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 NinthMusketeer wrote:

ERJAK wrote:

auticus wrote:
The -1 to hit charcters coming up in 2.0 is a positive change that I liked, though not far enough, I viewed it as a compromise.

There are pretty much a solid two house rules that I currently insist on to do AOS. Resolve those two issues and have iit so I don't have to houserule anymore and that'd be great:

* shooting through terrain gives a -1 penalty to hit

* shooting into a melee also gives a -1 penalty to hit. I used to have it where you randomized hits into your buddies but then to make it just easier and not need a second roll, the penalty to hit was acceptable. (that was a compromise on my part to at least make it more difficult to hit into combat)

These stack to a max of -3. These have worked for the most part quite well. Most (80% or so) shots are not penalized at all since they are not in cover fully or not in combat. It makes terrain and cover matter a bit, and also influenced lists to not just be static gunlines. Both things I viewed as positive and the campaign guys (not the powergamers that hate houserules) were all for it because it made the game "make more sense" to everyone (there's a reason I've been able to do this for over 20 years, there are a lot of people that like those type of rules, the problem has always been the minmax guys hate houserules but want to do public campaigns for some reason even though they aren't tournaments)

The other issues I have with AOS are their point system and those being broken, with things like focusing on spamming mortal wounds and the like making casual games not fun, but that issue is in every game (powergaming vs casual) so I just accept that as part of needing to screen powergamers out of casual campaigns if they can't reign it in.

I guess if you're not playing competitively(and especially if you're not using points) these would work, but honestly shooting is pretty underwhelming these days. There are only 4 armies that can have shooting as a strategy and 2 of those armies(mixed order and Tzeentch) have stronger builds focusing on combat/magic and the other 2(kharadron and to a MUCH lesser extent Kunnin Ruck) have fallen off massively. Things like Judicators and Kurnoths still see success, but they're not particularly powerful, just consistently useful. In a competitive environment, these changes, especially if they were combined with the other changes this edition, would limit shooting to basically just 1-2 units of skyfires. They also combo with other things oddly. You could make an entire DoK Army -2 up to -4 to shooting from turn 2 on(assuming good terrain, competitively built armies tend to hit combat bottom of 1 top of 2 or sooner depending on the list.) with their characters being -4 or -5 and Morathi topping out at -6. You could get a stardrake to -5 as well.

If it works for your group, more power to ya though.

Auticus' house rules don't cause a problem for shooting in general, they just make it harder to shoot stuff if it is in combat or behind cover. Shooting players have perfectly valid options to shoot without a -3 penalty by not shooting at the thing in combat behind two forests, which was dumb they could do in the first place. If something is not behind terrain and not in combat, no penalty, which is going to be most units most of the time. You are assuming worst case scenario for everything all of the time coupled with stacking explicitly beyond the limit he set, which completely fictional situation that you only invented to make the argument work. Once you clear away the lies it isn't nearly as bad a penalty to shooting.

And again, I raise the question of how well mono-melee armies are performing. It isn't good.

And I raise the question of how mono-shooting armies are doing, and it's even worse. Mono-magic armies are pretty bad too. Maybe it's the 'Mono' part of those that's actually the problem. Shooting is a tool that a lot of lists utilize but it's mostly for reaching over stuff, not it's own damage. Outside of Skyfires, and fully buffed freeguild long-gunners, most Shooting units have actually abysmal output relative to their point cost. That bastiladon everyone is so afraid of all of a sudden? Does an average of 3 damage per turn to a 4+ save for 280pts. To put that into perspective a unit of liberators with a grand hammer would hit any 5 wound character for about the same amount of damage. In fact, the best shooting in the game comes from units that get it as an ancillary benefit, like vulkite berzerkers

And what planet do you play on that your stuff isn't in combat or behind cover most of the time when it gets -1 to shoot for being behind a rock? Most good armies are entirely in combat or in cover by the end of their turn two. Even if you can't take advantage of the bonuses for your whole army, you can certainly guard your characters, and shooting units that can't hit high value targets are essentially there for moral support.

