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While I enjoy the current edition of Fantasy a lot, there are two major problems I have with it (steadfast and the Magic Phase). The first is easily solved (make disruption break steadfast). The Magic Phase is harder to solve. The biggest issue (in my opinion) are the game breaking spells (Dwellers Below, Curse of the Horned Rat, Purple Sun of Xereus). The easy fix is obviously to remove these spells alltogether, or alter them so they lose the ability to be game breaking. In this thread I would like to propose an alternative to this method of 'fixing' the game breaking spells: make the result rolled on the miscast table dependent on the amount of power dice used to cast a spell (with more chance of a bad miscast result if more power dice were used in the casting attempt). The reasoning is as follows: in general, the casting value of a spell scales with its ability to influence the outcome of a game. This means that spells that will influence the game most (game breaking spells) will require more power dice to cast. Therefore adapting the miscast table to have worse results when using a lot of power dice would result in a higher risk when casting spells that influence the game more. Additionally, this change will hardly influence the risk-reward ratio for lower level spells, which are (in my opinion) fine as they are.

I would propose something like:
Roll a D6 and add the amount of power dice used when casting the spell and consult the miscast table:
3-4: D3 dice are lost from the power pool.
5-6: D6 dice are lost from the power pool.
7-8: The wizard suffers a single wound with no saves of any kind allowed.
9-10: The wizard loses D3 wizard levels and forgets a spell for every level lost (attempted spell must be the first, rest is randomized).
11+: The wizard is removed as a casualty.

How would people feel about a change like this (possibly combined with miscast being split for irresistable force again)? Would you rather just have the game breaking spells nerfed or removed?

You're proposing solutions to something you're also seemingly trying to break.

-Steadfast is a solution to elite units/monsters and makes cheapo units not worthless (if you take a big block)
-Mega spells are a solution to big blocks
-Miscasts are a solution to mega spells--and they already are dependent on the power dice used, as your chance of miscasting increases by using more dice. It's impossible to miscast using 1 die, it's pretty common on 12 dice. That's already built in. A few casters can avoid miscasts through ninja-ness, but if anything is borked, it's that, not miscasts itself, which are fairly brutal. You don't spend 300pts on a melee character and if you fail to charge successfully you have a chance of exploding.

If you can't cast mega spells and/or make it so they are punished more, casters become much weaker, dwarfs/dispellers much stronger, and huge high LD blocks are nearly impossible to take down. Horde armies also are totally screwed as they already lose every round of combat and will break with just some simply disruption.

Also, when you're framing a debate, calling something game-breaking is a bit silly. It's like you already have your mind fairly well settled just the way you're asking.

Like: "I want your guys' honest, unbiased opinion of the slow idiot dweeb who said he hates your all's guts who sits next to me."

With game breaking spells, I meant spells that can swing the entire game with a single cast. I would consider that game breaking, as it pretty much ends the game?

What you are saying is that you don't think spells like Dwellers Below, Curse of the Horned Rat and Purple Sun of Xereus need any fixing at all? They are perfectly fine as they are? If that is what you mean, can you not just say that and support that opinion? I think that the risks of casting these spells are not balanced with their rewards at all. Risk: if miscast, 1/12 of wizard dying, 1/6 of losing power levels. Reward: swing the game in your favor.

As far as your list of counters goes:
-Steadfast being stopped by disruption does not make cheap units worse against Monsters, they can't disrupt. It only makes them worse against elite units that aren't fighting them in the front. Flanking a horde with a smaller (more elite) army isn't that easy. This change, in my opinion, would make cavalry more useful again.
-I dont know which mega spells you are talking about, but the spells that can influence the outcome of the game with a single cast that I am talking about (Dwellers / Purple Sun / Curse of the Horned Rat) do not counter units like Goblins / Slaves.
-Yes the chance of miscasting is higher when using more power dice. I don't agree with you that the miscast table is already fairly brutal though. There is a 1/12 chance of your wizard exploding and a 1/6 chance of him losing wizard levels. That is it. The rest of the miscast results will not nearly impact the game as much as succesfully casting one of the strongest spells will. I think that last sentence should be: You don't spend 300pts on a melee character.


