40K: “Deepstriking” Lords of War Needs To Stop
A Lord of War just arrived 9″ from my army. Houston, we have a problem…
With the new Daemon’s Codex, Chaos has gotten a HUGE boost to their combat options in the form of Denizens of the Warp. This stratagem is making folks really question how the keywords work and if Games Workshop has intentionally (or accidentally) broken the game.
At first glance, bringing in a big heavy hitter from the warp is kind of funny. “Wait, I can DO that now? Heck ya!” So naturally folks want to try that out just for the novelty of it. But is it good for the game? What if people seriously try to use and abuse this strategy? Turns out that might not be a good thing at all.
“I’m a Daemon. Deal with it”
The Alpha Strike Factor
We’re 7th months into the new edition and folks are already building toward the Alpha Strike. This is a subject we’ve talked about before. It’s not going away and folks are dealing with it in their own ways. Unfortunately, the game itself is moving farther and farther towards this escalating Alpha Strike mentality. That has it’s problems but when were spitballing around the office Larry said it best:
“[The Alpha Strike] is boring and it ultimately drives players away. If an Alpha Strike means “you win” then why are we even playing?”
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That’s a really good point. Why did we bother buying, building, and painting hundreds of dollars of miniatures – and spending obscene amounts of time doing all that – to have it not really matter on the tabletop? If you win the game on a single dice roll at the start of the game, then why did we bother playing in the first place? We should just play Craps for money in an alley!
“Paradoxically, players seem okay with a single die roll determining the fate of the game – as long as it happens at the END of the game and not at the beginning.”
So what does this have to do with a Lord of War and them Deepstriking? Because that’s the ultimate Alpha Strike! There is nothing larger and scarier to drop on/near/around your opponent than a Lord of War. There was a time, not so long ago, that people were upset that Blood Angels could Deepstrike a Land Raider. Everyone thought “well now this is just getting a little ridiculous.” Guess what – we just raised the bar even HIGHER now.
Something Has To Give
Look, we really like the Denizens of the Warp. We think it’s a great stratagem for Chaos Daemons to have. It “fixes” the issue of being able to reliably bring in a huge pack of daemons and get a charge off. That’s not the issue. The problem is that you CAN abuse it to bring in things that *maybe* shouldn’t be able to do that. A Lord of Skulls for example. Magnus and Mortarian are two more examples. Or better (or worse) yet why not all three? Because you can. That’s the real issue.
How can GW fix this? The simplest fix is rewording Denizens of the Warp. Have a caveat that it doesn’t apply to Lords of War. Or maybe it only works on infantry. I’m not sure – but the competative scene is already wanting a fix and something will have to give.
What do you think? Is Deepstriking a Lord of War a step too far? What fixes would you implement to curb this issue? Or is it totally fine? How are you dealing with the Alpha Strike?
