Patch 2.3.1 (Tentative balance changelog preview)

[Caeltos]

The idea behind it is as follows -

The Zealous Charge is meant to be used for mid-range to long-range to allow for useage and being able to maximize the damage potential and punish oncoming units, as well as entrenched units. The speed reduction allows for the following things

- Being able to apply as much damage spunge as possible during the period from the hail of gunfire from which they will do. If they had too high speed values, the gunfire mode would seize to quickly even during mid-distance and not allow the rest of your army to seize to capitalize on the situation. 80% damage slow is more or less a complete snare, since it shares similiar values of a slow impact as that of a Purged by Flames/Purgation Squad slow or Crippling Poison. They WILL catch up with those speed reduction (that of a 3 speed unit) and they will most likely be completely immune to slowing impariment effects. But will still be vulnerable to ranged fire and incoming damage spunges.


The difference between for an example And They Shall Know No Fear is that it has no real risk value added ontop of it. It's a very defensive trait, whereas the Zealous Charge is more of an offensive-trait with a risk element added ontop of it, but has a large boons of effect and reward element added to it.

For more clarification
- And They Shall Know No Fear - Low Risk / Low/Medium Reward
- Zealous Charge - High Risk / High Reward

There has to be an element of counterplay available, so knockback/knockdown effects are still viable. You'll preferably want to try to use this if you've succesfully baited out grenades, or stop incoming Banshee attacks, and then try to intervene on the interruption effects. As always, it boils down to general mechanics and how it pans out. But the practically is pretty good in my opinion.

They'll still be vulnerable to more dedicated melee units with Heavy Armor, but it's more of an a good response against general weaker infantry/melee oriented units, or dedicated-ranged units that are already under the suppression effect, or being distrupted in one way or another. Giving them synergy with Havoc/MoT Dread with suppresion effect or Barrages from GL's and such. Or Chains of Torment/Daemon Shield to ensure they take as minimal damage during their charge period. Or even Bile Spewer for that matter.

Cooldown is slightly higher due to 2x CSM's are more-common ground of a build for Chaos. There needs to be room for counterplay for it's counterpotential after it's useage. As well as the fact that for an ex. Chaos has more sustain potential from Nurgle Worship/Shrine, and that's something I had to keep in mind with it.

As for melee dps - It'll probably end up around the same values of that of an Aspiring Champion in terms of melee/ranged dps during that period. It's specifically more of an anti-mid game ability against those melee units. Such as Slugga Boyz/Banshee w/ Exarch if you want to engage on those. Wheras MoK provides you with a more reliable staying power due to hp sustain / + higher damage output in general consistantly and being generally faster.

[Torpid]

The fact that bunkers heal is absolutely massive. Especially with the rate at which they do so, they reduce your bleed substantially compared to a similar build but with a chim instead of the bunker, not to mention bunkers are low on upkeep compared to chims.

[Helios]

The fact that bunkers heal is absolutely massive. Especially with the rate at which they do so, they reduce your bleed substantially compared to a similar build but with a chim instead of the bunker, not to mention bunkers are low on upkeep compared to chims.

Bunkers also don't move or provide shelter from a grenade/flame weapon, nor do they contribute their own damage or (if it remains in the final patch) act as a retreat point. I can play the list-the-pros-and-ignore-the-cons game too.

[Torpid]

I'm saying there are more reasons to buy a bunker than just reinforcements and being cheaper than a chimera.

[Helios]

I'm saying there are more reasons to buy a bunker than just reinforcements and being cheaper than a chimera.

That's totally understandable. I'm simply making a counterpoint as to why it still doesn't seem to surpass a chimera with this new ability. Maybe in one aspect, (like the healing) but not in others which make the chimera the better buy.

[Torpid]

I dunno about that yet, I would have to see this new chim first, I really like the bunkers now, they're uh-may-zing. The whole guardsmen upkeep reduction thing + the bunker healing and ogryn buffs to fix their req costs has made the IG t2 much less req heavy.

