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What changes do you think they need?

How much should different pts costs change to account for an extra wound? Do any other stats need to be changed? Do you like the new DG Daemon Prince? I think the claws on the Daemon Prince seem really underwhelming next to the other options, although the simplicity is nice I think maybe it should be 2 bonus attacks per talon. With 6 base adding 2 is 33%, adding 3 to 4 was a 75% increase, on top of that talons lost a point of AP. So, they're not even half as good compared to other options as they used to be. Should CSM DPs continue to be inferior to TS and DG Princes? I think it would be nice to see how M6 Mutilators and Obliterators play out. Bladeguard Veterans and Eradicators are M6, so why not?

Do you think allowing Grey Knights and Thousand Sons to smite spam again is a good way to make them more relevant? I think not allowing Pink Horrors, Rubrics and Strike Squads to spam smite is silly, it wasn't a problem with GK after they DOUBLED the smite damage. I know Keepers of Secrets are already scary strong, but I think all Monsters, VEHICLES and non-CHARACTERS should be excempt from the additional casting cost on Smite, the only things that have made Smite into a real problem is AFAIK Thousand Sons Supreme Command Detachments and ultra-cheap AM and Renegade psykers.

Should Hateful Assault and Death to the False Emperor be replaced with a permanent attack buff as with Death Guard?

What should the CSM/TS equivalent of contagions be? Death to the False Emperor for mono-CSM and smite-spam for TS perhaps? I personally hope they don't get too much, or that anything they get doesn't get broken by summoning. CSM being played mono 95% of the time would be a major balance failure IMO.

I'm not the biggest fan of the new disgustingly resilient rule, but I do think it is better than the old one, I would have loved Plague Marines to be T4 with 3-4 Wounds and no special ability and just give Plagueburst Crawlers 16 Wounds and no disgusting ability. But with Death Guard already out I think it's best to just stick with the theme. I also think plague vehicles should be available to any legion with access to Nurgle units and Death Guard and Thousand Sons should have access to all Nurgle and Tzeentch units respectively (Havocs, Raptors, Lord Discordant etc.), if Rubrics can be treated as Black Legion elites even though they're just mercenaries then why wouldn't mercenaries in service of the Thousand Sons be able to use Thousand Sons Stratagems? I also still think Zerkers, Rubrics etc. should become Troops when you have exactly 8/9/7/6 instead of when taken in the appropriate legion. I do think it would be acceptable (little iffy but acceptable) to go back to Rubrics always being Thousand Sons and simply requiring allies to get these units. But there would need to be a reward for souping to make that option viable, otherwise, people will be left with no way to use their cult troops.

I think Berzerkers, Rubrics and Noise Marines all need to have their abilities reworked. Having to resolve attacks, pile in and consolidate twice is a lot of extra time. I think maybe Berzerkers should just have 4-6 attacks and then a rule allowing them to consolidate 6", that would also make chainswords a non-necessity because they would trigger the bonus attack once, rarely twice instead of often twice and very rarely thrice. The 2+ Sv thing on Rubrics makes no sense to me and doesn't make them as special as a 4++ would. I think Music of the Apocalypse should be simplified, perhaps to a mortal wound mechanic (D6-T MWs maybe) targeting whatever killed the Noise Marine provided the unit is within range or something like that.

There needs to be a recent traitors option for SM to represent a chapter still using the new gear (unlike CSM) but having fallen to Chaos or just gone renegade, just a little note in the CSM codex, add in a note allowing AM to be taken as Renegades and Heretics. I don't like any of the current legion traits, Emperor's Children has been somewhat saved by 9th but TS are too focussed on psychic powers, World Eaters should be iron-jawed pit fighters rather than glass-jawed knock-out artists, Word Bearers should be more than a vehicle for getting OP Strats etc. etc.

I'd re-work TS and GK and give them a new mechanic. I wouldn't allow them to smite spam, and I wouldn't have their "normal" units count as psykers.

All Characters could still be psykers and behave as psykers do in other armies, but I'd rather see something else for the troops and other units.

I'm not sure exactly what the new mechanic should be, but the way SOB have faith is a nice example of introducing different systems into the game.

I imagine that giving GKs and TS units an equivalent ability to faith, using key words, would be a good way to represent their psychic abilities, in conjunction with giving them Deny the witch capabilities.

vict0988 wrote:What changes do you think they need?

How much should different pts costs change to account for an extra wound? Do any other stats need to be changed?
...
Should CSM DPs continue to be inferior to TS and DG Princes? I think it would be nice to see how M6 Mutilators and Obliterators play out. Bladeguard Veterans and Eradicators are M6, so why not?

