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Summoning
rpr
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 10:29 am 
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Some mind-storming...
- formation can buy daemonic pact for 25 to be able to summon daemons
- army can buy any number of daemon summon "pools", 75 each  
- like before, a formation can summon 2d3 daemons. This uses one daemon summon pool. When all daemon summon pools are used, no more daemons can be summoned.
- When summoning, a lord can be sacrificed to get GD instead of LD as a daemon. Thus a formation will get both LDs and then one GD.
- at the end of the turn, LDs are destroyed (no BM), GD stays on table on the summoning formation

Thus, changes to previous:
- no difference if daemons killed or return to warp in regard to daemon pools. This would most probably reduce 'call them to work as meat shield for this turn as nothing better to do' behaviour
- no special reserve of specific number of LDs or GDs.
- no icon bearers or champions (well basically some iconbearerchampion could be used to have more hosts to GDs but maybe not...  I would make lord optional and thus you could buy a lord for +50 points, thus also being potential host for GD)

Thus basically daemons would be 75 point "one-shot engagement boosts" which must be pre-determined which formations could use them (for 25 points per formation choice)
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Magarch
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 12:20 pm 
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(Hena @ Mar. 04 2008,07:29)
QUOTE
Also since this effect LatD list a lot more than Black Legion, I'm thinking that players who play LatD should voice in somehow. Perhaps make an own thread on SG to make sure that LatD players get their say as well.

Well, in fact, daemons in LatD are considerably more powerfull in that list. They're truly the shock troopers and are easier to summon with the bonuses of some characters and the chaos altar. Greater Daemons are especially more usefull, since they can protect some War Engines like the Chaos Altar and give a very good support in assault (the Bloodthirster and his Titan Killer attacks is quite the star in this field).

Daemons with Black Legion are usually used as meat shields and suffer from the already high cost of the formations (even since it's considerably less than the Space Marines). In LatD, that's not a matter.

The trouble behind the daemons not assigned to a formation is that it's a bit out of the normal rules. While I agree it is convenient to put the daemons where they are needed, I think that it's too much trouble for something that wouldn't need it. So, I would recommend a far more simpler way to handle the summoning of daemons ; the less an army has special rules, the easier it is to play with and against it since the rules stay relatively the same.
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Ginger
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 1:08 pm 
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How about keeping them in relatively close proximity to the thing that summoned them - the Icon bearer / Prince / Lord etc? In this they could then use mechanisms similar to 'Nids and Eldar Warp gates ?making the whole process simpler.

Perhaps GDs could both summon and retain LDs in their own right, and even (on radically thin ice here) have the ability to split off into their own formation on reaching a given summoning points mass.

As for temporary or permanent Daemons, perhaps we could do both. This would be governed by the amount of summoning points left in a formation at the end of the turn. Leaders and other Daemonic focus units stay on table, and if the summoning points total in the formation is 10+ for example, the GDs and LDs remain as well.

PS I do not tend to see many GDs in use, possibly caused by their summoning cost - perhaps a points increase and a summoning cost decrease would help?? After all it is a DC3 beast at 100 points with the 50+ for a chaos champion??!!




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BlackLegion
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 1:14 pm 
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In Wh40k Greater Daemons can serve as Icons = entrypoints for Summonings.

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Ginger
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 1:41 pm 
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Regarding the "meat shield" effect, this will always be true by the nature of the unit and summoning. Consequently you won't fix it easily.

However, one aspect is that they are a bit too good for their points (as Neal says 25+ to 35+ on current reckoning). Perhaps their stats could be reduced instead - I guess it depends upon how 'real' we all think they are in the game. :)

This is also heavily influenced by their strategy and initiative ratings, which allows the Chaos player to react to the local situation summoning and positioning Daemons as required. The use on Mono-factions is a significant boost to an already big advantage. IMHO, merely requiring the Chaos player to use more than one faction in the army could offset this quite a lot.

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Irondeath
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 1:43 pm 
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I caution against viewing GDs as assault units only.

While this perfectly fits the Bloodthirster, all the other GDs only come into their own when shooting, preferably twice if you can help it. In order to get there, you have to summon them early, which is too dependent on luck currently.

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Irondeath
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 1:49 pm 
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(Ginger @ Mar. 04 2008,13:41)
QUOTE
Regarding the "meat shield" effect, this will always be true by the nature of the unit and summoning. Consequently you won't fix it easily.

However, one aspect is that they are a bit too good for their points (as Neal says 25+ to 35+ on current reckoning). Perhaps their stats could be reduced instead - I guess it depends upon how 'real' we all think they are in the game. :)

This is also heavily influenced by their strategy and initiative ratings, which allows the Chaos player to react to the local situation summoning and positioning Daemons as required. The use on Mono-factions is a significant boost to an already big advantage. IMHO, merely requiring the Chaos player to use more than one faction in the army could offset this quite a lot.

The "meat shield" tactic was definitely playtested and isn?t an aberration but was considered perfectly viable and in line with BL fluff.

