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

For what it's worth, I like this one a lot! Probably needs some tweaking though, as I suspect it's not very powerful. Perhaps every to-hit roll of 6 generates two hits instead of one. Something along those lines.

Yeah I suppose you're right about the 'value' Brynolf.. I was thinking when I suggested this that it'd be worth about 'a point' but thinking about it a bit more it's probably not worth 1pts to be honest.

You could possibly make it so that every roll of 5+ To Hit gave you an extra attack (I reckon that indeed would be worth about a point) - but then perhaps the entire mechanic is starting to look a bit phoney somehow. I don't know..

We'll see what the others says, when they make it back here.

EDIT
We're at the top of a new thread-page so..
Check out the the Play-Test battle reports!
JonathanC's game vs WoC
DaemonReign's game vs Empire

I've managed to add the last few photos to my batrep (mostly pictures of WoC units fleeing!) so its all complete now.

As to this new idea as a replacement for Rending Claws, I quite like it. With 2 ranks of 6 attacking it would generate 3 extra attacks on average (4 if a HoS is in the unit). I think if we were to go with it, it should be the new version of Furious instead and then Furious could be given to Daemonettes after all.

Worth considering at any rate. Gotta go now.

Yup. I agree. Worth concidering! I assume it would be a '1pts' upgrade for both Seekers and Daemonettes though right? Doesn't seem like it could be worth more than that.. I mean; Not even on Seekers..(?)

I'll check out those pictures too. All though your batrep was rather 'complete' last time I looked at it as well.

EDIT
Brynolf's additional idea on this subject is perhaps even better..
'Every '6' rolled To Hit generates 2 Hits instead of 1'
Nice and simple - and it would save us from the trouble of having to stipulate what happens if you a roll a 6 To Hit 'two times in a row' (as would be the case with my original idea that Brynolf quoted at the top of this page..)

EDIT
Another minor reason why this new idea of upgrade might be a good idea (aside of Daemonettes and Seekers being able to have the same upgrade, and aside from making Brynolf happier *haha*) would be the Ignore Armour-saves augment we've installed in the Slaanesh Lore - which did not mesh well with the 'Rending Claws' upgrade.

I think that settles it for me personally.

How about, "every 6 rolled causes an additional automatic hit"?

Anyway, I've been re-proofreading (yes, again) and beyond fixing a few more mistakes, I've noticed a few potential issues.

Since the Flesh Hounds have the Collars of Khorne mentioned in their fluff, should we just remove the Magic Resistance (3) special rule and give them the Collar of Khorne Daemonic Gift?

I may have brought this up before, but I've forgotten. The Skullshrine has the Collar of Khorne Daemonic Gift, but it also has the Magic Resistance (1) special rule which carries over from the Behemoth. Should this disappear along with the Onslaught special rule when the Skullshrine is purchased?

Also, should the Daemon Chains special rule on the Skullshrine affect only Wizards or any unit which can generate Power and Dispel Dice? I'm thinking specifically of Warrior Priests here. They're not Wizards, but they are just the kind of thing that the Skullshrine would want to target. Also, should the Great Icon of Khorne affect only enemy Wizards or all enemies which can channel dice?

For the Phantasm's Ecstatic Caress attack, should there be any limits on what unit types can be targeted? Should the Phantasm be able to wrap around a Bloodthirster or some other Monster Character for example?

Should I add the Characteristic table for Discs to the Flamer entry?

Can the Blue Scribes cast boosted spells?

And that's it for now. Have a good weekend.

Edit
I forgot to ask; how did the Daemonic Rivalry work in both of your games? Was it a big factor? How did it add to the balance of the army?

All right, I'm gonna edit this entire post now as I am sitting at home with the PDF and can actually reference the questions you had specifically RealVeon:

Daemonette Upgrade
I basically think we're aiming for 'something' here that's worth 1 or possibly two points - when it comes down to it.

"For every 6 rolled To Hit the hit is duplicated"
OR
"For every 6 rolled To Hit gain another attack"

RealVeon's 'version of the mechanic is better because it's easier to resolve, but I reckon it's also 'better' in game-terms - perhaps even too good? We don't want this upgrade to cost more than max two points I think..

FleshHounds
I agree that they should simply have the Collar of Khorne Gift. That will look more consistant.

