Feels like there’s a fair bit hinging on this one, doesn’t it? Week after week, event after event, OBR and SBGL have been smashing it and smashing it and smashing it. It’s gotten to the point where I barely skim the “what’s winning” coverage because it’s mostly the same old shit every time, but it really came to a head with Nova. I won’t labour the point any further because plenty has already been said and written, but I will say that it struck me that a lot of Death players themselves were happy to say that their armies are borked and they’re over it. Good on ‘em for being up front about it all.
So this won’t be an extended whinge about Death – we all know they’re getting knocked, and we all know they deserve it. What we will be doing is smashing into our writing team’s individual hopes for:
- One unit to get a points increase;
- One unit to get a points drop;
- And one rules change they’d like to see.
The armies at the top of the meta will of course get a mention in that first category, but we won’t spend the whole article banging on about that to the exclusion of everything else, and we’ll shine a light on plenty of other armies and units that need some attention too.
“Just to chime in on Pete’s intro, I think it’s pretty obvious that Blizzard Teleport has got to go, either through a range reduction or a no setup rule. That’s another point not worth belabouring” – Patrick
If you want to see our thoughts heading into the last update, to see how those have aged, you can catch them right here:
So let’s have a think about some next steps to take the game forward. Ready? Let’s go.
Peter Atkinson
One Points Increase
What is our source of morality in a secular society? How do we resolve the climate crisis? Is 120 points appropriate for Zombies? Life is full of difficult questions, but this is not one of them. I’ll break it down for anyone who still doesn’t get it:
- 3rd Ed AOS is primarily a trading game.
- When your cheap-ass chaff unit splashes out mortal wounds on death, they often take down a much more costly combat unit with them.
- If this isn’t enough, you then recycle your Zombies unit back onto the table for free.
- Net result: you have models and your opponent doesn’t. This is a good thing for you.
It’s a massive, massive trading advantage. At 6 points per wound – which is really more like 4 ppw, given the wildly-overtuned recursion – they really don’t owe you anything other than existing as bases on the table, and yet here they are.
The limitation to those splashback mortals was a good step at the last balance pass, because it does show that GW at least understood where they’d fucked up and introduced some counterplay. But it’s not gone far enough. A DPS test is a good thing to have in the meta, but a DPS test that you have to pass twice needs to be costed appropriately.
The verdict: Zombies to go to 140 points
One Points Drop
5+ save, no ward, no enhanced Rally, no recursion, 15 points per wound. What we have here is a core unit profile that could be precision-designed to struggle against the top armies in the game, and it is of course the humble Ogor Glutton.
With 4 wounds each I can only imagine the idea is that they’re a mountain of blubber to get through, but they’re so damn expensive that you can’t get enough wounds on the table to cope with the modern game. I’ve been playing Gutbusters for years – right through the era when GW couldn’t even be bothered to give them a single page of GHB faction abilities – and while 150 or so fragile wounds was fit for purpose in 1st Ed AOS*, you just don’t get enough stuff in a Gutbusters army right now.
The wizards are too expensive – 140 points for a 1-cast wizard with no bonuses is awful, and seems to be based on their wounds count of 7 multiplied by 20 ppw, rather than a reflection of their utility or power in the game. But it’s the classic Ogre Bull that the army needs to come down most. With a minimum unit size of 6 they don’t trade all that well and bringing them back in line will unlock the coolest and most fun army out there, bar none.
A lot of people pick up Ogors as a pallet-cleanser but end up falling in love. If GW is going to keep on dishing out their cool and thematic army rules to other factions like $1 bills at a weekday-afternoon strip club, the least they could do is give Gutbusters some points relief on the iconic Battleline Bulls. The fat lads are great to play with and against, to let’s unleash them on the tabletop. You’ll be glad you did.
The verdict: Gluttons to come down to 210 points.
*Yes I’ve been playing them that long – and believe it or not, I was the person who started calling them Dad Bods, when I guested on Doom and Darkness way back in the day. If you think I’m full of shit, you are welcome to be wrong.
One Rules Change
The hero-targeting restrictions from the last GHB have been rolled into the core rules, so let’s do the same with another successful experiment. Bringing coherency up to 6 models was most welcome, but since GW is determined to keep it there for larger units, let’s at least allow them to fight properly. Units of 10 models with 1” melee range should not be punished for existing.
If GW really doesn’t want us stringing them out across the board, can we at least allow them to function while bunched up? The answer is right there in front of us: the Gally Vets batallion that was ported across from the Gally Vets Handbook into the Gally Champs Handbook, and then dumped because GW were too focused on nerfing Troggoths to think about copy-pasting it into the current GHB. It stops us stringing them out but still lets the unit operate, so that’s got to be an easy win.
The verdict: Galletian Veterans to rejoin the Core Battalions – and stay there.
Patrick Nevan
Wow Good Ol’ Pete deciding to climb on the current “Undead are too tough” bandwagon and crank out a few tunes on the well-thumped tub. Who could have predicted it after his deafening silence on the subject of every stinking gloomspite unit being endlessly recycled. Newsflash for all the crybabies out there, Zombies are doing exactly what a horde of Zombies is meant to do. They’re easy to kill but they just keep on coming. Hats off to the game designers on SBGL. I’m not saying they shouldn’t go up but the strength of the army is in the battle tactics and grand strats, and you don’t solve that with points.
As for the NPE, I bitch about it as much as anyone but it shouldn’t be a factor for competitive games. I’m still waiting for someone to identify a dominant army that was a PPE. On the other hand I support the appeal for more Glutton points drops so even a blind pig digs up a truffle once in a while.
