AoS New Battalion idea

[Nielspeterdejong]

Hello everyone,

While painting my new models, and waiting for the Warhammer Total War 2 game to come out, I had been brainstorming about a battalion based on the Fangs of Sotek and Dracothian tail, in which we could have a more mobile Saurus Guard playstyle! I added it here, and I was wondering what your thoughts about them were?

New Battalion (120 points): Savage Defenders
Requirements:
*1 Slann Starlord https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0BySRcyTjvqKIMFFUcmc2aTV0eEU
*1 Eternal Starhost
*0-4 warscroll battalions chosen in any combination from the following list: -Eternal Starhost -Shadowstrike Starhosts -Sunclaw Starhost -Firelance Starhost
*Any number of additional Seraphon units.
If a Savage Defenders battalion contains the maximum number of battalions, it gains the Strategic Mastery ability from the Starbeast Constellation warscroll batallion in battletome: Seraphon.

Bonuses:
-Stoic Defenders: Provided your Eternity Warden is alive, all Saurus Guard units within this battalion may ignore wounds and mortal wounds on a dice roll of 4 or higher.
-Mobile Defenders: Saurus Guard units within this battalion always benefit from Drakescale Shieldwall and Alpha Warden, provided they are within 20” of the Eternity Warden.
-Vital Strikes: At the start of your Hero phase the Slann Starlord from this battalion may designate an enemy unit whose removal is vital to the great plan. Until your next hero phase, all Skink units within this battalion may reroll hit and wound rolls of 1 against that target.

The idea is to create a army where you can teleport your Guards into Key positions, and they won't instantly die to Mortal wounds and -2 or higher Rend. Just to give them that "Elite Guardians" feeling For the Slann Starlord I was thinking about a point cost of 450, since despite his buffs he is still somewhat squishy, and doesn't have the +1 to hit aura from the Celestial Hurricanum.

What do you guys think?

 

[Canas]

Vital strikes feels a bit out of place, targetting skinks while the rest targets saurus guard.

Stoic defenders is horrificly overpowered in combination with the eternal starhost defenses. Put in a skink priest for maximum ridiculousness and you have re-rollable 2+ saves that ignore -1 rend and a 4+ additional save. That's a bit much. Make it just mortal wounds.

Mobile defenders doesn't actually solve the issue. They're still stuck to your eternity warden. Yes he no longers needs to be as close, but he's still going to be in the middle of your formation. And since the eternity warden is actually rather squishy on his own it's not like you want your guard to go far away from him anyway. It opens him up to assasination.

A better solution might be "as long as the eternity warden is alive, they benefit from drakescale shieldwall regardless of distance". In this case you can leave 1 unit with the warden to protect him, and the rest can roam. Alternativly, give it a caveat. For exampel "Pick a hero in your army, apart from the warden, to be their charge, the saurus guard will do everything in their power to defend him. As long as both he and the warden are alive they gain the benefit from the drakescale shieldwall at any distance from the warden"

also.. the battalion probably isn't the issue for them. it's that outside of the battalion they're expensive and rather bad. The best solution would probably be to just make saurus guard better so that they can actually function outside of the specific niche that their battalion puts them in.

 

[Joshmunga]

I love this! Now I really want the Slann Starlord to be a real thing. Great job writing this!!

 

[Oldest One]

I kinda wanna make a slann starlord, but i probably won't be able to use it.

 

[Killer Angel]

I will only address this one:

(snip)

Bonuses:
-Stoic Defenders: Provided your Eternity Warden is alive, all Saurus Guard units within this battalion may ignore wounds and mortal wounds on a dice roll of 4 or higher.

(snip)

What do you guys think?

I like the idea, but this is just broken, it's far stronger than the old ward save of Death armies before the actual nerf.
It would give each guard a better save than a Bastiladon.
I know it's not exceptional, but Stoic Defender should only grant a save of 6+.

 

[Seraphage]

This is not overpowered, it is broken indeed huehue. Even if the batallion costed 400 points it still wouldn't be balanced imo

Still even thinking of such a thing made me smile hehe

 

[Dalton Hall]

As broken as the battalion is, dang was it fun to read. The Vital Strikes rule did give me a idea for one though.

Shadows of Sotek (80)
Requierments
1 Slann Starseer
1 Shadowstrike Starhost-3 units of Skinks requiered with at least 1 being Chameleon Skinks
0-4 warscroll battalions in any combo- Eternal Starhost, Thunderquake Starhost, Firelance Starhost, Sunclaw Starhost
If max amount of battalions is met, Gain bonuses of Starbeast Constellation battalion
Any additional Seraphon units
Bonuses
Sever the Head- The great plan requires that those who lead against the Slann die, any Seraphon who target a hero with all their attacks reroll wound rolls of 1, Skinks reroll all wound rolls instead
Swift, Silent, and Deadly- The Skinks of the Shadows of Sotek are known for coming out of nowhere and striking without warning or mercy, in each hero phase you can remove 1 Skink unit from play and set it up within 3 inches of any edge of the board with no enemy unit being less that 6 inches away, they then cannot move that movement phase.That unit gains 1 plus to hit rolls against the nearest enemy unit.

That Vital Strikes rule gave me an idea for a assassination force, and i kind of wanted to be able to not have to rely on the huge units of Skinks to get decent hit rolls, hence the bonus to that in the second rule with the closet unit being their intended target. What do you guys think?

 

[Canas]

As broken as the battalion is, dang was it fun to read. The Vital Strikes rule did give me a idea for one though.

Shadows of Sotek (80)
Requierments
1 Slann Starseer
1 Shadowstrike Starhost-3 units of Skinks requiered with at least 1 being Chameleon Skinks
0-4 warscroll battalions in any combo- Eternal Starhost, Thunderquake Starhost, Firelance Starhost, Sunclaw Starhost
If max amount of battalions is met, Gain bonuses of Starbeast Constellation battalion
Any additional Seraphon units
Bonuses
Sever the Head- The great plan requires that those who lead against the Slann die, any Seraphon who target a hero with all their attacks reroll wound rolls of 1, Skinks reroll all wound rolls instead
Swift, Silent, and Deadly- The Skinks of the Shadows of Sotek are known for coming out of nowhere and striking without warning or mercy, in each hero phase you can remove 1 Skink unit from play and set it up within 3 inches of any edge of the board with no enemy unit being less that 6 inches away, they then cannot move that movement phase.That unit gains 1 plus to hit rolls against the nearest enemy unit.

That Vital Strikes rule gave me an idea for a assassination force, and i kind of wanted to be able to not have to rely on the huge units of Skinks to get decent hit rolls, hence the bonus to that in the second rule with the closet unit being their intended target. What do you guys think?

Feels a bit like a frankenstein by allowing the inclusion of well, everything. If you'd change it to just be battalions that include various skinks (shadowstrike, thunderquake) and just skink units it'd feel a bit more coherent.

Apart from that the bonus from the starbeast constellation is fairly pointless as skink heroes don't have command abilities (which frankly is a tad lame).

The bonus to wound and hit rolls is fairly decent and might make a full blown skink army actually viable without immeadiatly pushing them into overpowered.