Yes if you can't cast mega spells and/or make it so that they are punished more that will nerf casters. That is the entire point here. In my opinion, some spells influence the game to such a degree that they either need to be nerfed or have larger risks to attempting to cast them.

Airmaniac wrote:With game breaking spells, I meant spells that can swing the entire game with a single cast. I would consider that game breaking, as it pretty much ends the game?

I know you consider it game breaking. But you're assuming other people do. And obviously a publicly-traded company's worth of folks do not. Saying, "Do you think overpowered war machines are overpowered?" is not how you frame an objective question.

can you not just say that and support that opinion.

Reward: swing the game in your favor.

I did.
Everything can swing the game in your favor. Magic is the only one that can kill you doing it and have absolutely no beneficial effect whatsoever. Well, except for stuff like TK entombed where you try and place your units and they die...

they can't disrupt

Anything can disrupt. The larger the horde (and better the steadfast) the easier it is to disrupt, because it's got giant flanks. Monsters don't need to disrupt, you just need anything to disrupt, and every race has something, and a monster will face rape any amount of horde infantry a zillion:1. Which is why steadfast was created. That's why GW added it. Because unit types that were meant to win wars of attrition didn't have a chance against high-hitting enemies because they would break and get destroyed. We already did that model and it didn't work.

-I dont know which mega spells you are talking about, but the spells that can influence the outcome of the game with a single cast that I am talking about (Dwellers / Purple Sun / Curse of the Horned Rat) do not counter units like Goblins / Slaves.

Save or die regardless of number counters hordes. Yes, it does. It counters any large block. You get more bang for killing elites but it can make 300 slaves just as dead as 30 ogres. Stuff like final transmutation and dwellers.

There is a 1/12 chance of your wizard exploding and a 1/6 chance of him losing wizard levels. That is it.

Okay, next time you take a swing with an attack char, you have a 1/12th chance of dying. Not much, right? Remember, the spell doesn't even have to have a useful outcome. Not only that, but they may not even have access to the spell. So even before the creation of the character, you're hoping you get it to base your GAME BREAKING strategy upon. You don't have to roll off for your cc character to see if he's able to use weapons. If you roll bad on winds of magic you can't cast jack, boxcars or not. There's a whole lot more variability than what you're saying. If you're only looking at the worst aspect of miscasts as the ONLY deterent to mega spells, it's probably not enough, but that's not all that exists by a long shot.

Yes if you can't cast mega spells and/or make it so that they are punished more that will nerf casters. That is the entire point here. In my opinion, some spells influence the game to such a degree that they either need to be nerfed or have larger risks to attempting to cast them.

People seemed to think that a lot in the beginning of 8th. OMG THESE THINGS KILL EVERYTHING. Well, don't make big blocks. But big blocks are insanely powerful. Read these forums. There are innordinately more posts asking how to counter ______star than how to counter mega spells. A chosenstar or guttstar or whatever is not going to be beatable without mega spells or lots of war machines, which not every race has. I don't watch a ton of tournaments but of the last few big tourney winners I saw, exactly 0% were won with mega spells and 100% were clashes between blocks of at least some size. That tells me the generals, who are likely way better than me, did not consider the investment in mages and gamble that is mega spells to be a worthwhile path to victory. And their victory seemed to back that up. Can mega spells change the game? Sure. So can lots of stuff. But you don't nerf every high risk and reward strategy in the game.

It's fine that your opinion is that these super spells don't need to get nerfed, you are entitled to your opinion, but this thread was about: if the super spells need to be nerfed (which in my opinion they do), could changing the miscast table be a 'better' way to do it then simply removing the spell, or making the spell less powerful? So far all that you have posted is: they don't need to be altered at all! Which I, and a lot of others, disagree with.

On a side note:
-I don't agree with you that Dwellers counters Slaves. If you want to cast it on a 50 man slave block to get rid of 50 points, be my guest, but the risks just aren't worth it. Same goes for Final Transmutation.
-Everything can swing the game in your favor, but nothing can swing it as badly with a single action then the super spells can (in my opinion).
-It's a 1/12 chance when you have already miscasted, not everytime you cast, meaning the super spell has already gone of irresistably before the 1/12 chance, swinging the game. Now you just need to survive the 1/12 risk, you are considerably ahead.
-We didn't already do that model (with steadfast, but disruption breaking steadfast). In 7th there was no steadfast against frontal charges either. You might like the charge and grind tactics, but tactics that are based around swiftly picking of units out of position (like the Wood Elves employed before steadfast) have been completely erased by steadfast and I think the middle ground (requiring disruption to achieve breaking steadfast quickly) could be a good solution to allow for these kind of tactics once again, while not making grinding units useless (just don't get flanked).