I don't agree with Ace about the 30% resistance being too high though. If it takes 10 seconds to set-up/de-setup it's going to be very vulnerable, not to mention the chim is not a leman, it has no damage resistance so repairs aren't as strong on it and it only has 500 hp so spike damage will still be exceptionally strong against it. Ultimately if he's deploying and undeploying over and over he's just wasting so much time, you just move back when he deploys and go elsewhere. It's clearly a defensive thing and it won't overcome some of the major weaknesses of IG such as not being able to push up against lots of set-up teams, being weak against artillery and having poor map control outside of sentinel play.

[Dark Riku]

* Advanced Healing heals for 1,5% of the units max health instead of 2%

This wargear costs 150/50 already and can pretty much only be used together with Improved medical equipment (100/20).
Those are resources you can't spare in 1v1 since you probably need AV squad(s) as an apo or any other extra squads to try and deal with what your opponent has.

* Singing Spear damage increased from 90 to 100

This weapon was just fine. It's a heavy melee weapon on a support commander. You can also use guide on herself to buff the damage even further. Guided, It will do more damage than most of the aggressive commanders with their heavy melee weapons
(FC PF, WB claw, ~8 DPS under the HT claws, etc).

[Dalakh]

This weapon was just fine. It's a heavy melee weapon on a support commander. You can also use guide on herself to buff the damage even further. Guided, It will do more damage than most of the aggressive commanders with their heavy melee weapons
(FC PF, WB claw, ~8 DPS under the HT claws, etc).

And so what ? Guide only lasts ten second and a FS is a lot easier to force off than the three above. In fact if you use just one control ability on her (shotgun blast, crippling poison, aiming wutdat etc) the window where she does "problematic" amounts of HM dps passes without her doing anything.

To be honest I think this wargear on the FS is pretty damn useless or at least counter productive. Why would I guide my FS when I can guide wraithguards or a brightlance or any other unit that will provide more additional punch with the extra benefit of increased range.

To stay on the topic of the FS there will be a big external balance problem between Fortune and improved We are the hammer !
On one side for 110/25 you have 30 % resistance for 15 seconds on just one unit.
On the other side for 100/20 you have 30% resistance for 15 seconds on potentially (and most likely) all of you units AND it buffs your speed AND it cost only 10 more energy.

[Torpid]

The GK changes are stupid. In fact loads of these are. This looks like a horrible patch. Just wanted to get that out there. Can't even be bothered to critique it all though right now. Later I hope...

[saltychipmunk]

I am interested in hearing your critique of gk.

as for my final critque.

1 BC no changes to the hammer. in my opinion the hammer is a just a weak wargear. The main issue i have with it is two fold . 1 its damage type is bad for the power cost and tier it is in , 2 the librarian does it better. short range crowd control is one thing gk is not lacking. It would have been nice if the bc would get something to extend his versatility a bit more . but i am just nitpicking with this complaint.

as for his other wargear.. i will miss the energy burn wargear. it was nice against bubble commanders and spell casters , the knockback thing was silly as random chance is never something you should be relying on. i would have removed the knockback al ltogether and kept the energy burn.

and as for the flesh hook ability.... ehh....

the buffs to we are the hammer. the base buff i am not a fan of, but the buff to the sword i like *if* its cost was put back at 25 power . 30% damage resistance is the same as the force staff, that might be over the top. but at the same time 30% definitely distinguishes the powersword better since its actual dps is lacking.

Strikes getting melee charge.. after looking at them for a bit , i would have liked this change ... but i do see two issues.
1 it makes me really want to use strikes as a melee replacement for either purifiers or interceptors
2 it makes me never ever want to buy that already overpriced and clunky psycannon. because why would you want that on a melee squad?

the ist buff to the sarge... the new grenade is nice but i doubt the ist sarge is worth 25 power even now.

[Flash]

I'm looking forward to playing this. Will post feedback when I've had a chance to play with the new changes

[Sub_Zero]

1 BC no changes to the hammer. in my opinion the hammer is a just a weak wargear. The main issue i have with it is two fold . 1 its damage type is bad for the power cost and tier it is in , 2 the librarian does it better. short range crowd control is one thing gk is not lacking. It would have been nice if the bc would get something to extend his versatility a bit more . but i am just nitpicking with this complaint.

