Future DE - Strength and weaknesses

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Calisson
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Future DE - Strength and weaknesses

Post by Calisson »

From the 9th Scroll:
The 9th Scroll Issue 3 is released!
summarized and discussed here:
DE - Strenght/Weakness - Discussion - The 9th Scroll!, copy/pasted thereafter.

Strenghts

Supporting the Army:
The Dread Elves have many ways to buff their troops on the table, with unique upgrades for units coming from characters, having synergy between characters and certain units and access to buffing units. While a regular Dread Elf might not have the most impressive stat line compared to a Warrior of the Dark Gods, the units become more than the sum of their parts by using the synergy in the army.

Mobility:
The Dread Elves have access to units that are mobile and fast enough to work around their more rank and file units to harass the opponent.

Leadership:
With access to leadership 10 for a general, the Dread Elves become a very reliable force on the table. Also having access to high leadership on the general gives the Dread Elf player the chance to play with an army lead by a Spell Caster.

First Turn Combat Punch:
Dread Elves armies are the image of the vicious feline predator. Their troop’s mobility is among the best in the game, with high speed and manoeuvre ability. Stone-cold killers and careful calculators, they rely on choosing the best moment to engage the enemy. Their warriors strike hard, accurately and swiftly, for they know if the blow is not lethal and the combat must last, retaliation is going to be bloody. Frontload damage is one of the most defining features of the Dread Elves close combat units. Overpowering enemy units within the first round of combat or inflicting severe casualties to make the grinding down easier is what the Dread Elves close combat units sets apart from others elven melee units.

Mobile Shooting:
While not being gunline focused in their shooting style,the Dread Elves can still bring a very decent support in the form of their ranged weapons. With units having access to shooting and close combat weapons, they can fulfill different roles on the battlefield, making these units very flexible.

Offensive Magic:
It should be no surprise to anyone that Dread Elves enjoy pummelling their opponents with magic. This specialization means they are one of the most offensive capable wizards in the game with potential rule bonuses to their offensive magic.

Soft Weaknesses

Little Toughness:
Besides monsters and mounted units the units are limited to T3.

Little Special Saves:
While they have access to decent armour, the Dread Elves have less use for special saves like Ward or Regeneration Saves, since they are focused on killing the opponent before they get to swing back.

Little Magical Defence:
Since they focus themselves on being offensive wizards, they have lost some of their defensive ability on the table.

Little Medium Arms Fire:
Most of the Dread Elves shooting is focused on low strength fire while using their bolt throwers for the tougher targets.

Hard Weaknesses

No Long Range Shooting:
While the Dread Elves are able to bring some very decent shooting to the table, their shooting is mostly focused on being a counter measure against high priority mobile single targets like monster and character ridden monstrous beasts/monsters that are hard to “catch” with the R&F close combat units. Therefor their shooting is seen only as support, and you will not be able to field a true gunline build with this army. Besides the limited access to heavy and medium arms fire, the following hard limits are applied:
* Small arms fire max range 18”and preferably with quick to fire
* Other shooting, max range 36”
Short range bolt throwers (36”) will make them more unique and special, and differentiate them from Highborn Elves bolt throwers whose gunlines will be more playable. Highborn Elves bolt throwers will have better range but less damaging. Short range also forces Dread Elves players to play aggressive with their bolt throwers. Deploying them at the frontline and in not so protected places. High risk vs reward. Very fitting for Dread Elves who is supposed to be all about aggression.

No Strength in numbers:
Being an elven race, the Dread Elves are very elite army, and therefor they will never field massive numbers of cheap troops on the battle field. While Infernal Dwarfs might bring their slaves to the battlefield, the Dread Elves use their slaves only for their economy.
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Re: Future DE - Strength and weaknesses

Post by Lord Drakon »

Looks very nice and agree completely. Nice there is effort being made making the Elves more unique again. Short range shooting is something I fear but open for it! Keep up the great work you are doing Cal!

EDIT: I somehow missed these scrolls so far, white dwarfs for 9th age, awesome! Looking forward reading it tonight
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Re: Future DE - Strength and weaknesses

Post by Daeron »

Hmm. Well, it's good to see they keep working on the book and it's interesting to see their thoughts behind it. It sounds like a glass (close combat) cannon. That always worries me a bit...
In games, glass cannons can be fun because they bring high tension, and the suspense can make the reward feel twice as good but that's without another player being on the receiving end. As there will be players on the receiving end, it becomes a challenge to balance it properly. I'm intrigued to see how they do it!
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Re: Future DE - Strength and weaknesses

Post by Red... »

Long range shooting always seemed fairly at odds with Dark Elf culture to me. It's cowardly and contradicts Dark Elf martial values, and also prevents the shooter from being able to see their target up close to revel in their killing. Mobile shooting with close range missile weapons seems much more in tune with Dark Elf values to me - leave the long range missile lines to the yellow bellied high and wood elves, who fit into cultures that would not want to risk themselves or sully themselves with having to see the people that their missiles hit.
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Re: Future DE - Strength and weaknesses

Post by Pablo »

