Hexeris 12/4

[LonelyMonk]

All I notice was a +1 to his MAT....

Is there something I missed, tired long day...

What do you think?

[SaltyBob]

I think that's all he got.

It looks like they mainly gave out widely acknowledged needed fixes in this update. Although I was a bit blown away by Absylonia getting that much better. No love for Morghoul or Hexy?

[Deathraven]

You could give him +10mat and it still wouldn't change the fact that is spell list if far below par. The thing that amazes me the most is that he only gives +5 warbeast points. What is it about him that PP thinks is so good?!
Still I have not posted my feedback on him yet so I'll dutifully try him out a few more times with +1mat and see if it makes a difference.

[Sevwall]

I bet they've been testing her for a while now, as she was always a bit 'meh'.

Otherwise they made small, easily testable changes (outside of whelps, stones and the Cool Off rule, which should be called such).

[Junn Khan]

Sevwal they had a similar rule in Mark I called Heel. THough cool off sounds great, why not just call it that?

[Aptimus Sippy]

I like hex. I feel like i am the only one. I do want the original deathmarch back because i don't want to cast it on a unit that only gets the one attack even though it is an upkeep. While deathbringer was nice i have had more use out of death knell than with it. just my thoughts.

[NaCl Catapulto]

Playing Hexeris alot, I also find I'm liking him. MAT 7 is all I really wanted; happier with Deathknell, and deathmarch is actually working well for me (go Arcuarii). Everytime I use him vs. Khador, he feels like he's really earned that +5 allowance...

Cryx, not so much. But just like old times, when Hex is good, he's good.

[viperidae99]

The MAT 7 is a good start. Fixing his spells if you're not going to make his feat better, would be the next logical step.

He seems pretty useless against Mk2 Warmachine, especially Cryx, and that's totally fine, as long as you make him a god at smashing the stuff he's made to. I don't think he's really there yet.

NaCl Catapulto, I'd be interested in hearing about your experiences so far? Especially when facing Khador.

[Hollywoodxxl]

I think that's all he got.

It looks like they mainly gave out widely acknowledged needed fixes in this update. Although I was a bit blown away by Absylonia getting that much better. No love for Morghoul or Hexy?

+1,000,000,000 RIGHT!?!?!

I couldnt belive they didnt hookup Hexeris. Abs was LoE worst now she is playable. Hex was our worst and still is. Keep the bad feed back rollin in tyrants lol

[NaCl Catapulto]

NaCl Catapulto, I'd be interested in hearing about your experiences so far? Especially when facing Khador.

I've been using the same 35-pointer for 5 games...

Hexeris
Bronzeback
Cannoneer
Gladiator
Min Cetrati
Max Pg's
Either extoller or Void spirit


I'll post up some reports soon as i have time - I've only lost two so far; one against Cryx, and a 25 point vs Baldur. I'm starting to see some power in Hexy, but it's taken a bit of re-learning. Mainly in that you can't just ram a unit of DM'd arcuarii down your opponent's throat, and then leave the room.

[Wolfbane]

I hadn't have the oportunity to playtest him myself, but I really think the only fix he needs is getting rid of the upkeep part of Death March. If Death March kicks in, the upkeep part is moot (he has to re-cast it). Normally we would bring two units at most, that are two OoT movements. Not that much, and at a cost of 4 fury. Probably I will playtest that, to see how it goes.

[Thunder_God]

When I read Hexeris at the beginning, I read him as having the old Death March, and I couldn't fathom why people cried so much about him. Then I saw the nerf to that spell and understood.

Now, here's an interesting question, what does it say of a caster that one upkeep spell getting nerfed changes our opinion of him so radically? Because I can live with the feat. BTW, you do notice his feat also stops reaving, right? Sadly, it also stops his vampiric reaving...

[SaltyBob]

I have been thinking of ways to change Death March to make it acceptable in the MK2 world. It was clear that it needed changing to fit in with MK2, I just feel they went overboard.

I have the following 2 suggestions.

1- Change it to a RNG 8 non upkeep spell. Target Friendly Model. This is the simplest change that would make it tolerable to me. That way you could at least cast it a few times in a turn on various key models.

2- Have it remain an upkeep, but instead of immediately activating the dead models have them activate after your next control phase. Similar to how Alexia + Risen now work.

Death March - Target friendly warrior model/unit. When an affected model is distroyed by an enemy attack remove it from the table. At the end of your next Control Phase all models removed must be placed completely within Hexeris' CMD range. These models are considered friendly undead solos. Each model may make a full advance followed by one normal attack with boosted attack and damage rolls. Immediately after completely resolving this attack remove that model from play.

