8th Ed. The Not So New Empire

Didn't see a topic yet, so I thought I might share my thoughts, having seen the new book;

Magic items:

Almost entirely gone. GW seems to really hate army gear, they're tying to homogenise everyone to the default items in the main rulebook (which is good in theory but sorta short-changes people in practise).
The two Banners left are still awful, and for some reason Cruddance made them even more expensive.
Runefang is still there, and it can be taken on Grandmasters, but it prevents you taking a ward save so still pointless. Flaming Mace of Gimmick is still there too, again no one cares. Speculum is still in, but its more pricey and without the option for Sword of Justice, there isn't any reason to take it except on a Wizard Lord (for hilarity more than effectiveness). A few magic armours are left, they're still worse than the generic items in the main rulebook. Ring of Volans was never good, so meh.
So, nothing of value was really lost. No more Scroll of Forget Spell, which is handy for our Slann.

Special characters:

All still terrible, no surprises there
I know GW have been pimping the hell out of them (especially Karl Kranz, the Cannon Magnet), and people have correctly stated they had their gear and points redone, but they're still terrible to mediocre. If you you did face them before in battles, expect the same (they're not really different, mostly it was just a cost downgrade and a few rules tweaks).

Lords:

Unsurprisngly, Arch-Lectors got hit hard with the nerf bat. No more auto-generated dispel, although they can channel power/dispel like a Wizard. War Altar has also been downgraded, it only generates a 6" bubble and its bound Light spell is fixed as 'Banishment' (which means no one cares anymore). Arch-Lector is only as good as a cheaper Priest in casting (they're not Wizards, but they can cast spells, go figure), so unless you shell out for the nerfed War Altar, he's pointless.

Generals are still terrible. Their new schtick is they can pretend to be us (ie like Cold-Blooded) for Break tests, and it spreads to the unit they join. No one cares, because....

Grandmasters went up in price, but not enough to make them unfieldable. He is still Master of Horsies, and he still has the statline to fight other Lords. Speculum is a a forced swap, so pointless on him. Expect Sword of Swift Slaying+Talisman of Preservation+Potion of Strength to be the new default.

Level 4 is same price, just about the only item worth taking is Speculum at this point (ignoring generic items for now). All of the cool arcane items got removed, so no Wand of Seven Dice or Phase Swapping.
For those that are curious, yes you are forced to take a specific Lore to take a mount.
Beasts is for Griffon, which means no one will take it (because Lore of Beasts sucks, and the new Griffons are massive cannon/magic nuke bait)
Light is for Laser Cannon, which means no one will take it (as it can be taken in Rare, and Light doesn't need a Level 4)
Heavens is for Orb of Random, which means no one will take it (Heavens sucks, the Orb can be taken in Rare and it's worse than Laser Cannon anyway)

Heroes:

Captain is largely the same. As I mentioned before, you can't do the Speculum+Sword of Justice combo anymore, and with the removal of all but two banners, you'll probably see just default BSB and then Armour of Justice (as there is no Holy Relic, so Talisman has to be for the Grandmaster General). Might be mounted, might just be in a Halberdier horde for bunkering with the Level 4.

Warrior Priests are still pretty decent. You channel both power and dispel, the spells are now 'till next Magic phase' instead of RIP (arguably a better option for Empire, as we only gets one chance to dispel), and the spells themselves are arguably a lot better. They are now 'whole unit gets better', so less about characters and more about making Halberdier or Knight units insanely deadly. They are pretty much identical in options as before, so if anything they got better.

Witch Hunters are terrible. Again, GW has been pimpin these guys and various Empire players think Snipers with pistols are cool. No, MR2 doesn't mean jack, neither does there 'I really hate that guy' ability. Warrior Priest has amazing spells on offer; WH offers weak buffs and is basically a really bad assassin. He'll kill Skinks Priests or lone Slann, but provided your TG bunker is alive your Slann doesn't care (multiple wounds, ward save and point-blank range with pistols means you are difficult to snipe with even multiple WH).

Level 1/2's are the same. As I mentioned before, all the cool arcane items are gone, so no surprises here. As a side note, Light or Shadow wizards are pretty likely, as striking speed is an issue for Empire ranked blocks (they have re-rolls galore from Priests, they're just slow).