The Skullshrine & The Collar of Khorne
As I said in my original post this is one of the 'many' little instances where I'd humbly leave the issue to JonathanC's expertise.
That being said, my suggestion would be to remove Collar of Khorne from the Skullshrine and simply say that the Behemoth has MR(1) and the Skullshrine has MR(3).
Or what the hell people.. Why can't we just let the damn Behemoth have the Gift as well??
At any rate, as I wrote in my original post, if there's anything I 'don't like' about the Behemoth it would be the complexity of having two separate profiles (dependant on how you upgrade it) and the fact that it loses and gains Special Rules with that Upgrade as well.
I would prefer to add as little as possible to that personally.
So 'losing' MR(1) and 'gaining' MR(3) is not how I would resolve this. In fact, like I said, looking at this issue today I think we should simply let the Behemoth have the Collar of Khorne regardless of whether or not it's upgraded with the Skullshrine!

Daemon Chains
This is the current wording in the PDF:
'For each Wizard in base contact with the Skullshrine at the start of the controlling player’s Magic phase, roll a D6. On a 5+ the Wizard takes a wound with no armour saves allowed.'

We could change it to the following:
'With the exception of any Daemons of Khorne, all models in base contact with the Skullshrine at the start of the controlling player's Magic Phase that have the abiliy to channel power- or dispel dice take a wound on 5+ with no armour saves allowed.'

This would then include Warrior Priests, but still exclude the Khorne Daemon Characters who are effected by the Great Icon of Khorne.

Great Icon of Khorne
This is the current wording in the PDF:
'All characters within 12" of the Great Icon who serve Khorne may channel dispel dice as if they were a Wizard. All Wizards within 12" (friend or foe!) must re–roll successful Power Dice channel rolls.'

We could change it to the following:
'Any friendly character with the Mark of Khorne within 12" of the Great Icon may channel dispel dice as if it were a Wizard. All models within 12" with the ability to channel power-dice (friend or foe!) must re-roll successful channel rolls.'

Phantasm's Ecstatic Caress attack
As I said in my original post, I think since the Strength value of the Phantasm isn't stellar it's not much a problem if it can use the Ecstatic Caress attack on 'any type' of enemy. Strictly for fluff-reason, we could say that 'Large Targets' are excempt from being targetted by this attack however - but if you think about it, perhaps the Phantasm coils itself around the neck of a Giant or a NecroSphynx (strangling it!). Since the majority of these 'big things' are likely to have equal-or-better Strength compared to the Phantasm, however, the odds are really against the Ecstatic Caress Attack being a good option against them. So essentially I think we may well leave it 'as is'.

Disc stats for Flamers Profile
Yes I believe these should be added to the profiles of Flamers, just as any mount-option.

Blue Scribes
They cast their Spells as Bound spells. I believe it's part of the rules for Bound Spells that you always cast the spell at its nominal level/value. So by the current rules they cannot cast Boosted Spells, and I think it would be a little too unorthodox to change this as well.

* This is my take on these issues you brought up TheRealVeon. Now it's only a matter of waiting for JonathanC's input.

Reflections on our Daemonic Rivalry
Well there are no great surprices really. We have implemented one 'negative incentive' (the Inspiring Presence 'cap') and one 'positive incentive' (with regards to the BSB!) and it was my ambtion all along that the 'negative incentive' would be weaker compared to the positive one!
My feeling about the Daemonic Rivalry is that it's mostly a small detail that you of course concider while making a list, as in: it's in the back of your head, but it doesn't present you with a 'strong obstacle' in terms of how you Design your list.
So while someone like perhaps theDarkGeneral would naturally laugh at this Rivalry-rule and conclude that it's too 'lenient' and weak I actually think we've put it pretty much where it's supposed to be.. At least I would personally not want to make it 'stronger'.
I guess the alternative for making it stronger would be to also include the BSB into the Rivalry-rule in some way (denied Hold Your Ground! for unaffiliated Daemons, for example) but as I argued up-thread I think that would become too much of a negative incentive (and my opinion has not changed from playing with it).
I look at it not so much as "mixed armies" getting a penalty from this Rivalry-rule, but rather as "monogod armies" getting a very minute benefit. Just a little tiny feather in the hat, as it were, for really picking up the MonoGod concept in large parts of your list.

