"Failbadon the Harmless" (lore version) or from older tabletop days, "Meltadon the Armless" (old resin model used to "bend over" when getting a bid warm and both metal and resin models had so massive arms, they were falling off half the time)
Cant let Abaddon like this...such an iconic character people should and would love to run.. make him niche or what ever but at least usefull - he deserves it !
This is what surprises me. He's a lore heavy weight. Is GW ok with him being a literal joke? They seem to have some say in the game's direction ie. Blood Angels release seems coordinated.
I mean to be fair hes been a joke in tabletop for well over a decade at least. They used to call him fail-bbadon when i first got into 40k lol @MidnightHozz
Not a Certus apologist but he does have infiltrate over Sarq. Other than that though...how did Sarq make it into the game without Certus first getting buffed? Stuff like this makes me think they don't really play the game over there.
But they keep talking about how they do, anonymously, in "normal guilds" (that's what they called em 😂) and how they "EVEN pay for their own stuff with their own money...Except a handful that gets BPs for free" - no joke, this was in the latest Explainer 😂 Can't they see when a character makes no sense and has like 3 valid substitutes that do the same thing but better? Okay, maybe not. But they got the ambassadors, right? No? I wonder why do they need so many Ambassadors then. Don't they speak to the team about absolutely useless characters? Or they just won't pay attention to them? Why have an ambassador program then?!? 😂 Parenthesis: they also say that being an ambassador has absolutely zero rewards, aside from that profile frame you get. Mah, i think that testing and knowing about future drops months before other players so you can prepare weeks and weeks ahead is pretty much a huge reward on its own.
@@doomgoon8933I'm guessing it's to do with time and resources. It's not as easy as to just change some numbers in the code. Those numbers have to be tested so that it doesn't break other parts of the game.
Certus could have his damage type changed to heavy round instead of bolter. Move 3 would also be nice and maybe make his active range 4 so it feels like an actual sniper shot.
@@fredbrochu8322 Yeah, I get the strong impression since he was a launch character they tried to be conservative with him, but the meta has long since blown past him.
Yeah, I agreed with these five characters having issues. As you mentioned in the video, many of the issues seem to come from earlier game characters, perhaps needing reworking. It does seem that the theme is that older characters offer bonuses to other characters within their own faction, which is a nice touch, but they need to have wider use to compete with other characters. I would like to see a faction specific bonus brought in to encourage and reward players for using themed groups of characters (i.e., same army or even a weaker bonus for all Imperial/ Chaos or Xenos teams). This would mean removing the "limiting wording" to buffs for characters' abilities, but as you stated in the video, increasing the effect for use within their own faction. Maybe this could be applied like a "team active and passive" including the MOW too. Apologies for the long-winded comment. Great vid Nandi.👍
he is probably stronger than most of the primarchs, imo. Because of the support of all 4 chaos gods. I think its similar to Horus - with same 4 chaos gods support he was probably almost equal in strength to the Emperor
It's widely believed that Abaddon has essentially become horus again through soul resurrection, so he arguably IS a primarch if you buy into that. The lore definitely tries to portray him as on horus level
Njal needs the same passive that Vindicta has. His range attacks have a big chance to cover adjacent hexes in ice. Should give extra movement to fellow space wolves
I'd love to see Njal have deep strike, and also have an ice aura passive that covers all hexes surrounding him in ice, growing in a similar way to Nurgle's contagion aura. He is supposed to be the Lord of tempests after all 😅
I feel like it needs to be said that he'd need entirely reworked for that. It would have to replace his passive, since adding to it would create a perfect synergy giving him an ENORMOUS damage buff. It would also make his ice-making active pretty redundant. I like the idea, but I really don't think Snowprint would be willing to entirely redesign a character like that, especially not one so recent.
@vegladex I posted my own comment elsewhere but I don't think people understand how much damage Njal can put out in melee when Ragnar kills a character and Njal get surrounded by ice. I've personally seen mine whack over 7k psychic damage.
Thutmose is close to compulsory in the Necron campaign. On any five character mission your choices are either Thutmose or play with only four characters. The same would apply to any of the Orks or Aeldari, as you don't have any other options to bring in. Any non-compulsory Chaos or Imperials can be ignored without any impact on the campaign, but not the Xenos.
I would give Certus movement 3 and the camoflage trait, so he is more likely to trigger his passive as it is. I think his passive is good and defensive buffs somewhat rare, it just needs to come into play more often.
I think they should rework that passive into perhaps something more offensive based It doesn't fit for a sniper with high dps to have a defensive buff, and not only that, but a defensive buff thats so damn niche it does nothing If certus is on the frontline taking dmg, I think something has gone very wrong xd
Not to mention getting Shards for DA BOYZ, except Tanksmasha, is so damn easy. I swear, if I get again from using 10 Requistion Scrolls as guaranteed character shards for Snappawrecka I am gonna lose it.
I mean, Thutmose isn’t a core campaign character, but he is one of the only five characters you can use for Necron missions, so he is essential in that regard
Terminator armor should be a separate (small chance) on a high dmg block, like some characters have. Think beast slayer is 10% extrablock chance. Unfortunately the block chain is extremely miserable mechanics, having nothing to do with game mechanics of 40k.
Definitely agree with all of these, although I have had reasonable success with Njal. But he definitely lags behind other terminators or even Sybill Devine. I'd say Darkstrider is a contender for that #5 spot - he feels VERY difficult to use effectively and pretty much the only time I use him is if he's the best choice to replace a fallen character in Onslaught (if Darkstrider had Overwatch it would go a long way to making him more useful).
Darkstrider is under used but I believe that is more so because ranged comps have fallen out of favor atm. His passive is huge for ranged dps raid wise. In a specific theory composition you could have Rev As hitting 18 times a turn with calgar, eldy, actus, and Darkstrider buffing his damage by around +3000 damage a hit. The problem is more so currently that ad mech is superior to all comps except for Rag in Ghaz fights, and neuro comps in avatar and morty but I think Ad mech can do comparable damage to morty.
Now this is the kind of content you love to see - respectful, informative, and it caters to the fans who want to see their pet units made useful. For Certus I would change his passive to apply if he's at a higher elevation, since that's much more readily available on most maps. It would also need to be buffed, since it's such a sad number. Abaddon is a dumpster fire, for sure. His passive needs to be completely redone, since it's a total mess as it stands. I'd love to see them take inspiration from Aun'shi and have a rotating buff between Deathguard, Thousand Sons, World Eaters, and eventually Emperor's Children. Giving him each of the unique faction traits (contagion, weaver of fate, blessings of khorne, etc...) would also be a flavour slam dunk that doesn't change his overall power level very much -That Maladus Guy
terminator armor in general needs a buff, like idk make it unstoppable by default and make it lessen damage on each hit not just first which is honestly useless in 90% of scenarios
yeah its pretty stupid imo that guys in terminator armor are being encumbered by razor wire or fire lol giving them unstoppable built into terminator trait would be nice
Don't you know that in lore, terminator armor only works for the first hit? /S Seriously, the fact that terminators feel weak compared to gravis really grinds my gears.
@@Deris87 Is that seriously how it works? I assumed it was the first attack regardless of amount of hits. So Maugan Ra's first hit would be reduced but the other five would go through at regular damage?
I had found a use for Pestillian - LREs with a one hit max requirement and swarms - but then Tan Gi'da came along and completely eclipsed that issue by meeting the requirement spawning in multi-but summons. It's a shame, because Pestillian looks great art-wise and, as you said, with some tweaks could become amazing for certain situations.
