Would you take Venomthropes if there was no malanthro

[Iryan]

They could make 'thrope bubbles stackable, or make it -2 to begin with.

They could make the bubbles give enemy shooting -1 to hit and -1 to wound.

They could make the bubbles force enemy shooting to reroll successful hits, rather than giving -1 to hit.

They could force all enemies to roll a d6 for every shooting attack and on a 5+ (4+?) the attack is negated.


Many ways to improve their defensive buffery. Though just making them a bit tankier would also work. At least then they would be able to occasionaly make it into combat to use that special rule of theirs.

[Bellator]

kazetanade

I suspect that you don't understand why I think venomthropes are bad. I will try once more to explain.

Their only trick is to make your list harder to kill, but because of their durability per point they only do that if your list was fragile to begin with. That they contribute nothing else of note means bringing them lowers your lists total output, and killing stuff is important.

They need to be the most durable unit (per point) vs shooting in our codex, or at least close. And they aren't. A point drop would be the simplest way to do this. A profile change could also work. As could a special rule that makes them more difficult to remove, such as the one I proposed.

My problem isn't that -1 on other things isn't good enough, my problem is that it is either too expensive or too easy to remove, depending on how many you take.

[kazetanade]

Nov 23, 2017 13:37:32 GMT Bellator said:

kazetanade

I suspect that you don't understand why I think venomthropes are bad. I will try once more to explain.

Their only trick is to make your list harder to kill, but because of their durability per point they only do that if your list was fragile to begin with. That they contribute nothing else of note means bringing them lowers your lists total output, and killing stuff is important.

They need to be the most durable unit (per point) vs shooting in our codex, or at least close. And they aren't. A point drop would be the simplest way to do this. A profile change could also work. As could a special rule that makes them more difficult to remove, such as the one I proposed.

My problem isn't that -1 on other things isn't good enough, my problem is that it is either too expensive or too easy to remove, depending on how many you take.

Its more of we have opposing views on what counts as an effective force multiplier. I think them being more efficient tanking per point doesnt make them better at their job - it makes me less inclined to shoot them when i get better results by ignoring them in the first place.

IF they were effective at reducing damage enough that opponents couldnt just ignore them and shoot through the shroud for better effectiveness, THEN it would be an argument that they need to be tankier per point to be really good.

As it stands, you get more value from your enemies directing fire at the venomthropes, meaning the enemy gets more value out of their shooting by ignoring them.

[xtztxtxz]

Point values aside (and I agree that 20-25pts per venom would be a nice & simple solution), I do think GW missed the mark slightly with the rules for both kinds of 'thropes that trigger based on unit size:
Zoan bonuses are 1-3 / 4-5 / 6
Venom bonuses are 1-2 / 3-5 / 6
Both should have been a much simpler 1-2 / 3-4 / 5-6 structure

That lets you do something nice and clean like:
1-2 Venomthropes = Shrouding Spores gives -1 to hit for HIVE FLEET INFANTRY unit within 6"
3-4 Venomthropes = Shrouding Spores gives -1 to hit for any HIVE FLEET unit within 6" and HIVE FLEET INFANTRY units within 6" also gain the benefit of cover
5-6 Venomthropes = Any shooting attacks that target this unit at a range of more than 12" always hit on 6+ irrespective of the model's ballistic skill or any modifiers

Suddenly Venomthropes become more resilient, have more reason to be taken in large broods, and aren't neutered by losing a single model. I'd be happy to pay 30pts each for that.

[Bellator]

Doing the same thing for cheaper would make them better at everything, by simple virtue of having more stuff.

Making them harder to kill would make them better at protecting stuff by simple virtue of being able to take less without making it too easy to kill them.

[kazetanade]

If their effectiveness stacked with number of models, maybe. But it doesnt work that way for venomthropes - unlike a genestealer where every 1 extra GS is an extra 4 attacks, every venomthrope is an extra 3 wounds the enemy will ignore which doesnt do much more than the first 12 or 15.

Nothing doesnt "benefit" from being cheaper. Venomthropes with a 12pt discount means for every venomthrope you brought you now can bring another GS. This makes venomthropes "better" by reducing your opportunity cost for taking them. Or by giving you more of them for the same points, which doesnt benefit you a whole lot.

In my earlier post i took the example of Genestealets / Fexes being shot at with and without venoms, and how much i can buy if i exchanged the venomthropes for other units. For Genestealers, the difference (at 240 points of GS/AC razorbacks) was only 2 Genestealers or so. (So without a venom you lose 6 and with a venom you lose 4) If i took the points (apportioned to half due to the Fex component) and bought more GS instead, i would have had more GS at the end of the shootout compared to using the venoms, hence more usable units the can make an offensive impact.

For a cost reduction method to "make them do their job", then you'd have to have equal gain between bringing the venoms or bringing more GS (or fexes or whatever). And as of right now, due to how little they save, that's a huge jump they need to make to match that. They'd have to be nearly 40 pts a unit.

At the current points, you will have nett more GS or Fexes at the end of the shootout compared to adding more GS or Fexes, if the enemy spends his shooting on the venomthropes instead[/b]. If the enemy knows the maths, he will choose to shoot the GS/Fex through the shroud effect, because he will come out ahead compared to shooting the venomthrope in a turn. Making them tankier isnt going to make them better at their job because the enemy already doesnt want to shoot them.

Without understanding your "breakeven" concept and how you derive its value, we're not going to come any closer to an agreement tbh. I hold that Venoms will be better with a buff to their utility ability, rather than to their tankability.

