Ulthuan

I have tried using a unit of 35 spearmen along with two wizards (one of them teclis (3 spells (+2 to cast)) and a loremaster. The result: I buffed my spearmens armour save to 2+ with multiple mystic shield every hero phase. I really recommend this tactic! Its fun

But how.... lol You only had 2 wizards correct? So you can only cast the spell 2 times a phase and their save begins at 5+... Unless you had another wizard you should only have gotten down to 3+ at best.

3 wizards. Teclis, Archmage, Lormaster

I'm not a fan of AoS (at all), but I'm glad you're finding something to enjoy about it.

I still feel like I should point out that you could have achieved far better results (easier) with Phoenix Guard. Same range on their weapons, a better save to begin with, so you would only need 2 mages to get to a 2+, and 3 mages actually make you invulnerable against non-rending weapons (since AoS doesn't make 1s automatically fail), AND you have a 4+ ward save. AND they are immune to battleshock if within 8" of an annointed, AND they subtract 1 from the enemies bravery for battle shock tests (so one additional model flees, for instance). AND the hit and wound on lower dice rolls (3+ 3+).

And since there's no point values in AoS, why not bring 35 phoenix guard? Or 500 for that matter.....


(remember, I think AoS is dumb... lol)

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Ignore the hate laurie1. It's very popular in this forum. People tend to fear new things, it's been that way since the beginning of time. I enjoy AoS and many unspoken enjoy it. We are all just scared to say so because Fantasy fanboys will jump down our throat in an instant. McMulligan is the guy that will bring 500 phoenix guard to a friendly game and lose all of his friends. Point values were only created to control people..ehem.. trolls like McMulligan. It's very easy to balance the game as I have already done so in a previous thread if it is really that important. If you don't care and just want to enjoy AoS like myself and my group of friends, and even the random people I look to play, then more power to you. Keep those spearmen in your list because people will see them and know that you are there for fun which will make your time all the better. Stay clear of trolls and safe travels my friend.

Perhaps you should stay clear of the personal stuff.

His response was actually fairly polite. And to say if you take the same number of ______ instead you'll get a better result isn't exactly an unreasonable thing to do. He even gave an informed case of why 35 PG would do the same job a bit better. That's not someone who didn't even bother to look at AoS. It's also hardly hate, and your response was far closer to trolling than anything written by mcmulligan.

Gromo, I can understand your need to defend the game you enjoy, but others are equally entitled to voice their opinions. No personal attacks from now on please. I will keep an eye on this topic.
As long as you play with like-minded friends, most games can be fun. But thinking of someone with no previous experience (especially if they are of certain age), the lack of any balancing system is still a major flaw.

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If you can't take a little tongue in cheek humour, these forums (and probably the entire internet) are going to give you a rough ride. I fully admit I have a low opinion of AoS (said it right in my post), doesn't mean that what I posted was in any way inaccurate or out of place. In fact I myself noted something I missed, PG also automatically have 2 attacks each on their profile, so no need to worry about numbers in the unit, which again boosts the PG far above spearmen in the role that the OP described.

I see you're a fairly new person around here, and probably fairly new to the hobby? I've even answered some of your rules questions on AoS in another thread (Caradryan and mounted Annointeds). Either way, in a very short time span you've gone full crusader mode against anyone that disagrees with you on the quality of AoS. In my opinion, that's equally as disruptive to the community as the unabashed hatred from others. I've expressed my opinion in a very even handed manner, and even attempted to help others understand the GW perspective (as shared with me by a GW rep).

My not liking AoS is in no way less valid on these forums than your approval of it.

I think something that gets lost when looking at AoS is that out of the box it's not a game where you make up an army the day before and play that force. Instead, it's looking at what your opponent is deploying, what the terrain is, and what the scenario is and choosing what units (and how many) to play. Given this, I think AoS is highly dependent on different scenarios.

Does this mean there aren't suboptimal choices in the game? Of course not. But there are suboptimal choices in any game system. I think in AoS, though, with the right synergies you can make even suboptimal choices deadly, as laurie1 has shown. Would Phoenix Guard be better? Yes. But with the right synergies you might catch your opponent sleeping on those spearmen, who just happen to be near a totem carrying Sea Helm, with a prince throwing his command ability on them, and containing 20+ bodies. The Phoenix Guard may be better, but you can get a lot of mileage out of those spearmen if you play them right, which is something I like about AoS that I felt was lacking in 8th.

This type of game is, of course, not conducive to tournament play, as people with deeper wallets can amass a more varied collection. And the lack of precision balancing is frustrating for people who have grown accustomed to such a system over years. I get that. But there are actually some pretty good balancing systems out there to get this game closer to such a system. I've enjoyed Azyr, Ulthuan's own Seredain has been using Indy (I think?) and there are many others.

Some people are upset that players need to rely on independent comp systems to achieve a measure of balance for tournament play. I'd respond that those types of things existed in 8th as well (Swedish, ETC, Combat, etc). Should players have had to make a comp system from scratch rather than working off an existing structure? I don't know. To me, there is no real difference whether the comp is made from scratch or off an official points system. And it seems that given the response to 9th Age, there is an appetite for such things. But then again, maybe skirmish games aren't for you and big blocks of infantry are where you get your fix. Fine by me.

There is no need for this either. It doesn't add to any discussion. Next rime I will edit.

I believe AoS would be received with much more gracefully if it was standalone game and not presented as replacement of WHFB. GW did themselves no favours there.

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I have gone a bit "full crusader". I am just sick of hearing about how terrible the game is in every thread in every forum on every site. I apologize again. I can get very passionate quickly. If your true intentions were to be informative and not to troll then I apologize if you took offense to my post.

I, also, am sick of people having a go at the game. Actually all I play now warhammer wise is Age of Sigmar becuase I honestly think its much better than 8th.

But, be honest here. When is the last time that's actually happened? Personally I don't hate the game, I just think there are better options in the space that's similar to AoS. Comparisons to 8th are almost meaningless as they are simply different styles of game. Liking one over the other says more about what type of game you prefer to play than it does about the quality of either game. In fact I think GW couple have saved themselves some fans simply by having both games out there. You could even include rules for both systems with any newly released models so you wouldn't have to worry about updating army books (all the rules used to come on the box).