King Mekhet

OTHER cowardly Canadians, perhaps. Team Nerd Council is paid up and reppin' the Great White North. Though yeah...to hell with exchange rates. My OFCC ticket was $100 CAD. Ridic.

I will! ...with a unit of direwolves that will inexplicably make you run off into nowhere.

It wasn't until I saw the Host of the Eternity King that I was really turned off of the End Times. The storyline was awesome (even if the writing is very average "corporate fantasy" in terms of narrative quality), and the rules for the new units are spot-on. The rules for Nagash were...well...he's Nagash. Also 1,000 points. Also cannonable, with a ginormous base size...manageable. Then KFA came out and well...ugh....at least he's in Empire, where he doesn't really have much synergy with the rest of the army? ...and then Malekith, and the abomination that is the Host of the Eternity King list. Everything else is just gravy on top. I really appreciate the effort that's gone into this comp pack. Swedish is complicated as balls, and getting a fair addendum that incorporates all the nuances of the combined lists is an enormous undertaking. I don't think it's there yet, in terms of actually being a "fair" extension of the comp pack. However I don't think it's ever really going to be, and honestly in the spirit of this event I don't feel like it needs to be perfect. I can appreciate too why others don't like End Times. However we ARE in the End Times, and I think it would be remiss if we didn't take at least a few opportunities to really run with that. As much as uncomped End Times is unpleasant as a result of the super characters, it still saddens me somewhat that the PNW has largely shunned End Times. I feel like we're missing out.

I'm not denying that an Undead Legions list isn't objectively more powerful than a VC or TK list on their own. My concern is more that the changes to the comp pack do essentially nothing to comp those synergies, and basically just hammer a number of predominantly VC builds adapted into UL (and I already feel that Swedish hits VC a little too hard). I say this (in the interests of full disclosure) as a VC player who is looking to do just that: adapt a primarily VC list into undead legions with the addition of some of my TK toys. However, shoehorning my VC list into the UL, with literally no changes or added TK units, results in an increased comp hit of -38. And for what? It's not like I'm taking a flat hit for taking the superior UL list over the VC list. It's just my specific choices that are for some reason comped significantly harder under UL than under VC. Quite frankly what this comp pack says to me is "don't take Undead Legions." I understand of course that I'm quite biased in this regard. However I feel quite strongly that the changes to the UL comp are a massive overcorrection, and ones which don't have any real connection to the actual strengths of the combined roster. Might I ask what the lists were that these changes were in response to?

Poor Ricky. I drew him round 1 at Gottacon, and the response of my club was "don't worry about it, he can't roll dice for [big bad swear word]." Sure enough one of his own fleeing chariots panicked 600 points off the board turn 2, with his BSB a couple inches out of range. Great sport about it, though.

Just IMHO, but for the Undead Legions comp -5 per "flying unit, character, or monster" seems a bit harsh, don't you think? That doubles the comp of fellbats, increases the comp on vargheists by roughly half, and pushes Terrorgheists up to -35. "Flying characters" also feels a bit broad. Are hellsteeds or flying horror on vampires really worth an additional -5 comp? Both are already taking a comparable comp hit. Obviously I am a bit biased, as an UL player myself, but a threshold system would seem a lot more fair? Something like how ethereals are comped under the current VC pack, where the first couple are cheap and after that their price climbs dramatically.

Dan also came 20th in that tournament, while Fin came 35th (out of 40). Also let's not all act like Dan being tabled by a 9 year old is out of the ordinary ;)

Large portions of GW's stock have been "Direct Only" for quite a while now. They essentially disincentivize retailers from stocking it regularly via a lengthier ordering process and lower margins. There's really no surprises here at all. On the topic of "Direct Only" though, I'm guessing that this strategy figures into the rumours of future "limited release" kits. It seems ludicrous for GW to design these expensive kits then throw away the molds afterwards. Much more likely that they'll move to "direct only" after a period in order to make way for a new wave of higher-volume stock. This both makes the shelf space of their retail locations and partners more efficient as well as pushing a wide variety of products into a higher-margin category. Can't wait for 9th to come out and dispel all of these silly "WHFB is being discontinued" rumours. They're starting to get really irritating.

Spotted a typo. Should be: Aidan "Casts Dreaded 13th into non-Slave Combats" Rodgers.

I really doubt this is anything beyond a fluff reboot. I think that they're trying to break out of the confines of their old fluff so that their range can be a bit more nimble and flexible. A rebooted setting could provide justification for alliances between factions (a la 40K, which is good for business). It could revitalize some of the more stagnant factions (i.e. Bretonnians, who are basically just a historical range). It adds some opportunity to do new and interesting things with the sculpts going forward. I doubt though that we'll see the game change dramatically. GW knows that this is the surest way to lose their player base (necessary to incorporate new players), so I doubt they'll risk alienating BOTH the fluff purists AND the gaming purists at the same time. As for Harry and Hastings, 90% of what they've been spouting has been conjecture and speculation. There is very little in the way of concrete rumours from anyone save Darnok, and his sources contradict themselves at a number of occasions. Not to mention who knows if what they're relaying is current, true, or properly interpreted.

