The "Fix The Mountain King Through Model Addition" Thread.

[PG_Celedor]

If you thought the MK was going to die Mulg is going to get splattered. Mulg does not have 2 pow19 reach initial attacks. Mulg is slower. In those situations where you want crit smite you can easily just power attack with the mountain king. Mulg can get slammed or pushed off of an objective, not the MK. There are other ways around Mulg, knock him down, throw him, push him etc. There is only one way around a MK sitting on an objective.

All that being said I don't think I would use him with either Doomie, especially not Epic, you lose too much. No goad, no refuge and Mulg just works too well to take out. But put him with Borka or Grim, both of which can give him remarkable threat ranges and have synergies to offset his greatest deficiency, his 5 mat, and he could shine. Put him with Gunnbjorn and his portable wall with boosted sprays and you can offer him obscene protection that will be nearly impossible to remove from a zone.

I think so many people got caught up with all of the doooooooom, myself included, that we didn't look at the things that we could make possible with him. He isn't an always, but he certainly is an option.

You should look at Doomies Affinity with Mulg. Voila, two POW19 reach attacks...and his fist to boot.

You do know about Wild Aggression and Doomies feat too right? Both of which outshine the reasons why you say other casters are better... increased hit and threat range. Not to mention charging for free...

[Spume]

Name 5 circumstances where Mountain King outlives Wold Wrath.

Arm 23 with proper support, Arm 25 under eGrissels feat, Def 11 Arm 23 under Surefoot with pMadrak. I'll take 3 more arm, 4 more def and Whelp Shedding over 6 more boxes.

[Spume]

You should look at Doomies Affinity with Mulg. Voila, two POW19 reach attacks...and his fist to boot.

You do know about Wild Aggression and Doomies feat too right? Both of which outshine the reasons why you say other casters are better... increased hit and threat range. Not to mention charging for free...

Celedor, I'm pretty sure you didn't read my post. Where I state he doesn't have two INITIAL pow19's. Which I follow up by saying I don't think Doomie is the best caster for the MK, where I would rather have Mulg for all the awesome synergies they share. You did read that, right?

[PG_petegrrrr]

Wasn't a balance argument, I was merely stating that they weren't useless. If the main issue with the MK is that he isn't survivable this can be said of ALL colossals/gargantuans. He will certainly outlive Wold Wrath in most circumstances. If you allow your 20 point investment to get 1 rounded its a matter of poor play, not poor rules.

I'm not exactly sure how to respond to a paragraph in which almost every sentence is demonstrably wrong.

1) You can't say survivability is an issue of all colossals gargantuans. They all have about 10 or more extra wounds, and similar or higher base armor, so now, math says you are wrong I am afraid.

2) Woldwrath has 8 more wounds, 1 higher armor naturally. How does this make him more likely to get killed than a model with 8 less wounds and 1 less arm who can't heal unless it happens to survive an entire round of getting beat on?

3) You can't hide a 5 inch base from much of anything. It occupies so much space that getting to it is inherently easier than getting to any other targets. You can throw stuff in the way, but since you just paid 20 freaking points for a model, you have a lot less points to use on screening models.

[sourclams]

Arm 23 with proper support, Arm 25 under eGrissels feat, Def 11 Arm 23 under Surefoot with pMadrak. I'll take 3 more arm, 4 more def and Whelp Shedding over 6 more boxes.

So I assume every one of these (3) circumstances has EBDT+KSB+Janissa for a total module cost of 37 points? Fenn Blades + UA with Slag or Pyre troll for a damage boost is about all you have left in the list (and seriously, beast brick with eGrissel? That list is terrible). How do you refute the playtesting that has generally reached the consensus that Beast Brick is not a recommended/effective way of playing MtK?

pBaldur and eKrueger's feats alone generally trump the 'scenarios' you've outlined.

[JoeGuardsman]

I'm not exactly sure how to respond to a paragraph in which almost every sentence is demonstrably wrong.

1) You can't say survivability is an issue of all colossals gargantuans. They all have about 10 or more extra wounds, and similar or higher base armor, so now, math says you are wrong I am afraid.

2) Woldwrath has 8 more wounds, 1 higher armor naturally. How does this make him more likely to get killed than a model with 8 less wounds and 1 less arm who can't heal unless it happens to survive an entire round of getting beat on?