It would be nice if they did some balance changes for heroes more often... There is some heroes that are just plain far worse and others that are leagues above
a dishonorable mention not shown in the video in my opinion is thaumachus both his active and passive are cool concepts but weak in execution Arcane shield: being simply a shield randomly given to an allied unit ina 2 hexes range make it honestly weak. make it so that the shielded unit receive a dmg buff, a big one at that, being on a single random unit possession attempt: you either target an enemy summoner or the biggest hitter and that's it. honestly weak and unwordly bad. let it also target allies (so he get more synergy with other character) also, if used on allies they gain the arcane shield
I disagree. I feel he is fine in niche cases and there is space for niche heroes. Hes great in guild war against summon hemlavy squads. Ive also hit into the 100-300s in TA using him with Wrask and ahri and other chaos for a surprisingly resillient heavy hitting team. He needs certain conditions but waaay less so that the heroes on this list and I think hes alright
Space Wolves never teleport, it's a point of lore. They don't trust the warp and psychic powers. ...What's that you say? No no no, Njal is a Runepriest! That's totally different from the nasty dirty warp!
@@maxiumite Yeah, I'd forgotten about that. It's lore-inaccurate, but if they've already done it for Arjac there's no reason they couldn't do it for Njal.
It made me very sad when I got Pestillan as one of my first ever characters, but I suppose it balanced out my amazing luck in getting Sho'syl about that time as well.
gotta be honnest i like thutmose being a glass cannon with short range. sure, he needs a buff but i have nothing against a character, that is hard to play because he is fragile but can be very rewarding because he is a cannon. however i 100% agree with the rest of the video :) i was sooo happy when i got sarqael so i could replace certus with him as my number one sniper
Definitely agree. I also think Aethana could use a health or armor boost, as well as her passive and active receiving a boost. Her active basically spreads her current melee damage over 3 targets instead of one target receiving all three hits, which kind of neuters the damage potential. Her passive increase to crit is great, but the added bonus damage feels middling compared to other characters passive damage buffs.
Excellent analysis as always Nandi, with consideration to the developers and their limited resources. I also cannot fault your logic and liked the suggested improvements to characters, especially Certus (AP damage and move from 2 to 3). Other food for thought are the gaps across the factions. For example, Xenos have no healers. Makes the Incursion events dicey.
I wonder if having Abaddon's passive be a reverse of Calgar's would work - enemies in an area around him take extra damage, which increases if they're imperial?
Very detailed, very deep video as always and you are right in many many points and in most of the cases, but as a Necron main player: Thutmose + Exitor Rho is a power house. If you position Exitor next to 3 enemies, then bring in Thutmose -> BANG the passive ability strikes, and BANG Exitor doubles on it... then you use Thutmose's active, which strikes the 3 enemy that surrounds Exitor (with 100% pierce) and then again -> BANG BANG BANG + BANG BANG BANG 3+3 hits from the two guys. So with 2 characters in one round you just made 9 attacks (because Exitor still have 1 regular attack left -> BANG! 😄 ). ( I started playing in the earliest of days, that's why I maxed out my Necrons first 😅 I know they are far from META, but was fun circa 2 years ago. If I started playing today, I would chose a different path off course. But it's still fun and I have to came up with new tactics like one of the above mentioned ☺ )
Still I give you that: He is (sadly) useless in most cases, and min-max meta teams, PVP or basically everywhere else 😄 But I love my ancient, soulless, sleepy-sleepy metal space-skeletons ☺❤😄
Great video. Fair points made against all these characters. Great suggestions for improvement. Hopefully it can change soon. I think I’ve pulled pestillian 3 times in a year, abbadon twice (and no other leg. characters from req drops) pulled thutmose 3 times too. ATM these characters just seem like a waste of time/space.
I knew Abaddon would be on this list, I was investing in him before, so that when he does eventually get his buff/rework, he would be ready to go, besides I need more powerful chaos units anyways. Also, I'm quite sad I can't play Tacticus currently, since my iPhone suddenly stopped working, and I didn't make a Snowprint account before it stopped working completely, so I'm missing out on the Blood Angels' event, and my guild definitely kicked me out, but as soon as I get my phone repaired, I'll be back in the fray. As always thanks for the informative video, Nandi!
This month will mark my first complete year of tacticus as far as I can remember, I pulled Abaddon three times, twice a row. It has been my only legendary before I got Ragnar from the latest event (after which I got him from a 10 pull again lol), the only reason I have invested something into Abaddon is due to the value spread he has in LRE in most events, which is pretty nice but would've loved it if he was actually good in other modes too. The heal instead of set to X hp would be a really good change!
Abbadon was in my initial 10-pull when I started the game, and he has carried me to where I am now. His ability to 1-shot almost anyone in Arena shouldn't be underestimated, I don't regret investing in him.
As usual your content is amazing and 4 out of the 5 I couldn’t agree more. However pestilian has found a niche in recent LRE events and although desperately needs a buff I feel there’s likely worse toons in the round due to that niche
I've found a niche spot for Pestillan since I obtained it early as a new player. His passive is good to support Archimatos to one shot targets with his range attacks to creat demons, also helping out to clear swarms in onslaught.
I agree with basically everything but the argument of abbadon's active, specificall, the fact that it dosen't come up since he die to quickly i actually found that he is almost always immediatly low health enought so that you can use the active without loosing to much healing especially with the resilient trait but everything else seem very well thought out and explained even better nice video
Abaddon makes me sad, pulled him and volk early and had a lot of fun with a full black legion squad, but i could see he started feeling squishy as i leveled up. I like his active, but it doesn't ever reach its potential. It might be fun to keep its "double edged" nature by leaving the set HP part and giving it bonus damage if it causes his hp to be lowered. Then, provided he gets some defensive buffs, the healing side of it would also be more useful, and players would have an interesting choice: use it early as a massive nuke but also take damage, or save it for a heal in later rounds. Good video, thanks for the analysis
I agree with all your points. I started to invest in all of them but moved away as soon as I realised they were getting hammered for lots of investment
Great video! Would have loved for the list to be 10 instead of 5 cause it feels like so many characters are in need of a rework to make them competitive. Some of these are creed, thaumachus, darkstrider and maybe deathleaper?
1. NJal - Njals passive also allows basic attacks to all allys adjacent to Njal add ice to the field this could also be on crit effect which pairs well with ragnar. This is even better for psychers or multi hit characters. Gives a big bonus to adding multi hit units as well as characters who have reactionary abilities. Another idea ice lasts one more round when njal is around. 2. Thutmose- Just give him one more range. Make him a harder character to get to. All around Thutmose sucks. Give him some love. I liked your ideas though. LEaning into the glass cannon idea is a good idea. I would charge him in get his ability off and let him die if he was more powerful. 3. Certus- Camo cloak should automattically treat him as if he is in a bush. If he is in a bush he can have more bonus' (however there are maps that have 0 bushes so he is useless there. His active ability is also meh. It does damage and pushes them back. Can be great but super situational. If it pushed back and did damage if they hit a wall or an ally then it may be more useful. 4. Pestilian- is just awkward I agree. I think his passive should be to all units within his range of effect and also any character that is not chaos as well. His active should just add the direct damage on top of his passive. Explosion damage is so weak too. 5. I don't have abaddon so I have no care.
Abaddon is the only legendary I've ever gotten through requisitions. Figures I'd roll the worst unit in the game when it finally happens. Actually, he has some use in LREs and paired with Rotbone he's a bit less squishy, but I would love to see him buffed.
