Today there was a Battle Scroll update with several notable changes, including changing the Nighthaunt Battle Formation from affecting the whole army to just one unit. Obviously someone at GW has been watching my videos 😉😉. I will probably do a follow up video addressing the changes (mostly to Sylvaneth and Nighthaunt), and another video including other top-performing factions.
My new favourite channel - love the idea of the bait dryads in the general’s regiment! I think for the final list I would cut down one unit of kurnoth to 3, and a dryad unit to fit in belthanos. He is expensive, but I really like him on a flank for objectives and he can usually bully their objective grabbers. The run and and charge means that you always have that 11”+2d6 threat range from the kurnoth, or 18” from himself, which against Lumineth archers or other shooters is quite useful. But I agree he does feel a tad expensive for his utility and an extra drop. I feel like the two power pairs of 6kurnoth + branchwych and 3+dryads+lady, is a cool concept and start to an army!
I like that idea. It definitely adds a lot of flexibility and mobility to the army without giving up too much damage power. That would cover up the weakness into other army compositions (like armies with shooting as you mentioned) while still retaining the ability to go up against the top meta armies. Thanks for watching! I appreciate the kind words. Hope you continue to enjoy!
@@gammafighter one thing i realized. In theory Spite revs might be the best counter unit to nighthaunt. Crit mortals, weight of dice and you don’t pay for any rend. Only thing is they still kinda pale in comparison to nighthaunt infantry.
wh 40k player and not a very good one lol, just found your channel as i have been thinking of starting a sylvaneth army for my venture into age of sigmar, subscribed 👍
Great video! You got a new suscriber just a few notes on nh: the abilities that they apply during their charge phase can only be used once each. They have the “once per turn (army)” keyword. You missed the most broken unit on the book which are the dread blade harrows!
You're totally right, thanks for pointing that out! That brings the Aura of Dread abilities down from "completely busted" to "really really good", lol. I have to admit that I overlooked the dread blade harrows. I basically saw them as a cavalry Tree Revenant with little bit better combat profile. Is their teleport extra useful in NH or is it the control score buff? Thanks for sharing your insight!
@@gammafighter As for yesterday they could teleport in both movement phases (not anymore now) so you could move block units and then teleport away. They were unkillable
Yes, the stats presented on HonestGamer are not showing actual representation. Only success rates on a scale. It helps Rob reduce perspective and minimize objection. In example, his results don't present faction attendance at an event or how often a player repeat-fights the same faction even 3 times at an event, potentially supporting a success advantage of a faction repeat playing against a faction it has an advantage against. That was a specific example. It also doesnt capture player skill. For example, Kaleb is a fantastic player, does that mean the same player playing bonespliters is going to switch up with Tzeentch and win in the same matchup? Doubt it. What's missing is an Error bar which shows the level of uncertainty. This means when comparing factions, the data has an unreliable value by percentage next to it. What is missing from the faction "value" critique is how many points a faction allows. If a specific faction allows a lot of high score points for the opponent, also needs to be contrasted against the player skill level. This is collected through a player Rating. Contrastic this with faction success and points allowed will show a scale of success against higher and lower rated players and how significant the strength a faction is against all the test data. The lower attendance of a faction across the board shows a meta dominance, meaning, the core rules are not written in a direction that favors that(those) factions rules. Rob doesn't want to address these issues. (look up barplots with error bars )
One thing that I think you got wrong is the charge battle traits. You say that as long as you don't stack the abilities, you can use them multiple times per turn. They all mention once per turn (army), so only 1 unit can reduce the hit, only one unit can cause strike last, and only one unit can reduce save rolls by 1. This was a big nerf to the way things were in season 3. This was something nighthaunt players were worried about when the rules were initially released. In the past, you could run mass armies and give -1 to saves all over the place. Now we are forced to pick and choose where this is going to work best. This also nerfed chainrasps to a bottom tier unit.
