Alternate 8th Edition DoC army book, The definitive Daemon re-write.

I havent been writing this thread too much due to being busy with my new company lately. I noticed few things that you might want to check here.

Firstly you got something like 80 gifts there on the list. Basic rulebook got 82 magic items and majority of them are very mundane items like +2A or 5++ save. On new armybooks there has been around 10 items max for each race. Our current book got 53 gits in it. It seems that the trend is to reduce all magic items and severly tone them down, I would say its quite optimistic to throw almost same amount of gifts there that there is items on BRB. So instead of making them all gifts some could be taken as upgrades instead, like new Empire monsters and big things got them. You know, terror or swifstride by spending some points. Some gifts might be given to special characters only.

Second, the big guys on the new books are mostly support and if they have magical abilities they are bound spells (TK/Empire/Vampires). I actually like this trend that big guys offer some boosts and make units work differently or make them just plain powerful. TK support makes mages more powerful + bounds, Empire all the troops + bounds, Ogres give ASL to opponent, Vampires have reg bonus machine and pure support distruption unit. According to trend daemon models would be something like: "Khorne: All units withing 6" get furious charge. Nurgle: All units within 6" reroll regeneration. Tzeentch, All models withing 6" get +1 to cast. Slaanesh: All enemies within 6" get ASL". All of those are just quick ideas, but you get the idea. Just browse the new books and you see that majority of the big new things are pure support that gives some new ways of fighting.

This could affect all of the work done again (har har), but I would still seriously consider it since that really seem to be the trend they are taking here. If the next books big thing is yet another support we can be pretty darn sure that ours will be too. Third thing is yet another thing of those supports. They are all multipart models where you could make several models of the one pack, so something like warshrine, war machine or something like that would be the likely thing we would see here. I am just speculating here so that the choices would be closer to what dev team thinks.

@ JonathanC
Right. The damn bird doesn't have Spellbreaker in our current book either. I just assumed without really thinking about. Well in that case it's a 'good catch' and of course the Spellbreaker should be removed from the LoC.

@ SaintSpirit
That those Herald-level Special Characters should have the Locus was probably the First thing I would have said about them too, at the beginning of this thread. But like has already been pointed out they would just become no-brainers in virtually every game that 'allows' Special Characters to begin with.

The subject of 'what units' to add for Nurgle is one of those issues where I think one has to accept that it's just not possible to get 'everything' one might have wanted.
As I reference I was reading through the Hordes of Chaos book this morning when going to sleep, and that book has a lot of stuff in it. Too much stuff. With a little hindsight, the infamous 'split' of the Chaos factions (that had already begun with Beastmen at that point, I think) is really 'written on the wall' in that book.
Bottom line is that Forgeworld and GW have 'tighes' to one another. And Forgeworld has made two 'new' units for Nurgle that could reasonably be implemented into a new Daemons of Chaos volume - adding two new units (off the top of our heads) to the other 'Marks/Gods' is where we decided to stop ourselves.. Simply because you gotta draw the line somewhere.
That Nurgle Chariot is 'missing', you're right. Personally though I'm not really missing it - we did discuss it but it seemed to us [at the time] it didn't really add much to the Army as a whole, and thus constituted perhaps the 'easiest' thing to get along without (and the 3 other chariots, in the Special Section, are not that much of a stretch seeing as they actually exist in our current book all though as Char-Mounts only).
Scrutinizing things sternly many a 'weakness' can be analysed in this re-write. Kitsune is onto the same track pretty much (will reply to this in a sec!) and basically it's important to remember that while we have indeed written this as a "total Army Book" that will be playtested as a whole, nobody is expecting the "New DoC Book" to officially include All the stuff we've suggested (or even the same amount of stuff) - for good or worse that just doesn't seem to be GW's melody in 8th Edition.

@ LAV-Kitsune
Well we've been missing you dude. But yeah, it's not hard to imagine you've had to prioritize between which text-walls you're gonna get yourself entangled in lately. I hope things are working off to a good start with your business and all.
Daemonic Gifts
Sadly, you are right of course. Every indication we have thus far in 8th Edition points toward Daemons actually getting less variety in terms of Gifts compared to the present Army Book. As will be carefully expressed in the Designer's Note we're not seriously suggesting that ALL these Gifts (old and new) are to be included in the official Army Book - all though we will also add the notation that this would of course be preferable(!) as far as we're concerned. A GW Designer will instead get a whole slew of 'suggestions' where they can pick and choose and use our 'mechanics' as inspiration for whatever Gifts they ultimately decide to keep or add.
In the case of the Daemonic Gifts, and while it might look more 'serious' at a casual glance, I think we would have done ourselves more harm than good by keeping to (for example) a narrow line of 40 or 50 Gifts. That would have become much more of a 'Take it All, Or Leave it All' subject - where-as now we're presenting a veritable smorgosbord of 'alternatives'.
Beyond that, assuming that Daemons retain the basic 'mechanic' of Deamonic Gifts I think we'll both agree that '10' of them is not gonna cut it. You're right that with extensive 'individual upgrades' for each Unit one could probably get away with 10 Gifts per God but it would be a sad day as far as I am concerned.
Bottom line is that we're not ignorant to the appearant trends in Warhammer 8th Edition - but there seems to be little point in suggestion to GW what they already are thinking of doing, and to some extent this re-write is our way of telling them 'Enough!'
Because, yeah, personally I really think this concentration on BRB Magic Items is perhaps the biggest 'design flaw' of 8th Ed Army Books. I really hate it to be honest. I don't care if it's easier to balance or survey, I don't care if old Army Books were filled with Magic Items that nobody every used - to me variety [in itself] is a bonus, and every time two enemy characters are facing each-other sporting 'the same' Magic Item(s) on their profile I feel it's very 'meh' indeed, and quite a shame.
Anyway: We know there's too many Gifts. This will be amply emphasized to GW as well. And it is sort of the point.

New Units & Support Functions
Well the Burning Chariot (the Special Choice), the Behemoth and the Eye of Tzeentch ALL include very definate support-bonuses in the direction that you describe Kitsune. I would venture as far as saying that the Phantasm of Slaanesh is the only suggestion added that doesn't have a very clear supporting role in the Army.
And the difference between Daemons and most other races in Warhammer is that we already have the Locus!. So to a large degree we already have those kinds of dynamic bonuses covered already.
The "multipart-plastic" kit observation is also something we've discussed of course, and yes there are 'fears' that GW will go in the direction of doing something 'cheap' like a Daemonic 'Warshrine' plastic kit where you can stick a Nurgle/Tzeentch/Khorne/Slaanesh 'emblem' at the top for 'variety'.
That would be really 'meh' - if you ask me. Just as in the case of Gifts, I think GW would have gone 'overboard' if they did something like that. And compared to the actual suggestions we're putting forth in this re-write I'm pretty damn sure they'd be 'losing money' too - assuming that 'economies of scale' is the sole parameter judged on this issue.
And hey - The new Walter is not in the same kit as the Luminark/Hurricanium, the new Gryphon cannot be built into a new Warwagon or whatever.. Just saying..

And again: These are suggestions. Nobody in their right mind dears even hope that we'll be getting this many Gifts or this many new Units. Our objective has been to present a pallette of ideas to draw on, that work together as a synthethized (balanced) 'total' but where the ultimate Designer can 'pick and choose' (or just ignore!) parts or All of our suggestions.

In the end I seriously think GW will have to re-evaluate their 'Design Philosophy' [of late] when it comes to Daemons (and Dwarves would be another good example of this) lest they will redo Daemons into something quite bland and boring.
A Designer of the new Dwarf-book would be presented with very similar problems:
Dwarves shouldn't have Monstrous Cav, they shouldn't have Monstrous Infantry, they shouldn't have Wizards, they shouldn't have Common Magic Items. Period. If GW gives them all that stuff merely because it's '8th Edition' then they will have lost the plot as far as I am concerned.
You could give Daemons the Unstable Rule and Common Magic Items as well. It would be ugly. But you could. But I will eat my own hat rather than actually 'suggestion' such things to GW.