And I think it is a great wargear. Just think of it. Your Brother Captain teleports to ranged units and the ability serves him a great role. It deters any melee unit from engaging him. He can freely chase his targets and if some fools interrupt they will be sent flying. Not to mention insta disruptions when you catch a bunch of units in one place. That is why the ability doesn't stun. Don't even bring here the FC commander with his thunder hammer. The FC cannot create a vortex under his feet after teleporting.

Strikes getting melee charge.. after looking at them for a bit , i would have liked this change ... but i do see two issues.

This is not relevant anymore. Strike Squads' justicars do only more damage in melee now and that is it. But I hope this change (the charge) will have its place in the future update but not in the state of its initial proposal (they get it in T1, that is really op).

[Tex]

This weapon was just fine. It's a heavy melee weapon on a support commander. You can also use guide on herself to buff the damage even further. Guided, It will do more damage than most of the aggressive commanders with their heavy melee weapons
(FC PF, WB claw, ~8 DPS under the HT claws, etc).

And so what ? Guide only lasts ten second and a FS is a lot easier to force off than the three above. In fact if you use just one control ability on her (shotgun blast, crippling poison, aiming wutdat etc) the window where she does "problematic" amounts of HM dps passes without her doing anything.

To be honest I think this wargear on the FS is pretty damn useless or at least counter productive. Why would I guide my FS when I can guide wraithguards or a brightlance or any other unit that will provide more additional punch with the extra benefit of increased range.

To stay on the topic of the FS there will be a big external balance problem between Fortune and improved We are the hammer !
On one side for 110/25 you have 30 % resistance for 15 seconds on just one unit.
On the other side for 100/20 you have 30% resistance for 15 seconds on potentially (and most likely) all of you units AND it buffs your speed AND it cost only 10 more energy.

Well put. I 100% agree with you about the disparity between WATH and fortune. The wargears themselves are different of course, but...

I don't think the singing spear is useless at all. It is a great combination gear with warspiders or firedragons. Guiding the FS is rarely the best option as you have said, but you can't just disregard that her DPS increases to a very respectable number for the duration. Increasing its damage is just one of those things where we have to see how it plays out.

[Forestradio]

PATCH 2.3.1 (TENTATIVE BALANCE CHANGELOG PREVIEW

TENTATIVE BALANCE CHANGELOG PREVIEW

TENTATIVE CHANGELOG

TENTATIVE

[Dalakh]

1. I can read a thing just once and remember it during a reasonable length of time thank you very much.

2. Even more reasons to put my opinion out as it's more likely to result in a correction of these changes.

[Forestradio]

I wasn't trying to be offensive at all, just wanted to emphasize that all these changes are not certain to be in the next patch at all.

The 2.3 changelog thread has quite a few things that weren't included in the 2.3 release

[Helios]

PATCH 2.3.1 (TENTATIVE BALANCE CHANGELOG PREVIEW

TENTATIVE BALANCE CHANGELOG PREVIEW

TENTATIVE CHANGELOG

TENTATIVE

We're very well aware that it's tentative, we CAN read. Maybe some give said input slightly more harshly or critically, but that's still input, so long as it's constructive.

[Daddy]

Can someone help me understand the purpose for blood sacrifice summoning temporary blood-letters. Why not make the blood letters permanent. Seeing as how other races have troop-call ins that stay on.

The thought is, if I have to summon bloodletters to help my engagement, that means they are needed to help deal with a threat. Meaning they will still be needed for the next engagement if the opponent retreats.

[Nurland]

Well imo blood sacrifice is a great way to boost your effectiveness in single engaments without crippling your economy by having a squad you might not want. Much like abilities like UYC, ToN etc.

The great thing about summoned BL is that you can just throw them away to tie/stuff or wipe squads since they will die anyway.

