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Does anyone have any good insight as to why this change was made?

Am I missing something?

I'm being serious, I have looked at every possibility and I can't think of a good reason.

My conclusions.

GW is considering making some HQ changes down the road. Some of the big hitters, Abaddon and Marneus are going to go to the LoW slot.

Battle legiones crusade 30k army's vs a xenon. Except a Primarch would monkey stomp Ghaz

Allow for a legal 3rd HQ Ina single FoC

Negative conclusions:

An easy VP for your opponent. Which is a considerable negative.

Even if they make some of the big hitters LoW it's still hinders your army as there are far more deadlier LoW out there.

I would love to hear from some of the smart Dakka peoples who have a bigger brain than me and see something I'm not seeing.

Thanks

I think it's so that multiple beat stick SC can't be put into a single slot. Why they can't have a note in their entries stating that only one of each particular type of HQ can be taken is beyond me. Is Ghazzy as good as a Titan or a Baneblade?

I'm not sure that I credit them with sufficient forward planning for this, but it could be a back door way of persuading a wider acceptance of LoW units.

My understanding is that Gahzzie isn't hugely changed in terms of game rules, so most people, one would assume, wouldn't have any more problem playing with or against him now than in the last book.

If you're willing to play against one LoW...

Starts blurring the lines, and then hopefully encourages an uptick in all those big shiny kits they're looking to move.

It does seem odd. I'm not sure why GW doesn't just give differing armies different FOC slots. I guess their whole unbound thing does that now...

Well, they actually did do that with the Orks...

 azreal13 wrote:
Well, they actually did do that with the Orks...

Ohh... Tell me more!

I find it ironic that they made him a Lord of War, and yet he got weaker... No invuln except on his WAAAGH (Exchanged for 6+ Feel No Pain), no automatic 6" Run, and no +2 attack on the charge, and you can't call the WAAAGH whenever you want anymore. And, his point cost remained the same.

I would have been fine with Ghazkull in a Lord of War slot, if he had actually gotten stronger. Maybe give him 4 Wounds and an invuln that doesn't disappear after one turn? Perhaps make him better at cheering on Da Boyz? Let him keep his +2 attacks on the charge? I'd even be fine with paying 300+ points for him if he made a tough enough beatstick.

EDIT: Apparently he's always had 4 wounds, and I'm an idiot.

Not sure on the exact details, but you can take extra troops choices and gain extra bonuses, I'm sure someone will be along shortly who has the book to give details..

Ork Amy list shows 1 mandatory HQ and 3 mandatory troops, and has the option to take a total of 3 HQs and 9 troops (instead of the normal 2HQ/6troop). Other then that FOC remains unchanged.

My buddy just picked up the new Ork 'dex, and we've already agreed that he can count Ghaz as a normal HQ, but since we both plan on running a big Lord of War for fun (a stompa for him and a Greater Brass Scorpion for me), make what you will of that.

Ah cheers! That just confuses me more as to why Ghaz is a LoW... Maybe if he could take a Gargant without it using up a slot or something... or had access to a very powerful battlewagon...

There are alternate formations in the books that let you take different numbers of certain slots.

Ex: "The Great Waagh!" formation for the Ghazghkull book lets you take 8 Troops, 2 HQs, a single Lord of War, etc.

It also mandates that you have 1 HQ 2x Troops and 1x Elite as your 'musthaves'.

I think the whole codex needs a rewrite and a public appology given to the gaming community. The book is terrible. The only good thing is the artwork on the cover. After that it gets worse and worse.

I could see Ghazz being a LOW if he was a MC and had 8 woulds and 8 toughness with a good invuln. and some kind of crazy attacks or something. As of now I will never use him again till an update. He cant go in regular games hes balanced for and you want to spend points better in a unbound game because your oppoent will be doing knight spam or hell drake spam or something ridiculous. He is completely useless now int he book. I would rather he was deleted than given his place.

He got seriously nerfed and turned into a lord of war.

How is that fair? 99% of everything in the lists lords of war belong in could Instant ko him in one round of combat...or should be able to at least.

Its like saying, You can never use GT unless its apoc and your opponents agree you can use him when they got 5 tau mantas and six titans to protect them from your thraka.

No +2 attacks from admantium skull and his waaagh is just a normal waagh from what I hear. No auto 6 inches which is what it SHOULD BE since the codex is suppose to get models into combat.

Gold Tooth Jerry: Hyperbole much?
Vasarto: His WAAAGH! Let's Slow and Purposeful run, and gives his 2+ Invuln. Plus he has the Warlord trait that gives everyone fearless, but that's something any Warboss with good rolls can get that ability too.
So, yeah.