Oh well, our re-write is obviously 'too good to be true' - hopefully not in terms of 'balance' but definately in terms of variety and depth.. In terms of what an awesome joy it would be for DoC players everywhere to get an Army Book like this in their lap(!).
If GW just takes notice of the 'bits and peices' however, or by some wierd stroke of luck implements the same basic design philosophy, a lot would be gained.
So we are humble to a lot of the points you bring up Kitsune, I really think we are.

Well I will just say I pretty much agree with what DaemonReign has said. The only reason I can think of for us getting some sort of Empire-style buffing aura is if the Locus went onto them instead of being on the Heralds, because either they both do the same (and one becomes potentially obsolete as a result) or they both give different benefits, in which case the combined power of both (plus augments too) would be hard to balance.

I would hope they don't do some sort of Altar/Warshrine with different bits for customisation like DaemonReign mentioned. Apart from it not suiting the style of the army, it would fit into 40k even less. Some sort of generic monster that can be marked (like the Giant Chaos Spined Beast from FW) and grants area buffs based on its mark is a possibility I guess, and probably closer to what Kitsune was thinking of than a Warshrine-type construct. That would at least fit into 40k better, even if there would be some overlap with GD/DP.

While recent books have included a lot of support monsters/chariots, pure fighters have been included too. For every Heirotitan, Thundertusk or Mortis Engine, there is a Necrosphinx, Arachnarok, Stonehorn or Varghulf (OK, last one was an old one but you get the idea, plus it can no longer help nearby units march so has lost what supporting role it had). DaemonReign has already pointed out that some of our new units have supporting capabilities with shooting, slash attacks, magic channeling and magic protection. The Phantasm is more of a fighter in the Varghulf mold and I would say in a mono-Slaanesh army having an S5 monster when most of the army is S3 is useful in itself. Nevertheless, it has Soporific Musk, the ability to ensnare characters and a breath weapon that lowers WS and I, so it has its uses when involved in a multiple combat beyond pure kill-power.

But you could be right that most new big kits in future will be support orientated, in which case we would just have to admit we got it wrong. Problem with Daemons is they are all so different its difficult to envisage a kit that would suit all 4 Gods aesthetically (and work in 40k too). We have tried to imagine how some of our new units could be combo-kits, but apart from the Behemoth/Skullshrine, Plague Toads/Pox Riders and possibly GUO/Ku'Gath, BT/Skarbrand and Keeper/N'Kari most of them would have to be done individually. I imagined the Phantasm would probably be a single finecast model anyway, which is easier to produce (although it could possibly be made an option in a plastic Keeper box). In many ways here, I think Daemons are a victim of their diversity so its hard to see us getting all our units when the book comes out if we get as many new ones as were suggesting (unless some come out in advance like the Terrorgheist).

When it comes to the gifts (and icons), I think if I had been doing this myself I probably would have gone a similar way to how Kitsune suggests. Here I bowed to the majority though and I think we have so many great new ideas I'd struggle to cut the numbers down that drastically if I was forced to.

Regarding the Number of Gifts
- If the BRB has 82 'shared' Magic Items, and each Army Book (except Daemons and Dwarves) have 10-15 Magic Items (plus the race-specific Big Names/Vampiric Powers) I find it quite difficult to grasp why having ~80 Daemonic Gifts is such a giant stretch. To be perfectly honest.

- Kitsune mentions that most of the BRB Items are quite 'mundane', but I think the same thing applies to our Gifts (really). The spread of costs, and effects, seem pretty equal at a glance. Surely Daemonic Gifts are different, because Daemons are Different.

- 'Cutting those numbers' drastically is something we should leave to GW to do, and basically hope that they don't. The decrease of Army Specific Items is a shame when it comes to most armies, but when it comes to Daemons/Dwarves they just plain need to 'Stop It'.
In my humble opinion.

Other than that, or really, including that - I agree with what you're saying JonathanC.

EDIT
Speaking of which.. JonathanC..
You mentioned earlier that you had some thoughts on those Designer's Notes I've been jotting together on my 3rd post of Page 1. Perhaps it's time to address that bit now that we're basically waiting for RealVeon to implement the sum of our little edits to the latest version of the PDF. After all, if the 1st of May is the 'deadline' I feel we're not exactly endowed with much time to waste.
Oh well, it's not like the world is gonna end if we break that deadline.. But perhaps you could give me some pointers before I start editing those Designer's Note (perhaps saving us both some double work, so to speak)?

Hello, I've got the new pdf here:

http://www.mediafire.com/?n9c4ajjdrefswk1

A couple of things with your edits:

For the Seeker upgrade, DaemonReign suggested we re-word it to say that every model gets to make 2 supporting attacks, but how would that interact with the Steed mounts? Would they then get 2 attacks as well? By saying that every model that makes a supporting attack gets an additional attacks keeps the Steeds out of it. Of course, if someone has a better way of phrasing this that gets the same point across, I'm all ears.

I've separated out the mount special rules from their rider's special rules if there was more than one rule that only applied to the mount (or rider depending). If there was only one rule that applied to the mount (like Steeds poisoned attacks for Seekers), I kept it as is. This is consistent with the Demigryphs for example, which have armour piercing while their riders don't.

Finally, should the Lord of Change have the Power of the Warp gift option?

Just tried downloading it but no luck. Says webpage not found. EDIT: 4th time lucky!

Yes, Power of the Warp should be available to the LoC too (hadn't noticed it was missing from him).

For the Seekers, how about: "Every model with this upgrade that can make supporting attacks can make 2", or possibly: "Models in the unit with this upgrade can make 2 supporting attacks instead of the normal 1"

Hmm, neither looks ideal to me. The only thing we really need to make certain of with the wording for it is that we don't allow for an interpretation where Seekers can make supporting attacks at all, since they can't normally. Also, that if a Herald is in the second rank it can't make 2 supporting attacks.

@DaemonReign - I wasn't suggesting that the selection of gifts could get knocked down to 15 or so (and I'm not sure Kitsune was either), more that I would have gone for a "one-in, one-out" approach if I'd been doing this myself, so that we ended up with roughly the same number we had already, say 40-55ish. Anyway, its rather immeterial now as we have gone for the "smorgasbord" approach instead.

As for the designers notes, I will post a more detailed review soon. I will ignore most spelling mistakes as you will no doubt run it through an English (UK) spellchecker before sending it off, but some stuff needs changing because we have moved on a bit since you first wrote them and there is also some restructuring/trimming that could be done. One thing I will point out now is there are a lot of combined words mistakes, i.e. stuff like "alot", "pointscost", "ToHit", etc, where you just need to insert a space (or sometimes a hyphen) between the two words.

I'm at work so I won't even try to Download the new version of the PDF until the morning, so a few hours.

Furious Upgrade
You're right guys, I'm an idiot.

Now.. Looking at that issue, if we are to 'measure' the exact words to make the Rule specific 'enough' then this should suffice:
"Each Daemonette the unit that would normally be allowed to make a Supporting Attack can make an additional Attack in each Close-Combat Phase."

- This excludes Heralds (in the backrank).
- And Naturally also the Steeds.

The problem is *sigh* - you're right! - people (being 'people') are still going to Ask what happens if you put a Herald of Slaanesh in the Second Rank of the unit.
Avoiding that, it seems, is only going to be safely conducted by actually adding a "Note that this does not include any Characters that might be displaced to the second rank."

Now.. I had not really concidered the whole issue of the Herald of Slaanesh in the second rank of such a Furious Unit.
Would it be such a crime if that Herald was allowed to make one measly extra attack? I mean: Would it prompt the entire upgrade to become more expensive? There some 'abuse factor' I am missing here?
Sure, you cannot Hit the Herald in combat - but the Herald is also giving up 2 attacks still (as opposed to giving up 3 attacks).

With the 'Swiftstride'-upgrade for Daemonettes we resolved that it would include joined Chars. But I assume that's just a 'no-go' with this one? Yes?

Designer's Note
Yeah I imagine there's quite a lot to fix. I think what we'll do is take it 'section by section'. Let's give it a go as soon as we've hammered out the last details in the PDF.

Also:
Good catch about Power of the Warp RealVeon!

Cheers!

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EDIT
*Home at last*

First off: I added RealVeon's latest Edit to page 1, as usual, and I guess it's not necessary for me to point that out..