The 'positive incentive' on the BSB Icon Allocation is much stronger. I think with the rules, as we've written them, it will become 'rule' rather than 'exception' with our re-write to see Daemon armies where the BSB and General are aligned. It simply provides such a great increase of variety in terms of your Icon-choices (like the 'combo' I used in my recent playtest battle).

So if you ask me: Will the Rivalry-rule prevent players from taking extremely mixed lists? The answer is 'no'. It will not even prompt people to take the Unmarked Daemon Prince for General (unless there's also some other reason for doing this of course!). But again: As far as I am concerned this was never the intent of the Rivalry rule! It is supposed to be a fluff-driven thing that you can choose to either ignore or remedy (Radiance of Dark Glory Gift, or Unmarked DP for General) - whereas making it stronger would irrevocably hurt the variety of the Army which a lot of players enjoy.

I'd forgotten that about bound spells, thanks for reminding me.

As for adding in potential upgrades to the profiles, I know Jonathan wanted to add the Flamers to the Burning Chariot because they are not normal mounts and therefore should probably be included.

However, Discs are normal mounts and in all the character profiles, mounts are not included. Except for the new Karl Franz which includes Deathclaw. Yet in the old edition, all the mounts we included on his profile, if I'm remembering correctly, so the pattern seems to be going in the direction of not including optional mounts on the profile. Anyway, perhaps it should just be characters that don't have the mounts's profiles on theirs as well. In that case the Flamers should have the Discs.

I don't know, it just seems that we should go one way or the other and not halfway. So include the mounts for everything, which would include the Palanquin for the Great Unclean One and the Juggernaut for Skulltaker for example, or none at all.

A couple of more questions:

Should the hits caused by Pink Horrors Crackling Explosions count toward combat resolution?

Should the Eye of Tzeentch's Whirling Blades hits count toward combat resolution?

Both of these seem obvious to me that they should, but I'm just wondering if we should explicitly state that they do.

Discs listed in the Flamer Profile

*gah* It's good that you're vigilinant on these little details. I feel I'm hard pressed to give a definate answer. I guess I am leaning toward the 'separation' of Characters and Units that you mention yourself:
So we'd list the Flamers in the Burning Chariot Profile, and we'd list the Discs in the Flamer profile - but we would not list 'optional mounts' for Characters such as Skulltaker or Great Unclean One..
Either that, or we list these optional mounts everywhere I guess. Which would for example mean we'd have to list the Palanquin on the Daemon Prince's profile as well..
I think perhaps we should let this one linger in the air until JonathanC makes it back here. In the case of Flamers, specifically, I actually feel that that those Disc-stats are needed so that it becomes clear what happens when you purshase the "Changebringer" upgrade (i.e. you gain Fly, and 1 S3 I3 Flaming Attack). This should be quite obvious of course, but for 100% clarity having 'a line of numbers' representing that optional Disc wouldn't hurt I think.

What your opinion by the way?

Crackling Explotions & Whriling Blades
Both should definately count toward combat resolution. Absolutely. And that's another good catch because I think we can bet our asses it would become a FAQ-matter unless we specify very clearly that these mechanics do indeed count toward CR.

* Also, about my 'alternative' wordings for the Great Icon of Khorne and Daemon Chains I hope it's evident that they were written on the fly and I don't expect/want you to just copy&paste them into the PDF. Rather, I assume you will re-word them into running more smoothly as far as sentences go (if you think its necessary!).

A little issue I want to bring up:

Battle-hardened
I was talking to my Dwarf-playing friend (i.e. not Brynolf) at our work-lunch last night and we got onto the subject of this 'heavy armour upgrade' for Bloodletters. He doesn't have anything against it but the portent of what he was saying is simply that Bloodletters are 'always' going to be better without this upgrade rather than with it.
He relates this to the general interwebz-wisdom of Dwarves in 8th Edition, where most poeple seem to favor just taking Core-Dwarves with Great Weapons (even foregoing the option of having a unit of Longbeards) because the bonuses given by extra armour-save etcetera just isn't enough to motivate the increase in cost. Essentially, putting "more wounds on the table" is more important (i.e. 'better') compared to plowing down those extra couple of points into increase resilience.

