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It was a good idea overall. In 7th there were some armies(Daemons and HEs) that could get 25+ power dice in a phase almost garunteed.

Having it based on number of wizards was a broken method.

quack98 wrote:
I don't like the power dice cap at all, I think it should be 12+ the number of wizards you have, as the magic is more easily contained

The meta I played in featured DE, VC, and DoC, mostly DE and VC though. With people converting over once they realized they couldn't win against them.

The Power Dice Cap was a Blessing because of how horrible the "Machine Gun Magic" ended up.

I love 8th edition myself, 7th edition nearly killed it where I was playing at the time because you either had the strong armies, or you had nothing.

Yeah, but they can achieve that by using lore of deaths attribute, but with my high elves, I find that lore really ineffective.

Why would having 5 sucky wizards be better than having the greatest wizard that every lived?

^ I suppose my system wasn't very good, but you know what I'm getting at, just some way of showing that the more wizards or the better the quality of the wizards, the easier magic is contained

High Elves have several items that generate additional dice, they have no right to complain about not having enough dice.

^ but once you get to 12 you can't get more no matter how many you generate.

Yeah, so? The fact that you can get the maximum even if only a 6 or 7 is rolled for the number will put you sitting pretty on 12 power dice opposite your opponents 4 or 5. Thats a massive advantage in casting power. Its even better when the dice roll is very low. 3 or 4 power dice.

I'm assuming that's:
BOS - 50pts +D3 ~2
JoD - 15pts +1
2 Mages - 200pts 2 channels +1/3
1 Archmage w/ channeling staff - 240pts channel + 1/3

That's only +3 2/3 on average for an insane 505pts! I know you can take more mages, but its pointless taking more than 3.

Regarding magic dice it is not really a matter of how much dice you have, it is a matter of how much you have contra the dispel dice. If you roll two 1's on the magic phase then every exstra magic dice is very good.

If you roll a 3 and a 4 chanches are you are fighting to get a spell through as you will be luring out his dispell dice with a less the optimal spell while he is holding his dispeldice back for the real spell. Every exstra dice in that senario is very good as it will give you many more spells. Especialy if you both have a +4 to cast and dispell because you will be abel to get off spells level 7- 11 very consistantly.

If you roll 12" you are in for a great magic phase and you do not need the exstra spell dice. You already have 6 more dice then your oponent.

Exstra spell dices are very good. Especialy those that do not go into the magic pool. Like slaan, dragon mage, worn power stone/scroll, incatatsions of necraheth, purple sun dice etc.

I always think a death slann would be cool, for the insane amount of power dice from each spell, so he would constantly have 12, but the problem is purple sun, the best power dice giver, is great against lizardmen, so it's not very competitive.

The flaw with using Death magic to generate more power dice is that you will have run out of spells to cast once you get all those power dice.

^ You could maybe back it up with another wizard, like the slann and tetto'eko. (2 loremasters, that'd be fun!)

My TK army usualy runn two level 4 mages to get a good choise of spells to cast. I rarly runn out of good options. (Although, depending on then list (tomb guard heavy) light might be better then death.

Light is awesome for TK as far as I'm aware, you can make them I10 with ASF, and a sphinx with ASF, can't really be ignored!

So, what's the "problem" with magic, then? Too many power dice? "6" spells too easy to cast, or too easy to get, or too powerful? Wizards are too cheap and too plentiful? Counters to magic are too few and far between, and MR sucks? Some combination of those, or something else entirely?

Combination of "I win" spells with Irristable Force is a really bad thing.

Magic Resistance isn't good enough.

Spells that remain in play are not "remain in play" stupidly.

I must say the only two spells I really consider potensially to good that are not from before 8th edition would be purple sun and dwellers from bellow. Dwellers however, is sort of like a panic button for the game vs deathstars making deathstars less apealing, so that actualy a good thing.

Purple suns abilaty to just kill to easaly is quite bad. Also, I do not like it combined with undeads as you are allowed to cast vortexes trough your own units you could nuke some speedbums and your oponents units. But all deathspells has a short range so you would have to be close to do it.

Perhaps it is not so bad?

From my limited experience, the level 6 spells are surprisingly difficult to get off, and only really do huge amounts of damage in very specific circumstances. I've opted to try not getting Purple Sun off and just sticking to buffing my own units instead.

We usually see them at least once per game and thats usually the end of the game.........

 tmarichards wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Indeed. This is why Ogres can't be OP. As long as spells like Purple Sun and Pit of Shades exist the Ogre army book cannot be OP.

They really are a balance point to Everlasting Steadfast and unstoppable Ogre Hordes. Of course I am a savvy player and know how to counter those uberspells with proper positioning.

