AoS Starblood stalkers in AoS 3.0

[Michealmas]

Picked up a box for conversion bits and gave the warscrolls another look through the 3 0 lense and I'm debating. Because I always wrote of underworlds as bad but with the point increases and new rules they actually seem a lot better now. Priest's got a buff so the unit gets prayers etc, they have access to the new hero abilities and the whole unit can deep strike anywhere on the board a la chameleons.

They stayed 225 which makes it about the same cost as the newly pointed Skink Priest + 5 Chameleons but it comes with an extra Saurus hero, more wounds, a couple of extra abilities and the ability to deep strike a slightly worse Sunblood and the priest with the chameleons to deliver buffs anywhere on the board or contest a point. You trade away the Camo Skinks MW's but it's not a colossal drop off and the added utility means I'm wondering if it's possibly worth considering in Coalesced?

Anyone else reassessing them?

 

[Geedo-Ra]

Picked up a box for conversion bits and gave the warscrolls another look through the 3 0 lense and I'm debating. Because I always wrote of underworlds as bad but with the point increases and new rules they actually seem a lot better now. Priest's got a buff so the unit gets prayers etc, they have access to the new hero abilities and the whole unit can deep strike anywhere on the board a la chameleons.

They stayed 225 which makes it about the same cost as the newly pointed Skink Priest + 5 Chameleons but it comes with an extra Saurus hero, more wounds, a couple of extra abilities and the ability to deep strike a slightly worse Sunblood and the priest with the chameleons to deliver buffs anywhere on the board or contest a point. You trade away the Camo Skinks MW's but it's not a colossal drop off and the added utility means I'm wondering if it's possibly worth considering in Coalesced?

Anyone else reassessing them?

I picked up the Oldblood off Bits and Kits, for the intent purpose of running him as a nicer Sunblood model. But, they sent me every part except the chest; so now I just have an incomplete and really awesome model that I can't do anything with.

Personally, I'm not a fan of 'set units' eg Starblood Stalkers or Gaunt's Ghosts (40k); I like running my own flexible units.

 

[PabloTho]

I'm still unconvinced. 225 points adds up very quickly and the only thing that would provide any value to my lists is the Priest, whose only real advantage over the standard version is an extra wound.

Then Klaq-Trok is an even weaker version of an Oldblood, which is already among the weakest and most non-functional units in our tome. Hard pass.

The Skink models are 10/10 sculpts though, so I'm gonna go ahead and buy the box and use Kixi-Taka as a Priest / Starpriest anyway.

 

[Togetic]

I think at the very least the price changes make them more viable to use if you like them, even if it doesn’t push them into like a Meta Pick kind of situation

 

[Michealmas]

I'd be tempted to drop my Priest and Camo Skinks for them. I wouldn't normally look at them as they are pretty bad in a vacuum but if you're running a priest and MSU camo's anyway...well I did some math to look at them side by side and you're only actually paying 30 points extra and the trade offs are:

+ Deep strike two heroes
+ Better melee profiles and damage output
+ 7 more wounds
+ Better saves
+ Better bravery
+ An extra body for objective control
- Less mortal wound output
- Worse ranged profiles

Numbers wise, besides the loss of a mortal wound or two a turn, you're actually getting a lot more bang for your buck. You pay a small premium for it but if you have the 30pts to spare, you're running a priest and MSU Camos anyway and you're playing Coalesced it's not a bad idea...

 

[Michealmas]

Questions I'd have to ask myself before playing them:

- Am I relying on the mortal wounds from camo's?
- Would it benefit or hinder me to deep strike a priest and a little hero?
- Is Klaq-Trok worth 30pts?

 

[Togetic]

It’s worth factoring in that Klaq-Trok is a hero unit that doesn’t count towards the hero cap, and allows the collective unit of the Starblood Stalkers to use double the amount of normal Command Abilities, which could be a little nice

 

[Erta Wanderer]

no they are still awful. they could be half the price and still not be worth taking.

 

[Michealmas]

no they are still awful. they could be half the price and still not be worth taking.

Why?

 

[Michealmas]

It’s worth factoring in that Klaq-Trok is a hero unit that doesn’t count towards the hero cap, and allows the collective unit of the Starblood Stalkers to use double the amount of normal Command Abilities, which could be a little nice

I'm not sure on how this actually works in practice, if I remember right a unit in AOS 3.0 can only issue and receive 1 command ability per turn. I'm not sure how this actually works for SBS as they are both one unit and seperate units. Likewise in terms of spekks would you target them individually or ad a collective?

 

[Erta Wanderer]

Why?

ok lets look at what you are getting for 225 points.
first you get a skink priest. normally 80 points this is by far the best part of what you get but he is just a skink priest and he misses out on faction abilities so he is less then a normal priest. granted he does get +1 wound....wooo
next you get a old blood on foot (120 points). now foot heroes come in 2 categories. 1 units that can buff other units and 2 useless waists of space. this holds true over the entire game with 2 exceptions(and the old blood isn't one of them). and what is this? this old blood can't buff he looses his CA literally the only reason you would want to take one. oh and he has a worse save
you also get 3 skinks(22.5 points) all with different weapons so only one of them is any good and even if they did all have a cohesive load out it's just 3 skinks. they can't even act as ablative wounds for your priest so they are just tax.
last you get 1 chameleon (23 points) who makes up for the fact that you can't teleport this unit by giving 1 deep strike to a bad foot fighter a hero who doesn't need or want to deep strike and 3 useless skinks. oh and the chameleon doesn't get the defensive abilities common to his kind so again a worse version of the base unit.
this unit is literally less then the sum of it's parts because each part is a nurffed version

now true you do save 20.5 points in taking them in a bundle (golly) but all of that is worse then their base forms and 2 3rds of it you don't want in the first place. star blood stalkers don't get allegiance abilities they are unique so can't use artifacts CA or prayers and save you less money then 1 single unit of skinks.
it would literally be better to just take a normal priest and old blood for 200 and drop the rest.