Engineer's are better, but because warmachines will be fewer (as Laser Cannons are likely to replace some Cannons now), probably won't see more than one or two for camping with the cannons. They removed the option for Sniper rifles from the shooty units, so I guess you'll see them on these guys now (for sniping Skink Priests out of units maybe).

Core:

Halberdiers and Handgunners are just about the only things worth taking except Knights. Halberdiers outperform all the hacky options by a long margin, Handgunners are in reality only 1/8th more and still have the Sniper rifle option.
Knights got a price reduction, and interestingly he moved the IC upgrade to still be Core (presumably so they won't compete with Demigryphs). So yeah, small IC bunkers for BSB or General are probably likely, to back up the Halberdier blocks. Still the cheapest Knights in the game, and Core as well, so definitely expect them.

Special:

Demigryphs are pretty formidable. Amusingly, the chickens hit faster than the riders. Lances or halberds, so either S6 on the charge, or S5 always for the riders. S5 and AP for the chickens, so Saurus and TG don't like these guys hitting their flank or even the front without serious magic support.
The mounts can't attack from the second rank, so expect 3-4 chicken flanking units. Either Knights hit your front, or a Halberdier block, to pin you. They then slam these small but deadly chicken units into the flank, and just eat lizard until we die.

Cannons got a price hike, but only by 1/5th. So yeah, 3 is still entirely possible. However, Laser Cannons cost the same and are cooler (although requiring power dice to shoot), so expect a mix. Either way, our EOTG or Stegs die by Turn 2 usually. No surprise.

Mortars are terrible, which is good news for us. Saurus now care less about them, as do TG. Still squish Skinks just fine, so Southlands lists will still hate them.

Greatswords are the same. Flagellants are terribad now, so meh, enjoy grinding them down. Pistoliers and Outriders are the same, so I guess just poison them before they shred the Skirmishers.

Rare:

Helblaster is still insane but short-range, Helstorm is still deadly but random.

Orb of Random is sorta useful, but I think it's a bit too random. Remember, bound spell, so just like the Laser Cannon, our Slann can block or we can burn a dispel scroll to block it.

Laser Cannon is actually pretty good. It's easily blocked, but because we need our dispel to remove Prayers (which are easily spammed by the Warrior Priests hiding in the Knight/Halberdier units), you'll probably see two to supplement the cannons. It is good at killing monsters, lone models, especially good at killing Undead (re-rolls to kill them), and murders multi-wound infantry and heavily armoured infantry. In short, deploy shallow blocks against it, then rank up to fight the Halberdiers. Sadly, it is going to overwhelm the EOTG, Skrox and Stegs.

Stank is now affected by magic normally, is only T6, and its cannon requires more steam to fire longer ranges. So, not that different to before, bit easier to kill and not as long-ranged unless it stays still.

tl;dr

Grandmaster for General
Level 4
BSB Captain
Mix of Warrior Priest, Level 2's and Engineers
Halberdiers/Handgunners/Knights
Demigryphs, Cannons n stuff
Laser Cannons, Helbasters, maybe Rockets, Stank probably

 

So how do we murder them?

Slann still work great. They'll shut down Laser Cannons and Prayers, Pha's Protection from a Light Slann works even better now that they have less warmachines, and Dwellers/Pit still blows away Empire infantry and cavalry quite well. Demigryphs need a 'Misama' to lower their decent I4 first, but thats par for course when nuking with a Shadow Slann.
Life Slann aren't going to work as well solo'ing, now that Demigryphs exist and will walk through our non-magic artillery (poison and Salamanders). Maybe when combo'd with a Shadow or Death Slann, but not alone.
Happily, because Priests need to channel dispel and power like normal Wizards, we aren't facing such a losing battle in the Magic phase.

Old-Blood is still meh really. We can assassinate the Grandmaster without needing to shell out for a combat Lord, and Carnosaurs are still going to be shot to death before reaching enemy lines. Smaller games maybe, in larger games where Double Slann is possible, he just doesn't bring enough to warrant inclusion.

Scar-Vets still work pretty well as cheap Mage assassin for 'Steed of Shadows' teleporting into enemy units. Now that Warrior Priests have become so badass, they'll have to target down them as well. Should be ok, barring magic armour Priests max out at 4+ so S5 spam still kills them (and they usually pack great weapons anyway).