3) You can't hide a 5 inch base from much of anything. It occupies so much space that getting to it is inherently easier than getting to any other targets. You can throw stuff in the way, but since you just paid 20 freaking points for a model, you have a lot less points to use on screening models.

He didn't say that Colossals have an issue with survivability. He said that if you are going to say the MK has low survivability you can say that about all other Gargantuans. As in "If A then B". You keep doing your own math based on the MK in a vacuum. We shouldn't be doing that. You should be expecting Kriel Stone and EBDT on top of that. You should expect the Stormwall to have Arcane Shield. You know what does have a bit of a vacuum. The Woldwrath. It is exactly what it is and that is slightly more survivable than a naked MK. Fully synergized the MK has a net gain of +3ARM over the wrath and healing turns the hit points into an ignorable number that we can count before the game starts.

It will not be as easy to drop in one turn as anyone no matter how upset at the moment may think. No vacuum, so intervening models, walls, Stone, Earthborn animus and all other game elements mean you will not have the opportunity to drop it in one shot in most games. If someone does well they were better than you that game and move on to the next.

[Trollicious]

KSB should always be in there though, as the huge base is easy to tag from farther back.

I think in general, the trolls have better resources for buffing the armor, speed, and damage potential of the MK as opposed to the circle and the woldwrath. Generally speaking, I would expect to see the MK edge out on survivability

[Spume]

I'm not exactly sure how to respond to a paragraph in which almost every sentence is demonstrably wrong.

1) You can't say survivability is an issue of all colossals gargantuans. They all have about 10 or more extra wounds, and similar or higher base armor, so now, math says you are wrong I am afraid. The Kraken would say otherwise.

2) Woldwrath has 8 more wounds, 1 higher armor naturally. How does this make him more likely to get killed than a model with 8 less wounds and 1 less arm who can't heal unless it happens to survive an entire round of getting beat on? Wold Wrath can only get his armor buffed with one caster for one round and has an unbuffable 7 defense. With any caster we can have an Arm23 MK. I'll take the 3 arm over the 8 boxes. With a pMadrak beast brick he can be 11/23 with whelp shedding and 48 boxes. Is there another Colossal or Gargantuan that can match that stat line?

3) You can't hide a 5 inch base from much of anything. It occupies so much space that getting to it is inherently easier than getting to any other targets. You can throw stuff in the way, but since you just paid 20 freaking points for a model, you have a lot less points to use on screening models. I'll spend 38 pts on him and his base support and still have 17 or so points to play with to flesh out the list. Hrm, full fenns with ua, ssc and a fell caller is a good start.

Bold is me.

Hey, if you want to look at everything in a vacuum go for it, but I'm pretty sure we play this game with more than one piece on the table.

[PG_petegrrrr]

He didn't say that Colossals have an issue with survivability. He said that if you are going to say the MK has low survivability you can say that about all other Gargantuans. .

The point is NO, no you actually can't.

For 22 points the Stormwall is arm 22 and has 58 wounds with any caster in cygnar. It also can do multiple ranged attacks a turn to do damage while safely out of reprisal range. It does not have the survivability issues the mountain king does.

Galleon has even more boxes, and higher base arm. He's also in a faction that has feats and spells that can buff arm.

That is why that is not an accurate statement.

[PG_petegrrrr]

Bold is me.

Hey, if you want to look at everything in a vacuum go for it, but I'm pretty sure we play this game with more than one piece on the table.

Apparently you play this game with 37 points worth of pieces vs 20 points worth of pieces, LOL.

[Spume]

Apparently you play this game with 37 points worth of pieces vs 20 points worth of pieces, LOL.

Um, no. It's that my other points help the mountain king, while your 20 points helps other stuff but nothing can help it.

[PG_petegrrrr]

You realize if my other 17 points kill your 17 points, then they have helped me a hell of lot, right? becuase if you spend 17 points and a silly amount of fury all to buff that beast, I'm just going to kill the other stuff...

Because then we are back to MK vs WW...and WW takes that all day long.

[Arizona_Troll]

Trollblood Apologist
FA: 2, PC 1, Stats as Trollses.

Whoops: Subtract 2 points from the PC of one Mountain King when you field this model.