* Didn't most marine units go up 2 or 3 points when they got the extra wound? I imagine the same cost increase should accompany the CSM wound increase.
* I don't use princes very often. What is it that makes the TS and DG ones so much better? Just relic/power options?
* Speaking as someone who plays both aeldari and necrons, an extra inch of movement isn't nearly as big a deal as it seems.

Do you think allowing Grey Knights and Thousand Sons to smite spam again is a good way to make them more relevant? I think not allowing Pink Horrors, Rubrics and Strike Squads to spam smite is silly, it wasn't a problem with GK after they DOUBLED the smite damage. I know Keepers of Secrets are already scary strong, but I think all Monsters, VEHICLES and non-CHARACTERS should be excempt from the additional casting cost on Smite, the only things that have made Smite into a real problem is AFAIK Thousand Sons Supreme Command Detachments and ultra-cheap AM and Renegade psykers.

Getting rid of the increased WC on subsequent casts for TS would probably be reasonable. I've seen it get pretty nasty on GK thanks to their ability to do 2 wounds with it. But honestly, smite spam is kind of dull and annoying to play against. Basically, bringing back smite spam would be OK, but there's probably a better solution.

Should Hateful Assault and Death to the False Emperor be replaced with a permanent attack buff as with Death Guard?

Probably. Hateful Assault is pretty useful as-is. DttFE should be changed; non-optional abilities that you presumably pay points for/that eat up "slots" for useful abilities should probably work in all games; not just in games where you happen to be facing certain factions.

What should the CSM/TS equivalent of contagions be? Death to the False Emperor for mono-CSM and smite-spam for TS perhaps? I personally hope they don't get too much, or that anything they get doesn't get broken by summoning. CSM being played mono 95% of the time would be a major balance failure IMO.

I think all armies (not just CSM) would benefit from having their legion tactics equivalent be both more in-depth and less faction-specific. So instead of having "Alpha Legion" rules, you could have generic "Masters of Deception" rules meant to represent sneaky CSM of all stripes. And instead of just giving them a legion tactic, give armies of that style a limited version of GSCs' cult ambush or something. Instead of "Emperor's Children" rules, have "Devotees of Slaanesh" that can take daemonettes and noise marines as troops. GW could fit a lot more content into a codex without dramatically expanding the page count if they wanted to.

I'm not the biggest fan of the new disgustingly resilient rule, but I do think it is better than the old one, I would have loved Plague Marines to be T4 with 3-4 Wounds and no special ability and just give Plagueburst Crawlers 16 Wounds and no disgusting ability. But with Death Guard already out I think it's best to just stick with the theme. I also think plague vehicles should be available to any legion with access to Nurgle units and Death Guard and Thousand Sons should have access to all Nurgle and Tzeentch units respectively (Havocs, Raptors, Lord Discordant etc.), if Rubrics can be treated as Black Legion elites even though they're just mercenaries then why wouldn't mercenaries in service of the Thousand Sons be able to use Thousand Sons Stratagems?

TS DP gets a 4++ and knows an extra power.

DG DP got a 5+ FNP now they get the new DR and two attacks instead of Hateful Assault and DTTFE.

Mutilators are M4 and outside of rolling 9+ for their DS charge they're not really worth spending Strats or CP on because of their low unit size. A unit of 6 EC Mutilators could be real scary with Strat support.

The number thing is how DG organize their plague companies AFAIK, not obscure but I know it's controversial.

I always try to be careful to separate 'what they need' from 'wishlisting.' While there's things I'd love to see for each faction, there's a separate set of issues that make them unwieldy for the current edition.

That said, these are some of the issues that need to be addressed:

- All three factions need that extra wound.

- CSM need better shooting at mid-range and distance. Point-for-point, Obliterators are severely outclassed by loyalist options like Heavy Intercessors and Proteus Kill teams with have better range (HI guns) and better damage output on average (Frag Cannons.) Noise Marines are basically firing bolters with extra shots, and bolters themselves don't do much. Beyond that... not sure what we have that's really useful on the table.

- CSM need better rules for tanks. Not talking about Deamon Engines so much as Rhinos, Land Raiders and Predators. Primaris Tanks are so much more points efficient. I don't think this is solved by points alone, maybe let them take marks and specialize a bit or allow them to be fielded as squadrons of 1 - 3 (allowing other HS options in a list.)

- GK need Brotherhood of Psykers back. I'm not sure they are that bad to begin with, but they'd be more competitive with better smite spam. I'd go so far as to stay: remove the rule about double casting for GK and TS armies. Let them use whatever powers they want as much as they want, they're supposed to be the psychic bad-asses.

- GK and TS need a way to ignore Invul saves. CSM get it through Death Hex / Belakor, other factions have a way to do this. It's such a huge advantage, any faction without it will have problems.

