Arcaux
Junior Strategist
Posts: 724
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Post by Arcaux on Sept 29, 2017 8:30:56 GMT
You think CotD is bottom of the barrel? I've seen it not only get played but win tournaments. Not little local steamrollers but national ones. This OoA is the only good thing in legion argument is the excuse of people too lazy to try the others. You can take you half-ass assumptions elsewhere. I play CoD 10 times more often than I play Oracles. I have a higher win rate with Kryssa than any other caster. Don't tell me I'm too lazy to try sub par options. CotD Is poorly designed. Mediocre in support and just blatantly does not compare to the strength of other themes. Yes the models in the theme are good. But unyielding on Nephilim doesn't make a Swordsman any better than it already was. It's a joke of an infantry theme. The only feet it has to stand on is the addition of Azrael and Zuriel. Even then 50% of that addition is still a lack luster piece for it's point cost. As for winning tournaments, Please refer to the WTC list breakdown and tell me that CotD and Ravens are so fantastically represented. conflictchamber.com/?event=15"Little steamroller" or not. That's still not the global scene. In my Local meta I do well against Cygnar. Does that mean Legion is OP and Cygnar needs a buff? You're right. I did make an assumption. I assumed that someone that cared so much about balance would play the things he thought where strong.
You're instead tell me you purposefully play something which you think is weak. That's fine, but then you say that you have a better win percentage with those things.
None of it adds up.
Go check Discount Games Tournament lists. Uk Nationals 128 man event. Losing finalist was running Kallus2 in CotD. GenCOn Champions 2nd place JVM CotD GenCON Masters 2nd place JVM CotD
And that's just the incredibly limited number of games on Discount Games.
I wouldn't set too much stock by what WTC players do. There aren't a lot of good Legion players at the WTC and most just copy what they find online.
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Post by pangurban on Sept 29, 2017 8:52:16 GMT
You can take you half-ass assumptions elsewhere. I play CoD 10 times more often than I play Oracles. I have a higher win rate with Kryssa than any other caster. Don't tell me I'm too lazy to try sub par options. CotD Is poorly designed. Mediocre in support and just blatantly does not compare to the strength of other themes. Yes the models in the theme are good. But unyielding on Nephilim doesn't make a Swordsman any better than it already was. It's a joke of an infantry theme. The only feet it has to stand on is the addition of Azrael and Zuriel. Even then 50% of that addition is still a lack luster piece for it's point cost. As for winning tournaments, Please refer to the WTC list breakdown and tell me that CotD and Ravens are so fantastically represented. conflictchamber.com/?event=15"Little steamroller" or not. That's still not the global scene. In my Local meta I do well against Cygnar. Does that mean Legion is OP and Cygnar needs a buff? You're right. I did make an assumption. I assumed that someone that cared so much about balance would play the things he thought where strong.
You're instead tell me you purposefully play something which you think is weak. That's fine, but then you say that you have a better win percentage with those things.
None of it adds up.
Go check Discount Games Tournament lists. Uk Nationals 128 man event. Losing finalist was running Kallus2 in CotD. GenCOn Champions 2nd place JVM CotD GenCON Masters 2nd place JVM CotD
And that's just the incredibly limited number of games on Discount Games.
I wouldn't set too much stock by what WTC players do. There aren't a lot of good Legion players at the WTC and most just copy what they find online.
Players going with an Oracles/Children pairing rather than double Oracles probably aren't choosing to do this because Children is so great though. It really isn't. But tactically it's arguably more useful to bring your best Oracles and your best Children list than your best two Oracles lists. Legion themes aren't that good. Even Oracles is a bit wonky. It's better than Storm Division, since typically you'll get more use out of the benefits, but most players still go all beasts and therefor forego one benefit entirely. Honestly, it says a lot about Legion that playing Children is (considered) better than playing a vanilla list.