Skink Priest is still needed for EOTG, to 'Portent' against their warmachines and Laser Cannons, not to mention both Demigryphs and regular IC Knights hate 'Burning Alignment' wrecking them. For smaller games, where 'Pha' won't be available, 'Iceshard' spam from multiple Priests hidden in with Saurus is good enough for denying cannons and Helbaster.

Saurus still wreck Halberdiers with the right buffs/hexes. You'll still fight the same ranks, but maybe less blocks of them. There will be less Handgunners too, so in Core v Core matchups, our tough hacky lizards will do just fine. Knights will give them trouble, as will Demigryphs.

Skinks are pretty much just for poison spam onto Laser Cannons and their counterparts like Pistoliers and Outriders. Skrox still get wrecked by Empire artillery, and Mortars/Helblasters still chew through the ablative Skinks.

Stegs still get shot down too easily, and Kroxigor get eaten by Demigryphs.

Salamanders are still very relevant, Knights hate them and Halberdiers do not enjoy lots of dead manz before they even hit the Saurus and TG blocks. Expect Laser Cannon or cannon sniping of them, just like before. Demigryphs are going to walk through their flaming spit easily enough though.

tl;dr

Still need Slann to block Priests+Lasers, and to kill Demigryphs
Saurus still work fine
Skinks are still suicide
Salamanders are fine
EOTG is a Turn 2 lifespan, 3 cannon is still perfectly possible

 

I'm curious to see the book for myself now...I originally played Empire but found them 1) Way too squishy, 2) The heroes were awful, and 3) I had to bring tons of artillery if I wanted to win against anything that caused Fear, because my stupid units would flee en mass.

Doesn't seem like they changed...well...any of that. The Warrior Priest spells were always dispelled absurdly easy, did they at least upgrade the power value?

 

I have a hard time believing that everything across the board sucks as has been described. Anyone else have any differing opinions?

 

I have a empire friend who actually is very excited about the changes

 

I real dont like the way that GW are turning all the priests into wizards!! They did this with TK, who were originally my only army, and now empire. A priest is not a wizard! They are different all together and should have been kept different...sry!

Back to the topic, i have heard mixed results on the book, and should be playing them sometime this week hopefully. It is a cav list, with hellblaster, cannon, chicken riders, and a budgie riding lord and i think some hand gunners.

 

Thanks for the replies guys

Meh, Empire aren't overly squishy really. If you're talking about the Special Characters, yeah they are lacking. The generics can be built to be pretty dangerous though.

I believe the new prayers are 4+, so yeah, still pretty easy to shut down. The thing is though dude, they can cast all three every turn and thus burn out your dispel dice. Then a Mindrazor or Timewarp hits a Halberdier block and the Saurus get wrecked.

Well seeing as Cruddance didn't change 90% of the rules for existing units, upped points costs everywhere, yeah what sucked before sucks even worse now. The magic armoury is a wasteland, which is sad because it means Empire lost a lot of options with regards to characters.

I wouldn't say better. Mournfangs are pretty hard hitting, especially with Dragon Banner. Demigryphs are a bit cheaper. I'd say they're both good options for their armies. Demigryphs are pretty sweet for Empire, there aren't many units for less than 200 points that are as tough, well armoured and hard hitting.

Well, they still don't have a Wizard level, so no arcane items or bonuses to casting. I think the channel ability was included to make up for the loss of auto-generating dispel.

Cool, let us know how you go. I'm genuinely interested to see if Griffons work for their investment.

 

My friend collects Empire so I expect he will play them for a while with the new book. Overall he seems disappointed, they are a bit weaker than before since most things went up in points. Well balanced against 8th ed books, some powerful combos, but overall will struggle with strong armies like LM, Skaven and High Elves.

 

I don't think they'll struggle. The mono-build is gone, but the core strengths of Empire are still there (cannons blowing away enemy monsters and warmachines, Knights as Core, cost-effective horde blocks in Core, Wizards and Priests everywhere). I get that people will hate Cruddance for making most of Core overpriced without improving it (and they should), and removing 90% of magic items for no reason other than GW policy of 'no fun allowed' (double hate for both parties). He did however make most of the new units useful (Orb of Random is a bit too weak), and the SC's technically aren't worse, so I think on balance people should be happy.