- For GK and CSM - the changes to multi-charges really hurt us from the standpoint that charging multiple units now has more risk of failing. CSM are ideally a melee army, GK are low model count, so this really matters. They're going to have a hard time without something that allows them to charge multiple units and succeed so long as one is within range. This could be on specific units, like Berzerkers and Strikes.

- For CSM Legion Traits - they need to be reworked so each one is useful in the game. The difference in quality is so significant. A really simple way to make Legions more useful would be to allow FoC changes for each - i.e. Raptors as Troops for Night Lords, Chosen / Terminators as Troops for Black Legion, Havocs as Troops for Iron Warriors, etc. This alone could benefit lists that are having to take a second detachment.

The Primaris hover Predators seem a good bit less pts-efficient than regular Predators.

You don't have any opinion on abilities like contagions techsoldaten?

 vict0988 wrote:
The Primaris hover Predators seem a good bit less pts-efficient than regular Predators.

You don't have any opinion on abilities like contagions techsoldaten?

Like I said, there's wish lists, then there's what a faction needs.

I don't think any of these factions need Contagions. It's a nice to have for DG, not a have to have for everybody else.

TS and GK - give them Brotherhood of Psykers or let them cast psychic powers multiple times. Let that be their Contagion.

CSM - improve mid and long range shooting because, point for point, they are outclassed by Loyalist and most Xenos factions. That's a have to have. Followed by making Legion traits useful and maybe allowing certain legions to move units into the Troops slot.

On CSM, pretty much in agreement with Techsoldaten on everything, but we need to look at what has already been done in comparative 9th edition codexes to see what will most likely be in store for us:

-Predators, Land Raiders, and Rhinos won't be getting any better. They didn't for loyalists or Death Guard, they won't for CSM. Vindicators will most likely be able to get a 2+ save with a Siege Shield, same as loyalists.

-Cultists won't have obsec, Legion traits, or CORE, same as Death Guard.

-Daemon engines likewise won't get Legion traits, just as Death Guard. They will go to BS/WS 3, and most likely get whatever our monofaction bonuses are, as they get Contagions in Death Guard.

For better non-daemonic vehicles, look to fw. A Land Raider Achilles is better than a repulsor in every way: more firepower, tougher, and cheaper than an executioner. Sicarans are better than Gladiators. Contemptors, Leviathans, and Daredeos are excellent dreadnoughts. The problem is that almost all of these (the Achilles being the exception) are subject to Martial Legacy. That goes against how fw handled them in 8th compared to loyalists, and how CSM have always been portrayed as ancient warriors using archaic weaponry. Allow the LEGIONS to ignore Martial Legacy, then we have vehicles that can compete with Primaris.

On troops: Allow the Undivided Legions to take Chosen as troops just as the god aligned Legions can take their own Cult Marines as troops. Now we have a troops choice that can compete with intercessors. I've been beating this drum for a while, and I'll keep doing it.

Next give our units back what they've lost: Give Chosen Infiltrate, Raptors Hit and Run, and remove the ranDUMB from Obliterators weapons and allow them to switch between various heavy weapons as the situation demands again.

Finally, stop making our units overly reliant on strategems and character buffs. In older editions, loyalists needed their characters, because they needed the leadership boost from Rites of Battle to make them better for leadership tests. CSM didn't, because we had naturally better leadership than loyalists, with almost every unit L9 or L10. Leadership isn't as important now, but that could be handled by making CSM units slightly better than comparative loyalists units in basic stats and special abilities. CSM are supposed to be veterans, and shouldn't need to have someone shouting at them constantly to remind them to "SHOOT BETTER!". Our characters should be scary beat sticks, not buff bots.

I'd be all for a fixed profile on Obliterators, actually. Honestly people talk about how they loved to switch weapons on them, but the reality of the situation is that you only ever chose a couple of weapons. GW just decided randumb is the way to go as always.

Got into Thousand Sons recently so have been thinking about this a lot:

- Some benefit to the overall psychic abilities. GK get plenty of +1s to tests, whereas TS are a bit lacking in this area, particularly as our overall strategy seems to revolve around a limited selection of powers, namely Glamour and Weaver. Given GW's current pattern of removing any abilities that give any unit any character or flavour, I doubt this'll happen.

- Some variety of units would be appreciated. I'd allow 2 Soulreapers to be taken for 10 Rubrics, and introduce some new units entirely, such as a Soulreaper Havoc unit, or a Scarab Occult bodyguard.

- Horrors in general need some incentive to take Blues and Brimstones. It gets difficult in Matched Play as the sheer points worth of units you can gain from splitting Horrors would ruin the game somewhat. I'll be honest I don't know how to balance this.

- With Tzeench Daemons in general, would be good to mix and match in a TS list without having to take a whole new detachment.