[Warhammer Dark Omen Forum]

Warhammer Dark Omen Forum

human units also have relatively good leadership

orc units have lower leadership and will suffer very badly if skeletons become too cheap

And O&G have more toughness and numbers, which makes it even less likely for Fear to even be put to the test let alone succeed (and Orcs and Human mainstay troops both have equal leadership).

This test is terrific for the "skeleton flag" but says nothing about the true "strength" of the skeleton, you cannot take one point from the skeleton and say: this is their weak point => they suck (yeah they do in this way), you have to see the "whole" skeleton with their weakness AND their strength.

Well this skeleton flag was the reason for the test, so for people to argue that Unbreakable was the reason for their high cost but now go and say "actually its Fear thats the problem" is more than a little dubious; as ive pointed out before the main argument people seem to make against Skeletons not being weak is the Unbreakable, not the Fear. Now people are turning around and saying the opposite. I wonder if people are actually reading this properly: Skeletons are getting their arses handed to them on a silver platter by cheaper units when it comes to a straight fight! Fear will need to do a damnsight more than give them a 50/50 chance to make them worth double the opposing basic troops! I also stated that another test will be needed to see if Fear is actually worth what people are attaching to it by uninformed default. But I dont appreciate people now suddenly doing a 180-degree turn on their positions of why skeletons should cost so much when their previous position is undermined.

i can agree with the changes proposed here but i have to say that i feel it has to cost something to get the benefits,
just like zombies a 2 for the price of 1 is best suited, because otherwise its the same as free potion of strength for everyone and that is the not the objective

Something I did point out initially and ask people about.

If the theory about the skeleton flag is correct, then wouldn't the unit without this flag last longer?

Ive just spent 3 games and the report post proving its not a theory but a verifiable mechanic... If we make the combatants too identical it just makes the results more ambiguous not less; we want the skellies to lose by enough to actually show us its happening, but not by too much or too little that we cant get any useful info from it. Just to prove this, I did a quick test with Olly where 10 flagged skellies fought 10 unflagged skellies. All it came down to was who had charged, which is generally always going to be the decider in mirror match-ups.

The system used before is used because its identical across both groups, with only 1 variable, that of the racial flag. We could probably have the skellies do the charging and get a different result, but all that proves is charging is good and leaves you in a better position. After the bonus is expended, matches go 50/50 between combatants and are won by such small margins that the Skellie flag doesnt generate enough additional casualties to make a difference. We arent testing charge bonuses (or pumping the strength bonus button for that matter), we're testing Unbreakable .

Incidently, we performed another test with swordsmen vs. Skellies, same result; flagged skellies died quickly and with little to show for it, unflagged skellies actually wiped the floor with their enemies despite relatively higher casualties (because they didnt have the flag to cause them additional casualties over what the better Empire troops could cause naturally). It shows how powerful true unbreakable is in a fight they arent overwhelmed in; the enemy needs to win every time; the unbreakable need only win once to potentially cause their enemy to flee, and given the randomness of DO, thats quite likely! Full Unbreakable seems to add a certain resilience thats quite out of odds with simple stats, perhaps explaining why Flaggalants appear so damn effective.

Id say 2 points on the staff precisely because it seems the only item effectively limited by terrain, and also because its limited to mages only. It isnt even necassarily the best item for them at all times but it certainly has a deadlyness even the Wrath Banner cant necassarily match if well-used (of course, the Wrath Banner has a big advantage in simple reliability and ease of use so still rates higher in my book)

What other items need looking at? Stormsword looks like a candidate but it seems to be able to hit your own troops and its quite heavily limited by the requirement to be in melee, so i think its still a 1-point item. The other swords? They're all both expensive (the costliest of all items often by some way) and quite limited in their applications, and the Stormsword is probably the best of the bunch but even it doesnt deserve an increase. Spelleater Shield and Shield of Ptolos? Well they can both effectively make a unit immune to a certain type of attack and can also give unarmoured units a bit of armour, but its still only one unit and only against one type of attack so I think its still 1-point. Banner of Defiance? I do kinda feel its 2-points, especially given its prevelance, but then both Empire and Undead have access to Unbreakable troops anyway and perhaps we shouldnt begrudge O&G players having only this to emulate them.