This isn't really a valid argument, as Ogres have some of the best magic defence in the game. Other than Purple Sun, there isn't really anything to worry them (anything else gets Runemawed away), and against that they have a turn 1 Dispel Scroll, turn 2 Hellheart and turn 3 into combat.

I suppose your next "point" would be that Mournfang are balanced because of lore of Metal?

Any good general can beat Ogres. Time to stop whining and change your tactics. first daemons and now ogres...is there an army in the game that you don't cry about?

there are no OP armies in fantasy. time to get out of your 7th ed mentality and put on your big boy pants.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 tmarichards wrote:


4. Overall, I'm having more fun with the current rules than ever before but I do still get exasperated at losing games in the "purchase models" phase.

hi, let me introduce you to games workshop. a publicly traded company that is run for profit.

phoenixrisin wrote:

 tmarichards wrote:


4. Overall, I'm having more fun with the current rules than ever before but I do still get exasperated at losing games in the "purchase models" phase.

hi, let me introduce you to games workshop. a publicly traded company that is run for profit.

GW are hardly alone in having models and units that underperform. The only game system I've seen it loudly and proudly claimed that this isn't the case is Infinity. Games workshop are also hardly the first company to price models in a way that can only be for making money (looking at some of Privateer Presses latest stuff is painful. $100au for a 10 man squad, with its command models sold separately for $30au? yikes).

At least with Warhammer Fantasy, they're taking steps to mitigate this, whether it's intentional or not. The 8th edition books are generally pretty well balanced with fewer 'stinkers' and 'must haves'.

 -Loki- wrote:

phoenixrisin wrote:

 tmarichards wrote:


4. Overall, I'm having more fun with the current rules than ever before but I do still get exasperated at losing games in the "purchase models" phase.

hi, let me introduce you to games workshop. a publicly traded company that is run for profit.

GW are hardly alone in having models and units that underperform. The only game system I've seen it loudly and proudly claimed that this isn't the case is Infinity. Games workshop are also hardly the first company to price models in a way that can only be for making money (looking at some of Privateer Presses latest stuff is painful. $100au for a 10 man squad, with its command models sold separately for $30au? yikes).

At least with Warhammer Fantasy, they're taking steps to mitigate this, whether it's intentional or not. The 8th edition books are generally pretty well balanced with fewer 'stinkers' and 'must haves'.

i agree with you 100%. i was just trying to teach tmarichards about the priorities of a publicly traded co.

The thing is that it would be extremely easy to balance some really broken stuff out by FAQs.

Then again, that would imply that GW cared about an actually balanced game...

I wouldn't complain. This may be as close as we ever get and its not too shabby. Could be worse so we better quit while we're ahead.

phoenixrisin wrote:

 tmarichards wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Indeed. This is why Ogres can't be OP. As long as spells like Purple Sun and Pit of Shades exist the Ogre army book cannot be OP.

They really are a balance point to Everlasting Steadfast and unstoppable Ogre Hordes. Of course I am a savvy player and know how to counter those uberspells with proper positioning.

This isn't really a valid argument, as Ogres have some of the best magic defence in the game. Other than Purple Sun, there isn't really anything to worry them (anything else gets Runemawed away), and against that they have a turn 1 Dispel Scroll, turn 2 Hellheart and turn 3 into combat.

I suppose your next "point" would be that Mournfang are balanced because of lore of Metal?

Any good general can beat Ogres. Time to stop whining and change your tactics. first daemons and now ogres...is there an army in the game that you don't cry about?

there are no OP armies in fantasy. time to get out of your 7th ed mentality and put on your big boy pants.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 tmarichards wrote:


4. Overall, I'm having more fun with the current rules than ever before but I do still get exasperated at losing games in the "purchase models" phase.

hi, let me introduce you to games workshop. a publicly traded company that is run for profit.

As far as 8th being totally balanced i don't think i'd say that. The sad thing is in many games with fully unique sides it's hard to balance them all. This is even with just 3 races in some RTS games (like 'starcraft 2's incessant fan whinings). WHFB has 15 factions. That's a lot. Balancing all of this is going to be a momentous task for anybody esp. when new stuff is added for everybody. While i do like the character of everybody getting a lot of different magic items and stuff it does admittedly make things harder to balance (as another member of dakka already mentioned).

Anyway there are such things as 'top tier' armies (factions that are overall better). I don't think armies are often as OP as some people complain but there are annoying power-gaming lists that abuse the OP-ness of a bunch of combined units or magic abilities in an army. I suppose it's more a problem if some units are OP and everybody takes those few units. It's understandable that people want to win or they want an effective list but that's the bigger problem.

-----------------------------

Anyway i still say my biggest problem is still with steadfast. I don't want it removed as it's good but even as a skaven player i'd like to see it get re-worked. Funny thing is flanking with 2 ranks is still kind of successful against skaven as we don't get our 'Strength in Numbers' ability considering our ranks are negated.

