Reign of Chaos (A Chaos Revamp project)

[maverike_prime]

So I did the comparison to Thunderwolves like Kythos suggested. It did change my view on pricing for the Mutis somewhat.

comparison of Thunderwolves to Mutilators (version 1.5).

So first off stats:

Thunderwolves are:

 

WS: 4

BS: 4

S: 5

T: 5

W: 2

I: 4

A: 4 (Yes I even double checked this)

LD: 9

Sv: 3+

While Mutilators are

WS: 4

BS: 4

S: 4

T: 4

W: 2

I: 4

A: 2

LD: 9

Sv: 2+/5++

Unit types:

 

Thunderwolves are Cavalry, meaning they move 12” in the movement phase, and are not slowed by difficult terrain but treat it as dangerous terrain instead so they have a 1/6 chance of wounding themselves if they charge through terrain.

Mutilators by contrasts are beasts, so they move 12” and ignore the effect of difficult terrain entirely.

Special rules:

 

Thunderwolves get And they shall know no fear and all the benefits associated with that. They have acute senses so if they outflank they get to re-roll which table edge they come in on. Nice plus. Thunderwolves also get counter attack so they almost always have a nice battery of attacks to dish out.

 

Mutilators get Fearless so they basically will never break. They also get hammer of wrath so a nice extra when they charge. They also have the daemon special so they get a 5++ and fear. Nice extras. Nothing really pants-droppingly great but nothing to sneeze at either.

 

Okay so the differences we have thus far are:

 

Thunderwolves: Get 3 more attacks that they will almost always have, a higher strength, a higher toughness, but risk injuring themselves when/if they move through difficult terrain.

Mutilators by comparison get a better save, fearless, fear, a 5++ invulnerable save, and their swiss army knife of weapon choices while ignoring difficult terrain effects.

Thunderwolves are 40 points while mutilators are 80. Okay, so twice the points for an invulnerable save, fear, fearless, immunity to difficult terrain and a choice of weapons but compared to a greater number of attacks with better survivability.

 

At first view it seems like the Thunderwolves are crazy under-priced compared to Mutilators, or that Mutilators are stupidly over-costed when looked at in the opposite way. But there are other things to consider with pricing: The units role in the army and the unit implied scarcity in the army. In days past the later was handled with a limitation on how many of a unit you could take, Raptors were once a 0-1 limited unit meaning you could only have a single unit of raptors unless you were playing Night Lords. These days, that sort of limitation isn’t used much in going for a limit of 1 per army, by including the designator of being ‘unique’, or no limit at all. The only real limiter in a non-unique unit is the price of the unit with some accommodation for the price of the kit itself.

 

Well here is where we start getting quit subjective: What IS the role of mutilators in a Chaos Renegades army and how scarce are they? The former is somewhat easier to answer but is harder to justify, what do Mutilators do in an army? Well they kill things, right? Yeah it’s not that simple, because anything in the Chaos Army is capable of killing things. But take Cultists for example. Sure they’re capable of killing things. But they’re not terribly good at it since the majority of armies have a Space Marine base to them or can drastically outshoot cultists long before the cultists can charge being able to make use of their numbers. Thus why Cultists are generally regarded as bullet sponges.

 

Mutilators are, what I call, a omni-option meaning they have the capacity to stand a reasonable chance against nearly anything in the game. Charging a Tank? They’ve got a weapon for that. Dealing with squad of infantry? They have a tool to address that. Attacking a monsterous creature? Yep they got a weapon for that. Now their usability in all of those situations becomes more dubious based on conditions. If a pair of Mutis go against say the Swarm Lord… hmm chances are they’re coming out on the loosing end of that fight thanks to the Lords higher initiative and better save potential.

 

So Mutilators are really more a killer unit of opportunity. You really want to pick your target with them. They don’t have the number of attacks to deal with massed horde unit like hormagaunts and there are plenty of characters, both special and generic, that will hit first with killing blows against them. And anything that can get around their armor saves leaves them hurting.

 

Now the question of scarcity. Here is where we get REALLY subjective. Mutilators are a fairly new unit to the 40k universe. To my knowledge, there’s never been a mention of a mutilator in the books as a unit proper but rather in-story notations about “The Obliterator mutilated the unit” for the most part. So it’s fairly hard to point to much information regarding how rare or common Mutilators really are in a Chaos army so I’ll look at Obliterators and try to make some educated guessed based on them. In several books the Chaos forces use Obliterators but there’s little mention of how many are actually there. There are either “Several” or a single monster. In the context of an army this leads me to believe that Obliterators while uncommon are not hard to find and whatever scarcity they do have, is attributed more to their isolated nature more than a numbers thing.