Airmaniac wrote:This thread was about: if the super spells need to be nerfed (which in my opinion they do), could changing the miscast table be a 'better' way to do it then simply removing the spell, or making the spell less powerful? So far all that you have posted is: they don't need to be altered at all! Which I, and a lot of others, disagree with.

This thread is whatever anyone wants it to be about. You WANTED it to be about let's all agree mega spells are breaking the game and then how should we fix it. But we can talk about how mega spells are the best thing since puppies. That's what happens in conversations.

-I don't agree with you that Dwellers counters Slaves. If you want to cast it on a 50 man slave block to get rid of 50 points, be my guest, but the risks just aren't worth it. Same goes for Final Transmutation.

No one is scared of 50 man slaves. They will be gone in a blink. 200 man slaves (they cost 2 points each, minimum) is 400pts.

-Everything can swing the game in your favor, but nothing can swing it as badly with a single action then the super spells can (in my opinion).

Maybe you're right. But if you remove them there will be a NEW tactic that can swing it as badly with a single action. Such as war machines with their explosion charts. Do you keep nerfing everything that isn't infantry?

-It's a 1/12 chance when you have already miscasted, not everytime you cast, meaning the super spell has already gone of irresistably before the 1/12 chance, swinging the game. Now you just need to survive the 1/12 risk, you are considerably ahead.

You're assuming a gigantic amount of things that simply don't exist. For that mage to be even viable, to fit into your game breaking strategy, they need that spell and they need power dice. If they don't get them, everything else is irrelevant.

We did it without steadfast. And we needed it because who race's worth of Core were useless.

If you don't want to converse about a topic that is proposed by someone who posts a thread, then you don't have to reply. You keep writing about things that I don't have the need to converse about. Proposed rules are thought experiments only. I like talking about what would make the game more enjoyable for me. I don't enjoy the super spells in their current form, so I post a thread with a possible change to the game that might make it more enjoyable for me (and others who do not enjoy the super spells in their current form). You are continuously replying that the current rules are fine, but if I don't enjoy the current rules, that is not fine for me.

I am no longer going to reply to all your other off topic statements which go against anything that I have seen while playing this game (units of 200 slaves a regular slave unit size anyone?).

The issue we had here was that these spells were too hard to counter. It felt like you could just throw 6 dice at it and garuntee getting one off each game. With 6 dice you have a 20% chance to irresistable. And despite how the rules state that these spells are harder to get off and control, it felt like it was too easy to control. Miscasts were intended to make irresistables catastrophic back but more often than its supposed to, it doesn't hurt.

My solution? Irresistables and miscasts require triple sixes on spells with casting value of 15+. This simple change makes these spells harder to irresistable and easier to dispell without making a new, overly complex system to deal with.

The simplest change would be to not have IF. You still miscast on double 6s*, but the spell doesn't work automatically, meaning it can be dispelled by the opposing caster or a scroll. Suddenly getting the big spells cast is that much harder, as the enemy has a fair bit of resistance.


The other option is to change the ranges of a few of the big spells. A classic example is Dweller's, which is supposed to be limited by its short range of 12". This is quite good design as it means you get one chance to cast this before combat begins, unless the player has positioned his wizard very cleverly. The problem being you can go for the 24" version, which is enough range to reach almost everything by the end of the first player's turn 1 movement. As a result you can expect to see Dweller's cast every turn until the wizard dies or the game ends.

Giving all of these spells are tighter range restriction would greatly restrict the number of times they're cast in a single match, reducing their impact. They'd still be a major threat to any deathstar unit, in which case the ability of an army with multiple smaller units to get their wizard on the flank of the deathstar in range with the powerful spell would be an interesting match.

