Here is episode 2, thanks to Flame Rose for doing the editing!
Opening session-our random uncontained thoughts
Grumpy's Gripe- Pay to Play and 40k
Tourqer's Tally- Crimson Slaughter Thoughts
Rumors- Knights, IG
Tactics- Knight Army Ideas
Episode 2
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YOU SOUND FUNNY! Nah man that was a great episode. Cant wait to do number 3!
ReplyDeleteYour face is funny!!
DeleteWe are making it happen
First off, I feel so honored being indirectly referenced during your podcast (the Dark Eldar guy lol). I am going to may sound totally negative during this post, but that isn't my intention. You guys just happen to be imperial players that mostly agree with each other, so perhaps I can offer a differing perscpective (as the DE guy). I'm going to try to adress the points you made in the podcast in order, forgive if I don't.
ReplyDeleteAs per your discussion about pay to play, yes the game obviously is as you have to purchase models, duh. I think what many people see and have complaints about is how it seems to be turning into 'pay to win'. And when people talk about pay to win, I think it has to do with the marriage of power creep in the new codexes (Tyranid codex is the exception...poor 'nids) and the 6th ed allies system. To many, myself included, Eldar, Tau, and now Imperial Knights did not seem to be about providing armies that balanced well with others given the current rule set or even fit well with the fluff. They seemed mostly about pushing new minis and I believe Torquer even spoke to this, "If you think they can't beat them, buy them and add them as allies". From a hobby perspective and a GW business perpective that sounds great, but for a gamer (and I see myself as gamer first, hobbist second) that really sucks and is really disappointing as I want to have fun playing the game with the army I have not the next hot $150 model I may not be able to afford. Thats pay to win, and thats bad. The hobby needs to be viewed a bit seperately from the game, and GW has conceded that they are more concerned with the hobby, and not the game, which again I think is bad, because in the end, the game really is what drives the hobby.
I have to poke at you a bit Torquer. I took a bit of issue when you said you wouldn't play with people with scratch built models (at least you guys could admit it was a bit elitist). I think that is wrong in two senses, where again, you need to seperate your views from the game and the hobby. In the hobby sense, scratch building and kit bashing is and was a MAJOR part of the hobby, especially for those of us xenos (again you damn arrogant imperials who GW caters to lol) who don't get many models made and have ZERO fortifications in our respective styles. In the gaming sense GW produced books with a set of rules which you can buy seperate from the models. You don't even need models to play, in fact I have some pretty fun theory skirmishes using quarters with paper taped to them. The depth and strategy of the game itself is what draws many people, maybe not Torquer and thats fine, to buy the models just to make it LOOK cool. Here is a question I pose for you Torquer (and I will copy this into your blog as well because I enjoy yours as well!) are you just down on scratch built/proxyed because you had to drop $150 on say, a knight, and they haven't? Or is it just a 'looks' thing? How would you feel about playing a 'home made' model that looks identical to yours?
Keep up the good work fellas,
Servicious
Thanks for the comment, and I hope i did not come off to negative against you. I enjoy the counterpoint and discussion even if I don't agree with everything. I thought your points were important to bring up as you represent the reasonable "other side" of the argument.
DeleteDid sound a little elitist and thats my fault for not being eloquent enough and articulating my personal views. We did say that there is a difference between proxying to proxy and making your own/modifiying. My issue is more when the guy brings the gundam (real experience) for a riptide with no intention of buying or making his own, vs using it till he saves up or builds one. Its a complicated issue for me personally as on one hand I support building your own, though I would never buy someones scratch built, and using it. If you spend the time and effort, I am ok with it, the intent is clear what you are trying to achieve. On the other though, when its being cheap to be cheap, its not as much fun playing against black bases or legs, it does take away the immersion for me, which I'll admit is my personal view. If you brought an awesome looking "knight" or even a decent looking one that you spent the time to make, I'm ok with it.
well we are arrogant imperials, we get everything cause daddy loves us! And regards to power creep, GW stated they made a mistake with eldar and Tau and would not be going for over the top codexs. So far that has been the case, SM and Tyranids have not been at the same level, will see if IG is in the same boat though I wouldn't be surprised if they went back on their statement.
I like having all these options and I do think you can deal with them without having to completely buy a new army. DE is a hard nut because of how fragile it is naturally and with no 6th update it is even less powerful. I am hoping you get some love when your time comes around. Again thanks for the comments and keep them coming
Your the DE player now btw, its done and set in stone :p
If you are the Grumpy Guardsman I should be the Disguntled Dark Eldar, and no negativity percieved btw. I tried copying into Torquer's blog but it won't let you post as anonymous (I'm not cool enough to use those other services...) so have him fix that or read it here!