The ability to bring back models with Lady O is pretty strong. If you are running a reinforced Bladegheist, it is tough to take them all out at once. She can heal them up, and if they are still low, they can use the damage free retreat on them to help get them out. Since bladegheist are the main damage, keeping them alive is one of the biggest things a spell caster can do. As far as the black coach, they don't need to stay in combat with a unit. The verbiage just mentions that the unit can be set up in combat only if black coach is in combat. You can set up the new unit out of combat no matter what, but if you want it to be set up in combat, the black coach needs to be in combat. This is big, because you can keep bringing back a non unique hero like knight of shrouds or lord executioner. If I bring back Knight of shrouds on ethereal steed, it's basically a free 180 pts. As a nighthaunt player, I think our biggest detriment is big models that we can't deal with in one turn. If you charge into 20 bladegheists, we can't all out defense, so we are stuck at our save profile. If you manage to take a decent chunk out before we are able to retaliate, we aren't going to be able to take down your big model in a timely matter and will more than likely lose our unit. We can't use our wave of terror (strike last, -1 to hit,-1 to save) in the enemies turn, so we have no way of forcing your big model to strike last. Once a battle is initiated with nighthaunt, you need to finish it. If you let them get away, or retreat yourself, you aren't in a good position. Another thing that is a potential threat, is a lot of shooting. As long as you can keep strong units far enough in front so that we can't charge into your ranged attackers, it will be tough to deal with.
That's really good insight, thank you for sharing! Losing Run + Charge army-wide is a big deal, but Nighthaunt players still have a lot of powerful tools available to them.
@@gammafighter Yes they do. I think they are still the strongest army, but I think there are armies that can deal with them now, where as before it was tough for all armies. I think bladegheist will get another cost increase, I'm not sure what else they can do to nerf nighthaunt without it hurting the army too much. I do like seeing other armies perspectives on the factions they play against. Keep up the good content
Sadly i don't think it's really a NH boogieman. You missed the most problematic unit: dreadblade harrows. Those + charge in combat + run/retreat & charge army wide make impossible to deny scoring to NH, while they have lot of tools to do so. A Nighthaunt boogieman is a list that can do 10pt every turn and table them round 4... Idk any faction but LRL who can. Nice video & list tho
Actually, the idea is that Nighthaunt and Slaves are the boogiemen of the format (everyone is scared of them). I don't think *anyone* is going to be scared of Sylvaneth in 4th edition, lol! Hopefully by tweaking our lists, we can be better prepared to play against them while still not making ourselves weak into other factions. I have to admit that I overlooked the dreadblade harrows because I found their durability and attack power to be weak. I think of them as Tree Revenants on horseback with a little better combat power. In hindsight, it would have been good to bring them up because that's actually still really powerful. But is there something else I'm missing about them? Thanks for your feedback!
As a nighthaunt player, I knew that the first nerf would be teleporting during the enemies movement phase. It was too easy to take an objective, let the opponent move to within 3", and then teleport out with them having no way of moving the extra inch or 2, to get to the objective. My first game on TTS with friends, I blocked two of the three objectives round 1, and kept my bulk in the center and they managed a big 0 in the first round. Now that run and charge is only 1 unit, and they can't tele during the opponents turn, dreadblades are average (good for getting a few battle tactics, but with the durability issues, and needing to be 9" from enemies on a teleport, they aren't great for objectives anymore)
@@dustinroberson1865 dreadblades are still the best teleporting unit in the game (with knight Zephyros but he will be legend soon). But that’s ok. There is still a stacking rules problem with Nighthaunt but post balance they have predators. Main problem about NH (and LRL) is that since they are strong by breaking the rules, it’s not even possible to have fun in casual and if you are skilled but not a tournament player those armies stay in the closet
I have spent so many turns trying to get that stupid 5+ ward off with LoV lol. 3 games, trying every round and it's only ever gone off once. Dice man...
