[AL] New Beastmen list

[Dark Omen]

Here are my ideas for an alternate Beastman army list.

It is based on the Trial list from 2009.

Things I have changed are:

1) No free woods. Beastmen operate in other areas of the world outside of the forests.

2) New army rules. The Wild at Heart rule gives a positive and a negative, encouraging you to use woods but not villages for cover. The Warherd rule is a direct copy from the Warband Rule from Warmaster ancients. I think the Warherd rule suits the Beastmen style of play. Lots of punch when you have momentum but if the attack falters they become easy to push back.
The army rules are essentially free so do not impact on the points values of units.

3) Changes to Ambush rule. It is now a bit simpler but has a downside if you don't get to use it! I costed it at +5 pts for the Infantry.

4) Ungors are now the same as Goblins. Centigors are now the same as light cavalry. Hounds brought in line with Chaos army.

5) Minotaurs are now more similar to Ogres but with added charge bonus.

6) Minotaurs limited to 1 per 1000 pts as they are very rare.

7) Got rid of Dragon Ogres and Shaggoth. They are traditionally part of the Chaos Warrior list and only got shoe horned in to the 6th edition Warhammer Beastman list due to "diversity quotas". They have no place in the Beastman list in my opinion. They have been replaced with the Cygor and Ghorgon who are much more representative.

8) Added Harpies for flying mobility. Got rid of Spawn as I don't like the concept.

9) Reduced the Command of the General to an 8. However this is not as bad as it looks, as due to the Warherd rule he will usually get a +1 command bonus to brigades anyway. As you can also take a Command 8 Hero per 1000 pts , effectively you can have up to 3 Command 9 characters for your big brigades.

10) Gorebull rules simplified.

11) Shaman brought in line with other wizards and spell list updated.

Please read and provide feedback, the points values are my best educated guess at what seems fair. I will be playtesting soon so hopefully can develop some ideas further.

Many Thanks

Iain

[Alexander]

I like the list except for the cygor. Most of the list is fairly simple with some standard abilities and pointcost. The cygor is a walking rocklobber with special abilities. I think it is too much for the pointcost.

If you would want to keep the rock throwing ability I would change that rule into something like the giant blunder result.

"The Cygor picks up a rock, tree, abandoned cart or whatever comes to hand and throws it
at the closest enemy unit that he can see. The object travels 5xD6cm and, if it travels far enough to
hit its target, strikes with 3 Attacks worked out in the usual way. "

As an option to try out Instead of 5xd6 maybe a fixt range of 30cm? Not sure about the points cost.

If you dont use any units to ambush Then the extra pointscost for those units is wasted. Why not add an extra ability  ( similar as a banner for units) or something to get ambush for that unit for 10 points? ( half of the units can now ambush  So pay 10 per unit as an upgrade per unit instead of 5 points for all units and halving the units that can ambush?)

[Gunslinger76]

1) No free woods. Beastmen operate in other areas of the world outside of the forests.

*Agree with this rule. It's very fluffy but I think with how difficult it is to balance, it may not be the best for balacing a list.

2) New army rules. The Wild at Heart rule gives a positive and a negative, encouraging you to use woods but not villages for cover. The Warherd rule is a direct copy from the Warband Rule from Warmaster ancients. I think the Warherd rule suits the Beastmen style of play. Lots of punch when you have momentum but if the attack falters they become easy to push back.
The army rules are essentially free so do not impact on the points values of units.

*I don't mind this rule, except I think the penalty is too great at -2. This seems unbalance the rule into more of a negative trait instead of a neutral. If it stays, I'd prefer to see -1.
*The Warherd rule is a lot. This may be adding too much picky details. I do appreciate that this is an import from established rules.


3) Changes to Ambush rule. It is now a bit simpler but has a downside if you don't get to use it! I costed it at +5 pts for the Infantry.

*This is a little biased since I didn't like the original Ambush rule either. I'd rather see the rule take language from Skaven gutter runners for consistency within the rule set.

4) Ungors are now the same as Goblins. Centigors are now the same as light cavalry. Hounds brought in line with Chaos army.

* I like this. Always felt strange that Centigors weren't calvary.

5) Minotaurs are now more similar to Ogres but with added charge bonus.

* I think this should be 5-10 pts less based on the more restrictive required initiative charge compared to bull ogres.

6) Bestigors and Minotaurs limited to 1 per 1000 pts as they are very rare.

* I'd strongly like too see bestigors remain at 2/2000. It's important for a primarily infantry horde army to have a good unit to anchor around, or to dig units out of terrain. I think that limit of 4 was correct. Additionally, they have the same stats as saurus warriors which aren't capped.

7) Got rid of Dragon Ogres and Shaggoth. They are traditionally part of the Chaos Warrior list and only got shoe horned in to the 6th edition Warhammer Beastman list due to "diversity quotas". They have no place in the Beastman list in my opinion. They have been replaced with the Cygor and Ghorgon who are much more representative.

* I agree with this and I'm really excited for the addition of the Cygor and Ghorgon. I think the only downside that bears consideration is people's existing collections.

Added Harpies for flying mobility. Got rid of Spawn as I don't like the concept.

* I'm not sold on these moves. Why don't you like the chaos spawn? These seem to be a staple in beastmen armies across fluff and even being added to the army in Total War. While fluffwise, harpies can follow the herds around, it feels a little bit of a grab to get flying. Not that I'd be opposed  to that making its way into the list, I just don't agree that they belong more than Chaos Spawn.