DeleteI had some thoughts about your '7th ed' assualt changes as well (damn your blogs word restrictions!). 6th ed really put a beat stick down on assault armies. I don't think you imperial folk see it as much because SM have 2+/3+ armor saves and IG have their blobs, but for us folks that have neither of those things (to be fair DE do have beast packs, but I digress) overwatch REALLY sucks. Overwatch has relegated DE whyches, which used to be a solid troop choice for CC, to mostly be shelved aside from being a suicide anti-tank unit. 6+ armor and only being able to fit ten in a transport makes most overwatch brutal for them, especially considering rapid fire and many different ways to get rerolls for most armies in adition to flamers. Then you guys discussed giving everybody the ability to assualt from transports. GAH, thats one of the only edges DE have left in this edition since all our transports are open topped. Take that away and we litterally have NOTHING besides poisoned weapons.
I thnk all the options are great, but the game is ruined when every/most of the new units turn into 'must takes'. I believe their is balance to be had, but it would require GW to go back and FAQ armies that have fallen behind. Maybe 7th ed is where that will happen, but I wish it could be sooner.
I know you guys are excited about your new toy the knight and want to see more, but doesn't it piss you off a little bit that GW released a book with only TWO units that have rules? Are you happily going to throw down another $30 dollars when they release only TWO MORE knights to the fray? If it were me I'd be pissed, which is why I fully intend to buy one knight and make the rest of my army myself should GW go that route.
As for your knight tactics, you guys were spot on, which is funny because those were the same arguments I put to you that a knight army could be in OP department. I think the only 'good' option my army has against the knight are my earlier mentioned whyches with haywire. A squad should strike first with haywire and maybe survive a round or two. Getting there is going to be the problem though which means only squads of five or ten in a venom or raider respectively, which will probably get shotdown by double battle cannon shots, so its hardly a hard counter. I hope we get a FAQ sooner than a full 7th update or worse a new codex.
Servicious (the Disgruntled Dark Eldar)
Disgruntled Dark Eldar...I like this.
DeleteAssault has taken a hit, that is for sure. Big thing that hurts is not assaulting out of reserves or vehicles (minus open topped/assault). Over watch definitely hurts the non powered armies the most especially when you lack transports that can carry enough to get there. DE do have the advantage of assaulting by being open topped, but if 7th has updates, you could get other bonuses in addition to charging out. Its something at least. Hopefully it will have modifiers against overwatch, that or get rid of random charge ranges, that I don't really understand.
I'll admit I have new toy syndrome (NTS?) and that has something to do with it. I don't think they'll be OP to the game, most will be able to handle one or two, granted your army will have a very hard time with any more than that, though you can play the keep away game. Scourges with haywire blasters deep striking behind combined with wychs assaulting up front. It could work, nothing is guaranteed though.
It doesn't piss me off per say, I would prefer they just released the whole range, but I can understand why they didn't. The knight isn't part of an army range that can support it if it doesn't sell. So i get why they would sell it alone and see if there is enough market for it to be expanding on. But no I will not be buying the next one, thats what phone cameras are for, and the internets, or ripping pages out of a white dwarf.
Disgruntled Dark Eldar. Love the input. Allow me to answer here, since my elitist blog (read: cant figure out the interwebz) wont let me change the anon posting thing. I am yelling at my Techmarine (read: wife) to do the proper incantations!
Delete-Scratch built-
I have no problems with a scratch built if its not a bottle of soda with paper wings taped on. Serious effort gives immersion. Its the redaction of immersion that chars my pants. If you bring a well affected attempt, this shows love for the game.
Using a stand, in is fine if you are testing a model before purchase. See grumps discussion on the gundam. I was there and it torqued the crap out of me. And peeps give me a hard time about my painting!
As to will I gripe about how the book only has 2? Not a chance. I love the frequency of models and rules. I will gladly pay for the new books and models to field an all knight army! But that is me, and me is not you! I accept this as a finacial commitment to my passion. As such, I pay the price GW asks.
Hope that answers your queries.
ATSKNF
Torquer
Deepstriking scourges is an ok option, but I prefer heat lances to haywire blasters. Haywire blasters are great for finishing off a beat up knight, but the lances within 9 inches have a chance to alpha strike down a full strength one. Either way a full strength squad of ten is only 100 or so points less than a knight. If there is more than one knight, or you don't finish the knight off, you are very likely to lose the whole (tightly packed due to deepstrike) squad to those pie plates. Besides the noted vulnerablility to fliers, the only 'good' option is target saturation with numerous squads of suicide haywire wyches.
DeleteThey could fix DE assault pretty simply (most other armies as well I think) by allowing defensive grenades to provide a cover bonus to overwatch regardless of range to target. Letting whyches take their dodge save against overwatch and eliminating random charge lengths would also be a plus.