Fix It
* Action: Target Mountain King gains +1 MAT.

Done.

This is hilarious! Made my morning :-).

[sourclams]

You should be expecting Kriel Stone and EBDT on top of that.

Extensive playtesting by Happy Anarchist and others says you don't actually want to put MtK in the beast brick, which is all that 37 pts spent on EBDT+KSB+Janissa+MTK could ever be considered. Would be happy to see your batreps that show otherwise, however.

You should expect the Stormwall to have Arcane Shield. You know what does have a bit of a vacuum. The Woldwrath. It is exactly what it is and that is slightly more survivable than a naked MK. Fully synergized the MK has a net gain of +3ARM over the wrath and healing turns the hit points into an ignorable number that we can count before the game starts.

This is quite true, so you have to take into consideration the insane amount of control/denial that mass boosted forcebolts and eKrueger/pBaldur's feats represent. To have an inherently strong statline that further benefits from an additional ~14 pts of offensively-oriented models means that a WW list can play much more proactively, killing off and controlling the opponent, than the poor sad MtK beast brick that can do little but walk 5" every turn, praying the opponent doesn't have fast flankers.

It will not be as easy to drop in one turn as anyone no matter how upset at the moment may think. No vacuum, so intervening models, walls, Stone, Earthborn animus and all other game elements mean you will not have the opportunity to drop it in one shot in most games. If someone does well they were better than you that game and move on to the next.

There's a small but, from what I've seen, growing sentiment that Wold Wrath might make eKrueger's NQ tier the best tier list in all of Hordes. Not just competitive, but the best tier list in Hordes.

MtK has not had nearly that amount of positive reception. Not by half. There's the best non-vacuum 'index' by which to benchmark the models; the Circle faction is almost entirely excited for WW and many compare it to the Stormwall. The most optimistic of the Trollbloods forums have said 'he's playable'.

[JoeGuardsman]

The point is NO, no you actually can't.

For 22 points the Stormwall is arm 22 and has 58 wounds with any caster in cygnar. It also can do multiple ranged attacks a turn to do damage while safely out of reprisal range. It does not have the survivability issues the mountain king does.

Galleon has even more boxes, and higher base arm. He's also in a faction that has feats and spells that can buff arm.

That is why that is not an accurate statement.

You are right, the statement should be limited to Gargantuans who have similar stat lines. At the moment we can only really compare the Woldwrath with MK and frankly as far as survivability I would go with the MK.

So what do you want to make lists or something to compare the two now? Do I need to explain the ancillary pieces of everything on the board in a situation in order for you to understand it. Put whatever 17 points in that you want so that you can say to count on your fingers 37 twice.

It is nice that the Woldwrath throws a little support out to the army around it though it is a bit specialized. MK though gets to use an armies worth of synergies in a faction known for it.

[sourclams]

What you keep ignoring is that, aside from the Fennblade screen, to get all the support and synergies that keep getting referenced you need to spend ALL the points available IN your entire ARMY.

[PG_frazerpenman]

Chow Time Whelp

-May be eaten immediately after spawning to heal d3 damage

Logic being the mountain king gets pseudo excessive healing where as our existing options would only get the benefit of this 5 times

[JoeGuardsman]

What you keep ignoring is that, aside from the Fennblade screen, to get all the support and synergies that keep getting referenced you need to spend ALL the points available IN your entire ARMY.

I'm not sure if we are all talking about the same points level then. The MK, EBDT, Janissa, Fenns + UA, Full Stone with Scribe all fits in easily in 50 and there are still points around. It already is sized up to be a full army. Points have to run out sometime.

[PG_thegreatblah]

Riddle me this, what benefits does bringing a Mountain King give that Bringing ANY combination of our othe Dire Trolls doesn't. I like the Mountain King, but once I do said comparison it is going to be difficult to want to put him on the table.

[sourclams]

I'm not sure if we are all talking about the same points level then. The MK, EBDT, Janissa, Fenns + UA, Full Stone with Scribe all fits in easily in 50 and there are still points around. It already is sized up to be a full army. Points have to run out sometime.

Yes, and yours run out at 'Make the MtK ARM23, with a screen unit, and a damage buff'. That's the problem. The Mountain King is the centerpiece of this list and he HAS to perform. Yet he doesn't (playtest).