Of course, we've already concluded ourselves that the Battlehardened upgrade really is only worthwhile if you're up against S3 opponants (that don't have Armour Piercing!) - but that makes this upgrade very circumstantial.. And making a long story short my Dwarf-playing buddy simply doesn't give it much credit (every army has something with S4 or better that they'd arguably be able to send in against that Horde of Bloodletters).

So, at the end of it, I worry that we've gona astray with the Battle Hardened upgrade. I realize making it a 1pts upgrade is probably completely "off the table" (we had it at 1pts before, but Bloodletters themselves were 14pts/model at that point - which I think is just too expensive, and besides it wouldn't help the situation with the Armour-upgrade!).

Initially, my assertion was that the "Armour Upgrade" would be more expensive and also quite a lot better. My original idea was that you'd be able to give Bloodletters Armour of Khorne (i.e. 3+ Armour Save) - but this was not recieved at all by the rest of this board.. Now, I'm not gonna drag that whole issue up once more.. But I have to say that it would really solve a lot of 'problems' for us if we perhaps made the Battle Hardened upgrade represent 4+ Armour Save (instead of the current 5+) with that natural consequence of it becoming more expensive (3pts/model? 4pts/model?!).

I do remember that Kitsune, in particular, did not want Bloodletters to become "good at everything" like Chaos Warriors - so perhaps it's a bad idea seen in that light.. But it would create a definate 'niche' for the Battle Hardened upgrade where Bloodletters with this upgrade would become significantly 'different'.

Of course.. The Battle Hardened upgrade works just fine for Bloodcrushers.. Which really only leaves us, in my mind, with the option of actually lowering this upgrade to 1pts for Bloodletters.

Damn it. Circular. haha This is not a 'big issue' for me. Just something that my Dwarf-friend brought up that I wanted to relay once more to this board..

Lots to pick up on I see. Have been to a tourney today with my Daemons (came 2nd!) but am a bit tired now so I'll try to be brief.

Changebringers - I don't see the need to have the Discs listed on their profile really. It doesn't change the profile of the Flamer at all and the Disc rules are no different to the character mounts either, so I don't see why it can't just be a case of refer to Bestiary/Mounts section. Maybe in the Changebringer upgrade listing on p43 just have "see page XX for Disc profile" at the end of the rules. The reason I wanted the Flamer profile on the Burning Chariot was to clarify which parts of the profile are used, to clarify that the Flamers extra wounds compared to Horrors made no difference, for instance. Incidentally, it may be a good idea to add the Flamer profile to the Bestiary listing too.

Crackling Explosions/Whirling Blades - Well thats how I played it.

Battle-hardened - I'm not sure when I'd use it either, but I can say the same for some other upgrades too probably. Still, I'm hardly the only DoC player so not everything has to appeal to me. As you say, this is a circular issue and what we have already is the most balanced option we can go for.

Flesh Hounds - I would leave it as MR3 to cut down on extra boxes and cross-referencing. However, I don't mind too much either way.

Phantasm - agree with DaemonReign here.

Skullshrine - the Collar of Khorne issue is irrelevant, as different values of MR don't stack, so you wouldn't get MR4 for having MR1 and Collar of Khorne in this case.

I would rather the Daemon Chains only affected actual Wizards. For the Great Icon though it should be all models that can channel dice.

Daemonettes - the 'extra attack' seems more appropriate than the 'extra hit' to me, although doing it that way would make it a bit quicker to resolve. This is where Kitsune's opinion would probably be useful as he could tell us how many extra wounds it would cause against T3 troops and whether it was worth the points or not!

Daemonic Rivalry - didn't apply much in my game as my units were either wiped out, same mark as my GUO, or just didn't lose combat. I lost one extra Bloodletter because of it, although I forgot to take one important test that I wouldn't have had the GUO's Ld for, so it could have had a big effect. Anyway, for now I would say it works as intended.

Congrats on the 2nd place in that Tournament. I trust you were using the official book!

Changebringers - All right. If RealVeon is also satisfied by what's said above then I think we can do was JonathanC says.

FleshHounds - Not a big issue, certainly. I thought RealVeon's suggestion of simply writing the Collar of Khorne Gift there would look sort of neat - it's largely what we've been doing with all other entries that have "special rules" that mirror Gifts.