Secondly: Thinking more about the Furious Upgrade and how it should not effect Heralds in the 'backrank' I finally realized that the Locus of Slaanesh would present a bit of a problem if you were able to fight from the backrank in a reasonable manner with a Herald.

- Take a Herald of Slaanesh, get her into the backrank of a unit, give here the Etherblade (or something like that) and have fun chopping up enemies that suddenly can't even cancel the ASF that the Daemonettes have.
So yeah the Furious upgrade shouldn't effect joined Characters.

Therefore, as I said before, writing that:
"Daemonettes with this upgrade that are allowed to make supporting attacks are allowed one extra attack compared to the normal single attack"
Or simply:
"Models in a unit with this upgrade that are normally allowed one supporting attacks may instead make two supporting attacks. Note that this does not include any Characters that might have joined the unit."

I don't really know how people would get from that the Steeds would be allowed to make such an attack - since Mounts are never allowed to make Supporting Attacks in the first place.

***

There, my download just finnished, I'm gonna look over it before blabbering on any further.
*Ah.. This is like opening a chrismass present every time!*

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EDIT
Well I naturally haven't read all of it, but it's looking good.. I'm sitting here looking at the 'Furious' Upgrade for Seekers of Slaanesh..
The present wording in the PDF is fine in the sense that I don't think anyone (with any grasp on the Core Rules) would get from that the Seeker Steeds would somehow get to make supporting Attacks.
The only problem is that, well, the current wording in the PDF also includes any Herald that might have joined the unit and be in the backrank.

This morning when I thought about this I said that the Locus of Slaanesh made this an issue that needs fixing, but now I'm starting to lean the other way primarily because we're talking about Seekers here (i.e. it would have been a whole different ballgame if Daemonettes also had this Upgrade!).

Sticking the Herald in the Backrank of a Seeker unit would be questionable either way, I think..
If you reform them to be 3 wide (assuming you got full command) you'd be sacrificing a whole lot of attacks unless the unit was only 6 models (Herald included) to begin with - and with a unit that small (6 models) you'd be *gone* in one round of shooting.
And you wouldn't get ranks, wouldn't be able to disrupt.
So at this point I fail to see the problem. Sure, it's a bit gamey I guess - but since it's actually not particularly usefull..
The other way of getting a Herald into the backrank is to get 3 Heralds and deploy five wide, of course. But then you're investing 360+ points just to make a unit of Seekers strike first reliably.. Hardly broken.

Anyway, if you guys are adamant that Heralds should be excempt from this rule, I think the best thing to do is to pretty much KEEP the current wording and simply add another sentence saying: Note that this does not include joined Characters.

Also, while we are at it, and only if you can be bothered and agree RealVeon, I'd like to make a little change - perhaps - to the actual fluff-description of the Furious Upgrade..
It currently reads like this:
The swiftest of Slaanesh’s daemons are often also those with th e great est martial prowess.

I envision this upgrade more like this:
These Slaanesh Daemons seem to hurl themselves at the enemy in a deadly ballet that gracefully overwhelms most opponants.

Or something like that.. But naturally RealVeon's original description works too. This is really nitpicking due to us putting this but under the looking glass.

********************************************************************************
EDIT
Further nitpicking..
If/when you edit the Furious Upgrade for Seekers, I just caught this little thing at the beginning of the 8th Paragraph on page 37:
Tzeentch’s symbol is a rune covered sphere, often in the shape of the all–seeing eye, bounded by a twisting fl ame.
- Should be 'rune-covered'.. We should have caught this before, sorry.

I also just noticed *haha* that Be'lakor has M6 while the generic Daemon Prince has M8. Seems like we've all be speeding past that.. Or should Be'lakor be 2 digits slower on the ground compared to the normal DP?

Page 62:
Icon of Essence
- I guess "Icon of Essence" works.. But if it was up to me I'd call it "Icon of the Essence instead.

Page 63:
Be'lakors Movement Value is '6' in his Army List entry as well. Again, assuming he shouldn't actually have a lower M-value compared to the normal DP. (Awww! ... Does this mean we have to recalculate his Cost??)

Page 55:
Daemonic Gifts are cumulative except for saving throws of all types (eg. armour, ward and regeneration).
It's great that you added this sentence, it's probably good to include Ward and Regen as well.. Just a word of caution though, or really something I just want to check with you guys so that we're not shooting ourselves in the foot:
- The Daemonic Gifts "Aura of Nurgle" and "Aura of Tzeentch" are specifically designed to be cumulative - and I know it should be pretty damn appearant that they are (given the wording of '+1 to Regen/Wardsave') but a suppose a really pedantic rules-lawyer could start to argue the opposite with the above sentence.

Let's look at the Official FAQ entry:

Q. Does a Daemonic Gift work in combination with other
equipment, magic items, or Daemonic Gifts? For example, the
Balesword with flail – would it combine the +2 Strength bonus
with the effects of the Balesword? (p92)
A. Yes, except for saving throws, where the best saving throw of
each type (armour, ward or regeneration) must be used.

So, if we write:
Daemonic Gifts are cumulative except for saving throws of all types where the best saving throw of each type (Armour, Wardsave or Regeneration) must be used.

I don't know, maybe I am chasing a ghost here.. What do you guys think?

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Now that I have the Official Errata FAQ in front of me I'll paste in the Questions&Answers that I think we should implement into the PDF (in their relevant places):

Q: If a unit of Pink Horrors of Tzeentch are the target of a
magic item or spell, such as Sivejir’s Hex Scroll or Wurrzag’s
Revenge, how is this resolved? (p37)
A: The player controlling the Pink Horrors must nominate one
model to be the target of the magic item or spell.
- Is this clarified in the PDF already?

Q. Does the Tally of Pestilence affect bound spells? (p57)
A. No.
- This one could be added as a notation for Epidemius' Tally.

Q. Does Miasma of Pestilence effect Impact hits? (p62)
A. No.
- There's a lot of Questions&Answers regarding the Miasma of Pestilence, most of them I think are pretty obvious (wonder why they felt they need to FAQ them) but this one concerning incoming Impact Hits is actually pretty 'on point'.

Q. Can Dark Insanity increase a model’s number of Attacks to
greater than 10? (p92)
A. Yes.
- I guess it would not hurt to add this sentence to Dark Insanity in the Gift Section:
Note that this may bring the number of attacks beyond 10.

Q. How does the gift Daemonic Robes interact with hits that
wound automatically? (p93)
A. Daemonic Robes only works against attacks that roll to
wound, so the Robes offer no protection.
- Is it worth adding this as a notation to Daemonic Robes?
I.e. This Daemon can never be wounded on better than 3+, assuming the attack does not wound automatically. (?)

Q. Is Iridescent Corona applied before or after impact hits? (p93)
A. The player whose turn is taking place can decide.
- I don't know about you, but I really dislike this "Player who's turn it is may decide" stuff. Can't we just say that Iridescant Corona applies simultaneously with Impact Hits?

Q. Can an enemy model affected by the Temptator gift issue a
challenge? (p93)
A. No.
- Why not just add this to the description of the Gift?

Q. Does Pestilent Mucus force Toughness tests for wounds suffered
by failed Daemoninic Instability tests? (p94)
A. Yes.
- I guess it would not hurt to clarify this as well.

Q. If a unit is affected by more than one Siren Song who must they
charge? (p94)
A. The player whose turn is taking place can decide.
- This has got to be the dumbest Question (and Answer) in the entire Game. I litterally get a headache every time I see it. Just wanted to point that out.

Q. Does the Great Standard of Sundering give a -2 penalty to
Ogre Gut Magic? (p95)
A. No.
- This isn't something we can add to the PDF.. But I certainly hope they remove this Q&A at some point... No justification for it anymore. Especially not now that we've toned down the Sundering Flag.

Q. Can the Great Standard of Sundering interact with ‘free’
spells in particular army books, such as Drain Magic in the High
Elf book, and Invocation of Nehek in the Vampire Counts? (p95)
A. No.
- I suppose this could be cleared up directly "in our book" though. (?)

