Arcaux
Junior Strategist
Posts: 724
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Post by Arcaux on Sept 29, 2017 12:41:29 GMT
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. I watched a team with 3 skorne players win the ETC.
I then watched Germany pick a Skorne player for their WTC team. Regardless of who the best are, I don't think anyone will argue that Germany prep more than any other team. Do you really they'd take a Skorne player if they didn't consider them top tier.
I'm going to go with reigning world champions on this one.
Surely no one is suggesting Mercs are underpowered? They don't see huge amounts of play, but surely that isn't an argument people actually believe in? Especially not with the new Irregulars theme.
And yet for all your complaints about the legion themes. They are working and doing well at tournaments. If the themes are underpowered then the rest of the faction must be overpowered. ...or the themes are good and everyone wants Ghost Fleet/Dark Host level themes.
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Arcaux
Junior Strategist
Posts: 724
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Post by Arcaux on Sept 29, 2017 12:48:34 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. 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 think the new theme will help a lot. It feels like a MK2 Circle them. I.e Living warbeasts + Stones.
I expect to see Kromac2, Kromac1, Kaya2, Kaya3 all seeing play with it. Free Spring is so good, as well.
P.S. There was an hilarious moment when I was reading your post where you said that Circle where 4th out of hordes. I had immediate outrage that you could place Minions or Trolls ahead of Circle until I realised Grymkin where hordes Just thought it was funny.
On a side note, last December Jason Soles said "I don't think anyone can reasonably say they know that warmachine is stronger than hordes"
It's been a year and it's obviously still the case that they overbuffed Warmachine and Overnerfed hordes. I'm actually expecting them to do something small at the start of the year.
My guess would be: Animus can be used by the caster even after they are dead and/or Each beast can drop 1 fury in the maintenance phase if they want to
That or 2-3 point price drops
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Post by 36cygnar24guy36 on Sept 29, 2017 13:02:47 GMT
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 think the new theme will help a lot. It feels like a MK2 Circle them. I.e Living warbeasts + Stones.
I expect to see Kromac2, Kromac1, Kaya2, Kaya3 all seeing play with it. Free Spring is so good, as well.
P.S. There was an hilarious moment when I was reading your post where you said that Circle where 4th out of hordes. I had immediate outrage that you could place Minions or Trolls ahead of Circle until I realised Grymkin where hordes Just thought it was funny.
On a side note, last December Jason Soles said "I don't think anyone can reasonably say they know that warmachine is stronger than hordes"
It's been a year and it's obviously still the case that they overbuffed Warmachine and Overnerfed hordes. I'm actually expecting them to do something small at the start of the year.
My guess would be: Animus can be used by the caster even after they are dead and/or Each beast can drop 1 fury in the maintenance phase if they want to
That or 2-3 point price drops
I dunno, I don't think Hordes players have suffered long enough being inferior to Warmachine, I would give it another year at least for you all to learn your lesson...
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Post by Trollock on Sept 29, 2017 13:05:54 GMT
And we made it to 8 pages. Who would have foreseen this? Big Fat Troll
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Post by Azuresun on Sept 29, 2017 13:13:12 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. I played Mercenaries. Don't start the game of misery poker about "PP forgot about our faction!", because you will lose.
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Post by macdaddy on Sept 29, 2017 13:58:35 GMT
Arcaux BRING ON THE PRICE DROPS BABY! I honestly don't even listen to anything that one PPS_strawman says anymore. The dude is so out of touch with the community it isn't even funny. At least Other PPS_Strawmen are more reasonable.
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Post by Wibble on Sept 29, 2017 14:04:00 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. I played Mercenaries. Don't start the game of misery poker about "PP forgot about our faction!", because you will lose. Haha.... didn't say it was just us. But same factions get all the attention and more importantly they get obvious enthusiasm...
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Post by jisidro on Sept 29, 2017 14:13:46 GMT
Can't see a power-down ability happening for hordes... but then I had a conversation about spells that could never be in hordes and Synergy was in there... Just before Bradigus hit.
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Post by mcdermott on Sept 29, 2017 14:41:26 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? Its less about "deal with it" and more about "this too shall pass" and the vast overestimation of how effective whining about it on social media to a company that shuttered its own forums is compared to how crappy an environment it creates.
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unded
Junior Strategist
Posts: 760
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Post by unded on Sept 29, 2017 15:35:32 GMT
So is the speculation about theme forces now just a betting pool of "how many days past September will we have to wait for the promised themes?"
For the record, I'm betting on a Christmas release on Dec 25. For you heathens out there that's the day Lylyth brings presents for all the good little elves.
-und_ed
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Post by Big Fat Troll on Sept 29, 2017 18:00:10 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. I played Mercenaries. Don't start the game of misery poker about "PP forgot about our faction!", because you will lose. Privateer Press needs a full-time employee whose sole job is to remind them of things.
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Post by chillychinaman on Sept 29, 2017 18:48:17 GMT
I just want to clarify something since it was also brought up in another thread. A Charger, or pair of charging Praetorian Swordsmen, needs to roll at least a 15 on 3d6 twice to kill a soldier with its gun or combo strikes. Individually, that is a 20/216 chance. Assuming that it's in theme, the Praetorians would actually have a 4/216 chance due to Unyielding. Zuriel and Soldiers are still bad, but don't use dice spikes to say that they get OHK by models a fraction of their cost.
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Post by ForEver_Blight on Sept 29, 2017 18:56:04 GMT
I just want to clarify something since it was also brought up in another thread. A Charger, or pair of charging Praetorian Swordsmen, needs to roll at least a 15 on 3d6 twice to kill a soldier with its gun or combo strikes. Individually, that is a 20/216 chance. Assuming that it's in theme, the Praetorians would actually have a 4/216 chance due to Unyielding. Zuriel and Soldiers are still bad, but don't use dice spikes to say that they get OHK by models a fraction of their cost. I don't specifically mean the Soldier gets one-rounded. That would take 2 chargers. But what I mean is that the standard scenario; the Soldier does not threat far enough to charge the gun distance. So it can have 2 turns shooting the soldier. Or it runs to engage. It's not a very good scenario for the Soldier. But I have had a Soldier shot off the table in one turn by a Charger and good dice.
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Post by chillychinaman on Sept 29, 2017 19:07:31 GMT
I don't specifically mean the Soldier gets one-rounded. That would take 2 chargers. But what I mean is that the standard scenario; the Soldier does not threat far enough to charge the gun distance. So it can have 2 turns shooting the soldier. Or it runs to engage. It's not a very good scenario for the Soldier. But I have had a Soldier shot off the table in one turn by a Charger and good dice. I understand your point, but is there anything that can be done in this gun heavy meta? According to the internet, dedicated gunlines can trivially remove DEF16 models, so even if we gave Nephilim and Nyss Blade Shield that only put them at 14-16 which combined with their low ARM doesn't change anything. The alternative route is what CoC and Grymkin are doing and that's flooding the board with Shield Guards. And this doesn't help at all with the other meta boogeyman that is high ARM lists. So all in all, CotD is a bad theme list since it: -Is holding a few good choices hostage by mostly bad choices. -Neither poses a question nor has an answer to anything but infantry heavy lists, which Ravens arguably does better. -Has irrelevant or cornercase benefits.
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Post by josephkerr on Sept 30, 2017 20:11:35 GMT
Don't play CotD into a Cygnar gunline? Swordsmen arent any good into gunlines either.
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