Treatise on Magic Lores
Posted: Mon Nov 22, 2010 1:25 am
I was wondering the other day about usefulness of the magic lores we have access to.
You only see pretty much three of the five we have access to in the lists.
Dark
Shadow
and Death
What about the remaining two? Fire and Metal?
Well, lets see. I'm deliberately skipping Power of Darkness as all our Sorceresses have access to it, no matter what lore they choose.
Disclaimer: I'm writing this with no preconceptions. I have no idea what the result of this article will be in the end. I have personally only used Shadow, Dark and Death lores so far but I'm going to try out the other two in future games.
I will attempt to value each lore in the following categories:
Difficulty - How hard the spells are to cast in general, taking the average casting value of all spells in each lore and using the powered up versions.
Killing Power - How damaging the spells are, ranging between mass destruction spells and more focused but more powerful spells
Support - How many and how good augments does the lore give us.
Disruption - How many and how good hexes does the lore give us.
Lets get this thing started then.
The Lore of Dark Magic
Direct Damage Spells: Chillwind, Doombolt, Bladewind, Soul Stealer, Black Horror
Augments: none
Hexes: Chillwind, Word of Pain
Clearly focus of our main lore is to deal damage, with five out of six spells capable of doing so.
One spell shares benefits of a damage spell with those of a hex
And one is a pure hex.
All Dark Magic spells are really easy to cast.
Difficulty: 7.8 average casting value, even our level 2 sorceresses have no issue getting that on as little as two dice. 5/5 - can't get better than this
Killing Power: Two Spells with small amount of hits, one awesome against war machines, and two great against weak hordes (anything above T3 or S4 and both Soul Stealer and Black Horror start having trouble). 3/5 - spells very focused. Some become useless depending on the opponent you face, others gain in power. Sucks when you get the wrong spells against the wrong opponent.
Support: - 0/5 - no augments present
Disruption: Two good, but situational hexes. 2/5 - Chillwind becomes useless against no-shooting force. Word of Pain on the other hand shines against shooting force, or if your army is heavy melee oriented. Too situational.
The Lore of Fire
Direct Damage Spells: Fireball, Cascading Fire-Cloak, The Burning Head, Piercing Bolts of Burning, Fulminating Flame Cage, Flame Storm.
Augments: Cascading Fire-Cloak, Flaming Sword of Rhuin
Hexes: The Burning Head, Fulminating Flame Cage.
Fire is very... Firey. Every spell burns, and only one spell doesn't deal damage to the enemy by itself.
Very flexible signature spell, going from small firey bolty to an exploding sun.
Big downside is that no spell ever goes over S4
Difficulty: 12.8 Still possible to cast every spells without major drain on power dice. 4/5 - second easiest lore to cast
Killing Power: five out of seven spells do damage directly, four out of seven can cause massive amount of hits. Only downside being S4. 4/5 - Lore loses out due to its low strength, struggling against high T or high AS foes.
Support: Two spells that help out your own troos. Flaming Sword of Rhuin is great on our crossbowmen, dealing with their problem of being S3 and also giving them magical flaming attacks. Cascading Fire-Cloak doesn't help your own troops survive, as much as it burns everyone nearby, would be better if wounds caused added to CR. 3/5 - Tackles our weakness in strength with one spell, but doesn't help us survive in any way for longer... it's fire after all.
Disruption: Well aimed 36" burning head can cause panic in most of the enemy force, even one unit suddenly running through your own line can be really dangerous. Flame Cage on the other hand can stop those big hordes from moving. 50 marauders with flails with the flame cage on them? They sure as hell won't go anywhere next turn. 3/5 - Much bigger impact on the battle than Dark Magic hexes, but also somewhat situational (as all fire magic losing against high T and AS...)
The Lore of Metal
Direct Damage Spells: Searing Doom, Gehenna's Golden Hounds, Final Transmutation
Augments: Enchanted Blades of Aiban, Glittering Robe
Hexes: Plague of Rust, Transmutation of Lead, Final Transmutation
Metal clearly works best the more armor your opponent has, something our basic troops struggle with, elves being plagued with strength 3 on almost everything.
Difficulty: 14.7 Spells are getting harder to get off now. 2/5
Killing Power: Depends heavily on the amount of armor your opponent has. Even the snipe spell allows look out sir from potentially lower armor troops. Shining (pun intended) example here is the Final Transmutation which cuts down *any* enemy unit by a third, with a chance of killing enemy characters right away. 3/5 - too much reliance on enemy armor.
Support: Glittering Robe makes even our warriors 3+ save, that's save of a chaos chosen, nothing to laugh at! And because it's not a remains in play spell your opponent can't dispel it in his turn. Enchanted Blades are a notch weaker than Flaming Sword, We usually have no problem hitting the enemy, but wounding them.. and the addition of Armor Piercing is useless on our Crossbowmen (who need the boost to accuracy the most). 4/5 It makes our troops much more durable than they seem, and improves our already good accuracy.
