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9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 04 Nov 2015, 20:17
by Orion
9th age woodies are out, and boy do they look nice!
http://www.the-ninth-age.com/pdf/the-ni ... _0-9-0.pdf

Let the glade come together and discuss how we once again becomes the OP elves we are meant to be!

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 04 Nov 2015, 21:44
by Mollesvinet
I had a quick look through the book as I will attend a 9th tournament in february.

All in all it looks good. Kindreds are nice for elven fighting characters. Forest spirits have a lot of choices now, the combat treeman lord can even get a magical weapon which is pretty sweet.

The main loss to me is waywatchers. The elite rare archers are basically just scouts with BS5. No special rules or anything.

Also reducing strength on wardancers during 3++ ward is okay (they are S4 now anyway) but taking away killing blow dance is a bit sad. Might be that killing blow doesn't even exist in 9th, haven't checked the rulebook so much in detail yet.

It seems that the only way we can deal with armour now is magic or fighting characters.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 04 Nov 2015, 23:05
by Yuri
Everything has to go under the nerf bat and examination by Rules Team yet.

In addition to "loss" of waywatchers (9th age equivalent is Pathfinders) is "loss" of scouts (sentinels) because you can have only one scouting skirmishers in army. Rules Team persists on anti-avoidance lists and this is how they are resolving it. I have no objection but other armies can do avoidance lists also, and they aren't that badly nerfed on that field.

Killing Blow doesn't exist. There is a rule called Lethal Blow. Model is not slain outright, but suffers a wound with AP (6) and no saves except Ward save. Bladedancers are sweet.

All units in Sylvan Elves army gained AP (1).

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 00:56
by youngseward
I'm not too happy with it. Haven't had an in depth look but it seems to have robbed wood elves of their identity. They're no longer the best shooting army in the game with high mobility built in. I'm not sure they're going to be all that fun to play either.

Also a small gripe but people keep claiming that all old models are useable in 9th but there's, understandably, nothing for Orion. It is a shame though because Orion is really my favourite aspect of playing woodies.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 02:15
by Billthesurly
Ok, so I just went over there and spent some time looking over the 9th ed Sylvan Army. All in all I kinda like it. I never used an army swarm of scouts anyway and everything else looks pretty freakin solid. The only thing I saw that I didn't like was the Pathfinder unit. Looks to me like an extra 5 pts each for scouts with a BS of 5. And they can't even get Fey Arrows. Why not? It's not like they have some built in special shot like the Waywatchers did. (Kind of lets us know how the rest of the community viewed Waywatchers neh? :evil: )

I also particularly like the fact that all of the fey arrows are the same price. Makes things easy.
Love the return of the kindreds. (Put some "spite" expys in there somewhere and they will have me sold.)
Oh, find a way to get Orion in there somewhere. Come on man, it's ORION - KING IN THE WOODS for Pete's sake.
Standards and musicians are now a possibility for "dryads & Treekin" - cool.

Now they've got me drooling to try it out because so far I like what I see. :thumbsup: :nod:

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 02:28
by Nicholas Nitro
Seems like they've fixed a few of the annoying things. Falcon-Riders can take magic arrows, and that's good.
Otherwise it looks exactly like 8th: with arbitrary point-costs, bizarre restrictions (no arrows for Glade Riders, No skirmish upgrade for Grove Guard), and OP magic. Disappointing.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 02:51
by Billthesurly
Nicholas Nitro wrote:Seems like they've fixed a few of the annoying things. Falcon-Riders can take magic arrows, and that's good.
Otherwise it looks exactly like 8th: with arbitrary point-costs, bizarre restrictions (no arrows for Glade Riders, No skirmish upgrade for Grove Guard), and OP magic. Disappointing.
Skirmishing Grove Guard are now special units and called Sentinels. (But they really took a nerf bat to the Waywatchers.) Edit: ACTUALLY NOT SO. SEE BELOW.
The magic system is self regulating as throwing max dice for "total power" is very likely to kill the wizard doing it.