I recently did a deep dive into the magic odds. Even with your opponent attempting to unbind, you should have about a 45% chance to succeed. When casting in your opponents turn, it should be about 31%. Eventually, you'll get it at some point! lol
Chaos Knights are good but they are not better than Varanguard. Varanguard are damage 3 on the charge with crit mortals and fight twice. Dont get me wrong, knights as an anvil are great but their output pales against Varanguard
Yeah, tbh I knew it was wrong as I was saying it. It was meant to be a comment on how they have similar-looking profiles- 3 attacks on 3's/3's Rend 2 Damage 2. But of course all those things you pointed out make Varanguard solidly more powerful. Appreciate the feedback!
I know you love the swords (and I do too) but I think you are over keen again in this video. You rank them significantly higher than the other two kurnoth but they still have the distinct issue, they have poor movement and a 4+ save. Against StD, they just evaporate against varanguard and will struggle to be the unit charging due to their smaller threat range. If you’re then using the TLA or wych- Scythes are just as good. With nighthaunth they are clearly better but their retreat and charge and efficient unis still make it an uphill battle Edit: spellings 😁
I think that's a fair criticism. Overvaluing Kurnoth Greatswords is probably a blind spot for me and it's good to make me aware of it. I'd still side with the Swords if we're tuning our list specifically against StD and NH. I just think the best way to deal with StD is to screen them with Dryads since they can't shoot them off and the Swords are a better counter-punch than Scythes. But a list with TLA, Branchwych, and a reinforced block of Scythes sounds absolutely diabolical (in the best way possible)! "Oh no, I failed my 4+ strike last rampage with my TLA. That's ok, my Branchwych rolled a 3+ and my Scythes are going to strike first with 2 rend anyways!"
Today there was a Battle Scroll update with several notable changes, including changing the Nighthaunt Battle Formation from affecting the whole army to just one unit. Obviously someone at GW has been watching my videos 😉😉.
I will probably do a follow up video addressing the changes (mostly to Sylvaneth and Nighthaunt), and another video including other top-performing factions.
My new favourite channel - love the idea of the bait dryads in the general’s regiment!
I think for the final list I would cut down one unit of kurnoth to 3, and a dryad unit to fit in belthanos. He is expensive, but I really like him on a flank for objectives and he can usually bully their objective grabbers. The run and and charge means that you always have that 11”+2d6 threat range from the kurnoth, or 18” from himself, which against Lumineth archers or other shooters is quite useful. But I agree he does feel a tad expensive for his utility and an extra drop.
I feel like the two power pairs of 6kurnoth + branchwych and 3+dryads+lady, is a cool concept and start to an army!
I like that idea. It definitely adds a lot of flexibility and mobility to the army without giving up too much damage power. That would cover up the weakness into other army compositions (like armies with shooting as you mentioned) while still retaining the ability to go up against the top meta armies.
Thanks for watching! I appreciate the kind words. Hope you continue to enjoy!
@@gammafighter one thing i realized. In theory Spite revs might be the best counter unit to nighthaunt. Crit mortals, weight of dice and you don’t pay for any rend. Only thing is they still kinda pale in comparison to nighthaunt infantry.
wh 40k player and not a very good one lol, just found your channel as i have been thinking of starting a sylvaneth army for my venture into age of sigmar, subscribed 👍
Thanks for the Great Video. I play Sylvaneth and S2D and i can take some great points for playing both.
Glad you liked it, I appreciate the compliment!
This came in clutch! I have my first ever 2k Sylvaneth game this Friday against STD. Thanks!
Glad to hear it, good luck in your game!
Great video! You got a new suscriber just a few notes on nh: the abilities that they apply during their charge phase can only be used once each. They have the “once per turn (army)” keyword. You missed the most broken unit on the book which are the dread blade harrows!
You're totally right, thanks for pointing that out! That brings the Aura of Dread abilities down from "completely busted" to "really really good", lol.
