Oh, the sculpts are great, but for a faction that really shines as a horde-focused army they stick out not only as really bad battleline units but also suffer the problem of trying to do it all without really being good at any specific task. On top of that, the warscroll battalions that require you to take them don't actually benefit them either. Their only benefit right now is in being financially cheaper to field than the same number of points worth of Skryre Acolytes, which last I checked were still being sold individually in metal blister packs.
Well, he has no DPR save, has no way of getting around screens, and only has a 10" move so shouldn't be much of an issue for us at least. His damage output looks insane at first glance but he shouldn't be too hard to manage with screens
He's *really really* good, and I'm glad for that. He's just what a Destruction player would want. But, with smart play, he's not unmanageable for the rest of us.
Kragnos is indeed really, really good. However, I'm never too happy to see yet another unit where the only realistic strategy for dealing with them is "throw screens at them and just ignore them otherwise." It's not fun for either side. The player using the big powerful model doesn't want to have them bogged down fighting fodder the entire game, and the person playing against them doesn't enjoy having no option other than to just bring a lot of fodder to throw at them.
What a horrible unit... Against a capable opponent with the right list it'l get shot of the table pretty much immeadiatly or get stuck in screens for 99% of the game and won't be of any real use. And against everyone else it'l be murdering everything it touches with little to no effort. Also, what is with the amount of anti terrain mechanics being introduced lately? I mean, at least he doesn't have a ward-save. Anything that relies on mortal wounds like buffed up skinks, chameleons or terradons actually stand a decent chance of killing him. Or if you want to be really lame, screens of deadwalker zombies will kill him surprisingly quickly while he wastes his time being stuck in them.....
The one good thing to come out of Kragnos his nonsense. Apparently he was such a threat the drakes came begging Kroak for help. So that's a neat tidbit that puts Kroak on a even more extreme level lorewise, being powerfull enough to be the last hope for a race as powerfull as the dragons.
Hasn't every competitive skaven list since their book came out taken at least 6 storm fiends? But to each their own dude, I thought it was a pretty nice package for a boxed set consider the start collecting has the bell and monks but I guess they did just have them in the fec set. And I doubt many skaven players need warp lightning cannons lol.
It makes a nice refresh from good rules like "This model counts as 20 instead of 1 for capturing objectives" having silly names Mightier makes Rightier
Well, Kragnos is really good, considering he is fights with right target... which should never to. Top tier armies won't have issues, for low tier nothing really changes. He should be arnound 400-500 to be even considered, IMO. The worst part - he won't benifit from any allegience and can only use basic CAs. In other words, imagine Gotrek with +6 move.
I haven't cared to examine how they've been implemented in competitive lists. The most I know however is that they're exclusively taken with a specific loadout in mind (can't remember if it's ranged- or melee-focused), and that taking 6 of them is a good quarter of your army points tied up in just those models. I've personally never found them to be durable or damaging enough to be worth taking in my lists, as much as I would like to imagine that they can be used well. And like I said, I can probably find better uses for the approximate 500pts needed to field all of 6 models, as much as 6 wounds apiece and 4+ saves are concerned.
The problem Kragnos presents is the same problem Mortarion presents in 40k. Namely its a giant based 500 pt god-level character that is a complete beast in combat and is going to be thrown him into combat as soon as possible. While the opponent has to deal with this guy for a couple turns of combat, the rest of the army will be cementing a huge point lead on objectives with their cheap 40 man horde units. Skaven and gloomspite are going to see a lot more success with this guy in their armies.
Mortarion as whole different story and should be compared to Archaon. Unless 3rd bring some special rules for monster models to ignore screens, you won't be having problem at roadblocking him with cheap 10-model units and just going for other 1500 or something points off opponents army. Just compare him to leviadon, who has good damage output, same 2+ save, but ignore -1 rend, buffing army around himself and has FLY atop of it, deals same d6 mortal wounds on 2+ on charge for mere 300+ points. I think, kragnos should be in the same price category. Or compare him to Wierd 'Un mawkrusha, which can fly, can be given 2+ save, ignore rend -1 and can charge your line turn 1. Why would an Orruk player take kragnos over it? The only army, which can benifit from it, that I see, is GSG, who lack real heavy hitter. And all the top-tier army can deal with kragnos in 1-2 turns without much problem, since they have access to high rend/non-magic mortal wounds. Interestingly, Teclis's innate damage spell has almost 50% chance to hurt Kragnos and deal d3-d6 MWs on top of other army.
I'd guess cuz Kragnos is essentially immune to magic and doesn't need any support whatsoever. If your opponent heavily relies on magic then Kragnos is borderline immortal. Aside from that it mostly depends on how expensive he is... Also, if nothing else he makes for a great distraction as your opponents options for dealing with him are extremely limited. Kragnos + a small escort to break screens for him could be more than enough to dictate how your opponent has to play depending on how expensive he is. And everything that isn't a top-tier army will hate dealing with him... I mean sure, this approach will lead to a "balanced" state in competitive play because it averages out if he fights a healthy mix of top and bottom tier armies. But it doesn't seem like much fun for anyone involved, including the Kragnos player himself....
i don't even think they will have problems with him. he is slooooooow and any thing with rend will eat him alive
I don't think, that any army relies heavily on magic to deal damage. Even tzeentch and seraphon have flamers and salamanders, while can target with spells other units. A way to deal with such a threat exists since the first day of AoS (and even predates that in wargaming as whole, I guess) - if something is too much effort to deal with - stop it with something cheap and ignore. And what really kills kragons for me is 10 move without fly/run and charge. There is literally now way to charge anything for him, if he goes first. Well, even low tier army like Legion of Grief and Gloomspite can find a way to stall it. I just really can't see what Kragnos can give any current destruction army, except GSG. I think, if meta can deal with Archaon, it should be able to deal with Kragnos too with not much problem.
Kragnos warscroll mentions the Drake keyword. Right now there is nothing with that keyword, so a new stormcast mount perhaps hmm