Yes, some things are not as we would wish it (and since when has that NOT been the case :roll: ) but the question is; is the system playable and enjoyable as a mass combat fantasy war game? I believe it might be and I intend to find out very soon.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 10:48
by Etheneus
Billthesurly wrote:The only thing I saw that I didn't like was the Pathfinder unit. Looks to me like an extra 5 pts each for scouts with a BS of 5. And they can't even get Fey Arrows. Why not? It's not like they have some built in special shot like the Waywatchers did. (Kind of lets us know how the rest of the community viewed Waywatchers neh? :evil:
Not exactly true. They can't choose from the arrows because they have them all. Look at their special rule: Master archer
It gives them access to all arrows, every round of shooting you can shoot a different kind (or the same) so they are even more versatile than before. Now they can shoot at armor units (although with only -3 in armor) at high T monsters, trueflight or Starlight (which in my opinion got a well deserved buff (magic attack, flaming attack and holy attack, the last one making you reroll ward saves) All in all, I don't see this as much of a nerf, 1+AS cav is once again a problem but spears having lethal strike (former killing blow which now doesn't kill outright but takes away armor and regeneration saves) makes that problem a little less so (my Equitaine knights tremble at the thought)

And about Orion, the 9th team have stated that they will take care of special characters but it will have to wait for a while, the basics first. They have in a way gotten Durthu on the playing field with the Avatar of nature and I don't think it would be a problem to place Orion there if you want to use the model, for the fluff part, just wait and it will surely come.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 11:39
by Phil Rossiter
Nicholas Nitro wrote:Otherwise it looks exactly like 8th: with arbitrary point-costs, bizarre restrictions (no arrows for Glade Riders, No skirmish upgrade for Grove Guard), and OP magic. Disappointing
Game balance is tricky. Why were no-save spells introduced in 8th? To counter the horrendous stuff that for example stacked Ward and Regen saves at the end of 7th. But Jervis Johnson freely admitted they hadn't spotted the character-sniping aspect of Dwellers for example. So many tournaments (ETC the prime example) house-ruled Look out Sir vs Dwellers. Then of course, you get Deathstars again.

Most regular Core infantry are overpriced in 8th. Why? Because GW felt Steadfast made these good and in early 8th that wasn't too far off the mark. By mid-8th though, MC were running wild and those infantry units were junk. Late 8th and Waywatchers, cheap RBT, super-hard characters etc rein in the MC and the infantry get slightly better again, though still overpriced.

Given that 9th Age is written by high-profile ETC guys (including the authors of Swedish Comp) you would expect it to be strong on the detail. My first impression is that it's pleasingly similar to 8th, at least on the surface. But the proof of the pudding is in the playing of course, seeing how Core rules and army books interact over time. Lacking physical books and having to tread carefully because of IP, 'feel' is likely to suffer at first. This was true of early 3rd edition 40K though, or early 6th Warhammer too, any transitional game.

The 6th edition book really lacked tools vs armour. But now, Waywatchers losing the ability to ignore it shouldn't hurt as badly. Bodkins shot might actually get used now. Much more magic is available. Combat seems to have been buffed. Testing FTW!

:)

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 12:18
by Mollesvinet
Didn't notice the master archer rule, will have to go through that when I get home from work. That does make pathfinders stand out and makes them very versatile indeed.

I know bladedancers have been buffed with strength, but I would still prefer a dance that gives them lethal blow compared to the character killer dance.

All in all I am quite happy with this new list, looking forward for my first game of 9th to really try it out!

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 13:41
by Orion
+1

Besides, these are living rulebooks, meaning that they will be updated based on some of the best guys playing the game.
Oncebitten wrote the beastmen book also for bonus info.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 13:54
by youngseward
Orion wrote: Oncebitten wrote the beastmen book also for bonus info.
I really really like the beastmen book. Its got an interesting style and stays true to the theme.