9) Reduced the Command of the General to an 8. However this is not as bad as it looks, as due to the Warherd rule he will usually get a +1 command bonus to brigades anyway. As you can also take a Command 8 Hero per 1000 pts , effectively you can have up to 3 Command 9 characters for your big brigades.

*I really disagree with this rule. I think this will the army far too much later in the game. Brigades losing units will quickly start requiring 6 at best. I think it should remain at 9 and Warherd be trimmed if it's decided that this would overpower the command (I don't agree that it overbalance the army since the benefits are so conditional.)

10) Gorebull rules simplified.

* I liked the old Doombull rules and didn't think they were too cumbersome while adding a nice bit of fluff context. I'm not sure the tweek was needed but I'm open to being convinced.

11) Shaman brought in line with other wizards and spell list updated.

* Why is the movement spell requiring contact? I think it's beneficial across armies for the spells to remain as close as possible to assist with balance 


Thanks for your time and effort that you're putting into the list!

[Dark Omen]

Thank you  Alexander and Gunslinger76 for your feedback.

-The Cygor is an experiment, essentially if all you use it for is a rock lobber then you are paying a very high price for it, if you put it in combat it is not a very powerful monster but still adds Terror. So it is a compromise. Perhaps the range of the shooting attack could be reduced to 40 cm.

-I like the suggestion for individual units having to pay for the Ambush upgrade. That is very simple and easy to apply. So Gor herd and Ungor herd can be reduced by 5 pts cost, BUT, any Ambushing unit now has to pay 10 pts to get the Ambush rule. I'll keep the restriction that at only half the units in the army can ambush - and that means half of each unit type, so half your Hounds, half your Gors, half your Ungors.

-For the Wild at Heart rule, Villages already count as dense terrain and impose a -1 command modifier to all troops. I was trying to force the player to avoid man made terrain in favour of natural terrain.

-Minotaurs are costed as follows; Black Orc profile 110 pts. Add Immune to Terror but must charge on Initiative, same as Brettonian Knights = free. Add +1 attack on the charge for +10 points, same as Grail Knights or Wild Riders, total 120 pts.

- I could be convinced to allow 2 Bestigor per 1000 pts and maybe even 2 Minotaurs per 1000 pts, but as they are the strongest units in the army I feel they will become "must have" choices and you will always see four of them in every army. Still, if that is what is required to make them competitive, it should be changed. Playtesting will tell.

- For people with existing collections, Dragon Ogre models can be "counts as" Chariots and the Shaggoth is a straight "counts as" Ghorgon. For anyone with twelve Hound units, all I can say is SHAME! SHAME! SHAME!

- I added Harpies to make Beastmen suitably different to play from Orcs and Goblins. The Spawn is very appropriate for Beastmen lore, BUT in Warmaster it operates more like a tank than a damage dealer. I wanted the focus of the army to be lots of melee power but little armour or resilience. Therefore I removed it.

- I can see how the Command 8 General will cause concern, all I can say is that playtesting will determine if it is too much of a nerf. Taking inspiration from Warmaster ancients, all Warband style armies are limited to a Command 8 General.

- The Shaman's movement spell is identical to the Lizardmen "Wings in the Jungle" spell. I feel this is more appropriate than a "Voice of Command" style spell as per the Empire list. In my opinion the Beastmen are more likely to follow a character into combat rather than listen to a distant magical order.


Please continue to provide feedback if you get a chance to try the list out in playtesting, you never know, the Revolution committee may even pick up on some of the ideas and implement them when they redesign the Beastmen list.

Many Thanks

Iain

[Rowlybot]

I like it Ian. Reflects how I remember playing Beastmen in Warhammer 8th at least. Whilst I appreciate the game styles are different, it's good to see the flavour captured.

[Alexander]

Listening to the recent warmaster podcast i heard talk about the new Beastmen army list. When will it be available for the public?

[toco]

I like these changes...

[adaird153]

Hi,

Didn't want to join in the wood elf debate as it got too confrontational.

I like the use of the Warherd rule - I also play a lot of Warmaster Ancients and have been on the receiving end of the warband rule. It makes an attacking army much more potent and encourages opponents to carefully consider where and how to attack brigades with this rule.

On the 'Wild at Heart' rule - is it really necessary? Most terrain I have fought over rarely has much in the way of man-made structures so perhaps it is a bit too niche....

I would go with 2/1000 for minotaur/bestigor - the army needs some sort of line breaking capability.

On the Cygor - I was quite drawn to Alexander's proposal for a random range 3 attacks. I would say the points cost feels right.

Finally not really a fan of harpies,,..,how about a flock of ravens (similar to VC bat swarms?).

With these minor niggles aside - it looks like great work and might inspire me to dust off my half finished army and start painting again! - who knows I may even get the chance to give it a run out at Saffron Walden someday...

Cheers,

Dave

[Aldhick]

Listening to the recent warmaster podcast i heard talk about the new Beastmen army list. When will it be available for the public?

Along with the WMR armies 1.0 which will be out within month or so hopefuly. However the Beastmen list is just updated list from the Trial armies compendium. No radical changes to the list as suggested here happened.

[Alexander]

ok thanks 

[Dark Omen]

After some playtesting I have altered my ALTERNATIVE Beastman list a little. This allows players with existing armies to field units they will already have based up (such as Centigors!).

Please note this is in NO WAY an official list, it is a fan list only so cant be used in tournaments but will provide some alternatives in friendly games.