I love the frequency of the models and rules too Torquer, it gives me hope my army will get some love sooner than later, but if they truly are adding more knight variants later, it just feels like a money grab. In general, I don't have an issue with supplemental rules and formations, but with a codex that only has two units, making you buy another book for what by all rights (they are even called out in the fluff in the codex) just seems greedy. It feels like they are banking on people buying 5-6 knights, and THEN releasing a whole new $150 dollar model to replace a few when reasonably they should have just been weapons variants added to the base kit.
Can't wait for the next podcast,
Servicious, the Disgruntled Dark Eldar.
Def agree with wyches getting their dodge save against overwatch, that is fluffy and would make them capable of getting into ocmbat a whole lot easier. The random charge length, I believe they will keep it, but I wish they would get rid of it.
Deletereavers also are a good unit, especially since they have skilled rider so you can keep them in cover, boost out and shoot with lances and blasters, then 3d6 back into cover or way from them knight. A couple of them can deal with a knight over a few turns, death by a thousand cuts type deal and with the jetbike move then can stand a reasonable chance of staying away before it gets too close. I personally like haywire, but lances are a good choice too, if I was going the scourge route I would do two squads not maxed out to get access to more lances/haywire. You could do 2 reaver squads and one scourges, with the reavers bringing it down and then the small squad of scourges deepstriking or jumping(depending on game) to finish it off.
Question, can wyches get haywire for the whole squad or just the leader?
Reavers are also a solid choice, but are pricey, large models easy to hit with pie plates, though the cover save is golden. They can't deepstrike so you are going to have to deal with the 4+ invul shield, which is why scourges may be the better pick for an alpha strike. Reavers are probably the best all around unit in the codex truth be told. The WHOLE SQUAD can get haywire which is why I believe they are the closest thing we have to a hard counter for knights/superheavies, but they have to get there, die in droves when their vehicle explodes, and they WILL die once it blows due to dodge being FAQed to not avoid the explosions :(
DeleteThe more I theory craft, the more I see one or two knights as managable, depending on the rest of the army that comes with. Allied air power in Vendettas or Stormravens, excellent in their own right, might prove insurmountable. A full army of knights... lets just say the numbers I have crunched do not make me optimistic... maybe if the board is litterally saturated in cover, but DE can table most other armies in those conditions.
Servicious, the Disgruntled Dark Eldar
If you have a couple of squads of ravagers, they can hit it from multiple angles to get around the shield. Then a squad of wyches charge in and finish it off. It won't be easy to pull off granted, but I see that as best bet. Blasterborn in venom could be another unit to look at to scoot up and shoot them, but thats a fragile unit and when it dies there goes your plan. About the exploding, the Knight's scatters when it goes, so there is a decent chance of not taking the brunt of it. What I have seen is that it tends to scatter far enough away to save most of your guys, though with your luck it will scatter right on top of them :p.
DeleteYeah unfortunately there are a lot of hard counters to dark eldar right now. As to terrain, you don't need a lot, just the right terrain, that being a few tall pieces that do a good job of block LoS and some bigger area terrain pieces that can slow the knight down or force it to move around a lot.
Ravagers can't be taken in squadrons sadly, if they could Knights would hardly be a threat at all. The other issue is both ravagers and our fliers take up a heavy slot (Eldar's flyers are fast attack...grrrr....) so the choice against knights is do I want the extra dark lance and possible coversave or do I want two dark/void lances and can only get hit with snaps? Against a full army of knights or any super heavy bringing the D, it fliers all day. Also ravagers are opened topped, even one battle cannon shot grazes one of my vehicles its going to blow it up on a 4+ (AP2 ordnance if I'm not mistaken). The knight army is one of the few that might require I leave the ravager on the shelf as even a 20 man warrior blob packing two darklances, sitting in cover, is going to be more survivalbe (never thought I would say that lol).
DeleteI saw a guy in my local shop that brought two knights as an allied unit and put one in each corner facing on an angle so all he had to do was put the shield in his front arc and nobody could get a shot from the side or rear. Very sketchy move, but quite effective. You may want to give that a go yourself, unless you are hellbent on whacking people with you big D stick lol.
blah sorry I meant reavers, though I agree it is sad ravagers cannot be squadroned. Yeah the flyers should be fast or at least the fighter, I could agree with the bomber being left in HS. The battle cannon is AP3 so a 5+ to explode it. Lol that is true, lots of warriors behind cover can plink away at it and eventually bring it down.
DeleteThe corner tactic is a good one, but limited. I really like the Knights as an agressive unit, plus whats not to like hitting stuff with a big D, lol. With that many points in them, I could see starting them off in the corner and going from there, but if you aren't using them in CC there is a lot of points wasted with them, though that could work well with certain armies.