Good point about MR not stacking, with regards to the Skullshrine. That resolves that issue!

Daemon Chains - I know you haven't gotten your copy of the new Empire Book, but basically Warrior Priests are Wizards for all intents and purposes (it's just they're not Wizards by definition!) - so they channel both Dispel and Power Dice, and they are casting those Prayers they have - but they would not be effected by the Daemon Chains if we simply write 'wizards'.
I think that's what RealVeon was getting at. And I can't help agreeing with him that Khorne would despite those priests at least as much as any 'normal' wizard.

Daemonettes (alt. upgrade) - As soon as I get time I will PM Mr Kitsune the old math-hammer maniac and kindly ask him to invest five minutes of his time into this issue. Let's take it from there.

* At work. So need to run. Hopefully I will get time to PM Kitsune and check back in here before my shift ends. Cheers.
*************************************************************************
EDIT
* PM sent to Mr Kitsune. I might have taken you a bit to litterally there JonathanC *haha* but you're right - if LAV is in the mood he'll sort this issue out for us pretty swiftly I reckon.

My personal 'guesstimation' (as I also relayed to Kitsune in that PM) is that "an extra attack for every 6 To Hit rolled" is probably almost worth a 1pts, while simply getting "a second hit for every 6 To Hit rolled" is worth 2pts.
3pts is starting to look awfully expensive though.
But yeah, I'm merely guessing here.

Battle Hardened
I've come to think of it as almost poetic justice. Bloodletters are pretty good as they are. Lots of folks would raise their cost beyond the 13pts we've raised them to - but in return we've given them two upgrades that really arn't no-brainers at all. Both the "armour" and the "Magic Resistance" are sort of 'open questions'. Where-as the Core units that may need a little bit more buffing are getting much more 'interesting' upgrades from a competative stand-point.

EDIT
I think we should finalize the Designer's Notes. Well that's obvious I guess. I'll get to work on that in the afternoon hopefully. Planning on going through the parts that JonathanC have checked-through, cleaning up the text further (I tend to really 'blabber' when I write, so it's a good idea probably to 'abbreviate' the text in places!).

Once those Designer's Notes are ready I reckon the status of the PDF will allow me to find a Printer's Company and make some hard-copies.

The reason I mention this is because I'm getting 'sucked in' to this "play-test" mentality.. And PlayTesting is great of course, but we shouldn't delay anchoring things up with GW more than we necessarily have to.
If that makes any sense..

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

Well Kitsune doesn't seem to be in the mood actually!

Good thing I've been talking this Daemonette-upgrade over with my Dwarf-playing friend (he's not completely lost when it comes to math either) and he agrees with me that 2pts/model looks like a good place to start at least. Especially since we've reduced the base-cost of Daemonettes to 11pts/model they'd 'only' cost 13pts/model with this upgrade.
And like I mentioned before I don't see any reason why it'd be more expensive for Seekers to purchase this upgrade either.
So:
Furious - 2pts/model - 'Daemonettes with this upgrade that roll a 6 To Hit in Close Combat inflict 2 hits instead of 1.'
- Let's install this upgrade for both Daemonettes and Seekers!

Sleeping
Sort of overslept today. Besides, my wife had people over when I woke up so I hid in bed for a while until they had left. I hate making these incomprehensive 'apperances' in my underwear in the afternoons. So not much work done today alas. Sorry about that.

Tuesday
Tommorrow (monday) I will know for certain whether or not Brynolf will have time for another test-game on Tusday! He's sounding as though it will work out, but yeah he needs to check in with his business on Monday to see if anything unexpected ruins our plans on Tuesday.
That's why it would be awesome if we had an updated version of the PDF by Tueday! We'd manage without one of course, but still.

Last Topics of Discussion
Well RealVeon you've got both mine and JonathanC's feedback on these various issue on hand. Do you reckon you have enough to go on?
- FleshHounds (Collar of Khorne?) - Basically, it's either way you prefer! JonathanC thinks we might as well keep them with the simple MR3, while I was more in favor of your suggestion. It doesn't seem anyone has a strong opinion though so.. 'surprice us!'
- Daemon Chains (to include Warrior Priests or not?) - I guess this is the one issue that's still hanging in the air a little bit. JonathanC said he'd prefer it to "only" effect Wizards, and for all I know he's factored in how very similar Warrior Priests actually are to Wizards now. Hopefully JonathanC will have time to make another round of comments on this issue later tonight.

