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TBF they also have a long history of releasing new models that suck. They just tend not to get noticed because, well, they aren't played. For example, the new SC special characters and scythe banshees are sub par while glaivewraiths are downright terrible. Kharadron had issues when they came out and are among the worst battletomes now despite being entirely new. Everything new for Nurgle isn't as strong as blightkings, etc.

It does show that GW is unlikely mis-balancing intentionally, but rather is just poor at doing so. Unfortunately that makes the situation even worse, not better. Being beaten by new shiny stuff is irritating, buying new shiny stuff and discovering it can't beat anything is even worse.

Thats the rub. Some of those new stormcast were so obviously undercost that it took about 5 seconds to glance over the abilities, note the points, and realize how criminal they were point costed.

If thats not intentional then thats gross incompetence.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

It does show that GW is unlikely mis-balancing intentionally, but rather is just poor at doing so

This is the one thing, GW is just bad at game design but people still play their games (as they are in a position were people play just because it is the game played and not because it is good, making it hard to fail)

Releasing the Errata book not at the end of the year but with the new edition and making it before last minute changes to the rules were made was also a mistake.

This is what I mean by "they never learn" as this is nothing new

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
TBF they also have a long history of releasing new models that suck. They just tend not to get noticed because, well, they aren't played

But it is for the same reason
The Designers just have limited idead what the models role on the battlefield is and therefore releasing models with similar roles makes it impossible to balance as one will always be better than the other (or they become identical)
It is just a slap in the face when it gets really obvious even without looking at the point costs (and you get units that are so bad you won't take them even for 1 point per model whole others are so good that a 10-15 point increase won't change it)

I thought they had overcome this issue by releasing only small factions with less different units so that all of them are an option and at least the internal balance for the battletome works and than we got the new SCE stuff.


Sad thing is, at the moment I think that AoS is (rulewise) better than 40k and in a much nicer spot as there are no legacy items GW to care about while designing their stuff (unless for 40k were they could not just replace existing Marines by Primaris and so there will always be one being better than the other as they have the same roles on the battlefield)

 Overread wrote:
Actually right now besides their model count, Stormcast are doing fairly poorly for a modern and poster-child army. Balance wise and in the competitive scene they are not ranking as high as many other armies. I think GW has taken great pains to avoid Stormcast being overpowered and too easy to play to avoid having them dominate in the same way that Marines do in 40K.

Uhhhh Marines in 40k are one of the weakest armies in the game currently

 Bosskelot wrote:

 Overread wrote:
Actually right now besides their model count, Stormcast are doing fairly poorly for a modern and poster-child army. Balance wise and in the competitive scene they are not ranking as high as many other armies. I think GW has taken great pains to avoid Stormcast being overpowered and too easy to play to avoid having them dominate in the same way that Marines do in 40K.

Uhhhh Marines in 40k are one of the weakest armies in the game currently

I thought they made up for it by going "soup" though?

At least that is one area AoS has got right I think. Whilst there are Grand Alliances and ally systems, the way Battletomes are setup it favours taking more pure armies. I prefer that greatly because its those pure armies that have a visual style that they share and a lore and artwork which all draws you into them. I like a system that has allies as an option, but hasn't made it mandatory to remain competitive (even if you're not playing tournaments the balance filters down to the casual and if making a strong army required a huge soup then you either accept to have a continual uphill struggle or have to adapt)

I think one of the problems GW has is that they sometimes approach content with new models first. This tends to put a lot of weight and models onto certain factions whereas other factions suffer without anything new.

This usually means that with each addition to the largest force the new addition risks overlapping or negating existing units instead of actually expanding the force and a part of me fears Stormcast is in that territory now. Same thing with Space Marines.

If the model creation was a bit more even we might have gotten a few more Sylvaneth figures, perhaps some new Fyreslayers, and so on that probably would have been better for the game in the long run.

My impression is that GW has brought their model design team a bit more in line. I think with Kirby there was a lot of "they make what they want" going around which in the extreme kind of led to divisions like FW where they were almost producing stuff for just one or two model lines. Lets face it as ignored as fantasy is the FW offering for FW is pitifully small.