One of the guiding principles of 8th when they redo books is that they are standardized. If ALL high lvl spells are too powerful, make changes to affect them all such as Stoupe suggested. Because you still have weirdo army books like DoC and WoC and Skaven with their own mega spells--and ranges. And then we're back to FAQing a dozen spells.

You obviously need the spells or even threat of spells to break up mega blocks. If the idea is that they are cast too easily without penalty off the cuff you can:

-IF on 3 6's. Not sure why 15+ is a requirement. They are still trying to IF, maybe just not a big spell. But if the cost of spells change, then this rule isn't as valid.
-Miscast on 3 1's AND if you IF. So you can still 2 dice stuff without fear. But the more dice, you run the risk of IF/Miscast and a pure miscast.
-Can only throw as many spell dice as your spell level +1 (so lvl 1's aren't useless). To throw another you must pass a T test and failure = lost powerdice.

I think the spells are very scary. I think they're not nearly as scary as a lol block of Saurus with regeneration though.

DukeRustfield wrote:One of the guiding principles of 8th when they redo books is that they are standardized. If ALL high lvl spells are too powerful, make changes to affect them all such as Stoupe suggested. Because you still have weirdo army books like DoC and WoC and Skaven with their own mega spells--and ranges. And then we're back to FAQing a dozen spells.

You obviously need the spells or even threat of spells to break up mega blocks.

I obviously agree. I was looking for a quick and easy way to effect the majority of spells. However theres a reason I picked the way I suggested.

-IF on 3 6's. Not sure why 15+ is a requirement. They are still trying to IF, maybe just not a big spell. But if the cost of spells change, then this rule isn't as valid.

15+ casting value is a general guideline. Most 15+ spells are the game changers. They are harder to control and cast. Yet more often than not, irresistabling on these spells are more beneficial to the user then debilitating. This is not true on easier to cast spells. An IF on Invocation or Enfeebling Foe is not exactly so good that the miscast table doesn't make up (more often than not, especially at low levels more than making up for it).

If I have a 20% chance of irresistabling on invocation of nehek is it worth using 6 dice to cast it? Nah, i'd rather use 4 dice and have an average of 16 casting value with a 13% chance or so (don't know the exact percentage on the top of my head) of miscast. If you look, most level 6 spells are cast on 15+. Infact, only Light and Fire have a level 6 that isn't 15+ (but can be upgraded to 15+).

You could apply the triple 6s to spells that aren't 15+, however this might encourage more spells being cast with max dice thrown, which isn't the intent of the rule. Irresistabling a lower level spell may hurt an army just as much as benefiting an army.

-Miscast on 3 1's AND if you IF. So you can still 2 dice stuff without fear. But the more dice, you run the risk of IF/Miscast and a pure miscast.

Would work as well. I don't like the threat of miscasting without getting the spell off though. The issue is alot of the miscast table not only hurts the caster, but the people around the caster. It makes sense that miscasting and not getting the spell off would hurt the caster... But why would it cause an explosion that feths everyone else up?

-Can only throw as many spell dice as your spell level +1 (so lvl 1's aren't useless). To throw another you must pass a T test and failure = lost powerdice

.
I think spell generation is too random for you to allow this. If I could pick which spells my level 1 knows, and garuntee my level 4s know the more difficult to cast spells, I think this would be a great solution. However this is not the case. There are just times when my level 1 or level 2 is stuck with my number 6 spell. Its already more difficult for me to get it off (+1 casting vs +4 dispell). Why punish this further? The issue is not that these spells are too easy to get off. The issue is that these spells are so good that irresistabling is more beneficial then hurtful.

15+ is just an arbitrary number. They tailor spell casting values to each army. Ogres get trollguts on 12, which is probably the most powerful spell in their book realistically. There isn't one spell in the DoC book that is >13 I think and only one in WoC.

The point is, as I said, you want to make it standard. The casting values in each army book are custom to that army, such as the relative cost of their mages, whether they will be casting lots of small spells (such as VC and TK). If there was only BRB spells it would be a little easier.

Again, I'm not especially convinced mega spells or IF is too powerful, but if you want to curtail it, I believe you should do it in an agnostic manner. 15+ would literally have no effect on some armies.

