New Details on End Times Khaine - Book 3 (the Elves!)

[Banat]

If it's ONLY in certain scenarios then it's kind of similar to the Chaos Ascendant rules from Glottkin, except with the Magic Boost there'd be incentive for BOTH sides to agree to playing those scenario rules. With the Chaos Ascendant rules in Glottkin there's really no reason why you should agree to playing those rules as they benefit purely the chaos player and chaos are meaty enough as it is.

There's those who can play Warhammer. For those who can't, don't worry, Chaos has got your back.

 

[John Rainbow]

nto the role of the god of unde

h) HOWEVER... does this mean that ACTUALLY, the new Mortarchs are kind of getting screwed over? With Lvl4, Mannfred can choose four spells in any combination from Death, Vampire and Shadow... I assume he DOESN'T get loremaster in EACH of those disciplines? If he did, you would assume the same would apply for Nagash, which makes his Nine Books item completely irrelevant...

I read a small shot of a WD page somewhere that said they do indeed get Loremaster of every lore. Pretty redonk. Think about Teclis or the Wandering Deliberations Slann too...

 

[LordTobiothan]

I read a small shot of a WD page somewhere that said they do indeed get Loremaster of every lore. Pretty redonk. Think about Teclis or the Wandering Deliberations Slann too...

Wouldn't that still make nagash's books still useless? He gets all of his lores just by being a level 5 wizard. What use are the other 4 spells he gets from the books?

 

[John Rainbow]

I guess so. It just gives him extra in 'normal' games.

 

[Yorga]

IF these changes really affect WHFB in its entirety, I'll be switching back to 40k, like I switched to Fantasy four / five years ago ...
'cause then they'd have messed up WHFB for sure.

I don't know what I will do. Kind of a prisoner to what my buddies want to play. Not like I can switch to Warma-hordes. Nobody else nearby plays it.

 

[Blutsauger]

Eh, don't chuck the baby out with the bathwater. Loremaster for everyone and lots of dice are interesting, but the really important factor is the balance between any two given armies. Giving each army 4D6, 10D6 or even 100D6 doesn't matter, so long as the ratio of power to dispel dice remains the same. If that ratio remains similar, then you won't see any more spells being cast no matter how many dice each side has, or how many spells they know.

 

[Yorga]

Eh, don't chuck the baby out with the bathwater. Loremaster for everyone and lots of dice are interesting, but the really important factor is the balance between any two given armies. Giving each army 4D6, 10D6 or even 100D6 doesn't matter, so long as the ratio of power to dispel dice remains the same. If that ratio remains similar, then you won't see any more spells being cast no matter how many dice each side has, or how many spells they know.

Yeah one of the aspects that bothers me is the introduction of even more dice rolls in any given phase. So now when a Legions of Chaos army is on the field you have to resolve all that Reign of Chaos stuff. Now you have to roll a D6 to see how many PD and DD you can use for any given spell. It makes an already fickle magic phase more so. On principal I do not like when probability is increase at the expense of strategy. People are winning/losing games just to something as random as Reign of Chaos. Now I have to worry about you rolling the ability to use 6 of your dice to cast purple sun to me rolling a 1 to see how many dispel dice I can use. Seems unnecessary.

 

[najo]

Eh, don't chuck the baby out with the bathwater. Loremaster for everyone and lots of dice are interesting, but the really important factor is the balance between any two given armies. Giving each army 4D6, 10D6 or even 100D6 doesn't matter, so long as the ratio of power to dispel dice remains the same. If that ratio remains similar, then you won't see any more spells being cast no matter how many dice each side has, or how many spells they know.

More dice does mean more spells getting off if the ratio remains the same. Typically the controlling magic player is going to have more 30-40% more dice. Spell costs remain the same, so those extra dice are going to mean more spells.

Good news is the super magic phases are restricted to having requirements around them. Unfortunately one of those requirements is when one of the armies is the elven host. The rest of the times you can avoid, but when you fight an end times elven host the elf player can basically choose to turn the super magic on if they want. Then both of you get it for the game.

 

[Demian]

Uhm... they don't choose to.

They have to D:!

Beefy magic elves will screw up every game! hahaha nah. We will just adapt as we always have, and make a quick tactical response against most spells. The one that really outshone the other End Times spells is the Slaanesh one:

if you think there is an anti-deathstar spell, it's the Slaanesh one. Now THAT's an anti-deathstar spell. Also... we really should bring 2 lv 4 casters against Elves... their End Times spell for High Magic is... awesome and dreadful.