Q. If an enemy unit is within 12” of the Great Icon of Despair
and the unit is within the general’s Inspiring Presence radius, does
the Leadership value conferred by Inspiring Presence suffer the
modifier even if the General is not within 12” of the banner? (p95)
A. Yes.
- It would be neat if this was clearly expressed as well..

**********************************************************************************
Perhaps you guys can have a little look at the FAQ as well.
I need to go to work now.
Cheers!

****************************************************************************
EDIT
Quite quiet here for the last 24 hours. You guys exhausted? I know I am..
Anyway..
Unless someone beats me to it I'm gonna try and make some more specific sense out of these FAQ entries that I listed above yesterday. Gonna try to formulate the exact wordings that need to be implemented in order to "mirror" them (where applicable) in our re-write.
I guess this will take some of the load off RealVeon's back.

Cheers!

Well I'm pretty tired, so I'll try to keep this brief.

Furious - I think its the principle of the thing more than how powerful it could be, so for that reason I'd rather the HoS was exempt from this benefit.

Be'Lakor - well the profile is mostly a copy/paste from Storm of Chaos, including the M6, so it was facored into his cost. Since he has wings its not a major drawback, but I think his legs are a bit different in shape (and certainly shorter) than a normal DP anyway.

I think the notation on saves stacking in the gift section is sufficiently clear for everyone but the hard of thinking to make sense of it.

Hex scroll, etc - too specific to make it worth including perhaps? Can't cover absolutely everything in such a finite space after all.

Tally - probably worth including.

Aren't impact hits normally exempt from bonuses/penalties anyway, like breath weapons?

Dark Insanity - not needed I think as it uses the proper Random Attacks special rule now.

Daemonic Robes - probably wouldn't hurt to add a note to that effect.

Iridescent Corona - not sure if necessary.

Temptator/Pestilent Mucus - agreed.

Sundering - that Gut Magic question is obsolete now as Ogres use the Lore of the Great Maw instead. I think 'free' spells are on the way out, going by the changes to VC magic, so I see no reason why they should be exempt now (the fact they get more spells is advantageous enough).

Despair Icon - not sure this is needed either. Should be obvious.

I was going to post my comments on the first section of the designers notes, but am rather tired so will leave it for now. Hopefully get it done soon though.

A good reason for not sticking to the arbitrary deadline we set though is that I have arranged a game using our new book for next Wednesday - Huzzah!!! It will be a 2,500pt game against WoC (probably Tzeentch themed). Planning on using The Eye, Horrors, a Keeper or LoC, at least one Chariot and maybe some Beasts of Nurgle. Not sure what else yet, anything you think I should try out if I can?

Furious
Ok, I really have nothing against the Herald being excempt from this mechanic!

So we're looking at two basic options of wording here:
v.1 - Every Daemonette in a unit with this upgrade that would normally be allowed to make one supporting attack, can instead make 2 supporting attacks.

v.2 - Every model in a unit with this upgrade that would normally be allowed to make one supporting attack, can instead make 2 supporting attacks. Note that Heralds joined to such a unit cannot benefit from this upgrade.

* So both these version are saying the exact same thing. The first wording requires fewer actual words, but those 'hard of thinking' will probably still try to rules-lawyer that a Herald is really a Daemonette, if you think about it, just more powerfull.., so the benefit of the second version is that it leaves absolutely no room for willfull interpretation what-so-ever.

Aren't impact hits normally exempt from bonuses/penalties anyway, like breath weapons?
- Yeah, you might be right on that one now that I think about it.



Iridescant Corona
Well it is an 'interesting' question which goes first: The Iridescant Corona of the Herald getting hit by the Chariot, or the Impact Hits of the Chariot as it Charges. Since 'Iridescant Corona' takes place 'before any blows are struck' (just like Impact Hits), I don't think it would hurt to add a parenthesis in the description of the Gift that simply says '... before any blows are struck (simultaneously with Impact Hits) ...'.

Despair Icon
Well I agree it should be obvious. Clearly, though, GW found it necessary to clarify it for some reason. Admittedly, it's looking as those it could get a little 'wordy' to pinpoint it though.. but if we don't clarify this then we're basically working on the premise that this FAQ question will remain in the future as well.

Designer's Notes
Looking forward to your comments on those. But like I said: I think we should wrap up the last odd ends with the main document first, and then we can take the Designer's Notes 'section by section' *HERE* so to speak (rather than having my messy draft on the third post of page 1).

Finally
That's awesome you got a test-game coming up. I am half hoping that I'll be able to play one at the end of this weekend as well.. We had a little meet planned at the club.. But it seems one of my buddies screwed up his planning a little so I can't promise anything.

I think there's a definate limit to how much "new stuff" you can seriously test at the same time. So that looks like a pretty good list. Maybe upgrade a few Flamers to Changebringers and see what that feels like?
But I'd say that between the Eye and the Horrors (alone) you got enough new details to evaluate.
Either way, I'll certainly await the result with anticipation. Bring the camera if you can!

*************************************************************************
EDIT
Just a quick little thing that I started thinking about while getting ready for sleep-mode:
Our 'Changebringers' (Flamers on Discs) are Flyers, and so the general rule of Warhammer is that Characters cannot join such units by any means.. Right?
So the Herald of Tzeentch on Disc would not be able to Fly in such a unit - correct?
I am not arguing that we should change this, create some sort of gimmicky Special Rule that would somehow allow the Tzeentch Herald to join Changebringers, but I just want to be certain I got this bit right and that there's nothing we need to specify further about it.
I just realized, however, that while the Herald of Tzeentch on Disc wouldn't be able to join such a unit of Changebringers such a Herald would still be able to get the 'weaker' form of "LookOutSir" by being in proximity to those Flying Flamers.
Both the Disc-HoT and the Changebringers are Cavalry, after all.

And that's actually very cool (now that we've removed the Wings from the HoT all together!) - because it used to be that only Seekers of Slaanesh could provide the Disc-Herald with the 4+ LookOutSir save.

Now we're looking at a situation where you can get the 2+ LookOutSir! save from joining either Horrors or normal Flamers, and you can get the 4+ LookOutSir! save as a single model but with the caveat that you can no longer fly, or you can get a Disc of Tzeentch and Changebringers and provide some [expensive] protection for the HoT.

@ TheRealVeon
I'm hoping/assuming that you're lurking this thread from time to time so I'll just say that unless I hear from you I'll start posting 'edits' (on account of these FAQ entries that we've been discussing) as I mentioned before. The reason I bring this up is that if you're 'keeping pace' with me and JonathanC already [i.e. already have made the necessary tweaks to the Gifts etcetera in question] then I suppose it would be quite superflous for me to come up with such 'exact wordings'.
So let me know. And I don't say this as a way of pressuring you man, we all got 'a life' (even though I'd understand if you guys doubt it in my case..)

Over and out!

We know you 'have a life' D-Reign, your just obsessed with Daemons!!

Came up with the following list which I think allows me to try out a variety of new/revamped stuff, along with the effects of Daemonic Rivalry:

GUO - level 4, Blade of Entropy, Trappings of Nurgle
HoK - BSB, Magic Hater, Armour of Khorne, Bloodlust of Khorne
HoT - Radiance of Dark Glory, Arcane Knowledge, Attuned to Oblivion
28 Bloodletters - FC
19 Pink Horrors - Standard, Musician, Banner of Change
3 Plague Toads
Blood Chariot - Fury of Khorne
3 Bloodcrushers - Musician
2 Screamers
Eye of Tzeentch
Beast of Nurgle - Playful

Deliberately avoided Plaguebearers, Fiends, Flamers and Nurglings because I have been using them a lot recently and they haven't really changed much in our re-write. Hopefully I'll get some Plaguebearers during the game by casting Plaguewind on something. Thought about including the Phantasm or Behemoth but decided to see how much difference the extra wound on the Crushers made, plus for my first game one completely new monster is probably enough.

