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So Stormcast being able to deepstrike their entire army wherever they want and then charge on the same turn is a thing, and its a thing that a lot of people in my area are drooling over since it is basically a game mode where they get to dictate how the entire game goes and cause the opponent to have to react the entire game.

Not going into the merits or fun factor of that game type. Knowing that its a thing and will be a very common thing if history with 40k's alpha striking deepstriking army popularity was, lets discuss how to counter it as opposed to taking the boot to the groin over and over again.

I'm personally at a loss for how to deal with it barring also buying an alpha striking stormcast army, which I really don't want to do.

 auticus wrote:
So Stormcast being able to deepstrike their entire army wherever they want and then charge on the same turn is a thing, and its a thing that a lot of people in my area are drooling over since it is basically a game mode where they get to dictate how the entire game goes and cause the opponent to have to react the entire game.

Not going into the merits or fun factor of that game type. Knowing that its a thing and will be a very common thing if history with 40k's alpha striking deepstriking army popularity was, lets discuss how to counter it as opposed to taking the boot to the groin over and over again.

I'm personally at a loss for how to deal with it barring also buying an alpha striking stormcast army, which I really don't want to do.

Screening. Place your force into two echelons and space units in a way that they'll need to be 9'' away. That will make a nice area denial and will allow your forces to counterattack. Abuse shooting into combat and all of a sudden scions of the storm may well turn out to be the enemy setting your own killzones.

A popular tactic is to deploy your army in 2 halves, either corner. It means the player can only really commit to destroying half (or attempting to) and you can fight back with the other half.

As the Azyros has lost the ability to allow drops to come down 3" from the enemy the overall effectiveness of deep striking Stormcast has been weakened. Which is probably for the best seeing as it was the only list to win multiple large events in the UK last year (Facehammer, Clash and Blood&Glory).

Also, you're forgetting that were plenty of alpha striking armies up until now. Stormcast themselves, Ironjaws, Order draconis', etc. It is nothing new.

Hell, 2 units of ten freeguild guard will deny the stormcasts' threat if they spread out. 1'' per nine plus 11'' from 28mm bases and the 9'' inches of distance per squad would mean that each of those two squads has an area denial of 38'' of length, which is 76'' of the battlefield on a 72'' length table. Deploy them within 9'' of your board edge and BAM! Scions of the storm stops threatening your game for just 160pts.

When the storm cast teleport in do they have to stay 9" away from an enemy unit?

AN'SHI wrote:
When the storm cast teleport in do they have to stay 9" away from an enemy unit?

Do you mean the Azyros' skill? It has been removed. Scions of the storm only works on a 3+ and at 9'' from enemies.

Lord Kragan wrote:

AN'SHI wrote:
When the storm cast teleport in do they have to stay 9" away from an enemy unit?

Do you mean the Azyros' skill? It has been removed. Scions of the storm only works on a 3+ and at 9'' from enemies.

Is it 3+ per unit or 3+ and the entire army comes into play? also is it 3+ starting from turn 2 on wards like 40k or can the player decide when he/she wants to come in? ie. just wait till the moment is right?

I'm thinking if it's 3+ per unit then the army comes in via piece mail which is not so bad in fact could be deadly for the storm cast if say you have a gryph hound

Lord Kragan wrote:
Also, you're forgetting that were plenty of alpha striking armies up until now. Stormcast themselves, Ironjaws, Order draconis', etc. It is nothing new.

Hell, 2 units of ten freeguild guard will deny the stormcasts' threat if they spread out. 1'' per nine plus 11'' from 28mm bases and the 9'' inches of distance per squad would mean that each of those two squads has an area denial of 38'' of length, which is 76'' of the battlefield on a 72'' length table. Deploy them within 9'' of your board edge and BAM! Scions of the storm stops threatening your game for just 160pts.

I think the difference with those armies is that if you go first, you can actually target them with ranged attacks, where as the Stormcast aren't on the table so you can't target anything. And then they show up and you take it in the face and just watch. While yes there are other alpha strike armies, the ability to deny your opponent the ability to target them at all is probably one of the top three horrible game designer decisions that I can think of in my entire life.

 auticus wrote:

Lord Kragan wrote:
Also, you're forgetting that were plenty of alpha striking armies up until now. Stormcast themselves, Ironjaws, Order draconis', etc. It is nothing new.

Hell, 2 units of ten freeguild guard will deny the stormcasts' threat if they spread out. 1'' per nine plus 11'' from 28mm bases and the 9'' inches of distance per squad would mean that each of those two squads has an area denial of 38'' of length, which is 76'' of the battlefield on a 72'' length table. Deploy them within 9'' of your board edge and BAM! Scions of the storm stops threatening your game for just 160pts.

