End Times Magic

[MorGrendel]

Oh and Steve has been around for almost a decade.

[lilscutt]

So i have seen a couple end time games played, it is interesting how the magic phase turns out. It's sometimes even and at times it's not. The Randomness of the magic now is good and add a new element of fun to the game. Big draw back is it makes the game longer in some cases, and fantasy is already long enough. ( maybe that's why jeff and Chris don't play, the games are too long and they can't remember the rules;) lol)

[MorGrendel]

That was my point. It is one more die roll per spell, that has a drastic effect (read as: oh, wait nevermind, I guess i'm not casting that spell, well actually, the rules say I have to try, even though we both know it will never work, oh well. what a waste of two die rolls). Thus more time spent weighing the options/lamenting rolls. I just don't see the winds being that fickle, or the wizard not being able to "feel" the ebb and flow. Would you play a sailing game where the winds were so fickle?

[Berserker]

If you're going to allow the wizard all the extra benefits like everyone's a loremaster, double casting dice on average vs dispel dice, cast spells multiple times and never break concentration, you really need to pair it down. I think that's why they did the d6, to try to stop the 4d6 2 die always cast fireball. Hell, even 1 die fireball will pass 4 in 6 times on a lvl 4 wizard. And armies with cheap wizards (who also get free extra dice -- looking at your goblins), I would 1 dice everything, all the time.

The more I think about these new rules the more I don't like them. It's just a min-maxers dream. And I can definitely see how it would add a lot of extra time to the game.

[lilscutt]

I would say don't knock it until you tried it or in this cased played it. We can all talk about it but until you try it and seen it played or played it out then you will never know if you like it. I like the fact that it's more up to the dice and then that plays into your strategy, and how the game is played I love variable aspect of the magic phase. Either you do well due to your dice or do poorly.

[Titus]

Either you do well due to your dice or do "Jeff-like".

[boagrius]

Skaven still suck

[MorGrendel]

I would say don't knock it until you tried it or in this cased played it. We can all talk about it but until you try it and seen it played or played it out then you will never know if you like it. I like the fact that it's more up to the dice and then that plays into your strategy, and how the game is played I love variable aspect of the magic phase. Either you do well due to your dice or do poorly.

I can too hate something I've never experienced. I already know I would not like to be shot or run over by a car. I also know I don't like my game to be controlled by a roll of a die. In general, Warhammer works because the law of large numbers is maintained, one can ascertain what the averages are in combat and shooting. However, rolling a single die is not random, as you say; rather, all six sides have an equal probability, but drastically different outcomes. I don't agree that leaving it up to the dice, is in anyone's strategy. Moreover, what a waste of time to do poorly, simply because you can't "get lucky" with your rolls.

Also, I'm not saying I won't try it or that it's not worth it, just that I see a thematic flaw.

Per Serban, OMG I can not imagine how annoying it will be to play against a goblin caster with that Nuisance spell.

[Titus]

Itchy Nuisance? Or the add a die to every cast? Also, just to be clear, the extra die is just for Night Goblins.

[MorGrendel]

Night Goblins were already broken. I was speaking about the spell that hampers movement. That can have a major game changing effect.

[boagrius]

Just to be clear.... I still hate skaven. That is all.

[Berserker]

For Morg, try a loremaster high slann with the book of ashur and spam soul quench. 2 dice at it each time, reroll on the rare failure. Fun.

A few things I found online. Point three should make Clayson happy!

1.) Bound spells DO NOT have to roll to determine max casting dice. So, Ruby Ring can throw 6 dice at a cast, making it much harder to dispel. This also makes the casket of souls much scarier.
2.) You can opt to dispel via the army and not the caster, thus forgoing the max dispel dice roll. Sure, you're not getting a bonus from the caster level, but you can safely throw 6 dice at something. Which leads to...
3.) Dwarfs don't have to roll to determine max dispel dice. Their bonus is inherent to their army. This change has suddenly made dwarfs much more resilient to ETK-style magic.

