Exactly this. Although my brother plays skaven and on turn 2 or 3 of my last game i moved the slann out of the unit and he proceeded to get instagibbed by cracks call. Damn those rats. Still, i think its the best way to go.
I hear ya'll. Mine is slated to be ethereal at the moment precisely because I don't want to 'waste' units bunkering him. I'd like to be able to send my skinks and saurus warriors out to do their actual job instead of just babysitting. Maybe I'll change. Dunno. I have a few hours to decide. I do miss having my main squeeze (old blood with stuff) in the list.
Ok, new list. This one goes against my original philosophy in just a stupidly high number of ways, but I have a plan.... 1 Slann - High Loremaster 1 Oldblood on Coldone - Glittering Scales, Dawnstone, Sword of Strife 1 Scar-vet BSB - Armor of Fortune, Great Weapon 10 Skink Skirmishers with Javelins & Shields 10 Skink Skirmishers with Javelins & Shields 16 Skink Skirmishers with Javelins & Shields 29 Saurus - Full Command 2 Jungle Swarms 7 Kroxigore + Champion 1 Bastiladon - Solar Engine 1 Ancient Stegadon with Engine of the Gods 1 Troglodon Gonna go pack it up. Wish me luck!
Game 28 - 2400 vs. Vampire Counts Date: May 30, 2014 Opponent: Vampire Counts Point Value: 2400 Scenario: Battleline Overview I decided to have an open mind, a positive attitude, and another go at using the Slann. I really wanted to get some experience using High Magic, having been on the receiving end of it a lot in recent games. I had forgotten just how much doing this changes my list, but I suppose a little variety is good now and then. My opponent is just making his return to Warhammer after a break, so he was a little rusty. The pressure was on me, then, to make sure I won! My list: See above His army (sort of) : Vampire Lord with Red Fury, Quickblood, and some other stuff Necromancer With King BSB with +1 to hit banner 5 hexwraiths 5 hexwraiths Terrorgheist (whom I shall call Miley in this report) 5 wolves 25 or so grave guard 3 Crypt Horrors 3 Crypt Horrors 25 or so skeletons 25 or so skeletons 40 or so zombies Summary of Events There was a building sort of in the middle, with a fence near it. Two hiils on my left, one in each deployment zone. Building on the far right, in his zone. Earthblood Mere in the middle of my zone. Woods off to my right. His deployment from my left to right: Miley, wraiths, wolves with Horrors #1 behind them, skeletons, Guard with zombies behind them (Lord and BSB here), skeletons (other wizard here), wraiths, Horrors #2. Me: Skinks, Bastiladon, swarms, Saurus (with Old Blood and BSB) with Krox in single rank in front of them, Ancient and Trog with larger skink unit behind them (with Slann in them), more skinks. Turn 1 He went first and advanced most of the stuff toward me, but flew Miley behind his lines. He added zombies in magic. I sat still, waiting for him to commit his forces to get around the building. In magic I killed the left hexwraiths with a few spells. Turn 2 He advanced again, moving Miley all the way over to my right, but still staying in his zone. Gaze of Nagash put 3 wounds on the Trog and lost his Necromancer to a Dimensional Cascade. I charged his wolves with the Kroxigor unit and began swining the army up and around the left, pointing toward the center. I anticipated his blocks would come around the right side of the house, where I could hit him in the front with the Saurus, the left with swarms, and a roar from the Trog to make all those attacks not only poison, but also PF on a 5+. The plan, as it were. Soul Quench killed 4 of 5 hexwraiths in the remaining unit. A dispel of Burning Alignment kept the last one alive. I failed to cast boosted Apotheosis on the Trog. Bummer. Turn 3 It kind of starts to blend together at this point, but some things happened: - I lost my Slann to a Dimensional Cascade when trying to put Fiery Convocation on the Grave Guard. That killed 4 models, who came back quick enough from his spells. - The Kroxigor unit was a terror! it obliterated the wolves, ran into the skeletons on the left, got charged by the Horror #1 unit, and proceeded to use S7 attacks, stomps, and easy combat res vs. the skeletons to crumble both units to dust. They then swung around and hit the zombies in the flank, killng 50 (had been grown some) in two rounds of combat. After that (turn 6) they hit the flank of the Grave Guard and had them down to just two or three models before the Vampire turned the tide and started killing many Krox on his own. - Burning Alignment did actually kill the last hexwaith. - Somewhere around Turn 4 he got his other skeletons into the Trog and broke him. He did not chase it down, preferring to spin toward my Saurus unit. No fear, though, since Miley screamed to kill the (later) rallied Trog and also the Ancient along the way. - My larger skink unit, now with no Slann, spent two rounds shooting at Miley and took her down with poison as if she had been smashed with a wrecking ball. - The skeletons that