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Yes, this is just an "I wish" thread for the upcoming Seraphon battletome. Not very productive, I know.

I think the thing that's most urgently needed for Seraphon is 4+ saves for Saurus Knights. Right now, Saurus Knights are Movement 7 with 5+ saves, making them not fast enough to serve as fast cavalry, and not resilient enough to serve as heavy cavalry. It's not enough to reduce their points cost; their statline needs to improve.

Also, the army as a whole is sorely lacking in Rend: only a few -1's here and there, and almost no -2's and -3's. I hope they give us more Rend.

Right now, Ripperdactyls get a bunch of concurrent and conditional bonuses and re-rolls from three separate rules (Swooping Dive, Voracious Appetite and Toad Rage). It would be nice if these rules were streamlined somewhat.


Things that I do like about the Seraphon, and hope they keep:
- Stardrake shields (ignore -1 Rend)
- Skinks' ability to disengage from melee instead of piling in
- Bravery 10

.

Agreed on the three things to keep.

Honestly, I just want all Sauras to go up in durability, via saves, and wounds. Regular Sauras could go up to 2 wounds, while Guard could go up to 3 (since they're supposed to be supremely tough, come in units of 5, and buff themselves by being new heros), while Cav could go up to three, being a normal Sauras on a 1 wound beast.
They really need to decide what Knights are though. They either need to be very mobile on their own, or threatening in a big way to make them worth taking. Lance's will probably be reworked to be like either the Kavalos lance or the Chaos Knight lance.

Skinks are fine. They're chaffe. And serve that purpose well. It'd be nice if we got a Skink chief hero back to buff them somehow.
On the Skink hero front, I'd like to see a Skink Prophet/Hero/Priest on a Terradon or Ripperdactyl that would make Rippers or Terradons battleline.

Dinosaurs need a big buff, mostly in wounds and their weapon profiles. Troglodon really needs rend on his bite at the very least, while he's mostly fine as is I guess.
Carnisaur needs more attacks baseline in my opinion. Steg seems alright, just not very durable. Basti just needs more than 8 wounds and they'll be perfect....

Reworked Kroxigors. Make the Moonhammer a secondary profile to the Drakebite maul, while also giving the maul a little more rend and better hit. The Moonhammer profile could make the unit better at sweeping hordes, while the DBM could be for cracking nuts.
I'd honestly like for them to have a better save, since they don't have the protection against -1 Rend most of our infantry have.

That's just a few things. And I don't think most of that is unreasonable....

A release date.

-Guardsman- wrote:
Yes, this is just an "I wish" thread for the upcoming Seraphon battletome. Not very productive, I know.

Bah who cares if it's not productive!

I agree that Saurus Knights need a buff. They are laughably pitiful, especially compared to what they were in WHFB. They need an improved profile even more than they need new models, which is really saying something!

Also agreed on the three things to keep. As many times as I have lost to that skink maneuver I would still be sad to see it go.

Saurus need an offense buff to bring them in line with the overall offense creep of AoS; GW has decided to make 2nd edition hit much harder and Saurus should too. Saurus Guard need more durability against MWs too. Would be pretty happy if saurus just went up to being 2w infantry, they have to suffer 32mm bases after all.

Wishlisting? Sure, I have some Strong Opinions!

-Move away from summoning spam, the army should be playable without it
- Saurus units in general need a buff. Ideally +1W to foot saurus of both types, and maybe damage boost of some sort. They're very clearly behind the curve on the 2.0 units
-Knights need to go down in price or up in damage output, or both. Or armor. Point is, right now they're doing nothing particularly well. Or just squat them, no one will miss the ugly buggers- I'd gladly catapult mine into the sun...
-big boys need a survivability boost, carnos need damage boost.

Yes on the above. Squat the knights or give us a new sculpt. Not only are they really potato-grade in their presentation, but the quality of assembly is really bad, too.

I'm all for making the knights tougher, slightly.

I would be hoping primarily for better and more satisfying background. The idea that the Lizardmen are just dreamed into existence by the Slaan is quite original, and I give kudos for that, but I just don't like it. I would rather they took them in a different direction that gave me a greater feeling of satisfaction about using my aztec dinosaur people.