DukeRustfield wrote:One of the guiding principles of 8th when they redo books is that they are standardized. If ALL high lvl spells are too powerful, make changes to affect them all such as Stoupe suggested. Because you still have weirdo army books like DoC and WoC and Skaven with their own mega spells--and ranges. And then we're back to FAQing a dozen spells.

Fair point, but it's also pretty clear the game is a constant work in progress, with a stream of updates every time a new army or even an FAQ is released. Putting in place a change to the BRB spell to change the ranges of big spells might not fix up the issues with the powerful spells in other books, but we all know that GW will continue releasing new army books, and so those spells will also all get fixed in time.

You obviously need the spells or even threat of spells to break up mega blocks.

Yeah, I know, I never said otherwise. Which is why I looked at options that didn't reduce the power of these spells, instead considering removing IF, or possibly making the use of those spells more situational.

I think the spells are very scary. I think they're not nearly as scary as a lol block of Saurus with regeneration though.

At some point there probably needs to be a discussion on whether the mega spells are really the healthiest way, in terms of game design, to limit the power of deathstar units. But as long as army design remains as it does, I agree they mega-spells are needed.

I'd just like for there to be a little more of a game involved in whether or not the big spells goes off. Right now it really is roll six dice, hope for IF, if you don't get it see him use his dispell scroll (or roll six dice in reply if he has them and you rolled low enough). Next turn try again. If it comes off you've probably delivered a big enough blow to that enemy unit to make it manageable enough for your combat units, if you haven't then you need to redirect/anvil it as best you can.

The problem is that there is really very little tactical flair to be found in that 'roll a mess of dice, hope for IF' game, and when it plays such a huge part in the outcome of a game that's a problem. Away from the mega-spells there's plenty of skill to be found in the magic phase, and I've had a lot of really interesting coversation with opponents after games about the order in which they attempted their more mundane spells, and which ones he was hoping I would burn some dice to dispell and which ones I wouldn't. All of that goes out the window when you get to the bigger spells, because it just becomes 'cast this and be very likely to win, fail and be very likely to lose'.

DukeRustfield wrote:15+ is just an arbitrary number. They tailor spell casting values to each army. Ogres get trollguts on 12, which is probably the most powerful spell in their book realistically. There isn't one spell in the DoC book that is >13 I think and only one in WoC.

It wasn't exactly arbitrary. I actually looked at the spells I was afraid of in the brb and compared casting values of them. I did 15+ because that was the lowest of the uber bad spells. Ogres number 6 spell while potent I don't find to be overly powerful. Infernal gateway is 15+, I'm afraid of that. Dwellers is 18+ I believe.

Honestly I picked 15 because it works. It works for our house rules too. Some level six spells are good but not oh my gawd good spells. But the ones that are, tend to have a higher casting value. 14+ may work for you. Or 13+. It doesn't for our gaming group because together we sat down and looked at those spells and said "well the miscast could be just as bad for those spells as the IF. They are fine."

The point is, as I said, you want to make it standard. The casting values in each army book are custom to that army, such as the relative cost of their mages, whether they will be casting lots of small spells (such as VC and TK). If there was only BRB spells it would be a little easier.

Again, I'm not especially convinced mega spells or IF is too powerful, but if you want to curtail it, I believe you should do it in an agnostic manner. 15+ would literally have no effect on some armies.

Honestly I'm not trying to make it standard. It's just what's worked for me. Yes it has no effect on some armies. But I've found that the new lores that have come out are actually balanced for the most part. The only exception to this is the BRB lores and the two number six spells in the OaG book (while foot of gork is unlikely to do it, we all know stories of it falling 10 times in a row on an opponent.)

Ymmv. We just found through play testing a bunch of armies that 15+ tends to apply to spells with the most hurt.

Look through the list of spells that your afraid of that IF for yourself and apply it to your games.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I actually don't believe it was intended for people to use those spells the way they are. I don't think gw realized that it was a 1 in 5 chance to irresistable on 6 dice. However that's another discussion entirely.

Mega spells are necessary. Don't get me wrong. I just want to be able to throw dice at preventing it!

Stoupe wrote:I actually don't believe it was intended for people to use those spells the way they are. I don't think gw realized that it was a 1 in 5 chance to irresistable on 6 dice.