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Post by jisidro on Sept 29, 2017 8:53:13 GMT
... Yes dude, it is "wargames, it happens" unless you can name a single popular wargame that it doesnt (you cant and if you try i'll go to their boards and find posts of their players proving you wrong). Your beef is that during a big tournament (team tournament, shitty concept for balance to begin with) this faction was on top and hadn't been nerfed yet. Life goes on, itl get nerfed or the meta will change. If you can't handle the fact that wargame balance almost universally comes in these waves where different factions end up on top to the squealing of other faction players before new models/rules/meta changes it, you and everyone around you will probably be happier in another hobby. ... You are ignoring that mk3 started with the usual pecking order changed and a few outliers... Madrak2 was kinda dumb on the table, the Mad Dog Spam was all kinds of dirty tricks, Minion throwing circus was more circe du solei than warmachine and Wurmwood was out of the woods and into the tables. OMG! WTF! BBQ! Madrak2 is gone, the Mad Dogs got nuked into unplayability (Mind boggling how CID hasn't adressed them yet... or perhaps it won't.) and Wurmwood is still on the table because Circle is (was?) very unbalanced, Una2 was deemed the antichrist and nuked, Scarsfell lost the ability given to the minuteman and Una1 is crying alone where noone can hear her... But now these stats come out and reafirm what the recentes results have been and there are no twitter pics of frownie faces, the various wills don't talk about it and "Deal with it!" is in the air... I'm cool with "Deal with it!" but what was that attittude when Madrak2, Una2, Karchev, Wurmwood where the armies to beat? Where was the super foresight used to justify this and that?
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Arcaux
Junior Strategist
Posts: 724
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Post by Arcaux on Sept 29, 2017 9:00:22 GMT
You're right. I did make an assumption. I assumed that someone that cared so much about balance would play the things he thought where strong.
You're instead tell me you purposefully play something which you think is weak. That's fine, but then you say that you have a better win percentage with those things.
None of it adds up.
Go check Discount Games Tournament lists. Uk Nationals 128 man event. Losing finalist was running Kallus2 in CotD. GenCOn Champions 2nd place JVM CotD GenCON Masters 2nd place JVM CotD
And that's just the incredibly limited number of games on Discount Games.
I wouldn't set too much stock by what WTC players do. There aren't a lot of good Legion players at the WTC and most just copy what they find online.
Players going with an Oracles/Children pairing rather than double Oracles probably aren't choosing to do this because Children is so great though. It really isn't. But tactically it's arguably more useful to bring your best Oracles and your best Children list than your best two Oracles lists. Legion themes aren't that good. Even Oracles is a bit wonky. It's better than Storm Division, since typically you'll get more use out of the benefits, but most players still go all beasts and therefor forego one benefit entirely. Honestly, it says a lot about Legion that playing Children is (considered) better than playing a vanilla list. If the Legions themes aren't good why are Legion doing so well competitively?
They aren't dominating like Cygnar or Cryx, but they are certainly top 5 and their results show that. None of this suggests a faction with two average or bad themes.
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Post by pangurban on Sept 29, 2017 9:24:21 GMT
Players going with an Oracles/Children pairing rather than double Oracles probably aren't choosing to do this because Children is so great though. It really isn't. But tactically it's arguably more useful to bring your best Oracles and your best Children list than your best two Oracles lists. Legion themes aren't that good. Even Oracles is a bit wonky. It's better than Storm Division, since typically you'll get more use out of the benefits, but most players still go all beasts and therefor forego one benefit entirely. Honestly, it says a lot about Legion that playing Children is (considered) better than playing a vanilla list. If the Legions themes aren't good why are Legion doing so well competitively?
They aren't dominating like Cygnar or Cryx, but they are certainly top 5 and their results show that. None of this suggests a faction with two average or bad themes.
Assuming they're top-5 for argument's sake, is that because Legion's so good or because most if the others just aren't? And objectively, what's so good about their themes? Oracles is good, but wonky. Lots of free points and starting with free upkeeps is good, obviously, but it's still a half-assed beast theme. Children is aggressively mediocre, particularly with the weaponized randomness that is +1 to the starting roll.