They didn't balance it. Dread elves seem to be the weakest book right now by a fair margin with only one type of list finding success (cauldron deathstar+chariots+ support) being truly competitively viable. Our magic is terrible(miscasts destroy us disproportionate to other armies, our sorcerecces of yema cannot access a light cav mount even though there are no vortexes anymore, no access to horde killing spells) we get outshot by goblins, and any type of lighter list(which I believe to be one of the higher skillcap styles of play) is almost auto loss if the enemy has scorching salvo(which I get is one spell from one lore but there is again nothing to do against hordes and is a contuination of 8ths edition of 6 dice purple sun, just that its acceptable because its against elves).
I don't know what type of fast glass cannons you are talking about. Our fast units don't do enough damage to remove steadfast and our competitive fight units are all tough3 with 5+ armor.
The idea that shooting is at odds with dread elf society is laughable. Our shooting is not long ranged outside of the more expensive bolt throwers which you can field less of in a list where high toughness high armor is a problem to deal with. My favorite story about dark elves goes back to 6th where the dreadlord releases bretonnian slaves to a bretonnian army and shoots them all as they run to incense the bretonnian army so that their one unit of knights catch their army off guard.
This playstyle doesn't exist competitively and our shooting is quite lackluster. Strength 3 without access to any to wound buffs is just bad. Also, the cult restrictions are just ridiculously constricitve for balanced army building.
Its been frustrating coming back to try and play a playstyle I find challenging and enjoyable and seems to be much more "push it forward" with just big blocks for the most part. I get the new edition will change things and seem to make us better but I don't think that they fix the problems we have currently. Our armies now are much more glass than cannon. It has been frustrating coming back to warhammer and feeling like I played better and still losing 20 nil. Finally, it makes no sense to gate a high armor save for our characters. Like they don't trust anyone and would seemingly wear a ton of armor all the time and to get it now you need a so many points to make viable.
I get it. Elves were strkng in 8th. But now we are a joke and it feels real bad.
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Re: Future DE - Strength and weaknesses

Post by Calisson »

Sad but true.
There is hope:
In the short term, 1.99 version, which has been presented through spoilers, fixes some issues.
What I like best is the ability to mix cults more freely.
In the not-so-long term, DE is known to have so many issues that it is the 4th book to be redone completely. ASAW in the first post are about that future book, not about the current one nor the 1.99.
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Re: Future DE - Strength and weaknesses

Post by [llct]kain »

They didn't balance it. Dread elves seem to be the weakest book right now


The strength and weaknesses lined out in the first post are the guidelines for the 2.0 armybook. So they are in place to define the future armybook. Please rethink your post before putting all that salt.

Personally I will miss that 48'' Bolt Thrower as it was a flexible tool and pretty much the only unit that has never realy changed all that years. But I like the idea and the concept to define every amry with strength and weaknesses. Through this they will get more flavor over the time - and it will make a clear difference between us and the weak traitors, not just other colours and monsters.

I get it. Elves were strkng in 8th.

You are right. In 8. the Druchii were too easy, it spoiled the fun to play. For me that easy pushing forward of our elites was not the Dark Elven style of cunning warfare...(which also included some risk and bad odds). The comming changes are very promising (at least for me). :burns:

P.s. 1.99 - is that the 2.0 beta, or the 1.3 armybook adjusted to 2.0 beta ?
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Re: Future DE - Strength and weaknesses

Post by Calisson »

It is 1.3 armybook adjusted to 2.0 beta...
With some early indications about the announced 2ed DE AB.
Example, the Cult of Cadaron is new, but will be developed in the future book.
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Re: Future DE - Strength and weaknesses

Post by Pablo »

I get it. Elves were strong in 8th.

"You are right. In 8. the Druchii were too easy, it spoiled the fun to play. For me that easy pushing forward of our elites was not the Dark Elven style of cunning warfare...(which also included some risk and bad odds). "

Have you read the scroll or played 8th? If you think the "push forward blocks" was one of our stronger playstyles when compared to the fast, mobile shooting and magic in addition to the warlock character bus that was the higher level tournament meta, then maybe your scene is less competitive. Also, you are actively admitting that you are choosing not to play a list with more subtlety. The dominant 8th "netlist" playstyle exemplified "cunning warfare" as it is entirely dedicated to knowing the rules about sight, fleeing, etc that are the core skill based mechanics of the game. The reason it was so strong was because of the supportive magic we had which could tear through blocks in several ways, and was what was so imbalanced in general.
If the changes go through, I worry what constitutes a "decent" armor save as our main weaknesses now revolve around low armor and if we will be fast enough to hit the enemy before being shot/magicked off the board.
I like a lot of the previewed rule changes but am scared of what happens when our shooting is lower range than gobbos. Also, with the changes to bolt throwers, it seems as if the rules dev team wants to make our only true monster hunters the scourgerunners which would really only be viable in that role. I pray that the next edition will allow for flexible, balanced lists but the changes seen so far seem underwhelming, and could potentially just hinder one aspect of our current and previous lists.
The one unit I am excited for is cold one knights as they seem finally strong enough to warrant spots, but the question will be is will they compensate the rest of the list to accommodate for our support shooting to be weakened. As of now, without drastic changes to the profile of the average foot dread elf, there will be more melee centric list like ogres or armies with chariots that can charge our units before we charge them and negate our speed "advantage".
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