Again, the rule is narratively focused, so it's fine. Do what you want. But it's a preference change, not a balance one.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

auticus wrote:
Three bastilladon are what you get with what we know and with bastilladon being 18 points to summon.

They revealed up to 12 points. Its not a huge stretch to put bastilladon at 18 points as the next tier up from what they revealed.

At 18 points you can get one in turn 2, turn 3, and turn 5.
Slaan gets 11-13 points a turn or 12 on average. Kroak gets 13-15 points a turn or 14 on average.

Turn 1 - 12 pts
Turn 2 - 24 pts (then 18 on bastilladon #1) leaves 6
Turn 3 - 18 pts (bastilladon #2)
Turn 4 - 12 pts
Turn 5 - 30 pts (bastilladon #3)

Considering that a bastilladon has its 2+ save that really can't be modified and 12 wounds, they hold up quite a bit (I have yet to see a seraphon player not buy 2 of them in their army not even counting summoning). You use them to tie up whatever nasty melee units they can and push the saurus line to hold lighter units.

Now cast mystic shield on your bastilladon as well so they are re-rolling ones (new mystic shield) and you have the 2++ bastilladon that ignores rend, and you want as many as you can get on the table because they are the ultimate tanking unit.

The counter to this is you have to have a lot of ranged attacks to hit the slaan and you need ranged mortal wounds en masse.

A teleporting stormcast army won't really sweat much of this.

I had to fight this army last year in our patth to glory finals (narrative, so no matched play limitation on summoning) and it was a beast. Lord Kroak was summoned in turn 5 on doubles and won him the game single handedly but I ended up killing 3 bastilladons and had a 4th down to half its wounds.

Those by themselves held most of my army up (nurgle).

You're deliberately choosing the least like point value range(18-24) over the more likely value(24-30) to make your point sound bigger than it is. A squad of Terradons is 120, a skink starpriest is 80, that averages out to the 12pt slot being for 100pts(ish) of models. The 6pt slot is 45pts on average.

This means that the rough exchange rate is around 9ish-pts per summoning point. A bastildon is 280pts so it should be in the 30pt bracket. Now this is certainly circumstantial, but it's a whole lot more valid than 'i think it's 18 because GW are the dumzz.'

Paul Conti did a mathhammer video on YouTube where he breaks down the points value of summoning with contagion points with Nurgle. It came out to about 8.5 points per contagion point with a bias towards the expensive stuff being better value. The idea being that stuff you save up for and bring on later will have less of an impact on the game.
It is interesting that the Seraphon table has a similar value

The idea that you can get past all of that and still be worried about 'muh immersion' is the craziest part.

Just because a world has dragons and wizards in it doesn't mean that all "muh immersion" should just be hand waived, I still expect the world to function mechanically how it does in the books and movies. Thats the entire reason why I play.

Again, the rule is narratively focused, so it's fine. Do what you want. But it's a preference change, not a balance one

Its a rule that exists in some form or fashion in pretty much every other wargame that was ever written because it makes sense. "balance" is a word that means many things to many people. Cover rules aren't written for balance no. They are written to give meaning to terrain and to make movements more important as well as positioning. Magic isn't needed for balance. Its written intto a fantasy setting because people expect there to be magic, but its not for balance reasons. Dragons aren't needed for balance. They are written into a fantasy setting because they are fantastical creatures and are a preference. We could just as easily not have dragons. Siege rules and rules for taking cover behind fortifications aren't needed for balance, but if wanting to play out a siege scenario are a preference. Honestly terrain isn't needed either. In a lot of games that are "wargames" from the boardgame or card game variety there is no terrain. Terrain is there because its expected and makes sense to exist, but not from a balance standpoint. We could just as easily play a miniature game with no terrain (and well thats not far off from how a lot of tournament tables are anyway)