The summoning kit (Pact+Icon) adds +75 to a retinue and eats 2 of 4 upgrade slots, it?s +125 and 3 slots if you add a champion/sorceror. It hasn?t been found overpowered.

IIRC, many of the BL tournament lists I?ve seen featured no daemons at all. Go figure.

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Magarch
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 2:12 pm 
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(Hena @ Mar. 04 2008,12:22)
QUOTE
Perhaps Black Legion should have a way to get augment summoning (2d3 or d3) to their formations similar way to Icons? That would allow usage of Greater Demons to be easier.

I'm a bit uneasy with these random numbers. It makes me feel we throw more dices in a game where randomness already play a good part. That just adds more randomness for the chaos player. Is it really necessary ?


If there is formation specific demon pools (do I undestand wrong your meaning), then that would require a lot more handling on what pool belongs to what formation.


In fact, I don't like the "daemon pool" concept ; I rather like daemonic formations, working just like any other formation of their own. I feel this is better suited to the way Epic is working, but that's just my point of view.

I understand perfectly the current system has been playtested and that the "meat shield" tactic is part of the Black Legion list. It's just that I don't agree at all with that way of seeing the daemons in Epic (W40k tend to focus about units while Epic is all about formations : I think that's why there are some troubles with some lists in Epic, because they try to stick too much to the way it works in 40k).


I just like the imaginary of the demons that is shown in the current rules. Demons are not something that lasts entire camping. But something that is summoned to engage in a battle and then they leave. Now is that correct way to represent them is another matter, but it feels nice certainly.


I understand as well, but then why should daemons be able to return in game when they disappear ? That's not really the way it works in the fluff ; when a daemon returns in the warp, that's against its will most of the time. It can't come back before a long time has passed in the material plane. That's what is bothering me the most ; daemons keep showing up and disappearing, like some yoyo game. It's very weird to me.
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Ginger
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 2:22 pm 
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(Irondeath @ Mar. 04 2008,12:49)
QUOTE

(Ginger @ Mar. 04 2008,13:41)
QUOTE
Regarding the "meat shield" effect, this will always be true by the nature of the unit and summoning. Consequently you won't fix it easily.

However, one aspect is that they are a bit too good for their points (as Neal says 25+ to 35+ on current reckoning). Perhaps their stats could be reduced instead - I guess it depends upon how 'real' we all think they are in the game. :)

This is also heavily influenced by their strategy and initiative ratings, which allows the Chaos player to react to the local situation summoning and positioning Daemons as required. The use on Mono-factions is a significant boost to an already big advantage. IMHO, merely requiring the Chaos player to use more than one faction in the army could offset this quite a lot.

The "meat shield" tactic was definitely playtested and isn?t an aberration but was considered perfectly viable and in line with BL fluff.

The summoning kit (Pact+Icon) adds +75 to a retinue and eats 2 of 4 upgrade slots, it?s +125 and 3 slots if you add a champion/sorceror. It hasn?t been found overpowered.

IIRC, many of the BL tournament lists I?ve seen featured no daemons at all. Go figure.

I think you may be missunderstanding my point - I have no problem with their use as a meat shield; it is an obvious and valid tactic.

However, daemons seem to be overpowered / underpriced for their intrinsic abilities. Add to this the high strategy / initiative values allowing the Chaos player to control the battle at the all-important start of turn #2, and they become less balanced overall IMHO.

Furthermore, I have never seen a Chaos army without them. Current flavour seems to be around 200 points of LDs and around 10 activations in 3K armies.

However, I agree with your points on the GDs; they are very rare because of the associated costs / slots needed to summon them. Dropped to 6 points they could possibly use a points increase 50+ to 100+ but even then would start to make an appearance. The main issue here is that the better players do what they can to reduce chance in their games, and this runs completely against having to rely on a dice roll with a significant chance of failure.

Perhaps another mechanism to fix this would be to use the pool of on-table summoned points to give a bonus to the dice throws for summoning - to represent an increase in the "belief" in a local area.

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Evil and Chaos
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 2:45 pm 
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What if summoning points were fixed, so instead of icons (or whatever) providing 1D3 summon points, they provided a set '2' points.

One of the things that has brought balance to the Tyranid's spawning values in the last few versions has been reducing the ammount of randoms in the spawning rolls... perhaps the Chaos armies could follow suit.

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Kleomenes
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 2:53 pm 
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If you want certainty, carry on worshipping the corpse-emperor!

Re Greater Daemons - perhaps a reduction to 6 points to summon, and an increase of 25 or 50 points, or a reduction of the chaos champion to 25 points. The champion is the stumbling block always in my calculations

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nealhunt
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 3:24 pm 
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However, daemons seem to be overpowered / underpriced for their intrinsic abilities.


I'm sorry, Biggles, but what do you base this on?  They are about the same cost as a chaos marine about as durable, have no ranged fire but better assault.  What's overpowered about that?  I've seen not a single tournament list that uses more than ~10 daemons, total.  Most have considerably less.