 

i was a bit disappointed too. they fixed the game breaking possibility of the rocket blaster thing, and they added some synergy possibility with the new chariots (+1 to hit and +1PD for just over 100 p doesnt seem too bad to me) but overall they feel a bit boring. they just didnt have anything that made me feel "wow, i really wanna play empire now!"

Balance wise i think they are OK. on par with orcs probably wich means middle of the pack at best. i am really glad that there seems to be very little "power creep" in the 8th ed books. yes ogres and VC are definitely more powerful than orcs (not to mention TK) but neither are stronger than the top 7th ed teams, which is a good sign.

 

I have never played Empire or even against it, but at least the Cruddace-haters on TK forums seem to think he has learned something and that the book is rather good. Go figure. But I agree that it's really annoying when they keep subtracting the Magic Items lists, especially since theyl give Ogres and Vampire Counts extra candy in the form of Big Names and Bloodlines. Maybe that indicates that there's hope for Lizardmen's special spawnings coming back.

 

we can but hope- but will they nerf the basic stats or increase the points.

Either way i would like both a skink & saurus cold ones/Horned ones and possibly EoTG varrients and something like chaos hounds but lizard

 

Apparently the empire book doesn't even have 1 arcane item of its own. Sad to see so many of the unique items from army books getting removed in favour of the extended list of common magic items...

 

I have several friends who play Empire and am in the process of building an empire army myself. Having played a couple games against the new Empire now and discussed the new book with more experienced Empire players, here are some observations (I won't bother to repeat what others have already mentioned).

1) Synergy is the key to making the more expensive troops really effective. Between altar and warrior priest buffs, units can get re-rolls to hit, to wound and a 5+ ward save. This makes a horde of halberdiers fairly useful in dishing out some damage and really improves the knight units.

2) War machines - more expensive but in line with what they are able to do in 8th edition thanks to no more hiding behind terrain or range guessing. The ability of an engineer to improve war machines by avoiding misfires is likely to result in more of them being fielded. They are very effective when combined with either the helblaster or the helstrom rocket.

3) Demigryphs - a new, must have unit. However, they are still T3 to shoot at and since they are only delivery systems for the mount they are unlikely to be seen in numbers larger than 4. The prime reason being that only riders can deliver supporting attacks. Skrox are likely the best unit to take them on since they will kill saurus almost as easily and the krox can grind them down and eventually break them - especially true if they can be hit on the flank.

4) Magic - the only army item worth taking is the speculum, the others are very overpriced or next to useless. However, with the priests and altar spells, it would be possible to field only a 2nd level scroll caddy and then spam bound spells for the magic phase. Since priests are not wizards, they don't suffer from loss of concentration and thus can 1 dice each of their 3 spells if they want.

5) Altars - compared to a similarly priced Warriors of Chaos chariot, these are excellent value. In fact, they are so cheap that two of each type can be taken in a 2000 point list. Only problem is the new models are expensive and hideously difficult to transport without breaking them.

6) Stank - While the T10 near invincibility is gone, they are cheaper and more flexible. Perhaps the greatest change is random movement - stanks can now charge 360!!! On top of that, they have the potential to charge up to 18" (3d6). Although the average will obviously be less, a buff with Birona's Timewarp would make very long charges. Also, they will remain able to function even at a single wound, albeit less capable and they have the potential to unleash a S4 flame template attack if 3 points are put into the flame gun. Lastly, as a chariot they will actually get a save versus some of the killer spells that used to finish them off.

Green bits edited to reflect error in steam point allocation limit

All in all, a decent update with both good and bad but definitely in keeping with the latest 8th ed books in terms of avoiding power creep.

 

The Tank can only put three of its steam points in to any one option it has so max random movement is 3d6 not 5. and as a whole i feel that the army really didnt gain anything to help it out and warrior Priests got hit hard with the nerf bat.

 

I fought a stank for the first time the other day... Really really hard to bring down. 10 wounds, T6, 1+ armour save, completel unbreakable... I put a unit of chaos warriors and a chaos lord (who dishes out 6 s6 attacks and 2 s5 atacks per turn) against it and after 4-5 rounds of combat, had barely half destroyed it.