Appreciate ur content, Nandi! However, for thutmose, you ask to make him a ''glascannon'' and then also suggest increasing his defensive stats. That's not how glasscannons works, typically. Just wanted to point that out 😆
Abaddon was my first legendary and I used the hell out of him until I saw how outclassed he was. Based on my experience, you were on point with all of your recommendations, but I believe based on lore and a current state of the game there are two other salient options: an armor sundering ability to complement the lore of drachnyen and abaddon (in the lore drachnyen has cut through the fabric of reality and Adamantium walls. It stands to reason he should be able to cripple our tanks, perhaps a sweeping strike direct damage active paired with an armor sunder, or maybe a passive where he boosts chaos *faction traits* by a certain percentage. Either way whatever snowprint does, Abaddon should be the cornerstone of any chaos team. That’s what his entire lore is based around.
Pestillian was one of my earliest characters, and I've been trying to find a consistent use for him all that time. He can be useful, but very specifically, and usually only when you've got no other decent option (some legendary events when he's needed to complete the team). The one advantage over Helbrecht is that I do not have Helbrecht, and I am nowhere near to getting him! Also considering that I have to choose between grinding to get Helbrecht or Calgar. I'm currently going for Calgar (I have Abaddon, but only because there were other routes to getting his shards) so it'll be a while before I get Helbrecht (not withstanding being lucky on the requisition pulls).
Certus is one of my key players in TA with the territories mode. I hunker him next to thad for his buff. I make sure his overwatch covers the territory with sarquael/calandis. I then use his active to knock people off territories.
I believe you ranked Abbaddon #1st more because the frustration of being a “meh” character than the super char it would be by lore. I would rank Darkstrider Sha’s el T’au Myamoto in the 1st pos instead.
I think Deathleaper needs a change as well. Deepstriking death just kills it, and he's very Squishy. Cassius Creed is also weird and feels like he just has Yarrik's active but worse.
The only reason Pestillian is at all worth investing in is if you play a legendary event vs. Necrons with the 1 hit restriction so you can deal with the scarab swarm a lot more easily.
No disagreement at all. One things I’d LOVE to see is Snowprint add Codex of War to the Guild War shop like the Guild Shop. Easy addition that will help players get to level up more of their characters for a more diverse roster.
I agree with most of this, I use Abaddon for onslaught. I also wanted to mention Asmodai… like in theory he could be cool but examplar of hate is too specific. Would be cool if it worked on any character.
I was thinking about Pestillian the other day, thought it would be neat if instead of giving nearby allies extra damage, he could make nearby enemies take more damage. for instance, Enemies within Contagion range could take 1x Blast hit from ranged attacks, and when he triggers his active, enemies within contagion range take 1x Direct hit from melee attacks. Then his role would become clear as a midfield bruiser who makes the enemy team more vulnerable, playing into the existing Contagions debuff
One thing I would give Pestilan is a range 2 blast damage type. Makes him a bit more helpful in a turtle formation (a key DG) tactic and give him a way of damaging winged prime himself.
I know Pestillian isn't great but i like him. I like his passive. It doesn't boost the attack but adds another, which can be very useful. He was often my way to use high penetration units with few attacks against swarm units. So you add him to a team of snipers and psykers and you can damage high arnour enemies and still kill swarm units.
In the first couple weeks I played I got very lucky with req drops and got 2 legendaries, abaddon and typhus. I loved both of them, but while typhus carried me and didn’t fall off until I got g1 characters, abaddon became obsolete by the time I was getting my first characters to silver. He is a very overhated and underestimated character in the fan base, but he’s a very interesting and competent villain in the lore, I really hope snowprint gives him the respect he deserves and lets him stand out in the game alongside Ahriman and Kharn (maybe give typhus a little love bump too)
Njal is amazing in a group of psychers, his ability hits 7 enemies at once and keeps melee attackers at bay by reducing their movement. Pairing him with Toth and abraxas is incredible, you drop a pink horror, hit a group with ice nova then hit em again with Toth. You can wipe out 6 or 7 enemies and make 6-12 summons in a single turn
Using Thutmose extensively to farm the coin dropping Grot in Salvage Run, keeping his abilities intentionaly low. He could pick up quite a lot of boons at the end with his active.
I totally agree, specially in regards to Abaddon! It is kind of sad how he is presented in the game, compared to other characters. Would also include in this top five Asmodai, Tjark, Thaumacus, Varro and Imospekh. What would, hmm, well, make it a top ten. But don't rework Imospekh FFS. Just buff his stats.
Snotflogga is my favorite character, good damage (as long as there isn't a lot of armor, hits alot, summons a very strong grot every turn, and active summons up to 6
What really sucks is spending Months on a character that becomes obsolete as you get closer to "maxed out". Certus does indeed get outclassed by other snipers. His passive is worthless. Sarq is the Sniper King! (Unless you count the space elves 🙄)...Ra' is badass, but he can be one shotted by A lot of units All 5 on the list definitely need help. I'd throw Incisus on there as well. Between him and Certus, the UltraVanilla Marines need some help.
I agree 100 percent because I'm a collector I have Abaddon but he's currently sitting at stone one and that says it all not very good for the warmaster of chaos
I don’t know if this makes a lot of this group better or worse, but many of them are quite useful to have invested in for release events (Abaddon, Certus, Pestillian). This may be BECAUSE their traits are so limited, but they are versatile enough to play in many of the limited runs for points.
I think a lot of the early design expected battles to have more rounds in PvP. Basically any ability that takes time to snowball or ramp up is useless because the battle is almost always decided by round 2. But, with the addition of guild wars the defenders suddenly have a whole different purpose. Their survivability is insane and any ability that takes time to snowball becomes 3 times more valuable. Healers, necrons, terminator armour, passive summons and death guard in general all gain value. Some of these characters could find their niche if they were re-work for the purpose of guild wars defence. Their AI would need improved but character like Njarl who mess up movement prevents the attacker being able to focus down units. Give him a passive that heals allied characters on or adjacent ice in range 2 after he makes an attack and he will hold the line like the epic hero he should be. Deep strike sucks on guild wars defence, a support character with 2 movement is great because it means the AI can't rush them forward and get them killed before their abilities get a chance to pay off.
Pestillian is a beast in the tournament arena. After long try and error, I use him in my Death Guard team and this team is amazingly good. They are: Pestillian, Maladus, Rotbone, Corrodius and (an obviously corrupted) Noble. I managed to have a 400+ rating there. You can replace Noble with another range-dmg-dealer, but I use him mostly to negate any kind of overwatch or to kill or damage possibly dangerous enemies in the first round. So until now I did not find a better glass bomb to replace him. Probably Maugan, Calandis or Toth, but I did not try that. Back to Pestillian. He kills enemies when he needs to, he buffs the death guard when they need it. He's unbelievably good, he's durable and does a hell lot of a (close range) damage AND on top he is buffing Noble. Hints: I only play on the lowest rarity rank and the team is very slow. So you won't get all (or sometimes any) buffs from the battlefield. But it doesn't care, they are going to stomp everything into the ground, buffed or not. Even Kharn-Ragnar-Aunchie combos. And yes, I beated a lot of them.
Agree with the 5. If we were to expand the list I would add: Thaumacus - Utterly bizarre passive and almost useless active Volk - Poor movement. Active scales down with more enemies. Dies to a sneeze Incisus - Effective early game but becomes irrelevant once you get Isabella.
Maybe another hit increase for Calgar from 2 to 4. Or a life steal of 2% for all Black Legion. But what is much more important, when will a healer (not repairer) for xenos come. It would also be good to have a healer with a ranged attack for the legendary path trail. It would also be good if Wrask used his axe in close combat and the flamethrower had the same effect as the Black Templar NPC's as range attack. Maybe when his Aktiv ist the flamer like the plasmagun of Baraqiel.
