Great video! I'm really excited about these changes and new detachment, and you do a great job of highlighting the strengths and challenges with skysplinter assault. I'll definitely be referring back to this after some games
Loved your Goonhammer article! It read just like you speak and was great to see your enthusiasm. Can't wait for more Drukhari content again! I subbed a long while ago when the channel was more focused on them.❤
Warning! Warning! Word Wall incoming! ( :)P ) Something I wanna get people's opinions on: ... does the new detachment give us enough pain-tokens? Can we even get enough tokens to use on all the cool new melee tricks we get in Skysplinter? because as Tom says, in the old Realspace Raid Detachment we were practically swimming in them :)P. I'm wondering if Realspace Raid 'might' still be the best option. Heavy emphasis on the 'might' part though. This is just my gut instinct, and honestly I'm hoping that testing things out and playing the new detachment on the tabletop will prove me wrong... but I can't help but feel like we won't get pain tokens in Skysplinter. And you need lots of pain tokens if you want all those cool melee units to re-roll the hit roll, re-roll all wound rolls if led by an Archon, get the +1 AP in all close combat, etc. etc. I'll lay out my rationale behind this. Chances are you guys already know this stuff anyway, but I'll go into detail in case there are any new budding archons watching these vids. Besides it's always good to lay everything out in full so you can check my reasoning :) ) . Realspace Raiders basically gives you 13-14 extra pain tokens throughout the game. 6 from the start with if you include Lelith (a Succubus), Urien (a Haemonculous) and a generic Archon. (Great characters who are well worth including. They aren't a tax). + 5 Tokens if you give the archon that '+1 pain token a turn' enhancement. Run him solo, by himself, in the backlines doing actions, holding the home objective, screening out enemy deepstrikes, preventing 'capture enemy outpost' by the enemy etc. Keep him alive 'til the end of the game, giving you +1 pain token a turn, keep him alive for 5 turns = 5 more Pain tokens. We're at 11 tokens already. Then let's say you don't bring Urien, &/or you also bring a basic haemonculous as well. ... well now you can give that guy the Crucible of Malediction enhancement. I,e the one that lets you generate even more pain tokens once per game by yeeting him into the middle of your opponent's army and forcing 5+ units to make a battleshock test at -2 leadership. I tend to average an extra 2-3 pain tokens from that manoeuvre, and suddenly my opponent's key units can't use any stratagems and are OC 0 at the crucial moment I need to take an objective. I've won games off of that. So that's 6 plus 5 plus 2-3 pain tokens. 13-14 pain tokens are being generated 'for free' / with minimal effort by that detachment, on top of all the ones you get by killing enemy units. I was re-rolling hit rolls for every single unit in my army the entire game in both melee and shooting in every game I played. ... and do you know what? Those games were still a struggle because of how underpowered the melee was in that army because archons couldn't join incubi. My games were a struggle and the army felt really underpowered, and that was with 13-14 extra pain tokens. That's where I'm worried about this new detachment. The army fundamentally struggled when it had an abundance of tokens... and now GW expect us to do more with even fewer of them? Is the detachment viable when you're only getting 3 extra pain tokens? Sure maybe you'll get a few more if you give a character the new enhancement for killing things in melee - but is that enough to make up for the loss of Crucible and 'Art of Pain'? What happens when I play against Custodes? Knights of any kind? an 'oops all Dreadnought only' army? I have to kill units to get my pain tokens back. But if I can't kill them because I don't have enough pain tokens to start with... Caveat time: Am I a whiney, salty b-hole who thinks Drukhari are dead? Oh No, Heck no! My Archons can join my Incubi now! XD Yay woohoo! Finally! I'm stoked and over the moon! Now my Incubi get +1Ap and the archon makes them re-roll all wounds! That's hecking awesome! I'm incredibly happy! 😁 I'm looking forward to running 3 Archons in the Realspace Raid detachment. 1 to stay at the back and farm pain tokens/ screen deepstrikes as discussed, and the other two will lead Incubi units into glorious melee combat. We can now solve the original problem the Realspace raid Detachment had in the 1st place; a lack of melee punch. Like I said, I hope I'm proven wrong in a few months time. I'm looking forward to seeing people try out Skysplinter and report that actually 3-5 extra tokens is enough. I hope I've misunderstood something in the rules and people find a way around the lack of pain-tokens. And Either way, It really feels like the Archon-Incubi change alone should do enough to get us over the edge and into 50% win rate. Honestly with that change alone it feels like Drukhari are great now. Drukhari are back babyyyyyyy! 😁🥳🎉
thanks for the incredibly well thought out post! I agree entirely- in a lot of terrain contexts I think Realspace Raid remains very strong, and quite possibly better (UKTC, I'm looking at you!) What I like about the slate is that it has given us two meaningfully different ways to play the army, which makes the wait for a book a hell of a lot easier :D Tom
Great video! I'm really excited about these changes and new detachment, and you do a great job of highlighting the strengths and challenges with skysplinter assault. I'll definitely be referring back to this after some games
Amazing, thanks :D
Loved your Goonhammer article! It read just like you speak and was great to see your enthusiasm. Can't wait for more Drukhari content again! I subbed a long while ago when the channel was more focused on them.❤
Aww thank you! This means a lot. Drukhari are getting my focus for the next few months so there will be a bunch more content :D
Looking forward to seeing how you, Jack & Rob get on with this!
