Fair enough As I've mentioned before, I find that restriction a bad mechanic. But that's somewhat beside the point. Also, I don't really view that restriction as interaction with summoning. First the seraphon player can always simply teleport somewhere else to summon. And although yes you can deny them acces to a particular area this is simply positional play and not something specific to summoning. As such I view that as a seperate thing from the actual summoning. Second, since correct positional play is already taking into account our teleporting the positional aspect of summoning is kind of moot anyway. You're already going to cover those positions cuz of our teleport. Having an identity & certain playstyle as an army is of course good. And I'm not necesarly against the slann being key to our army. However, I do feel there are a couple of ways in which our slann is different to the exampls you listed. Our slann needs to be our general. Those examples do not. We cannot bring a back-up slann. Those example you can bring a back-up of whatever it is they need. Our slann mostly just sits in a corner summoning. Those examples generally take a more active role in the game. Combining 1 & 3. Our slann is the only one where a centerpiece unit for your army (namely your freaking general) is mostly passive. The others are either far more active, or at the very least are only a minor hero (e.g. necromancers) and not the star of your army. Your examples have meaningfull choice as they're often a class of unit with several options (a priest, a wizard), not a specific unit (slann). And nearly all of them have at least some meaningfull load-out options (spells, prayers, artifacts, weapon loadouts). Whereas for us it's the exact same thing most of the time. Namely a slann on a balwind vortex near a cogs, with 9 out of 10 times the same trait and artifact & only recently have we gotten an actual choice with our spell lore (admittadly still only 2 spells that are really worth it... but progress.) Our entire summoning mechanic lives or dies with the slann. For those other examples that's, generally speaking, not the case. Yeah your fyreslayers are gonna be a lot less sturdy without the priest. But it's not like they turn into skink levels of squishyness either... I think the following summarizes it best; our slann is currently little more than a glorified piece of scenery that can get killed and can move. And personally I'm not a fan of that... Imho, if you want to keep the current mechanic you need to do the following: Give us an actual choice in generals. A great solution here: our armies have 2 generals, both with general traits and an artifact. The slann & the highest ranking skink or saurus who relays his orders to the lesser seraphon. It'd be super thematic, very unique & gives us far more flexibility when making lists. Give our slann a more active role so he isn't just a glorified piece of scenery. Make it a capable combatant. Give it short ranged buffs that requires him to stay near the fighting instead of sitting safely in a corner. Just something that forces him to do be active if he wants to utilize more than a fraction of his power. Some sort of interactive backup mechanic. Be it a second slann or the skinks helping him. It's okay if the slann is mantains the vast majority of our summoning. But the entire mechanic living or dying with the slann is a bit much. Also, don't underestimate how much an influence it has on regular games when you only "need" something in high levels of play. If all the high end players only use a certain strategy that'l eventually trickle down into the lesser gamer's games as well as they hear about it (and plenty will figure it out on their own). Not to mention that it'l shape the rules by the balancing changes it causes as designers respond to new found OP nonsense.
I have played multiple 2k point games without a Slann and won them before in what I would consider to be semi competitive environments. I have also had games where I brought a Slann and full summoning apparatus, generated over 50 CCP, but never needed to spend it. AoS is not a balanced game. It is a well made game, but it is not balanced. The OP nonsense is there because it is fun and engaging. It I wanted balance I would go back to competitive Chess or Go. The zany OP mechanics are deliberate. The vast majority of people who play AoS are garage gamers. They get together with their buds, drink beer, eat food, and roll dice. I just don't buy that garage gamers care about what theorycrafters have to say about what they should and shouldn't put on the table. I don't think a Slann has to remain what it currently is for the army to continue. However, I don't think there is any actual problem with the Slann as it is. Seraphon are the only true summoning army in the game. That is pretty damn cool if you ask me. There are ways for the Seraphon player to enchance their summoning. There are always ways for other armies to disrupt Seraphon's summoning. I think it says a lot about the depth of the game that an army like Seraphon, which has real problems killing enemy units, can be given other tools to play the game with and still be able to win via board control/objectives. On top of this it actually fits the fluff of the army perfectly. No one knows the machinations of the Slann. They just show up. Complete their objectives. Then they leave and the enemy never really understands what it was about. Most of the time when I win my opponents are left scratching their heads. That is awesome to me. It's why I play Seraphon at tournaments. I know Skaven, Hedonites, Fyreslayers, ect are better than our army. However, those armies do not do what Seraphon do. In short, what AoS doesn't need is more of the same. Currenlty Seraphon are one of the very few armies that doesn't run hordes. And we are the only army that wins consistently without having to kill hardly any of the opponent's army.