Disruption: Plague of Rust counters its own lore damage spells, but makes enemy troops easier to kill by everything else, while transmutation of lead is a weaker version of Word of Pain, though it has the addition of -1 to armor saves. 4/5 - it deals with what our troops tend to have problems with... armor. Successful Final Transmutation can also cause massive problems in the opponent's battle plan if half of his units go stupid for the gold.
The Lore of Shadow
Direct Damage Spells: The Penumbral Pendulum, Pit of Shades
Augments: Steed of Shadows, Okkam's Mindrazor
Hexes: Melkoth's Mystifying Miasma, The Enfeebling Foe, The Withering
We're looking at a very hexing lore here, and possibly the best synergies within a single lore. Its Damage spells depend on enemy's initiative, but its signature spell reduces the initiative among others.
Difficulty: 14.2 A little bit easier than Metal, but harder than fire. 3/5
Killing Power: Only two damage spells, both strongly dependant on enemy's initiative. One aimed more at single models and characters (Only hits what's in a straight line, like a cannonball), the other can cause huge devastation, but again relies on initiative. 3/5 - you can't debuff everything's initiative to do reasonable damage, and no of the damage spells are particularly easy to cast.
Support: Not a whole lot of it here, Steed of Shadows lost it's main use from 7th edition which was jettisoning sorceresses out of combat. Just a fly for a character is a little less useful now... Okkam's Mindrazor on the other hand is amazing with our high leadership across the board (it even boosts harpies very nicely, go figure) 2/5 - One crap, and one very good augment. Though Mindrazor has to be cast on a unit already in combat as it's not RiP, reducing its usefulness a little.
Disruption: The Hex lore out there, if you want to make enemy troops useless, this is the lore for your level 4. 5/5
The Lore of Death
Direct Damage Spells: Spirit Leech, The Caress of Laniph, The Fate of Bjuna, The Purple Sun of Xereus
Augments: Aspect of the Dreadknight
Hexes: Soulblight, Doom and Darkness
Focus on single-target sniping spells coupled with one extremely powerful mass destruction spell (and only Vortex available at the moment). Lack of strong debuffs makes this lore a really good combination with shadow hexes.
Difficulty: 14.2 very much like Shadow. 3/5
Killing Power: Three out of four damage spells focus on killing single models, and with the increased power of magic, and importance of BSB, those spells are amazing. Purple Sun comes in when there's too many targets for you to handle. It has the same issue as Pit of Shades, but hits many more targets and sticks around, Nobody is going to come close to a swirling vortex of killing power, forcing your opponent to get around it. 4/5 - kills vital, expensive targets the opponent might have, characters and/or single monsters.
Support: Single spells that makes our troops cause fear or terror, useful, but not as useful as it would've been in 7th edition. 2/5
Disruption: Limited usefulness of Soulblight, but Doom and Darkness is really handy at breaking those stalwart troops. Stalwart on Ld5 or 6 isn't that amazing anymore. 3/5
Summary:
Easiest to Cast: Lore of Dark Magic
Most Damaging: Lore of Fire/Lore of Death
Most Supportive: Lore of Metal
Most Distruptive: Lore of Shadow
Best Overall: Lore of Fire very closely followed by Lore of Metal and Lore of Shadow
Conclusion:
On its own, Fire Lore seems to be the most universal, sporting both augments and hexes as well as a healthy dose of damage dealing spells.
But when lores come together forming synergies, things change a little. Here's a little summary of good (IMO) synergies:
Dark + Shadow = Shadow lowers enemy stats to make Dark damage spells even more deadly (Soulstealer on a T1 unit? yum, Black Horror on S1 unit? even more yum!)
Fire + Shadow = Shadow in this situation needs to have The Withering, to lower the T of the target, and then Fire comes in blasting with increased force (also Fire + Shadow = Balrog!)
Death + Shadow = one of the most common combinations. Shadow kills stats, Death kills models.
Metal Magic stands on its own, not gaining much by combining with any other lore since it attacks something no other lore does - armor saves.
Shadow on the other hand can be effectively mixed with any lore, but at the same time doesn't do much for itself (it does help the army in general though)
In the end the choice of Lore of Magic depends largely on what the rest of your army *can't* do.
Do you have little shooting and are worried about horde armies? Fire Lore is your friend.
Are you worried about fully armored knights charging down your lines? Here comes Lore of Metal to the rescue.
Want to make killing easier for the rest of your army? That's where the Shadow comes in.
Enemy characters making you lose sleep when they reap through your expensive troops? Death Magic will take care of that.
