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 Galas wrote:
I like Berzerkers gaining leadership for killing enemies. And Plague Marines for every DGR save they made as Andysonic1 suggested.

Those are much more "interactive" leadershipg buffs than just "It ignores morale". And yea, for Deathwing to be just inmune to morale is BS, even being a Dark Angel player. In the end, it didn't matter because you are just running a bunch of 5-Terminator squads that are inmune to morale but even without that inmunity they just ignore battleshock effects by how much leadership they have.

Except these "interactive rules" accomplish nothing. They won't change the way you field these units, small size to mitigate morale issues, because those abilities are niche enough they won't factor in till late game, when you've already suffered heavy morale causalities if you tried to take more than 5 maybe 10 models per unit.

Like I said, it makes sense thematically and it isn't anything other armies don't have access to. It isn't even particularly overpowered, it just lets a few units be fielded in more than MSU configuration, particularly needed for tsons but useful for the others as well.

 andysonic1 wrote:
I get why thematically why the cult troops would be fearless or equivalent, but I think people aren't giving this much more thought than that. Any additional rules added on via marks or straight abilities on the units will cost something in points. Berzerkers are amazingly good not just because what they do they do better than anyone else, but because they are so god damn cheap. 16 PPM before the 1 point chainaxe is insanely good. Tacking on more rules to make them "better" is going to bloat their points (same for all other cult troops). Berzerkers really don't even need fearless if you play them correctly they should be being shot at minimally and always fighting gak in melee. Only when you mess up will you be removing large amounts of them and risking morale checks. The other troops units benefit from cover more (camping noise marines) or have damage mitigation abilities (rubi tuesdays and plague bois) which make the chances of taking a morale test go down. The cult troops may need some adjustments (not Berzerkers, I fear any more changes will be nerfs at this point) but adding on fearless seems like a step in the wrong direction. Remember not to just look at the one unit in a vacuum and realize there should be other high priority threats in your army for your opponent to focus on over your cult troops long enough for them to do their job.

Except... it isn't expensive. It shouldn't be at least. Look at the pricing on fearless units, commissars, or the cheaper synapse creatures. Fearless is maybe a 1 ppm upgrade going by the units and rules we've seen so far. Technically it isn't even that, deathwing terminators get fearless at no cost, a single lord commissar can probably spread his aura to 100 conscripts easily so that's less than a ppm, For tyranids it is a bit more expensive, a tyranid prime is the cheapest option and is probably a ppm upgrade for each, but then again he actually contributes beyond just synapse, same with a tervigon.

So no, it isn't going to bloat their points much, if any. The fact half the cult troops are overpriced already isn't helping matters either. Because fearless is a borderline free upgrade, 1 ppm at most, the way the indices are written and balanced.

SilverAlien wrote:

 Galas wrote:
I like Berzerkers gaining leadership for killing enemies. And Plague Marines for every DGR save they made as Andysonic1 suggested.

Those are much more "interactive" leadershipg buffs than just "It ignores morale". And yea, for Deathwing to be just inmune to morale is BS, even being a Dark Angel player. In the end, it didn't matter because you are just running a bunch of 5-Terminator squads that are inmune to morale but even without that inmunity they just ignore battleshock effects by how much leadership they have.

Except these "interactive rules" accomplish nothing. They won't change the way you field these units, small size to mitigate morale issues, because those abilities are niche enough they won't factor in till late game, when you've already suffered heavy morale causalities if you tried to take more than 5 maybe 10 models per unit.

Berzerker units are far better larger as opposed to smaller. 19 popping out of a Kharybdis and being backed up by Warptime plus a Dark Apostle is a terrifying sight to see gunning for you. I don't play the other cult units so I don't know how well they would do in larger units. Also, like I said when I suggested the abilities, they reward you for playing the unit how they are meant to be played and effect the unit throughout the game not just late game. It isn't niche for Berzerkers to be removing models or whole units and it certainly isn't niche for Plague Marines to be passing DGR rolls at all times. The LD boost wouldn't last more than a full round either it wouldn't be added up over time or something. There are ways to make the cult units better without removing core game systems completely. Morale has a purpose and shouldn't simply be ignored because another army has a way to sometimes / often ignore it.