Thank you!!
Warning! Warning! Word Wall incoming! ( :)P )
Something I wanna get people's opinions on: ... does the new detachment give us enough pain-tokens? Can we even get enough tokens to use on all the cool new melee tricks we get in Skysplinter? because as Tom says, in the old Realspace Raid Detachment we were practically swimming in them :)P.
I'm wondering if Realspace Raid 'might' still be the best option. Heavy emphasis on the 'might' part though. This is just my gut instinct, and honestly I'm hoping that testing things out and playing the new detachment on the tabletop will prove me wrong... but I can't help but feel like we won't get pain tokens in Skysplinter. And you need lots of pain tokens if you want all those cool melee units to re-roll the hit roll, re-roll all wound rolls if led by an Archon, get the +1 AP in all close combat, etc. etc.
I'll lay out my rationale behind this. Chances are you guys already know this stuff anyway, but I'll go into detail in case there are any new budding archons watching these vids. Besides it's always good to lay everything out in full so you can check my reasoning :) )
. Realspace Raiders basically gives you 13-14 extra pain tokens throughout the game. 6 from the start with if you include Lelith (a Succubus), Urien (a Haemonculous) and a generic Archon. (Great characters who are well worth including. They aren't a tax). + 5 Tokens if you give the archon that '+1 pain token a turn' enhancement. Run him solo, by himself, in the backlines doing actions, holding the home objective, screening out enemy deepstrikes, preventing 'capture enemy outpost' by the enemy etc. Keep him alive 'til the end of the game, giving you +1 pain token a turn, keep him alive for 5 turns = 5 more Pain tokens. We're at 11 tokens already. Then let's say you don't bring Urien, &/or you also bring a basic haemonculous as well. ... well now you can give that guy the Crucible of Malediction enhancement. I,e the one that lets you generate even more pain tokens once per game by yeeting him into the middle of your opponent's army and forcing 5+ units to make a battleshock test at -2 leadership. I tend to average an extra 2-3 pain tokens from that manoeuvre, and suddenly my opponent's key units can't use any stratagems and are OC 0 at the crucial moment I need to take an objective. I've won games off of that.
So that's 6 plus 5 plus 2-3 pain tokens. 13-14 pain tokens are being generated 'for free' / with minimal effort by that detachment, on top of all the ones you get by killing enemy units. I was re-rolling hit rolls for every single unit in my army the entire game in both melee and shooting in every game I played.
... and do you know what? Those games were still a struggle because of how underpowered the melee was in that army because archons couldn't join incubi. My games were a struggle and the army felt really underpowered, and that was with 13-14 extra pain tokens.
That's where I'm worried about this new detachment. The army fundamentally struggled when it had an abundance of tokens... and now GW expect us to do more with even fewer of them? Is the detachment viable when you're only getting 3 extra pain tokens? Sure maybe you'll get a few more if you give a character the new enhancement for killing things in melee - but is that enough to make up for the loss of Crucible and 'Art of Pain'? What happens when I play against Custodes? Knights of any kind? an 'oops all Dreadnought only' army? I have to kill units to get my pain tokens back. But if I can't kill them because I don't have enough pain tokens to start with...
Caveat time: Am I a whiney, salty b-hole who thinks Drukhari are dead? Oh No, Heck no! My Archons can join my Incubi now! XD Yay woohoo! Finally! I'm stoked and over the moon! Now my Incubi get +1Ap and the archon makes them re-roll all wounds! That's hecking awesome! I'm incredibly happy! 😁 I'm looking forward to running 3 Archons in the Realspace Raid detachment. 1 to stay at the back and farm pain tokens/ screen deepstrikes as discussed, and the other two will lead Incubi units into glorious melee combat. We can now solve the original problem the Realspace raid Detachment had in the 1st place; a lack of melee punch.
Like I said, I hope I'm proven wrong in a few months time. I'm looking forward to seeing people try out Skysplinter and report that actually 3-5 extra tokens is enough. I hope I've misunderstood something in the rules and people find a way around the lack of pain-tokens. And Either way, It really feels like the Archon-Incubi change alone should do enough to get us over the edge and into 50% win rate. Honestly with that change alone it feels like Drukhari are great now. Drukhari are back babyyyyyyy! 😁🥳🎉
thanks for the incredibly well thought out post! I agree entirely- in a lot of terrain contexts I think Realspace Raid remains very strong, and quite possibly better (UKTC, I'm looking at you!) What I like about the slate is that it has given us two meaningfully different ways to play the army, which makes the wait for a book a hell of a lot easier :D Tom