I don't think there's anything else more to be gained by discussing that particular topic as things are moving into inflammatory and personal and there's nothing more to be gained by discussing it. You don't like it? Cool. I'm not after a 100% approval rating, I've been around long enough to know that any given rule will have people that don't like it. And AOS upped the ante for nonsensical rules being ok because its just a game and created a pretty deep rift (or exposed the already existing rift since up until AOS, these type of nonsensical rules in a wargame weren't really a thing)

You're deliberately choosing the least like point value range(18-24) over the more likely value(24-30) to make your point sound bigger than it is.

I think its well understood that none of know the true value, so the scenario I laid out was if they went the lower value because thats what GW often times does. Especially if they are going to say slaan SHOULD have better magic and summoning because SLAAN. Its not out of the ball park that they'd do that at all. Especially for a model that only has 8 wounds and a 3+ save that can't be made into 2+ now.

It could very well be 24 or 30. I will believe baby jesus and santa will come screaming from the sky today before I believe GW will put a bastilladon @ 30 but hey its possible. Great Unclean Ones are 28. I think a Bastilladon at 24 is probably too high when compared to the greatt unclean one's cost, comparing the two stat lines, so thats why I think its likely 18 instead of 24.

It came out to about 8.5 points per contagion point with a bias towards the expensive stuff being better value. The idea being that stuff you save up for and bring on later will have less of an impact on the game.

From a free summons standpoint there is a bellcurve of effectiveness. Bringing in a greater demon on turn 4 of a 4-5 turn game is largely pointless, so yeah saving up for a greater demon in a 4-5 turn game if you can't get it out by turn 3 would be largely a waste.

Artefacts of the Realms from Warhammer Community.

When you’re writing your army list, you have the option to pick a Realm for your army to be from. Perhaps your Freeguild hail from Hammerhal Aqsha, in Aqshy, or perhaps your Slaves to Darkness raid the distant outskirts of Ghur. As well as providing you with loads of opportunities for roleplaying (not to mention painting and converting), you’ll be able to replace one of your normal Artefact picks with a special artefact from your chosen realm.

Each of the seven Mortal Realms has 6 magical weapons and 6 trinkets, artefacts or pieces of armour to choose from, boasting a range of thematic and unusual effects. We’ve previewed a few of these already in our Faction Focuses.

Yeah and they confirm, you pick whattt realml you are from now as part of the list building phase to get access to spells and artefacts.

The way tthat banishment spell is... armies like stormcast can listbuild the gryph hound trap and then use banishment to get some free shooting.

There are going to be a lot of Hyish stormcast I'm betting (depending on if Azyr gets something equally as useful of course)

All the Artefacts of the Realm we've seen so far:


Still a ton left to see apparently.

auticus wrote:
Yeah and they confirm, you pick whattt realml you are from now as part of the list building phase to get access to spells and artefacts.

The way tthat banishment spell is... armies like stormcast can listbuild the gryph hound trap and then use banishment to get some free shooting.

There are going to be a lot of Hyish stormcast I'm betting (depending on if Azyr gets something equally as useful of course)

The article says "Each of the seven Mortal Realms...", so I would say Aqshy, Chamon, Ghur, Ghyran, Hysh, Shyish and Ulgu. We'll also need to see if Stormcast Eternals and Chaos can be from one of those seven Realms or if they're limited to Azyr and Chaos respectively.

They give mention of Chaos and realms here:

Perhaps your Freeguild hail from Hammerhal Aqsha, in Aqshy, or perhaps your Slaves to Darkness raid the distant outskirts of Ghur.

I would be so thrilled for Stormcast Eternals to not be able to claim to be from a Realm though.

Restrictions would be nice, though that begs the question... armies like nurgle could thematically be from Ghyran and Khorne could be from Aqshy and Tzeentch from Chamon as those chaos powers have long held dominion over those mortal realms.