the problem isn't with the slann the problem is with everything else being terrable. the way i see it we have three potential centerpieces. the slann who we relie on to a degree that the others have to be broken to displace them the star seer which makes me sad, and the carnasaur being kro-gar incarnate. and this isn't uncommon to use your samples skaven have 8 leaders to build a army around fire slayers have 3 death has 6+ tzeench has 4 and thats not even mentioning stormcast. surtenly not all of them are good but that's also a problem and just becous AoS isn't balanced doesn't meen we can't aspire to be. there are no down sides to a more fair system and i wan't to make it so that all of our options are just as good in different ways. also it might be that we are supposed to be the main summoning army but we are not any more several other armies do it better and they don't have to sacrefice to do it. korn dosen't have to not attack to get summoning points he has to kill things. slanesh dosen't have to not run across the battle field at 200 miles an hour he has to hurt things and survive..... and charge things.... and take objectives ect. and tzeench doesn't have to not cast spells he has to cast spells. death is in the same boat as us and i think it would work better if they had the gitz way of bringing back units. i love the fluffy feel of our army the mind games that we play are awesome but im running out of tricks to play and i really wish they had the saurus side of the fluff where you can fight it out if your plans fail. and i have to object to the hordes comment with very few exceptions that is all we run hordes and hordes of skinks.
any hoo back to making our stuff not crap Seraphon Spell Lore Celestial Apotheosis CV5, 1 visible friendly unit wholly within 18" heals d3 wounds, and can bring back models Claws of Glory CV6, 1 visible friendly unit wholly within 18" can re-roll wound rolls of 1 until your next hero phase. Walk Between Realms CV6, 1 visible friendly unit wholly within 18" can fly until your next hero phase. Meteoric Convocation CV7, pick 1 visible enemy unit within 24". Roll 8 dice, for each 5+ they take 1 mortal wound. if they take 4 or more wounds this way half movement Mystical Unforging CV8, pick 1 visible enemy Hero with an artefact of power within 12". They take D3 mortal wounds and on casting roll of 10 their artefact no longer has any effect. Stellar Tempest CV8, pick 1 visible enemy unit within 24". Roll a dice for every model in the unit, for each 5+ they take 1 mortal wound.
