Fateweaver ! or ?

I figured this is a discussion needed to happen and people just needed to a place to do it.

Now keep in mind I use fateweaver so there will so this first post is going to be bias strongly toward that.

Pros:
3++ re-roll-able save

gives re-rolls in 6"

3 shooting attacks a turn

cons:
Pricey

Has a chance to run away after a wound.


Now lets look at the pros more closely:

Assuming the enemy needs a 2+ to hit and a 2+ to wound then fate weaver gets his saves

83% of being hit hit--> 69% that that hit wounds -->23% that he fails to save it-->7% that he fails his re-roll. So that comes out to about 1 in 14 shoots wounding and that is if they are hitting / wounding on 2s

Then he has about a 14% chances to run away , after taking the wound.

I feel the weak point of daemons is the turn they come in they have to sit around. The answer, fateweaver! Honestly if he dies the 1st turn that's fine with me and if they don't shoot him I will happily take re-rolls for most of my army. Any time you can make a lose-lose situation for the opponent or make there target priority harder your off to a good start.

Some counter to arguments i know will pop up:

He only gives re-reolls in 6".

Keep in mind you only need 1 unit in 6" to get the re-roll for the whole unit.

He is a crutch for weak players.

A strong unit does not make it a crutch, fateweaver is hard to use to his full potential. The first time I used fate weaver he scattered forward and I chose to shoot instead of run. He died to gaunts the next turn.

I am sure some more will come up ,but this post is long enough.

I would like to finish in saying I use fateweaver that is how I play is it right or the strongest? Maybe, Maybe not, It is the build I have practiced and gotten quite good with. I have tried other builds(a lot and often) and they have different strengths a weakness I am not saying fateweaver is a must just good and worth a shot.

First off, by crutch, i meant that, players would be making every list trying to put fateweaver in, which imo, doesn't encourage them to try the different (yet still kinda limited) builds of the daemon book. Anyway.

When I started daemons, Fateweaver was awesome, especially when a whole army of guard would point shooting at him. 6", like it or not, is still small. Taking into account the possible scatter when deep striking units.

Another thing, I good way to shut down fateweaver is to charge a CC unit into him, and he's pretty much stuck. ANother problem i see is, the only thing that jives well with Fateweaver are bloodcrushers. Let's face it, you can say fiends, but fiends are too fast for fateweaver unless you want fateweaver to keep up with them and be open to an assault/rapid fire. But personally, if im a shooty army, i'd aim the fiends. But let me digress and say Fatecrusher is an amazing build when the book was first out, and is still a great build now even when some players have experience against it.

Another bad thing i see from him is his statline, it's less than stellar, and genestealers can give him a run for his money, if a horde of orks. Heck a walker can probably keep him in combat for a good amount of turns. Walkers can also tie up fatecrusher lists pretty bad.

3++ is an awesome perk. It's pretty much having a 2+ invul save. But I want to hammer on the fact that 333 points + some other HQ (If you take them) Or you dont take another HQ slots, but i really dont like skipping an HQ slot because Daemons offer an awesome selection of HQ choices.

3 Shooting attacks a turn, and one of them making him extremely vulnerable to CC. And those 2 shooting attacks can be filled by DPs for half the cost.

I agree the weakpoint of daemons is when they finally touch down. But I disagree that the answer is fateweaver. He is still a gamble, and when there's a chance to shut down a good chunk of your army when fateweaver goes down. I would still not like those chances. 2 other solutions to mitigate the weakpoint of daemons is first, stacking waves. which still has an element of randomness in it. And another is Target saturation, giving your opponents many target choices on the get go. This is possible by MSU, cheap cavalry and affordable MCs. All of which is hard to accomplish with fateweaver in the list.

Anyway, I use fateweaver in a good number of my builds. Heck, Fateweaver+Skarbrand, Fateweaver+LoC are some pretty annoying builds out there. But there are definitley options that are as good as, and if not better than fateweaver.

You make it sound like there is never a close combat unit nearby to solve this problem... *cough*bloodcrushers and fiends*cough*

He is vulnerable in CC though... by no standards a CC monster. It's only real CC threat is the boon...

Not many walkers have fleet... so keeping karios out of CC by moving tends to be a good idea. Unless you get very unlucky of course, and scatter directly towards the walker... which in retrospect will happen about 1/5 of the time if you use math.

You are still playing, "point for point" games here.

Why would tyranid players take trygons. Genestealers will do a much better job point for point at everything they do, save taking down landraiders.

And you speak as if taking other options will make your army less random... let's point out that mo matter what you take instead of the fateweaver, it will be deepstriking as well. You will have more of them, therefore you will be scattering more. Therefore, the other options are more random

More seriously than above statement... The fateweaver has less killing power than 3 chariots, but still makes the rest of your armies assets live.

It is common in 5th edtition for people to judge models based on how much they can kill. In the soulgrinder thread, you said that spending 400 points to take care of 200 points is a bad idea. I would disagree if that 200 point unit can take out 400 points of models by doing what? Supporting other units by making them more efficient.

A landraider isn't taken because it has a lot of killing power. It is taken because it makes terminators get into close combat quickly, and makes a wall that breaks Los or gives cover to other models in your army. In the same way, the fateweaver supports your models by allowing them to survive longer than they normally would.

Play-style actually has a lot to do with this as well... Tyranid players like myself who come over to play daemons will know how to use buff auras to there fullest and selectively choose with the speed of the fateweaver, what gets buffed, and when they need to be buffed. Eldar players would know how to pick and choose combats using Karios' speed. Deathwing players will say that karios is cheap pointswise

If your tactic is more models with more shooting, but lose the buff that stops your army from dying from shooting, then play that way. If you prefer the buffs for that you can shoot more turns before losing your models, then play that way.

And there is always the target priority that comes from the fateweaver. But, I guess that 4 chariots would also create target priority problems as well.

That's my 2 cents.

I love using Fateweaver, as he is one of the only units in our army which provides a benefit to more than himself (screw Scarbrand). A pain in the rump to kill and a huge target for the enemy, he gives my Fiends time to get into combat (as everyone wants to kill him so badly). If my 6 Fiends survive to charge, they start erasing units.

I pair mine up with 1 unit of Bloodcrushers (another big target) and a unit of Fiends behind them.

i dont look at it so much as what does he kill, but what does he remove from you? Does he save the points that he makes back? ie does he save 83 points worth of models than a reg GD or 200 or so from a herald?

with a 14in bubble he just doesnt protect alot esp when they DS in unles you have an icon.

i prefer more bodies than chances to save. Plus i am worried that if the enemy target my T3 horrors they will be forcing a lot of ld tests on Kairos.

"Plus i am worried that if the enemy target my T3 horrors they will be forcing a lot of ld tests on Kairos. "

You do know he only has to take a leadership test when he fails a wound right ?

isnt it any model using his reroll to save and fails makes him test...dear god have i been playing it sooo wrong?!

Bloody hell! i was taking ld tests for all failed saves!! just checked it up.

Makes him a little better huh lol.

Fateweaver can be good and is fun. It's fun to see most opponents faces when a Greater Demon arrives (especially Bloodthirster).

It is however, so hard for me to go past 3 Tzeentch heralds. These can be split so at least 1 can be in the other half when deepstriking, and get a buttload of shots and have fairly good survivability. I guess Fateweaver and a few heralds might be the answer