And let's not talk about the Little Wag's End Time spell... that is just... disgusting D:

 

[Adam_Barrow]

I wanna see a Gobbo Shaman modelled with Nagash's books. And Ghal Maraz. And the Widowmaker.

 

[najo]

Actually we potentially are the strongest with the end times magic. Between having a level 5 caster, characters that can use extra dice beyond the six (Nagash, Arkhan and Manny can all do this), +2 to Vampire spells, +d3 to all spells, Nagash having all spells for his five lores! and then how low our casting values are for Vampire and Death magic. Looks to me like we might be able to easily cast on low dice and make the best use out of recasting.

 

[miniPhil]

Good news is the super magic phases are restricted to having requirements around them. Unfortunately one of those requirements is when one of the armies is the elven host. The rest of the times you can avoid, but when you fight an end times elven host the elf player can basically choose to turn the super magic on if they want. Then both of you get it for the game.

Holding the book now, page 8 says "The Magic of the End Times rules must be used instead of the rules from the Warhammer rulebook if any of the following conditions apply: ...
If either player wants to use the Magic of The End Times rules instead of rules for magic in the Warhammer rulebook."
Not if both agree, just if one wants to.

 

[Demian]

Holding the book now, page 8 says "The Magic of the End Times rules must be used instead of the rules from the Warhammer rulebook if any of the following conditions apply: ...
If either player wants to use the Magic of The End Times rules instead of rules for magic in the Warhammer rulebook."
Not if both agree, just if one wants to.

Wooooooooooooooooow...

End times are fun. Chaotic, but fun

 

[miniPhil]

Also Nagash is pretty gnarly now. Sure you lose the benefits of some stuff but you can now cast spells multiple times. Kick off your magic with a unit of GG worth 300 points then a vampire. And another, and another, and another etc.

 

[Yorga]

Once you all start playing with these rules something tells me you will have less fun. That is my prediction. I hope I am wrong.

 

[najo]

I'll be playing them this week. I'll let you know how it goes.

 

[Yorga]

I'll be playing them this week. I'll let you know how it goes.

SkaveninAZ posted a video that paints a bleak picture and is making me dread this change. I will do my best to keep an open mind.

 

[najo]

You have a link to that video?

 

[Yorga]

You have a link to that video?

Yep.

 

[LordTobiothan]

Yep.

There is no game being played here though. It is just more speculation. Really need to wait to see it in practice.

 

[Henning]

There was a game played... Was maybe William Page where he played against a loremaster of hoeth. First turn 14-9 and the HE attempted 9 spells. I think only about 3 went through but that just shows the potential to create really cumbersome magic phases.

In the end I believe the Khaine magic is better than the current magic system, not without flaws but a step in the right direction.

 

[GDD]

@Henning Excluding Dwarfs from the equation I think I might agree. Looking forward to seeing more battle reports with the system.

 

[najo]

Couple things to point out that are off in the video:

1) The book does say that a spell has to be successfully cast. That means you have to get past dispel.
2) A spell that rolls an unmodified 1 or 2 on the casting roll fails from not enough power. That rule is still in effect. So if you are one dicing spells, you are going to just burn out your spell options.
3) The rule of D6 dice can be used is done after the spell is chosen. This means you can't reliably cast nuke spells anymore. You go to cast a spell with a high value, and you roll a 1 or 2, you are going to have a tough time casting that spell. Even spells like curse of years being spammed are going to be tricky.


The video is some what speculating. We need to see people play with these rules more before denouncing it. GW could be using these rules as an experiment.

What I do see as potential problems:
1) Too many spells leads to longer magic phases.
2) The D6 dice before casting/ dispelling adds more randomness to casting/dispelling spells, and not necessarily in a good way. There could be less planning and interplay between players with their dice because you need to take advantage of opportunities to dispel spells. Your also going to go to cast a medium casting value spell and have it fail because you roll poor. So spells are less reliable.

Like I said, I plan on trying to build around it for a game this Friday. I will let you guys know how it goes.

 

[Demian]

Do we also need to roll a D6 to see how many dice we can use to dispel? D:

 

[Yorga]

Do we also need to roll a D6 to see how many dice we can use to dispel? D:

Yes you do.