I am fairly sure they intended it. They got paid-to-play testers after all. I can't imagine how many games are played in GW. But when 8th came out the stuff that stood out in my mind was

steadfast
stomp/thunderstomp
mega spells
miscast table

It's like a wheel balancing each other. I didn't believe the 6th spell rumors until I actually got my hands on it, and I was like how can anything withstand this? Then steadfast seemed almost like an addendum someone forgot, OH btw... Then people came up with the ideas of ____stars for hammer/anvils and point-protection. Which seemed unbeatable until you realized a unit was any size unit and those 6th spells kill em all. I only hear about mega blocks now in terms of fodder or super elites like Chosen, because their attributes are so stupidly good they can withstand the 6th spells. But initiative/str tests had to be there for a reason, it's not a hero or monster killer (maybe init), but you're not going to throw that many dice at a monster anyway. The only time it's cost-effective in terms of risk is when you're going after a crapload of points that can't resist it.

Stoupe wrote:Most 15+ spells are the game changers. They are harder to control and cast. Yet more often than not, irresistabling on these spells are more beneficial to the user then debilitating. This is not true on easier to cast spells. An IF on Invocation or Enfeebling Foe is not exactly so good that the miscast table doesn't make up (more often than not, especially at low levels more than making up for it).

This is exactly the reason of the original post. I figured changing the miscast table to be based on amount of power dice used in the cast would make IF less beneficial for the bigger spells (compared to the current form), but make IF slightly more beneficial for the smaller spells.

DukeRustField wrote:IF on 3 6's. Not sure why 15+ is a requirement. They are still trying to IF, maybe just not a big spell. But if the cost of spells change, then this rule isn't as valid.

I agree that there probably shouldn't be a 15+ requirement on trying to IF. As Stoupe mentioned earlier, you often don't actually want to IF the lower level spells, so making IF on triple 6's would actually be a slight buff to these lower level spells. The problem I have with this option is that you don't actually fix the part where IF is so much more useful than the miscast is harmful for the mega spells. The chance of it happening is much lower though, so I could see why this would be an improvement (if you are trying to reduce the power of the mega spells).

DukeRustField wrote:-Can only throw as many spell dice as your spell level +1 (so lvl 1's aren't useless). To throw another you must pass a T test and failure = lost powerdice

.
The overall effect of this change would be the same as making IF appear on triple 6's (less IF), but in addition mega spells will fail cast more. Sounds good to me, the only problem (in my opinion) would be the slightl nerf to lower level wizards compared to the higher level wizards. I don't know why you would allow for a T test to add an extra dice. This would just nerf the armies with lower thoughness wizards compared to armies with higher thoughness wizards.


Side note to Stoupe: IF on 6 dice is actually a 26% chance, so slightly more than 1 in 4.

DukeRustfield wrote:

Stoupe wrote:I actually don't believe it was intended for people to use those spells the way they are. I don't think gw realized that it was a 1 in 5 chance to irresistable on 6 dice.

I am fairly sure they intended it. They got paid-to-play testers after all. I can't imagine how many games are played in GW. But when 8th came out the stuff that stood out in my mind was

steadfast
stomp/thunderstomp
mega spells
miscast table

It's like a wheel balancing each other. I didn't believe the 6th spell rumors until I actually got my hands on it, and I was like how can anything withstand this? Then steadfast seemed almost like an addendum someone forgot, OH btw... Then people came up with the ideas of ____stars for hammer/anvils and point-protection. Which seemed unbeatable until you realized a unit was any size unit and those 6th spells kill em all. I only hear about mega blocks now in terms of fodder or super elites like Chosen, because their attributes are so stupidly good they can withstand the 6th spells. But initiative/str tests had to be there for a reason, it's not a hero or monster killer (maybe init), but you're not going to throw that many dice at a monster anyway. The only time it's cost-effective in terms of risk is when you're going after a crapload of points that can't resist it.

I think your over-estimating the amount of playtesting GW does prior to releasing content. I think when they wrote the rule they realized that more dice would cause IF to happen more often, but didn't realize HOW often. But this is a topic for another day/thread.