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Irondeath
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 3:28 pm 
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(Ginger @ Mar. 04 2008,14:22)
QUOTE

I think you may be missunderstanding my point - I have no problem with their use as a meat shield; it is an obvious and valid tactic.


Got you wrong there, my apologies.



(Ginger @ Mar. 04 2008,14:22)
QUOTE

However, daemons seem to be overpowered / underpriced for their intrinsic abilities. Add to this the high strategy / initiative values allowing the Chaos player to control the battle at the all-important start of turn #2, and they become less balanced overall IMHO.

Furthermore, I have never seen a Chaos army without them. Current flavour seems to be around 200 points of LDs and around 10 activations in 3K armies.


I definitely have. While I wasn?t very lucky digging up lists, these two didn?t have any daemons in them:

http://www.tacticalwargames.net/cgi-bin....t=11512

http://www.elisanet.fi/henrikk....html#12

But that?s anecdotal evidence. I had 8xLD and
1xGD in the last BL tourney list I fielded.


However, I have read no complaints about summoning until now while there was plenty of criticism on other parts of the list. Between the upgrade slots and actual costs, let alone the luck factor LD summoning seems fine.


(Ginger @ Mar. 04 2008,14:22)
QUOTE

However, I agree with your points on the GDs; they are very rare because of the associated costs / slots needed to summon them. Dropped to 6 points they could possibly use a points increase 50+ to 100+ but even then would start to make an appearance. The main issue here is that the better players do what they can to reduce chance in their games, and this runs completely against having to rely on a dice roll with a significant chance of failure.

Perhaps another mechanism to fix this would be to use the pool of on-table summoned points to give a bonus to the dice throws for summoning - to represent an increase in the "belief" in a local area.


We had generating a D6 worth of summoning points in earlier incarnations, going to 2D3 was thought to take out some randomness while leaving a chaosy luck factor, which works okay with LD but has been the bane of GDs, at least in the BL list. The fixed augment summoning bonus of a War Altar is lacking here, BL could use something similiar.

But: Another upgrade means another upgrade slot taken, and that is one too many IMO. The bonus could be tied to an existing upgrade, say the Pact, Icon or Champ, which could come in different grades, say +25 for +1 Augment or +50 for +2 Augment.

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nealhunt
 Post subject: Summoning
PostPosted: Tue Mar 04, 2008 4:06 pm 
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Old system for reference:
==================

Formations bought "Sacrifices" as an upgrade.
You could spend sacrifices (up to 2, I think) to summon d6 daemons at the beginning of the formation's action.
You could spend 1 sacrifice to keep daemons from disappearing in the End Phase.

We replaced d6 with 2d3 to reduce randomness.

We later instituted the daemon pool to more closely map the point costs to the value of the daemon units.  We also instituted the return of daemons that weren't maintained to balance "meat shield" tactics against all other tactics.

===

I think now that the cost of daemons has been determined to within a reasonable error it might be possible to back off to the sacrifice system.

Under the system now, 235 points would pay for a Pact, Icon, and 8 daemons.  They would be summoned over 2 turns and stay for the entire game.  Alternately, you could pay 285 to add a Champion and summon them all at once.  Note some of those points also provide special abilities for the characters (assault attacks, leader).

Using sacrifices at 100 points for 2d3 summoning points, it would cost 300 points to summon ~8 daemons for 2 turns (2 sac to summon 4d3, 1 to maintain).  This has some substantial advantages, however.  You get them all at once as compared to the 2-turn plan.  If the daemons take too many casualties or the formation breaks (or you just get a really lousy roll for summoning), it's not worth it to maintain them so you don't use the other sacrifice and  re-summon later.  Also, since it's not linked to characters, you don't risk something like the Icon bearer dying and the daemons going "poof".

The downside of sacrifices would be flexibility, waste, and longevity.  The sacrifices were be linked to a single formation.  The Daemon Pool can be accessed by a formation for the relatively cheap price of a Pact.  The chances of "wasted" sacrifices would be much greater than "wasted" points from the Pool.  The formations with sacrifices would be high priority targets, because taking them out would keep points off-board.  Also, the price of keeping daemons around long term become prohibitive as compared to the Pool system.

The biggest challenge in pricing sacrifices would be trying to figure out an appropriate discount for the uncertainty of losing them that didn't make it a no-brainer to load up every formation with at least one.

The bookkeeping would be easier with sacrifices.  However, I'm not sure how the "all or nothing" nature would affect game play.

===

One possibility that would mix the two systems would be a character that allows summoning and a pool of sacrifices.  Say, 50 points for a summoner that can use sacrifices, then 100 points per sacrifice in a common pool that any summoner can access.  That would simplify the system but still allow a reasonable certainty that the sacrifices wouldn't go to waste.  It also follows more closely a mechanic that seems to be working - Nid Spawning, with summoner=synapse and sacrifices=mycetic spores.

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