Fenns + UA = 10
MtK = 20
EBDT + Janissa + KSB+UA = 17
Slag Troll = 6

That's 53 points before WB points. SSB or Trollses is all that's left for the list.

[sourclams]

Riddle me this, what benefits does bringing a Mountain King give that Bringing ANY combination of our othe Dire Trolls doesn't.

Boostable spray and immobile. That's really all there is.

[NinjaSpank]

I think talking about the survive-ability of the Mountain King is kind of moot. We could go back and forth theorycrafting if he's more survivable than the WoldWrath but the bigger question to me is: What are we protecting exatcly?

I can put all the work into making the MtK more survivable than the WW, but at that point I've made a really expensive paperweight. Aside from survive-ability, he just doesnt do a job that 20 points of other dires cant do better. I think that's my biggest issue. Being able to take more hits does help out in some situations, but in a faction thats known for being able to take hits, it doesnt feel like its taking hits that much better.

The WW may not be as survivable, but he _does_ something. And he does something really useful for his faction and with ONLY the points he cost without 18 more points to make it better.

[HellecticMojo]

I'm not sure if we are all talking about the same points level then. The MK, EBDT, Janissa, Fenns + UA, Full Stone with Scribe all fits in easily in 50 and there are still points around. It already is sized up to be a full army. Points have to run out sometime.

by then you've lost room for Mauler, Bomber and Mulg You are losing tremendously in the economy of action and assault vectors at that point, not to mention the screening and the protection done for the MK is being is not being used at something else. do you really want to waste the wall that grants cover on a huge model that can't even be benefited from except for melee?

It is nice that the Woldwrath throws a little support out to the army around it though it is a bit specialized. MK though gets to use an armies worth of synergies in a faction known for it.

Woldwrath's not even all that specialized. Everyone benefits from Knockdown fists and lightning templates. The animus is just an extra, and even then it's more generalized that Amuck. Everyone to my knowledge in Circle can cast offensive spells, it's a boost on that, Amuck is meaningless on our casters, and since it's an animus, we can't stack with stuff like primal and Rage. Something we always use on the thing we are powerattacking with.

[PG_Viper114]

I just wish PP would errata the MAT to 6 and be done with it, make everyone happy again.

[Beckman]

If you thought the MK was going to die Mulg is going to get splattered. Mulg does not have 2 pow19 reach initial attacks. Mulg is slower. In those situations where you want crit smite you can easily just power attack with the mountain king. Mulg can get slammed or pushed off of an objective, not the MK. There are other ways around Mulg, knock him down, throw him, push him etc. There is only one way around a MK sitting on an objective.

I think this is the part most people have problems with.

All that being said I don't think I would use him with either Doomie, especially not Epic, you lose too much. No goad, no refuge and Mulg just works too well to take out.

Yeah, losing Goad alone makes him kinda bad with eHoarluk. Banishing Ward seems like it COULD be good, but then you look at the Woldwraith and cry because it gets it for free :P

But put him with Borka or Grim, both of which can give him remarkable threat ranges and have synergies to offset his greatest deficiency, his 5 mat, and he could shine. Put him with Gunnbjorn and his portable wall with boosted sprays and you can offer him obscene protection that will be nearly impossible to remove from a zone.

Gunny's wall is a really good option to keep TMK safe, and Guided Fire seems like it would be good. I think Gunny is the only option at current that could use the mountain king well...

I think so many people got caught up with all of the doooooooom, myself included, that we didn't look at the things that we could make possible with him. He isn't an always, but he certainly is an option.

We looked at it. We Playtested it. And it's not pretty. Mauler+Mulg / Mulg+Axer / 2x Maulers + Whelps. They're all cheaper, have more boxes, and better offensive output when you cast animi from your caster. Animi, I might add, that are included in your 20 points of heavies.

TMK needs another 10+ points of support in order to function marginally well.

Edit: Mat 6 wouldn't even make me happy. He needs 8 more boxes and virtuoso. It's insulting that he has an ability that revolves around durability, and he can't live long enough to use it. Not being able to shoot and melee in the same turn with the exception of Kill Shot is also stupid.

[HellecticMojo]

mat 6 and one more change, seriously I don't care what it is.

