February FAQ: Don't let the Dragon Emperor Drag On, and Ents are OP now

Dan Stu: It's February again, and we all know what that means! 

No, we're not talking about lapsed New Year's resolutions and seasonal depression - it's FAQ time! 

Credit: Warhammer Community

It's quite slim pickings this time around, which we can view as a good sign of the game being in a pretty healthy place. Had we wished for one or two extra bits? We'll bite our tongues on that for now...

HEADLINE - DRAGON EMPEROR GETS COMEUPPANCE

Let's talk first about the one big nerf which I think we all saw coming a mile off, which is that the Dragon Emperor now costs an extra 30pts. This feels like it's been on the way ever since his points cost was first announced, prompting every SBG player to say in unison 'The Dragon Emperor costs HOW MUCH!?'

While it's a pretty decent response to pretty outrageous performance the Easterling Legendary Legion has been putting in at GBHL events, we're not sure many of us predicted a points change, which are very unusual for SBG. In SBG, units are balanced in the context of their armies, and buffs / nerfs tend to take the form of  new releases, Legendary Legions, special rules and modifications to alliances, which are all much more interesting than points tweaks, which GW tend to use as a last resort. 

And let's be honest, the Dragon Emperor was only making waves inside his Legendary Legion. While he was clearly undercosted as a model, this was counterbalanced by the rest of the Easterling faction's 'meh-ness', and it was only in the Legion that things got problematic. So with that said, let's have a look at the various ways in which the community had predicted that Emperor would be deposed:

Solution #1: Remove the +1 Fight bonus

Pros: Emperor is now an expensive paperweight

Cons: Emperor is now an expensive paperweight

Easterlings are bad again

Solution #2: Decrease or remove the banner effect

Pros: Has a big impact on his buffing ability

Cons: The Emperor loses a bit of his identity as a centrepiece support hero

Impacts DE outside of the LL

Solution #3: Increase points cost

Pros: Can be tuned easily

Has a meaningful impact on model count at low points

Cons: Emperor is now dead outside the LL

It's not a very interesting fix

MESBG doesn't really 'do' points tweaks

Might not be enough 

Solution #4: Remove extra reroll in the LL

Pros: Only hits the LL, which is the only problematic incarnation

Cons: Removes one of the few Legion bonuses - it is now basically just the same as regular Easterlings apart from free BDs, which is boring

Solution #5: Remove free BD upgrade in LL

Pros: It was a weird rule to start with and skewed things towards the Legion way too much

Ebay gets flooded with cheap BD models

Cons: Black dragons are now just in the back rank, it only works out at around a 20pt nerf

Everybody who bought 4 packs of Black Dragons writes GW an angry letter

When we spell these out, it's disappointing but not really surprising that GW chose the route of a points tweak. It preserves the character of the model who, while he might be detested by many, still occupies a really interesting and unique niche in the Middle Earth roster. It's a very 'play it safe' way to curb his effectiveness, especially at lower points, where the LL had a shockingly high model count and could be really oppressive to play against.

However, the big casualty here is non-LL Easterling lists which will now never see the Dragon Emperor. Nobody was doing this competitively, but it was a fun and experimental way to play (some of us may have had Emperor & Chariot lists in the works) and the disproportionate hit to these wacky, uncompetitive lists feels a lot like collateral damage. The Emperor will now only even be seen in his most disliked and arguably his most boring incarnation - a big whiff from GW on that front. 

In a vacuum, I think that removing the free Black Dragon upgrade in the Legendary Legion is a much neater fix. It targets only the legion, brings back the 'high fight at the back' playstyle which is a unique Easterling quirk, and let's be honest, the rule was only there in the first place to sell a ton of the very tasty but very expensive FW Black Dragon models that GW oh-so-coincidentally released at the same time. We get it - GW are running a business here, and the game and community we love is built on the back of a successful business model designed to sell toy soldiers. But this kind of shoot first, ask questions later approach is something we're more used to seeing the the more heavily monetised games like 40k, and we'd be lying if we said it didn't leave a sour taste.

But the good news is that the emperor could have been absolutely gutted, and he wasn't. He's still well designed and perfectly playable, even if not top tier any more. Compared to some knee jerk nerfs that makes a unit unplayably bad, or totally remove whatever made them cool in the first place, it could be a lot worse.

Time will tell whether this nerf is enough to bring him in to line, though - it's ultimately around a 3-model penalty to the LL which still functions in exactly the same way. 3 models isn't nothing, but I have a feeling that the list will still be a big shiny brick wall in certain matchups. And the mumak in the room, of course, is that this nerf may just roll out the red carpet for the other list that we've seen dominating GBHL podiums recently... 