I would love if abaddon got reworked to make it feel like he’s *the* big bad commander of the black legion. Maybe something like calling down droppods of legionaries/havocs. Or calling down an orbital strike using the vengeful spirit. Would be thematically nicer than him being a guy who hits you with a sword/makes others hit you slightly harder
Typhus and Pestillian are there-there to be honest. Yeah Typhus and his active might help you mid game during FoC campaign but that's literally that. His passive is fluffy, but useless. His melee is horrible, why would one want to have him adjacent to enemies? Give us a reason for it, or a better passive, please. Pestillian and his explosive death (given the fact he's a DG health points monster, therefore him inflicting 25% of those to everyone around him is a lot) could be fluffy and cool too... If he didn't buff all chaos with his active and everyone ranged with his passive that is adjacent to him, making him literally a self-sabotage bomb with legs. Only his DG friends would be left unscathed. The only character with direct damage per se, he deserves better. So does Typhus, that as of now doesn't feel like a legendary AT ALL. Remember that Maladus starts as an Uncommon character, and Pestillian as Rare. 🙄 But... Since you left out Orks because they're being rewORKed... Why did you talk about Pestillian, mister Nandi? Isn't the Death Guard getting reworked too? That is what they said when they came out with Corrodius' BP and buffed him a little bit.
Terminator trait should give Unstoppable and Deep Strike by default but give + 2%/4%/6%/8%/10% ( respectively at common/uncommon/rare/epic/legendary) Crit and Block chance if they haven't moved. Certus should get movement 3 and camouflage (that way multi-hit ranged attacks have reduced hits by default so no need to touch the passive). Maybe give Mortis Round the Suppression trait and make Stun instead if it can't be pushed. Pestilian should add Blast damage to ranged attacks and Toxic damage to Melee attacks within his Contagion Aura.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on Haarken. Everyone trashes on him, but I think he’s incredibly versatile, and he’s got a permanent spot on my melee team…
He is my #1, moves really well, increases dmg as the fight goes on, his base attack can hit an additional enemy and he can reduce armor for a tough enemy
I have an idea for Abaddon’s passive: Add “Let the galaxy burns trait to all chaos characters, if they don’t have one. +1 hit when the trait is triggered”
Something i was thinking for Abaddon was, what if his passive allowed him too inherit other Chaos factions traits? So team him up with a World Eater and Deathguard would give him both "Blessings of Khorne" and "Contagions of Nurgle" traits. Making his damage buff a 2 hex aoe instead of adjacent and possibly giving other Chaos units the "Let The Galaxy Burn" trait could be nice too
for certus -rework his passive to make his overwatch not only a guranteed crit and last for 5 shots but also every end of turn when certus didnt deal dmg he automatically gain invisibility -rework his ability to penetrate the enemy behind it and it guranteed a crit -increase hp and armor For pestillan -passive now effects all chaos units with a range of 3 hexes -defeated enemies while in the range of his passive is instantly convert to a pox walker -active can be used repeatedly with a 1 turn cooldown
Abbadon has been on my core team since I first got him, around a week into playing Tacticus. I've had no complaints so far, but the better my other characters get, the more his glaring weaknesses become apparent. He's a Legendary character who's passive is far, far weaker than Eldryon'S (a rare character). Double his passive and have it work like Calgar's, and honestly I'd be more than happy. His damage penalty is fine due to his damage output, just something to be aware of and use accordingly.
Certus really needs more fire Power, upgrading his normal attack to Heavy is sure good, also you can Upgrade his active to pierce or even direkt Hit to fulfill his sniper role.
I like the ideas around certus, give him some sort of +1 movement if he his overwatch has not triggered. I like the idea of giving him a getting pierce if he has not moved. I would like it to be part of passive skill this would allow him to be used for LRE and give new players another 1 hit character with added dmg. Alternatively give his active pierce dmg and a cooldown. I love the idea of cooldowns or triggers that give back the active skill. Even his a reset so if he kills during overwatch it resets his active.. He is a nice character I think he deserves a good rework that brings him online with more Imperial characters. his passive could give a range buff for other overwatch characters or heavy weapon dmg bonus for spotting skill. Example if Certus attacks in overwatch all other overwatch characters gain one attach in overwatch. Lol that would be something fun! I'm kidding but thier is some room to make it fun.
I mostly agree, but I think njal is a bit more on the verge of “bad for lack of potential“ instead of having outright detrimental stats. In fact just a few days ago I thought how he isn't badly designed at all, I quite like him, but he absolutely needs his passive buff to be just good enough to use, so imo he needs a buff in stats and an adjustment to his passive for balance. Maybe the passive could cause ice in 1Hex range to not go away over time.
Invested in Abby cause I love him as a chaos guy got him nearly d3 and white star yet actively have to pass him up for better playing characters even if they are lower level
A-BAD-‘UN
Fail-bba-don more likely 😂
what a shammee he is on top of that list
A bad joke - but I'll allow it since Abaddon is a joke too
XD great joke
"Failbadon the Harmless" (lore version) or from older tabletop days, "Meltadon the Armless" (old resin model used to "bend over" when getting a bid warm and both metal and resin models had so massive arms, they were falling off half the time)
Cant let Abaddon like this...such an iconic character people should and would love to run.. make him niche or what ever but at least usefull - he deserves it !
This is what surprises me. He's a lore heavy weight. Is GW ok with him being a literal joke? They seem to have some say in the game's direction ie. Blood Angels release seems coordinated.
The armless failure deserves what he gets. No amount of retconning and new models in a post-8th world can fix him.
I mean he's a punching bag of the astartes and choas
I mean to be fair hes been a joke in tabletop for well over a decade at least. They used to call him fail-bbadon when i first got into 40k lol @MidnightHozz
He is failbaddon the armless for a reason.
I love the “feeble five” concept. Funny but also very useful. Great video as always Nandi!
Certus gets outclassed by Sarquael in every single metric
Agreed
@@enderknight39 so true!
Not a Certus apologist but he does have infiltrate over Sarq. Other than that though...how did Sarq make it into the game without Certus first getting buffed? Stuff like this makes me think they don't really play the game over there.
But they keep talking about how they do, anonymously, in "normal guilds" (that's what they called em 😂) and how they "EVEN pay for their own stuff with their own money...Except a handful that gets BPs for free" - no joke, this was in the latest Explainer 😂
Can't they see when a character makes no sense and has like 3 valid substitutes that do the same thing but better?
Okay, maybe not. But they got the ambassadors, right? No?
I wonder why do they need so many Ambassadors then.
Don't they speak to the team about absolutely useless characters?
Or they just won't pay attention to them?
Why have an ambassador program then?!? 😂
Parenthesis: they also say that being an ambassador has absolutely zero rewards, aside from that profile frame you get.
Mah, i think that testing and knowing about future drops months before other players so you can prepare weeks and weeks ahead is pretty much a huge reward on its own.
@@doomgoon8933I'm guessing it's to do with time and resources. It's not as easy as to just change some numbers in the code. Those numbers have to be tested so that it doesn't break other parts of the game.
Certus could have his damage type changed to heavy round instead of bolter. Move 3 would also be nice and maybe make his active range 4 so it feels like an actual sniper shot.
@@fredbrochu8322 Yeah, I get the strong impression since he was a launch character they tried to be conservative with him, but the meta has long since blown past him.
Hmm 2 move+range4+ one hex pushback
Might be too much xd
I like the idea though, its not like hes used that much
I think it’s stupid so many space wolves rely on ice but are affected negatively by it as well.
THIS! Couldn't believe everytime Wulf uses his ability he nukes himself also - so dumb, they should be immune to negative ice effects.