Airmaniac wrote:

Stoupe wrote:Most 15+ spells are the game changers. They are harder to control and cast. Yet more often than not, irresistabling on these spells are more beneficial to the user then debilitating. This is not true on easier to cast spells. An IF on Invocation or Enfeebling Foe is not exactly so good that the miscast table doesn't make up (more often than not, especially at low levels more than making up for it).

This is exactly the reason of the original post. I figured changing the miscast table to be based on amount of power dice used in the cast would make IF less beneficial for the bigger spells (compared to the current form), but make IF slightly more beneficial for the smaller spells.

DukeRustField wrote:IF on 3 6's. Not sure why 15+ is a requirement. They are still trying to IF, maybe just not a big spell. But if the cost of spells change, then this rule isn't as valid.

I agree that there probably shouldn't be a 15+ requirement on trying to IF. As Stoupe mentioned earlier, you often don't actually want to IF the lower level spells, so making IF on triple 6's would actually be a slight buff to these lower level spells. The problem I have with this option is that you don't actually fix the part where IF is so much more useful than the miscast is harmful for the mega spells. The chance of it happening is much lower though, so I could see why this would be an improvement (if you are trying to reduce the power of the mega spells).

I read this an laughed. So you agree that the 15+ spells are the game changers. They are the spells that are causing issues, right? Yet you don't think that the rule your trying to create should just apply to them? Thats the point! The game changing spells have the issue, so make the ruling only apply the the issue!

While it doesn't fix the part where IF is more useful then harmful, It lowers the probability alot. While it still can happen, it won't happen often. The threat isn't there. I can throw every die I have at something small. This changes the game alot. Mostly because I know players who at small games, won't even use up their power pools because they're afraid of miscasting (VC/TK players especially won't at small matches).

I have 10 dice this turn in a 1,000 point game where I only have 2 vampires and 3 spells. I'll use 4 dice on 2 castings of nehek, and then sure I'll cast 6 dice at the big version of my number one spell! Why not? I got nothing else to do with the dice and the threat of miscasting isn't there anymore. If the threat of miscasting that spell is still there, I'd likely have only thrown 3 or 4 dice at the spell and debated the odds of even getting off the big version of the spell. It is too risky for me when I only have 2 vampires.

When somethings a problem, you fix the problem in the easiest solution possible, without effecting the balance of things that are already balanced.

@Stoupe
I never actually said that I agree that only 15+ spells are the game changers. I agree that balance changes are best made by changing the rules in such a way that they don't have an influence on things that are already balanced. Your proposed method doesn't do this either. Any spells that are 15+ casting value that didn't need a balance change will get screwed in comparison to the spells with a casting value less than 15+. Additionally, as DukeRustField mentioned, the rule limits balancing changes to spell casting values (as the same rules don't apply to all spells). Also, this change is very unfluffy. Why would wizards miscast more on spells that are easier to cast than on spells that are harder to cast?

If you ever played the horribleness that was 7th edition then you will see how 8th isn't so bad.

7th magic spells were not game breakers individually, but you could spam SO much magic it wasn't funny. I'm talking about 25+ magic dice in a single phase, probably opposing only 4-5 dispel dice. Then the same army gets a similer number of Dispel dice in your phase so you arn't getting any magic either.

7th also had the rediclous case of monsters charging in, winning combat by 1 or 2, auto-breaking the enemy because of Fear/Terror and running them down. And if the enemy was higher inititive then you then you probably wouldn't even get to strike blows.

@Grey Templar
I fail to see how your post is connected to the topic of this thread. I agree that 8th edition is a better edition than 7th edition (though you are making it seem a lot worse than it was), but what does that have to do with changes to the balance of super spells in 8th edition?

He may have just been reminiscing, but it was also what I was saying earlier a bit. All those items are interlinked in that they counterbalance each other. Mega spell>block>steadfast>monster etc. If you start tweaking one of those components too much, the others will gain an advantage. I.e., per his post, if steadfast simply went away, Monsters would once again be able to crush and break truly gigantic blocks without problem--especially now with Tstomp.

DukeRustfield wrote:I am fairly sure they intended it. They got paid-to-play testers after all. I can't imagine how many games are played in GW.

There's a difference between having people play games, and having someone actually sit down and do the numbers on a thing. Especially with a thing that's going to come up in general play a couple of times a game, if that, then seeing IF come off a lot can be written off as statistical noise.