Staff of Osiris -> 2
Strength Potion/Enchanted Shield/Heart of Woe/Dragon Helm -> 0 for the first item from that list

Very nice test!
Not quite conclusive perhaps, but I like the fact that you set out to find out about this.

How about;
Pitting Skeleton Warriors against another units of Skellis?
One flagged Skel unit charged in front and back from two enemy Skel units.
And a mirrored, but unflagged set-up.

Wouldn't this prove it? Fear and difference in stats would not be conclusive.

/Mr Shadow

No it wouldnt, because all you are really testing is the effect of generalship (and army selection insofar as having more units than the enemy allows more chance to get a unit into the rear of the enemy), not the strength of the unit itself. As long as the same unitThats why the Wraith test made isnt any indication that Wraiths are 'weak', because it relied on creating a situation where generalship not the quality of the units was the prime deciding factor. With correct generalship, even goblins can beat a superior foe (I know, I made an entirely goblin army but found I could only deploy about 10-12 points worth of units against the enemy's 15!), so proving that well-used skeletons can kill stuff is no better an indicator of balance than badly used skeletons not killing stuff! All I set out to prove was exactly what the Skeleton's Unbreakable rule is not actually the same as other unit's Unbreakable abilities; as I said, a straight test with Fear enabled is needed to show if their raw power is still worth twice the points of other basic troops.

Its also why we moved from halberds to swordsmen, because that extra strength took them above comparison with Skeletons, and as such was interfering with our ability to tell how Unbreakable was working. Another reason why not to use say Cavalry or elves was because their superior movement gives them advantages that skeletons have no comparison to, whereas Swordsmen are the equal in that respect.

To perhaps make it clearer, im theorising that Fear will bring Skeletons up to a level with other basic troop regiments, but what I have is practical proof that the Unbreakable ability they have still leaves them inferior to troops that cost half as much in points.

With a recent test of the actual strength of Skeletons Unbreakable ability, the case for Skeletons being worth less than some have assumed has just been strengthened. They simply arent even tarpits on the level of even a goblin unit with the Banner of Defiance. Only a straight-up test of how flagged Skeletons with Fear enabled perform will show if they are significantly stronger than Orc Boys/Goblins, Ghouls/Zombies and human infantry.

I also had a brief try-out with the Staff of Osiris against Black Grail Knights (before the game disconnected). And I can tell you that what the Staff does is cast a Blast/Gaze of Mork spell each magic phase. One shot took out a whole file of Grails (4), which was matched by a shot from Blast. Ive also seen Gaze of Mork take out a Treeman in 2 hits so I think we can assume that these are all extremely powerful spells that are only limited by what you can shoot them at and how many you can effect with it. I also know from experience that the Staff is easy to block the shot with terrain that you couldnt see, as even a slight rise in the ground will block the shot. But when it does land a good hit, its very powerful; roughly the equal of a cannonball would be my assumption.

I have now proved with the help of OllyOrc that Skeletons are indeed subject to this altered version of Unbreakable. See here for the results.

Can't find that in the 3rd or 4th ed. core rules, but I don't have the undead army lists for those editions. Interesting rule though!

There was no Unbreakable rule in the core rules back then anyway; it was a army-specific thing back then. And yes it was in the UD book, and it has been a part of all Undead rules since at least 4th edition.

