AoS Is a scar vet carno too strong?

Hi, so my friend and I just played our second game today. Seraphon vs Soul Blight gravelords.

I managed to charge my scar vet carno (215 pts) into his Vampire Lord on Zombie Dragon (435 pts, 14 wounds), and one shot it. (I forgot to use the additional jaw attack on the carno, but I still rolled really well and managed to instantly kill his dragon??)

We're both really new to playing AOS and thought it was absurd with the point cost difference. If they're both glass cannons I get it was whoever hit first probably won the fight but is this the usual outcome?

 

You might be the first person I've seen say the Scar Vet is too strong. A lot of us here wish they were stronger.

Ultimately, this is a game of dice, so unusual results happen from time to time. You spiked high and killed the Vampire Lord, which is atypical unless you have debuffed the dragon's save in one way or another. Because a VLoZD sits on the coveted 3+ save and innate ward save, he's more of an iron cannon than a glass one. As the Scar-Vet caps out at -1 rend without assistance from a Starseer or Purple Sun of Shyish, you are generally lucky to get some (if any) of your big 5-damage swings through - especially with counter-play like All Out Defence and Finest Hour thrown into the mix.

On the other hand, it would become apparent why the VLoZD is priced the way that he is if he had charged your Scar Vet first, because he would kill it fairly reliably considering some of the artifacts, spells, and other buffs that can be given to him. This is before we even consider that the dragon moves four extra inches, can fly, and is a Wizard to boot.

If the Scar Vet seems strong, wait until you try a Skink Chief on Stegadon.

 

Thanks for the detailed reply! Turns out my friend just really messed up then

He didn't all out defense and thought his ward was only for summonable units.

Looking at it with that +1 save makes the lack of rend reaaaally show in the total damage output.

(So I hit 15 wounds with the jaws and he was saving on a +4 and only +3 Vs the spear, and no ward save)

He was so salty thinking the scar vet was stupidly over powered but I guess we're both just terrible

 

Don't get me wrong, the Scar-Vet can punch well above his weight when juiced up with the right buffs, but that's true of many combat monsters.

He's far from overpowered. Especially in the context of a battletome as strong as Seraphon's.

 

Even with your friend screwing up and forgetting the ward save and all-out-defense, you still were pretty lucky.
Against a mere baseline 3+ save you would on average only hit 0.33 bites or something. So hitting all 3 is pretty lucky.

Not taking into account any (de)buffs, against that 3+ save, you would on average only be doing like 5 damage or something.

 

Gratz on the slaughter! Just let us know what you did to appease the RNG Gods so I may be similarly blessed!!

In all seriousness, scar-vet damage is very swingy and very reliant on the jaw damage to punch up in a head to head.

 

So a year, a battletome, and 40 points later, I would say this is a fair question again. Having played games with both the Scar-Vet and Old blood options, the Scar-Vet definitely seems like the better option, even at the discount price. Sure, the Old blood has the gauntlet to (maybe) pick off some weak infantry and get the Blood Frenzy bonus, but IMO that pales in comparison with the Scar-Vet's Maim and Tear rule. In more than one game, I have killed a hero the Scarno didn't even attack, just by piling in to within 1" after the Trog or Ripperdactyl Chief put some wounds on it. Again, this isn't a complaint! I'm just glad that the new battletome made some less-traditional options worth taking. However, I feel like people are short-selling the Scarno a bit - because Maim and Tear is brutal.

 

There has been some disagreement as to how Maim and Tear works, and some interpretations are much stronger then others. But I think the most accepted interpretation is that it rolls dice equal to the number of wounds currently allocated to the unit it's attacking, regardless of when those wounds were allocated (they could be from a previous phase or round) or by whom (they could be from a different model).

With this interpretation, at 5+ to wound, Maim and Tear should average doing one mortal wound for every three wounds the model has already taken. This is useful against high wound heroes and monsters, but not against units with one or two wounds per model, as slain models' wounds don't count toward the allocated wound count. Therefore, on average, Main and Tear would finish off a model that has already taken 75% of its wound characteristic in damage. Of course, it's a Carnosaur, so it can contribute handily to that 75%. It also must survive the combat to use the ability at the end of the phase.

 

Also, the Oldblood on Carnosaur's ability is very very good. The ability to issue two of the same commands for one command point every single phase is an extraordinary boost. It allows you to buff, maneuver, inspire or rally so many extra times for free that it's hard to understate. Like Maim and Tear, the extra command points can equate to a lot of addition damage as well if used on all out attack in the shooting and/or combat phases. But it can do so much more than just increase damage.

 

That's fair, I had mostly discounted the support/command side to focus just on raw combat power. I typically keep the Carno in the second attack wave, letting a Stego or block of Saurus serve as the anvil before hammering him in. It seems that the Scar-Vet Carno is more focused on pure damage, while the Oldblood is more of an all-around command and conquer monster.