Maybe GW is trying to go back to the days where you can only take special characters in certain situations (back then the top notch characters could only be taken in a 2000+ points game, and the others at varying points) which made sense.

If so then it was poorly executed

Well, there is a Thrakka-Star formation in the Supplement, which gives him two more warlord traits (for at total of three) and allows you to field a 8-15 model unit which will completely obliterate anything it touches, while advancing under the cover of 2+/4++/FNP and happy 2+ LoS! for old wound allocation shenanigans. It's 715 with no upgrades though


Automatically Appended Next Post:

LordSolar wrote:
Maybe GW is trying to go back to the days where you can only take special characters in certain situations (back then the top notch characters could only be taken in a 2000+ points game, and the others at varying points) which made sense.

If so then it was poorly executed

There is no need for such a limitation, as it comes from the huge point cost all by itself. Thrakka is a huge investment that does absolutely nothing if he is kept out of the fight. If he is a quarter of your army's points, you'll be lacking elsewhere and created a weakness in your army.

Just to point out something no one has mentioned in this thread.....



Ghazghkull being a LoW does NOT prevent him from being your Warlord. He comes with a Warlord Trait and his special rule states it only works if he's your warlord.

Also in 7th - any character can be your warlord. It doesn't have to be the highest leadership nor an HQ slot. If you REALLY wanted to for some crazy reason, a Nob leading a unit of Boyz could be your warlord.


Having Ghazghkull as a LoW gives you a Warlord that's not an HQ - so you can still run 3 IC Painboyz (and 3 Killsaw Meks) in your list using the Ork Detachment. 3 IC Painboyz is absolutely brutal. In a few tests games, placing a Painboyz, KS Mek, and a PK Nob in a unit of 30 'Eavy Armored Boyz decimated a ton in the 2 games I've played with them (against Iron Hands and CSM). I've also found adding a Painboy on a bike and attching them to a unit of Deffkoptas provide some amazing results too.

So really - Ghazghkull as a LoW is a good thing. Yes he doesn't hold a candle to a Stompa if he went toe to toe with one but his role isn't the same as a super heavy. Him being a LoW gives you, arguably, the best Warlord in the book in a non-HQ slot so you can fill up the HQ slots with more utility or power models. Boyz are weak but our HQs definitely aren't.

who is saying you cant take him unless he is being played in apoc because he is a LOW? wait what? did someone forget to read the 7th ed codex?
making him a LOW is telling you that Dante, Abbadon etc etc will ALL become LOW, get used to the idea with 7th, escalation gave us all the insight that the slot was going to be there and GW it seems is going to make use of it to put the option to take your main HQ with other hq's at no penalty.
sure he got nerfed a little but what, were people expectin the eldar treatment for orks? nope that wasnt going to happen, and remember first codex for the edition, look at CSM and how THEY went as first codex...

 ausYenLoWang wrote:
who is saying you cant take him unless he is being played in apoc because he is a LOW? wait what? did someone forget to read the 7th ed codex?

Many people have good reasons to ban lords of war from their games to improve the gak balance that GW has served up. Him being a Lord of War would be fine - awesome even, if the game was balanced enough that it wasn't a better idea to just ban LoW's across the board. Ghazz is prolly fine, but just like most FW is fine (better overall than codices) people just ban it across the board.

DA were the first 6th codex if I remember correctly.

Regardless - the Apoc Only LoW comments seems to stem from local rules stating LoW aren't allowed in their area (from what i've seen and heard). Thing is, GW just changed LoW from meaning Super Heavies to "important pieces we feel like putting in here".

To be honest, I don't think his nerf was too bad. If anything, he still retains the worst part of him from the last codex - Mega Armor grants Slow and Purposeful. But that's just me. Too bad we can't take him in the Ork Formation so he could Waaagh every turn :-)

Is Ghaz the only Ork LoW? No Stompa?

 Medium of Death wrote:
Is Ghaz the only Ork LoW? No Stompa?

Stompa as well, both are listed as Lord of War in the new codex.

 Kanluwen wrote:
There are alternate formations in the books that let you take different numbers of certain slots.

Ex: "The Great Waagh!" formation for the Ghazghkull book lets you take 8 Troops, 2 HQs, a single Lord of War, etc.

It also mandates that you have 1 HQ 2x Troops and 1x Elite as your 'musthaves'.

Time to get "technical."

These aren't formations, they're detachments. You can take either in place of the Combined Arms Detachment from the main rulebook.