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An unrelated point I brought up in the skellie test, but its worth mentioning here because it deals with how Weapon Skill stat actually works:

"Another interesting point: At this stage, people are probably looking at the difference between results for Halberds and Swordsmen and thinking “Swordsmen must suck!”. Well, let me offer something in Swordsmen defence (other than “they cost half the price of a 2nd unit of greatswords/halberds”).  Halberdiers have polarms which makes them effectively Weapon Skill 3/Strength 4, which means they are more likely to wound people, whereas Swordsmen have WS4/S3, which means they are more likely to hit in the first place. However, its not a case of ‘higher the WS, the better’; you simply only have to exceed the current enemy’s WS to get the hit bonus. So a WS6 Black Grail is no better at beating up a WS2 unit than a WS4 one! (all other factors being equal, although if you have less than half your opponents WS they get a penalty to hit, but goblins/skellies against BG and Vamps are about the only instances). Because both Halberds and Swordsmen had higher WS than Skellies, Swordsmen’s advantage didn’t count; their strength comes from fighting WS3 (they hit more) and WS4 (they stop the enemy getting the hit bonus) enemies. This just happened to be one of those times Swordsmen couldn’t play to their strengths."

[First match: 10 Skellies vs. 10 Halberds]

Following on my remembering TT rules for skeletons dying faster, I performed a test with the help of OllyOrc to determine if it applies in DO. In essence, this is what im talking about:

 * Certain units the the game (Flaggalents, Black Grail, all Skeletons, and the Banner of Defiance) have a rule called Unbreakable. This means they can never be forced to flee from combat, or panicked by missile fire; ie. they are extremely reliable troops, though it has no effect on how well they fight
 * In DO, the Skeleton regiments have marker in the rules called a 'racial flag', which identifies they are subject to a certain rule other units are not subject to.
 * In the TT game, Skeletons also have a form of Unbreakable, but they have a rule built into this whereby they actually take additional casualties by simply losing the combat they are in, as well as the casualties caused by actually being killed by the enemy; this is to balance out how they never normally flee (which is otherwise very expensive), because it means they are actually much easier to kill off than a unit where you literally have to kill them all off with regular attacks to get rid of them.
 * So it follows that in DO, the reason Skeletons have a racial flag is because they are also subject to this rule. This would make sense as it would stop you having to face truly Unbreakable units all over the place, which is a powerful ability even in 1 unit (as the heavy use of the Defiance Banner in multiplayer shows). It also means that in multiplayer, we charge a high points cost for an ability which isnt actually as good as people have assumed; essentially meaning Skeletons (who are below-average fighters) are treated as being a better unit than they actually are.

To test this out, i made an army of 10 Skeleton Warrior rediments, and used the unit editor to remove the racial flag from 5 of these (referred to as 'unflagged', with 'flagged' units being those who still have the racial flag). I also disabled Fear on all of them, so that it wouldnt skew fights as we're trying to determine how their Unbreakable works, not Fear.

First match: 10 Skellies vs. 10 Halberds
Simply put, we lined up the combatants in wide ranks and Olly charged his human troops into the Skellies front. The Skellies were grouped into unflagged on one side and flagged on the other, to clearly differentiate results. We followed this format in all tests, so only the 'dice' and the flagged/unflagged nature differ between combats.

This test was a little disappointing, as the halberds actually cut through all the Skeletons in fairly short order. Whilst there was a definite difference in time between how long the flagged skellies lasted, and the unflagged ones, it was not what I would call very conclusive. Because the same combat is repeated 5 times, it reduces the variables further but the halberds appear to have been so capable of generating normal kills that we couldnt get a good look at the different interactions! I believe that one of the unflagged units did manage to cause its opponent to flee however, but given other results this can be put down to luck.

Conclusion: The test showed a trend to the skeleton racial flag having a negative effect on Unbreakable, but it was pretty inconclusive because the fights were simply over in too few rounds of combat!

Second test: 10 Skellies vs. 10 Swordsmen

We switched to swordsmen in this test because both units then have hand weapons, and thus equal Strength. Otherwise both Swordsmen and Halberds have higher Initiative and Weapon Skill than Skellies, making them identical for this test. It would mean that the test would last slightly longer by limiting casualty rate without sacrificing the superiority of the human troops, giving us a clearer result but same relevance.