Assault, assault and battery, diminish, excessive healing, unyielding, impervious flesh, parry, momentum, beatback, regeneration, quake, weight of stone, flank, girded, guard dog, combo strike, chain attack anything, Pain response, Shield guard, Grand slam, Berserk, Empathic transferrence, snap fire, prey, luck, blessed, ETC, ETC

The list goes on and on.

[Spume]

@HelleticMojo: Sadly MAT5 is the price for having Amuck. I would much rather have all of my power attacks boosted for 1 fury than have 1 more MAT.

@Beckman: I appreciate the thought out replies and the time taken to make them. But one issue I have when you combine two beasts is that you're not pulling a Voltron with them. When you quickly eat through the maulers minimal boxes you are left with only one other Mauler or Mulg. When you do those same amount of boxes back to the mountain king he uses his whelps he just pooped out and heals up.

I think what people are mistaking here is that I don't believe the MK is the be all end all. He has a place, where sometimes he is the best option and other times there are better options. It's all in how you build your lists and what you build them for. Remember that in SR 2012 you can't have Mulg in every list, so he can't always be the answer. But if I'm building a beast brick, or I want to make Gunnbjorn competitive I'll start my list with the Mountain King.

[Davian2K5]

@Beckman: I appreciate the thought out replies and the time taken to make them. But one issue I have when you combine two beasts is that you're not pulling a Voltron with them. When you quickly eat through the maulers minimal boxes you are left with only one other Mauler or Mulg. When you do those same amount of boxes back to the mountain king he uses his whelps he just pooped out and heals up.

The one problem I have with this is, if you take basic support like Krielstone or other pieces, the Mauler has less boxes, yes, but it's only 1 ARM less with support pieces, and it has a much, much smaller base, so fewer guys get base to base. You can hide the Mauler significantly easier, and it's also not going to clog your own lanes.

Not to mention, the Mauler's animus is absolutely fantastic. So yes, when you lose the Mauler, you're down a piece, BUT you can also make it harder to get to the Mauler to eliminate it. That doesn't mean you can't lose it, but with the MK's base size, it's going to be nigh impossible to block off to a truly determined enemy.

[Col_Festus]

Doomshaper 3

Elite Cadre [mountain king] - mountain kings in Doomshapers battle group gain excessive healing.

Or whatever else you think would fix them

[Beckman]

@Beckman: I appreciate the thought out replies and the time taken to make them. But one issue I have when you combine two beasts is that you're not pulling a Voltron with them.

This is SURELY the case. You're NOT combining them, which is the only argument to be made for the Mountain King.

But that argument cuts both ways. Although the Mountain King is immovable, 2x heavies can be in two places at once, and have 10 FURY! With nearly double the damage output! That's a huge deal.

When you quickly eat through the maulers minimal boxes you are left with only one other Mauler or Mulg. When you do those same amount of boxes back to the mountain king he uses his whelps he just pooped out and heals up.

While I disagree with the Mauler's boxes being, "minimal", the Mountain King's capacity to heal, his spray and 18 boxes over our regular heavies is the only thing that keeps it from complete turd status. How many whelps are you really going to spawn? Is your opponent just going to attack your beast over and over again and waste effort like that? It seems like The Mountain King will be ignored until he can be killed with SOME REASONABLE DEGREE OF CERTAINTY. Certainly, if this fails, you'll be in better shape due to your whelps. But those extra 8 boxes you lost for whatever reason really make it a lot easier for the other guy to seal the deal without you using the whelps at all.

I think what people are mistaking here is that I don't believe the MK is the be all end all. He has a place, where sometimes he is the best option and other times there are better options. It's all in how you build your lists and what you build them for. Remember that in SR 2012 you can't have Mulg in every list, so he can't always be the answer. But if I'm building a beast brick, or I want to make Gunnbjorn competitive I'll start my list with the Mountain King.

I think he can work with GunnBjorn, but I think that a competitive Gunny list wants other options.