I think the difference with those armies is that if you go first, you can actually target them with ranged attacks, where as the Stormcast aren't on the table so you can't target anything. And then they show up and you take it in the face and just watch. While yes there are other alpha strike armies, the ability to deny your opponent the ability to target them at all is probably one of the top three horrible game designer decisions that I can think of in my entire life.

Dear, my Ironjawz have only gone second twice. Both times because I let my opponent
Stormcast's scions of the storm is a pretty weak ability as far as alpha striking skills go, you have to stay 9'' away to begin with. And roll a 3+. The scenario you're describing is less than 20% likely to happen. And you can deny it easily with chaff units. So what if, for example, he charges/shoots my freeguild guard/ardboyz? It doesn't mean anything because these guys' purpose was to die and allow for my heavy hitters. That is exactly what I planed and now my gunline or heavy hitters are in a perfect position to beta-strike them. IF he makes it. In that case even my screen will go and bash.

I'd have to see it played out. If you don't play an army with chaff units you could be kind of hosed. By could I mean you will be kind of hosed.

Which means if you have no chaff units you appear to have to go out and by chaff units to keep up with the meta.

I see the bubble wrap thing in my head and I think it has merit.

I have played against Ironjawz a good dozen times and I was not aware that they had some ability to always go first if they wanted. I have been able to shoot at them for a couple of turns before they get into me pretty much all the time.

The 9" away thing is what may make this not as busted as I thought it was. Before it was 3".

 auticus wrote:
I'd have to see it played out. If you don't play an army with chaff units you could be kind of hosed. By could I mean you will be kind of hosed.

Which means if you have no chaff units you appear to have to go out and by chaff units to keep up with the meta.

I see the bubble wrap thing in my head and I think it has merit.

I have played against Ironjawz a good dozen times and I was not aware that they had some ability to always go first if they wanted. I have been able to shoot at them for a couple of turns before they get into me pretty much all the time.

The 9" away thing is what may make this not as busted as I thought it was. Before it was 3".

Big blobs are your friend. At 2000 pts most enemies usually bring more than 6 units.

For me with Beastclaw, I would just deploy in a corner and have them go first. That way the one or two units that get lucky and roll a 9" charge will pull all of my Stonehorns into combat with them (since there is a very small "front line" to charge into). Then hope for the double turn and roll into whatever didn't make the charge.

With the double turn potential, I think alpha strike isn't as strong as in 40k. Basically beta strike can be brutal in AoS.

Army specific tactics I know, but hey...

Just for clarity almost every army should have some chaff units. Just some chaff units are slightly costlier than others. Combined arms is a thing now thanks to this shift.

Also as someone who has played 40k "competitively" for the last 14 years this is nothing like a true alpha strike army. Anyone banking on around a 23% (rough math) chance of a single unit (not an entire army) being able to charge is going to be a piss poor player. It'll be a helpful tool, especially since SC standard models are so slow that redeployment can be killer but it's not going to alpha armies off the table.

People will just have to do what people in 40k have been doing for years, use some chaff. Difference is you can still shoot the bad men in combat in this game so it's actually worse that it ever was in 40k and in 40k it was never that big of a deal.

Also Ironjawz tend to go first because they normally have 1-3 drops and that's it. At least the armies I tend to see run.

I hope the new SE battletome fixes the alpha strike just right. There are still some tricks out there. Though even if the alpgha strike is neutered the army as a whole is still tactically strong against gunlines and dodgy enemies. Time will show how it performs overall.

The only thing that wasnt nerfed was the hammerstrike force, which got buffed to let you use any kind of Paladin.

 Crazyterran wrote:
The only thing that wasnt nerfed was the hammerstrike force, which got buffed to let you use any kind of Paladin.

Worth noting that this battalion does still allow deep striking with said paladin units with no minimum range. However, they do have to be within 6" (12" if they are vindicators meta-battalion) of the prosecutor unit that's in the battalion. The standard that previously allowed Stormcast to teleport close to the enemy now has a 9" minimum too, so shooting the prosecutor unit as it approaches is possible.

Though, it should be super easy to get first turn, as taking one of the named warrior chambers makes everything in your army one deploy, since its one warscroll batallion.

Take cunning strategist on your warlord, scout the prosecutors forward five inches, move 12, run, then drop the Paladins in their face. Hallowed Knights might be the strongest warrior chamber here, as they add +1" to run and charge distances, meaning the minimum your prosecutors will move is 19", 5" from your opponents front line.

Alternatively, use the now cheaper Vexillor to drop the prosecutors 9" away, then drop the retributors 6" from them.

It's doable, but notably less OP than the freeform drop-everything-in that the Azyros previously allowed. Also note that both routes have drawbacks; in the former an enemy will know where your prosecutors are and what they are going to do before they deploy, giving them the option to stay out of range or control what the paladin's will be in range of. The vexillor option still allows the same tactics one would normally use to mess up 9" minimum deployments. Again, both are still useful strategies but actually allow cpunter-play as opposed to before.