Raindog Posted January 5, 2015 Report Share Posted January 5, 2015 After watching Will and Keith battle last night, I was struck by how powerful the Lore of Undeath is. With L2 casters, Keith repeated raised news units every turn. skeletons acted as speed bumps and anvils as new units popped up. Varghouls killed off units including a Star Dragon and Lord. Spirit Hosts held up units for turns. Keith probably summoned 750 points of undead units to assist his Goblins. I think he as many undead units on the table as he did at the end of the game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murphy'sLawyer Posted January 5, 2015 Report Share Posted January 5, 2015 Personally I don't think they thought of balance when they were writing it, they were most likely worried about their up and ups threatening them to find new ways to sell models. It was my first thought when I saw the rules and still is. This is a Lore designed to sell models becuase you can't just buy a unit or two you have to buy the whole range of Undead to get the most out of Lore of Undeath. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peanut Posted January 5, 2015 Report Share Posted January 5, 2015 Agreed to both posts! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Threejacks Posted January 6, 2015 Report Share Posted January 6, 2015 Humm..wont let me Quote you Murphy Ok..so first off yes I agree that its certainly a new feature to the game and yes,GW is hoping to sell a lot of models for it.I mean they are a business and that's what businesses do right?.Its clear to me from last years releases for 40k ,with a rushed new edition rules due to their botching of balance(like there is some,lol) with certain codex releases,that they don't do much testing on anything and are more just throwing stuff at the wall and seeing if it sticks. As to the added cost for getting into LoU.Personally I ran into some extra money last year due to having a very good year at work with bonus sales and stuff of that nature so I really jumped on the opportunity to start a new army in WHFB and always liked the TK models so I dove in on this new UL thing..plus I love playing the latest features in games .I started this with the idea that I would be running the new Super characters as well and plan to have a 2500-3k list range to build in.Now I can say with ease that ive spend ALOT more than one would have to spend if they just wanted to use LoU as a feature for their army,using it the way I do with the Goblins. Really all one needs to run the LoU as additional redirectors/blockers/speed bumps is maybe a box of Skeletons,box of Dire Wolves and box of Spirit Hosts...these are the most common I can get out reliably.The monsterous infantry stuff,cavalry and Monsters are much more difficult to get out needing 16+ casting and likely draws a scroll or requires a juke or two to try and get them out there.Of course one would need the army books for the stats and abilities as well,unless of course that was house ruled to just use army builder info or maybe a community made roster for most common summoned units. So I guess for investment purposes,you are probably looking at another 200.00 tops to start using LoU in your army...which is certainly a lot of money however is probably not far off base from what it would cost to start a new army..and that's pretty much what you are doing anyway. Now for how effective it can be on the table I only can speak to the few games ive played with it and the reports ive read elsewere,and I can say at this point that I do see it as a good addition for OnG`s and its actually not nearly as unfluffy with them as it would be with most of the Order factions...for instance Bretonians,,yeah that seems just wrong.From using the lore with my OnGs I think it certainly does add a lot of security to the fragile army in the way of delaying the opponents elite units from getting to the meat of my OnG`s,that usually being the main bunker with the BSB and Gen.But that alone wont win games consistently as I still need good hammers or some way to actually remove enemy units and LoU simply is not reliable enough to do that.So yes its annoying,perhaps even rather "cheesy" but hey, every army can use it.And that's were it may be a real game changer..how can some of these more top tier armies exploit LoU by throwing in a lvl 1-2 wiz with it. Plus I can say with confidence that a 2500-3k Nagash list WILL put the beat down on the average top tier army right now because with him Ill be throwing down 8 crypt horrors on a 16+ summons,,or how would you like a Blender Vamp every turn on a mear 10+ summons...15 Black Knights breathing on your gunline on turn one?...yup 16+ to cast and they are in the face.OK..thats enough tough talk especially when I have no were near the skill to back that up ...but seriously,these "Super Heavy" characters really have no place in the current meta and are strictly novelty/scenario lists,though I suppose as this End Times stuff completes its release cycle these big guys may end up being the norm..who knows? Last nights game with Will was a lot of fun and quite the bloodbath ending up pretty much a Draw...he had poor overall luck ,and mine was above average for what I usually see.But I got to play someone with a more equal skill to me(him being a new player and me being ..well..dense as usual )and it was against HIgh Elves which will be my main Order army and my next project.Summoning in this fight kept me in the fight for sure as I think If I didn't have it he would have walked through me by turn 3.Is LoU going to make my OnG`s into a top tier army?..no way..it just adds a bit more survivability to the army and that's about it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MexicanNinja Posted January 6, 2015 Report Share Posted January 6, 2015 I like the lore, but IMO all summoned units should give up VP. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wisetiger7 Posted January 6, 2015 Report Share Posted January 6, 2015 I agree with MN. All summoned units, period. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murphy'sLawyer Posted January 6, 2015 Report Share Posted January 6, 2015 Rcnjack understand I respect your use of LoU and you are just doing what players should do, trying out your options and seeing what happens. And we as a group get to see how LoU works and try to guage where it sits. So keep using it. I was just pointing out the obvious. The LoU was most likely a rushed lore put out to help GW's lagging profits for fantasy. Of course I would love to see GW's profits for the last 2 quaters to see how well the ET have boosted their sales. My guess is that they are very happy. My finner point was that the way LoU is written you can raise just about anything and are not limited to certain choices outside of the unit type you can summon. It makes it very nice for those who have both TK and VC armies but really encourages players to invest money into more models for more options. Infact it is very clever but the balance might be the big issue since it appears to be rushed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
generalripphook Posted January 6, 2015 Report Share Posted January 6, 2015 I think LoU could be a more balanced lore if only available to the undead armies and without Nagash and his uber summoning. Also i agree on the vp thing. Thats just stupid. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MexicanNinja Posted January 6, 2015 Report Share Posted January 6, 2015 At least in 7th ed there was a set number of VP that summoned units were worth. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Threejacks Posted January 6, 2015 Report Share Posted January 6, 2015 /agree on the VP thing To me that's the biggest issue with LoU as at this point there is really no downside to it at all.And with the possibility of that new magic system going mainstream with the next rulebook I could see summoning being much more powerfull. I would think at a minimum that summoned units should at least give up a set value based on the summoning cost,perhaps something like the 9 and 10+ spells giving up 25/14+ giving up 50 or maybe 75 and so on.At least this is something but yet not complete unit cost as there is some effort/luck involved in putting them on the table. More playtesting needed!..actually I would like to see what some of the higher tier lists can do with it as that's what will really force some rules ammendments or house ruling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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