[Sub_Zero]

If you want this global ability to summon permament bloodletters then its red cost has to be higher and you have to add requisition and power. I hope you implied these additions and changes? But I like this ability as it is. In massive engagements sometimes it will be hard to spot this dark ritual and bloodletters do some insane damage so it can lead to easy kills. He thinks that he deals with simple heretics but Khorne does have a trick up his sleeve.

* Advanced Healing heals for 1,5% of the units max health instead of 2%

Really concerned about that. I bet this change has something to do with more tanky terminators. So the nerf towards them may be reasonable. However I see no point to reduce its effectiveness on units like tacs who already don't benefit from it that much unless level 4. Apply this percentage only to super-heavy armored units, huh?

[Dark Riku]

You can make the summoned bloodletters "permanent" near a shrine due to the increased energy regen.

Edit: as Caeltos pointed out below I was mistaking. Elite introduced an extra energy reduction of 5 after a 20 second delay.
So this holds only true in retail. My bad.

[Caeltos]

You can make the summoned bloodletters "permanent" near a shrine due to the increased energy regen.

That was fixed ages ago.

[Commissar Vocaloid]

just read the chimera change.

Kreygasm cirLewd

Reinforce and retreat point. Much orgasm.

[Torpid]

Hugely OP, they already can do a soft version of that with the retreat function damnit.

[Atlas]

After having a night to think about it, I would like to see something done to improve the agility of the Manticore.
There was already consideration of improving the cooldown of the Manticore barrage, but the biggest issue that I've had with the unit isn't that it doesn't wipe squads every volley or that it' really expensive; it's the fact that I know that if a single AV weapon ever reaches it I can kiss it goodbye.

I feel like the Manticore does best when it's used to dislodge an enemy position and not to do damage and I think it's good practice to move it around to not get a dial on it's position. To that end, I really liked the proposed cooldown reduction in T3 in return for slightly less damage (iirc). If we're not going to get that, then I'd like to see something like a rotation speed boost or just a flat +.5 speed increase just so that it can at least match the speed of infantry forces. I say that your 300/90 investment isn't completely doomed when something looks at it.

It's a very minor buff and they're only mostly doomed, but it's something imo.

[Helios]

After having a night to think about it, I would like to see something done to improve the agility of the Manticore.
There was already consideration of improving the cooldown of the Manticore barrage, but the biggest issue that I've had with the unit isn't that it doesn't wipe squads every volley or that it' really expensive; it's the fact that I know that if a single AV weapon ever reaches it I can kiss it goodbye.

I feel like the Manticore does best when it's used to dislodge an enemy position and not to do damage and I think it's good practice to move it around to not get a dial on it's position. To that end, I really liked the proposed cooldown reduction in T3 in return for slightly less damage (iirc). If we're not going to get that, then I'd like to see something like a rotation speed boost or just a flat +.5 speed increase just so that it can at least match the speed of infantry forces. I say that your 300/90 investment isn't completely doomed when something looks at it.

It's a very minor buff and they're only mostly doomed, but it's something imo.

Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnno.

And I play IG exclusively. Manticore is fine. Even the proposed nerfs earlier in the patch testing I could begrudingly say were justified.

[Vapor]

plz no buffs to manticore survivability, for the love of god

[Caeltos]

Updated the first post.

You'll notice some things are gone, and some things have been added, and some things have been edited out. As always, tentative stuff- but getting settled now.

[Forestradio]

* Inferno Cannon Dreadnought weapon cooldown from 3 to 2
* Inferno Cannon Dreadnought weapon duration from 3-5 to 3-3
* Inferno Cannon Dreadnought reload frequency and duration removed (set to 0)
* Inferno Cannon Dreadnought splash radius reduced from 7 to 5
* Inferno Cannon Dreadnought splash range damage modifiers all set to 1

BBQ time.

[Dark Riku]

When will the next release go live approximately? (Is it before or after the next MRT / bigger tourney)

Hero choices
* Daemonic Visage cost reduced from 125/35 to 110/30
* Daemonic Visage damage reduction improved from 15% to 25%
Gayos Lawd main, check.
Still 8 second of invulnerable sluggas/stormboys. Will have to pick up Orks.