Anyway, onto the Designer's notes. I have tried to keep alterations to a minimum so its more of a polish job rather than re-writing them. Here's what I've done so far:

Designer's Notes

Introduction:
The objective with this project is to build on the existing Daemons of Chaos Army Book, tending to internal balance and update the Book for the 8th Edition of Warhammer Fantasy. 'Fixes' have been employed, rather than removal, when it comes to gifts and icons deemed problematic in the current Army Book. These are to be considered suggestions for how to keep these various items, but we are humble to the fact that some old items are likely to be removed as new ones are inserted. The objective with this re-write has naturally been inspired by the army books released for 8th Edition thus far, and it is in that spirit that we sincerely hope our work will be a source of inspiration for the Lead Developer of the next Daemons of Chaos Army Book. This re-write is being sent to the Games Development Team, and will be followed by a more extensive "Playtest-Run" where we will report back to Games Development on our own findings.

Disclaimer! - While we consider ourselves to have been taking this project very seriously, it is important to point out to any reader that this re-write is 100% fan-based and Games Workshop has not been involved, commented on, or 'supported' this project in any way. We're just a varied assortment of Daemon-players from around the world who have come together on a Forum (The Daemonic Legion) to discuss something that is very dear to us: Daemons of Chaos!

These 'Designer's Notes' will cover the sections of the army book as we have worked through them, focusing on those subjects where this 'consensus project' reached the least consensus. Details being mentioned briefly, or not at all, are such issues where consensus was reached by our Board. The purpose of these notes are, after all, to give a quick guide to the re-write so every new points cost or rules change will not be defended specifically. Before discussing these sections, some general 'principles of design' should be mentioned.

Daemonic Instability
We have decided to keep the mechanic of Daemonic Instability from the current army book, while acknowledging that both the "Storm of Magic" and "Tamurkhan" (Warhammer Forge) releases featured Daemons with the Unstable special rule. It is our view that Instability is a more interesting mechanic, and above all that it creates a good separation between Daemonic units and the Undead. Removing Instability for the sake of streamlining gameplay does not seem worthwhile to us. If it is indeed the ideological intent of the Games Development Team to remove Instability, we would prefer virtually every option over the Unstable rule (which belongs to dead things in our view). For example, the old mechanic of entire units being removed when rolling higher than your unmodified leadership value in a break-test could be re-instated and this would be 'preferable' (despite requiring the same re-evaluations of points costs across the board) compared to giving Daemons the Unstable Rule, which in our view would simply turn Daemons into a ‘3rd Undead army’ for a lot of players.

We do acknowledge that Daemons are a 'strong' faction amongst the armies in Warhammer, particularly able (in our present army book) to create a vast array of competitive builds with great synergy. This issue has been partly addressed with a new version of Daemonic Rivalry that effects the Inspiring Presence of Daemonic Generals as well as rebalancing some of the more powerful options currently available to them.

Daemonic Rivalry
Our suggestion for Daemonic Rivalry is intended to be mostly a background-driven rule, although it's also intended to curtail the versatile synergies of the Daemon Army in a marginal way. The concept of Daemonic Rivalry has been embedded into this re-write in two ways:

First of all, Daemonic Generals that are dedicated to a Chaos Power (i.e. all Heralds, Greater Daemons and Marked Daemon Princes) only confer Inspiring Presence on aligned Daemons (i.e. Daemons that are servants of the same Chaos God). As will be further discussed below, changes have been made to the Daemon Prince (most importantly increasing its Leadership) which will allow players to always have an Undivided General (getting Inspiring Presence on all Daemons), albeit with the downside of the 'Unmarked Daemon Prince' being more fragile - and having 6" less range on his Inspiring Presence - compared to the Greater Daemons.

Secondly, aside of the 'negative incentive' put on Daemonic Inspiring Presence; we suggest a 'positive incentive' with respect to the alignment of Battle Standard Bearer and the General of the Army. Essentially, if your Battle Standard Bearer and General are followers of the same Chaos God, the optional Icons the Herald may pick include not just the (4) 'standard' Icons but also any unused 'unit icon' from the Chaos power in question. In addition, we suggest the addition of a '5th' God-specific Battle Standard Icon, that is strongly themed to the background of each Chaos God, and naturally only available to the Battle Standard Bearer. Even then, it can only be taken as long as the Battle Standard Bearer and General are servants of the same Chaos God.

The majority of this board feels that our version of Daemonic Rivalry is soft enough in mechanical terms in order to not ruin specific players armies and private notions of 'how Daemons should be played', while at the same time imposing a degree of restriction that encourages background-driven lists and essentially gives Daemons a little weakness for all their inherent little strengths. It is our sincere hope that the Lead Developer would look toward creating restrictions like this, rather than (for example) removing Gifts, Instability, Daemonic Aura, or re-instating the requirements of 'True Core' from previous editions.
----------------------------------------------------

I did this in Word using the Track Changes function, but unfortunately it doesn't really translate when copy/pasting it over so its difficult to highlight what has actually changed. Mostly its just changes in terminology and formatting (a lot of unnecessary quotation marks removed, for example) and the first couple of paragraphs in particular have been combined, but I've also added bits here and there. I also put the notes on Rivalry ahead of Gifts as it seemed more appropriate to have them follow the notes on Instability (the two are more closely linked after all). If you get this post up in a window next to your original notes I'm sure you will spot the changes I've made.

I'll look at Gifts, Icons, etc later.

I have to say I like the way the Rivalry bit rolls off man, I think it's a good point to push home to keep our current break test.

Have any of you guys ever read a GW publication? Your proof reading skills seem far more proficient then anything they have ever produced! Good on ye!

I'm still here, but I've had a cold all week. Also, I'm going to be gone this weekend, so I won't have a lot to say. I may be able to type some stuff in on my phone, but not much more than that.

I've added most of what you've been talking about concerning the FAQ. I also changed the way the Temptator is worded. Currently it just says that one character in base contact must take the test without specifying who gets to pick which character. I changed it so that the controlling player chooses, just because that made the most sense. If anyone disagrees, please tell me.

Also, as for characters joining flyers, can't they still join if the character (or their model) has the Fly special rule? I know it was last edition, but I remember Bretonnian Lords on Pegasi joining up with units of Pegasus Knights. Has anyone played them this edition? Can they still do that? No one around here uses them anymore since they lost 360 line of sight and their ranks due to Skirmishers.

Anyway, since I'll be gone, here's the latest update. I've also fixed a lot of the pictures so that they print out better. When you do print this out, please let me know if any of the images are too dark or unclear or if there's anything else wrong with them. That way I can fix them and they you'll only need to reprint those specific pages. Thanks.

http://www.mediafire.com/?zpxdukcttk3831i

Also, whenever I upload a new pdf, I always check the link to make sure it works. So if it doesn't, just keep trying, it should go through. If not, let me know right away.

Edit

Whoa, two updates since I started typing. As far as the Designer Notes go, I can put them into a file just like the actual pdf, but just not as fancy. I don't want to be spending a long time tinkering with them like I am with the actual rules, so I've just been waiting until they're finalized.

* I added the 'cleaned up' Designer's Notes to my third post on page 1. I think you've done an excellent job with these JonathanC. You actually changed a lot less stuff than I would have imagined, and I hope that means you're pretty much 'all right' with my original writing - because you certainly shouldn't hold yourself back from giving me critique. I'm just saying: Don't worry about hurting my feelings or anything!

I did read them and there's not a single thing worth nit-picking about as the portent of the text is identical to what I meant to put across - it just looks a lot more clean and tidy.

Your List
I think that is looking like a 'sane' place to start. I wouldn't have been able to resist giving the Bloodletters the "battlehardened" upgrade personally but then one cannot 'test' everything in one go - and besides, perhaps that upgrade is a little bit easier to evaluate from a math-hammer perspective alone (i.e. it's quite clear what its effects are!) so maybe not a priority in terms of testing.

Wow that whole Army will basically be denied the Inspiring Presence of the General. I guess the HoT (with Radiance of Dark Glory) is going with the Horrors - making the Radiance-Gift work as compensation (for them) for the loss of Inspiring Presence.

I think it's good that you're trying out the Ruinous Blade on the GUO. All though I 'worry' about the Gift a lot more in relation to other Daemonic Lords that sport almost twice as many Attacks as the GUO does.

Looks to me as a rather 'all round' list. It'll be cool to see how this pans out!