fought the Trog headed toward my Saurus, who spent two rounds of combat wiping them out entirely. The Old Blood himself killed 6 in one round. +2 A sword and PF on that guy really can pump out the damage. Too bad I never got to use the Roar of the Trog. By the end, I had lost the Slann, the Ancient, the Trog, and a unit of skinks. He had lost the Necromancer, both skeleton units, the zombies, the wolves, both hexwraith units, both Crypt Horror units, and Miley. The Kroxigore were down to one model and the Grave Guard had only a few left. It was nasty! Result: Victory to the Lizardmen! Post-game Thoughts and Unit Evaluations Well then, that was interesting. So much to say. Where to begin? I was right to fear a VC lord. Had it gone one more round, my Kroxigor unit would have given up its VPs. That would have stunk. Still, it is a 6 turn game and I managed the time, so it was ok. I respect his redundancy (2 skeleton units, 2 Horror units, 2 hexwraith units), but I think he should have made larger units instead of multiple units. Eighth edition is the edition of Big Units, and he did not embrace that. He's a 7th ed guy just finding his way into 8th, and that was probably the biggest reason I won. For instance, each time I killed the hexwraiths, they were just about in range to engage something of mine what would have been stuck fighting a thing they could not kill, but I was able to just barely kill them first. Had he combined his units into one, I wold have been in trouble. Ok then, what about my stuff? My plan was to get the saurus unit into a fight, then flank the enemy with swarms and Roar with the Troglodon. Say what you will about too narrow a plan, but Warhammer is often a sprint as opposed to a marathon, and if you can be hyper-focused on a plan and execute it, you stand a good chance to carry the day. In this game, my plan did not come together at all and I still won. This tells me that maybe I have a good plan as a basis. After all, if I can do well without my BamBam plan happening, then imagine the results when it does! I'll elaborate more on individual units in a moment, but I gotta say that the whole Slann thing (despite my optimism and positive outlook heading into the game) completely reinforced my feelings on magic in 8th edition. Putting that many points into a "plan" that uses magic is just plain stupid. Add into this the fact that I had to drop things from my list that are more fun for me, and I think it's safe to say that under 3000 points there will never be a Slann in my lists again, and that's too bad, because I think High Magic is awesome. So, onto the units... Skink Skirmishers with Javelins and Shields As usual, they proved themselves. I've seen some of the threads talking about how nothing has changed and how skinks are still the way to go, and I can totally see why. 9th my eff this up, but right now, these are the staple of Lizardmen lists. Twelve inch march, twelve inch shots and poison - hard to say no. People ignore them because "they're just skinks" and they pay for it. As I continue to paint these guys, there will be fewer and fewer Saurus Warriors in my lists, which, being honest, is sad. I'd love to keep a core (and Core) of Saurus, but it's just dumb to do it. Saurus Warriors Speaking of these guys... As often happens, they didn't really do much. Sure, they killed a skeleton block, but let's face it - a drunk hobo with a boner could do the same while he vomits up blood and loses himself in thoughts of how good he used to have it when he worked in the mail room at Sears. Killing skeletons is not exactly an accomplishment. They held their VPs, which is good, and gave my opponent something to think about, but at the end of the day they were not important to the outcome. Bastiladon I included him because he is painted. His zappy drew out dispel dice, which is good, but he never got to make an impact with his Initiative boost or his combat prowess (such as it is). I'll keep using him since he does make other magic work and can help out other ways (and is cheap) but he should not be thought of as overly important to a plan. Ancient Stegadon Sheesh. On one hand, he was really disappointing. He did not get to impact casting (see Slann comments), nor did he ever fight. On the other hand, he did finish of a hexwraith unit with, of all things, Burning Alignment and he drew out some dispel dice. Man, I want an FAQ. Kroxigor Ho ho ho! They were the kings once again. They just slaughtered things left and right, and did not need help to do it. I really liked using them as I did, as a 7-wide screen in front of my lines. Come on, wusses, fight my Kroxigore. I dare you! Including the champion mattered today, which is cool since I don't think I had used him before. He was able to minimize damage to the unit by taking things into his own hands. For 10 points, it's worth it. I'm pretty sure I will never play without this unit, and cannot wait to add more to my armies. Saurus BSB He fought. Yep. Never needed his