Yes I hate that it hurts your team to use an active skill. Makes me not want to use it a lot of the time!
Spacewolves are a lame faction anyway. Their entire lore is trying to one-up every other faction, and adding wolves to it.
@@n0isyturtlethat's literally every space marine chapter lore, minus the wolves
same goes for wrask with fire... some tweaks should be made
For Certus i would add the extremely high requirements to upgrade, but to be fair thats an issue for all Ultramarines
You'd think that the early campaign characters would be easier to farm, not harder.
And it eats up time for newer players trying to work through indomitus elite campaign nodes.
He's actually the longest grind of any character
true, I think simply increasing his att.dmg. and his hit points and the dmg of his active might do it and then he will be fine
Yeah, I agreed with these five characters having issues. As you mentioned in the video, many of the issues seem to come from earlier game characters, perhaps needing reworking.
It does seem that the theme is that older characters offer bonuses to other characters within their own faction, which is a nice touch, but they need to have wider use to compete with other characters.
I would like to see a faction specific bonus brought in to encourage and reward players for using themed groups of characters (i.e., same army or even a weaker bonus for all Imperial/ Chaos or Xenos teams). This would mean removing the "limiting wording" to buffs for characters' abilities, but as you stated in the video, increasing the effect for use within their own faction. Maybe this could be applied like a "team active and passive" including the MOW too.
Apologies for the long-winded comment.
Great vid Nandi.👍
SP- if you read this, Abaddon is nearly Primarch tier and really does deserve to be on the level, if not higher than Calgar.
he is probably stronger than most of the primarchs, imo. Because of the support of all 4 chaos gods. I think its similar to Horus - with same 4 chaos gods support he was probably almost equal in strength to the Emperor
@sergs3348 yeah no, horus was a primarch, abanddon isn't. At most, he'd be at the weakest primarch level
Nah he’s known as Failbadon the harmless until very recently.
It's widely believed that Abaddon has essentially become horus again through soul resurrection, so he arguably IS a primarch if you buy into that. The lore definitely tries to portray him as on horus level
Yup hes just a chaos terminator captain
I would love to see some more campaigns for the factions that have not got one yet, Tau, Space Wolves, Dark Angels ect.
I was actually kinda surprised they didn't roll out the Blood Angels as a them vs Nids campaign
It might happen eventualy, but if so the rosters needs to be complete first, id guess. Nids still miss the legendary to this day.
Nids vs Blood angels would make sense
Then maybe Dark Angels vs Night lords
Space Wolves vs the Death Guard.
Njal needs the same passive that Vindicta has. His range attacks have a big chance to cover adjacent hexes in ice.
Should give extra movement to fellow space wolves
I'd love to see Njal have deep strike, and also have an ice aura passive that covers all hexes surrounding him in ice, growing in a similar way to Nurgle's contagion aura. He is supposed to be the Lord of tempests after all 😅
I feel like it needs to be said that he'd need entirely reworked for that. It would have to replace his passive, since adding to it would create a perfect synergy giving him an ENORMOUS damage buff. It would also make his ice-making active pretty redundant.
I like the idea, but I really don't think Snowprint would be willing to entirely redesign a character like that, especially not one so recent.
@vegladex I posted my own comment elsewhere but I don't think people understand how much damage Njal can put out in melee when Ragnar kills a character and Njal get surrounded by ice. I've personally seen mine whack over 7k psychic damage.
Thutmose is close to compulsory in the Necron campaign. On any five character mission your choices are either Thutmose or play with only four characters. The same would apply to any of the Orks or Aeldari, as you don't have any other options to bring in. Any non-compulsory Chaos or Imperials can be ignored without any impact on the campaign, but not the Xenos.
yeah but he's so squishy sometimes he's more of a hindrance. Sometimes you're better off bringing just 4 so Thut doesn't just get 1 shot
yeah it's better to invest on Aleph-Null and Anuphet instead and lose Thutmose altogether
I would give Certus movement 3 and the camoflage trait, so he is more likely to trigger his passive as it is. I think his passive is good and defensive buffs somewhat rare, it just needs to come into play more often.
I think they should rework that passive into perhaps something more offensive based
It doesn't fit for a sniper with high dps to have a defensive buff, and not only that, but a defensive buff thats so damn niche it does nothing
If certus is on the frontline taking dmg, I think something has gone very wrong xd
If we add the boyz then Boss Gulgortz would be at the top, the guy is a glass peashooter
Honestly, everyone except Snot is pretty useless
Gibbascraps is good in a mechanical team like with necrons
Not to mention getting Shards for DA BOYZ, except Tanksmasha, is so damn easy. I swear, if I get again from using 10 Requistion Scrolls as guaranteed character shards for Snappawrecka I am gonna lose it.
@@BaranZenon you'll love them once you get to the Rogue trader. Those 80 Snappa shards are worth about 72,000 xp with some change to spare.
I’ve been playin for roughly 3 months and have managed to pull two legendaries. Both times it was Abaddon. #FeelsBad
Ouch man
You have my sympathies. I've been playing for a while now but have still only got one legendary pull. I was fortunate that it was Creed.
I mean, Thutmose isn’t a core campaign character, but he is one of the only five characters you can use for Necron missions, so he is essential in that regard
The Terminator trait needs a rework. It sucks, especially combined with the movement penalty it has.
Terminator armor should be a separate (small chance) on a high dmg block, like some characters have. Think beast slayer is 10% extrablock chance. Unfortunately the block chain is extremely miserable mechanics, having nothing to do with game mechanics of 40k.
Definitely agree with all of these, although I have had reasonable success with Njal. But he definitely lags behind other terminators or even Sybill Devine. I'd say Darkstrider is a contender for that #5 spot - he feels VERY difficult to use effectively and pretty much the only time I use him is if he's the best choice to replace a fallen character in Onslaught (if Darkstrider had Overwatch it would go a long way to making him more useful).
Darkstrider is under used but I believe that is more so because ranged comps have fallen out of favor atm. His passive is huge for ranged dps raid wise. In a specific theory composition you could have Rev As hitting 18 times a turn with calgar, eldy, actus, and Darkstrider buffing his damage by around +3000 damage a hit. The problem is more so currently that ad mech is superior to all comps except for Rag in Ghaz fights, and neuro comps in avatar and morty but I think Ad mech can do comparable damage to morty.
Now this is the kind of content you love to see - respectful, informative, and it caters to the fans who want to see their pet units made useful.
For Certus I would change his passive to apply if he's at a higher elevation, since that's much more readily available on most maps. It would also need to be buffed, since it's such a sad number.
Abaddon is a dumpster fire, for sure. His passive needs to be completely redone, since it's a total mess as it stands. I'd love to see them take inspiration from Aun'shi and have a rotating buff between Deathguard, Thousand Sons, World Eaters, and eventually Emperor's Children. Giving him each of the unique faction traits (contagion, weaver of fate, blessings of khorne, etc...) would also be a flavour slam dunk that doesn't change his overall power level very much
-That Maladus Guy
terminator armor in general needs a buff, like idk make it unstoppable by default and make it lessen damage on each hit not just first which is honestly useless in 90% of scenarios
At the moment it’s really only useful for taking hits from over watching snipers so the rest of the team can move up
@@Whereisthearmynow And even that's iffy, because one of the most common OW characters is Maugan Ra, who has six hits.
yeah its pretty stupid imo that guys in terminator armor are being encumbered by razor wire or fire lol giving them unstoppable built into terminator trait would be nice
Don't you know that in lore, terminator armor only works for the first hit? /S
Seriously, the fact that terminators feel weak compared to gravis really grinds my gears.
@@Deris87 Is that seriously how it works? I assumed it was the first attack regardless of amount of hits.