Dark Magic? well... do you only have one wizard and want to cast as many spells as you can? Dark is cheap and not totally useless. Personally I would only use it with a supporting Shadow Sorceress
You only see pretty much three of the five we have access to in the lists.
Dark
Shadow
and Death
What about the remaining two? Fire and Metal?
Well, lets see. I'm deliberately skipping Power of Darkness as all our Sorceresses have access to it, no matter what lore they choose.
Disclaimer: I'm writing this with no preconceptions. I have no idea what the result of this article will be in the end. I have personally only used Shadow, Dark and Death lores so far but I'm going to try out the other two in future games.
I will attempt to value each lore in the following categories:
Difficulty - How hard the spells are to cast in general, taking the average casting value of all spells in each lore and using the powered up versions.
Killing Power - How damaging the spells are, ranging between mass destruction spells and more focused but more powerful spells
Support - How many and how good augments does the lore give us.
Disruption - How many and how good hexes does the lore give us.
Lets get this thing started then.
The Lore of Dark Magic
Direct Damage Spells: Chillwind, Doombolt, Bladewind, Soul Stealer, Black Horror
Augments: none
Hexes: Chillwind, Word of Pain
Clearly focus of our main lore is to deal damage, with five out of six spells capable of doing so.
One spell shares benefits of a damage spell with those of a hex
And one is a pure hex.
All Dark Magic spells are really easy to cast.
Difficulty: 7.8 average casting value, even our level 2 sorceresses have no issue getting that on as little as two dice. 5/5 - can't get better than this
Killing Power: Two Spells with small amount of hits, one awesome against war machines, and two great against weak hordes (anything above T3 or S4 and both Soul Stealer and Black Horror start having trouble). 3/5 - spells very focused. Some become useless depending on the opponent you face, others gain in power. Sucks when you get the wrong spells against the wrong opponent.
Support: - 0/5 - no augments present
Disruption: Two good, but situational hexes. 2/5 - Chillwind becomes useless against no-shooting force. Word of Pain on the other hand shines against shooting force, or if your army is heavy melee oriented. Too situational.
The Lore of Fire
Direct Damage Spells: Fireball, Cascading Fire-Cloak, The Burning Head, Piercing Bolts of Burning, Fulminating Flame Cage, Flame Storm.
Augments: Cascading Fire-Cloak, Flaming Sword of Rhuin
Hexes: The Burning Head, Fulminating Flame Cage.
Fire is very... Firey. Every spell burns, and only one spell doesn't deal damage to the enemy by itself.
Very flexible signature spell, going from small firey bolty to an exploding sun.
Big downside is that no spell ever goes over S4
Difficulty: 12.8 Still possible to cast every spells without major drain on power dice. 4/5 - second easiest lore to cast
Killing Power: five out of seven spells do damage directly, four out of seven can cause massive amount of hits. Only downside being S4. 4/5 - Lore loses out due to its low strength, struggling against high T or high AS foes.
Support: Two spells that help out your own troos. Flaming Sword of Rhuin is great on our crossbowmen, dealing with their problem of being S3 and also giving them magical flaming attacks. Cascading Fire-Cloak doesn't help your own troops survive, as much as it burns everyone nearby, would be better if wounds caused added to CR. 3/5 - Tackles our weakness in strength with one spell, but doesn't help us survive in any way for longer... it's fire after all.
Disruption: Well aimed 36" burning head can cause panic in most of the enemy force, even one unit suddenly running through your own line can be really dangerous. Flame Cage on the other hand can stop those big hordes from moving. 50 marauders with flails with the flame cage on them? They sure as hell won't go anywhere next turn. 3/5 - Much bigger impact on the battle than Dark Magic hexes, but also somewhat situational (as all fire magic losing against high T and AS...)
The Lore of Metal
Direct Damage Spells: Searing Doom, Gehenna's Golden Hounds, Final Transmutation
Augments: Enchanted Blades of Aiban, Glittering Robe
Hexes: Plague of Rust, Transmutation of Lead, Final Transmutation
Metal clearly works best the more armor your opponent has, something our basic troops struggle with, elves being plagued with strength 3 on almost everything.
Difficulty: 14.7 Spells are getting harder to get off now. 2/5
Killing Power: Depends heavily on the amount of armor your opponent has. Even the snipe spell allows look out sir from potentially lower armor troops. Shining (pun intended) example here is the Final Transmutation which cuts down *any* enemy unit by a third, with a chance of killing enemy characters right away. 3/5 - too much reliance on enemy armor.
Support: Glittering Robe makes even our warriors 3+ save, that's save of a chaos chosen, nothing to laugh at! And because it's not a remains in play spell your opponent can't dispel it in his turn. Enchanted Blades are a notch weaker than Flaming Sword, We usually have no problem hitting the enemy, but wounding them.. and the addition of Armor Piercing is useless on our Crossbowmen (who need the boost to accuracy the most). 4/5 It makes our troops much more durable than they seem, and improves our already good accuracy.