Interestingly, 4/5 unflagged Skellies won their fight and broke the enemy, but in 2 instances were reduced to just 2 men and their enemy was still ~10+ (and I think the other 2 victories may have been due to those Skellies being on a small hill). In the final unflagged fight, the swordsmen killed all skellies without loss. So this tells us that whilst skellies are poor fighters, the inherent randomness of the system never guaruntees victory to the 'better' unit; put another way, skellies fight like goblins but even goblins can sometimes get a bit lucky if they arent totally overmatched.

However, the flagged Skeletons all sucked and died very quickly (with combats lasting on average about less than half the time with the unflagged units), without causing more than 4 casualties on any of their opponents. This is a clear indication that the normal Skeletons do take additional damage as a consequence of losing combat, as well as the normal casualties from the enemy killing them.

Another interesting point, though not relevant to what we were testing: All skeleton units took fairly heavy casualties from the charge, but once the charging round of combat was done, the flagged skellies clearly died a lot faster. This could mean that DO gives some bonus to charging troops beyond simply the ability to always strike first in that round.

Conclusion: The result much more strongly indicated that the skeleton racial flag does alter the rules of their Unbreakable nature, making them much less good at hanging around compared to true Unbreakable units like Flaggelents and units with the Defiance Banner. Thus their apparent ability to never flee is actually worth a lot less than it is on other units that have it.

Third test: 10 Skellies vs. 10 Swordsmen

This was a repeat of the second test, as the Swordsmen had proved to be better at showing results at a slow enough speed to be useful. In this one, we saw basically the same results as we had previously; flagged units died much more quickly than unflagged units. The only differences were that 1 flagged unit (with very heavy casualties) actually broke their enemy, but conversely only 2 of the unflagged skeleton units broke their opponents this time. Again this shows more that DO is based on a system that places a lot more emphasis on variable results than most games. Again, the Swordsmen took low casualties, even the units that fled had only suffered 3-5 dead.

Conclusion With 3 sets of results in the bag (a total of 15 seperate tests each way), it was now clear that the racial flag does indeed have a noticable impact on how Skeletons perform. With it, their Unbreakable ability is much reduced in effect compared to other units with Unbreakable. With only 1 flagged unit in 15 actually defeating a roughly similar foe, it is clear that they depend on supporting units for effectiveness (though only a test where Fear is not turned off will give a true indication of the relative power levels), and also that they are not the tarpits they are commonly assumed to be or compared to.
Conversely, the fact that they won 6/15 (possibly 7/15) combats when they were unflagged shows that even troops with inferior stats benefit from normal Unbreakable, because you can hang in the fight so long you jjust need to get lucky in 1 round to potentially cause the enemy to flee. Thus it is this very racial flag that stops Skellies being a match for other armies 'basic' troops (Fear then being an equiliser, but not a winner in itself).

So Skeletons with Fear and their version of Unbreakable are roughly equal to, but not as some have supposed superior to, other enemy basic troops. Only the skill of the player will determine their true effectiveness, but thats not something the point system measures.

Another interesting point: At this stage, people are probably looking at the difference between results for Halberds and Swordsmen and thinking “Swordsmen must suck!”. Well, let me offer something in Swordsmen defence (other than “they cost half the price of a 2nd unit of greatswords/halberds”).  Halberdiers have polarms which makes them effectively Weapon Skill 3/Strength 4, which means they are more likely to wound people, whereas Swordsmen have WS4/S3, which means they are more likely to hit in the first place. However, its not a case of ‘higher the WS, the better’; you simply only have to exceed the current enemy’s WS to get the hit bonus. So a WS6 Black Grail is no better at beating up a WS2 unit than a WS4 one! (all other factors being equal, although if you have less than half your opponents WS they get a penalty to hit, but goblins/skellies against BG and Vamps are about the only instances). Because both Halberds and Swordsmen had higher WS than Skellies, Swordsmen’s advantage didn’t count; their strength comes from fighting WS3 (they hit more) and WS4 (they stop the enemy getting the hit bonus) enemies. This just happened to be one of those times Swordsmen couldn’t play to their strengths.

