, then typically move up and fire at shot range. After this, they'd flee the charge, pop through the Iron Guts behind them (panic tests on 9 with re-roll), then rally to cover my flanks. Cats and gnoblars would just hold up a flank, while cannons would fire on big threats/hard targets. The 3 shooting phases would net me ~60 or so S4 hits, usually crippling 2 or 3 units, to the point where they couldn't charge or survive a charge from the iron guts.

With the new instability rules for over-run, I'm wondering if flamers and furies can provide the same type of fire power, while bloodletters and shadow heralds provide the hammer/support.

-Matt

I really don't know if you're trolling or not. Flamers suck compared to Leadbelchers. You forgot to compare one gigantic thing: CC. Which Flamers will be in at least 6" earlier than LB and people will want to engage them in because they suck at it. LB don't. You can always run up and lol at Flamers trying to hit you. LB are still going to bash your face in, just more expensively than vanilla Ogres.

A mage is a mage. Not a cannon. They aren't remotely in the same category. DoC are crap casters. Ogres are better casters than DoC are. A Butcher is a vastly better attacker, defender, and has the same bonuses to cast (though he has the option of buying bonuses, which DoC can't). He pays for all this awesomeness by just not being a loremaster. But he's also not an unstable daemon. Slaughtermasters are worth their gutts in however many Heralds you want to field.

I think 7th edition has so burned itself into people's brains that they forget that all those cheese rules are gone. DoC has 2D6 power dice and cast at +2 with a Herald, who is one of the more expensive caster Heroes in the game with no ability to get magic items. He pretty much has to be bunkered in one specific unit (can't join other Core). He has some of the most limitations of any Hero caster.

But saying someone has a caster therefore you don't need the best cannon in the game is some very odd logic. Ogres got better casters. So does that mean DoC gets Mournfangs?

Khairos is a god. When I want to win the lottery I pray to Khairos even though he's a fictional character in a game. THAT'S HOW POWERFUL HE IS. But Heralds and even LoC aren't Khairos. They aren't even in the same ballpark in the same country on the same planet.

I agree compaired to leadbelchers they are not very good. But when you don't have shooting options, taking 3 flamers or so will not hurt you. Though you are right since they have limited range they are prone to getting charged. It's all how you play them and what you have around them. They can still be a viable option but they just aren't overpowered now.