[nurglitch]

Are we factoring in any FNP from Leviathan Synapse or Catalyst?

[Jbizzy]

With addition of the sporecyst for fexes the shrouding from venoms/Mal's are less of a priority for my army now. I think I'm in favor of more bodies.

[Bellator]

kazetanade

With venomthropes, 3 things can happen, your opponent's choice.

First, your opponent may not have any guns, or at least not many. In this case the venomthropes are a near useless waste of points because their -1 penalty is not doing anything significant.

Second, your opponent could shoot the venomthropes first. If you have 3 venomthropes positioned to shroud most of your army, killing those 3 venomthropes will be a priority. Not only because of the penalty they hand out, but because killing 3 venomthropes will take less shots than eating the penalty will. Conversely, if you have too many venomthropes, killing the other stuff will be better. Which leads to...

Third, your opponent could ignore the venomthropes and shoot the stuff around them with a -1 penalty. If you don't get shot much, the penalty may not be worth the points you spend. This leads to the question of, how much of a impact does the -1 penalty have to make to be worth it? That is what I was referring to when I said 'break even'.


6 venomthropes cost 180 points. So 180 points of stuff has to not die to break even. The easiest way to figure out how much of a impact they made is to look at how much stuff died, and add 33%.

So if 540 points of stuff gets shot to death while eating the -1 penalty, roughly 180 points of stuff didn't die because of said penalty. So for 6 venomthropes to 'break even' you have to have 540 points of stuff die to shooting, any less and you didn't save 180 points worth of models. And they must all be shrouded while they get shot to death.

As I said before, just breaking even is a bad thing. This is because you may as well take something with a gun rather than something that saves its own points worth of things with guns.



So for 3 venomthropes to be 'good' 3 things need to happen.

Your opponent needs guns.

Venomthropes need to be more durable than the rest of your list.

And they need to cost at least less than 1/3 the price of what dies to shooting.


A point drop would make them more durable per point and lower the 'break even' threshold.

The theoretical -2 to shoot venomthropes would make them more durable. It wouldn't lower any threshold by itself, but it would make shooting them less attractive and allow us to take less of them and still expect them to last, which could indirectly lower said threshold.

I hope that answered your question.

[kazetanade]

Bellator Yes that's nicely explained. Thanks, i appreciate the info to chew on.

Mine is a roundabout of the same thing but I'm surprised we came to different conclusions. Maybe scale plays a factor?

I hold still that at the current point cost, shooting the venomthrope will yield a lower net gain benefit for the enemy, even if they are "easier to kill". So if an enemy was savvy, he would ignore the venomthropes and just shoot at everything else there. An assault cannon shot at the venomthropes instead of the Genestealers is that many less dead Genestealers.

But i suppose if we increase the scale and use your measurement of "breakeven", it would be beneficial to kill the Venomthropes first if you are confident of killing 700+ points in the shooting round?

So against huge gunlines capable of destroying a third of your army in one sitting, venomthropes would shine as a force multiplier.

Lowering their cost would bring the breakeven cost down lower, so make them a prime target earlier (which we are in agreement). At which point you need to increase their actual tankiness (because additional units of venomthropes is both redundant and detrimental to army strength).

In conclusion: venomthropes arent very good at their job, making them cheaper would make them more points efficient but still not very good at their job due to 0 scalability, making them both cheaper and tankier would make single units just fine.

Edit: i think the theoretical-2 does not lower the treshold, but it does increase the bar the enemy needs to meet to "breakeven" so it also becomes more efficient at its job. Becoming a comparison of "how many points need to be killed for Venomthropes to break even" versus "how many more points of shooting need to be dedicated to meet the breakeven" . Possibly this is where we diverged to get different conclusions.

Edit 2: where did you get 33% from? Degrading 3+ to a 4+? Is the degradation levep the same from 2+ to 3+, and 4+ to 5+, and 5+ to 6+?

[Bellator]

A couple points where I disagree.


Shooting the venomthropes first may or may not be ideal. A lot factors into this, but one of the biggest things is how durable are what they are protecting?

Normal stealers are easier to kill, so shoot them first, unless you are shrouding alot of them with few venomthropes.

Jormungandr stealers with enhanced carapace are more difficult to kill, so shoot the venomthropes first, unless there are alot of them.


Everything is about point efficiency, doing the same thing for cheaper IS doing a better job.

[Bellator]

That is a lot of questions.

33% is from bs 3+ to 4+.

Vs a bs 4+ army the numbers are a bit better.

Vs a bs 2+ army (not much, commander spam?) the numbers get worse.

[kazetanade]

Bellator thanks.

I think all the info is out for consideration.

One point distinction : there is a difference between doing a job more efficient (less resources spent) and doing a job better (more quality).

Making venoms cheaper means they do their job more efficiently, and it means their breakeven point is lower. It also means you have (theoretical) 60pts extra to spend. It also means you lose less points when he wipes your squad.

I guess if you put the extra points back into more venomthropes... the enemy has to burn more points to remove the shroud, so the trade off becomes even better than before and you have more stuff alive. So their being "cheaper = better" protection thing is conditional on the enemy choosing to (or being in the position where its more points efficient to) shoot venoms instead.

[jesses]

Regardless of how efficient it gets, if the enemy is shooting them first they are a decoy, not a force multiplier.

Being a decoy is not a bad thing neccessarily, but its definitely not what GW intended them to be.

[russellr]

I will use malanthrope if the points are fair, or I will use venoms.
The simple reason is that it will frustrate the people I play against, causing them to change their strategy. That's gold.