I doubt we’ll see any Seraphon changes in this one. I’d be willing to bet this was signed off/sent to the printers etc before the Seraphon battletome was released.
I’d say you’re right , I don’t know if it would have hurt to maybe wait a little longer to do this seeing as the pandemic impacted a lot.
This is what I feel too. On the other hand playtesters have played with Seraphon months before Seraphon was released, so they could have given feedback that points were too low for Salamanders. In general it feels like they base point changes off tournament results, and there havent been any real ones due to Covid-19. I hope they make battleplans less of a pain - I like when you play on each of the long edges, but those that cut it the opposite side is just ass. In general I would like for them to be more specific for where objectives etc. are placed on the battleplans. Having to measure and figure out where objectives are placed prior to a game isnt super difficult, but I dont get why the battleplan cant just say "X inches from this, Y inches from that" so it is clearcut and you dont have to be a god at trigonometry. I also hope they make terrain rules more interesting. Many of them are completely irrelevant and its really just clutter to avoid too many arcane/commanding om the table. Deadly/volcano etc are just not doing enough and the odds of them triggering is too low.
i want mount traits prayers to but i think the ones the skinks have already do well enough. but i expect nothing like slanesh last year we are to close to be included
https://www.reddit.com/r/ageofsigmar/comments/hhizp0/malign_sorcery_getting_banished_for_matched/ that is really going to hurt us (sigh) oh well
I was about to ask if there is any chance it was for narrative play, but it mentions matched play just above in that picture - Every other I have seen was cropped. I really dont like the idea of the winner just picking a Realm, rather than rolling on a chart. None of our bound Endless spells get boosted based on Realm so this is a hit for us, but for other armies that play with Endless spells it is kinda big. Nagash has a 50/50 to win a roll off and choose Realm Ulgu to have unlimited range on Hand of Dust? Soulscream bridge is suddenly 24” distance, Lifeswarm D6.
ya from what we can see here it's going to break more things then it fixes,we will have to see. well at least now the realm rules are mandatory and we have a 50% chance of having a command ability for croak and a better spell for every one. man no one is ever going to pick aqshy all of those suck hard
Here I was thinking Aqshy looked pretty good.... as Coalesced in my Territory I would ignore Volanic altogether, the Command Ability stacks with the Hunter & The Steed for +2 to run and charge which my Thunderquake Battalion loves, the Spell just gives Kroak something else to cast with his 5 spells chillin on his Balewind and I mean now you can basically take 2 of the Koatl’s Claw Eviscerating Blade or take it if you’re Thunder Lizard
cool you can ignore your speshal ability cool but not worth a CP we need those to badly espeshaly if aether quarts is not one of the artifacts sure or you could go to a realm with a good spell that you want to cast no this one does not deal mortals it's gives you a second attack when you roll a 6 that is not good at all in fact all our saurus heroes have it already
meh, as pointed out on reddit, at least it reigns in some of the more problematic artifacts that are just flat out better versions of faction artifacts. And it means realm rules will be used a bit more consistently, instead of being forgotten half the time cuz it's yet another book to keep in mind. Tying it to a roll-off is problematic though, especially with empowered spells. I wouldn't be surprised if certain combo's with endless spells will end up ridiculously powerfull cuz of it. Having a 50% chance of getting the empowered spell to significantly boost your main strategy can easily cause those endless spells to become super dominant.
the main problem have is that many units(and sometimes monsters) espeshaly monsters need those artifacts to function.i am sure that monsters will almost dispensary from tournament play due to this any fix to a lack of deversity in choices(every one taking the realm artifacts) that reduces it else where by even more is a bad fix. just make the faction artifacts not shit and that fixes the problem without breaking the things a lot of armies need
The issue is that some battletomes just have really terrible artefact choices and kinda relied on the Malign Sorcery ones, where as other tomes actually have really awesome artefacts. It is a bit funny with Orruk Warclans - Warchanter (hero) cant take any of the Orruk Warclans artefacts because they are keyworded to either a Megaboss or a Weirdnob Shaman specifically, so you rely on the Malign Sorcery ones if you want to give him an artefact. On the other hand it is quite frustrating going up against a 3+ save monster with Ethereal Amulet, rerolling 1s (spell or CP) and potentially having a FNP afterwards. Playing against Legion of Grief getting to roll two dice per CP spent and raising their entire army from the gravesites due to spiky RNG is super frustrating too. On the other hand that army might just die if they can only roll one dice per CP spent in the future since it just isnt consistent enough.