One Points Increase – The Krondspine
I don’t know how much business they are doing internationally but I’ve been to one GT this GHB and Krondspines were the only 5-0’s around on the day. A rant on everything I hate about Krondspines would be a separate series of articles, but they are a pretty fair indicator of a shit meta. This isn’t some goofy personal vendetta like Pete and Zombies everybody: even the hacks who run them hate these things. (Or at least won’t admit to liking them in public).
Bringing them back into the game so Magic Dom armies can turn them out with Rupture and make them invincible by feeding them some endless spells will stand as one of the stupider decisions in a 3rd edition that will be remembered for its endless run of bad design choices and piss poor playtesting.
I’ll accept that having a Krondspine go wild is, in some way, shape or form a bad idea when your opponent gets to move it in their turn; until then, fuck the Krondspine.
The Verdict: Krondspine to go up to whatever it takes for me to never see one on the table again
One Points Drop – Putrid Blight Kings
Time to drag out the Bernie Sanders “I am once again asking for…” meme. Seriously why are these poor schmucks coming in at 250 points for five? That’s well in excess of anything else on the 3 wound elite infantry tier, and they just don’t do all that much for their points.
The poor guys are slower than a nerf to an Order army, pump out indifferent damage and enjoy a 4 up save and a 5 up ward that is available to about half the armies in the game. To top it off, unlike nearly everything else in the elite infantry class they have a 1 inch weapon range and struggle to bring their piss poor output to bear.
Granted Papa’s children got the good allegiance abilities, but I don’t think the folks that do the costing realize how hard it can be to get your money’s worth out of schmucks trudging along at 4 inches without any movement shenanigans. Somebody banging enough braincells together to drop the points on Flies without touching these things last time around was pretty durn aggravating.
The Verdict – Blight Kings to 210
One Rules Change – No Primal Dice for non-Champions
This was a tough one as there are a bunch of things I’d like to see tightened up, starting with the spelling of Andtorian. My idea would be to restict the use of primal dice to people who qualify for the champion slot in the battalions. Less than 10 wounds, no mount, not unique. It’s such an obvious rule that a lot of people didn’t realize anyone could use primal dice on their first reading of the GHB.
This would be a simple way to bring the little guys into the edition while sticking a thumb in the eye of the Magic Doms. Was the purpose of primal dice really for Nagash to casually throw them on top of his 14 plus cast until he has hit whatever number he needs?
It would solve a whole bunch of other problems including unique heroes racking up massive casting or unbind values à la Gobsprakk, The Voice of Stupid Rules Interactions, and jerk ass unique heroes being able to juice up their very powerful signature spells, aka Nefferatta.
You could argue that it would make Andtorian Locusts more powerful but that’s the point of the GHB, and foot wizards tend to operate without all the casts and buffs of a Kairos Fateweaver anyway. If your army doesn’t have decent primal wizards or qualifying priests you were already in trouble. This change won’t give you an extra fucking.
The Verdict – Strike a blow for the little man, Primal Dice for Primal Casters (and qualifying priests)
Sean Benson
Feel like there’s at least a few things written on the wall when it comes to this wave of “balance” changes here in the scroll. I don’t want to pull the wind out of the sails of too many people, but I do think there’s at least a few things striking into “bad times for everyone involved,” pushing the game into the most extreme versions of parking asses in circles on a table. My beloved Death has had a nice little run but there definitely seems to be a storm brewing, and we’ll see very soon how exactly it gets handled.
One Points Increase – Immortis Guard
There is a lot of nuance to this but I think that Immortis Guard should go up while also reducing points costs in other aspects of OBR. There’s a fair amount of reasons they are taken right now, but a big part of that is they are just so efficient for their points. Everything OBR is already doing is just compounded onto a reinforced unit of these shield-carrying wound sponges.
Kick the points north of 250 for these guys and look at reducing Mortek Guard, Mortek Crawler and Harvester. I know, I know I’m getting a bonus wishlist with points reductions, but I think it’s important for the context.
The Verdict: Later Immortis Guard
One Points Drop – The Black Coach
OOOkay well we nearly got our last ask with the reduction of Crossboo points, so let’s take a look at a piece that’s probably 40-60 points overcosted. There’s so many things we could consider fixing about the Black Coach to make the juice worth the squeeze…damage output, buffs to nearby models, durability, make it a monster, more cool factor. But right now in the current state of Nighthaunt, let’s just drop some points and keep squeezing more wounds into the lists. It has the teleport and the relatively easy Battle Tactic ready to go, but just give ghost loyalists more reason to bring the centrepiece model to the table. Alternatively give it an aura that gives all Nighthaunt units wholly within 12″ a 5+ ward when it has a 5 or 6 on its power dice. 😏
The Verdict – Black Coach to 220
One Rules Change – Blizzard
For those that have been around for just a little while, we’ve seen these weapons of mass NPE come and go between balance passes and well, I think right now it’s the time for this one to get dialed way the fuck back. Primal dice “help” the problem, but not really because they amplify the problem just as easily. Merciless Blizzard is a match held in a hand covered in gasoline that forces games into standoffs between wizards ready to evaporate each other. The worst part is that it’s entirely a thing that seasoned players have thought about and have ways to deal with it, but the newer or less aware players can be caught directly in the crossfire.
Nerf the damage I say: make it 4d3 and we’re good. It just doesn’t need a possible 24 mortal wound output. Onwards and upwards.
The Verdict – Melt Blizzard
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