As far as I can tell, the rest of the little things we've been discussing over the last two days ought to be more or less resolved.

All right, hoping to see you guys pop in here over the course of the night. And let's keep our fingers crossed for Tuesday giving us another playtest-game against Brynolf (sort of planning to go 'Slaanesh Heavy' this time around!).

Cheers!

DaemonReign asked me to do some math, so here goes nothing: There is lots of risk of having errors here as its quite late and I didnt have much time, but I got one of the daemonette choices done:

If all 6's would deal double hits, then with ASF you would get almost 19 more hits than without the buff, meaning almost ten more kills against T3 6+ save units. Considering that extra attack (additional hand weapon for example) would increase this number only by 4, this is too much really. I didnt calculate other option yet, but it wouldnt be far from this one. Synergies with spells would make it even more horrible, so I really would suggest dropping this idea.

Thanks a lot for taking time to give us feedback Kitsune.
19 more hits sounds quite 'extreme' indeed. Well you said yourself there may be some error in your calculations, but I am certainly not the right person to second-guess what you're saying. But 19 'extra' hits sounds like a lot - 'everyone' on my end of the computer are sort of going '19 extra hits?! How did he calculate that? *lol*

All right, if it turns out that Kitsune's math is correct then he's probably right that this idea is too powerfull. We did - of course - want Daemonettes to get an upgrade that made them more efficient at chopping up stuff like Goblins (T3 etcetera) but yeah.. it should of course be implemented with moderation.

I would humbly ask however, if you can be bothered, to run these numbers again when you have slept some.. 'Cause 19 'extra' hits (I'm assuming Horde Formation) does sound like a lot.

Thanks again Kitsune.

EDIT
We've run some numbers on this:
40 Daemonettes (hitting on 3's with re-roll to hit) would normally hit with ~31 attacks (assuming every model gets to attack) and with the upgrade (roll 6 to hit and double the attack) they'd score roughly ~41 hits.

In conclusion, I still think 2pts/model is a good place to start.
In 'real life' you wouldn't get to strike with every model in a horde of 25mm bases.

EDIT
Did some better math:
16,66% more hits with this BUFF (assuming hitting on 3's with re-roll!)
So 40 attacks from a Daemonette Horde:
Without the Upgrade: ~35hits
With the Upgrade: ~41hits

So worth 2pts. Possibly 3pts if we want to avoid it becoming a 'no-brainer' - all though concidering how expensive that would suddenly make a Daemonette-Horde I'm not sure about it. Let's remember that it would only ever cause those 41 hits (on average) against enemy models that cost less than half of what the Daemonettes cost (regardless of whether the upgrade is 2 or 3 points per model) - and they still need 4's to wound.

As soon as there is no ASF re-rolls, or the Toughness is higher, or the weaponskill of the opponant is higher, this "upgrade" would no longer give the same benefit of course.

So yeah.. 2 or possibly 3 points. I'd still say 2pts/model is a good place to start.

Hmmmm, well I certainly didn't mean for you to get Kitsune involved directly, it was more of an observation based on the type of analysis he has done for us in the past. I figured he would choose to involve himself if he had time for it. Still, thanks for taking some time to provide us with your perspective anyway Kitsune.

I ran the numbers through excel myself (whilst DaemonReign was obviously doing something similar!) and can see where he is coming from. In horde formation the 'double hits' option results in 9 more kills against WS4 T3 6+ save troops, 4.11 if in 2x6 ranks and 3.44 if in 2x5 ranks. These numbers are not completely exact but are very close, and include the effects of a Herald in the unit. With no Herald, the numbers are 6.83, 3.17 and 2.67 respectively.