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Arcaux
Junior Strategist
Posts: 724
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Post by Arcaux on Sept 29, 2017 9:51:26 GMT
If the Legions themes aren't good why are Legion doing so well competitively?
They aren't dominating like Cygnar or Cryx, but they are certainly top 5 and their results show that. None of this suggests a faction with two average or bad themes.
Assuming they're top-5 for argument's sake, is that because Legion's so good or because most if the others just aren't? And objectively, what's so good about their themes? Oracles is good, but wonky. Lots of free points and starting with free upkeeps is good, obviously, but it's still a half-assed beast theme. Children is aggressively mediocre, particularly with the weaponized randomness that is +1 to the starting roll. You think at least 8/13 factions in the game aren't good? I don't really think that's a line you can take.
Unyielding on the already high arm Nephalim beasts is undoubtedly strong. +1 to go first means you win the role 2/3rd of the time. Again that is excellent.
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Post by pangurban on Sept 29, 2017 10:20:31 GMT
Assuming they're top-5 for argument's sake, is that because Legion's so good or because most if the others just aren't? And objectively, what's so good about their themes? Oracles is good, but wonky. Lots of free points and starting with free upkeeps is good, obviously, but it's still a half-assed beast theme. Children is aggressively mediocre, particularly with the weaponized randomness that is +1 to the starting roll. You think at least 8/13 factions in the game aren't good? I don't really think that's a line you can take.
Unyielding on the already high arm Nephalim beasts is undoubtedly strong. +1 to go first means you win the role 2/3rd of the time. Again that is excellent.
If Legion's top-5 (and I still find that questionable with Grymkin out, but ok) that means 8 factions are not as good. Doesn't mean they're all terrible, but still not as good. Again, is that because Legion's so excellent or because the others are not that great? I mean, the prevailing opinions I hear are that regardless of a Cryx and/or Cygnar nerf a bunch of factions still need a nudge in the right direction anyway. Unyielding's good, sure. How good is it exactly if no Children list I see ever has more than three beasts (one of which has a stellar ARM 17 base) though, particularly given that points spent in beasts are what you get free models for? It's not like players are making sure to maximize this benefit. As for +1 to the starting roll, in 80+% of games that doesn't make a difference. Really not that excellent.
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Arcaux
Junior Strategist
Posts: 724
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Post by Arcaux on Sept 29, 2017 10:57:04 GMT
You think at least 8/13 factions in the game aren't good? I don't really think that's a line you can take.
Unyielding on the already high arm Nephalim beasts is undoubtedly strong. +1 to go first means you win the role 2/3rd of the time. Again that is excellent.
If Legion's top-5 (and I still find that questionable with Grymkin out, but ok) that means 8 factions are not as good. Doesn't mean they're all terrible, but still not as good. Again, is that because Legion's so excellent or because the others are not that great? I mean, the prevailing opinions I hear are that regardless of a Cryx and/or Cygnar nerf a bunch of factions still need a nudge in the right direction anyway. Unyielding's good, sure. How good is it exactly if no Children list I see ever has more than three beasts (one of which has a stellar ARM 17 base) though, particularly given that points spent in beasts are what you get free models for? It's not like players are making sure to maximize this benefit. As for +1 to the starting roll, in 80+% of games that doesn't make a difference. Really not that excellent. I guess I hear different prevailing opinions from you.
- Cryx and Cygnar are undoubtedly at the front right now. - Khador, Ret, Mercenaries, Skorne, Grymkin, Legion, CoC Seem in a strong place and seem relatively evenly balanced. - Circle: Are great into everything except Khador Jack spam. - Menoth: mixed Bag, most seem to thing they are underpowered, but tournament results suggest they are strong. Especially with new theme coming. - Trolls and Minions are underperforming and need this push you spoke of.