So Maugan Ra's first hit would be reduced but the other five would go through at regular damage?
Fully agree with this list. The sad thing is that Abbadon has really good traits for LREs but is too weak to do much.
I had found a use for Pestillian - LREs with a one hit max requirement and swarms - but then Tan Gi'da came along and completely eclipsed that issue by meeting the requirement spawning in multi-but summons. It's a shame, because Pestillian looks great art-wise and, as you said, with some tweaks could become amazing for certain situations.
It would be nice if they did some balance changes for heroes more often... There is some heroes that are just plain far worse and others that are leagues above
a dishonorable mention not shown in the video in my opinion is thaumachus
both his active and passive are cool concepts but weak in execution
Arcane shield: being simply a shield randomly given to an allied unit ina 2 hexes range make it honestly weak. make it so that the shielded unit receive a dmg buff, a big one at that, being on a single random unit
possession attempt: you either target an enemy summoner or the biggest hitter and that's it. honestly weak and unwordly bad. let it also target allies (so he get more synergy with other character) also, if used on allies they gain the arcane shield
I disagree. I feel he is fine in niche cases and there is space for niche heroes. Hes great in guild war against summon hemlavy squads. Ive also hit into the 100-300s in TA using him with Wrask and ahri and other chaos for a surprisingly resillient heavy hitting team. He needs certain conditions but waaay less so that the heroes on this list and I think hes alright
Great video. A solid list of attention.
Couldn’t agree more about Njal. I was so excited when I got him. He needs deep strike to make him worth grinding up.
I ground him out of the rogue trader T_T
Space Wolves never teleport, it's a point of lore. They don't trust the warp and psychic powers. ...What's that you say? No no no, Njal is a Runepriest! That's totally different from the nasty dirty warp!
@@Deris87 Arjac already has deep strike lol
@@maxiumite Yeah, I'd forgotten about that. It's lore-inaccurate, but if they've already done it for Arjac there's no reason they couldn't do it for Njal.
Deep Strike is cool on paper but really it's not that great. The only time I use it is in campaign play.
It made me very sad when I got Pestillan as one of my first ever characters, but I suppose it balanced out my amazing luck in getting Sho'syl about that time as well.
Sho is my favourite at the moment
@@Nandi40k Mine too, always has been. I actually started playing the game because I saw Tau were being/had just been added.
gotta be honnest i like thutmose being a glass cannon with short range. sure, he needs a buff but i have nothing against a character, that is hard to play because he is fragile but can be very rewarding because he is a cannon.
however i 100% agree with the rest of the video :) i was sooo happy when i got sarqael so i could replace certus with him as my number one sniper
I really like this idea for a video. Great idea, presentation, with thoughts and ideas on how to improve characters.
Definitely agree. I also think Aethana could use a health or armor boost, as well as her passive and active receiving a boost. Her active basically spreads her current melee damage over 3 targets instead of one target receiving all three hits, which kind of neuters the damage potential. Her passive increase to crit is great, but the added bonus damage feels middling compared to other characters passive damage buffs.
Finally my #PrayForCertus is working!!!
amazing
Excellent analysis as always Nandi, with consideration to the developers and their limited resources. I also cannot fault your logic and liked the suggested improvements to characters, especially Certus (AP damage and move from 2 to 3). Other food for thought are the gaps across the factions. For example, Xenos have no healers. Makes the Incursion events dicey.
I wonder if having Abaddon's passive be a reverse of Calgar's would work - enemies in an area around him take extra damage, which increases if they're imperial?
Certus now is a character without the passive ability
Very detailed, very deep video as always and you are right in many many points and in most of the cases, but as a Necron main player: Thutmose + Exitor Rho is a power house. If you position Exitor next to 3 enemies, then bring in Thutmose -> BANG the passive ability strikes, and BANG Exitor doubles on it... then you use Thutmose's active, which strikes the 3 enemy that surrounds Exitor (with 100% pierce) and then again -> BANG BANG BANG + BANG BANG BANG 3+3 hits from the two guys. So with 2 characters in one round you just made 9 attacks (because Exitor still have 1 regular attack left -> BANG! 😄 ).
( I started playing in the earliest of days, that's why I maxed out my Necrons first 😅 I know they are far from META, but was fun circa 2 years ago. If I started playing today, I would chose a different path off course. But it's still fun and I have to came up with new tactics like one of the above mentioned ☺ )
Still I give you that: He is (sadly) useless in most cases, and min-max meta teams, PVP or basically everywhere else 😄 But I love my ancient, soulless, sleepy-sleepy metal space-skeletons ☺❤😄
Fully agree on these characters. They desperately need help.
Great video. Fair points made against all these characters. Great suggestions for improvement. Hopefully it can change soon. I think I’ve pulled pestillian 3 times in a year, abbadon twice (and no other leg. characters from req drops) pulled thutmose 3 times too. ATM these characters just seem like a waste of time/space.
I knew Abaddon would be on this list, I was investing in him before, so that when he does eventually get his buff/rework, he would be ready to go, besides I need more powerful chaos units anyways.
Also, I'm quite sad I can't play Tacticus currently, since my iPhone suddenly stopped working, and I didn't make a Snowprint account before it stopped working completely, so I'm missing out on the Blood Angels' event, and my guild definitely kicked me out, but as soon as I get my phone repaired, I'll be back in the fray.
As always thanks for the informative video, Nandi!
This month will mark my first complete year of tacticus as far as I can remember, I pulled Abaddon three times, twice a row. It has been my only legendary before I got Ragnar from the latest event (after which I got him from a 10 pull again lol), the only reason I have invested something into Abaddon is due to the value spread he has in LRE in most events, which is pretty nice but would've loved it if he was actually good in other modes too. The heal instead of set to X hp would be a really good change!
Abbadon was in my initial 10-pull when I started the game, and he has carried me to where I am now. His ability to 1-shot almost anyone in Arena shouldn't be underestimated, I don't regret investing in him.
Agree with all picks. Don’t have Abaddon, but I will now hold off on farming shards for him!
As usual your content is amazing and 4 out of the 5 I couldn’t agree more. However pestilian has found a niche in recent LRE events and although desperately needs a buff I feel there’s likely worse toons in the round due to that niche
Great video! I love the suggestions you made - and that you made them at all :)
Great list! I feel a few factions could use a touch up (similar to rewORK), and would definitely put Black Legion and Death Guard on that list.
I've found a niche spot for Pestillan since I obtained it early as a new player.
His passive is good to support Archimatos to one shot targets with his range attacks to creat demons, also helping out to clear swarms in onslaught.
I agree with basically everything but the argument of abbadon's active, specificall, the fact that it dosen't come up since he die to quickly i actually found that he is almost always immediatly low health enought so that you can use the active without loosing to much healing especially with the resilient trait but everything else seem very well thought out and explained even better nice video
Glad to see Njal on that list. Love the character and has good potential. Specially with Mephiston comming
Abaddon makes me sad, pulled him and volk early and had a lot of fun with a full black legion squad, but i could see he started feeling squishy as i leveled up.
I like his active, but it doesn't ever reach its potential. It might be fun to keep its "double edged" nature by leaving the set HP part and giving it bonus damage if it causes his hp to be lowered. Then, provided he gets some defensive buffs, the healing side of it would also be more useful, and players would have an interesting choice: use it early as a massive nuke but also take damage, or save it for a heal in later rounds.
Good video, thanks for the analysis
Good job nandi.. amazing video.❤
I agree with all your points. I started to invest in all of them but moved away as soon as I realised they were getting hammered for lots of investment
Great video! Would have loved for the list to be 10 instead of 5 cause it feels like so many characters are in need of a rework to make them competitive. Some of these are creed, thaumachus, darkstrider and maybe deathleaper?
