And the summoning bloodthirsters for free, except it's not. You have to sacrifice characters. Thats old school daemon summoning and the loss of the character is the cost.
The point isn't that there is a cost, the point is that you lose a character on turn, what, 4? In exchange for a bloodthirster that doesn't actually show up until turn
six, because it deep strikes in, and the FMC rules therefore put it into swooping mode, which means it not only cannot charge the turn you lost one of your characters, which was probably already contributing in melee, but it can't charge the next turn, either. And whip or no, a blood thirster that isn't charging isn't contributing.
And that's the thing, unless you can ramp up to 8 blood points in the first couple turns of the game, that $100 bloodthirster model you ploped on the table is effectively cosmetic. It's the top end of the table! You inherently have to delay your blood bonuses to use it! The last item on the table needed to be something that mattered right away, not the one item on the table with literally the longest time delay between activation and effect, especially when it has reduced your combat ability during that time!
It's terrible design! They put the biggest, flashiest effect on the top of the charts, and never stopped to ask if the implementation was actually usable!
GW may have solved khorne lacking psychics and non-combat support, which is what khorne players wanted.
I don't know what khorne players you've been talking to, but the ones I know
wanted cult terminators and HQs. What they
didn't want was a book that removes the only (special character) cult HQ they still had. What they
wanted was a book that rewards them for running power and terminator armored bodies, and so far KDK does not look to be that at all. I don't know of any Khorne player who was saying "you know, I love the sorts of narrow, CSMless CSM rush lists I'm already pushed by my book to field, but I really wish that my book wanted me to field hounds instead of spawn or bikes as my character retinues."
Daemonkin isn't even out and on the table, so how can you honestly critique it yet?
Apparently the same way you can honestly claim it as some sort of triumph? By looking at the (extensive) leaks? I mean, what don't we have confirmation on yet, the price of one or two of the less attractive artifacts?
First, the codecies have been streamlining the special rules and making playing against an unknown army easier, getting rid of specific army rules knowledge. Ie special rules combo bloat, or better known as the warmahordes effect. This was plaguing 40k through 6th edition, and they caught it and are thankfully removing it.
No, instead we have rules source bloat. Clearly you've never had an opponent claim a unit had a special rule, and then take five minutes trying to find what source gave them that rule (was it built into the unit? Did a supplement add it? A formation?), or had to argue with someone that some unit
didn't have a special rule because they
weren't selected from within a structure that granted it (for instance, that helcult cultists don't have objective secured).
Formations are messy, but that mess is worthwhile where it gives you reasons to run units that are otherwise pointless or lackluster, but too many of the formations, especially in the KDK book don't do that. Instead of making you want to take bad units, they try and force you to take them, by making them required for benefits that you'll then apply to other units that matter. None of the KDK formations make you
want to take possessed, bloodcrushers, warp talons, berzerkers, or chaos marines, and increased minimums and full price MoK prereq manage to make a few of those units worse than they already were. They just require them, turn them from bad units you don't take into formation taxes, and imo that's even worse.
It's like Krell in the host of death formation from archaon. What's he doing there? Nothing. He's just as terrible as he always is. He's doing nothing, you don't
want to field him, at least not mechanically. He's just a tax. Compare to Arkhan and Nagash in the same formation. These units aren't terrible on their own, but the fluffy combination of both in the same army is total redundancy, so the formation gives you a bonus to make fielding both together more functional, or at least less punishing. Yeah, that formation is a mixed bag, demonstrating both the potential and the pitfalls of formation design, but there you go.
That's what a good formation is, it's like Nagash & Arkhan in the HoD. It doesn't replace the obligation on designers to make units function on their own, it should be used to provide extra motivation for fielding combinations of already functional units that would be fluffy together but don't synergize.
When they're used haphazardly, instead of making particular combinations more fun, it has you fielding bad units as taxes to heap extra benefits on units that are already good, like Krell in the HoD, and imo that just isn't fun. And KDK's formations are all over that.
When they're not just "formation: one thing. No bonuses or rules, it's just the thing. Don't know why this thing is a formation at all really."
Just... aaagh. I like the idea of formations, and if the implementation is like in the Necron book, then maybe they won't be awful, but if they look like KDK... Honestly, if
Anything in 9e looks lie KDK....