Edit: the problem with that is that commissars and synapse can be removed with good shooting and positioning or counter units (all debatable in effectiveness but nevertheless the option is there). Simple giving fearless to a unit simply undermines the whole idea of the morale system. Deathwing all having fearless is silly I agree but they really don't have much going for them, I've had no trouble against Deathwing armies or units so it seems like they kind of need something. If cult troops need a price decrease they will get it, if they need some other ability they will get it, but making them straight up fearless doesn't make them better. Also, yes fearless should be expensive since it negates an entire game mechanic, or the thing it is on should have some other downside. It's balanced out in everything but the commissar in my opinion, giving it to the cult units when they are already pretty good is just silly.

 andysonic1 wrote:
Berzerker units are far better larger as opposed to smaller. 19 popping out of a Kharybdis and being backed up by Warptime plus a Dark Apostle is a terrifying sight to see gunning for you. I don't play the other cult units so I don't know how well they would do in larger units. Also, like I said when I suggested the abilities, they reward you for playing the unit how they are meant to be played and effect the unit throughout the game not just late game. It isn't niche for Berzerkers to be removing models or whole units and it certainly isn't niche for Plague Marines to be passing DGR rolls at all times. The LD boost wouldn't last more than a full round either it wouldn't be added up over time or something. There are ways to make the cult units better without removing core game systems completely. Morale has a purpose and shouldn't simply be ignored because another army has a way to sometimes / often ignore it.

Edit: the problem with that is that commissars and synapse can be removed with good shooting and positioning or counter units (all debatable in effectiveness but nevertheless the option is there). Simple giving fearless to a unit simply undermines the whole idea of the morale system. Deathwing all having fearless is silly I agree but they really don't have much going for them, I've had no trouble against Deathwing armies or units so it seems like they kind of need something. If cult troops need a price decrease they will get it, if they need some other ability they will get it, but making them straight up fearless doesn't make them better. Also, yes fearless should be expensive since it negates an entire game mechanic, or the thing it is on should have some other downside. It's balanced out in everything but the commissar in my opinion, giving it to the cult units when they are already pretty good is just silly.

Again... these are useless abilities. They don't change anything. It's niche because it won't end up changing the outcome. Beserkers locked in combat aren't worried about morale, the only issue is if they get caught in the open and gunned down (such as a falling back enemy, shoots down half your zerkers, then poof the other half melt away). The bonus for death guard gives me no incentive to run them at more than 5 men, not that there was ever much of one. Honestly, lets just make it "no more than one unit lost in the morale phase". There, that's clearly a free upgrade going by this edition, and it isn't fearless so wooo.

Basically, the only purpose morale currently has is to punish non MSU units. Which really hurts some units, notably tsons who'd really like to be able to get a heavy weapon or two with a constant sorcerer tax. The morale rule mainly keeps extra bodies from actually contributing to the longevity of a unit, adding 5 bodies a space marine unit is less rewarding than taking a second, because morale invalidates 2-3 of those bodies if your opponent isn't a moron.

Bottom line, I fail to see why the morale phase is so important, I fail to see what if anything it brings to the game. The main usage, allowing counter play vs huge blobs now that template weapons are gone, has been invalidated for half the armies that use huge blobs. It now only exists to force MSU spam, which is a non issue for many armies and units, but absolutely awful for the few that are hurt by it. It also hurts diversity, encouraging small squads again for no real reason I can see, no real reason to discourage a ten person squad over two five person squads.

TL;DR The morale rules were bad, the actual depth they added to the game has mostly been invalidated, they offer nothing of value so we might as well start having units invalidate them. Unless they plan to alter the base rules of the game, morale offers nothing of value... except vs demons the horde army who can't ignore it totally. Funny that.