Credit: Micheal Bradford

Editor's note: This is all very nice Dan, but can we please address the ACTUAL nerf to the Dragon Emperor?

Dan S: Whoops - my mistake. Let me sort that real quick:

RIP Dragon Emperor, 2022-2024. I for one welcome our new Ent overlords, etc, etc. 

That's your lot for balance updates. On to the rules clarifications and changes.

RULES CLARIFICATION - PAIRING OFF FIGHTS 

Listen, here at Drawn Combat we're a classy bunch, and we don't like to say 'I told you so'.

But in this instance, we totally told you so, so suck it nerds. 

This diagram generated a decent bit of conversation (and dare I say controversy?) back when we posted our 'Upping your Game' article, and it seems that common sense has prevailed. Despite some poor wording, it was clearly intended that the priority player can allocate fights to their advantage and this was the way it was usually played at events. However, the relevant section of the rules was worded clumsily, leading to some overzealous application of 'rules as written', with people saying that having a 1v1 was always mandatory if possible and model C would always have to fight model B, regardless of whether that was advantageous for the player with priority.

Now it's clearly established that the priority player can divide these fights up in to a pair of 2v1s if they like, which is the much more intuitive ruling. In the case of red having priority, this is good, as it evens up fights and gives them a chance to un-trap model B before it has to fight. This is the way it was played in practise 95% of the time, and the competitive community had landed on this as the correct interpretation.

However. It's not all peaches and cream. The change to the wording does introduce some new complications, too, and the ramifications of these may take some time to unpick.

Without the '1v1 where possible' wording, there is no longer a requirement to pair models in to the maximum number of fights, and this could have quite a big impact on the non-priority player's ability to 'peel off' models from fights. This is helpfully illustrated by adding a new red model D to this diagram:

Under the old rules, this would have to be resolved as 3 fights, which may or may not include a trap, depending on the order in which the fights are resolved. Now, may be resolved as only two fights - a 3v1 vs red B,  and a 2v1 with red D and A - which is a potentially massive change. 

Blue having priority here results in a trap as long as they resolve the fight with red B first - same as before - but now that blue C can join the same fight, that's potentially an extra 2 strikes against trapped red B compared to previously. If there are any heroes in the mix, that's an even bigger change and favours the priority player much more. It does make the game more intuitive, as there are no arbitrary restrictions on how fights are paired and the only restriction is that everything in base contact needs to fight somebody - but we'll need to do a bit of work to see just how big this change is. 

However, we've said it before and we'll say it again - movement, control zones and pairing off fights constitutes the bulk of the game's complexity, and they could really do with fleshing out in the rules to make sure this stuff is as clear as it possibly can be. A flowchart or two wouldn't hurt, either. 

BUY ONE AXE, GET ONE FREE (THIS IS A MANDATORY OFFER)

Was anybody doing this? I never saw it and now I guess I never will. If you are the one person who modelled all of your Acolytes to have one sword and one axe - kudos for the effort, and I hope you kept some spare axes lying around. 

IT'S NOT OVER, ANAKIN - I DO NOT HAVE THE HIGH GROUND

This one didn't come up all that often, but it did always feel a bit bad when your opponent had an unscalable cliff or building in their board half and you didn't, resulting in you being peppered by spells or bow fire all game with no recourse. A simple change but a good one. 

However, it's still slightly unclear whether you can deploy in terrain that is theoretically scalable, but that your opponent can no longer climb once your models are deployed - e.g., narrow balconies and trees. Technically it would be possible for a model to reach them over the course of the game if they died to ranged fire, so there still might be some 'feels bad' moments during deployment. 

RULES CLARIFICATION - CONTROL ZONES

I'm not sure this was really ever misinterpreted much, the rules are quite clear on starting a move inside another control zone - just don't move closer and you're golden. Clearly some people were confused on it, though, so there's no harm in spelling it out. 

COME CLOSER, I WANT TO HIT YOU WITH MY BOW

Again, I'm not sure how many people were doing this and I'd hate to be the TO who had to admit that, rules as written, someone carrying a bow is technically not 'unarmed' - but it's no longer an exploitable wording. Lovely.

RULES CLARIFICATION - BLUDGEON

RIP overpowered Ents 2024-2024, it was fun while it lasted. 

That's pretty much it - there were a couple of small rules clarifications but nothing meaty. The main event here was the Dragon Emperor nerf, and time will tell what the effects will be - but early reactions seem to be pretty mixed. Regardless of how you feel about it, get used to seeing an awful lot a certain evil alliance until the next FAQ drops!