priers Every PRIEST in a SEREPHON army gains an additional prayer which can be used in addition to their other abilities in the hero phase and comes into effect on a 4+ Marshal Prowes: a friendly unit wholly within 18" gains an additional hit for every roll of 6+ until your next hero phase. stars edge : a friendly unit wholly within 18" gains +1 to wounds comets tail : target within 18" suffers d3 mortal wounds vigor of the dragon: unit within 8" can pile in and attack apon death flurry of blows: add 1 to a units weapon profile within 8 chains of time: target within 18" suffers halves all charge rolls
I'm curious how often a slann-less army is used & how those perform (also taking into account players who outclass their opponents by such an extent they'd win regardless of what they field) They don't necesarly care about theorycrafting. But someone winning a tournament using X will spawn copycats. Hell, it might just appear in the white dwarf. Unless your group is super insulated from outside influences it will eventually cascade down into it. And more importantly, those tournaments are far more visible than your local group and GW will get input from the tournament. If something is influential in the tournament it will end up influencing balance changes which your group will be affected by. I'm not saying we need more of the same. Or that we need to lose summoning (or the slann). I'm not even saying our playstyle as a whole is bad/uninteresting/etc. I am however saying that currently the slann is essentially a glorified piece of terrain that's all but mandatory which needlessly occupies our general slot in 9 out of 10 lists thus limiting our choices while also being a super passive unit that often has little to no direct influence on the battle (for clarity, summoning is indirect influence in the same way that having a buff that gives an ally +1 to hit is indirect influence. He's not the one doing the actual fighting/shooting/capturing of objectives/etc. he's just sitting in the back) To be honest, making the slann our faction terrain could actually be interesting. Have them sit in a nice fancy shrine to the ancients and meditate there. Giving us the choice between summoning or casting some spells during the hero phase. You can say he knows all our spells cuz he's just that awesome. Maybe add in some aura's for good measure. You can say the slann is protected by some magical barrier so he's safe from harm. Could be quite an interesting model as well. It'd literally change nothing to the playstyle of the slann or how our summoning works. But it'd open up our general slot for our skinks and saurus to shine and it'd free up some points & an artifact.It'd also make the lack of a backup feel much more natural. And lastly, since it's now a proper terrain piece the relative passivity isn't problematic anymore. Kroak could remain as a unit seeing as he's the single most hands-on slann and likes to go around killing stuff. @Erta Wanderer for the prayers, maybe include some defense or utility there as well. Not just offensive abilities
we already have the re-roll saves prayer that all skink priest have so i think defensive ones would be redundant or massively over powered. i have chains of time so far for utility do you have any other ideas? ive been going thru prayers from different factions but all I've found so far are bravery shenanigans which are useless and teleport that we already have.
Buffs on allies: +1 to save, +x movement, +x charge distance, move model x", mortal wound protection, ward save, improve a certain existing mechanic (e.g. re-rolls of 1 become reroll all failed rolls or +1 to a ward save roll like the hearthguard berserkers get for being near a priest) debuffs on enemies; -1 to hit/wound, re-roll hit-rolls of 6, -1 to save, -X movement, can't benefit from modifiers on its rolls, move model x" That sorta thing
priers Every PRIEST in a SEREPHON army gains an additional prayer which can be used in addition to their other abilities in the hero phase and comes into effect on a 4+ Marshal Prowes: re-roll charge rolls memory of legion: pick a unit that has a base unit size of 5 or more within 8" add d3 models to that unit. comets tail : target within 18" suffers -1 to save rolls dragon terror: target within 12" must move 5" away from the priest flurry of blows: add 1 to a units weapon profile within 8 chains of time: target within 18" halves all charge rolls
Loving the prayers. Our army needs a lore of prayers or a universal prayer. I would also love to see more use for the Skink Starseer. It is the only model I haven't found any use for yet within the Seraphon line, at least since Cosmis Herald was errata'ed. Perhaps allowing the Starseer to be a mini Slann with 2 spell slots and the ability to generate CCP if chosen as the general. Keyword him as a priest and give the army something along the lines of the prayers you have drawn up as well. This would make them very useful for 1k matches. In 2k you chould use the Starseer if you wanted less of a focus on summoning, but still want to be able to call on lots of skinks. You could also use prayers while saving the spell slots for summoning. If not the mini Slann treatment, then maybe give the Starseer a unique spell. Perhaps cast on a 4+ and allows the caster to set up a unit of 10 Skink, or 1 Razordon/Slamander with 3x Skink Handlers wholly within x" of the Starseer. Seraphon are still the best at summoning by a long shot. The only army close to us in that respect is Slaanesh, and they can be denied much easier than us. This would literally change everything about the army's playstyle. It would massively devalue Chronomatic Cogs. Which helps both with summoning and with charges after LoSaT. It would mean that opponent's could not target the Slann. It would also mean the Slann could not jump around the table via LoSaT to drop off summoned units where needed. A hero playing support doesn't mean they aren't aren't active, unless the only thing you consider to be active is dealing combat/shooting damage. In most games I find that I cast 1-3 spells instead of summoning. I also end up using the Slann's Azure lightning attacks at least once. I respect the desire to use other units as the army's general, but that is already very common at 1k points and still playable at 2k.
