Daemon Team (lots of playtest)

[cthol]

posted this on fumbbl as well, in case anyone saw it already... I thought the existing 4 chaos powers teams were a bit broken alright, so I tried to ferlect the fluff a bit more, and give the teams some flavour, without breaking them and making them over-powerful. The basic idea is that most of the skills will come from the PHYS abilities list, as is fitting Also, the cultists are a bit rubbish, but they cost 60K because they have access to mutations. Each team has 1 greater daemon as a big guy, and severqal position players, but they can only have 2 of each. No team has an apothecary. I've used Take Root as the negatrait for all the daeoms; none of the others seem to work I wanted to reflect that greater daemons have better things to do than play blood bowl, so they may not turn up; however if they do then they're dynamite:)



Khorne

Khorne has no wizards. The bloodthirster is basically a minotaur, excepta bit faster (wings...) it would be nice to use Leap to reflect the wings, but I think a big guy with leap ( and the AG to use it) would be completely broken... unless you allow them break tackle and say they can use their STR for leaping... but that sounds like madness:) The juggernauts are fast, but definitely blitzers rather than receivers - no hands...

0 – 1 Bloodthirster 110,000 5518 Horns, Mighty Blow, Big Guy, Take Root, Frenzy, Throw Team Mate PHYS

0 – 2 Bloodletter 70,000 5328 Frenzy PHYS

0 – 2 Juggernauts 90,000 7418 No Hands, Break Tackle PHYS

0 – 2 Chaos Warriors 100,000 5439 GEN, STR

0 – 2 Beastmen 60,000 6338 Horns GEN

0 – 12 Khorne Cultist 60,000 6337 GEN, PHYS

ReRolls: 70,000
No Apoth
No Wizards



Nurgle

The Great unclean one is quite expensive, but i think he's still quite cheap for what you get... the nurglings can't hold the ball, but being able to throw someone with foul appearance into your opponent'splay coiuld be very nasty. their AG of 5 reflects the fact that there's loads of them: you can't stop them swarming all over the place, and if a few off them get squashed on landing then it doesn't matter much.

0 – 1 Great Unclean One 130,000 3619 Big Guy, Mighty Blow, Take Root, Foul Appearance, Mighty Blow, Throw Team Mate, Regenerate, Always Hungry PHYS

0 – 2 Plaguebearers 70,000 5338 Foul Appearance PHYS

0 – 2 Nurglings 60,000 4356 No Hands, Infect, Regenerate, Right Stuff, Stunty, Dodge PHYS

0 – 2 Chaos Warriors 100,000 5439 GEN, STR

0 – 2 Beastmen 60,000 6338 Horns GEN

0 – 12 Nurgle Cultist 60,000 5338 GEN, PHYS

ReRolls: 80,000
No Apoth



Slaanesh

again, the daemon is basically like a minotaur

0 – 1 Keeper of Secrets 120,000 5528 Horns, Big Guy, Mighty Blow, Take Root, Throw Team Mate, Thick Skull, Regenerate

0 – 2 Daemonette 80,000 6337 Hypnotic Gaze, Regenerate PHYS

0 – 2 Beasts 70,000 7337 No Hands, Leap PHYS

0 – 2 Chaos Warriors 100,000 5439 GEN, STR

0 – 2 Beastmen 60,000 6338 Horns GEN

0 – 12 Slaanesh Cultist 60,000 6337 GEN, PHYS

ReRolls: 80,000
No Apoth


Tzeetch
The Horrors I may have got the wrong way round: i can't remember if the pipnk ones split into blue ones or vice versa, and i don't have the book with me atm...

0 – 1 Lord of Change 120,000 6528 Big Guy, Mighty Blow, Take Root, Throw Team Mate, Thick Skull, Regenerate

0 – 2 Flamer 70,000 6337 Claw, No Hands PHYS

0 – 2 Pink Horror 70,000 6247 Foul Appearance PHYS

0 – 2 Blue Horror 60,000 5236 Stunty, Foul Appearance, Right Stuff PHYS

0 – 2 Chaos Warriors 100,000 5439 GEN, STR

0 – 2 Beastmen 60,000 6338 Horns GEN

0 – 12 Tzeentch Cultist 60,000 6337 GEN, PHYS


ReRolls: 80,000
No Apoth


Anyway, that's the idea, certainly not claiming them as finished, but let me know what you think

Cthol.

