But easier to table by far, and relies on being much more Artillery Bait...I mean keeping slann all bunched up to get the best bonuses also makes them that much easier to kill with one ball..
Well the fluff book has a 12 slann conclave deciding on a plan of their own to beat chaos because of superior insight.... just imagine 12 slann!
Anyway my 3 to5 suggestion was based on the librarian conclaveand being a formation to take down Nagash.. that was what it was balanced at.. death god slaying...
An army consisting entirely of slann... That is so broken its funny - a sinlge deployment drop means you can always decide to go first there fore giving you an opportunity to counter any alpha strike units the opponents have so turn one means you need to summon enough protection to keep the slann alive - this is assuming that you are not going to be able to destroy the entire opposing force with a single hero phase 2x slann and 1x kroak - gives you a total of 10 spells to play with with an agreed formation bonus of +1 to cast, I think I would probably do the following: Slann 1 - spell1 - Saurus Astrolith bearer - summon on a 4+ - immediately plant his battle standard Slann 2 - spell1 - Saurus Astrolith bearer - summon on a 3+ - immediately plant his battle standard Slann 1 - spell2 - Eternity Warden - summon on a 2+ - deploy within 2" of at least 2 Slann Slann 2 - spell2 - Eternity Warden - summon on a 2+ - deploy within 2" of at least 2 slann - these two give you an extra 14 wounds of survivability to your slann Slann 1 - spell3 - Saurus Warriors - summon 10 on a 3+, 20 on a 8+ - deploy in protective ring around Slann and saurus heroes Slann 2 - spell3 - Saurus Warriors - summon 10 on a 3+, 20 on a 8+ - complete protective ring arouns slann and saurus heroes Kroak - spell1 - bastiladon - summon on a 5+ Kroak - spell2 - salamanders - summon on a 3+ Kroak - spell3 - Stegadon/Engine of the Gods - summon on a 7+ Kroak - spell4 - Saurus oldblood on carnosaur - summon on a 7+ I cant see anywhere in the rules saying that you have to complete a single wizard's spells before trying to cast with another wizard - please let me know if i've missed it! This should present you with a good core of survivability for the slann whilst also giving you some monsters to distract your opponent further - in subsequent turns you can concentrate on building the force you want to play with the 2 Slann and nuking your opponent with Kroak - the +3 to cast would be so goddam powerful especially with the celestial deliverance being cast on a 4+/5+/6+ with a range of 3D6 + 16 (and +8 as well if using Zarathustra's rules!) an average of 26.5" (34.5" zarathustra) range will allow you to reach pretty much everyone. Also dont forget Kroak's insight - up to 3 re-rolls for your crucial spells will help further! With 10 summon spells per turn you could be absolutley filthy
the key factor, here, is that your starting number of models would be three. The enemy needs only to kill 3 models of yours to inflict 100% casualties. My version of the formation (which could be toned down), was that only one summon would give to you units that must not be counted among the casualties the army suffers, so you need to be careful, 'cause additional summons each turn would put in play "killable" units. With 10 summons, your opponent only needs to concentrate fire on certain units to kill 100% of your starting forces, scoring a minor victory. Zarathustra's version, that gives to all summonings the power to be not counted toward the number of models, is probably broken.
I would probably drop the no counting as casualties entirely tbh. Also the casting and range perks would stack but might reduce the range to another Slann within 3. Such a formation would then be an all or nothing approach you need to win a major victory to not lose the minor.
The counting of summoned units as casualties does kick the entire formation into touch - making it completely not worth taking. But the beauty of AOS is that you really can ammend what the rulebook says to suit the scenario you are playing. The vast majority of comp packs throttle summoning to such an extent that its not really worth taking as a significant part of your seraphon force. But if you wanted to play a scenario where Kroak and two Slann Starmasters line up in an epic duel against the dark powers of Nagash, Arkhan and Neferata/Mannfred where summoned units dont count then go for it and now I really want to play that battle
Ok, so looking at the issues with the previous suggestions of myself and Killer Angel, I am going to give this homebrew Slann Formation one more go... The Conclave of the Starmasters This formation consists of between 3 and 5 models with the Slann Keyword. Masters of the Stars and Heavens All Slann in this formation possess +1 casting value. Additionally all members of this formation may use other formation members as arcane vassals if they are within 24". Chamber of Divination. All members of this formation possess the spell A New Grand Plan. A New Grand Plan. This spell has a casting value of 5. You can change the value of any one dice roll between now and the start of your next hero phase. On a casting value of 11+ you can change the value of D3 rolls. Choir of the Heavens. Nominate one model in this formation. For every other member of the formation within 6" add +1 casting roll, 8" range, and +1 additional spell casting and unbinding. For this turn no other members of this formation can cast or unbind spells, but the Designated model can also cast any of their spells as many times as they have castings available, unless the spell has its own specific rules for recasting. Ok, so hopefully a much more balanced and usable formation. You will notice that for Kroak, being the lead singer in the choir is far less of a boost than it would be for others. His heavy damaging spell is not increased at all beyond the range available to it, and the Call Comets spell is now mostly boosted in the number of repeated castings. This would still be nowhere near as broken as Nagash on his own. Anyway, the idea is to impose a choice on the player, we can essentially get the flexibility to use our Slann as glorified Astrolith Bearers with the loss of greater volume of spells. It is now designed towards pushing you to what you wish your magic to be, force multipliers and give you the player more choice, or instead be a support infrastructure for a Kroak nuker and obliterate the enemy.
That's absolutely true, but the issue exists, and I thought it was better to address it, because I know you can Gentlemen Agreement within your meta, but the two extremes are: - we don't care about starting models, and 3 Slanns with buffed casting can just suffocate you with summons - we care about starting models, and you lose just fielding the Slanns' battallion.
i just have one question - for the choir of the heavens rule - why not simply summon a bsb or two to do the same job and not loose your slanns' spells?
Because Choir of the Heavens lets you use a spell more than once each turn. This includes your Slann's native 3 spells he starts with. So it does end up being worth more from a raw offense point, to be able to stack 6d3 of mortal wounds, rather than the usual 3d3 of mortal wounds in raw dice. But as a consequence you do lose a fair chunk of support in the lack of mystic shield and other support spells.
Agreed - in that case - why not conjoin the Slann battallion with the Eternal Starhost formation - 3 large units of indesructible temple guard (one for each slann) and an eternity warden for good measure - this should provide you with a deployed force of 19/34/49 etc models - then just summon lots of monsters to throw at the enemy and you basically quids in - even if you do count models
Yes that's true - although it would probably be more potent to summon multiple of the same monsters - 4 bastiladon or 4 dread saurian in a single turn for example
The would have to be one massive game, and your basically bringing things back to Warhammer Fantasy by doing that.