 

[Michealmas]

ok lets look at what you are getting for 225 points.
first you get a skink priest. normally 80 points this is by far the best part of what you get but he is just a skink priest and he misses out on faction abilities so he is less then a normal priest. granted he does get +1 wound....wooo
next you get a old blood on foot (120 points). now foot heroes come in 2 categories. 1 units that can buff other units and 2 useless waists of space. this holds true over the entire game with 2 exceptions(and the old blood isn't one of them). and what is this? this old blood can't buff he looses his CA literally the only reason you would want to take one. oh and he has a worse save
you also get 3 skinks(22.5 points) all with different weapons so only one of them is any good and even if they did all have a cohesive load out it's just 3 skinks. they can't even act as ablative wounds for your priest so they are just tax.
last you get 1 chameleon (23 points) who makes up for the fact that you can't teleport this unit by giving 1 deep strike to a bad foot fighter a hero who doesn't need or want to deep strike and 3 useless skinks. oh and the chameleon doesn't get the defensive abilities common to his kind so again a worse version of the base unit.
this unit is literally less then the sum of it's parts because each part is a nurffed version

now true you do save 20.5 points in taking them in a bundle (golly) but all of that is worse then their base forms and 2 3rds of it you don't want in the first place. star blood stalkers don't get allegiance abilities they are unique so can't use artifacts CA or prayers and save you less money then 1 single unit of skinks.
it would literally be better to just take a normal priest and old blood for 200 and drop the rest.

I completely agree in Starborne. But in Coalesced, specifically Thunder lizard. They get too keep all the faction abilities. As for the rest the priest still gets access to generic prayers even if he can't use the ones from enhancements. The heroes also get access to generic CA and heroic actions. Being able to drop that in anywhere on the board isn't something to sniff at

 

[PabloTho]

I completely agree in Starborne. But in Coalesced, specifically Thunder lizard. They get too keep all the faction abilities. As for the rest the priest still gets access to generic prayers even if he can't use the ones from enhancements. The heroes also get access to generic CA and heroic actions. Being able to drop that in anywhere on the board isn't something to sniff at

The generic prayers aren't that great, and are used in the hero phase anyway. Meaning that you would deepstrike the squad and then require them to survive a turn before using the prayers.

Neither of the heroes care that much for generic CAs either. Again, the Priest can't even use his own CA in the turn that he drops, and other CAs have such a generous range that it's very rare for a units to be out-of-reach of a hero/general, AND incapable of buffing itself via squad leader.

As for Heroic actions, which of the heroes put those to better use than anything else in our roster? Is there ever a scenario where we forfeit Heroic Leadership so that the Oldblood can use Finest Hour and then deal 2 or 3 damage to something (if we're lucky)?

 

[Togetic]

I'm not sure on how this actually works in practice, if I remember right a unit in AOS 3.0 can only issue and receive 1 command ability per turn. I'm not sure how this actually works for SBS as they are both one unit and seperate units. Likewise in terms of spekks would you target them individually or ad a collective?

The starblood stalkers and the priest are seperate units taken together for the single slot/point cost, so the two heroes in the warband are in seperate units

 

[Erta Wanderer]

I completely agree in Starborne. But in Coalesced, specifically Thunder lizard. They get too keep all the faction abilities.

they do but as they aren't monsters none of those abilities benefit them.

As for the rest the priest still gets access to generic prayers even if he can't use the ones from enhancements.

or you could take a normal one and get access to all of them.

The heroes also get access to generic CA and heroic actions.

why on earth would you waist hero abilities on these guys??? they aren't a good platform for them. and every thing has access to generic CAs. basic units have access to generic CAs so thats not a benefit.

Being able to drop that in anywhere on the board isn't something to sniff at

it definitely is as stated above all of their abilities go off in the wrong phase for the deep strike to be useful and they do better just running alongside the units you mean to buff.

and again they are worse versions of the base units just take the generic priest heck take 3 it's only 15 points more

 

[Nart]

Is "starbrood stalkers are actually good, because they didn't get a +5/+10 price hike" thread a season event now?

Things to consider:

- Starbrood stalker cost 225 pts;
- Scar-Veteran on carnosaur costs 10 pts less;
- bastiladon with solar engine costs 10 pts more;
- triple priests cost 15 pts more;
- 10 chameleon skinks cost 10 pts more;
- two salamanders cost 15 pts more;
- the cheapest thing we can take in our list is burning head, which is 20 pts.

Think again.

 

[Jason839]

I do think they got more interesting in 3.0 with the new command abilities, but I still think they are a but too pricey for me. If they get a big points drop in our 3.0 book, to say 150-175, then they would be more appealing to me.

 

[Dread Saurian]

They can't really even make their points back barring incredible rolls. Drop their points by like 60 and it'll literally entice people to use them more often