[MorGrendel]

Crap... ETK. What is that Extreme Tomb Kings?

Am I missing something, I thought the Book of Ashur was pretty weak. +1 to cast and dispel, right?

Who needs any of that? With being able to recast Walk Between Worlds, I'll just move my entire army behind yours.

[Fritz]

Night Goblins were already broken. I was speaking about the spell that hampers movement. That can have a major game changing effect.

You're joking here right? You can't possibly think Night Goblins are anywhere near "broken." That extra die is mitigated by two things. First, if it rolls a one, the spell fails. Period. Second, and more importantly, Little Waaagh! pretty well sucks as a lore. It has exactly one game changing spell, and it has to be done on a 25+ to be reliable.

Let's compare it with my favorite go to powerful lore: Shadow. Itchy nuisance reduces M and I by D6 on an 8+. Miasma does M, WS, BS, and I by D3 on a 10+ (or pick one for 5+). Both are good utility, but probably not game changing. Curse of the Bad Moon can be pretty nasty, but again you need that 25+. I've watched Jason fail that many times. In turn, shadow has a strength reducer, a toughness reducer, an auto-remove war machines (and demolishes low initiative armies), and a spell that takes spearmen from laughable to overpowered in 5 seconds flat.

Having played against Night Goblins damned near exclusively for a couple years now, I can say with absolute certainty that there is nothing broken about Night Goblins. A High Elf Archmage with the Book of Hoeth using shadow? Overpowered. a Night Goblins that gets an extra die? Not that scary. Jason deserves props for sticking to a theme and making it work despite being sub-optimal.

For Morg, try a loremaster high slann with the book of ashur and spam soul quench. 2 dice at it each time, reroll on the rare failure. Fun.

A few things I found online. Point three should make Clayson happy!

1.) Bound spells DO NOT have to roll to determine max casting dice. So, Ruby Ring can throw 6 dice at a cast, making it much harder to dispel. This also makes the casket of souls much scarier.
2.) You can opt to dispel via the army and not the caster, thus forgoing the max dispel dice roll. Sure, you're not getting a bonus from the caster level, but you can safely throw 6 dice at something. Which leads to...
3.) Dwarfs don't have to roll to determine max dispel dice. Their bonus is inherent to their army. This change has suddenly made dwarfs much more resilient to ETK-style magic.

Number 1 is just plain wrong. No idea where the internet wisdom got that. You still have to select the number of power dice to use and therefore must roll the D6. You don't skip that step even if the model is not a wizard.

Number 2 and 3 is just selective rules lawyering that goes against the number 1 rule of warhammer. I'm sure the argument is that because the ET:K rule says that you roll a D6 after you select a wizard and that by not choosing a wizard you bypass that rule. It's an obvious unfair advantage that goes against the spirit of the rules and is therefore also wrong

[Berserker]

Jeff, your spell choices can vary by your gamestyle. I was just making a point on how powerful magic is in this new system by providing an example of single dice spamming of cheap spells that can have huge effects.

Your slaan, with the book is now a Lvl 5 loremaster. That spell does 2d6 Str4 hits on a cast of 8. That means you can single dice it and will only fail on a 1 or 2 which you get to re-roll making it very unlikely that you will fail.

The opposing army has to use at least 2 dice to try to dispell your 1 dice because they are already at a -1 to you if they brought a lvl 4 wizard. Seeing that you can get tons of dice for a magic phase (and generally many more then the dispell pool will have), this all translates in you being able to wipe entire units in one magic phase without even getting into close combat.

And now that i think of it, high magic also gives you that +ward save. Maybe that's an ingredient in the making of a death star unit ;)

I'm glad to see that i got you and Fritz to argue on which is the most powerful way to fuck up the other person under this new magic system. That validates my claims. This new system makes magic waaay to important to the game.