I hope that they offset it by introducing decent artifacts/removing the dead weight in the current faction artifacts. Cuz a lot of those are just terrible. If all they do is remove the realm artifacts it obviously isn't much of a fix and might outright break certain armies. To be honest that's something I've always found very weird about the way artifacts work in AoS, like 75% of them are just terrible or don't make any sense for that faction.
You don't ignore effect of Volcanic. You can only ignore Sinister (which you auto-ignore anyway because of Cold-Blooded) and Deadly. I haven't seen many realm artefacts in the top lists, TBH. They were really a problem at the start of the edition, especially etherial amulet on the 3+ stuff. Now I mostly see the brooch and the Ignax scales. Anyway, I have to find a way to get more CP. Probably, have to sacrifice 40 skinks in favor of slann or find a place for penumbral engine - both of its effects are good for the bastiladons. But it hurts my dual battalion list even more, because there's no place for anything, all units are important.
Some new teases in regards to GHB20 here https://www.warhammer-community.com/2020/06/29/the-generals-handbook-2020-whats-in-the-book/ Sky battles sounds pretty cool, if only we had a proper flying unit.. I mean sending in a Ripper Chief vs Terrorgheist, Mawkrusha etc. sounds a little weaksauce.
Didn't we already get the full rules for sky battles in a bunch of white dwarfs? It honestly looks rather boring. With sky battles being the only really noteworthy thing. The new rules for 3v3 battles are nice I guess, but quite niche so that's not super exciting either. Also don't underestimate the Ripper chief, he'l just dodge around the terrorgheist and annoy it to dead
Ok, returning to LRR topic - I finally got to testing them and... they are far from broken. I mean, I feel I was even overestimating them. We played battle for the pass with new aqshy rules against OBR. I had teclis, LoE, Cathallar, 3 x 10 wardens, 20 and 10 sentinels, Icon of Petrifection (or how was that called?) and Auralan battalion, Zaitrek. My opponent brought Katakros, 40 and 2x20 mortek guard, boneshaper, two harvesters. I've lost by turn 3 15-3. First imperssions: 1) Teclis is overestimated greatly. He is always out of range for like half of his spells despite potential 24 inch movement. He was super bad in close combat, because 2 attacks on 4+/2+ and 6 attacks on 3+/3 are super random. Well, I admitt I've rolled a lot of 1's on all of his 2+ rolls. But still, he is very underwhelming in combat. I know, it is petrifex and such, but if it wasn't for this fact, I'd call him pure garbage. I know, that he is at least okayish against non-tanky factions. It is also hard to chose, which spells you need most. Like, they are all good, but you don't have enough good targets for them. And attack spells are fairly short-ragned. He is really good at shutting down spells, but my opponent had only boneshaper, so that part of him wasn't particulary useful. So this leads to conclusion: Teclis will be very good against certain armies and not so much against other armies; 2) Light of Eltharion is garbage. Total waste of points. You don't need his CA, if you play carefully and don't receive too much battleshocks. I'd probably take another Cathallar. He is supposed to be tanky, but he was just mawed down by mortek. He also failed to deal any good damage, which is OK, because it is petrifex. But, I am sure, 3 salamander could be now worse. Just compare - 220 pts for 6 attacks with exploding sixes, 2 at -1 and 4 at -3, all d3 vs 240pts for 12 ranged attacks at -2 d3 + 9 close combat attacks at -2 d3, and each 6 is straight d3 mortal wounds. He was finished by Katakros and halving damage didn't help at all. 3) Cathallar was great. Ignore battleshock is very helpful. If it wasn't for bravery 10 across the board, she would debuff enemies even further. She is also a good support caster, because teclis cannot do everything in one turn; 4) Wardens are okayish, because of MW, but otherwise is very-very poor. We've read the shining company rules, and looks like once you break it, you cannot reassemble. So your -1 to-hit is gone till the end of the battle. But without running and charing they are ultra-slow. You only have single speed of Hysh to compensate for that. They still die very quickly even under Protection of Teclis, unless you use Aetherquartz. And you can activate it only once per phase. And that's what I was talking about - they are okayish, because they have lots of drawbacks on top of their strengths. And they are as significant, as I assumed. 