Leadership is an odd thing with skaven. I'd say in 40k with imperial guard leadership can be your best friend if you know how to work it and skaven are kind of similar in fantasy but i find that it's unforgiving when you mess up with skaven. Also base leadership tests really hurt skaven.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
As far as 8th being totally balanced i don't think i'd say that. The sad thing is in many games with fully unique sides it's hard to balance them all. This is even with just 3 races in some RTS games (like 'starcraft 2's incessant fan whinings). WHFB has 15 factions. That's a lot. Balancing all of this is going to be a momentous task for anybody esp. when new stuff is added for everybody. While i do like the character of everybody getting a lot of different magic items and stuff it does admittedly make things harder to balance (as another member of dakka already mentioned).

Anyway there are such things as 'top tier' armies (factions that are overall better). I don't think armies are often as OP as some people complain but there are annoying power-gaming lists that abuse the OP-ness of a bunch of combined units or magic abilities in an army. I suppose it's more a problem if some units are OP and everybody takes those few units. It's understandable that people want to win or they want an effective list but that's the bigger problem.

I don't think anyone said 8th is totally balanced. it's heading the way of better balance than other editions, however. And while yes, there are still 'top teir' armies, they tend to be old books that haven't been updated to 8th edition. The 8th books play pretty nicely with each other. Even though there's still a power scale (no one can say Tomb Kings and Ogres are equal), it's more on the 'x has more valid options' level, rather than 'x is outright broken' or 'x is outright terrible' level.

So yeah, when you consider 8th edition, played between 8th edition books, the playing field is far more balanced than it has ever been regarding Fantasy. We just need more bloody 8th edition books.

GW needs to start releasing updates between a new codex. That's the main reason why both systems tend to have big balance problems e.g. Lizardmen with 2 Slann going totally crazy because of the way magic works in 8th.

My main claim about 8th is the very weak internal balance. It shows of very little effort to actually balance the game. Deathstars are a main problem in GW's eyes because they required good unit movement to be countered. You had to tarpit and then outflank them in order to get them down. Certainly, that requires tactics, and thus, it was considered too hard for most players. In the end, GW decided that it needed a hard counter and there we go, we get ridiculously overpowered BRB lores. A blind monkey can be succesful as long as he got luck with the dice. Tournaments I took part in mostly boiled down to who could pull of the 6th the first and games have been forfeited usually after turn 3-4. Get a 6th off before your enemy, troll your way to the top.

Movement phase? Too hard. Let's remove most tactics out of it and replace it with randomness. Randomness is fun.

Guessing ranges? Too hard.

Playing WoC felt like mainly shoving your troops forward with the right hand while rolling for the 6th with your left. The sad thing is that this actually works.

I do agree with the latter point. If we only let 8th army books fight and did not look at the BRB lores, the game would be pretty darn well balanced.

WHFB 8th is not a competitive (GW) game. It's even, by far, less competitive than 40k. It's a 100% beer&pretzels fun game now...and that's fine for me.

A blind monkey can be succesful as long as he got luck with the dice. Tournaments I took part in mostly boiled down to who could pull of the 6th the first and games have been forfeited usually after turn 3-4. Get a 6th off before your enemy, troll your way to the top.

Must've been some bad tournament players, around here most people can easily survive several and continue on with the game. That's kinda why even ogres don't try to make huge deathstars without vast preparations in an attempt to defend it.

Guessing ranges? Too hard.

Yes because it's such a skill to guess ranges, it really only benefited those who have far superior depth perception. Friends who require glasses/contacts now can actually deal with such a thing.

Playing WoC felt like mainly shoving your troops forward with the right hand while rolling for the 6th with your left. The sad thing is that this actually works.

Because it's a very bland army, even back in 7th this was somewhat the case, IMO they really screwed over WoC, the humans had a bit better flavor and options when they were still the big book of chaos, though they still work quite effectively.

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

Guessing ranges? Too hard.

Yes because it's such a skill to guess ranges

Guessing ranges was, by definition, as "skill" as a single element of a game can possibly be.

it really only benefited those who have far superior depth perception. Friends who require glasses/contacts now can actually deal with such a thing.

Hm? It wasn't a lot about depth perception, it was about memorization. You could always guess by base sizes, terrain, stuff nearby, etc. War machines are 100% luck now. I am short-sighted btw

Because it's a very bland army, even back in 7th this was somewhat the case, IMO they really screwed over WoC, the humans had a bit better flavor and options when they were still the big book of chaos, though they still work quite effectively.

In 7th, you at least had to manage with difficult terrain. In 8th, you just push them forward. Fun. It's a bland "roflstomp" army as it is almost an autowin against new / bad players but lacks vs. better ones compared to stuff like Lizardmen / DE.