re-roll in this game, but he needs to be there. Oldblood on Cold One Boy, that build can be brutal. He did not get magic support, not Trog support, and yet he still dished out the pain. Granted, it was against skeletons, but man he was cool. If I had to pick between another Old Blood and a Slann, I know what I would pick... Slann ..and it would not be a Slann. Wow. Talk about our massive, massive disappointments! I really developed my list around the idea this guy would be healing monsters, moving units, and otherwise supporting the army, but once again I was shown that any plan that counts on magic is a stupid, stupid, stupid plan. There's a reason i branched out from TK, and this game showed it clearly. I had things all set. I was going to Burn some stuff and then trade for Wildform so that my Saurus could benefit, but I only killed 4 guys and then I killed my own Slann. Yes, I used the Vassal rule once, but that's all. It was not a big deal. This points sink is a waste. A total waste. The only way to make him better would be to invest even more points in him, and even then you are at the whim of FAAAAAAAR too many dice rolls to even think about making him a part of a plan. Good bye, frog. (yay!) Good bye High Magic. (boo!) Troglodon It did not get to Roar. It got taken down. It was a nice little part of the army. I won despite not having him do his thing, and he took lots of attention. I still think he may be over priced, but he was once again fun and contributed. Not being able to heal him the God's Gift to Magic (the Slann) was sucktastic, but oh well. He's a borderline case for inclusion in future lists, but goddamn he's a cool model, so...grr!!!! Swarms Dangit! I really wanted to see what they could do to help the Saurus prove their worth. Despite what a said above about skinks being better than Saurus, if you get the Trog's Roar and these guys both making a Saurus unit do better, I think you are talking about a real game-winner that skinks cannot match. I'll try them again but it's awfully hard to justify the points expenditure when you know it may not work out. There you do. Good fun. Good times. A win. Can't ask for much more. Thanks for reading!
You're not kidding. I expect it now, though. It colors so much of my opinions, but experience shows me that this is normal...for me.
Just 2 cents on the slann Theres a reason the competitive build is either death or wandering. You dont throw big dice at anything, and you pew pew. The only thing you "need" him to do in that situation is throw magic missiles at stuff, with the occasional debuff. He performs that roll better than any other wizard. I think high magic on the slann is extremely overrated. /shrug, some people swear by it, but its a flexible lore that attempts to do a lot of things, and as you point out, magic just isn't that reliable. However, you CAN reliably throw 2 or 3 dice at 3 ish magic missiles a turn and do tons of damage. The only thing i'm taking away from your slann in this game is that he cascaded on turn 3 and still managed to kill a unit of hexwraiths. Realistically thats probably the only thing you should have asked him to do that game. And pew pew on the vampire lord/mikey. I mean you lost him trying to (probably) six dice a spell onto a unit of glorified skeletons. Theres almost no situation where that is ever worth the risk, especially because you didn't need to (as you clearly saw, you still won the game after all). If you wanna six dice spells you should take soul of stone because you will be miscasting. I know its not your preference but a lizardmen list with a slann will wipe the floor with a slannless list all day and night. However i suppose that does assume somewhat average luck...
Miscasts happen, Cascades happens, Below 4+ happens Not just to a slann (it happend to borh of you ) its the way if the game and even if that backs up your statement on unreliable magic in general it also points towards the Slann being "awesome" due to Soul Of Stone. I never leave without it anymore, just think what the game would have looked like if you hadnt. The Slann is worth it, even though ive stopped going above 400pts for him, as his usefulness dosnt seem to raise with it. My go to guy is Slann - soul of stone - Wandering Deliberations He is the most reliable magic phase ive ever had, and if you put the BSB on a Vet then that leaves room for an Oldblood as well. Wandering takes practice but High takes more. Its not fair to judge its use by 1 game, especially not when you both cascade of the the table. I really really really beg you to reconsider Sleb, Try my build for 2 more games with high 3 games with WD (2 games is a line, 3 games is a pattern) Its an official Challenge! if not for personal fun then for the accomplishment. (Sleboda unlocked the "Ive played high magic in a hatrick and its still crap" achievement) What say ye!?
In return I will of course play slannless for an equal amount of game. Can we agree that Tournaments are "of the table" ?