Basically we have 2 At the top of the pack who are overly strong. We have 2 at the bottom who need a bit of help. and 9 in the middle who are pretty even, with potentially Menoth and Circle needing small tweaks.
The game is an excellent position balance wise. I know it doesn't always feel that way with the Cryxpocalpyse happening, but in the middle there is so much parity it's amazing.
I feel you misunderstand "+1 to go first" You're suggesting it's only important when it changes a result from a time when you would lose the dice roll to a time when you then with +1 win it? That's what it does at a very basic level, yes, but think about what that means for list design.
You can build lists with the knowledge that you will have the choice 2/3rds of the time. You can build a list with the option of going first and jamming an enemy out or of going second and scoring first and last if you build to attrition. You can build with the assumption you will win the dice roll and it will work 2/3rds of the time.
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Post by jisidro on Sept 29, 2017 11:09:23 GMT
Arcaux: Circle got spanked by Cryx with 29% wins over 37 games and got a 59% over 17 games against Khador... Victories against Khador include 3 Karchevs, 1 Harkevich and 3 Butcher3 loses are to Vlad1 and Butcher3... Seems Circle is in a different place... I was surprised as well.
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Arcaux
Junior Strategist
Posts: 724
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Post by Arcaux on Sept 29, 2017 11:19:53 GMT
Arcaux : Circle got spanked by Cryx with 29% wins over 37 games and got a 59% over 17 games against Khador... Victories against Khador include 3 Karchevs, 1 Harkevich and 3 Butcher3 loses are to Vlad1 and Butcher3... Seems Circle is in a different place... I was surprised as well. Everyone got spanked by Cryx. We consider them obviously above the curve. I guess when I said Circle was good into everything... I should have clarified that Cryx don't count. Thanks for the info though, super interesting.
I know circle aren't bad. My understanding was that they struggled against Khador Jack spam, but if stats even show that as incorrect then excellent.
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Post by pangurban on Sept 29, 2017 11:31:28 GMT
If Legion's top-5 (and I still find that questionable with Grymkin out, but ok) that means 8 factions are not as good. Doesn't mean they're all terrible, but still not as good. Again, is that because Legion's so excellent or because the others are not that great? I mean, the prevailing opinions I hear are that regardless of a Cryx and/or Cygnar nerf a bunch of factions still need a nudge in the right direction anyway. Unyielding's good, sure. How good is it exactly if no Children list I see ever has more than three beasts (one of which has a stellar ARM 17 base) though, particularly given that points spent in beasts are what you get free models for? It's not like players are making sure to maximize this benefit. As for +1 to the starting roll, in 80+% of games that doesn't make a difference. Really not that excellent. I guess I hear different prevailing opinions from you.
- Cryx and Cygnar are undoubtedly at the front right now. - Khador, Ret, Mercenaries, Skorne, Grymkin, Legion, CoC Seem in a strong place and seem relatively evenly balanced. - Circle: Are great into everything except Khador Jack spam. - Menoth: mixed Bag, most seem to thing they are underpowered, but tournament results suggest they are strong. Especially with new theme coming. - Trolls and Minions are underperforming and need this push you spoke of.
Basically we have 2 At the top of the pack who are overly strong. We have 2 at the bottom who need a bit of help. and 9 in the middle who are pretty even, with potentially Menoth and Circle needing small tweaks.
The game is an excellent position balance wise. I know it doesn't always feel that way with the Cryxpocalpyse happening, but in the middle there is so much parity it's amazing.
I feel you misunderstand "+1 to go first" You're suggesting it's only important when it changes a result from a time when you would lose the dice roll to a time when you then with +1 win it? That's what it does at a very basic level, yes, but think about what that means for list design.
You can build lists with the knowledge that you will have the choice 2/3rds of the time. You can build a list with the option of going first and jamming an enemy out or of going second and scoring first and last if you build to attrition. You can build with the assumption you will win the dice roll and it will work 2/3rds of the time.