The PDF & those FAQ Entries
I actually logged on just now to get to work on creating the necessary 'wordings' for implementing the FAQ-entries that are applicable to our re-write. While I was reading the new posts I noticed RealVeon was online (Cheers!) and so I'll post this now and continue by looking at those FAQ entries.. My 'worry' being that RealVeon and I will cross-post and do the same work twice essentially.

@ Bonesaw
I'm glad you approve of the Rivalry! And proof-reading is a pretty demanding process but I agree GW let's things slip sometimes (most notable case lately in my opinion is the "Steadfast/Detachment/Regimental Units" catastrophy of the new Empire Book) so I think it's to our merit to spend some extra time really making sure everything is flawless (and in need of as little additional clarification [FAQ] as possible!).

Cheers!

***************************************************************************
EDIT
You the man RealVeon, you the man... (!)

- I will momentarily move your latest Link of the PDF to page 1, download it and start going through it.

- I don't think Flying Units can be joined by Chars any more, at least I have seen a lot of Bret-players whining about that on Warseer since 8th Ed came out so I think there must be a rule somewhere preventing them from doing that. Whereas you're right, they could it before!

- Designer's Notes: Agreed. No reason to work them over like you have done with the PDF. Absolutely no need for that! By the time you make it back here hopefully me and JonathanC will have them in mint condition.

- Your change to Temptator sounds very reasonable to me. I'll take a better look at it once I get the new PDF up and running!

Well I hope you manage to shake off that cold fast man. Have a nice trip (or whatever it is you're doing) and unless we hear from you over the phone we'll see what's turned up when you get back here next week.

Cheers!

*****************************************************************************
EDIT
I added the latest version of the PDF to the top of page 1.

I have also gone through the 'implemented' FAQ entries that were brought up earlier, including the Temptator-change RealVeon implemented himself, and by god.. it all looks great!

I'll be damned.. But I wonder if we're not actually on the 'verge' of being *done* here. Awesome!
Still, we'll spend the weekend looking over things in general.. I'm also gonna take one last look at the official FAQ to see if there's anything there that I missed the last time around.

As always: Outstanding effort RealVeon! We are forever in your debt!

******************************************************************************
EDIT

Browsing through the PDF, not really finding anything that's evident put I'll post a couple of things here - either just for musing over them, or for asking you guys if you think they are relevant 'enough' to be implemented:

Q. In a Daemon vs. Daemon battle, does the Standard of Chaos
Glory affect Daemons on both sides? (p95)
A. No.
- Ok this answer used to be 'Yes, let the Chaos reign!' at one point in time, and [no pun intended to my sig] I really prefered it that way. Not that it matters all that much, and I certainly don't think it's worth 'going against' this FAQ-entry as it stands.. Just saying I liked the original answer to this question becuase of the utter grind-fests it could result in.
Imagine having two Daemon armies, both with Standard of Chaos Glory at different ends of the table, effecting "all daemons" on both sides.. *muahaha*

Q. Is Noxious Vapours a permanent effect? (p94)
A. No, it only lasts while in contact.

Q. Do excess wounds inflicted by failed Toughness tests caused by
Pestilent Mucus pass on to the rest of the models in the unit? (p94)
A. No.
- These two FAQ entries are just strange to me. Why would you even ask these questions? What part of the current rules prompted questions like this? ... I don't get it.

Q. Is Noxious Vapours a permanent effect? (p94)
A. No, it only lasts while in contact.
- This isn't worth specifying either I reckon. Such a dumb question. While we could of course re-word the mechanic to cover this:
While in base contact with this Daemon all enemy models lose the Always Strike First special rule (if they have it) and gain the Always Strike Last special rule.

Q. If Acquiescence is cast on a unit that includes a character, does
he become Stupid too? (p63)
A. No.
- I guess we could add to the mechanic of this spell that 'If this spell has been cast on a unit containing joined Characters, such Characters are only subject to Stupidity as long as they do not leave the target unit.'

I really can't find anything else.. There's some FAQ-entries concerning whether or not the Masque can reduce the LD of a unit down to '0' but these seems rather dumb as well.. At least to me..

***************************************************************************
EDIT
Page 61 (of RealVeon's PDF!), regarding the "Icon of Stench":
The mechanic reads:
Any enemy models in base contact with this unit gain the Always Strikes Last special rule.
I wonder, though, if we shouldn't write it exactly like the 'Noxious Vapours' Gift?
E.g.
While in base contact with this unit all enemy models lose the Always Strike First special rule (if they have it) and gain the Always Strike Last special rule.

****************************************************************************
EDIT!
IMPORTANT NOTICE:

As I said before I was hoping earlier this week to get a play-test battle in with our revised Daemon Book. For a while there it looked as though schedules were collapsing for me and my friends, however, but suddenly things are looking as though they are opening up for tomorrow (Sunday).

It's all a bit dependant on the weather-forecast standing firm because we want to do this outdoor where there's more room to relax and move around the table.

Usually, this being our group's "Summar Opening" we'd be playing a game of about 10k size, but I've negotiated (for the sake of Playtesting) that we're only gonna play a 4k game. It's more than likely gonna be Daemons vs Empire (and Empire will be bring no DemiGryphs, and none of the Wizard-mobiles).

Now it's almost 15 years years since I actually made an Army list with 'pen and paper' so that's gonna take some time all by itself. I also have some questions, for JonathanC mostly I reckon, since I know he has at least some experience with play-testing stuff (where-as I really have no idea what I am doing!).

- As for the Game-Size, is 4k still crazy in your opinion? I mean: While being fun and all, will be 'meaningless' in terms of getting any bearing on stuff? Because I guess we could slim stuff down to 3k (or even less) if you think it will be of greater 'scientific value'.

- For 'Scenario' and Terrain I'm thinking that we're gonna do a standard "BattleLine" Scenario, but that we'll be generating the Terrain randomly in accordance with how the BRB suggests this to be done.
Or do you think we should go "all the way" and play it exactly by the book - i.e. Random Scenario?

I'm torn personally with that decision because I can see reasons both for and against going with random scenarios:
On the one hand it would force you to take that one unit of 20 Core troops (WatchTower), and it would force you to concider your Standards (Blood and Glory) etcetera.
On the other hand, I feel that that "BattleLine" is usually the most 'balanced' Scenario - in the sense that all the other scenarios clearly tends to tilt things in favor of either side, so to speak.

All right, it's time for me to try and find a calculator here somewhere and get to work on building that list..

***********************************************************************************
Ok here's a draft for the list I'm planning on using tommorrow:

What do you think?

The idea is to deploy the Bloodletters right in the center and give him something to focus on. I actually want him to 'choose' which units charges them - because that's when I'll have the Siren Song 'Nettes right on the side ready to derail his plan.

The Fiends are meant to be deployed as cannon-ball-catchers to protect the Thirster in deployment, then they'll try to make themselves usefull as the fast and flexible unit that they are.

The Daemon Prince is meant to attract attention (3+ Regen and Daemonic Robes, please shoot at me!!) and both the DP and the Thirster are kitted out to be able to deal swiftly with the (2) Stanks I am likely to be facing.

I gave the Herald of Khorne in the BL unit the Crimson Carnage banner so that it will carry itself without help in combat - the Lash of Khorne for the Herald is actually meant to 'avoid' being challanged by whatever a-hole is carrying that damn Mirror-thingy (the Speculum).

Bloodcrushers are of course just meant to be bad.
Nurglings as harassment on some unguarded flank, hunting WMs with the Furies - and I added those Nurglings with 'spare points' so I'm not sure about them.. I was thinking 2 Screamers instead just to try them out..

The Herald of Tzeentch is the only wizard but against Empire magic is always shut down anyway so I think one Tzeentch-guy with 3 spells will suffice. This army is just meant to hit hard and stomp everything he's got into the ground really..

I guess the unit-count is pretty low because those Bloodletters (above all) cost a lot now.. But then that's how my army-lists have pretty much always been looking and ever since 8th Edition came around I really haven't lost a game unless playing MonoGod so sue me..

Well.. What do you think?
I really wanted to add a Behemoth with Herald but ran completely out of points, don't really have a good model for the Skullshrine upgrade either..

Comments are welcome. I'd be very happy to re-arrange this list, or just take whatever list you think would be more interesting to play-test.