It'd only be when you sit down and realise that if you throw six dice at thing then its going to happen about a quarter of the time, which is maybe about twice as often as it should. Upon seeing that number, it'd prompt any game design team to go back and look at the numbers, and start to look at the various designs that are possible given the high chance of IF going off - they might ask for instance if it was wise to have a RIP spell that ignores the miscast effects of IF on a 2+ in the same magic group as a powerful 'kill everything that fails a strength check spell'.

While I commend GW for most everything they did in the design of 8th ed, it's pretty clear they didn't fully grasp how often an army list geared to firing off IF 6th spells could do so.

It's like a wheel balancing each other. I didn't believe the 6th spell rumors until I actually got my hands on it, and I was like how can anything withstand this? Then steadfast seemed almost like an addendum someone forgot, OH btw... Then people came up with the ideas of ____stars for hammer/anvils and point-protection. Which seemed unbeatable until you realized a unit was any size unit and those 6th spells kill em all. I only hear about mega blocks now in terms of fodder or super elites like Chosen, because their attributes are so stupidly good they can withstand the 6th spells. But initiative/str tests had to be there for a reason, it's not a hero or monster killer (maybe init), but you're not going to throw that many dice at a monster anyway. The only time it's cost-effective in terms of risk is when you're going after a crapload of points that can't resist it.

I think a lot of this balancing actually starts to come through naturally, once you start building genuinely unique units. That is, once you had units that could, through ranks and sheer number of wounds, reliably stay in combat against units with elite killing power then a natural balance starts to form in the game. That is, you can't just take elite killy units and break the enemy in the first turn, because those units can get tarpitted. Nor can you just take masses of crap troops, because you need to actually break the enemy. As such, good army lists start to be about balancing those two elements.

Once you have that natural balance, then options like those powerful sixth spells start to find their own balanced place within the game. Having seen what GW have been attempting with their two main games in the last couple of editions I'm inclined to give them credit for setting this system up intentionally (they tried to make troops similarly unique with the objective capturing rules in 5th ed). But having played GW games for two decades I'm not inclined to give them any more credit than that - I've played through so many games where its clear they simply didn't do the maths, and didn't realise how certain mechanics would work in play.

I could see them going, look, let's give Life something smashy since it has such fluffy Life stuff in it. But we'll make it their ultimate because it will be rarely cast. Yah, but throne of vines description should end with, "oh, and you win." TK/VC/Ogres have good Life-like lists and there's nothing remotely like Throne in there or even Dwellers.

Making lists even in 7th was a lot easier. You HAD to have some stuff. You can see it with Daemons now. You can pretty much guess what 80% of a competitive DoC army will have. But the new TK/Ogre/OnG you can really go some wacky wild ways and still be competitive.

DukeRustfield wrote:Making lists even in 7th was a lot easier. You HAD to have some stuff. You can see it with Daemons now. You can pretty much guess what 80% of a competitive DoC army will have. But the new TK/Ogre/OnG you can really go some wacky wild ways and still be competitive.

Yeah, making lists in 7th was easier, and picking the winner of a game before it was played was even easier. Not just because one list was just stronger, but because there were a lot of match ups where one list just lined up really well against someone else's.

Now that's a lot less easy to predict, because you can look at units and say 'well they'll win combat every round, but this other unit is steadfast, if he can keep his general/bsb alive and nearby he should make the LD checks and grind him down', among all kinds of other match up options. And magic used to be a case of counting up the dice, whoever had more was likely to dominate magic, and the other player might as well have had no magic. These days anything can happen once you get into the game.

Airmaniac wrote:@Grey Templar
I fail to see how your post is connected to the topic of this thread. I agree that 8th edition is a better edition than 7th edition (though you are making it seem a lot worse than it was), but what does that have to do with changes to the balance of super spells in 8th edition?

My point is that magic is just fine in this edition considering what 7th had.

The whole concept here is cool, but there actually is already a mechanic that makes casting more dice at a spell more risky. The chance of a Miscast goes up exponentially with each additional dice rolled.


Maybe a better idea would be something along the lines of "If you roll a miscast and 5+ dice were used to cast the spell, your opponent may add or subtract one from your roll on the miscast table if he wishes"