Isn't there an argument that this is just poor luck, though, which could affect anything? I mean, in one of my games yesterday my Oldblood General fluffed all his attacks and only hit once, broke from combat and got run down, costing me 350 VPs (spoiler alert). That doesn't mean I think he's garbage though, just that I got unlucky (compounded by a poor tactical decision). Equally, across two games I chucked 6 dice at a Comet three times, 6 dice at the Bastiladon 4 times, and 6 dice at a Chain Lightning twice - and only miscast once. But that doesn't mean that you can rely on 6-dicing a spell, only that extremes will sometimes happen and nothing is immune to that. Nonetheless, I'm coming around to the perspective that running without a Slann is the way to go also. I do think Putzfrau is right that they can be powerful (And investing that much into a model it seems like a wise decision to grab Soul of Stone), but I'm not sure that its as clear cut as Slann>No-Slann. Certainly I'm finding that no Slann and no reliance on Slann magic is a lot more fun to play!
I am now hating high magic. The spells cost too much to cast (which makes you bound for hell), they are unreliable, and trading out a spell at the end of the magic phase for a better spell just tells me I should have picked a better lore. I can see why people stick with Light, Life and Wandering. Low casting cost wins the day. So I agree with Phatmotha, I loooove wandering deliberations and the only reason I am trying other things is to branch out in strategies. Try a block of saurus with a hero who makes them stubborn. They become so much better as an anvil. I hate skinks for the exact opposite reason you hate slann: I cannot roll 6's on their attacks. When I get 1/10 I feel lucky, and statistically that just ain't right. I think my luck saves all my 6's for spells and saurus. Edited to remove mistake. I am probably taking my poor ability (and bad luck) to use high magic out on its usefulness.
I wouldn't go to say that you should have picked a better lore, HM is awesome if you use it for what it was designed for: an accelerating path to the best options, which is eternally valuable in tourney environment. It might not be the best option for each match-up, but your job as a caster is to get there before its too late. There aren't a single situation in the game that the lore doesn't have a spell for, and when that spell is used you can swap it for something for further situations. Agreed: Wandering sets you up to start with, which in the given magic meta works better (for me at least). that aside: HM isnt a multicasting lore. You decide what spell is a must this phase and then you try to get it of. all dice beyond that is a bonus, not something you shall take for granted. its 10+ boosted, which you are always getting anyway as you ARE using 2 dice for it on your lvl4 caster right?
Wow, I totally messed that up. Confused walk between's 16 with apotheosis cost of 10. Rereading the lore I see hand of glory and apotheosis are cheaper than I thought. I am going to edit that post to remove stupidity. Thanks for the correction.
I have some specific things I want to address, but I think a general commentary on the topics of luck and chances may be in order. On Luck I don't believe in luck, at least not as something you can manipulate or as some sort of cosmic force that influences our actions and the results of those actions. Luck, magic, wishing/hoping, divine influence, and superstitions of this ilk are, in my opinion, a bunch of BS and the excuses of those who do not prepare, do not wish to understand reality, and do not accept personal responsibility. Will I toss out the occasional "good luck" to someone? Sure! Just like I'll enjoy going to a 'magic' show or say "oh my god" when something really grabs my attention. You don't have to believe in a thing to make use of language that surrounds it. So, the point here is that I don't chalk things up to luck (good or bad) even though I may, at times, curse my "luck." On Chances While I don't believe in luck, I do believe in chances, odds, and likelihood. These are the sorts of things I can evaluate and incorporate into my plans. Where this ties into what someone might think of as "luck" is how I seem to be able to buck the odds on a personal level, and how I will use this knowledge to assess what I need to do to achieve a desired outcome. I'll give you a story from my past. Many years ago I had a friend that played Titan Legions/Space Marine (older version of Epic) with me 50 out of 52 weekends one year. More often than not, I lost. I didn't mind the losing so much (didn't like it, of course, but it didn't put me off playing), but I did mind how I lost. It always felt like I had a decent plan, that I put my stuff in position to succeed, and that I stood a good chance to win. Yet it eluded me so often. Even my opponent would tell me that he was sure he had been outmaneuvered and was about to lose, only to have things turn around. Magnus the Red has a shot that hit on a 2+ a killed whatever it hit, but I swear he would hit barely half the time for me. That was just one example. So, after about 15 games, we started charting my rolls on a very old computer. We set up a list of every type of dice-odds the game called upon me to encounter. We noted the odds of success for each and then tracked each and every single roll I made in each category. I'm not kidding. Tens of thousands of rolls over about 35 - 40 games. All tracked and evaluated. Know what? It turns out I am about 35% less "lucky" than the odds say I should be. Seeing it there in a solid analysis definitely helped me come to grips with why I often utter the phrase "Just give me average - I'll take average." That analysis was a real eye-opener. Once I started to accept this as