If going for the 'extra attack' option (and asuming we don't allow further rolls to hit of 6 to generate even more attacks) then the number of extra kills against same opponents are:
Horde: 2.28
2x6: 1.06
2x5: 0.89

With Herald:
Horde: 3
2x6: 1.37
2x5: 1.15
So it seems to me if the idea is to be implemented at all the latter is the more reasonable option.
---------------------------------------------------------

I've got some important stuff to deal with at home next couple of days so won't be able to help anymore with the designers notes and other stuff till at least Friday I expect, sorry in advance for that as I know we wanted to have this all tied up by now. I will just add on what seems to be the only other outstanding issue that I prefer the Skullshrine's chains just to effect Wizards for thematic reasons really. I see where you are going with the hatred of priests and rival gods, but lets face it its hatred of the practitioners of magic Khorne is really known for! Also, I'm not sure I'd want it affecting everything that can generate dice for whatever reason, as this would include Casket of Souls, Luminark, Hurricanum, Runesmiths and probably a bunch of other things in future books that may not seem appropriate.

Well we'll be missing you JonathanC. Hope whatever it is you're busy with runs as smoothly as possible.

So for clarity's sake, we've got two options here:
Option 1 - "Every 6 rolled To Hit duplicates the Hit"
Option 2 - "Every 6 rolled To Hit generates another Attack"

I'm not following how 'Option 1' could generate 9 more kills, but I'm gonna assume here that we made some errors when running this in excel over here.
edit - 9 more Kills?! Wow we must really be missing something here..

Even if that is the case, however, I'd say that Option 1 still 'wins' over Option 2 at the end of the day. There are a couple of reasons for this:
- First of all, Option 1 is waaay more easy to resolve. Simplicity is bliss.
- Secondly; While we can argue whether or not Option 1 is 'worth' 2 or 3 points/model, I don't think you'd pay 1 point for Option 2. A Horde being at least 30 points more expensive for the average extra killpower of '3' (assuming Herald, re-rolls, hitting on 3's, and T3 enemy..) It's just not worth it.
- Third, you don't actually get to attack with all your Attacks when attacking in Horde formation. In order to really get an idea for the impact of this upgrade we should look at how many Extra kills a Horde of Daemonettes would get against a unit of 20mm bases deployed 5 wide (i.e. Steadfast formation).
This gives us 13,8 wounds (with Option 1) and 11,4 (without upgrade) - so a difference of 2 wounds.

So for the purpose of Playtesting (and I'm hoping to get to playtest this pretty damn soon, as I mentioned before) I still think we should go with Option 1 honestly. The math we're running over here just arn't giving us those '9 extra kills' (the difference we're getting with full Horde attacks is 4,4 kills, no where near 9...?)

Daemon Chains
Ok JonathanC! I just wanted to make sure you had concidered how Warrior Priests work these days. The Behemoth/Skullshrine is your baby, so if you feel the Chains should only effect Wizards by definition then I'm fine with it. Unless TheRealVeon is tearing his hair out over this issue let's go with how you originally intended this to function (i.e. the 'current' wording).

All right I gotta say I'm really perplexed here.. How can JonathanC arrive at the conclusion that you get 9 more kills? haha One of us is missing something critical obviously.

EDIT
We ran these numbers again, double-checking everything.. And I don't want to come off as rash over here but 9 more kills is just impossible.
40 attacks from Daemonettes (re-roll to hit, hitting on 3, at T3 6+ Save opponant):
Without upgrade: 14,8 kills
With Upgrade: 17,3 kills
(41 hits, half wounds, one 6th of those are saved)

This is what we're getting anyway. The difference between hits is about the same as the difference JonathanC described as "kills".

So Option 1 is still looking pretty 'right' at 2pts/model, possibly 3pts/model..

EDIT
It should be noted that everything above my prevoius 'edit' was actually incorrect because we had mistakenly plugged into the calculation that the Daemonettes were wounding on 3+, when they in fact wound on 4+. So while the numbers in my previous edit are 'correct' as far as we can tell (14,8 kills without upgrade, 17,3 kills with upgrade) everything I wrote prior to that actually gave a more extreme result than is 'true'.

Still, how could Kitsune conclude that this Upgrade would generate 19(!) extra hits?
How could JonathanC conclude that you'd get 9 more kills?
We've double checked this over and over.. Someone is obviously wrong here.. but WHO?! *haha*

Bottom line is I still say we should implement this Upgrade (Furious - "Option 1") for both Daemonettes and Seekers. Hopefully I'll get to playtest it IRL within 24 hours.
Cheers!