Failbaddon continues his streak.
Nothing out of the ordinary hahahaha
1. NJal - Njals passive also allows basic attacks to all allys adjacent to Njal add ice to the field this could also be on crit effect which pairs well with ragnar. This is even better for psychers or multi hit characters. Gives a big bonus to adding multi hit units as well as characters who have reactionary abilities. Another idea ice lasts one more round when njal is around.
2. Thutmose- Just give him one more range. Make him a harder character to get to. All around Thutmose sucks. Give him some love. I liked your ideas though. LEaning into the glass cannon idea is a good idea. I would charge him in get his ability off and let him die if he was more powerful.
3. Certus- Camo cloak should automattically treat him as if he is in a bush. If he is in a bush he can have more bonus' (however there are maps that have 0 bushes so he is useless there. His active ability is also meh. It does damage and pushes them back. Can be great but super situational. If it pushed back and did damage if they hit a wall or an ally then it may be more useful.
4. Pestilian- is just awkward I agree. I think his passive should be to all units within his range of effect and also any character that is not chaos as well. His active should just add the direct damage on top of his passive. Explosion damage is so weak too.
5. I don't have abaddon so I have no care.
Abaddon is the only legendary I've ever gotten through requisitions. Figures I'd roll the worst unit in the game when it finally happens.
Actually, he has some use in LREs and paired with Rotbone he's a bit less squishy, but I would love to see him buffed.
Appreciate ur content, Nandi! However, for thutmose, you ask to make him a ''glascannon'' and then also suggest increasing his defensive stats. That's not how glasscannons works, typically. Just wanted to point that out 😆
Abaddon was my first legendary and I used the hell out of him until I saw how outclassed he was. Based on my experience, you were on point with all of your recommendations, but I believe based on lore and a current state of the game there are two other salient options: an armor sundering ability to complement the lore of drachnyen and abaddon (in the lore drachnyen has cut through the fabric of reality and Adamantium walls. It stands to reason he should be able to cripple our tanks, perhaps a sweeping strike direct damage active paired with an armor sunder, or maybe a passive where he boosts chaos *faction traits* by a certain percentage. Either way whatever snowprint does, Abaddon should be the cornerstone of any chaos team. That’s what his entire lore is based around.
Pestillian was one of my earliest characters, and I've been trying to find a consistent use for him all that time. He can be useful, but very specifically, and usually only when you've got no other decent option (some legendary events when he's needed to complete the team).
The one advantage over Helbrecht is that I do not have Helbrecht, and I am nowhere near to getting him! Also considering that I have to choose between grinding to get Helbrecht or Calgar. I'm currently going for Calgar (I have Abaddon, but only because there were other routes to getting his shards) so it'll be a while before I get Helbrecht (not withstanding being lucky on the requisition pulls).
Certus is one of my key players in TA with the territories mode. I hunker him next to thad for his buff. I make sure his overwatch covers the territory with sarquael/calandis. I then use his active to knock people off territories.
Way to stay positive!
I believe you ranked Abbaddon #1st more because the frustration of being a “meh” character than the super char it would be by lore. I would rank Darkstrider Sha’s el T’au Myamoto in the 1st pos instead.
I think Deathleaper needs a change as well. Deepstriking death just kills it, and he's very Squishy. Cassius Creed is also weird and feels like he just has Yarrik's active but worse.
The only reason Pestillian is at all worth investing in is if you play a legendary event vs. Necrons with the 1 hit restriction so you can deal with the scarab swarm a lot more easily.
No disagreement at all. One things I’d LOVE to see is Snowprint add Codex of War to the Guild War shop like the Guild Shop. Easy addition that will help players get to level up more of their characters for a more diverse roster.
I agree with most of this, I use Abaddon for onslaught. I also wanted to mention Asmodai… like in theory he could be cool but examplar of hate is too specific. Would be cool if it worked on any character.
I was thinking about Pestillian the other day, thought it would be neat if instead of giving nearby allies extra damage, he could make nearby enemies take more damage. for instance, Enemies within Contagion range could take 1x Blast hit from ranged attacks, and when he triggers his active, enemies within contagion range take 1x Direct hit from melee attacks. Then his role would become clear as a midfield bruiser who makes the enemy team more vulnerable, playing into the existing Contagions debuff
One thing I would give Pestilan is a range 2 blast damage type. Makes him a bit more helpful in a turtle formation (a key DG) tactic and give him a way of damaging winged prime himself.
I know Pestillian isn't great but i like him. I like his passive. It doesn't boost the attack but adds another, which can be very useful. He was often my way to use high penetration units with few attacks against swarm units. So you add him to a team of snipers and psykers and you can damage high arnour enemies and still kill swarm units.
couldnt agree more with the certus pick, been suggesting for ages to change him
In the first couple weeks I played I got very lucky with req drops and got 2 legendaries, abaddon and typhus. I loved both of them, but while typhus carried me and didn’t fall off until I got g1 characters, abaddon became obsolete by the time I was getting my first characters to silver. He is a very overhated and underestimated character in the fan base, but he’s a very interesting and competent villain in the lore, I really hope snowprint gives him the respect he deserves and lets him stand out in the game alongside Ahriman and Kharn (maybe give typhus a little love bump too)
Njal is amazing in a group of psychers, his ability hits 7 enemies at once and keeps melee attackers at bay by reducing their movement. Pairing him with Toth and abraxas is incredible, you drop a pink horror, hit a group with ice nova then hit em again with Toth. You can wipe out 6 or 7 enemies and make 6-12 summons in a single turn
Power creep is in every game where the producers of the game want in new money every month instead of having a vision from the start
Thutmose is great. He stands next to something, kills that, then blasts something at range, and is hard to kill because he’s a necron
Using Thutmose extensively to farm the coin dropping Grot in Salvage Run, keeping his abilities intentionaly low. He could pick up quite a lot of boons at the end with his active.
I totally agree, specially in regards to Abaddon! It is kind of sad how he is presented in the game, compared to other characters.
Would also include in this top five Asmodai, Tjark, Thaumacus, Varro and Imospekh. What would, hmm, well, make it a top ten.
But don't rework Imospekh FFS. Just buff his stats.
As someone who made my top 3 harken, tigerious and gulgorts early on, I was so relieved I didn't invest in this 5 at least....lol
Me having Abbadon at g1 because he was my first legendary
Hopefully Snowprint rework him!
Snotflogga is my favorite character, good damage (as long as there isn't a lot of armor, hits alot, summons a very strong grot every turn, and active summons up to 6
What really sucks is spending Months on a character that becomes obsolete as you get closer to "maxed out".
Certus does indeed get outclassed by other snipers. His passive is worthless.
Sarq is the Sniper King! (Unless you count the space elves 🙄)...Ra' is badass, but he can be one shotted by A lot of units
All 5 on the list definitely need help. I'd throw Incisus on there as well. Between him and Certus, the UltraVanilla Marines need some help.
I agree 100 percent because I'm a collector I have Abaddon but he's currently sitting at stone one and that says it all not very good for the warmaster of chaos
I don’t know if this makes a lot of this group better or worse, but many of them are quite useful to have invested in for release events (Abaddon, Certus, Pestillian). This may be BECAUSE their traits are so limited, but they are versatile enough to play in many of the limited runs for points.
I think a lot of the early design expected battles to have more rounds in PvP. Basically any ability that takes time to snowball or ramp up is useless because the battle is almost always decided by round 2.
