I got my copy of Khaine a little early thanks to a friendly connection in the community and have been reading the new rules and story voraciously. The good news, End Times Magic, with the loremasters everywhere and 4D6 power dice is optional. The Khaine book makes it very clear that those rules are not mandatory to follow you anc your opponent can choose which to use. The only time you are obligated to use them is if one or both of you are running any characters or "formations" out of End Times Khaine. Many have been wondering, so if everyone gets loremaster, what happens to those who already have it? Well in the End Times, those with Loremaster can re-roll any casting attempt they make out of the lore they specialize in. Whether it fails or succeeds or miscasts they can re-roll it. In addition as long as a spell is does not have a casting value of 15+ or more it can be cast as many times as you like dice permitting, provided you did not fail to cast it already or it is an End Times spell. Put all that together and we have a Lvl 2 to Heavens who can cast Comet, re-roll all 1s (usually) when casting, then re-roll his attempt, and then as long as it goes off bring down another. The only drawback to this is you must now roll D6 to determine how many dice you can use to cast so roll a 1 after declaring an attempt to cast comet and you're screwed. That's the only thing I've thought of so far, I'm exceedingly tired at the moment. What this means for our Slann, I don't know the full implications yet, have at it
wait, so Tetto will both know the whole lore and have rerolls? If so it's great, if he has only rerolls he's useless now (2 spells with rerolls is not enough for me). And would slanns with FoM know 8 spells and have the chance to reroll them at the same time? That would be nasty, even if the D6 thing can destroy your plans
Focus mystery slann is so good. You get to reroll casting attempts and people are saying that when you swap a spell out for one in another lore you gain all the spels in that lore and get back the spell you swapped out
Nope, heres a problem. Tettos ability says re-roll 1's Loremaster says re-roll the entire attempt. you cant re-roll re-rolls So if you re-roll any dice from the pool you can no longer re-roll that pool as a whole. you have to choice.
@OP If you have the book,then you need to check something again. If -either- player (not just both) wants to use the new magic phase, it gets used. It's really not as optional as you think it is, which is a good thing. Also, phat is right about the rerolls.
Yes it does say if either player wishes, however given the social contract nature of this game I would put imposing it without discussion on your opponent as a rather uncouth gesture if they don't want to play by the optional rules. Tetto does have Loremaster still, and he has the option to choose whether to re-roll his 1s or 6s or the entire shebang. I'm excited to try it out but I wouldn't follow the wording of that clause to the letter, the opposite page does say in the How to Use This Book that "Some of the scenarios will require the use of these rules, and you can use them in an other games that you play when it feels appropriate, or just because it sounds like it would be fun!" Definitely want you as a gaming group to use it as you wish, very little hard and fast declarations, unlike the errata to the rulebook.
as someone on Warseer pointed out: it seems they are trying some things off before ninth. I for one am happy that they experiment with magic. It needs to be shaken, as its too random as it is. Everytime I build a list around the Slann I feel handicapped, as I more often than not feel let down by the investment. (especially after getting the exact same casting rate with skink priests) I also feel handicapped without him, as my playstyle really needs the Slann exclusive lores.. All in all I feel lizzies feel rather awkward this edition. fingers crossed for 9th. starting my Undead Legion meanwhile I guess.. EDIT: sry for the off topic, guess I had to vent that.
Slann with wandering deliberations + tetto... Knows all 8 lores with tetto having rerolls for heavens Just let that sink in...
A few points - The whole point is that they are not optional - at least not any more than any rule, anywhere, at all, in all of Warhammer is optional. You can say it's "optional" to use the rules for poison, flying, or anything else. The angle of approach on this wording may be differnet, but the rules themselves are in effect, and unless _both_ players _don't_ want to use them, they will be. Let that sink in for a second. Let's say you and I want to play a game. You bring Lizards, and I bring Tomb Kings. You have lots of skinks. I have some constructs. I wold prefer we don't use the rules for poison. You prefer that we do. Guess what? We use the rules for poison! The rules for poison are in effect until we both decide to not use them - which we are free to do if we agree on that. So, even though the mechanism is different, the net result is the same - if one player wants a particular Warhammer rule (poison, new magic, whatever) it is in effect because rules get used that way. Next thing - take a look at the rules in the Khaine book! It's laif out several times, but the phrase they use is "...new rule you can use in any game of Warhammer..." Lastly - I think these sorts of discussions (not just this one) would be better off if we could all get it through our heads that yes, of course the game has a social contract. You can always ask for changes, discuss things ahead of time, and so on. Of course. Do we really need to keep saying this like it somehow puts others in their place? Nobody is "imposing" rules on anyone. I am not "imposing" the various new Dwarf rules on my opponent when I suddenly start playing with the new Dwarf army book instead of the old one upon the new one's release. I am not "imposing" the various new magic rules on my opponent when I start playing games using the newest _GW-created-and-published_ rules for magic! I am simply playing by the current rules in both case. It's not like I am planning a super secret stealth attack on my opponent. In fact, he'll probably know well ahead of time that I am using the newest rules just because I tend to get rather excited by new rules!
I don't think that's an entirely fair comparison, equating the new Magic rules to the rules for Poison or Flying. They clearly handled the new Magic rule differently than they handled the new Lords and Heroes allowance, for instance. With the former, they listed the various conditions upon which a player must use the rule. With the latter, they updated the FAQ in order to rewrite the BRB, permanently erasing the old allowances. The difference is clear. One rule is now part of the BRB, like Poison and Flying. One rule is not part of the BRB, yet, and conditions exist where the old Magic rules should be used.