That might contribute to my disappointment at woodies. They seem really bland in comparison to the way beastmen have been changed. That said, a forest spirit army looks fun and interesting, unfortunately I don't have the models for that though.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 15:00
by noneshallpass!
I like the 0.9 draft.
Forest Spirits got better, and seem posible to field again. The combined force of Elves and Spirits is a important part of the army's identety in my opinion. Wood Elves has been like that for 20 years. And archery is still quite good.
In sum, I think the book is less bland than the 8th version.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 05 Nov 2015, 21:54
by Billthesurly
Etheneus wrote: Not exactly true. They can't choose from the arrows because they have them all. Look at their special rule: Master archer
It gives them access to all arrows, every round of shooting you can shoot a different kind (or the same) so they are even more versatile than before. Now they can shoot at armor units (although with only -3 in armor) at high T monsters, trueflight or Starlight (which in my opinion got a well deserved buff (magic attack, flaming attack and holy attack, the last one making you reroll ward saves)

And about Orion, the 9th team have stated that they will take care of special characters but it will have to wait for a while, the basics first. They have in a way gotten Durthu on the playing field with the Avatar of nature and I don't think it would be a problem to place Orion there if you want to use the model, for the fluff part, just wait and it will surely come.
Well there you are boys and girls. Just have to read a little deeper into it and just about all of our questions/problems get sorted out.
Thank you Mr. Etheneus!

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 07 Nov 2015, 20:04
by Mollesvinet
Will have my first 9th game tomorrow. It will be

1500pts "wood elves" and 1500pts "high elves" VS 1500pts "daemons of chaos" and 1500pts "ogres".

I will try to post a battle report and hopefully there will be things to discuss after that. My list is posted on my thread (link in signature). I have no idea what any of the other players will bring!

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 07 Nov 2015, 21:02
by Sneggy
Its certainly got me building and playing again. I'd not played a game of fantasy since AoS dropped and have played 2 in the last 3 days now.

Currently got a bunch of Wild Riders and Treekin on my paint station too.

Played my first game with the sylvans this afternoon. Absolutely decimated a Beast Herds army. To be fair to him the dice were against him but I lost I think 6 forest Guardians and 3 Treekin, oh and my Treant Ancient but thats my own fault for miscasting and exploding him (I've played 2 games and miscast 8 times, killing my mage 3 times. I'm not even throwing a lot of dice.....not the new rules fault, I am just horrendously unlucky)

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 08 Nov 2015, 13:39
by Phil Rossiter
My first impressions:

1) Getting a wizard into a wood looks important for the +1 to all Channels.
2) Treesinging looks bad, I may be missing synergies.
3) As said Blade Kindred could be a terror.
4) Pathfinder Kindred, thumbs up!
5) Slight nerf to Trueflight.
6) Dryads gain S4 and Skirmish, win.
7) Stag gains Frenzy (ugh) and loses combat power but becomes War Beast so you can tool the rider up.
8) Eternal Guard cheaper but nerfed. 'King's Guard' better but still dodgy IMHO.
9) Treekin, ye gods. S4, why, when Dryads are too and Treemen S6? Mon Inf have to kill stuff or they die to combat res, S5 is vital. Yes you can take a Treeman lord and give one unit +1 S but that ends if he dies and he has become an even more expensive Flammable Monster. I believe cannon have been nerfed but still.
10) Branchwraith rather sexy. Aspect to give Treekin Command interesting.
11) 5+ Ward on Forest Spirits obviously a big win, 'Daemonic' a slight nerf.
12) Banner of 'always on' forest, could be excellent but King's Guard not being able to take it is daft, would make them a player.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 08 Nov 2015, 21:23
by Mollesvinet
Phil Rossiter wrote:My first impressions:

1) Getting a wizard into a wood looks important for the +1 to all Channels.
2) Treesinging looks bad, I may be missing synergies.
3) As said Blade Kindred could be a terror.
4) Pathfinder Kindred, thumbs up!
5) Slight nerf to Trueflight.
6) Dryads gain S4 and Skirmish, win.
7) Stag gains Frenzy (ugh) and loses combat power but becomes War Beast so you can tool the rider up.
8) Eternal Guard cheaper but nerfed. 'King's Guard' better but still dodgy IMHO.
9) Treekin, ye gods. S4, why, when Dryads are too and Treemen S6? Mon Inf have to kill stuff or they die to combat res, S5 is vital. Yes you can take a Treeman lord and give one unit +1 S but that ends if he dies and he has become an even more expensive Flammable Monster. I believe cannon have been nerfed but still.
10) Branchwraith rather sexy. Aspect to give Treekin Command interesting.
11) 5+ Ward on Forest Spirits obviously a big win, 'Daemonic' a slight nerf.
12) Banner of 'always on' forest, could be excellent but King's Guard not being able to take it is daft, would make them a player.
After my first game I have the following comments to some of your points:

1) Keep in mind that only a single channel is made now, with a bonus for each wizard. So while bonuses to channels are good, we are still only talking about a single dice (granted, can make a big difference).
2) I agre that it is not overly useful except in a few select situations. However, it does make a good first aid kit for the treemen to carry around. Could have used the healing in my last game.
3) Bladedancer kindred rocked!
4) No experience with this. Sounds cool but wonder if more models would be better?
5) Agree, not a disaster but certainly reduces mobility as you question yourself whether it is worth it to move or not.
6) Dryads were great, 5+ ward save is back for all forest spirits as well which is great! A unit with hatred and +1S could probably kick a lot of ass. Many points though.
7) Only has frenzy if you choose wild rider kindred (fluffy) but the deer can be taken by vanilla characters I believe. It is also toughnes 5! As far as I can see this transfers to rider in current rules. Still not fast cav though :(
8) Agree. Wouldn't leave home without defensive buffs. At least the dawn spear is back for -1 to hit.
9) Agree, seems strange. At least flammable is not so bad anymore, instead of doubling wounds it allows rerolls of failed wounds.
10) Agree.
11) 5+ ward is really good, not even negated by magic. I don't see them being daemonic, forest spirits just can't be joined by non forest spirits and vice versa. Correct me if I am wrong.
12) Agree. No way a BSB will carry it for them.

Overall it was very enjoyable to play 9th. Game is much the same to be familiar, but with some major differences that really spices things up.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 08 Nov 2015, 21:36
by Billthesurly
Hey Molles! Would you care to expound on those "major differences" for those of us who are nibbling round the edges but haven't fully taken the plunge just yet? I just printed out the Sylvan Elves Army and am studying the 9th Age rules. I can see that the game is going to be different but I would like to hear about the really big, game altering changes in advance rather than stumbling across them in play.

And, am I blind or what - where are the spells? (Edit: Oop! There they are!)

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 08 Nov 2015, 21:56
by Mollesvinet
Hey Bill,

in my opinion the main differences are in army lists and magic phase.

For lists they tried to balance things which will take time between armies obviously. But they also tried balancing the choices within the books making many more units viable and build styles as well. Another interesting, and a bit annoying at times, thing is that there is an initial cost for units and sometimes a different cost for extra models. For example our eagles: A unit of 1 eagle cost 50pts as usual, but then each additional eagle only costs 25pts giving incentive to add more of them.

For the magic the lores look more or less familiar, but some spells have been changed out and many attributes have been made more interesting as well. The main point for the magic phase is irresistible force and maximum of 5 dice per spell: The more dice you use to cast the spell, the worse the miscast will be. It uses more or less the same table as now, but the strength is depending on the dice. Also if you get dimensional cascade with 5 dice you automatically lose your mage but if you used 4 or less you get to roll as before. Also you can only channel 1 dice per phase, but each mage increases the chance. Finally you can do something called aided casting, basically wizards help each other to boost a single spell but I haven't gotten into that rule so much yet. Oh, and champions of magic wielding units like sisters of thorne counts as a seperate level 1 mage!