Skeleton Warriors -> 1/1/2 or 2/1/2 or 1/2/2
Skeleton Archers -> 2/2/2
Skeleton Horsemen -> 2/3/3
Black Grail -> 8/9/10 (maybe)

Something ive just remembered, and needs to be looked at: Skeleton troops may appear to be Unbreakable like they have the Defiance Banner, but in the TT game they actually take extra losses when they lose combat, instead of taking a Break test like other troops. This means whilst they dont flee, they die at a far faster rate than truly Unbreakable troops do, which obviously if its true in DO (which anecdotely I believe it is, having seen how fast Skeleton troops die compared to comparable troops) makes the contention that they should remain expensive because they're 'Unbreakable' a far weaker argument.
Also note that this would explain why Skeleton Warriors/Horsemen/Archers have their own 'racial' flag as shown in the unit editor, whereas Catapaults and Chariots do not; the latter dont take wounds this way. This means that only those 2 units and Black Grail actually have the equivilant of the 1-point Defiance Banner people like to compare them to!

On TT, you can only attack if you're in base contact with an enemy model. Because thats played with neat blocks whereas DO is less organised, that means you can have less clean combats in DO. Either way, only troops animated in combat will be fighting. However, you have something called Combat Resolution (CR), which determines who wins combat and forces Break tests on the loser (this is why units break from melee). CR comes from wounds, but also from ranks (and possibly outnumbering in DO though it didnt exist in 4th edition on which it is based), banners (which DO probably doesnt count), and also from hitting people in the flanks and rear (which also causes a Panic check right at the start of the round).

So your extra regiments might not be contributing attacks but they will be contributing some CR to the fight.

Which reminds me, whilst Skeleton units appear Unbreakable like they all have a Defiance Banner, in TT they actually take additional wounds from CR instead of taking Break tests, which probably explains why they seem to be cut down a lot faster than Flaggalents or a unit with Defiance Banner (made worse by their goblin-level stats). Id forgotten about this and its probably needs checking out, but if so its another reason for looking at Skeleton troop costs, because they arent comparable to the Defiance Banner.

An army that is able to get outshot is pretty much forced to be the attacker by default; as much as I hate to you a Magic: The Gathering analogy, its true of every wargame that doesnt feature exactly identical lists. One 'deck' is always going to be the 'beatdown' and the other deck the 'control'. The army that can stay back and shoot is control because its slow and conservative is 'Control', and the one that has to be fast and aggressive is 'Beatdown'. Which one your army is varies from game to game. In the example given, ZzUu expected to be Control and all his opponents to be Beatdowns, but he was outplayed (because thats what it is) right from the beginning when Alavet took a list which is better at Control. Thus as much as he may not like it, he was outplayed and is now the Beatdown. The onus is on him to play fast and more aggressive, because the longer the game goes on the more it favours Control.

In essence, whilst ZzUu can sit out of range and not fight, he cannot win by doing it; Alavet wins because he has the army to fight that kind of battle, he cannot lose it. Its like in the Japanese sword art of Iaido (think thats the one), where you can actually win a competitive match without even drawing your sword if your set and composure is better than your opponents!

Thats not to say that shooting/war machines alone decides Control/Beatdown; you could have an entirely melee army that can decide the tempo, especially if its fast or numerous enough. Because of how DO is set up Mortars and to an extent Lobbas are dominating enough that its very hard to be Control; but for example a human army with lots of fast units can severely restrict their enemy's options if the enemy doesnt act aggressively to deny them their speed.

I dont know if I really have a point to this as far as coming up with rules 'forcing' people to be attackers and defenders, and I think those terms are too rigid to apply. Even if he didnt know the exact terms/theory, ZzUu was able to identify that he was not Control (as hoped) but was the Beatdown, and he acted accordingly. He didnt win, but thats not a result of Control being 'better' than Beatdown, he was just beaten; one of the ways he was outplayed was (presumably) in army selection and also his preconception of what role his army would play, but thats only 2 factors out of many. He already knows by running away he's playing to not lose, he has no possiblity of playing to win by running, at some point he need to get aggressive. Otherwise he's relying on his opponent choosing to give up his position of Control, which the opponent is under no obligation to do! Even then he could still lose.