The long and short is that the rumours are all over the place, are changing by the day, and at best can be described as "informed guesswork." I would guess that at 40-80% is also just plain made up as well. The general undercurrent of the rumours is that 9th edition will contain some sort of of game with fewer numbers of models. Whether this will replace the existing game or run parallel to it is unknown, but it is quite frankly inconceivable to me that GW would abandon their current system for one that requires *fewer* models. My guess is that this is conceived of as an entry-level game in order to make it easier for new players to start the hobby. Whether "skirmish" actually means skirmisher units, or simply restricts unit sizes to a level more workable for smaller point caps, remains to be seen. I played 500-1,000 point games as part of an escalation campaign with friends and I can tell you right now that 8th edition WHFB doesn't bloody work at that level worth a damned. As for the factions, this as well remains to be seen. Everything is destroyed in the fluff so they can basically do whatever the hell they like. However my guess (again - guess - since this is all we can do right now) is that they're grouping us all into umbrella factions, then ditching everything that isn't plastic, then reintroducing everything else as supplements. So for instance dwarfs might be relegated to crewing "Empire" warmachines, with maybe an elite unit here or there, but a supplement can let you introduce a larger number of dwarfen units in exchange for certain other restrictions (no knights, for instance). Tomb Kings could be reintroduced by way of a supplement, with some upgrade sprues to turn VC skeletons into TK skeletons (which lots of people do now anyways). Quite frankly, I am actually quite excited for this. Yes it means losing a lot of choice, but much of this is merely the *illusion* of choice. Cull the entire metal/finecast range from the VC list and, beyond characters, 90% of players wouldn't even notice. A good number of other factions are in roughly the same boat. In respect of the elves, there's an enormous amount of overlap between the ranges that could quite easily be trimmed for efficiency. 50% of all of the books are basically redundant units with slightly different army-wide special rules and slight variability in equipment options. Combine those all together, with "formation rules" for including Caledor refugees, etc. and you've basically got the same thing as before. Throw in some upgrade sprues to help people convert HE/DE/WE spearmen and you're golden there as well. The rest is just colour palette.

Which is to say that, like ETC, Swedish is a sort of "meta whack-a-mole" that retroactively hammers lists based on previous performance. Might not be the fairest approach, but it does encourage a dynamic meta with better list diversity which is a good thing in and of itself. Let me also mention that "breaking the comp system" is a key part of these high-level Swedish events, by design. Swedish is a system that encourages creativity in list design as much as it does play on the battlefield. Essentially you're looking for synergies that are efficient under the comp pack, and which you can make up for the deficiencies in through skillful use on the tabletop. The only part I think is kind of crap is that he took Best Overall as well, despite playing with proxied models. That's pretty garbage, if you ask me. Not his fault in the slightest, since that's the way the comp pack was written. The award was so skewed in favour of battle points that painting and sports became little more than tiebreakers.

The distinction I am making is between the world itself, and the immediate impression that world makes on a new entrant, and the races / narratives that fill that world. The effect of the WHFB world is that it appears very generic on the surface. The world is generic. There is no central, unifying narrative or theme that ties it all together. The races are immediately identifiable by their generic fantasy counterparts rather than as uniquely WHFB races. What people notice first about the 40K universe is the rather unique, gothic setting. There's a compelling central narrative in the Horus vs. Emperor, Chaos versus Imperial conflict. Even though all of the races have generic counterparts, they've been incorporated in such a way that the effect of it is muted. Essentially, WH40K strikes you as a unique setting on first glance. Nothing about the WHFB setting will do that. It lacks a "hook," which the WH40K has in that central conflict.

I don't quite understand where all this vitriol is coming from. From an outsider's perspective, the WHFB world has always looked like a 13-year-old's D&D campaign world. The map is a cheap carbon copy of Earth with Atlantis jammed into the Atlantic. All of the human nations are theme park versions of real world cultures (Bretonnia = France, The Empire = the Holy Roman Empire, Estonia = Spain, Tilea = Italy, Araby = Moors / generic Arabs, Nehekhara = Egypt, Ogres = Steppe peoples, Nippon = Japan, Cathay = China), and sprinkled amongst those are more cheap knockoffs of Tolkien races. Of course, beneath that cheap veneer is a rich world that's benefitted from 30 years of development and narrative material. However much of that is wasted on the general public (and even on most WHFB players) due to the seeming generic-ness of it. The ET is a way to give that world a send-off with a series of gorgeously illustrated narrative campaign books. While the narrative itself is hit-and-miss at times, it's hard to argue that the production values weren't top-notch. And now, with the world ended, they've set the stage to build a new world that is as iconic and as rich as any other wargaming setting. Including their own 40K universe, which I think most would argue is a far richer and more narratively compelling universe.