Finally dangerous terrain has changed, different unit types rolls more dice for each dangerous terrain but does not take d6 wounds. Look-out-sir doesn't exist, but you cannot hit characters unless less than 5 models in a unit and big killer spells usually ignore the first fail so you can roll your level 4 first to be safe. Warmachines are less accurate, especially cannons (even more true for cannons that move).

There are still quite a lot of typos, old definitions and even unfinished sentences here and there. But I am sure that it will all be sorted out soon enough.

EDIT: Ridden monsters have changed, not sure I like this change though but will give it a chance. Basically you can only attack the monster and once the monster dies the whole model is removed. Makes the character more safe in one way, but also more fragile in another as you cannot use the characters armour or ward.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 08 Nov 2015, 22:17
by Phil Rossiter
Mollesvinet wrote:1) Keep in mind that only a single channel is made now, with a bonus for each wizard. So while bonuses to channels are good, we are still only talking about a single dice (granted, can make a big difference).
2) I agre that it is not overly useful except in a few select situations. However, it does make a good first aid kit for the treemen to carry around. Could have used the healing in my last game.
3) Bladedancer kindred rocked!
4) No experience with this. Sounds cool but wonder if more models would be better?
5) Agree, not a disaster but certainly reduces mobility as you question yourself whether it is worth it to move or not.
6) Dryads were great, 5+ ward save is back for all forest spirits as well which is great! A unit with hatred and +1S could probably kick a lot of ass. Many points though.
7) Only has frenzy if you choose wild rider kindred (fluffy) but the deer can be taken by vanilla characters I believe. It is also toughnes 5! As far as I can see this transfers to rider in current rules. Still not fast cav though
8) Agree. Wouldn't leave home without defensive buffs. At least the dawn spear is back for -1 to hit.
9) Agree, seems strange. At least flammable is not so bad anymore, instead of doubling wounds it allows rerolls of failed wounds.
10) Agree.
11) 5+ ward is really good, not even negated by magic. I don't see them being daemonic, forest spirits just can't be joined by non forest spirits and vice versa. Correct me if I am wrong.
12) Agree. No way a BSB will carry it for them.
1) That makes a difference!
2) Noted, costs power dice effectively just for the Attribute though I guess? Also dislike TS being a 'Life' spell.
3) :)
4) Cool is King! But there may be a way to make it cost-effective.
5) You must hate this!
6) Some interesting builds to work out.
7) You may have just saved my army.
8) EG look like a deep Steadfast block to me now.
9) I like the new Treekin Hero, he may be a way forward.
10) Branchwraith was viable already and has got better.
11) I need to check the Otherworldly rule.
12) Half the point of this banner is for the third rank to fight, which is really an infantry thing. Not seeing the synergy here.

I really need to read the full rules up Thomas.

:)

ATM I want three BSB's. One in infantry to make them Stubborn, one in Treekin and one in the bus to fight!

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 08 Nov 2015, 22:37
by Mollesvinet
Haha, 3 BSBS. Maybe if you ask real nice to the 9th age team :D

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 09 Nov 2015, 15:04
by Orion
Since we have pretty low access to non-armour weapons, how would you guys deal with a chariot heavy WoC list with 2 demon princes and a hellcanon?

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 09 Nov 2015, 15:11
by Phil Rossiter
They've just updated the list to remove AP (1) from enchanted arrow shots. King's Guard now 14pts basic, looks too much to me. The 'forest' banner now 25pts but gives only Fight In Extra Rank. How long will that third rank be alive I wonder?

My first thought vs the WoC would be spells but I'd need to study the WE list more.

Re: 9th age Woodies are out! Lets discuss!

Posted: 09 Nov 2015, 15:22
by Mollesvinet
My S8 avatar of nature and S8 wardancer hero tore through chariots like butter.