Flamers.... to Flame or not to Flame, Has GW gone too far?

So I think it is safe to say that Flamers have been NERFED. How has this changed there current role in are armies?

NERFS

+5 points
Multi Shot (now effectively making them BS 3)
- 1 Strength in CC

BUFF

Moves to a Special Choice
Warp Fire

First the NERFS

The Multi Shot penalty for me is the one that is the hardest to swallow. This effectively makes Flamers a static unit since it effectively lowers the shooting to BS 3. The only other use is when they get in nice and tight and fire at close range. Since close range is still 9 inches, this means they are now right in the thick of combat.

The lowering of the strength is not a big deal, I think we have access to more than enough strength 5 attacks not to cry over this. Even at strength 4 they are a decent combat troop as far as missile troops are concerned.

+ 5 Points is not the end of the world, I think they felt the need to do this just for the sake of saying they did it. It's a hard pill to swallow when you consider they are now much less effective at shooting.

BUFFS

Special choice. This is the thing that surprised me the most. Now I can still take flamers, and not effect my rare choices. This opens up a entirely new thought on units as blood crushers and Beasts of Nurgle are no longer competing with Flamers in rare. I think this will radically change the look of daemon armies as we play around with the new freedom in our rare choices. I took 3 beats of nurgle to a tourney the other day and was impressed at how they performed, MV 6 with swiftstride makes them a fast moving unit.

Warp Fire is a JOKE. This is not a buff at all. Now you don't want to shoot at a unit of troops that 20+ strong because you might give them +6 regen! The d3 wounds no armor save may every once and a while kill off a knight or two, but really? This rule is horrible. They should of had this rule put in place in stead of the multi shoot rule.

Conclusion

Worse at shooting
Worse in Combat
Cost more
Don't want to shoot at large units and risk giving them regenerate +6

I think now they will be used as harassing units, Taken as units of 3 with a pyrocaster is how I see them being used currently. Small enough that loosing them is not the end of the world yet good enough that they will still deal with flak and put some ranged pressure on my opponents. At least the Pyrocaster is BS 5 so should be hitting on 5's and 4's more often than not. Worst case scenario use them as a redirector???

A redirector that costs 135 points? Thats a bit expensive

Flamers were already underperforming for me. The only redeeming features they had were that they could reliably kill/force a panic check on enemy chaff and provide a slew of S5 attacks while supporting combats. These uses have now been severely curtailed.

I used to always include a single unit of 4 in my lists. Now I'm rather glad that I only converted 4, as I don't see them having much of a place anytime soon.

Nope.

If I was only going to change what I usually have in my list,
2x3 screamers will replace my 6 flamers, more versatile and reliable.

But what I'll try is to drop my 12 furies and 6 flamers + 3-4 Bletters to fit in a Soulgrinder and 3 screamers.

With the changes made, it's obvious the majority of people have immediately dropped flamers from their lists, i ran 6 in friend and 12 in competitive, they will nearly all be replaced by screamers for me, as they are nearly as good in combat as hounds, but can get to placed easier, and make the necessary supporting attacks where needed.

People are starting to compare what's best, in terms of charriot/soulgrinder/screemers as they will total up to about the same points costs... personally, I'm going with screamers, because I feel the charriot will just be redirected easily, especially if you take that upgrade that makes it face sides (harvester?) and the soulgrinder simply isn't worth the points.

... well isn't worth the points until the ruin the rest of the daemons in the army book next year

The main problem I see, is that I may have to take horrors for a bunker. because where as I took flamers because they made a nice bunker for the HoTz because people knew flamers were no slouch in combat, the nerf to str means their not as potent, and stand and shoot will be a lot of the times hitting on 6's...

anyway, I've had my rant... Good job I didn't buy more flamers for my grand army, as I was going to buy them before I heard about the new flamer models, held off... because while the ones we have now are great, I wanted a bit of variety... and the new models don't live up to my expectations, and the nerf upon nerf means I won't be fielding them anyway

here's my thoughts on the subject, copied from the rumor thread

I'll keep taking them. Screamers do not impress me at all. They're nice but not all that great. The switch to special means I can now field both a fiend brick and a crusher brick, while flamers keep the herald safe (safer than a bunch of useless horrors would) in the early game before he can afford to fly around the table everywhere.

Yes, stand & shoot hits only on 6s, so what? For starters, if they're being charged by anything they can't beat, you haven't done your job right. And even 6s to hit when you throw 20 dice still means you might pick of a couple of guys, which in case of fast cav is enough for a panic check.

The alternative, horrors, is 120 points for 10 S3 T3 models that might generate a power/dispel die IF you roll a 6. I'm sorry, but horrors are just not worth bringing to te table unless you go all out and use 30+. And even then, I'd rather leave the casting to the herald and for those points get a brick of some other, better core daemons. Even plaguebearers, with a herald, are far better.

i disagree, M6 skirmishers (M4 since you're bunkering a herald) are not that tough to pin down, especially if they have to be within 18" to be effective.

right, but that only works if your opponent uses fast cav to hunt flamers, not things like eagles, harpies, and razorgors. the S5 was really the only thing keeping stuff like this away.

i'd actually consider the horror unit for the bunker over the flamers now. they were barely performing up to standard that justified them in my previous GT armies as it was, there's no way they're worth even close to 40 pts apiece now.

i think this is our fundamental disagreement. you're fine with them as a bunker, i expect performance out of a 240 pt unit.

what he said ^^^^

My herald has wings, so he keeps up. Heck, I don't see how those horrors would deter eagles and harpies anyway. Lower stats across their whole profile, except WS. 3 S4 attacks per file is better than 2 S3 attacks.

As a caveat, I don't mean to say Flamers are the best of the best, must-haves in any competitive WAAC list. I'm just saying they're useful, far more useful than 10 or 20 horrors.

Then again, one could always just wing it and keep the herald solo OR put him on a disc and fly around with the screamers...

Will the warpstone thingy be more useful to other units that have ward saves? Such as those High Elf units and large blocks of WOC infantry?

it is just a gimmick that will occasionaly make hit harder or backfire against us. no big deal either way.

models can only make a flying move if the entire unit is composed of flying models, so he still slows the unit down.

my point is, if neither bunker can protect itself (and therefore relies on other units for protection), i would rather have 10 ablative wounds with a 4+ ward for 120 pts than 12 wounds with a 5+ ward for 240 pts. both are useless in CC but the lower cost and increased ward save of the horrors is better against shooting.

Just to tack onto brother_maynard's thoughts:
--For the same point value of 6 Flamers you get 20 horrors. That's 20 wounds w/ a 4++ instead of 12 w/ a 5++.
--By using the horrors as a bunker you get another magic user for, if nothing else, channeling purposes.

My herald of tzeentch often just ran around behind my combat blocks alone so my flamers could be free to take risks and flank charge.. so no bunker needed.

I always equated a flamer to a few archers.. they cost as much as a few archers.. averaged as many hits as a few archers.. but the shots were S4 and flaming, and the S5 in combat was nice. Now they don't shoot as well as any decent missile troop, and don't fight well. Only reason to take them is flaming.

6 flamers move and shoot at a hellpit.. average 21 shots.. hitting on 6s may hit 4, wounding on 5s may get you 1. Good job 240 pts.

Maybe I just need to make my herald of tzeentch a fire or metal lore, and take that flaming sword on the HoK.