Equally... there are now stories of stormcast based in the realm of beasts and life. So I don't think restrictions are very likely.

I actually like the realm flavorings, I have always used them. The only concern I'd have would be that within a month or so we will have ascertained which ones give the best bonuses and thats where all armies will hail from.

That falls into the same thing we had in pretty much every past incarnation of WHFB though where only the same 10% of items were ever taken so I'd classify that as minor and to be expected.

 Kanluwen wrote:
They give mention of Chaos and realms here:

Perhaps your Freeguild hail from Hammerhal Aqsha, in Aqshy, or perhaps your Slaves to Darkness raid the distant outskirts of Ghur.

I would be so thrilled for Stormcast Eternals to not be able to claim to be from a Realm though.

Fair enough on Chaos, but would all Undead be from Shyish?

 Ghaz wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
They give mention of Chaos and realms here:

Perhaps your Freeguild hail from Hammerhal Aqsha, in Aqshy, or perhaps your Slaves to Darkness raid the distant outskirts of Ghur.

I would be so thrilled for Stormcast Eternals to not be able to claim to be from a Realm though.

Fair enough on Chaos, but would all Undead be from Shyish?

I think that's going to be a part of the whole "Necroquake" thing. Maybe it woke up the dead in all of the Realms?

Yeah. The walking dead are everywhere now, not just Shyish. Also even before the necroquake there have been undead in other realms from the realmgate stories.

auticus wrote:
Yeah and they confirm, you pick whattt realml you are from now as part of the list building phase to get access to spells and artefacts.

The way tthat banishment spell is... armies like stormcast can listbuild the gryph hound trap and then use banishment to get some free shooting.

There are going to be a lot of Hyish stormcast I'm betting (depending on if Azyr gets something equally as useful of course)

Do we know that realm affinity gives access to the spells? Can't read the article since I'm at work.

No they didn't say spells directly, so I'm assuming since we do know for sure that there are special spells per realm that choosing your realm will give you access to those as well.

auticus wrote:
No they didn't say spells directly, so I'm assuming since we do know for sure that there are special spells per realm that choosing your realm will give you access to those as well.

From the "Magic: Casting and Unbinding" Rules preview: "Here’s one of our favourites that any Wizard can use, for when you find yourself battling in the radiant vistas of Hysh.... This is just one of seven spells available in this realm, and that is just one of seven realms you can battle in! That’s nearly fifty new spells to throw around!" (emphasis mine)

It would appear that while you choose which realm you hail from, and this in turn gives you access to the artifacts from that realm, the realm you and your opponent agree to/roll for battling in determines the "extra" spells you have access to during that particular battle (which both sides may use), at least in the case of Banishment.

@auticus I'm expecting that to be the case (and for those spells to be buffed if you're actually battling on the appropriate realm). Just wondering if it had been confirmed. I love the narrative implications of this, though! Hopefully every realm will have a "good" option. I'd hate for every army to be from two realms.

i need some clarification here guys.
if i choose to convert a tomb banshee to have a wraith bow, is that a wep in addition to the frost dagger and scream or does it replace them?

From the way they talk about it, it looks like it's "in addition to".

The Isharann Soulscryer, for example, doesn't have a bow on their profile. They fire fish at you.

 FrozenDwarf wrote:
i need some clarification here guys.
if i choose to convert a tomb banshee to have a wraith bow, is that a wep in addition to the frost dagger and scream or does it replace them?

I don't see anything in the description implying you are replacing an existing weapon, so unless the rulebook says otherwise, I would say this is in addition to any attacks the model has.

Faction Focus: Free Peoples on Warhammer Community.

 EnTyme wrote:
@auticus I'm expecting that to be the case (and for those spells to be buffed if you're actually battling on the appropriate realm). Just wondering if it had been confirmed. I love the narrative implications of this, though! Hopefully every realm will have a "good" option. I'd hate for every army to be from two realms.