I do actually like the post-lizard men idea. Just develop it more, so they're more in line with the old one's magitech ideas than just lizard demons.

Cronch wrote:

-Knights need to go down in price or up in damage output, or both. Or armor. Point is, right now they're doing nothing particularly well. Or just squat them, no one will miss the ugly buggers- I'd gladly catapult mine into the sun...

Well if that's how you feel about them, send them my way. I'll pass them onto our local LM/Seraphon player. He quite likes them & would give them a good home.

And yes, if part of his army got squatted? He'd definitely miss them.

More DINOSAURS that's my wish. dont even have to be big ones.

Plastic razordon/salamander dual kit!

I'm wondering if the preview tidbit:

You’ll have the chance to find out how the original refugees from the world-that-was became the celestially charged Starborne, and how the Seraphon are changing into the Coalesced – whatever that means.

is going to be a switch back to their original form, ie, flesh and blood creatures that are spawned instead of brought forth from memory.

Out of all the lore, the Seraphon as dreams made manifest was kind of a hard pill to swallow. Not sure why, as alot of the AoS lore is bonkers, but it just seemed like a needless change. I can respect that they swung for the fences in terms of changing up their traditional lore, but they were already alien enough in WHFB.

If memory serves, there was a Malign Portents short story that dealt with a living Starpriest and spawn pools, so maybe its been in the works for some time.

 nels1031 wrote:
Out of all the lore, the Seraphon as dreams made manifest was kind of a hard pill to swallow. Not sure why, as alot of the AoS lore is bonkers, but it just seemed like a needless change. I can respect that they swung for the fences in terms of changing up their traditional lore, but they were already alien enough in WHFB.

I think it was a concept of Daemons of Order that they were trying to replicate.

At the LVO Q&A they described it as the longer the Seraphon dwell in the realms the more physical they become; they slowly become flesh and take on traits of the realm they are in.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
At the LVO Q&A they described it as the longer the Seraphon dwell in the realms the more physical they become; they slowly become flesh and take on traits of the realm they are in.

I can dig that.

Seems like a retcon but perhaps a sensible one. I still think I would have preferred something else, but I am at least happy the army remains fully supported.

On one hand I really, really don't like retcons. On the other there seems to be a broad unpopularity with the original fluff and it was written when AoS development was... A bit different.

It's hardly a retcon, given how nebulous Seraphon background was to begin with.

But thats also how all the realms work..... the longer you are in a realm the more you become like the realm lol.

I don't mind factions evolving and changing.

Seraphon had several vectors by which they could return to the world as living breathing breeding normal lizardfolk. First there's the original bodies on the ark-ships which could have been used to restore populations directly. Because of the insane timescales that we deal with in the mortal realms it wouldn't have to have been done all that long ago for them to have bred a few generations enough that they'd be "realm naturalised" and not have any recollection of the Old World save as stories from their great great grand-spawner?


The idea that Slaan summon them and keep them around for such extended periods that they start to become "Real" is another very interesting angle. It takes the original lore and builds upon it with a situation that might start out unique and then grows more commonplace as it becomes an established method. Plus once you've a living breathing breeding population it can grow from there.




I think the key is that when Seraphon are just Slaan (who basically don't do much conversation nor character development - they are more "here I am BAM some powerful magic") there isn't as much they can do with them. Plus as characters they are very open to becoming a Mary Sue every time they appear unless they are fighting greater greater demons - at which point their impact on the story should be as major as the Necroquake - so again not all that much material to work with.

Giving them living breathing normal lizardmen gives them a great vector to write stories and adventures about them. About how they interact with the other mortal realm peoples. It also means that they can and should hold lands and territories outside of the key military points. In addition there's more room for stuff outside of war. For trade, population growth; development etc....



I think it gives both gamers and authors so much more to work with. Plus there's even potential for conflict and confusion. What about lizardmen who stray from the path the Slaan set; or who disagree with their choices? What about interacting between the living and the recently summoned - social imbalance, conflict, rivalry, sadness etc... There's a wealth of potential there and one good thing about the BL right now is that they are not shying away from factions. Every faction gets stories both involving and about themselves.