 

I think Mutilators have a comparable situation, they’re not everywhere but they’re not super-rare either. I would gauge Mutilators/obliterators being a bit less common to forces of Chaos then Thunder Wolf cavalry are to the Space Wolves.

So with all this in mind, I think that the price of 80 points per Mutilator is fair until you compare it to other armies. Here is where the prices get rather wonky. I will say that I feel that Thunderwolves are under costs and really should be about 50-60 points and that’s about the same price I’m thinking Mutilators should be after this comparison.

 

I also looked at comparing Mutilators to Assault Centurions and Tyranid Warriors as bases of comparisons. While I could go through the entire process for those units, nothing much really changes my final thoughts about the Mutilators. I’m still looking at a price of between 50 and 60 points for a mutilator. As I get games in and I hear back from others trying them out in games I’ll probably adjust it a bit more by a couple points up or down.

 

So, version 1.6 of the Mutilators!

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a316/maverike_prime/Warhammer/Chaos%20Space%20Marines/Chaos%20Codex%20Revamp/8-26-14/thumbnails/mutilatorsthumb_zps8f79fd47.png

[Kythnos]

Yup, the new price looks much more reasonable :)

 

A few things I noticed in your file as well:

- Additional Mutilators are still priced at 80 points 

- I'm not sure anymore what the marks in your revamp do - but if it's still the same like in the current dex, their points for the Mutilators could be juggled around a bit. But as I said, not sure if that's still the case.

- Now that the unit type changed to beasts, the biggest advantage of the Icon of Wrath (rerolling charge distances) is moot, as beast can do that by having fleet. Maybe a point reduction would be a good idea.

[maverike_prime]

Yup, the new price looks much more reasonable

A few things I noticed in your file as well:

- Additional Mutilators are still priced at 80 points

Thanks for the catch.

- I'm not sure anymore what the marks in your revamp do - but if it's still the same like in the current dex, their points for the Mutilators could be juggled around a bit. But as I said, not sure if that's still the case.

Like I said, gotta get games in and see how they work out.

- Now that the unit type changed to beasts, the biggest advantage of the Icon of Wrath (rerolling charge distances) is moot, as beast can do that by having fleet. Maybe a point reduction would be a good idea.

I donno If that re-rolling charge range is Wrath's best advantage. I rather like the Furious charge personally. But yeah I haven't reworked any of the Icons yet so at the moment they still work the same as in the standard codex.

[maverike_prime]

Last updated: 9/30/14

Well guys that's it. I'm done. I have literally been ham strung from continuing this project in any meaningful way. What am I talk about? The point that 40k as an ongoing friendly game environment in this area is dead. The one store with in an hours drive in any direction for me, that has play space is situated in an out of the way shopping center that frankly is a pain to get into under normal circumstances, is currently all but inaccessible due to road construction cutting off the most direct access to the shopping center, followed by the second most direct route being declared private property and being barred to through traffic. So now to get to the shop it's make a left on this road that leads into the depths of the forest of doom, now make another left onto the trail of endless woe, then make another left and go over the bridge of infinite death, then make a right and go through the Cave of unending hardships and finally pass through the gates of unending torment.

 

Yes, I'm talking about making a 7 mile trip through residential areas, about 80% of which are blind turns at 4-way stops in place of going 1 mile on the main road. Thank you country road work. What does this have to do with playing 40k for me? Simple.

 

Of the the already barely present group of people who had an interest in 40k, only 2 of them would agree to allow me to play test this codex against them (They were tau and Eldar players btw). And with the difficulty in getting to the shop now, they're not coming in for 40k any longer. So, now I have 0 ability to play test the rules.

 

So... yeah. It was a good run. I'd have liked to finish all three books, but with out the ability to play test anything, it's nothing more then rules-masterbation. Sorry guys. I gave it my best shot.

[Lexington]

That absolutely sucks, man. Really sorry to hear it. You put some amazing work into this.

[maverike_prime]

That absolutely sucks, man. Really sorry to hear it. You put some amazing work into this.

If I can just a dedicated group of say 2-8 play testers I can continue it. But that's the key. They need to be dedicated to the project. And when I say dedicated I mean they need to be able to report back detailed info from the play tests. Who they tested against, what they were testing, what squads the unit being tested went against in what turn, what worked, what worked too well, what didn't work, ect. If I can just get a half dozen folks who are willing and able to commit to being play testers, I can continue the project.

[Xenith]

Also sorry to hear about the trouble, you were doing some good work here!

[incinerator950]

:cuss this day.