Captain Gunnbjorn (*5pts)
* Slag Troll (6pts)
* Slag Troll (6pts)
* Troll Impaler (5pts)
* Dire Troll Blitzer (9pts)
* Dire Troll Blitzer (9pts)
* Dire Troll Bomber (10pts)
* Trollkin Runebearer (2pts)
Krielstone Bearer and 3 Stone Scribes (3pts)
Janissa Stonetide (3pts)
Troll Whelps (2pts)

For example, this list seems good against Colossals and the Woldwraith. Walls prevent Dragging, plenty of ARM and things to transfer to.
If you took out a Blitzer, a Bomber, and subbed a Winter Troll for a Slag, I don't think I like it as much. It hurts the damage output a lot. Although Guided Fire is good with the Winter Troll.

Ultimately, I think both versions would need testing... But I can't even see a clear-cut preference for the Mountain King's best case.

I think we just need to wait for the other models from that book to come out. :-/

[HellecticMojo]

@HelleticMojo: Sadly MAT5 is the price for having Amuck. I would much rather have all of my power attacks boosted for 1 fury than have 1 more MAT.

Or I could just hit average things all the time and boost to hit necessary things. Only power attacks you would boost more than once are two handed throws, tramples, and sweep. If I wanted to throw I want to use rage, I can hardly trample because of my large base size, and even if I can since I can't goad, I can't re-position myself after it, so what, sweep? Psuedo thresher that hits 1+pow than the axer that's a quadrant only, and can't boost with other beasts' animus?

Also the MK is fury 5, Fury efficiency really doesn't mean much when we got 5 fury and no goad to exploit it all, and whelps that are likely gonna spawn keeping it at an all time low.

What if you get hit with icy grip? so you are stuck with a mat 5 model that can't even do the little thing it could do.

Mat 6 hits def 13 on average, meaning good chance of killing average infantry, It's actually not a risk to hit a cygnar jack, so it can actually do a point model removal.
I will glady give up the ability for the MK to cast any animus if it means it would have MAT 6.

[PG_Goldstep]

Name 5 circumstances where Mountain King outlives Wold Wrath.

Ooooh! I want to try!
Call it Skorne edition:

DEATH BY A THOUSAND CUTS!! If both models are attacked by wave after wave of Pretorian Swordsmen, five at a time. The Mountain King will outlive the Wrath simply because they each take 10 damage a turn and the Wold can't heal that much a turn, while the King can.

Anti-non-living-model spam!! I have been looking forward to seeing more of the Skorne slingers. Hitting either model is easy. But since the slingers have Erosion, they roll an extra die against the woldwrath.

Sheer Dumb Luck. Bronzeback rolls in on both beasts. Rolls nothing but ones on the MK. Rolls nothing but sixes on the Wrath.

Dumb luck part 2. Titan Gladiator... see Bronzeback.

Target Priority: Since the King isn't as high a target priority as the other models in it's army, while a Wrath might be highly valued above the many magic users you take with it, the Skorne player focuses on the Earthborne then the King while the same player first kills the Wrath and then the Warden.

Sorry! Felt like being a trollface instead of a trollkin when I saw the remark.

[sourclams]

Skorne swordsmen are an acceptable example, although in reality I doubt I'll ever see more than a full unit with UA on the table, crazy insane Zaal/Mordikaar builds aside.

Slingers, I think, are the best example you give since they have an actual damage output vs WW but do nearly nothing vs MK except spawn a whelp...maybe.

The others, though, simply aren't examples. Sheer Dumb Luck is not a strategy, it's a force of nature. The WW has the better melee and ranged attacks for putting down a heavy before it can be attacked, and the extra boxes means it can soak up 1 more attack, even if you consider the MtK to have "base" ARM21 due to KSB.

Target priority is also a poor example because MK burns up at least one, probably even two good animi with amuck and does the same for points for 'normal' Troll stuff simply by being in a list. Take MtK, lose Rage, or Horthol, or Goading Mulg. His force projection is so poor (kinda like an aircraft carrier with no airplanes) there are fewer targets of priority so target priority is less an issue; deal with the list, deal with MtK. By contrast WW forces you to deal with it every turn, through high-POW long range shooting and lightning cloud lane blocking, or threat of KD charge and animus, watching your infantry screen fall over while Druids push/pull your battlegroup into assassination range or out of countercharge range.

[notsoevil]

For me it just comes down to: I can have 2 EBDTs for the price of one MK.

That .. is .. nuts.