 Overread wrote:
First there's the original bodies on the ark-ships which could have been used to restore populations directly. Because of the insane timescales that we deal with in the mortal realms it wouldn't have to have been done all that long ago for them to have bred a few generations enough that they'd be "realm naturalised" and not have any recollection of the Old World save as stories from their great great grand-spawner?

Quite impossible. There are no male or female of the sentient species involved. They rose, fully formed, out of spawning pools at random times on the Old World with no noted inclusion of biological data aside from the initial establishment of such.

 Charistoph wrote:

 Overread wrote:
First there's the original bodies on the ark-ships which could have been used to restore populations directly. Because of the insane timescales that we deal with in the mortal realms it wouldn't have to have been done all that long ago for them to have bred a few generations enough that they'd be "realm naturalised" and not have any recollection of the Old World save as stories from their great great grand-spawner?

Quite impossible. There are no male or female of the sentient species involved. They rose, fully formed, out of spawning pools at random times on the Old World with no noted inclusion of biological data aside from the initial establishment of such.

I take umbrage with the idea that is was random. Many a time spawnings came that seemed to be guided by a plan or in reaction to external stimuli.

PLANNED AND SPAWNED ALL ACCORDING TO THE WILL OF THE OLD ONES.
PRAISE BE.

But yeah, unless they have a way of creating new spawning pools that can create the incubating Seraphon, most would probably keep in contact with their "mother" Temple Ships, and the Slann that spawned/remembered them into being.

So to clear up some misinterpretation here the old/current Seraphon fluff is as such (pieced together from the battletome, pestilens novel, and a malign sorcery short story):

-A Slaan on the battlefield isn't conjuring new Seraphon into existence, he is summoning them from the ships. When they vanish at the end of a battle they are teleporting back up.

-Slaan bring other Seraphon into existence through their memory, but this is done on the ships and their celestial forms come out of spawning pools (also on the ships). These ships are gigantic and contain a 'world sphere' which houses an entire jungle for the Seraphon to spend their time in between deployments.

-When a Slaan remembers a Seraphon he doesn't just remember 'Skink Priest #5' he remembers 'Bob, the Skink Priest'. If Bob is fighting and dies, the Slaan remembers everything Bob did. So he can bring Bob back again and Bob will remember those things that happened. The other Seraphon are still individuals with their own names and personalities.

It is strange because there are hugely important pieces of fluff for Seraphon that exist not in the battletome but in the Skaven Pestilens novel and a single malign portents short story.

It is unfortunately just a bit limp as far as engaging background goes. Feels like the only "real" actors are the Slaan.

To be honest, it also rubs up against the disatisfaction with the destruction of the Old World in a thematic sense, as you end up fighting with your actual memories.

 Carnikang wrote:
[
But yeah, unless they have a way of creating new spawning pools that can create the incubating Seraphon, most would probably keep in contact with their "mother" Temple Ships, and the Slann that spawned/remembered them into being.

Just send them to the edge of Ghyran, where life magic can randomly make you pregnant. Presto, lizard eggs

The other Seraphon are still individuals with their own names and personalities.

Actually, they're what the Slann remembers of their personality. How accurate would your personlity be, if you asked your coworkers to reconstruct you? The Slann summons Azyr energy to shape it into lizardmen "suits", and when no longer needed, he dispells them back into that energy. When he needs them again, he does summon them again, giving the same shape he remembers, so there's "continuity". Malign Portents did introduce the on-board ship spawning pools, but they seem to be something that wasn't in much use before, a reply to the problem of necroquake meddling with magic.

For now that is, I am sure they will actually organize and retcon it into a coherent whole with the new book, since it's no longer restrained by Kirby's ideas.

If my coworker was tens of thousands of years old, had an intellect beyond my comprehension, knew my brain inside and out telepathically, and could see the future I'd estimate they'd do an excellent job reconstructing me!

But even in the battletome there are references to them going back to the ships between battles, that particular piece of fluff has been around a while.