new vc - buffed or nerfed?

[Stealthman]

hi all. while i was delighted at the prospect of recieving my utterly gorgeous new vc codex i was left only to wonder - is the new vc more powerful than before in gameplay terms.

the major points to me were:


in the "we got screwed" column

-the increase of points on all character types (with an exception being the fairly new wraith and banshee characters). sure all vamps have hunger, fair enough, but vlad and mannfred copped it a bit with vlad now getting healed 50% of inflicted wounds instead of 100% and mannfred losing awesome stuff like walking death

-no marching unless 12 of general. i weep for the days.....

and in the we got buffed column:

skeletons are more than just viable now! theyre awesome! points cost just shy of halved and can be raised from scratch now!!


general dead? yes. Game over man, game over? no.



what i would like to know, is this:

with all things considered, even including the state of other teams out there, did we get buffed or stuffed???

 

[theangels77]

In my opinion we got Stuffed on the Magic Side of things (Items, Powers, Banners, Spells and So forth) but Buffed on teh Combat side of things. Maybe it is GW way of making the VC more combat orientated. I really do not like that units can only march within 12"of the General (Except for Vamps) And that Van Hels can no longer be used to Charge.... Grrr... But i do like the Cost of the Skellies and that aweosme sauce sword that gives the Vamp Death Shriek... So It may seem that i am fence sittin essentially, But honestly that is how i feel... Magic BAD! Combat GOOD!o_o

 

[Sanai]

I would say we go majorly buffed. Easy access to 3 magic lores, great vampiric powers, aoe invocation (which by itself is incredibly powerful), a really scary magic sword (devastating charge, frenzy, flaming attacks and the terrorgheists death shriek), the ability to force enemies to re roll fear tests, the incredibly useful buffing ability of the mortis engine.... terrorgheists that can one shot kill most monsters, some great cavalry, cheap hordes of skeletons... 2 great MI units.... and most importantly, none of the army books options look unuseable. Bat swarms, zombies, dire wolves, corpse carts.... they all actually have uses now.

All we really lost was some good magic armour, frostblade and blood drinker, the helm of commandment and the drakenhoff, all of which are pretty much made up for in a more varied, balanced army which has multiple viable options instead of a monobuild.

The only thing I really miss from the old book is the old wind of undeath (the new one is a vortex that doesnt make spirit hosts)

 

[Stealthman]

I would say we go majorly buffed. Easy access to 3 magic lores, great vampiric powers, aoe invocation (which by itself is incredibly powerful), a really scary magic sword (devastating charge, frenzy, flaming attacks and the terrorgheists death shriek), the ability to force enemies to re roll fear tests, the incredibly useful buffing ability of the mortis engine.... terrorgheists that can one shot kill most monsters, some great cavalry, cheap hordes of skeletons... 2 great MI units.... and most importantly, none of the army books options look unuseable. Bat swarms, zombies, dire wolves, corpse carts.... they all actually have uses now.

All we really lost was some good magic armour, frostblade and blood drinker, the helm of commandment and the drakenhoff, all of which are pretty much made up for in a more varied, balanced army which has multiple viable options instead of a monobuild.

The only thing I really miss from the old book is the old wind of undeath (the new one is a vortex that doesnt make spirit hosts)

this is true. i admit it is much better having variety rather than relying on a single op sword or banner to win the game for you.

also agreed that bat swarms and zombosses are tenfold more playable, spirit hosts are now a bit lost to me, because like you i will miss wind of undeath terribly as it was the only reason i ever bought hosts.

i will have to play and see with them now, even though they lost 10 slaves worth of dead point weight per base (its amazing how broken they were in hindsight)

anyway my major concern is this: i have always found that vc relies super heavily on the vamps. dumb statement. but with the points increase across the board on all vamps, is it going to hurt us in the end? because all hero vamps have 2 wounds, so there is only a very brief window after taking a single wound to roll a 6 for hunger before you are kindof... slain horribly. most of my vamps that die, do so due to an awful combat phase resulting in a crumble (dealing two unhealable wounds to the vamps)


sorry for the pessimism, im just antzy in my pantzy about being potentially trapped in a flawed army book for several years.

 

[Mad 'At]

I miss 35pts loremaster :'(

But I love the new rules for zombies, WIN :zombie:

 

[Sanai]

Well, from what I have been hearing, Master Necromancers with the master of the dead rule seem to be actually pretty effective, so you dont actually need vampires per se.

Of course, for me its vampires all the way. Im definatly going to run my vamp lord with scabscrathe- the only downside to the sword is that the vampire dies at the end of the game if he doesnt kill anything..... the way I see it, if your vampire lord hasnt done anything all game, he deserves to die at the end.... The only other worry is as vampires have less wounds as TGs, the death shriek wont be too scary- though you could buff the wounds of the vamp lord with curse of the revenant.

 

[Disciple of Nagash]

I say slightly buffed. We lost some stuff, the main hit being charging with Vanhels. But I think what we got in return outweighs the downside, especially AoE Invo as Sanai mentioned.

 

[Mad 'At]

Take AoDM instead Sanai. In effect it dose the same thing as CotR, but work for the TG aswell.

 

[Sanai]

Yeah, but Aura of Dark Majesty does not add to the effect of death shriek, CotR does.
My builds for a lord probably wont use COTR however due to its pts cost...

 

[Mad 'At]

AoDM reduces the enemies Ld by one, effectively casing just as much more damage as CotR dose by adding one to your roll when trying to beat the enemies Ld.

 

[FirestormXL]

Well I would say nerf EXCEPT for the AMAZING little by law I read that says no victory points are awarded EVER for raised units, meaning my days of (and these were rare) crushing the enemy under an onslaught of raised models and somehow still losing cause he axed about 7 of them are OVER. Let the dead rise and fear not the repercussions.

 

[Dklyn]

with all things considered, even including the state of other teams out there, did we get buffed or stuffed???

Yes. Some things nerfed some things buffed. What did you expect?


Overall, I'm pleased with the result. Fairly well balanced, a lot of choices available now etc. Vargheists are the only thing that made me think "huh, that's very strong."

Corpse cart is really the biggest disappointment, increase in cost, but unable to march . It did get an increase in str, but if it takes forever to get there what good does that do me?
I was also a little let down by not being able to summon spirit host anymore, but buff to raise dead makes up for it.
The hunger I think is weak, and probably won't come up much. But hey, when it does, it'll be neat right?

Increase in character cost was somewhat warranted (except with the lord, +1 atk -1 wizard lvl +15 point cost is not worth it imo). WK was incredibly great for the point cost before, and the ability to retain KB while using magic weapons is quite nifty. I'm still surprised we have a hero with 3 wounds.

Another neat thing is the variety of vamp powers with low cost, allowing you to keep the cost of your hero down while still giving him a nice role. Fear, of course, can be much more reliable with fear incarnate, and AoDM/screaming banner decrease in point. GG and fel bats went down in cost, for reasons I don't fully understand but will enjoy!

 

[Wolfrahm]

The only disappointing thing to me is losing the vampires can march move the troops but now only the general can. Other then that I really like what we have now. BUFFED

 

[baynexilos]

Also characters didt really go up in price as we gained an attack which if you look at the sword that does that anyway we came out ahead, especially with red fury