You suggest Legion must be good because they show up frequently on DGI. You also suggest factions like Skorne and Mercs are roughly on par with Legion. Have you checked Skorne and Mercenary results on DGI? I'm not saying 8 factions out of 13 are terrible. I am saying at least 6 need a nudge in the right direction (and 2 need a good shove rather than a nudge). That's certainly not bad compared to previous periods in the game, but it still is what it is. For some at least that nudge seems to be on its way. Now, does Legion need a nudge? That depends on where PP wants actual balance to land. Right now, compared to more than half the other factions they don't. But again, that's because those others do. As for +1 to the starting roll and building your list around it: one in three games that won't work. How much worse under those circumstances are you willing to make your list? The thing that helps Children the most is arguably that it's an infantry list you can pair with beast-heavy Oracles. What stands out to me there however is that even if Children is played infantry-heavy and Oracles is played beast-heavy, Children actually does more for beasts than infantry and Oracles does more for infantry than for beasts. Or at least they would if lists were built accordingly.
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Post by Wibble on Sept 29, 2017 11:52:27 GMT
Menoth needs more than a tweak it needs some sort of PR agent to convince us that they still remember we are a faction.
You can sum up their attitude pretty easily >>
3 years for the Revelator to appear >> and it's barely different to the Judicator. They don't give a toss about PoM and the only reason we had a theme in CID recently is because they are not going to be doing anything else for us for another year most likely - it was just a shitty gap filler.
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Post by macdaddy on Sept 29, 2017 11:58:34 GMT
Arcaux: Circle got spanked by Cryx with 29% wins over 37 games and got a 59% over 17 games against Khador... Victories against Khador include 3 Karchevs, 1 Harkevich and 3 Butcher3 loses are to Vlad1 and Butcher3... Seems Circle is in a different place... I was surprised as well. This surprises me as well. Maybey SR2017 had made the Khador match up more bearable? Or maybey Una 2/Wurmwood is the solution to it in the new SR. Also to my knowledge our best options into GF/DH from cryx is Wurmwood and Baldur 2. Perhaps 2UNA thanks to stealth? Otherwise I struggle to see a reliable match up into those lists. I would argue for Krueger 2 as his lightning AOE could mulch GF and DH in droves and he can always threaten an assasination. He also has windfall ibto GF which means pirate rifles have to come forward more. But outside of Bones he falls short on attrition and honestly I'm not good enough with him yet toreally try out the match up. Arcaux Circle is in an OK spot. We have a mostly decent caster stable and we have a half decent beast stable once the bones CiD drops. Honestly my issue is how much junk there is. The Rotterhorn, winter argus, cost of warpwolves and performance for that cost, the goats are mediocre particularly the gnarlhorn is pretty hard to make work. We also lack staying power in a lot of ways. And I think that is hurting us in SR2017. We can always run the Tharn Theme and Wild hunt with grayle and skinwalkers but neither of those lists hit exceptionally hard. If we run beast lists without Scarsfells and or Sentry stones we really struggle to stay in the scenario game. We are just in a really odd place now. I would consider us on par with legion in overalll power level. Oracles is a really good theme though and I think Circle sits at a solid 4th out of the hordes factions. The worrisome part about that is, that means the only factions below us are minions and trolls who have some serious issues. So when they get fixed where will Circle sit? I don't buy this legion is bad stuff. At NoVA double throne lists where everywhere and I saw typicaloraclea everywhere too. I think legions issie is oracles is just too good so it's other options are ignored. I'm not arguing that there isn't junk in the legion stable. But the faction is in better shape than others. Also The more I play protectorate the less I think it's Underpowered. Sure there is crap like our medium exemplars but the jack stable is solid, the caster stable is fairly exceptional with options, all the themes are coming into thier own now. And once Faithful Masses drops (assuming no other changes from CiD) I think Protectorate will have a strong leg in the races. I even play Reznick 1 and still have a blast and win games. A lot of people consider him trash. But the more I use him the more I see his strengths. Protectorate isn't an obvious faction, they take a LOT of work to figure out. And I think that's the issue, people are still trying to figure out what works best because there are so many options. If every faction had the same Power level as protectorate the game would be in a much better place IMO.