I suggest Wargames Factory for your skeletons. They're a bit fragile and finnicky, but they're an order of magnitude cheaper than GW skeletons.

He basically used TK's really light comp to absorb the hit for taking Lore of Undeath, then ramped it up into a summoning engine. Undeath is a mediocre lore...right up until you start overwhelming your opponent with it. Try playing a level 4 Undeath at a low point level when your opponent is only running a level 1-2...it's savage. With a casket / hierotitan to boot you can easily raise up hundreds of points of stuff during the game. It worked for him because his list had very few vulnerable points, and essentially fought his opponents with units he raised up for free while he shot/magicked them from range. An interesting and effective strategy. Didn't hurt that none of his opponents seemed to have any idea how to fight against Tomb Kings.

And he even blamed the loss on the dice. Looks like there was a sale on excuses at the weaksauce store :P

Awesome that you guys did so well even with stiff judging. Bodes well for next year.

That's why you go with Tomb Counts ;)

Funniest part (according to Dale...haven't checked his math): PNW came *last* in battle points, but rocketed to 5th of 8 on the back of having both the highest sports score (only one player didn't get a favourite opponent vote) and highest paint score (as Ricky mentioned above). And battle? That's the easiest category to improve! PNW for best region in 2015!

It was a very solid list played by a very solid player, and well deserved to win the Masters. Yeah his opponent cascaded his wizard off the board last game, but the TK player was up in points and his HE opponent needed a 15-5 to surpass him. So he had it in the bag either way. As to Undeath, as someone who's run it before it really isn't all some people crack it up to be. You're giving up the ability to affect the board NOW for an ability to affect the board a turn from now. There are times (i.e. raising chaff) where this is worthwhile, but it is often a stopgap where a more direct lore would have a much more significant impact. Where that changes is when you can overpower someone with the lore. I ran a level 4 undeath with a casket against an opponent with no wizard in 1,500 points and raised 1,000 points of stuff during the game. The above list uses a casket and hierotitan to achieve roughly the same effect. Also helped that the rest of his list was just a massive razorguard deathstar shielding all of his support pieces, and archers picking apart the poorly defended infantry that appear a lot in swedish. In an uncomped tourney im not sure how this exact list would work, but I really appreciate the basic scheme of it.

Hierophant can be the general in the new book (unlike in the old book). The two models in the kit you bought are the Sepulchral Stalkers (seh-pul-krull) and Necropolis Knights, of which the latter is the significantly more competitive option. Though they both serve very different roles, and aren't in competition with each other. As for TK...they're a frustrating army to say the least. There are some builds that are strong, but LOTS of trap builds that you'll get rolled over. Against low-mid tier players they are a fun and rewarding darkhorse army to play, but against good players their limited mobility renders them nigh unplayable in an uncomped environment. They'll win games, but there are so many bad matchups where even a tie is a major accomplishment. Undead Legions really helps them out. VC units fill in some of the gaping holes in the TK roster. Vampire lords and terrorgheists to chew through armour, for instance. Vargheists to shred enemy artillery. Etc. However UL is End Times content, meaning that it comes with the whole gamut of unbalanced crap in that range. Without some sort of comp or "gentleman's agreement" about the new super characters you'll be in for some bad times. They're not unkillable but they're close, and it doesn't take a deep wealth of tactical knowledge to jam Karl Franz Ascended or Malekith down someone's throat. Quite honestly, if you're looking for a "legion of bone" vibe then VC is the better option by far. They're faster, stronger, and are more fun to play than their slower, more gunliney cousins. If you've got some imagination and conversion skills it's not very hard to convert them up to look "tomb kingsey" either. HERE is a link to my painting log, where I've been doing exactly (in addition to the TK army that got pushed to the backburner when I burnt out on the book). If you want non-GW skeletons, I strongly recommend Wargames Factory. They're cheap as chips, and in my opinion look better than either variety of GW skeleton (TK or VC). Some people like the more cartoony Mantic skeletons as well, but I think they're horrific (like the GW TK variety).

Haha. Loving that our entire region is pegged to lose their first game. No respect for the PNW out east, looks like :P. What the hell is up with that star dragon list that Jordan is facing? I really don't understand what the purpose of it is. Early game light council, then counter-charge with the dragon+griffon? Odd.

Good luck guys! Remember: it doesn't matter who wins...so long as they're Canadian. ;)

The funniest part is that I'll still pay it, as even at -78 he's still punching his weight. Also worth mentioning that number includes -21 for being a level 4. A master necro level 4 and a SGK are actually more expensive, IIRC. And way [big bad swear word]tier.