************************************************************************

EDIT

JonathanC wrote:

You're right about the Runesmiths! I assume (with the next Dwarf book) they will channel Dispel Dice just like Warrior Priests, all though I'm hoping against hope (of course) that they won't get any damn 'bound spells' or whatever.

Luminark and Hurricanium don't channel Dispel/Power dice. They flat out give you either a PD or a DD, it doesn't matter if you have 1 or 10 of them in your army - you never get more than one dice (I've forgotten which one grants a PD or DD though, but that doesn't matter) - my point is that Lumnarks and Hurricanium wouldn't be effected by the Daemon Chains even if we included 'everything that channels'.

Would the Casket of Souls be included? Doesn't it 'generate' Dispel Dice by some other means than channeling as well?

So what I said last night still stands, JonathanC, if you really feel that the Daemon Chains should target 'wizards only' then fine - but so far I can't think of a single 'inappropriate' target that channels dice ... Because with the exception of the Casket of Souls (not quite sure about that one) the models that you exemplify do not channel dice.

And let's face it, haha, Dwarf Runesmiths are likely to 'channel Dispel dice' in the next Dwarf-book. They are also, alas, very likely to get some sort of offensive capabilities in the Magic Phase.. Bound Spell Runes or something like that.. And my point is: If that happens then they'd be just as suitable targets as any other Caster.

Finally, if we were to say that that the Daemon Chains effect 'any model' that channels Power Dice (thus excluding Dispel Dice) I think we'd pretty much narrow the list of 'unsuitable' targets down to almost zero.

Please don't get frustrated with my in-depth blabbering on this issue JonathanC. I just felt prompted to 'set the record' straight especially, I gguess, because Luminarks/Hurricaniums wouldn't be effected..

PlayTesting

Yes things are looking very good on that end for tomorrow, I'm happy to report. It's about 90% confirmed at this point, as Brynolf is still waiting for a delivery to his shop that is said to arrive today (freeing up his schedule for Tuesday).

As I've relayed before I plan on going 'Slaanesh Heavy' in this test-game. I will implement the 'new' version of the Furious Upgrade for Daemonettes and Seekers at 2pts/model (replacing the 'old' Furious upgrade for Seekers, and the Rending Claws upgrade for Daemonettes).

I did notice TheRealVeon popped in here this morning for a while, but he didn't make a post (*haha*) so I'll just repeat that if you have time and feel motivated for it it'd be great if you uploaded an updated version of the PDF before this next game - all though we will naturally manage either way of course, seeing as it's really only one 'change' to keep track of!

I'm heading out to our club this afternoon. Will be checking in here from time to time. Let's keep our fingers crossed for another test-game shall we!

EDIT

DAMN IT!!
Just got word from Brynolf and that 'someone' who was supposed to deliver stuff to him today screwed up and didn't show.. So that means he needs to work tomorrow (tuesday) and can't join me for some test-gaming.
So yeah that sucks. I'll hopefully get something set up next weekend instead.

Cheers guys!

Hmm, realised where I went wrong when calculating option 1, so you can basically halve all the numbers I came up with in the first part of my previous post for the 'double hits' option. Also, I assumed the 6+ save was negated by the Daemonettes armour piercing. I also ran the numbers for if the horde had additional hand weapons instead and it was 3.33 kills without Herald and 4 with (assuming they all got into contact). I also ran the numbers for a horde fighting a steadfast bus of 20mm based troops like you described (i.e. 3 ranks of 6 attacking) and it was 2.72 extra wounds with Herald and 2.08 without (additional hand weapons would be 2.22 and 2 respectively). I hope this clarifies things.

It seems that the 'double hits on a 6' option is therefore roughly comparable to the Daemonettes having the option for an additional hand weapon, which makes it a lot easier to evaluate and decide a price for. Most books charge 1pt for an additional hand weapon on core troops.

As for the Daemon Chains, reason I included all those examples is because RealVeon said "any model that can generate power or dispel dice", which isn't just limited to stuff that can channel. This is how the miscast result that does an S6 hit on all Wizards is worded too, so I assume he was thinking of this when he brought it up. Going by that definition, Luminarks, Caskets (which generate D3 PD per turn), etc would be affected, as would Runesmiths/Runelords now under their current rules.

Back to work.