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Post by ForEver_Blight on Sept 29, 2017 12:11:13 GMT
You can take you half-ass assumptions elsewhere. I play CoD 10 times more often than I play Oracles. I have a higher win rate with Kryssa than any other caster. Don't tell me I'm too lazy to try sub par options. CotD Is poorly designed. Mediocre in support and just blatantly does not compare to the strength of other themes. Yes the models in the theme are good. But unyielding on Nephilim doesn't make a Swordsman any better than it already was. It's a joke of an infantry theme. The only feet it has to stand on is the addition of Azrael and Zuriel. Even then 50% of that addition is still a lack luster piece for it's point cost. As for winning tournaments, Please refer to the WTC list breakdown and tell me that CotD and Ravens are so fantastically represented. conflictchamber.com/?event=15"Little steamroller" or not. That's still not the global scene. In my Local meta I do well against Cygnar. Does that mean Legion is OP and Cygnar needs a buff? You're right. I did make an assumption. I assumed that someone that cared so much about balance would play the things he thought where strong.
You're instead tell me you purposefully play something which you think is weak. That's fine, but then you say that you have a better win percentage with those things.
None of it adds up.
Go check Discount Games Tournament lists. Uk Nationals 128 man event. Losing finalist was running Kallus2 in CotD. GenCOn Champions 2nd place JVM CotD GenCON Masters 2nd place JVM CotD
And that's just the incredibly limited number of games on Discount Games.
I wouldn't set too much stock by what WTC players do. There aren't a lot of good Legion players at the WTC and most just copy what they find online.
CotD solved. Just be as skilled a player as JVM. Yes I'm weird. I purposefully play that which is deemed "terrible" by the masses. I champion Kryssa. I play Legionnaires, archers, and warspears. I play a blightbringer in my Abby2 list. I play Thagrosh 2 shredder swarm. I play Fyanna infantry spam. I've never played the Fyanna flying circus. I don't even own Lylyth 3 or know what's written on her card. I just bought into Menoth. I am anti-bandwagon. That means I have a very extensive knowledge of all those very under-performing aspects of the faction. I can find success with these poor things but that does not mean they are good. A choir member once did 6 damage to Azrael on a free strike. Does that mean choir are OP melee options? No. Do not conflate my success with the theme/model/faction being powerful. The same is to be said for JVM. He could put an entire legionnaire only army on the board and I'd still loose to him. That does not mean Legionnaires are in a good spot right now. There are plenty of things right now that non-direct experience players think are powerful that those in faction know are faulty. So I ask that if you have the chance, ask a legion player to build you a CotD list and you borrow it for a game or two. Take it up against some boogeymen like Cygnar and Khador. You'll find that a charger one rounds a soldier with little effort. A boosted ice axe cuts Zuriel in half. Swordsmen get slaughtered by even the maligned gunmages. That topping out at Pow 13 and 3 fury on non-characters makes dealing with heavies extremely difficult. It's a theme that absolutely leans all of it's capability on the infantry that it can do absolutely nothing to protect or buff. As a theme it has access to good models. So it is played because it's the only way to get access to those models and free points. That does not mean the theme itself is anything but lackluster.
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Cyel
Junior Strategist
Posts: 685
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Post by Cyel on Sept 29, 2017 12:18:15 GMT
As for +1 to the starting roll and building your list around it: one in three games that won't work. How much worse under those circumstances are you willing to make your list? It won't work even more often, as quite a few theme forces seem to have this bonus and other armies can take Anastasia for the same effect. So there is a fair chance to have the effect negated or not count due to te roll.
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