if it were the expected norm for me I started to do better. When the odds said I needed to commit three shots to something to make it work, I would commit four. When the casting value of a spell says I should be able to pull it off with two dice, I use three dice. When people say a Tomb Prince is good enough and that a BSB is wasted in a TK army, I take a King and a BSB so that I don't fail, for example, swift reforms. It goes through everything I do in gaming. I over commit so that I can get the same results that others get from a standard commitment. This means I cast fewer spells, have fewer units, don't declare charged that should make it "on average" and so on. I simply don't do it because I know it would work for me unless I stack the deck in my favor by at least 35%. With my luck I needed to overdo things to make the chance of success reasonable. Now, with all that said, maybe some of my past comments, and those in the future, will make more sense to readers. On I go to specific responses... => Yeah, too often it seems. It's why I don't play TK without Khatep - ever - anymore. That re-roll staff is just far, far too important. => A 1 pip shift won't help me. It would not have in this game for sure. Besides, I could not take my Old Blood if I spent more than 5 more points on the Slann. I cannot drop Loremaster since if I did, I'm pretty sure I would not get the spells I wanted. => True. It would have gone much better for me. I could have taken more of the things I know how to use and enjoy playing with. The Slann had so very little impact on the game that he ended up being a detriment that I somehow managed to overcome. => It's not one game. It's accumulated experience. A wizard failing to do his job is the expected norm for me. I've used him once or twice before too, and never been impressed. Ok. Why not? => The carnosaur is the main thing I had to drop to include the Frog, so when I go back to not using the Frog anymore, he'll be back in as a mount for my ScarVet BSB. => This goes back to what I said at the top. I expect "poor luck" and am rarely disappointed. Also (and this could be a fun forum topic all on its own), think of the nature of magic 'luck' vs combat (or shooting or...) 'luck.' Magic has so much going against it. You have to get the spells you want. You have to roll high enough when casting, but not so high as to hose the rest of your phase with a miscast. Your opponent (and this is a HUGE one) actually gets to make choices to stop your actions (the only phase in the game that allows this). You have to get enough on the Winds to give yourself options. Magic, unlike any other aspect of Warhammer, has a resource pool. If you take three cannons, they all get to shoot every turn if you like, and even when one of them messes up, the other two don't care at all. If you take two characters with 5 Attacks each and put them in a unit, they will each get all their Attacks no matter how it goes for either of them. There is no "Max 40 Attacks per Combat Phase" nor is there "If one guy hits with all his Attacks, d6 other Attacks have to go away from another Character" and so on. Magic just has so much more working against it that when it does fail, it has a dramatic impact on the rest of your plan. It's why, as I often point out, the main rulebook itself has that little sidebar that tells us that a good general never builds a plan around magic (so, yeah, don't get me going on why they made an entire Army Book where that is exactly what you must do (Tomb Kings)). The number of things that happen in a series of combat rolls is much less and the result significantly less dire when it all goes to hell. There is no roll at the start of he combat phase that tells you that the points you invested in 4 combat units cannot be fully used. You don't have to check to see if you will be allowed to use all the Attacks on the profile each turn. You pay X, you get to use Y. Magic is not like that. You could spend 600 points on magic and never cast a single spell all game. Plus, and I need to emphasize this again, magic is the only part of the game where your opponent can deny your actions so actively. With a wave of his hand (scroll) he can shut you down, and even without that the system is set up to give him access to a counter-action mechanism (dispel dice) that has nothing to do with his army and costs him zero points to use (though he can enhance this mechanism if he chooses). There are no "Dispel Cannon" scrolls or piles of dice that he can roll to tell you that you are not allowed to even make your Attacks with your combat hero. Magic is the only part of the game that lets your opponent so casually and easily deny your ability to use the several hundred points you invested. => I look at it differently. My game was actually set up to work out exactly how I wanted. I got Fiery Convocation off on the Grave Guard at a point when I no longer would need to use that spell. I planned to then turn it in for Wildform, which would not have been useful to me earlier in the game, so that the Saurus could take on the Grave Guard unit,. It was the perfect chance to make use of the flexibility of the lore attribute. Too bad I miscast. => I know you edited the comment about boosted Apotheosis maybe still only giving one wound back, but there is another thing about the boosted version. Even if you still end up only getting one would back, at least the boosted one also makes you cause Fear. It's not a huge deal, I know, but it's something.
Its on then! Skink priests! Your time of glory is Neigh! If 5 games is too much (I for one dont play as often as i'd like.) We could say 3 games. 3 for me sans-slann and 3 for you with WD? it seems you have emptied your patience for high ? Im still up for all 5 though, just putting out the alternative. .