i'm planing to hit all of the war-scrolls in the neer future hoping to get thru most heroes tonight now that i have a framework to build off of
OK by lizard wizards request hear is the Skink Starseer cost 220~250 Move 7 he uses the same transport as the slann it makes very little sence that he was slower Bravery 10 Wounds 5 Save 4+ Astromancers staff - melee 1 2" 4/4/-1/d3 special rules: fly Abilities: Seer of fates 4+ shrug it has been foreseen if your opponent deep strikes or teleports a unit you may immediately spend a command point and teleport a unit in response remaining out side of 9" this teleport resolves second. Skink of power the starseer produces 2 summon points instead of 1 from Lay lines and meeting of minds Magic: the skink starseer is a wizard and can cast and unbind 2 spells each round. it knows the arcain bolt, mystic shield, and the from the heavens spells. From the heavens CV:5 from the heavens calls down troops within 12" of the seer from following chart spell roll of 5-6 10 skinks unmodified spell roll of 7-9 choose of 10 skinks or 1 salamander/razordon and handlers unmodified spell roll of 10-11 chose of 10 skinks, 1 salamander/razordon and handlers, or 3 kroxigor unmodified spell roll of 12 any two of the above mentioned units Key words ORDER, DAEMON, CELESTIAL, SERAPHON, SKINK, HERO, WIZARD, PRIEST, SKINK STARSEER
skink Priest cost 80 move 8 bravery 10 wounds 4 save 5+ starbolt - Missile 3 18" 3/3/-1/1 star-stone staff 3 1" 3/3/-1/1 Abilities wary fighter Priestly Trappings Celestial rites star touched 6+ shrug Keywords unchanged
skink starpriest cost 100 move 8 bravery 10 wounds 4 save 5+ star stone dagger - melee 3 1" 3/3/-1/1 abilities wary fighter serpent staff star touched 6+ shrug Magic unchanged starlight is awesome keywords loses the priest key word
Not really. Cogs are still just as valuable for charges. The extra summoning points it can generate are again, a mechanic I don't really care for, but if you really want to keep it you could always just say the meditating slann can still interact with endless spells like Cogs. Ultimatly that's purely a matter of extra summoning points though and can just be accounted for with number tweaks. And losing a specific endless spell because most of it value came from sacrificing it for summoning points is not exactly a great loss as far as I'm concenred (idem with balewind vortex for example..) As for the slann not jumping around the table to drop summoned units, just allow the new shrine-slann to summon whereever. It doesn't change a whole lot given that right now we can effectivly summon whereever anyway after we teleport. Or you could even just say it can just be teleported. As for the opponent being unable to target the slann. That's about the only significant change that'l require some effort as you'd have to come up with a mechanic to allow the opponent to stop the summoning somehow as the slann is now immortal. Destructable terrain is possible, but personally not that big of a fan of that. A hero participating in 1 fight (probably cuz he didn't have a choice...) and casting 1-3 spells out of a possible 20-35 (depending on the presence of endless spells) is pretty passive and a massive underuse of his potential... @Erta Wanderer I'd give the skink heroes a wound more so they're a bit more difficult to oneshot. Though the shrug already helps a bit there. Also I'd give both the starpriest & seer a ranged attack similar to the priest. You've already made their melee profile a lot less terrible. But they're still not going to want to be anywhere near a proper melee and although they do have spells only 1 or 2 cast does mean they're a bit limited when faced with say a 40 man horde or a rampaging behemoth where they can't really help after flinging the one spell. On that note, I would actually like for the general amount of spellcasts for wizards to go up. Not that say 1 meteoric convocation can't be crucial in decimating an enemy. But having only 1 spellcast makes it feel like wizards are extremely easy to counter by just providing target saturation. And god forbid your wizard has to choose between providing defensive support to an ally or attacking an opponent. Does anyone know how AoS compares to WHFB/40K/Lotr/etc. in terms of the amount of spellcasts wizards can sling around? Are they a bit less hardpressed when encountering loads of targets?
