With the Generals Handbook 2020 right around the corner I was wondering what you lizards would like to see changed about our army, points wise or rules wise. I personally am hoping that sallies and kroak go up a little bit in points, as well as the oracle getting a points reduction. some different saurus artifacts would be nice as well since I can only justify taking one out of the three available.
Point drops for Bastiladon/Stegadon/Dread Saurian/Troglodon - They are all honestly quite bad imo considering the points you sink into a single model. Never played with a Carnosaur so dont know if they are pointed okayish. I would assume a point increase for Kroak and Salamanders, but how much? It is really difficult to tell since people have barely played across the globe. No major tournaments with 5 games yet either. I also dont think Kroak is bonkers OP compared to Lord of Change/Nagash/Teclis, he is certainly good though. Kroak is already a 600 points investment at least (320 for Kroak + 40 Balewind + 140 Astrolith + 100 for 5 Guards), possibly more if you throw in Endless Spells or a normal Slann. Considering that Balewind has been off the GW website for almost all of 2020, I have a feeling we might see it disappear in GHB20 - This would be a pretty big nerf to Kroak tbh. The loss of 6" range especially hurts Kroak due to the short base range on Celestial Deliverance, plus the extra spell and +1 save is pretty impactful imo. This would be an interesting way to nerf him. Salamanders are incredible strong and seeing lists with 18 hurts a bit, but we dont really have a strong alternative beyond blobs of 40 Skinks fully buffed with +1 hit, reroll 1s to hit and Starpriest venom staff. This would just make Coalesced/Saurus lists even worse if Salamanders were hammered. Changes to current terrain rules - Both previous GHB ones but also core rules ones. Make them matter a lot more. This would also be a welcoming buff to Coalesced. Like if you step onto a Volcano terrain piece you better have a damn good reason to do so, since it is a volcano right? As it is you can pretty much forget about them all beside Arcane, Commanding and Entangling. Maybe Overgrown and Nullification is semi decent.
While i am desprate for either fyreslayers or dispossed allies, cause i love dwarfs, i think we're more likely to see salamanders moved to artillery and/or points increase. I hope our big monsters get a points drop a little or mount traits so they can really get stuck in and like others are saying, improved terrain rules and some sort of orge like rule for objectives for our thunderlizards. I hope they either expand or reshuffle the mercenary sytem. I liked the idea but i dont think it was very popular.
I'm wondering if we may see some kind of general rule about big things and contesting objectives. With the announcement of Sons p of Bahaumet that has to be on their radar, even if it ends up just being a special role for that army.
I would be happy if they brought the skink oracle down to 200 pts and made kroak closer to 360 or 380, as for sallies i think they could go up to 100 points and still be a reasonable addition to any army. mount traits would be nice but since i haven't played my thunderlizard list yet its hard for me to say if they absolutely need it. dread saurian does seem a bit expensive imo but once again i havent had a chance to play them since the update, overall i think saurus units are in a good spot points wise, the carnosaurs feel like they are worth the cost as long as you play them tactically.
So we already know in matched play there’s now a dice roll and the winner picks the realm. Given the spell casting tricks we have (particularly vassals), that’s especially important for us. One of the first things I want to see is which spells have been kept for each realm. If either teleport (pool or bridge) is kept, it’s huge for Kroak vassals on turn 1 (HUGE.); if any of the ‘pick a point draw a line’ ones make it, the Oracle opens up interesting ‘line drawn across the whole battlefield’ shenanigans. I don’t think there will be much if anything in the way of Seraphon points changes. We’re just too recent, given when the GHB would’ve been printed. HOPES: - Changes to terrain placement and set-up which makes ours more reliable - Endless spells points adjustments which are also reflected in the bound versions. Some still feel a tiny bit off. - Army composition rules for 1500points. It’s such a sweet spot for quicker games (especially multiplayer, where 4 1500pts fills a table nicely). PREDICTIONS: - I suspect this may be a relatively minor ‘tweak’ book, ahead of the real shake-up of AOS 3.0. So focuses on tidying rules and new ways to play, rather than changing battlefield size or command points to align with the new 40k. - Regardless, realms alone, depending on features, will shake the meta big-time.
they already addressed this with spell portal the line is drawn from the oracle to the point not from the castor i do agree with every thing else you said
“Some spells require you to pick a point on the battlefield within a certain distance of the caster, and then draw a line from that point back to the caster. Can this point be measured from an Umbral Spellportal, and if it can, is the line drawn back to the caster? Yes to both questions.” I read that as saying we do indeed drop the point near the oracle and draw the line from Kroak...
huh guess i got that backwards my bad. still seems like a very gimmicky way to deal 1d3 to a few units
Absolutely an edge case to use the oracle! But even with a normal vassal, that’s a 36” line. If the realm feature/command ability also benefits us, it would sometimes be a spell worth having in the pocket. Doesn’t compare at all to Bridge of Shadows though. Teleporting a vassal up to dump mortal wounds from Kroak, then LOSATing them back in the movement phase would be dirty.
I don't think, that we'll see any changes to our points. Maybe, in FAQ, but since there were no large tournaments outside of TTS, GW possibly can ignore us. I really wish to see point drops on our saurus heroes and monsters, especially all variations of stegadon. Razordon should have point drop to, 10 at least. Rippers can lose some more points too, as well as ripper chief. But, I am afraid, some internal balance issues could be fixed only by warscroll changes, which won't happen in, like, 5 years. And nerfing kroak and salamanders=going to tier B, unless OBR, CoS and Tzeentch take a hard nerf too. But then - welcome to the new LRR domination era.
It's funny that I hear most of us talking about point changes, usually (but not always) lowering points. My SCE buddy (and others in my group too) constantly complains about how cheap my units are compared to his and how many he can field. Long story short, he's hoping for lowered point values for SCE.
I want to see mount traits lists that are specific to each of the big dinos (carno, steg, eotg, Basti), and the TL battalion ability changed from +2 wounds to behemoths to "instead of only one mount having a trait, each thunder lizard behemoth may have a mount trait" just have to make sure they give us enough foe steggageddon because for some reasons mount traits are affected by rule of one with factions that have them. minor point changes should occur. kroak needs to go up a little. maybe 20-40 points. big guys need to come down, however with mount traits they could prolly stay about where they are. sallies are a tough one, unless they intend to give us two point lists for starborne/Coalesced, which I really don't ever see happening. that would finalize us being two different armies instead of one faction with two subfactons. I want to see the Coalesced abilities tweaked, specifically I want cold blooded to prevent negative bravery modifiers only. and I want no terrains listed on the ones we can ignore or not, simply state "beneficial abilities and detrimental effects" I think its pretty safe to say its rather obvious which terrain effects are beneficial or not. I think this would be a way to make them more competitive without touching the scaly skin rule.
I want our terrain piece to be placed after sides are chosen so I actually get to take the stupid thing.
Looking at the picture of the Table of Contents there doesn't appear to be changes to armies at all this time.
It is okay, if everything else will be nerfed too. Yes, this GHB looks super boring, TBH. Lots of Open and Narrative play content, which would be barely used, because we, players, can handle these part by ourselves. MP missions overhaul - good, but nothing special. Team games - same. Realm rules - no one asked for that, but ok. I am not excited. Let's wait for points book then and points FAQ. These are interesting ones.
I dont know, we never played with realm rules and tournaments around here have started to exclude them. I like the idea of them being easier/more streamlined so people actually use them. It is an interesting shake-up with indirectly removing Malign Sorcery artefacts.