[Mazikeen]

Hi Plasmoid!

0-4 70K Plague Bearers..6417 foul app.;.G+PH
0-4 70K Blood Letters...4427 horns;........G+ST+PH
0-4 70K Daemonettes.....6347 claw, gaze, no hands;.......G+AG+PH
0-4 70K Horrors....6337 extra arms, regenerate....G+PA+PH
80K Rerolls, apothecary + wizard as normal.

Daemonettes and Plague Bearers seem to perfectly fit the spirit of their gods, no comment about them...

But I can hardly imagine Khorne daemons without Frenzy. And obviously, ST4 + Frenzy is too much. I suppose there is no solution to this...

Another comment : How can the MA difference beetween Plague Bearers and Blood Letters be explained with background? Don't necessary answer this, it's pretty useless

For Horrors, I think they are OK, I would just have a suggestion: How about considering Pro for them, which would reflect the influence of Tzeentch on reality?

Sorry to be a chaos fanatic

Globally, the team seem to reach its goal, that's an impressive work

Mazikeen

[Mazikeen]

Hi cthol!

Just a few comments:

The background is, I suppose, that the team is composed of cultist that invoke demons before the match... Let's take advantage of this to balance the team:

How about putting the Secret Weapon trait on the invocated demons? This would reflect the fact that the cultists invoke the demons, but that they do not find in this world the energy they need to maintain their presence...

For all teams, I would remove beastmen and chaos wariors, since they should have to have their own teams... And instead allow more demons

But I suppose that these teams could hardly be offical

[plasmoid]

Hi Mazikeen,
thanks for your interest

>But I can hardly imagine Khorne daemons without Frenzy. And obviously,
>ST4 + Frenzy is too much. I suppose there is no solution to this...
Actually, our playtest was with ST4 + frenzy, and it was fine.
However, some (TBB) people have such a hard time believing this, so I guess we won't use the frenzy.

>Another comment : How can the MA difference beetween Plague
>Bearers and Blood Letters be explained with background? Don't
>necessary answer this, it's pretty useless
No explanation really.
.....but they do have ST-skills.... So they are like black orcs to orcs?

>For Horrors, I think they are OK, I would just have a suggestion: How
>about considering Pro for them, which would reflect the influence of
>Tzeentch on reality?
Pro would be very cool
But I don't think I'll use it.
The skills that they start with fit them well, and are really needed. And I definately won't be giving them a 3rd skill.
But it really was a good idea.

>Globally, the team seem to reach its goal, that's an impressive work
Thanks. I'm very happy with the result.
Martin

[Mazikeen]

Hi!

I wanted to test this team, so I did (with the 1.5.1 version of the rules), and here is a small report

I played a complete team (Team Value: 1350K):

4 Plague Bearers (6 4 1 7 ; Foul Appearance ; 70K)
4 Blood Letters (4 4 2 7 ; Frenzy ; 70K)
4 Daemonettes (6 3 4 7 ; Claw, Hypnotic Gaze, No Hands ; 70K)
4 Horrors (6 3 3 7 ; Extra Arms, Regenerate ; 70K)
2 Re-Rolls (80K)
1 Apothecary
2 Fan Factor

The opposing team was an orc team (Team Value: 1350K):

1 Troll
4 Black Orc Blockers
4 Blitzers
2 Throwers
2 Linemen
3 Goblins
3 Re-Rolls
1 Apothecary
2 Fan Factor

So... I lost, but the game was "tasteful"

The team proposes really interesting challenges, even before the start of the match. The specificities of each player allow you to field a totally different team each time, to adapt to your opponent and to attack or defense. Plague Bearers + Daemonettes are really useful in defense, Horrors and Blood Letters are fielded for attack.

On the different players:

- Plague Bearers are a nightmare for passing (Surprise!). The MA6 is useful to place them next to the thrower or the catchers, but is maybe too much. They are definitely good players.

- Blood Letters are dangerous for themselves with Frenzy. As you must follow, the block during the turn after is fatal, due to AV7 without Block. Finally, Horns would make them better ;o) If you blitzed with a Blood Letter as a final action, with AG2, you are also tempted to dodge away sometimes (to avoid the two dice block by a troll with Mighty Blow for example), which should not be an option. Blood Letters are supposed to fight and kill or die, for the pleasure of Khorne, aren’t they? No matter where the blood comes from

- Daemonettes have to be masochists. The Claw + Hypnotic Gaze make them THE target (when the ball is not in the hands of an accessible Horror). But if they manage to survive, they could become with evolution some of the best blitzers...