I have to admit that I overlooked the dread blade harrows. I basically saw them as a cavalry Tree Revenant with little bit better combat profile. Is their teleport extra useful in NH or is it the control score buff?
Thanks for sharing your insight!
@@gammafighter As for yesterday they could teleport in both movement phases (not anymore now) so you could move block units and then teleport away. They were unkillable
Yes, the stats presented on HonestGamer are not showing actual representation. Only success rates on a scale. It helps Rob reduce perspective and minimize objection. In example, his results don't present faction attendance at an event or how often a player repeat-fights the same faction even 3 times at an event, potentially supporting a success advantage of a faction repeat playing against a faction it has an advantage against. That was a specific example. It also doesnt capture player skill. For example, Kaleb is a fantastic player, does that mean the same player playing bonespliters is going to switch up with Tzeentch and win in the same matchup? Doubt it. What's missing is an Error bar which shows the level of uncertainty. This means when comparing factions, the data has an unreliable value by percentage next to it. What is missing from the faction "value" critique is how many points a faction allows. If a specific faction allows a lot of high score points for the opponent, also needs to be contrasted against the player skill level. This is collected through a player Rating. Contrastic this with faction success and points allowed will show a scale of success against higher and lower rated players and how significant the strength a faction is against all the test data. The lower attendance of a faction across the board shows a meta dominance, meaning, the core rules are not written in a direction that favors that(those) factions rules. Rob doesn't want to address these issues. (look up barplots with error bars )
One thing that I think you got wrong is the charge battle traits. You say that as long as you don't stack the abilities, you can use them multiple times per turn. They all mention once per turn (army), so only 1 unit can reduce the hit, only one unit can cause strike last, and only one unit can reduce save rolls by 1. This was a big nerf to the way things were in season 3. This was something nighthaunt players were worried about when the rules were initially released.
In the past, you could run mass armies and give -1 to saves all over the place. Now we are forced to pick and choose where this is going to work best. This also nerfed chainrasps to a bottom tier unit.
The ability to bring back models with Lady O is pretty strong. If you are running a reinforced Bladegheist, it is tough to take them all out at once. She can heal them up, and if they are still low, they can use the damage free retreat on them to help get them out. Since bladegheist are the main damage, keeping them alive is one of the biggest things a spell caster can do.
As far as the black coach, they don't need to stay in combat with a unit. The verbiage just mentions that the unit can be set up in combat only if black coach is in combat. You can set up the new unit out of combat no matter what, but if you want it to be set up in combat, the black coach needs to be in combat.
This is big, because you can keep bringing back a non unique hero like knight of shrouds or lord executioner. If I bring back Knight of shrouds on ethereal steed, it's basically a free 180 pts.
As a nighthaunt player, I think our biggest detriment is big models that we can't deal with in one turn. If you charge into 20 bladegheists, we can't all out defense, so we are stuck at our save profile. If you manage to take a decent chunk out before we are able to retaliate, we aren't going to be able to take down your big model in a timely matter and will more than likely lose our unit. We can't use our wave of terror (strike last, -1 to hit,-1 to save) in the enemies turn, so we have no way of forcing your big model to strike last. Once a battle is initiated with nighthaunt, you need to finish it. If you let them get away, or retreat yourself, you aren't in a good position.
Another thing that is a potential threat, is a lot of shooting. As long as you can keep strong units far enough in front so that we can't charge into your ranged attackers, it will be tough to deal with.
That's really good insight, thank you for sharing! Losing Run + Charge army-wide is a big deal, but Nighthaunt players still have a lot of powerful tools available to them.
@@gammafighter Yes they do. I think they are still the strongest army, but I think there are armies that can deal with them now, where as before it was tough for all armies.
I think bladegheist will get another cost increase, I'm not sure what else they can do to nerf nighthaunt without it hurting the army too much.