But, with the addition of guild wars the defenders suddenly have a whole different purpose. Their survivability is insane and any ability that takes time to snowball becomes 3 times more valuable. Healers, necrons, terminator armour, passive summons and death guard in general all gain value.
Some of these characters could find their niche if they were re-work for the purpose of guild wars defence. Their AI would need improved but character like Njarl who mess up movement prevents the attacker being able to focus down units. Give him a passive that heals allied characters on or adjacent ice in range 2 after he makes an attack and he will hold the line like the epic hero he should be. Deep strike sucks on guild wars defence, a support character with 2 movement is great because it means the AI can't rush them forward and get them killed before their abilities get a chance to pay off.
- if that passive gave space Wolves characters the unstoppable trait for the next round it would basically fix the faction.
Pestillian is a beast in the tournament arena. After long try and error, I use him in my Death Guard team and this team is amazingly good. They are: Pestillian, Maladus, Rotbone, Corrodius and (an obviously corrupted) Noble. I managed to have a 400+ rating there. You can replace Noble with another range-dmg-dealer, but I use him mostly to negate any kind of overwatch or to kill or damage possibly dangerous enemies in the first round. So until now I did not find a better glass bomb to replace him. Probably Maugan, Calandis or Toth, but I did not try that. Back to Pestillian. He kills enemies when he needs to, he buffs the death guard when they need it. He's unbelievably good, he's durable and does a hell lot of a (close range) damage AND on top he is buffing Noble. Hints: I only play on the lowest rarity rank and the team is very slow. So you won't get all (or sometimes any) buffs from the battlefield. But it doesn't care, they are going to stomp everything into the ground, buffed or not. Even Kharn-Ragnar-Aunchie combos. And yes, I beated a lot of them.
Agree with the 5. If we were to expand the list I would add:
Thaumacus - Utterly bizarre passive and almost useless active
Volk - Poor movement. Active scales down with more enemies. Dies to a sneeze
Incisus - Effective early game but becomes irrelevant once you get Isabella.
Maybe another hit increase for Calgar from 2 to 4. Or a life steal of 2% for all Black Legion.
But what is much more important, when will a healer (not repairer) for xenos come. It would also be good to have a healer with a ranged attack for the legendary path trail. It would also be good if Wrask used his axe in close combat and the flamethrower had the same effect as the Black Templar NPC's as range attack. Maybe when his Aktiv ist the flamer like the plasmagun of Baraqiel.
I would love if abaddon got reworked to make it feel like he’s *the* big bad commander of the black legion. Maybe something like calling down droppods of legionaries/havocs. Or calling down an orbital strike using the vengeful spirit. Would be thematically nicer than him being a guy who hits you with a sword/makes others hit you slightly harder
Typhus and Pestillian are there-there to be honest.
Yeah Typhus and his active might help you mid game during FoC campaign but that's literally that.
His passive is fluffy, but useless.
His melee is horrible, why would one want to have him adjacent to enemies? Give us a reason for it, or a better passive, please.
Pestillian and his explosive death (given the fact he's a DG health points monster, therefore him inflicting 25% of those to everyone around him is a lot) could be fluffy and cool too... If he didn't buff all chaos with his active and everyone ranged with his passive that is adjacent to him, making him literally a self-sabotage bomb with legs.
Only his DG friends would be left unscathed.
The only character with direct damage per se, he deserves better. So does Typhus, that as of now doesn't feel like a legendary AT ALL.
Remember that Maladus starts as an Uncommon character, and Pestillian as Rare. 🙄
But... Since you left out Orks because they're being rewORKed... Why did you talk about Pestillian, mister Nandi?
Isn't the Death Guard getting reworked too?
That is what they said when they came out with Corrodius' BP and buffed him a little bit.
Typhus use is literally limited to his active. After that is spent he's just a damage sponge.
Terminator trait should give Unstoppable and Deep Strike by default but give + 2%/4%/6%/8%/10% ( respectively at common/uncommon/rare/epic/legendary) Crit and Block chance if they haven't moved.
Certus should get movement 3 and camouflage (that way multi-hit ranged attacks have reduced hits by default so no need to touch the passive). Maybe give Mortis Round the Suppression trait and make Stun instead if it can't be pushed.
Pestilian should add Blast damage to ranged attacks and Toxic damage to Melee attacks within his Contagion Aura.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on Haarken. Everyone trashes on him, but I think he’s incredibly versatile, and he’s got a permanent spot on my melee team…
He is cool. Damage boosting, penetration, hits, mobility.
He is my #1, moves really well, increases dmg as the fight goes on, his base attack can hit an additional enemy and he can reduce armor for a tough enemy
I have an idea for Abaddon’s passive: Add “Let the galaxy burns trait to all chaos characters, if they don’t have one. +1 hit when the trait is triggered”
Something i was thinking for Abaddon was, what if his passive allowed him too inherit other Chaos factions traits? So team him up with a World Eater and Deathguard would give him both "Blessings of Khorne" and "Contagions of Nurgle" traits.
Making his damage buff a 2 hex aoe instead of adjacent and possibly giving other Chaos units the "Let The Galaxy Burn" trait could be nice too
i laughed really hard at thutmose exposing himself. i know its leaving himself open for an attack, but i cant help but picture him as a flasher now.
for certus
-rework his passive to make his overwatch not only a guranteed crit and last for 5 shots but also every end of turn when certus didnt deal dmg he automatically gain invisibility
-rework his ability to penetrate the enemy behind it and it guranteed a crit
-increase hp and armor
For pestillan
-passive now effects all chaos units with a range of 3 hexes
-defeated enemies while in the range of his passive is instantly convert to a pox walker
-active can be used repeatedly with a 1 turn cooldown
Abbadon has been on my core team since I first got him, around a week into playing Tacticus. I've had no complaints so far, but the better my other characters get, the more his glaring weaknesses become apparent.
He's a Legendary character who's passive is far, far weaker than Eldryon'S (a rare character).
Double his passive and have it work like Calgar's, and honestly I'd be more than happy. His damage penalty is fine due to his damage output, just something to be aware of and use accordingly.
Certus really needs more fire Power, upgrading his normal attack to Heavy is sure good, also you can Upgrade his active to pierce or even direkt Hit to fulfill his sniper role.
As a black legion player this makes me sad but it was a necessary slap in to reality
I like the ideas around certus, give him some sort of +1 movement if he his overwatch has not triggered. I like the idea of giving him a getting pierce if he has not moved. I would like it to be part of passive skill this would allow him to be used for LRE and give new players another 1 hit character with added dmg. Alternatively give his active pierce dmg and a cooldown. I love the idea of cooldowns or triggers that give back the active skill. Even his a reset so if he kills during overwatch it resets his active.. He is a nice character I think he deserves a good rework that brings him online with more Imperial characters. his passive could give a range buff for other overwatch characters or heavy weapon dmg bonus for spotting skill. Example if Certus attacks in overwatch all other overwatch characters gain one attach in overwatch. Lol that would be something fun! I'm kidding but thier is some room to make it fun.
In the table top Abaddon is really op, I hope one day they make it justice
I mostly agree, but I think njal is a bit more on the verge of “bad for lack of potential“ instead of having outright detrimental stats. In fact just a few days ago I thought how he isn't badly designed at all, I quite like him, but he absolutely needs his passive buff to be just good enough to use, so imo he needs a buff in stats and an adjustment to his passive for balance. Maybe the passive could cause ice in 1Hex range to not go away over time.
Invested in Abby cause I love him as a chaos guy got him nearly d3 and white star yet actively have to pass him up for better playing characters even if they are lower level
You already know Failbaddon the Disappointment is the face of the list🤣🤣 Failbaddon lord of the Feeble Five