In a tournament situation, ZzUu would have essentially refused to play and conceded the game by running, in which case he forfeits the game if it is judged that he was indeed the army which couldnt win a stand-off. A bit like Iaido

As I said, im not sure I have a concrete point, its just an interesting ramble

i personally like to see 2/1 to avoid ppl use this unit as "meat" for blockign other units cause they unbreakable.

Thats fine, as it at least offers an inducement to use them. However, it should be 2/1/2 if people want to use 3. Big Uns or Wights with the Defiance Banner are 3 points and they far exceed Skellies (hell, even without the Banner they do). Ive found that whatever their unbreakability, being as crap as goblins they cant make as much use of that unbreakability for it to be comparable to Defiance Banner units, because noone gives the banner to their goblins!

Black Grail. 9 points is an awful lot to pay for a unit that isnt nearly as tough as 5 point mummies (nor have the physical immunity of Wraiths) an indeed only slightly more so than 2 point Wights (who they only exceed by WS, not vaugely worth a full point, and Unbreakable, which is apparently 1 point; the differences in T and armour balance out). Their hitting power is approximately 30-35% greater than Mummies (by virtue mainly of 3 more models, less so by WS6); that hitting power advantage is actually in net terms less than that, because of their fragility, so it tends to evaporate much faster than Mummies. Their main combat strength is perhaps derived from their damage causing Panic, which is possibly limited only to the round they charge (something else we need to check out). At 9 points, an army including Black Grail is basically only an army of Black Grail; UD struggle when Mummies/Wraiths get bogged down at 5 points. Numbers of troops counts for a lot, and when you can fit only a handful of zombies, ghouls and maybe a unit of Skellies or (probably bannerless) Wights, the Grail is virtually fighting an entire enemy army on its own. This is only made worse by virtually every army taking the Defiance Banner by default, meaning everyone has an easy option to stick the Grail and simply overwhelm it. Is a reduction to 8 points really too much to ask?

Are Big'Uns really better than, say, 2 units of regular boyz?

Big Uns are better fighters but they are exactly the same in durability and morale. So it somewhat depends on your intent for the troops as to which is better; having twice as many warm bodies or having good fighters. The same goes for Arrer boys, except that their combat prowess advantage is in having a ranged attack. Obviously, this is only a consideration so long as Orc Boys cost 1 point; between a 3rd boy unit or a unit of Arrers/Big Uns, then the latter wins out, gold permitting.

I think people are reluctant to reveal their current tournament armies...

Is it just me or do Flaggalants seem to perform a lot better than their (good) statline suggests? Are they actually worth more points (especially at just 360 gold a pop)?

we just tested it with ZzUu some of wights vs flag and wights really worthless

Well everyone makes the big fuss about Wights 3 Wounds but nothing about their 1 WS3 S3 attack, with Wight Blades that appear to have zero impact over hand weapons. 9 guys who fall apart when they break yet dont have the capability to kill stuff, which is needed to win combats? Not a strong combo Wraiths have twice the number of attacks (as a unit, 10 total instead of 9) and two-handed weapons on top; even Mummies muster 2 S4 attacks each (though only with hand weapons).

skeleton horsemen to 2/3/4?

That 3rd unit of Horsemen still isnt as good as Merc cav on 4 points also. They're fast and they cause fear, but fight-wise theyre the equal of basic skeletons and thus also goblins except for marginally more armour (whereas all other cavalry is above the average for their side, less so with boars but noticably with humans), and Unbreakable is less useful with cavalry (and also archers) than with infantry. 2/3/3 because of their fancy special rules but never more than 3.

p.s. and sad to say this secret but storm staff seems to be overpowered a little. i think we need increase it to 2 or so. i really smashed ZzUu orcs and some human armies with this staff. in last game i kileld 44 men with my ice mage (maybe 10 units in this number i killed by spells as max)

Noones commented on Defiance Banner, or indeed the UD Skellie cost issues.

As to the Staff of Osiris, its certainly been my primary mage wargear, but I rarely use mages...