Ork Horde Detachment:
3 HQ, 9 Troops, 3 Elites, 3 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support, 1 Lord of War, 1 Fortification
Mandatory: 1 HQ, 3 Troops
Reroll Warlord trait if from Codex Orks; replaces Objective Secured with rule giving Hammer of Wrath to mobs of 10+ who roll unmodified 10+ for charging.

Great Waagh! Detachment
2 HQ, 8 Troops, 4 Elites, 3 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support, 1 Lord of War, 1 Fortification
Manatory: 1 HQ, 2 Troops, 1 Elites
Reroll Warlord trait if from Ghaz supplement; replaces Objective Secured with rule that you roll for each non-Flyer unit in your army (+1 to roll if Troops), and on a 6+ they Deep Strike.

It's important to note that they're detachments, because in a tournament allowing one Primary Detachment (where they mean a CAD) and one Allied Detachment, you can replace the standard CAD with one of these.

A formation is a specific set of units, often with a set of special rules. And there's an abundance of those between the two books. The Ork codex has the mass of Boyz that lets you Waagh! each turn after the first; Ghaz supplement has the Green Tide returning with that same rule (plus a note that destroying it nets you 11 points for killing units), the Dread Mob (now with Orkanauts, and a Big Mek, and a Painboy, because why not?), the aforementioned Ghaz Superfriends, a formation of three mobs of Mega-Nobz with WS5, Zagstruk's Stormboyz (who can form to make a mega-unit, but counts as multiple units when destroyed), and a formation of five Battlewagons that have Scout (but you still can't assault first turn if you use that). Basically, the formations let you open up more slots in a "Battle-Forged" army, though some of them will be expensive. The Blitz Brigade's Scout move isn't the best thing in the world, honestly, but the idea of having five BWs to transport mobs without taking up your precious Heavy Support slots is kind of nice. (For the LOLs, stick three Big Meks with mega-armor and KFF in three of them stuff with fifteen Lootas each, and attach Meks to all three; then you have rolling armored fortresses with the Lootas firing at full BS.)

Thanks for the correction I'm still getting used to the terminology for 7th.

 azreal13 wrote:
I'm not sure that I credit them with sufficient forward planning for this, but it could be a back door way of persuading a wider acceptance of LoW units.

My understanding is that Gahzzie isn't hugely changed in terms of game rules, so most people, one would assume, wouldn't have any more problem playing with or against him now than in the last book.

If you're willing to play against one LoW...

Starts blurring the lines, and then hopefully encourages an uptick in all those big shiny kits they're looking to move.

Hmm, so lets see I can take Ghazz and underpowered character thats been nerfed heavily from his last iteration, or i can take a stompa. Hmmm. Which one should I choose...

Isn't Ghazzie getting his own book this weekend? I suspect that will clear up some stuff

Dabme wrote:
Isn't Ghazzie getting his own book this weekend? I suspect that will clear up some stuff

Nothing in there really explains it beyond the Great Waagh! detachment allowing you to take a LoW.

There are two "Echoes of War" missions(Uniting the Clans and The Green Beast and the Leviathan) that require you to take Ghazghkull but otherwise there's not much.

The only thing that really involves Ghazghkull himself is "Council of Waaagh!" which is a formation of Ghazzie, Mad Dok Grotsnik, 2 Warbosses, a Big Mek, and a unit of Nobz(which must be equipped with a Waagh! banner). Everything gets deployed as a single unit(none of the ICs can choose to leave or join the unit. They have to join) and the Nobz can be anywhere from 3 to 10 models. Both of the Warbosses in the Formation have +1 WS on their profile.

As long as the bearer of the Waagh! banner is still alive all models in the same unit have Fearless and add 1 to the WS characteristic on their profile. In addition all friendly units with the Orks faction within 12" reroll failed Morale and Pinning checks.

Also Ghazghkull gets to roll twice on the book's Warlord traits rerolling duplicates and has those results applied in addition to his Warlord trait.

 ausYenLoWang wrote:

making him a LOW is telling you that Dante, Abbadon etc etc will ALL become LOW, get used to the idea with 7th, escalation gave us all the insight that the slot was going to be there and GW it seems is going to make use of it to put the option to take your main HQ with other hq's at no penalty.

I can only hope that Dante get the LOW spot. Better him than Mephiston

LOW is just a slot. Unless you are running a Stompa, the slot will be wide open and ready to be filled with Ghaz, opening up another HQ slot.

As far as being stomped by a prim arch, in a green tide formation, he will have a 2++ after the first turn. Combined with 5 S10 AP2 attacks per turn and W4, he will be a pretty tough nut even for most primarchs.

Side question - is the green tide formation in the Ghazghkull supplement the same as that found in the apoc book? Or is it different in that instead of a Warboss, Ghazghkull is leading the 10 units?