[Yertle4]

Or we could leave it as is, accept it's an ok but not great spell now, and realize that we are all viewing Death March through Mk I eyes, where it was such a broken spell that we took Praetorians and Arcuarii PURELY to throw them away to Death March, and we have reactions like this:

When I read Hexeris at the beginning, I read him as having the old Death March, and I couldn't fathom why people cried so much about him. Then I saw the nerf to that spell and understood.

I must say I haven't played him against Hordes though - Vampiric Reaving and the Suffering were nasty before, and I think in the greater scheme of things they got even nastier.
He just doesn't have the tools to deal with warjacks or other Warmachine tricks. Before, that was Death March and the feat. And Ancestral Guardians to collect Death Marched souls and wreck jacks. Now, no longer. All 3 of those are weakened.

[Razhem]

Or we could leave it as is, accept it's an ok but not great spell now, and realize that we are all viewing Death March through Mk I eyes, where it was such a broken spell that we took Praetorians and Arcuarii PURELY to throw them away to Death March, and we have reactions like this:
.

I use infantry to die with the high reclaimer, is that a bad thing?

Death March is hardly broken in it's MKI form, I've had my death march movements swindled from me loads of times be it by range, placement and killing them trough continuous and indirect "non" attacks. I do understand it is preferable for him to retool deathmarch to avoid the timing hell we had before, but for me the guy has always been about the feat, death march and using his fury to heal and chuck some animus.

I never really capitalized on deathbringer so I don't miss the spell as much as others, but I definitely do believe Death Knell is anything but an interesting spell to cast, although if we get lucky and he gets hellmouth, I'll be all over that.

[Yertle4]

I use infantry to die with the high reclaimer, is that a bad thing?

Do the infantry also give you a boosted attack and damage before the soul token?

[goreshde]

While disappointed to see all the other factions get something sweet, at least Hexeris got a mat buff.

It still is not enough though.

[kantoboy]

I dont get why Skorne suffers so much vs cryx. During field tests do we own khador, menoth or cygnar?

[werecat]

Yeah, I'm a bit disappointed that so many of our abilities are against living only....

[SoulReclaimer]

Trolls suffer a lot against Cryx too, Trust me.
The whole living modelt thing. Grrrr

[Mutton]

As does Circle. Really, Undead models just screw some many abilities up.

[Yertle4]

Hordes kind of suffers against Warmachine as a whole at the moment. Just in case someone missed the memo....

[viperidae99]

He just doesn't have the tools to deal with warjacks or other Warmachine tricks. Before, that was Death March and the feat. And Ancestral Guardians to collect Death Marched souls and wreck jacks. Now, no longer. All 3 of those are weakened.

This summarises it pretty well for me. If his feat, his personal abilities and 2 of his spells are all going to be useless or much less effective against Cryx and/or Warmachine, I don't think it's unreasonable that he get SOMETHING that makes him worth taking.

Otherwise, I don't see him getting much play time, especially in tournaments. If you know you're facing Hordes, he's a contender, but otherwise, he's on the shelf. Just my opinion of course.

On the positive side, has anyone else considered that Molik Karn and his animus, coupled with Soul Slave, could be a match made in heaven? You've got a very fast heavy warbeast flanker that gets 2 moves a turn and hits really hard, with reach, not to mention having a solid amount of survivability. You could even assign him his own unit of paingivers to run around after him, Condition him when needed, Enrage him when you're going in, and Medicate him if something gets around Fate Ward!

Seems worth testing...

[Yertle4]

Yeah, more good stuff that revolves around Molik

It kind of scares me to think that PP development might consider the faction to be 'balanced' and Molik and Makeda1-2 (face it, most of the potentially broken things we discuss revolve around her) to be OP.... very scary.

[Deathraven]

Yeah, more good stuff that revolves around Molik

It kind of scares me to think that PP development might consider the faction to be 'balanced' and Molik and Makeda1-2 (face it, most of the potentially broken things we discuss revolve around her) to be OP.... very scary.

You know actually posting something like that here is like being beaten up in a dark alley with a baseball bat, and just as your attack turns to walk away spitting out your broken teeth and saying: "Is that all you've got?"

[i_like_tool]

I'm still leaving feedback about Hexeris. He was so amazing in Mk I, and even not comparing him to do that, he just needs more.

Death March...cmon. Let me pay a fury to keep the chain of fun times going. I would be down for that change. I'll upkeep it AND pay 1 fury for every trooper past the first that does.

Feat, let it be full movement if it's not boosted attack/damage rolls anymore

Those 2 things would go a HUGE way to bring him back

[Creaux]

+1 for him being a poor choice against Cryx.

On the upshot, I felt a LOT more comfortable when I had to surf the Deathjack to get to Goreshade. On the downside, I missed my last hit (4,1,1. Could have used an 8.).

I got my use out of Deathmarch, and the praetorian took his MAT 6 POW 9 swing and didn't do any damage to Goreshade. I didn't feel like casting it again would be helpful.

