I disagree. Yes, his casting is now weaker, but for maximum summoning he is still good because of his additional spell, and you still have a decent chance to insta-kill squishy heroes with his comet and getting Celestial Deliverance through at least once. Also: Remember how everyone said Kroak sucks and he was close to never played, and then @darren watson found a way to prove us all wrong? Let's wait a bit, play a bit, and see what we all can come up with. The 'meta' is changing, lots of other armies have to adapt as well. It is hard to predict what will really happen.
pretty much. Kroak is costly, but you can bump your summonings. Think to it this way: Kroak got a potential of 4 spell slots. 12 summoning points. A Slann costs a lot less, but to go near those 12 points, you must also pick an astrolith bearer, for a similar total cost, and those 12 points are not granted. If Kroak casts Comet, he still collects the summoning points of an inactive Slann (without the constellations but granting more durability). But yeah, no one can say that our undead frog is cheap for what he does...
The rules text says that you can summon units. There is nothing that says only once. So you can - for example - decide to not use four spell slots of your Slann general for casting and instead spend those 12 points at the end of the movement phase to summon two units of 10 Skinks each.
I would rather take a Slann Starmaster, BWV, Chronomatic Cogs and a Skink Starpriest for 440 points. That Slann produces 15 CCP per turn, gives an extra wizard (for objective grabbing) and the total is 10 points less than Lord Kroak.
The real question you should be asking, is why take kroak at all? His command ability is almost useless, on average you're not casting deliverance at all, or once with an astrolith, and he doesnt have access to any of the skink spells like a slann does. Is the extra 200 points worth it for on average 4 mortals a turn?
Probably not. Using Realm spells (or when we finally get our own spell lore) he might be worth it. But I agree that in most cases the regular Slann will have some advantages.
I think is still worth kroak but he costs 450 and with 70 more points you have 2 slanns for example that will be 6 spells 6 dispels... I dont know
I think that time will tell where seraphon will find themselves in v2. I personally believe that we all agree that seraphon completely lost magic supremacy. We also still have mobility. With regard to durability and melee/ranged I'd say we're in the middle. I'm asking if the loss in magic capabilities is compensated by the new summoning mechanic. This is where I'm a little bit sceptical. I'm not sure that even by playing 4 eotg pumping out skinks and rippers, and slann, or even kroak, collecting sp you stand a chance after the meta adapted to this list. And guards, saurus, and knights still seem pretty situational and sub par, even though we theoretically could buff them by dumping x command points for a one hit wonder.
i notice many of the lists have saurus cavalry. i always thought that unit was sub-optimal. did these lists rely on the fact that they can summon so many skinks later? why did they include the cavalry?