So I think it was partly the way they approached design and one would hope they are slowly changing that approach. Plus AoS had a very rocky start and changed its whole focus several times. It wouldn't surprise me if small armies was the original intention - letting GW add new factions really easily, but also retire old ones by removing only a couple of moulds from the system (and likely along the way using the Grand Alliance system to promote soup rather than stand alone armies).

I do agree that Fyreslayers need more models; heck you can basically buy the whole army bar one or two characters, by just getting Start Collecting boxes. I'd say since Idoneth we've seen bigger and more varied armies in general - either from fresh releases or from combined up forces. It actually leaves Daughters of Khaine in an odd place as one of the newer 2.0 factions with still quite a small range of models.

Hopefully we'll see some exciting stuff in 2019.

Personally I am still waiting on a more basic elven faction. Love my Daughters, but as you mentioned the faction is a bit limited.

Yep DoK work really well as they are, but I too wish there were a few more models in the range. It's almost as if there's a deliberate gap in the range to make room for either blending with another Dark Elf old faction or to make way for a second wave of new models.

There's loads of potential for what to add to the range and I'd hope its strong selling and position in the meta means that GW might well pay some attention to them and bolster the army variety a little.

AoS does have the advantage of not having to deal with Super-Heavy models. While there are the Super Daemon models of Forgeworld, nothing really gets played at that size.

Flying also has always been in the game as well, and they never had Vehicles operating as a completely separate system like 40K had for decades, so the introduction of Flyers never has been a problem for the Fantasy side of Warhammer.

Well....5th ed WHFB had "flying high" as a mechanic where you couldn't touch the flyer and then they could land anywhere on the table. But that ended iin sep 2000 with 6th ediition.

 Overread wrote:
Yep DoK work really well as they are, but I too wish there were a few more models in the range. It's almost as if there's a deliberate gap in the range to make room for either blending with another Dark Elf old faction or to make way for a second wave of new models.

I thought for sure the Executioners would be in the DoK roster, given their previous ties to the Khainite cults in Dark Elf culture. And the Assassin.

 Overread wrote:

 Bosskelot wrote:

 Overread wrote:
Actually right now besides their model count, Stormcast are doing fairly poorly for a modern and poster-child army. Balance wise and in the competitive scene they are not ranking as high as many other armies. I think GW has taken great pains to avoid Stormcast being overpowered and too easy to play to avoid having them dominate in the same way that Marines do in 40K.

Uhhhh Marines in 40k are one of the weakest armies in the game currently

I thought they made up for it by going "soup" though?

At least that is one area AoS has got right I think. Whilst there are Grand Alliances and ally systems, the way Battletomes are setup it favours taking more pure armies. I prefer that greatly because its those pure armies that have a visual style that they share and a lore and artwork which all draws you into them. I like a system that has allies as an option, but hasn't made it mandatory to remain competitive (even if you're not playing tournaments the balance filters down to the casual and if making a strong army required a huge soup then you either accept to have a continual uphill struggle or have to adapt)

Space Marines are trash and aren't included in the Imperial soup armies. Blood Angels used to have a single model (maybe 2 sometimes), but that's gone.

Oh yeah, that's another thing I don't like about the rules. I'd love to take 3 Elf Lords on Dragons, but that ain't happening. And even if my parents hadn't chucked my 3000 points of 90s High Elves when I was at uni, I wouldn't be able to field them together.

Not playing - tried it when it came out and didn't think much of the rules. Gave it a fair shake and it came up wanting.

Background - nigh incomprehensible. Sorry!

That was a few years ago. Looks like the games in a better place now, theres some interesting stuff been released. Read a couple of the battletomes - two were okay, one was utter toilet. Fairly standard GW Hit/Miss rate then.

Some interesting stuff going on, but we shall see how it fares. I'm not sure whether to go in or not - it'd be narrative play for me, all the way.

 ChazSexington wrote:

Oh yeah, that's another thing I don't like about the rules. I'd love to take 3 Elf Lords on Dragons, but that ain't happening. And even if my parents hadn't chucked my 3000 points of 90s High Elves when I was at uni, I wouldn't be able to field them together.

Actually you can.