I do like seeing other armies perspectives on the factions they play against. Keep up the good content
Sadly i don't think it's really a NH boogieman. You missed the most problematic unit: dreadblade harrows. Those + charge in combat + run/retreat & charge army wide make impossible to deny scoring to NH, while they have lot of tools to do so. A Nighthaunt boogieman is a list that can do 10pt every turn and table them round 4... Idk any faction but LRL who can.
Nice video & list tho
Actually, the idea is that Nighthaunt and Slaves are the boogiemen of the format (everyone is scared of them). I don't think *anyone* is going to be scared of Sylvaneth in 4th edition, lol!
Hopefully by tweaking our lists, we can be better prepared to play against them while still not making ourselves weak into other factions.
I have to admit that I overlooked the dreadblade harrows because I found their durability and attack power to be weak. I think of them as Tree Revenants on horseback with a little better combat power. In hindsight, it would have been good to bring them up because that's actually still really powerful. But is there something else I'm missing about them?
Thanks for your feedback!
As a nighthaunt player, I knew that the first nerf would be teleporting during the enemies movement phase. It was too easy to take an objective, let the opponent move to within 3", and then teleport out with them having no way of moving the extra inch or 2, to get to the objective. My first game on TTS with friends, I blocked two of the three objectives round 1, and kept my bulk in the center and they managed a big 0 in the first round.
Now that run and charge is only 1 unit, and they can't tele during the opponents turn, dreadblades are average (good for getting a few battle tactics, but with the durability issues, and needing to be 9" from enemies on a teleport, they aren't great for objectives anymore)
@@dustinroberson1865 dreadblades are still the best teleporting unit in the game (with knight Zephyros but he will be legend soon). But that’s ok.
There is still a stacking rules problem with Nighthaunt but post balance they have predators.
Main problem about NH (and LRL) is that since they are strong by breaking the rules, it’s not even possible to have fun in casual and if you are skilled but not a tournament player those armies stay in the closet
I have spent so many turns trying to get that stupid 5+ ward off with LoV lol. 3 games, trying every round and it's only ever gone off once. Dice man...
I recently did a deep dive into the magic odds. Even with your opponent attempting to unbind, you should have about a 45% chance to succeed. When casting in your opponents turn, it should be about 31%. Eventually, you'll get it at some point! lol
Chaos Knights are good but they are not better than Varanguard. Varanguard are damage 3 on the charge with crit mortals and fight twice.
Dont get me wrong, knights as an anvil are great but their output pales against Varanguard
Yeah, tbh I knew it was wrong as I was saying it. It was meant to be a comment on how they have similar-looking profiles- 3 attacks on 3's/3's Rend 2 Damage 2. But of course all those things you pointed out make Varanguard solidly more powerful. Appreciate the feedback!
@@gammafighter no worries, I enjoyed the vid. It just made me laugh because I wish chaos knights hit like Varanguard 😂
I know you love the swords (and I do too) but I think you are over keen again in this video. You rank them significantly higher than the other two kurnoth but they still have the distinct issue, they have poor movement and a 4+ save. Against StD, they just evaporate against varanguard and will struggle to be the unit charging due to their smaller threat range. If you’re then using the TLA or wych- Scythes are just as good.
With nighthaunth they are clearly better but their retreat and charge and efficient unis still make it an uphill battle
Edit: spellings 😁
I think that's a fair criticism. Overvaluing Kurnoth Greatswords is probably a blind spot for me and it's good to make me aware of it.
I'd still side with the Swords if we're tuning our list specifically against StD and NH. I just think the best way to deal with StD is to screen them with Dryads since they can't shoot them off and the Swords are a better counter-punch than Scythes.
But a list with TLA, Branchwych, and a reinforced block of Scythes sounds absolutely diabolical (in the best way possible)! "Oh no, I failed my 4+ strike last rampage with my TLA. That's ok, my Branchwych rolled a 3+ and my Scythes are going to strike first with 2 rend anyways!"
@@gammafighter swords are great though 😁😂