Yeah I like that direction overall from a narrative standpoint. The good or bad options I suppose we have to wait and see for ourselves.

The more of this I see the more I think narrative is going to be great fun and anything approaching competitive is going to be a lost cause. Will probably transition towards snagging best painted awards at tournaments instead. We will see though, I remain hopeful that tournaments will be able to house-rule in some control over more egregious elements.

There are lots of interesting things being teased, but there are definitely some things, in my mind, to be concerned about.

We're wrapping up a Firestorm campaign right now, so it might be a good time to let AOS2.0 come out and dink around with some of our other games (GASLANDS!) for a couple of months to let the dust settle and get the first couple of FAQ/Errata out. I'm not doom-and-glooming, but our AOS group is kinda small anyway, and we're all addicts to miniatures in general and have more games than is reasonable, so playing with some of our other toys for a bit isn't a horrible thing.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
The more of this I see the more I think narrative is going to be great fun and anything approaching competitive is going to be a lost cause. Will probably transition towards snagging best painted awards at tournaments instead. We will see though, I remain hopeful that tournaments will be able to house-rule in some control over more egregious elements.

Shyishian Mor'phann. Not sure if it's going to be viable, but I'll be damned if I'm going to get away from my theme!

Also, hucking Gravetides at people is going to be great.

Starting to think about a long-term conversion project of an Aspect of the Storm, firing a Wraithbow.

 Valander wrote:
There are lots of interesting things being teased, but there are definitely some things, in my mind, to be concerned about.

We're wrapping up a Firestorm campaign right now, so it might be a good time to let AOS2.0 come out and dink around with some of our other games (GASLANDS!) for a couple of months to let the dust settle and get the first couple of FAQ/Errata out. I'm not doom-and-glooming, but our AOS group is kinda small anyway, and we're all addicts to miniatures in general and have more games than is reasonable, so playing with some of our other toys for a bit isn't a horrible thing.

Off-topic but how ddid you find the Firestorm campaign? I'm going to be running a second private one this fall and want to blog its progress.

There's also an Alchemist chain from chamon (?).

I need to check how the artifacts work. That's a lot of promised special artifacts, but you can only pick one of them?

 Knight wrote:
There's also an Alchemist chain from chamon (?).

I need to check how the artifacts work. That's a lot of promised special artifacts, but you can only pick one of them?

Characters can only have one artefact. Right now, you're required to take Warscroll Battalions to get additional relics for other characters.
Added it and the Feather. Put them all into their own thread too. I'll update as we get them and I have time.

auticus wrote:

 Valander wrote:
There are lots of interesting things being teased, but there are definitely some things, in my mind, to be concerned about.

We're wrapping up a Firestorm campaign right now, so it might be a good time to let AOS2.0 come out and dink around with some of our other games (GASLANDS!) for a couple of months to let the dust settle and get the first couple of FAQ/Errata out. I'm not doom-and-glooming, but our AOS group is kinda small anyway, and we're all addicts to miniatures in general and have more games than is reasonable, so playing with some of our other toys for a bit isn't a horrible thing.

Off-topic but how ddid you find the Firestorm campaign? I'm going to be running a second private one this fall and want to blog its progress.

We've had fun with it. Made only 2 small house rules:

1. Forging the Scepter isn't an auto win (same change you made I think).
2. We roll off for order of who issues challenges.

Some of the games have been pretty lopsided due to Muster Points silliness, but overall still fun. We used the Open War deck for some of the scenarios because the "Sneak Attack" ones in the book were... odd.

Edit: Also we only had 4 players, and one for each GA, so kinda worked out there.

Nice. Yeah the forging the scepter being an auto win makes it so everyone just fights on those territories which was kind of lame so making that just give a bonus was nice.

Open War deck is one of my favorite things.

Kanluwen wrote:At this point, I'm just excited to start hucking this at people:

Spoiler:

Don't forget the spell you cast, your opponent can cast it back at you.