[Lucius]

Trollkin channeller. (old troll with cane.. Think doomie but with a beard.) troses stats

Focus - Action* beasts within 6"s gain +1 mat / rat
Fury - Action* beasts within 6"s lose 1 fury token

Once per game* beasts within 6"s gain boosted attack and damage rolls.

Cane - p+s 8 - any beast hit with this weapon loses all upkeep spells.

This guy would help control the mtk and make him more effective. Also give us an answer to debuffs on our beasts.

Pt cost 2?

[PG_Goldstep]

Wow... I go out trolling and people answer me like I'm not... weird.


Anyway, one thing we are getting a lot of that we aren't really appreciating as a faction is SPRAYS.

Lets look at the list of stuff we have with sprays:

Mountain King
War Wagon
Rök
Sons of Bragg
Grissel2
Winter Troll
Scattergunners
Fell Caller
Grissel1

And although the last two are models which are well loved and appropriately cherished, most of the people who post here on a regular basis who aren't named Dallas don't universally love the spray.

But... what if we got a solo or beast which helped sprays in specific.

Give him an ability like "Girded" but where it says Blast, use the word SPRAY.
And then give him an ability (even a fell call or an animus) that boosts (or better yet adds additional dice or even just adds 2) the attack rolls (and even the damage rolls if that isn't too breaking) for sprays.

And while it would be a harder ability to balance, it would be something you would want to use that could cheaply turn many of our under-appreciated models into very effective ones.

[Blaine]

Maybe someone already said this but I think he should be able to spawn whelps during his activation. I mean they are just falling off of him on his model and he hasn't even been attacked.

Maybe something like spawning d3 whelps per activation or something at the cost of a fury. So early in the game you could build up a few whelps for defensive purposes (charge lanes, etc) and then if they live to late game you have a heads up on eating them. That would help.

[PG_Celedor]

But... what if we got a solo or beast which helped sprays in specific.

Give him an ability like "Girded" but where it says Blast, use the word SPRAY.
And then give him an ability (even a fell call or an animus) that boosts (or better yet adds additional dice or even just adds 2) the attack rolls (and even the damage rolls if that isn't too breaking) for sprays.

There's definitely been a increasing trend in the acquisition of spray attacks in our arsenal. It seems like a suitable ranged attack speciality to mesh with our axe-to-face combat style. And that could be a good direction for opportunities to buff the Mountain King, and many of our other new additions without devaluing him relative to other Dires.

Ammunitions Engineer, Pyg solo. PC 3. CMD 5.
Action: Shrug Off Shrapnel! While within this models CMD, friendly faction models gain Clear!
Action: Calibration While within this models CMD, friendly faction models gain +2 to attack and damage rolls made with spray attacks.

Edit: Baka's Gunny Winter Wonderland list would be all the rage!

[Crate123]

They did the smart thing when they designed the woldwrath and gave it spellward. That means it has to be worth 20 points on its own and not have every single buff in the faction factored in when pricing it. Poor MK.
I think the trollblood apologist is the best solution so far.
Its really bugging me about the mountain king, its such a beautiful model but its such a pile of crap rules wise that Im finding it really hard to justify all that money being spent on it.
I wonder if PP knows in advance which pieces are gonna tank and which are not. On one hand I can not believe they would willingly release something so inferior, on the other hand I can not believe they wouldnt see the suckiness for themselves when they design it.

[Trollicious]

I think PP took everything into account in the design. Consider all the buffs mentioned and then ask what an improved statline on the MK would mean.

I understand that all these supporting buffs we're mentioning cost points, they can still result in something that can pose a real problem for an entire army. When PP decides on rules/point cost, they are trying to avoid making anything too broken, and they consider the common in faction buffs. True, the support required to improve the MK costs additional points, but in many cases, it's support you would want to bring already. It's not like the KSB, Janissa, and the EBDT never see competitive play.

I think the main key is that PP didn't want to create some mat6 fury5 gargantuan with 60 health boxes at arm24, that can hit with pow26 running around with wild aggression on it. (for argument's sake, I'm assuming mat6/pow22/arm20 base, which is what many were expecting) The level of support for all that gets costly (ebdt/mauler/ksb/janissa/edoomie..and some animus juggling) but it puts something out there that is unstoppable for many lists, and so they capped the mat, arm, pow and health of this monster at something more reasonable (though by some accounts, far too low)