5) Sentinels. Sentinels are what made the list work. 5+ MW on 30" is great. The problem is that it is only 10 MW from 30 bodies on average and... it is your army's damage. Seriously. Maybe some more MW from teclis and wardens and some damage from Eltharion and that's it. I only could kill something because of full rerolls against units, so I had more MW. But you are going to kill literally one unit per turn. That doesn't bring you anywhere. 6) Aetherquartz is helpful, but you have only one chance to use it, unless you are going with Syar. And even then it is just once per phase. So you need think twice when is the best moment to spend it; 7) Lightning-Fast reactions are okay, but most of damage comes from shooting and magic. They are nice, but not ultimate, especially against Petrifex. 8) Zaitrec is interesting, because you have lots of copies of spells, so almost every unit is able to cast something important. The thing is you need powe of hysh on, or you are doing no damage. It is hadny, when you need to throw Sparkling light on a target nearby, while other dedicated casters are far away. And +1 to casts very helpful. But still I have a feeling, I would be good with only one spell per Vanari unit. So, maybe I'll try Syar next time. 9) Even under Protection of teclis they die like flies to any rend or even without it. They are squshy indeed. 10) They have problems with controlling the table. Want to be fast? Forget about Shining Company? Want to have 5+ bubble from teclis? Forget about spreading. Want to move teclis outside of the center of your force? Forget 5+ ward. And you'll get a feeling that teclis only can cast 3 spells, because Protection of Teclis is an auto-choice. 11) They don't have much weight of attacks. Maybe, cavalry can solve this problem, but you have to find points for it first. I don't see how they can deal with Horrors, for example. They are good at sniping heroes and such, but they are all but exceptional, when you have to remove lots of wounds. Conclusions: I even not sure if they are a top tier army at all. But I am sure, that they are not easy to play. By the end of the game I was losing on points heavily, but I was able to remove most of my opp's army. This reminds me of my games with old seraphon against OBR. Exactly the same situation. And with modern seraphon I could deal with such a list with zero problems. I could strike where he is weakest, because he cannot be everywhere and salamanders are good enough to cut through 20 OBR under harvester. I think, I'd just drop teclis and eltharion and take more wardens/sentinels and cavarly, while cathallar would be my heroes for magic support and battleshock control. I wouldn't bother with shining company - just rush and deal as much damage as you can. I don't see how an army with such poor protection can withstand modern Tzeentch, OBR and Seraphon.
So interesting! Against OBR you're probably going to want to castle up and let them come to you, forcing them into your damage range with mortals on their characters and slowly taking the points back in the later turns, which should hopefully keep shining company up?? Obviously I dunno havent had played them, but yeah seems like a tricky situation. LoE seems almost like a Morathi style flanker, exists on his own to run up a flank and pressure an area your castle isn't. Mortek are probably not his ideal target, but against OBR what else is there haha! OBR with 80 mortek is going to be rough for just about anyone. Kudos for going against such a tough list. I do think your list with Teclis you probably don't have the points for the LoE, or i'd go with the named mountain guy to give your castle -1 to hit which is nice. More likely it seems like just more buddies is probably a better option? but who knows. Seems like a super weird army to build a list for. Love that you tried them out, did anything else stand out to you? I've heard they are a difficult army to get the most out of, and it's definitely a situation where the parts working together make the army work. I'm playing them this week, i'll report back as well! Edit: adjusted some phrasing