Disruption: Plague of Rust counters its own lore damage spells, but makes enemy troops easier to kill by everything else, while transmutation of lead is a weaker version of Word of Pain, though it has the addition of -1 to armor saves. 4/5 - it deals with what our troops tend to have problems with... armor. Successful Final Transmutation can also cause massive problems in the opponent's battle plan if half of his units go stupid for the gold.
The Lore of Shadow
Direct Damage Spells: The Penumbral Pendulum, Pit of Shades
Augments: Steed of Shadows, Okkam's Mindrazor
Hexes: Melkoth's Mystifying Miasma, The Enfeebling Foe, The Withering
We're looking at a very hexing lore here, and possibly the best synergies within a single lore. Its Damage spells depend on enemy's initiative, but its signature spell reduces the initiative among others.
Difficulty: 14.2 A little bit easier than Metal, but harder than fire. 3/5
Killing Power: Only two damage spells, both strongly dependant on enemy's initiative. One aimed more at single models and characters (Only hits what's in a straight line, like a cannonball), the other can cause huge devastation, but again relies on initiative. 3/5 - you can't debuff everything's initiative to do reasonable damage, and no of the damage spells are particularly easy to cast.
Support: Not a whole lot of it here, Steed of Shadows lost it's main use from 7th edition which was jettisoning sorceresses out of combat. Just a fly for a character is a little less useful now... Okkam's Mindrazor on the other hand is amazing with our high leadership across the board (it even boosts harpies very nicely, go figure) 2/5 - One crap, and one very good augment. Though Mindrazor has to be cast on a unit already in combat as it's not RiP, reducing its usefulness a little.
Disruption: The Hex lore out there, if you want to make enemy troops useless, this is the lore for your level 4. 5/5
The Lore of Death
Direct Damage Spells: Spirit Leech, The Caress of Laniph, The Fate of Bjuna, The Purple Sun of Xereus
Augments: Aspect of the Dreadknight
Hexes: Soulblight, Doom and Darkness
Focus on single-target sniping spells coupled with one extremely powerful mass destruction spell (and only Vortex available at the moment). Lack of strong debuffs makes this lore a really good combination with shadow hexes.
Difficulty: 14.2 very much like Shadow. 3/5
Killing Power: Three out of four damage spells focus on killing single models, and with the increased power of magic, and importance of BSB, those spells are amazing. Purple Sun comes in when there's too many targets for you to handle. It has the same issue as Pit of Shades, but hits many more targets and sticks around, Nobody is going to come close to a swirling vortex of killing power, forcing your opponent to get around it. 4/5 - kills vital, expensive targets the opponent might have, characters and/or single monsters.
Support: Single spells that makes our troops cause fear or terror, useful, but not as useful as it would've been in 7th edition. 2/5
Disruption: Limited usefulness of Soulblight, but Doom and Darkness is really handy at breaking those stalwart troops. Stalwart on Ld5 or 6 isn't that amazing anymore. 3/5
Summary:
Easiest to Cast: Lore of Dark Magic
Most Damaging: Lore of Fire/Lore of Death
Most Supportive: Lore of Metal
Most Distruptive: Lore of Shadow
Best Overall: Lore of Fire very closely followed by Lore of Metal and Lore of Shadow
Conclusion:
On its own, Fire Lore seems to be the most universal, sporting both augments and hexes as well as a healthy dose of damage dealing spells.
But when lores come together forming synergies, things change a little. Here's a little summary of good (IMO) synergies:
Dark + Shadow = Shadow lowers enemy stats to make Dark damage spells even more deadly (Soulstealer on a T1 unit? yum, Black Horror on S1 unit? even more yum!)
Fire + Shadow = Shadow in this situation needs to have The Withering, to lower the T of the target, and then Fire comes in blasting with increased force (also Fire + Shadow = Balrog!)
Death + Shadow = one of the most common combinations. Shadow kills stats, Death kills models.
Metal Magic stands on its own, not gaining much by combining with any other lore since it attacks something no other lore does - armor saves.
Shadow on the other hand can be effectively mixed with any lore, but at the same time doesn't do much for itself (it does help the army in general though)
In the end the choice of Lore of Magic depends largely on what the rest of your army *can't* do.
Do you have little shooting and are worried about horde armies? Fire Lore is your friend.
Are you worried about fully armored knights charging down your lines? Here comes Lore of Metal to the rescue.
Want to make killing easier for the rest of your army? That's where the Shadow comes in.
Enemy characters making you lose sleep when they reap through your expensive troops? Death Magic will take care of that.
Dark Magic? well... do you only have one wizard and want to cast as many spells as you can? Dark is cheap and not totally useless. Personally I would only use it with a supporting Shadow Sorceress