Putting it in the errata was completely unnecessary. Glad they did, but it was not needed. The End Times books are rules sources for Warhammer games. So are army books and FAQs. A new edition of the game is also an update to the rules of the game. GW has at its disposal a number of ways to add to or update/modify the rules of Warhammer. The End Times books may be a newer way, but I don't see how it's really any less authoritative than a new BRB, army book, or FAQ. These are publications from Games Workshop for Warhammer that contain rules that govern how Warhammer is played.
So I show up to our game with my TK and decide I want to use Storm of Magic, I've even convenienced you (the gracious host) by bringing along my painted up fulcrums I intend to use. We did not discuss this before hand. I agree with an earlier poster that the 50% characters was handled very differently than this change where it is very much treated as a variation of the game for when you feel it is appropriate. I'm not against the change, I'm likely equally excited as you, we just disagree to the extent it should be taken as "this is the way it is from now until to the end of 8th"
Storm of Magic (and Blood in the Badlands) is actually very different. I went into this in massive detail when Nagash came out, but the essential difference is that SoM has very clear language that says the SoM rules are for playing the specific SoM scenario. There is no language in it, at all, that is akin the the language in End Times books ("for use in any games of Warhammer"). Totally different animal.
With double the size of winds of magic and the ability to repeatedly cast the same spell until unsuccessful (under these new rules), am I correct that bound (and other dirt cheap) spells are incredibly powerful now? Assuming a max winds of magic and lots of lucky rolling, a lone Skink Chief with a Ruby Ring of Ruin can conceivably cast 24 Fireballs during a turn, right? Or your Solardon, EOTG, and/or Kroq-Gar can spam their bound spells repeatedly? With 3 bound spells in your list + a level 2 wizard, you could throw one die at roughly 12 spells and succeed with 8 of them before having to resort to higher power spells. Spirit Leech cast by a level 4 wizard seems absolutely insane, with the Lore Attribute providing additional power dice as you go. With virtually unlimited casting, having to roll a 3 to cast your spell vs a 7 or 13 seems to be the most efficient use of power dice, even if its not a very powerful spell.
Where did you read that? I didn't see any restrictions of that nature on the scanned pages that I've seen on other sites. And the BRB describes bound spells as being cast "just like an ordinary spell", which these new rules now apply to.
While I do agree that it does feel a little off to compare "poison" with "new magic rules" when judging officiality (its a word now, I made it so, use it, you have my permission) I am entirely with Sleboda on this one. People said the exact same thing when the 50% L&H and Lore of Undeath was released Those was made into BRB additions by a FAQ, which confirmed a new paradigm in rules addition. With that as precedence I find it hard NOT to reach the conclusion that this is just as valid. The wording, context and semantics is more or less the same, which makes it a rational deduction that the rest is also, as nothing shows otherwise. Im not a huge fan of the system, but I might have to try it before I complain. one thing is you can spam spirit leech another is the meta-changes it will bring. If you take a step back, with all the new "point and click" characters coming, wouldnt it be likely that a magic powerup is meant as counterbalance? "hm, so Karl Franz is 2+ against magic?.....if 1 spirit leech cant do -GUESS THE WORD-, maybe 10 will. #Inflation #YesIJustUsedAHashTagOnaWarhammerForumDealWithIt
You can spam spells until they are dispelled. Dispelling a spell makes it an unsuccessful casting which makes the spell ineligible for recasting. If you're only 1-dicing spells, then you're going to fail casting (via a 1 or 2) 1/3 of the time, and I'm going to be able to dispel you 1/3 of the remaining times (with 1 die) so you only have a 1/3 chance of being able to spam the spell. Ie, if you successfully cast it on your first attempt, chances are pretty good that you will fail on your second. I recommend trying the system out (even just pretend trying it out by rolling out a few pretend magic phases outside of a game and playing both sides yourself) see how many spells you actually cast.
You are right that it might not be Spirit Leech that a wizard is able to spam, and that the average result won't equal the most extreme results. Assume that a caster has access to numerous different spells that they can cast on a 3+ (either by use of a Slann with Wandering Deliberations, which provides access to 15 different 3+ spells, or by use of multiple casters/lores/bound spells), so that if you dispel one spell, the caster can start again on a different spell. Average power dice is 14 (average roll on 4d6), and average dispel dice is 4.472 (average roll of 2d6 taking the higher roll). You throw one dice at 14 3+ spells resulting in 9.333 casts and some number <= 4.472 are dispelled, that should result in an average of ~5 spells being cast during a magic phase. That might not seem like a lot, but 5 magic missiles/augments/hexes during each and every magic phase is significantly more magic flying around than we are used to. And on the extreme ends of the winds of magic spectrum, you are looking at anywhere from 0 to 15 spells being cast (just assuming unfavorable and favorable winds, but still keeping the 1/3 fail rate), without factoring in extra power dice from scrolls, harmonic convergence/channeling staff, Kindleflame and Life Leeching, re-rolling due to Loremaster, etc. I'm not arguing for or against the new magic rules, just trying to wrap my head around them. At the very least, it would seem that Dispel Scroll and Cube of Darkness are now weaker (as an individual dispel is less valuable), Hex Scroll is more potent for the chance to shut down a wizard during a magic phase or two, and units that are particularly susceptible to magic missiles are now worse (like Chameleon Skinks).
Average power dice is 14, but average dispel dice is 7. Dispel gets the best 2 out of the 4 dice rolled for power. (so in practice, an average 14 power dice will likely yield 8+ dispel dice)