well we could do that but with the way i have summoning set up you want a lot of these guys like 3 or 4 so i wan't to keep them cheep i think i already have them to low on the cost and they are reeeealy sturdy for mages already. with the exception of storm cast, wizards generally have a defensive profile of 5 wounds 6+ save i was going to drop then down to 5+ when i looked into it that would make them the second sturdiest line casters in the game. and they already have a lot more utility then most mages. they benefit from look out sir and i gave them wary fighter they are very tanky for what they are i think that the way i have them now they might be a little broken if you wan't a wizard thats harder to kill thats what the seer or the trogladon(im getting to him) will be for
Trogladon there will be two lode outs for the trogladon one with a star priest one with a normal priest their abilities replace the ones the trog has now and their attacks replace Divining rod cost 200/220 Move * bravery 10 wounds 12 save 4+ noxious Spittle - missle 2 *" 3/3/-1/2 Venomous Bite - Melee 6 2" 4/*/-1/2 Clawed Forelimbs -melee 2 2" 4/4/-/2 skinks attacks are ether starbolt - Missile 3 18" 3/3/-1/1 star-stone staff 3 1" 3/3/-1/1 or star stone dagger - melee 3 1" 3/3/-1/1 Wounds Move Noxious Venomous 0-2 12" 18" 2+ 3-4 11" 15" 3+ 5-7 10" 12" 3+ 8-9 9" 9" 4+ 10+ 8" 6" 5+ Abilities ether serpent staff star touched 6+ shrug Magic caustic spit: if either noxious Spittle or Venomous Bite manage to do damage the unit struck tackes 1 mortal wound during their hero phaze for the rest of the game this can not stack. or Priestly Trappings Celestial rites star touched 6+ shrug caustic spit: if either noxious Spittle or Venomous Bite manage to do damage the unit struck takes 1 mortal wound during their hero phase for the rest of the game this can not stack. key words this model is either a priest or a wizard not both
slann most of this will be unchanged he is almost good as is cost 280~300 Move 7" Bravery 10 wounds 7 save 4+ Azure Lightning unchanged fly abilities celestial configuration: at the start of your hero phase one slann can attempt to change the constellations give up a spell and and reroll to determine what constellation is in ascendance. arcane vassal Guarded by magic: the slann gains a 6+ shrug. if he manages to cast a spell without it being unbound this increases by 1 for every spell cast to a maximum of 4+ this resets at the start of your hero phase master of the web: +1 to cast and unbinds when on a objective command ability is actually good now that he isn't just siting in the back magic is unchanged but we are replacing his spell with Makers Hand CV8 pick up to d3 units within 12" they get + 1 to hit rolls
Saurus Oldblood Move 5" bravery 10 wounds 7 save 4+ Suntooth maul 3 attacks 1" 3/3/-1/d3 celestite war-blade 5 attacks 1" 3/3/-1/1 celestite war-spear 5 attacks 2" 4/3/-1/1 celestite Great-blade 3 attacks 1" 3/3/-1/2 Fearsome jaws and shield 2 attacks 1" 3/3/-/1 Abiliyies Star drake shield: 6+ shrug Wrath of the seraphon command abilities forced march: this model and units within 4" can roll 2 dice when running if they have wardrums triple the movement instead of doubling it.