- Horrors are good at what they are made for: playing with the ball. With the 1.5.1 rules, they pick-up and catch like elves, it’s a real pleasure. But passing skill access will soon make them too "standard"...

- A 80K Re-Roll is hard. As the team has no block or dodge, a turnover is quick to come. Hopefully there is no Big Guy.

- AV7 represents daemons’ instability far better than I imagined. Against orcs, 16 players were useful... The start of such a team will be a hard time.

According to this, here are some suggestions that I would like to try soon against an agile team:

Code: Select all

0-4 70K Plague Bearers  [5 4 1 7 ; Foul Appearance ; G + PH]
0-4 70K Blood Letters   [5 4 1 7 ; Frenzy ; G + ST + PH]
0-4 70K Daemonettes     [6 3 4 7 ; Claw, Hypnotic Gaze, No Hands ; G + AG + PH]
0-4 70K Horrors         [6 3 3 7 ; Extra arms, Pro ; G + PH(As normal skill, not only on double)] 
80K Re-Rolls, Apothecary + Wizard as normal.

Instead of allowing Passing Skills access, I would rather allow Mutations as normal skills, which looks far more "Tzeentch" to me ;o) It is just a suggestion, nobody screams! I know this is not possible with LRB 3.0. But it doesn’t seem forbidden with the 1.5.1 version, as the Mutations access is always specifically stated in the team list (in the league rules, it is only stated that you cannot gain a mutation, even on a double, unless it is written in the team list ; but I may have misunderstood). And as there are already 4 Claws, 4 Foul Appearance possible, I suppose that other mutations (such as Two Heads or Very Long Legs to have an interceptor) would be chosen, so I think it will not overpower them, and, instead, will offer new development strategies. However, it was just an idea

Mazikeen

[plasmoid]

Hi Mazikeen,
thanks for playing with the team. I really appriciate the feedback.

I've been thinking about this for quite some time now, and I'm convincing myself that the 70K version of the team is the best way to go. This team will be easier to get off the ground ( = fewer abandoned teams) and less powerful long term, which should help remedy any balance concerns.

Also, a starting 80K team had the excruciating choice between: 1 reroll + no apoth and FF4, and reroll + apoth + FF7. With expesive players, low AV and no reroll/block skills they were damned either way.

Now,
on to your comments:
>Plague Bearers.
For the starting team they are good, (though the opposing team should be able to contain them with their AG1). On longer term they are very slow to develop, and get only G skills, so they get less useful.

>Blood Letters.
Yep, frenzy starts out being a liability. I've lost many games due to frenzy. Still, it is very valuable to have once they accumulate skills. Access to ST skill also make them valuable for punch, long term. I like frenzy too, and will use it as first priority.
If others have a big problem with this I can switch back to horns. The models do have very big horns.

And - you've actually swayed my with the AG1 suggestion. They shouldn't be running away or have any interest in the ball.

- Horrors
I disagree that passing access would make them too standard. Coaches don't have to build 4 throwers at all. I do see the point of pro, and quite like it, but other coaches assure me that the team needs regeneration on the ball handlers - even more so when the Bloodletters drop to AG1.

And I can't agree with them getting straight PH access. IMO it would (among other things) mean that the team could too easily pump up the Foul Appearance aspect to the point where all ball handling is shut down.

>A 80K Re-Roll is hard.
Yep. The daemons pretty much loathe eachother.

>Hopefully there is no Big Guy.
Indeed. No BG.

>AV7 represents daemons’ instability far better than I imagined.
Thanks. Being an ST team is not that great when you have AV7.

As for your suggestion - using JJ's formula (or comparing to Saurii) puts the Plaguebearers and Bloodletters at MA6 for 70K.
So, this is the team I would be suggesting for further playing:

0-4 70K Plague Bearers..6417 foul app.;.G+PH
0-4 70K Blood Letters.....6417 frenzy;........G+ST+PH
0-4 70K Daemonettes.....6347 claw, gaze; no hands;..G+AG+PH
0-4 70K Horrors.............6337 Xarms; Regen;.....G+PA+PH
Apoth, Wizard, No Big Guy, ReRolls 80K

Cheers
Martin