High Elves dragons in Order Draconis are at 340 points so you can take 3 - it costs just over 1K points so that's quite a lot in the leaders pool, but you can certainly do it. You can even do it for Dark Aelves too.
The only limits are that both Order Draconis and Serpentis are very small armies so you're basically stuck with dragons and cavalry as your core army and then can ally in around 400 points worth of allies (assuming a 2K game). Both are very likely to get addressed as GW updates the game armies (personally I'd wager we see armies like that rolled into a single force much like theyv'e done with Beasts of Chaos and Goblins).

Yeah the concept of an "army" is largely gone. They recognized tiny model count is desirable and cater to that.

auticus wrote:
Yeah the concept of an "army" is largely gone. They recognized tiny model count is desirable and cater to that.

As long as we ignore Goblins, Stormcast, Beasts of Chaos
Small forces was the original focus of AoS; now however they are clearly reversing that design choice. There's even people wondering if they'll update Skaven the same way as they have Goblins - putting all the Clans into a single book and then having then either able to go all together in a single skaven force; or have clan groups that you can focus on - rather than having 4 or 5 separate skaven clan books.

Goblins - you can take a small army of all trolls.

Stormcast - most of the storm cast armies I see are small model count affairs. Certainly not the army counts of old. THey are 40 models or in that ballpark.

Beasts of Chaos - can't answer to this as this army lasted three weeks in my meta before disappearing.

When I say small armies or concept of an army I am talking the size of the force not the unit entry count in their book.

Poster was talking about an "army" consisting of 3 dragons and some stuff to go with it, ala 5th edition days when armies were 15-20 models.

Model count.

6th - 8th was focused on "armies". AOS is more back down to the D&D party or warband level again.

Ahh yes you are right AoS has stepped back to smaller numbers of models on the table I agree. It makes full sense too as the game was a big relaunch and a "new" game as such to many. It makes full sense that the army size would drop.

I fully expect that given 5-10 years we will steadily see things shift. Either the points values will go down or the army sizes will go up. Either way we will see GW push for larger armies because people will have bigger and bigger collections of models to use and thus will have more reason to push GW for bigger engagements and more chance to bring more models


Plus just like with 40K; GW can introduce new rules systems and model types that increases the type variety and thus the demands on players to bring more variety of units to tackle more situations.



It's not super extreme in AoS's case as it could have been, but yes you can do smaller armies now. I fully expect that to steadily change through time.

Or army structure/ruleset is altered to encourage groups of models as opposed to powerful single models. It would be a delicate balance for the Stormcast, though. Ogres were often on a tightrope walk in 7th, if I remember right.

Looking at the title of the thread and then looking at the new Gloomspite Gitz release. I don't know, man I might start a small little AoS force. I'd say a drawback is that none of my friends play AoS, they're all 40k players and while I probably would be able to drag one or two down with me I think I'm the fastest (or rather most consistent) painter in the bunch. Playing a game where you don't know the system all that well with a complete stranger can be fun, it's also a bit daunting sometimes.

How viable is a grot-throng looking? The getting grots back with the shrine seems strong and buffing them with snufflers seems like a good idea too but I'm not familiar with the game and am just guessing from how that would work in 40k roughly. I haven't played fantasy since 2003. The battalions in AoS seem a bit strange but I think I sort of get how they work..
But could something like this be a decent place to work towards?

I haven't really calculated where that'd all end up pointswise but I love the idea of massed grots and the rest of the units are just too cool to forgoe.

Because AoS killed any will I have to sink time into the New fantasy setting released for us by GW. But however I do realize that many welcome the changes it brougth when it was released, and even as much as the end of the old world aggrevated me some of the AoS models look half decent.

 Overread wrote:

 ChazSexington wrote:

Oh yeah, that's another thing I don't like about the rules. I'd love to take 3 Elf Lords on Dragons, but that ain't happening. And even if my parents hadn't chucked my 3000 points of 90s High Elves when I was at uni, I wouldn't be able to field them together.

Actually you can.

