Wednesday, January 18, 2017

Disappearing Artefacts

The scuttlebutt doing the rounds is that Mantic's new tournament play book for Kings of War sees the "retirement" of three of the magic items.

The first to go is the Brew of Keen-Eyedness or "+1 to hit on Ranged Attacks". Not many people will be sad to see this go given that it was a must take item on any archer Horde or especially Horde of Ogre Shooters.

Even less lamented will be Ensorcelled Armour. Every lord (and his dragon) had this and it was probably - after pre-CoK Honey-Maze - the best spend in the book. Certainly not sad to see it go.

Finally rumoured gone is the Medallion of Life, 5+ Regen for Heroes (and mostly seen on those with Monster mounts. Removal of Ensorcelled Armour would have just seen choices cascade to this so it is probably more pre-emptive than anything.

Overall I am very happy to see Mantic take this approach to the game. This will force changes to lists and shake up the meta.

The only other change I would have made was restrict Caterpillar to Infantry units which keeps it in line with historical use - auxiliaries operating in rough ground.

Good stuff Mantic, a big thumbs up from me.

5 comments:

  1. No say it is not so. How will my Elf on his Dragon survive without his Ensorcelled Armour, with only a 5+ Def?????

    I have not used medallion of life, but i can see it would be the natural step for those unable to take Ensorcelled armour. The Caterpillar an infantry only item would see me with an extra 55 points to spend for my elf army.

    I would prefer to see Wings of Honeymaze removed, though its impact on the game is slightly lessened by flying units now being grounded if disordered. Still on a individual character it can still be very powerful.

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  2. Slight nerve to breath, lightening and fireball to make them affected by cover and stealthy. Seems reasonable.

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    1. So i will no longer be able to race up my 3 Efreets and fireball my opponents units in cover to death :(

      It is a quite fair change :) Otherwise breath units like ogre boomers were quite good

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  3. Good to see the continual updates to the rules to stop no-brainer decisions.

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  4. Wings of Honeymaze could be -1Def, maybe 5-10 points cheaper. My Dwarf King will be a fair bit less awesome at only Def 5, but if everyone else is getting nerfed to bring them into line, then it seems fair.

    I agree with Lliam about the nerf to breath, lightning and fireball. Facing those when spammed isn't fun.

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