Thousand Sons Designer's Note Aug 12, 2020

[Archaeinox]

Hey, not sure if you guys saw this. Today, TS/GK faq updated with:

 

 

DESIGNER’S NOTES PSYCHIC FOCUS Many veteran Thousand Sons players are unclear whether or not a matched play rule called Psychic Focus, which was published in the previous edition of the game and enabled their psykers to ignore the increasing Warp Charge cost of Smite, should continue to apply or not. For clarity, this rule is not a feature of the 9th edition of Warhammer 40,000, and Thousand Sons psykers manifest Smite just like any other psyker unit. Rest assured that the psychic might of this army can be reflected using the additional updates and rules found within Psychic Awakening: Ritual of the Damned, and we will be building upon this even more in the 9th edition version of Codex: Thousand Sons.

Edited August 13, 2020 by Archaeinox

[MillionsSons]

There is very little to say unfortunately...

[byrd9999]

Dang, they just love to keep nerfing the Thousand Sons... :( 

[Are Verlo]

I think it is all ok. Spamming smite is a boring mechanic.

 

The thousand sons should be able to "copmpete" in more than just the psychic phase and the HQs should not be the units that do the heavy lifting.

 

Still the codex shows signs of old age and unless one leans on FW lists are a bit boring.

[Prot]

I'm mixed on this. (Also note it is now OFFICIAL: You cannot smite multiple times from 1 psyker, as some people had felt was a loophole in the rules.)

 

To be honest this helps us a bit, and hurts us a bit. Just hear me out:

 

- Smite spam is boring as heck. Relying on it to repeatedly do damage made for lazy list building, and aside from adding potency to the army, it did reduce the tactical requirement.

 

- I think Thousand Sons have multiple, interesting ways of dealing Psychic damage, but everyone tends to get lazy and just take utility and smite combo's. I think we have a few options that other armies don't that give us a variety of damage dealing through characters, and meanwhile using basic squad psykers to help with utility is a better option now. (To be honest I did this anyway.)

 

I'd really just be careful of over reacting to these FAQ's and meta based issues until we have a full understanding of Codex changes, and even weapons are changing to some degree. 

[Montoya]

Here's a question for you. 

 

It says "Thousand Sons psykers manifest Smite just like any other psyker unit."

 

One could read that to say that for our Rubrics and SOT that they now manifest normal smite vs. the baby smite.    Thoughts?  

[The Yncarne]

Boring or not, smite was one of the few ways I could remove wounds from high T models/units once I made turn 2/3.

 

I’m disappointed, but glad to know I played it correctly to date.

[Dolchiate Remembrancer]

Considering im cutting down my list to 1 sorceror and a DP, im OK with this.

Didnt find smite spam all that useful but then again maybe i was doing it wrong.

[Umbros]

Smite Spam was boring as hell. This is the right change. If anything I'd rather us have fewer, more meaningful psychic powers. Psychic phases are dull.

[Skerr]

My buds really dislike smite spam so much that one won't even play my 1k Sons. Im like dude, you play guard, out number me 4 to 1, can get off a ridiculous amount of shots and will shoot me off the table by round 5 if I am lucky. That MWs get no saves (speaking generally) was a sore spot. Our first game had me winning initiatve, warptiming Ahriman across the board on his disc, spamming MW, assaulting and destroying his hoverthing that was going to drop a buttload of guys into my deployment zone turn 1. So I get it, he still tabled me turn 5 as I predicted.

 

I was not thrilled that we were the MW army when 8th hit either. We just came to accept it as our main dmg output on armor. I would like to see some retooling on spell dmg output, even if that meant going back to saves and intro-ing AP to spells? Or just more buff, debuff and utility?

[Umbros]

My buds really dislike smite spam so much that one won't even play my 1k Sons. Im like dude, you play guard, out number me 4 to 1, can get off a ridiculous amount of shots and will shoot me off the table by round 5 if I am lucky. That MWs get no saves (speaking generally) was a sore spot. Our first game had me winning initiatve, warptiming Ahriman across the board on his disc, spamming MW, assaulting and destroying his hoverthing that was going to drop a buttload of guys into my deployment zone turn 1. So I get it, he still tabled me turn 5 as I predicted.

 

I was not thrilled that we were the MW army when 8th hit either. We just came to accept it as our main dmg output on armor. I would like to see some retooling on spell dmg output, even if that meant going back to saves and intro-ing AP to spells? Or just more buff, debuff and utility?

 

Honestly I'd prefer much fewer, more meaningful spells. Only characters are psykers; the unit leaders instead gain an ability (you could theme them by cult).

[Sorceress]

I have always felt that aspiring sorcerers and scarab occult sorcerers should have there own rubric themed set of powers that mostly buff/heal/modify the role of there unit. give them all a special sorcerous bolt attack spell that dosent increase in difficulty instead of smite and let them support and empower the rubrics under there command and leave the normal powers to the HQs. I could even see a tzangor discipline for the shaman with close combat and mutation themed spells.

[Archaeinox]

Cults should have always been assigned on a unit-by-unit basis. In any case, I'm sure the changes will be pretty significant and might be something we don't even expect when the Codex releases. 

 

Remember how Helm of the Third Eye went from letting nearby Rubrics overwatch in 7th ed to stealing enemy CP in 8th ed. I expect that sort of huge shift in the way we know things. So my advice is the meantime is just get accustomed to the core rules of 9th and play whatever you want in casual play and the occasional event. I didn't win the recent tournament, but I had fun and learned how the missions score so that's a bonus.

 

Even with the weapons changes that will come in October, the way we think about things will change.

Edited August 14, 2020 by Archaeinox

[Grendaxe]

I agree that smite spam is boring but I felt forced into it by GW design.

If i brought a mixed list of tanks/daemon engines i always lost those tanks T1 or T2 because other shooting army just do it better.
And since rubrics or scarabs cant take high str weaponry i had no way of dealing with T4+ stuff afterwards. So more and more i just got rid of tanks/daemon engines and just used a lot of psykers hiding behind a load of bodies because they will survive until later turns.

 

Smite at WC5 it's simply most efficient way of dealing damage. The higher WC for directed spells generally result in less damage (Also generally don't have a 10+ casting bonus)

 

I can understand if GW wants to move away from this smite spam but i'm a bitt annoyed about their handling of it:

"We dont like that the TS army revolves around smite spam, so in the new 9th edition we are nerfing this" => Cool fair enough, it isnt a very interesting playstyle

"But you'll have to wait 6~12 months before we can be bothered to release the TS codex to address the imbalance we now created " => Not cool

I mean why not add the increasing smite casting cost when you release the TS codex?