High Elves dragons in Order Draconis are at 340 points so you can take 3 - it costs just over 1K points so that's quite a lot in the leaders pool, but you can certainly do it. You can even do it for Dark Aelves too.
The only limits are that both Order Draconis and Serpentis are very small armies so you're basically stuck with dragons and cavalry as your core army and then can ally in around 400 points worth of allies (assuming a 2K game). Both are very likely to get addressed as GW updates the game armies (personally I'd wager we see armies like that rolled into a single force much like theyv'e done with Beasts of Chaos and Goblins).

Wouldn't I need Dragon Princes as Battleline?

I still think how AoS approaches terrain is truly abysmal, especially in the case of Skirmish where terrain is much more a part of the game.

auticus wrote:
Goblins - you can take a small army of all trolls.

Stormcast - most of the storm cast armies I see are small model count affairs. Certainly not the army counts of old. THey are 40 models or in that ballpark.

Beasts of Chaos - can't answer to this as this army lasted three weeks in my meta before disappearing.

When I say small armies or concept of an army I am talking the size of the force not the unit entry count in their book.

Poster was talking about an "army" consisting of 3 dragons and some stuff to go with it, ala 5th edition days when armies were 15-20 models.

Model count.

6th - 8th was focused on "armies". AOS is more back down to the D&D party or warband level again.

I think it is more that they added flexibility to how large you want to go. You can take Greenskinz and go big or you can go Ironjawz and go elite. With DoK you can go mass Witch Aelves, but you can also go smaller with a lot of melusai. With Blades of Khorne you can go mass bloodreavers or you can go Blood Warriors/Bloodletters with Bloodthirsters.

This flexibility gives the game something WHFB never had and that is scalability of investment. By being able to start smaller it becomes somewhat easier to build a larger army.

 AegisGrimm wrote:
I still think how AoS approaches terrain is truly abysmal, especially in the case of Skirmish where terrain is much more a part of the game.

To be fair terrain in both 40K and AoS needs a bit overhaul. I think its an area that GW rules writers are leaving slack because it adds pages to the rules that they want to keep short. I also half think that their rules design team has been playing wargames against each other so long that some of the terrain rules are not written, but they play with them because its just logical to them so it goes without saying.

It would kind of explain oddities such as how forests/woods work with regard to line of sight and ranged attacks and the like (where, I will point out, most think AoS is ahead of 40K in terms of representation).

I also think that they've got this idea kicking around to make all terrain tehmselves and then attach a warscroll to each specific terrain feature. So instead of generic building and wood rules they've got lots of little sub-rules for "Old wood" "Warped wood" etc... Though it seems they can't decide on if they want to do this or not; so we sort of get half and half with neither fully fleshed out.

I don't think it has to do with them wanting to keep it short. At all. I think it has to do with a lot of people hate terrain interfering in their games and past versions of whfb and 40k it was not uncommon to see people playing on planet bowling ball (a monikor for a table that has little to no terrain on it) intentionally, or pushing all the terrain onto the edges of the table where it can't interfere with their game.

When woods blocking line of sight returned with aos 2.0 if you recall there was quite a bit of wailing and gnashing of teeth about it not being "fair".

Battlefield management has always been a thing you had to do in tabletop battle games. That is until 40k 8th and AOS arrived.

I think they intentionally said "a lot of players find terrain to not be "fun" so we're going to omit it". I base that on many comments that have been made by their design team either before they were designers and were posting on these and other forums, or other commentary they have said in interviews and on their twitter feed.

I think Old fantasy had more issues with terrain because of the way units moved; you had to be lighter on terrain so that units could have space to wheel and turn in formation; AoS strips that out entirely.

As for forests I think the main issue there is still the seraphon and their ability to summon terrain to the table.

I am not a fan of the mechanic where opponent team can pop down terrain in general.

On another note I would love for GW to release "terrain maps" for their matches. Basically approved maps that have certain terrain at certain points. Could work both for Narrative and Matched Play. Narrative maps for storytelling and Matched maps that are balanced in a certain way. I think Flames of War has specific maps people play on for example.

 Overread wrote:
I think Old fantasy had more issues with terrain because of the way units moved; you had to be lighter on terrain so that units could have space to wheel and turn in formation; AoS strips that out entirely.

As for forests I think the main issue there is still the seraphon and their ability to summon terrain to the table.

Or the Sylvaneth, right?