EDIT
And let me just say... What a damn joy it is to be working with this Army List. It's almost wierd to actually have 'internal balance' as I found myself sitting here having no idea how to kit those Characters, for example - the main reason why I picked out the Ruinous Blade (more than other Gifts) is because it's the one Gift that worries me a little bit.. I want to see how effectively it actually is at dealing with something like that Stank, for example.
But really, the internal balance compared to our current book is just.. *wow*. So already at this stage I am very excited about tomorrow's (likely) game.

EDIT
*Hm..*
Thinking that those Fiends of Slaanesh (5) are a bit boring for playtest-purposes - seeing as I didn't even take upgrades for them.
They cost 275 points.
If I drop the Fiends I can get a sizeable unit of Seekers (with the 'Furious') upgrade instead.. I may even drop those 2 Nurglings for that purpose.. Give them the 'Siren Standard'.

I'll probably end up revising the Roster completely later tonight if I know myself correctly.
******************************************************************************
YET ANOTHER EDIT

All right, me have been doing some tweaking to this 4k Playtest Army. I actually feel like I need some help because I feel a bit of the old schizofrenia coming here with all these choices.
Anyway, to make a long story short a couple of Gifts are gone, and the Fiends.. Instead a nice big unit of Seekers are inserted.. Well here's the List:

- So basically it's the "Radiance of Dark Glory" Gift that's gotten thrown out in no less than 3 places of this list, also swapped "Daemonic Robes" for "Cloud of Flies" for the DP.
- The addition of Seekers to the list is cool because the Disc-Herald will suddenly be able to get LookOutSir rolls.
- Again I'm torn between the Nurglings and adding 2 Sceamers instead.. It would be nice to TEST the Screamers but those 2 Nurglings seem like such a perfect little 'middle finger' to drop just before the game begins in right where my opponant expects it the least.. Oh dear, throw me a bone here.. *lol*
- 'Stream of Corruption' for the DP seems like a good bet. I'll try to pinpoint the Speculum-wearing s.o.b. with that DP.. "Stream of Corruption" circumvents some of the nastyness of that item.. (Would I use the opponant's Strength to resolve those automatic Hits even??)

*************************************************************************
EDIT
While I was reading something I can't believe we've missed up until now..
P74 of the PDF, Army List Entry for the Bloodchariot:
Under Special Rules it says "Killing Blow (Juggernaut only)" ...
When indeed it should say (Bloodletters only) - naturally..

***********************************************************************************
A complete battlereport from the TestGame can be found HERE

* All right I'm making a new post here 'cause I've lost count of how many 'Edits' I made to the last one, and besides; what I'm about to write about is a bit of a 'new chapter'.

Well bring out your bottles of French bubbly stuff we have our first playtest game to look back on.
Here's the main points I've drawn from it myself, and it's only been a day or so since I played so things are still sinking in I guess.
Let's start with going through the units and how they performed:

Seeker of Slaanesh
Well I feel like I sort of killed them myself in this game. Botched the deployment and things just went from bad to worse from their. Upping their resiliance to incoming Shooting (well, anti-daemonic ranged magic actually) was never our intent - but it is a shame that they didn't get at least one round of combat with those extra attacks from the second rank. I'll perhaps put more effort into this 'next time' - perhaps even taking a Horde of them.

Daemonettes & Siren Song

Well since we hadn't covered the Detachment "out of sequence" charge-move in the rules-text for our version of Siren Song I ultimately set myself up for an epic fail in this department as well. I actually had the plan to derail the one Detachment he had that wasn't engaged in combat already and thus able to counter-charge my Bloodletters.
20 Daemonettes and a Herald fighting a Horde of Spearmen took longer than it statistically should have taken really - and the match-up for "Rending Claws" was just bad too in the end.

As an aside those 'Rending Claws' was something that caught some flak from my friends. Or not flak really, but they had their humble doubts so to speak. Basically it seems to remind them too much of Killing Blow (and Khorne) and they argued Daemonettes should instead be buffed in ways that make them better at killing cheap cannon-fodder type units (rather than stuff with armour).

We argued this a bit back and forth. I tried explaining to them how it's very hard to make Daemonettes specifically good at killing Goblins without making them generally 'worse' than the other fighty Core Daemons. Essentially the very problem we face in our current book.

Bloodletters
Battle-Hardened is naturally not a cost-effective upgrade when fighting GreatSwords. The "Icon of Crimson Carnage" is vicious (as expected) when combo:ed up like this - but (and my friends pointed this out later on as well) it will probably be most usefull as a simple Unit Icon for Bloodcrushers rather than in the hands of an Infantry BSB.
In the end, my opponant played is Power Dice just right and managed to vanquish that 44 strong BL-Horde with bodies left to fight another combat (had there been another combat to fight).
If I had brought a Level 4 and a Spellbreaker (or two) into that fight I'm pretty damn sure I would have won it though - especially with those insane saving throws I managed in some rounds (saving 50% on 5+ with 20 Dice).

Bloodcrushers
My opponant specifically noted that he thought we had done a very good job with these guys. And personally it felt like the 'first time' I used them that they actually 'behaved' like Bloodcrushers ought to behave. It was actually quite a nice moment.
That combat with the Inner Circle Knights mostly came down to who got the Charge - and me getting that Charge wasn't a certainty at all. The Grandmaster in that unit could easily (and did too) give both my Champ and Herald a good run for their money.
What happened in that combat seemed pretty representative, statistically correct, and above all fair.

Lords
I feel neither the Bloodthirster nor the Daemon Prince really got to prove themselves in this game. The Great Cannon blew up as soon as it tried to shoot at me, and the Daemon Prince did not run into a single multi-wound enemy all game.
In fact, everything they did in that game is stuff that our "current" Lords would do just as easily really.
In hindsight I would probably have won by a much broader margin if I had charged the BT into the Knights together with the Bloodcrushers - and given the set-up of that Grandmaster it would have been a more interesting 'test' of our new-and-improved BT as well.

At this point I must mention something general here about the new Gifts and other changes we've applied in our re-write: It was very funny..
- Every time I would describe a new ability my friends would shrugg a little and carefully ask: 'Ok.. Costing what exactly?
... And the beautifull thing is every time I told them the pointscosts we've set up they looked a lot more pleased. 10 pts for BattleHardened Bloodcrushers did not seem shockingly cheap to them. Nor did 45 pts for the Lash of Khorne - they actually thought it was quite pricey, except against Empire of course.. *lol*
They started to squirm a little over the Mark of Nurgle for the DP.. But once they had deconstructed that cost of 30 pts themselves they could no longer argue that it was "Too Good" (20pts for getting 4+ Regen over 5+ Ward and 10 pts for Poison Attacks - access to a Lore and some Gifts baked into both - it's not crazy..)

Herald of Tzeentch
Well it's sort of ironic what happened to this guy. He went for the big cheese and got it served right in the arse, you might say. If only I had rolled a 6 for Strength with that Firestorm ( ) but I am actually glad I rolled a '3' because had it been a '6' it would have been GAME OVER and the 'impression' of everything else would have been colored by yet another landslide victory for the broken Daemons..

I must say though, that I really think we've done something remarkable with the Tzeentch Herald.
The Choice between Loremaster + Master of Sorcery and Arcane Knowledge + Aura of Tzeentch is not an easy choice to make(!), let me tell you!
And that's exactly the way it should be as far as I am concerned.

Nurglings
Being able to deploy them in units of 2 has actually made them better, because that's 35 points you are saving and 2 is already more than enough to deal with your standard Warmachine-crew etcetera. After their performance in this game I'd almost be inclined to raise their cost just a little.

Furies
They do what they do. Nothing new really. Trick to avoid all kinds of Break Tests. Still, moving them to Special is correct and the one point we've shaved off their cost is probably fair&square too.

OVER ALL
It hasn't all sunk in yet. And I'm eagerly awaiting what JonathanC, RealVeon and hopefully one or two more people will have to say with regard to this battle. After having spent like a day posting that BattleReport I certainly hope it will be of at least some use - despite being a 'big' game and all that.

