Sneak Peek at Upcoming Changes to the Sylvan Elves Army Book

Hello community!

It is time to bring you up to speed with what's happening with the Sylvan Elves.
These past few months saw several versions of our Armybook, each time bringing a mixed bag of changes: sometimes they gave us nothing but despair, but sometimes they brought candies and joy. All of these changes reflect the combined effort of the Guys Below, or more specifically the Armybook Committee, Balancing Board and Rules Team. The ultimate goal is to balance the armies and to get rid of overpowered and imbalanced stuff. Behind the upcoming book stand several people with cojones who sacrificed so much of their time to bring this roller-coaster to the next checkpoint.

Speaking of balance! At the current stage, Sylvan Elves are considered one of the top-tier armies. More precisely, there are two lists which outshine any other combinations from our book. Those are Tree spirits lists, and avoidance lists. A wise man once said: “The most important part of the sneak peek is not to show you that something has been changed, but why something has been changed” (looking at you mr. little man), so we are not going to present you every change made in upcoming version of our Armybook (and there are quite a few), but leave you to find them out when the book is released come March. Without further ado (and pointless blabbering, if I may add), here are the most important changes:


1) The army-wide special rule has been revisited, in an effort to define what is crucial to the SE in terms of gameplay and identity. In the 9th age no race gets "freebies", so having a special rule that grants many bonuses could have reflected badly on the units, in terms of overall cost. We decided to drop the "Fight in Extra Ranks" part of the Forest Walker, and to move the Armour Piercing just to the units that need it. This way, archers and sentinels do not have to pay for a rule that they will probably not be using. The solution we've come up with also ensures the balance of combat characters, as it had been brought to our attention that the fact that they got AP(1) with magical weapons was making them slightly overpowered. Tree singing became cheaper and gained S5 at the expense of AP, and lost the attribute of the Path of Nature.


2) Kindreds and Aspects of Nature got a face lift:

• Bladedancer kindred had become overburdened with too many rules for just one pointy-ear, so in the new version it no longer provides amazing profile bonuses or a ward save, but instead creates a nice synergy with the unit of bladedancers it joins.
  
• The second big change concerns the Wild Huntsmen kindred. These bad boys are back, boosted by free reform. This comes at an expense, since the kindred's cost has been upped to reflect the added versatility, while at the same time the Wild Huntsmen will be less heavily armored than before.
  
• When talking about Aspects, this is where you’ll find changes regarding the Tree spirits lists we mentioned above. Fertile seeds became infertile and got ditched from the book. Toxic Spores became susceptible to the winds which shortened their range, and it seems Dryads decided to strike on Entwined Roots which became exclusive for Thicket Beasts only. All these were measures taken to tone down the power of certain aspects of the book (S5 core Dryads, I'm looking at you).
  

3) The magic item section saw a lot of modifications, since it quickly became apparent that certain items were either too good and got used all the time or too situational to be of any use. The Bladedancer Drums became a lot more usable, the Spear of Cadaron got a different role that differentiates it from the Whirlwind blade, and a new entry came to replace the Ancient Brooch, whose cost post-balancing would have been prohibitive in our opinion. The Fire Blight Pendant will make some of you nostalgic fellows smile, at the expense of the enemy's strength.

4) Our beloved Treefathers got hit by a nerfonball (TM). Dwarves swear it wasn’t theirs. Next in row to balance 4 Big-daddy-trees lists, it was decided to limit their presence on the field to max 3. It was a daunting task to confront these 4 big nasties at the same time; besides, they are the rarest of the all spirits, aren’t they? Avatar of Nature got a price increase to better reflect what it brings to the table, and Impaling Roots became optional.


5) Dryad Matriarchs became more customizable, too. Now, the plain Matriarch costs as much as one eagle, but it doesn’t inspire hatred in other dryads nor it does cast any spells, unless you decide to upgrade her. Now every ability of the model is properly costed and in line with our balancing efforts, but you are not forced to get the whole package if you only want a combat forest spirit to give Hatred to your Dryads.


6 ) In a Chess-like maneuver, Kestrel Knights and Sentinels swapped their places in Special and Rare.
Kestrel Knights have received some love and we are hoping they will see some play in your armies, other than continuing to collect dust on your shelves. They’ve become cheaper and their charge can have a devastating effect, but got less resilient in a way. Sylvan Veterans will welcome this change, putting the Kestrels in their traditional spot. It is worth noting that the Forest Eagles were also moved to Rare, to make some space for their Kestrel cousins.


7) The Blade Dancers changed their routine dances and got a new gig! Instead of the Dance of Thousand Cuts, which was admittedly too good in certain scenarios, now you can choose a new dance: Enemies won't be able to use parry against any one of your units while in base contact.


8 ) The Forest Rangers were among the least-used units in the latest versions, and so we decided to give them a boost that would allow them to function better without the help of the General or the BSB. By giving them Immune to Psychology, these can now occupy a flank and hunt monsters without fear of failed Ld tests. Their cost has been streamlined with that of other Elven elites, which means that they are now considerably cheaper.


9) Wild Huntsmen were also looked at from a balance perspective, and it was decided that Initiative 6 along with their damage output was too good against non-Elf characters and Elven elite. Their initiative went back to the original 5, but in return they gained the vanguard option, which should help get them in place for a game-winning charge and increase their survivability. In order to still give the SE players the ability to counter other Elven elite, these were also given the possibility to swap their Sylvan Lance for Sylvan Paired weapons, for a price.


10) Our shooting section was deemed to be too good for its cost, and as a whole we tend to agree: nobody has any fun facing 45 poisoned sentinels and 20 pathfinders, and it was not our initial intention to give rise to such lists. The Sentinels have now been moved to Rare, to reflect their specialized archer status and force some hard choices on the Sylvan Elf player. The Hawthorne points were toned down further after much deliberation, by dropping the AP(1) part of their rule. While we know that most of you consider them necessary to deal with the monster mash lists that seem to be so prevalent nowadays, we are confident that those lists will be addressed with changes to other army books.


And that’s it! Roughly. This is just a sneak peek, so take it as such. Now it is up to you. Take a seat on this roller-coaster and when the upcoming update hits, playtest them. Only that way you can help us make amends and point us in good and right direction. Until March, don’t worry and be happy… and make war with toy soldiers!

Snapshot of the Review session:

SE_review_snapshot

Please keep in mind that the issues and proposals discussed in those recordings may not always reflect the latest rules update you will see when we finally release the armybook, but we hope it will give you nevertheless an interesting sneak peek