Anyway, I guess the matchups can only go up from there...?

[alexandyr]

Feat was never boosted. 3" movement has not really hindered the feat much in my games, but his spell list has been kind of sad. Offensive spells are so expensive in Hordes - I find it very weird that things like Death Bringer are getting eliminated when so many insane offensive spells on Prime Warmachine casters stayed the same.

I'd really like to see some decent 2 point offensive spells on casters that have more than 5 fury... or at least have things that are as totally over the top as Earthquake, Tempest, and Ashes to Ashes for our 3 point spells (not that I want those spells specifically, just something approaching that level of power).

[Yertle4]

+1 for him being a poor choice against Cryx.

On the upshot, I felt a LOT more comfortable when I had to surf the Deathjack to get to Goreshade. On the downside, I missed my last hit (4,1,1. Could have used an 8.).

I got my use out of Deathmarch, and the praetorian took his MAT 6 POW 9 swing and didn't do any damage to Goreshade. I didn't feel like casting it again would be helpful.

Anyway, I guess the matchups can only go up from there...?

Death March is useless on Praetorians. Mk I it was awesome because they were cheap Death March disease carriers
Now it's either on melee solos or Cataphracts or Immortals.

[boskiche]

I think that +1 MAT is a good start. Now Hexis has shifted more towrds meele caster than spell slinger. The feat could affect undead, it's all the feat needs to change right now.

As for spell list I'll test him and than give more comments, but 2 spell+model combinations appeal to me:
1. Deathmarch on Rhadeim, or on Soulward (quite funny to be honest )
2. Death Knell + Karax. Just run karax and and circle some med/large based model (or small based but You have to leav a gap), cas DK. Karax will be immune to KN and the terget will suffer POW 16-20 (strike). Situational, but can catch somebody off guard.

[Draekon Darkstorm]

2. Death Knell + Karax. Just run karax and and circle some med/large based model (or small based but You have to leav a gap), cas DK. Karax will be immune to KN and the terget will suffer POW 16-20 (strike). Situational, but can catch somebody off guard.

Yes, because adding an additional -4 to hit, is an extremely good idea to make an expensive spell even more so. You seriously cut into your chances to hit with that gimmick. It isn't worth the risk.

Draekon

[Keegantir]

And after you miss because of the -4 it then deviates off of the target and you get nothing.

[Yertle4]

Yeah, Death Knell is poop at Fury 4 with no arc nodes.

It's almost as if PP playtesters used Death March solely by running their own Praetorians around Woldwardens and hitting them for damage that way.

[boskiche]

I'm not saying that DK is good, but I'm trying to find some use for it. I know taht the target will have DEF 14-16 against the attack (I think it should target Heavy beast/jack), so boost will be required as well as boost to DMG. 6 Fury is costly, but sometimes it will be worth it. Even better if the target will be knocked down by a ex. slam.

I would prefer something else for DK, don't know what, but a spell that is anti troop (Deathbringer was and DK is) and cost 3 Fury at most. Don't know what Hellmouth is but if it meets the criteria I'll vote for swapping it with DK.

[Rosicrucian]

Wouldn't making Death March an upkeep that granted vengeance be a fairly easy fix?

[Yertle4]

Wouldn't making Death March an upkeep that granted vengeance be a fairly easy fix?

Perhaps. It would be kinda crap still. And not fit the theme of the spell at all.

And what if a model is killed, and then the upkeep gets dispelled? I just see mechanical nightmares coming out of it (which is why Hallowed Avenger stayed as an out of turn move, rather than maintenance phase).

[Khador247]

Ok, I'm a bit late to the discussion on this one but I think I see the problem. If, for instance, I have Death March cast on a unit of Cetrati and one of them dies he gets to make his movement with boosted attack and damage and then the spell expires. So, the rest of the unit loses out unless you re-cast the spell. That's a really big drop off from MKI. Also, the feat is crap. I can see why people have been complaining so hard about him.

[Yertle4]

It seems a lot of the complaining comes from those of us who play vs Warmachine a lot more than Hordes.

Hexeris has many good anti-Hordes tools, and is gimped vs Warmachine. Not totally gimped, but helluva gimped.

[NaCl Catapulto]

Hexeris has many good anti-Hordes tools, and is gimped vs Warmachine. Not totally gimped, but helluva gimped.

Unless, y'know, your opponent fielded any halfway decent single-wound troops. Living, of course.

Lemme see that Doomreaver for a second....

[Yertle4]

Unless, y'know, your opponent fielded any halfway decent single-wound troops. Living, of course.

Lemme see that Doomreaver for a second....

Doom Reavers get 1 attack, no biggie. It'd still be 1 good thing to kill.

As I said, not totally gimped.