I enjoyed making this Army List immensely, and me and my Empire playing friend also got the most even and close battle between our respective races that we've had in a long time. So I'd venture the guess that he had a very good time as well - he was absolutely thrilled at finally being able to best a big Horde of Bloodletters (above all).

In the end, Daemons won of course all though it was only with the margin of about 700 points. So definately no landslide victory. What I had left on the table would probably have mopped up the rest of his stuff given enough time, but that's another story all together.

You guys will have to try and judge this for yourselves of course, but I think we had about an equal share of "bad luck" and "bad decisions" too. I really didn't bring enough Magic to this game, while he would have really needed to not send his Knights off all unsupported like that.. and so on. I can't say at this point any one side 'deserved to win' more than the other - it really was up to the dice.

Which was great.

Well, what do you guys think?

EDIT
Questions for us to resolve:
- Should Siren Song effect 'out of phase' Charge moves [such as Support Charges from Detachments] (?) - I actually think it should.
- The Upgrades we have for our units.. Should they be like mundane Equipment in the sense that you have to disclose them to the opponant at the start of the game?
*More to Be Added, I'm sure.. Just can't remember at the moment*

EDIT
Just checking in here before going to sleep. Did read your post JonathanC. Excellent about the Designer's Notes clean up! I'll tend to all this, and more, in the morning. Good night!

Well the report made for very interesting reading DaemonReign, thanks very much for that. I'll see if I can do something similar for my game on Wednesday. Like you said, there were some unfavourable match-ups in terms of trying out the new upgrades. If the Daemonettes and Bloodletters had been swapped around that would have been a good test of the heavy armour and rending claws.

Speaking of the Rending Claws, I see what your friends are saying here and there is some merit to it, but I do think the idea of razor-sharp claws that can pierce armour is quite fitting for them. Also, the main reason for it isn't to make them better at dealing with hordes (as they're quite good at that already) but to help them deal with the things Slaanesh troops generally struggle with. It could be the upgrade is a point too cheap however, but we need more testing to see if thats the case. As for the Siren Song, it makes sense to me if it only effects charges they declare in their own "Charge Sub-phase", so detachments counter-charging would be immune.

Good news about the Crushers, thats the sort of result we were hoping for. Surprised you didn't try out the Banner of Martial Pride on the BSB, that would have been interesting. At least we can say that perma-hatred Bloodletter hordes with heavy armour are NOT unbeatable, which is the sort of thing some people would whine about if it came out in the 'official' book.

Lords - while they may not have done anything spectacular, I suppose their added resilience meant you could afford to use them in a slightly more cavalier fashion without worrying about them so much. I wouldn't want to risk sending a Prince from the current book against a unit of 20 core troops almost single-handed.

Magic - well you went very light on magic for a 4k game, but it could have been potentially devastating. Looks like the Tzeentch's Firestorm spell is one to keep an eye on. Shame you didn't get at least one more Horror though so they could have done some casting, that would have been interesting.

Secret Upgrades - kind of undecided here, I think it would be 'sporting' to do so, but on the other hand can't help feeling they should be like other gifts.

We could add an appendix 'D' to the re-write with a brief summary of play-test games.....
----------------------------------------------------

Next stage of the designers notes. As before its more of a tidy up than a complete re-write as I want your original thoughts to remain intact as much as possible. I think there will be more extensive changes in later sections. Anyway, here it is:

Daemonic Gifts
We have decided to keep Daemonic Gifts working the same way they do in the current book. The number of Gifts available has been expanded, and this is to be regarded as a 'bundle' of suggestions for mechanics that we think would work well as Daemonic Gifts. We are certainly aware of the fact that the number of Gifts will most likely be fewer in any official release, but we felt the nature of this re-write made it suited for making a broad set of suggestions in this section. We have of course noted a decrease in army-specific Magic Items in other 8th edition army books - all though all such armies are compensated by having access to a wide range of 'shared' Magic Items from the main rulebook. Therefore it is the sentiment of this Board that in order to maintain parity Daemons should have access to a range of gifts roughly comparable to now at least when it comes to the time for the Design Studio to revisit their army.

Questions were raised, and opinions were quite divided, particularly with respect to the two 'dispelling' Gifts (Spell Breaker and Spell Destroyer) - the question being whether there ought to be a special restriction making these particular Gifts only "0-1 per army." The argument for this is that other armies only get access to one Dispel Scroll. The opposing argument is the poor aesthetic/background of creating a special case for a certain set of Gifts; coupled with the fact that 'duplication' of these Gifts haven't been presented as a balance-problem by the community (i.e. most people rarely include more than one per army anyway). In addition, participants in this project also pointed out that despite the Dispel Scroll being a 0-1 choice Magic Item, most other armies have access to an array of other "anti-magic" items (which Daemons don't have access to at all) that compensate for only having access to one ‘auto-dispel’ item. We ultimately agreed that this issue is best left to the Games Development Team in its entirety.

Daemonic Icons
Acknowledging the Errata/FAQ that made them "Magic Standards" (i.e. 0-1 choices), we have followed suit and essentially doubled the number of available Icons to each Chaos power. The internal balance of the Battle Standards has also been addressed, and the options for Battle Standard Bearers have also been increased (i.e. the Battle Standard Bearer's optional Icons are increased in variety when the General of the army is a servant of the same Chaos God, as mentioned previously).

Upgrades
In order to increase the depth of the dynamic in our current book we've employed a general principle of "two upgrades" per unit. However, as you will be able to see throughout this re-write, there are a handful of units (Furies, Nurglings, Screamers, Flesh Hounds...) that have been left without such upgrades. These decisions have been taken mostly on a basis of background as it didn’t seem fitting for some of the units of ‘lower status’ to have access to them. Also, applying upgrades universally seemed superfluous (in some cases only adding 'rules creep', as it were).

New Units
This has been perhaps the most freely creative part of this project, as we've simply brainstormed a couple of new units (Behemoth of Khorne, Phantasm of Slaanesh, and The Eye of Tzeentch) as pure 'guesswork'. More so - at this point, even compared to the rest of this re-write - we are certainly humble to the fact that we have no idea what's actually being developed. Our basic guideline has been little more than looking at 'what other armies have been getting' in 8th Ed.

The notion of a dual-kit (i.e. a box that can either build a Slaanesh or a Khorne 'thing') was abandoned. We realise the desirability of a 'big cross-Mark dual kit', however, and wouldn't be surprised to see one in the future! In this re-write are suggestions for three God-specific units (all are monsters in the Rare Section), which we imagine could be released in separate boxes. The vast conceptual difference between Daemons of different Marks is poor grounds for making a "dual-kit" aesthetically. We could see it working with a "Daemonic Cauldron" or "Daemonic Altar" (or similar contraption), but it was the unison sentiment of this board that Daemons ought not to have such things. New units should be Daemons in our opinion, and the reason for installing our suggestions in the Rare Section is mostly that the Core and Special Sections had already gained another five units not currently available.

We have suggested the addition of 'new' units that exist through Forge World (Plague Toads and Pox Riders) as well as reinstating Daemonic Chariots as fully independent units and not just mounts for Heralds (all bar the Nurgle one since this is not featured in the current book). These new units have been sprinkled across the sections, as will be discussed further below. Most notably, Plague Toads are the only addition in the Core Section, and this is 'balanced' by there being no new Nurgle unit in the Rare Section. While every other Chaos power gets a Chariot in the Special Section, Nurgle gains Pox Riders instead.

Army Composition
It is worth noting specifically that Bloodcrushers and Fiends have been 'moved' to the Special Section. This was prompted by the additions of new units that would otherwise have 'crowded up' the Rare Section. The changes to Bloodcrushers and Fiends were not dependant on this move to the Special slot, however, except for the minimum unit-sizes being changed from 1+ to 2+ (Bloodcrushers) and 3+ (Fiends), as is only appropriate for Special units. This move to the Special Section is 'conditional' on the inclusion of the other Rare Units that we have added. Bloodcrushers and Fiends (without the addition of other Rare Units) could very well remain Rare Units and thus accordingly keep their 1+ unit size requirement.

Furies have also been moved to the Special Section, in an attempt to follow precedence of other army books in 8th edition. Their current status of not counting toward any requirement/restriction seems to be a thing of the past, put simply.

Back with more later.