I have no idea how my elves would ever stand a chance of killing it, and even LM don't really have anything with insanely high strength except maybe a carnosaur.

 

You're not the target market for the new gear. They're after existing players, especially with the new Demigryphs and magic mounts.
Empire are still Tier 1, nothing overly changed that with the update. O&G are not a bad army overall, but they're still behind in magic, in warmachines (unless you field Spear Chukka gunline), and Empire infantry and cavalry trade far better in efficiency. Not to mention Priests and Wizards turn Empire units into meatgrinders for the enemy. Ogres were catapulted to Tier 1 by their update, VC still work pretty much the same as well (their rez spell is less spammable, but AOE, so a bit of wash).

I can confirm this, they removed everything arcane.
It's a deliberate strategy, I think it's more to prevent noob-slaying through the use of broken combos that may go under the radar (because not everyone has all the army books). Also, by having 90% of useful (or even usable) items in the main rulebook, they can FAQ broken things (such as power scroll) more effectively.

Not likely. Demigryphs are never going to be flanked, unless you sprint head on into them (which may be the bait for a Halberdier flank into you anyway). Demigryphs are going to trade extremely well with Skrox, they both cause Fear so their higher WS and superior Initiative means a lot of Skinks will die very quickly. Saurus are equally screwed without buffs, but thats why we have blowpipe Skinks. Get in the way, delay the chicken knights so you can nuke them with magic ('Misama' + Pit' is probably going to work the best). It's exactly the same with Mournfangs (from another power army), don't engage with anything that matters, just delay and nuke them with magic.

It is, but the magic mounts and prayers alone won't win the day. It's very unlikely you'll see an Empire army without a Level 4, they were already good last edition and even with all the magic items gone (ironically, Speculum is a pretty good item for a Wizard now), they still work just fine.

Who takes WoC chariots anyway?
On that note, they die comically easily in combat anyway, which is compensated by their decent buffs and abilities. I don't the Hurricanium is actually worth it, it's too random. Laser Cannons works as intended though, it's a weaker EOTG to nearby infantry, and it just murders whatever you point at.

Eh, it can still be killed using nuke magic, so we should be ok. It is a very annoying thing to deal with, but because they removed 'lol magic dun work because of steel' rule, I think it's not as devastating as before.

Demigryphs and Laser Cannons are two definitive improvements, they will both find a place in competitive lists, and they're brand new. Warriors Priests are arguably better now, auto-generate dispel was broken, channeling makes them useful to the Empire Magic phase as well now (not to mention Prayers are amazing now, and unit buffs).

Pit of Shades, Dwellers Below, Purple Sun. It may feel like a crutch, but all three of those options kill other Deathstar/unkillable monster type things in other armies too. Mindrazor on Spearmen/Saurus works too, you wound it on 2's now and with enough attacks you'll eat it.
Teclis will get off any one of those easily, as will a Slann. Carnosaur won't live long enough to reach it, cannons and magic will kill it before it hits the Empire lines.

 

In my gaming group, we don't use spell 6 in the 8 lores because most of them are broken so none of those options will work... And yeah you are right, a carnosaur would be blow away before it got close.

 

I think that's a brave stance to take actually. All three of those spells are very risky, they require you to spend a lot of power dice (even with a Level 4) to get it off, and if you don't IF they can be scrolled/dispelled. I don't think they are broken really, they exist to provide a hard counter to certain units (the 'unkillable monster' being the primary thing, along with Deathstar blocks). If you don't have them, you can't kill such targets effectively, and they just steamroll you. Lizardmen and High Elves are especially exposed by not having nukes or counters like 'Mindrazor', as we have no decent monstrous infantry to slay monsters with, and our infantry blocks are overcosted and underpowered.
By forbidding '6' spells, you ignore 'Pit' anyway, which is technically the best nuke the game (it's own Lore nerfs the enemy before it's cast, it doesn't backfire like 'Sun' can, and it kills monsters instead of infantry unlike 'Dwellers').

I think the problem lies not with magic, it lies with the inability of GW to balance monsters properly. They never seem to get it right, they always overcost or underpower (or in the case of ours do both). Hydras are one of the few people complain about, because I think they finally got it right (under 200pts, has a ranged attack, Regen and enough wounds to make cannons chancy).