Druchii.net

That dagger is looking more and more well suited to a lvl 2 in a spearmen unit. Even if you get only the default chillwind and one other less than desireable spell. You can either use the level 2's personal dice to cast chillwind and augment with the dagge or if you got a second really good spell (Black Horror perhaps) you can use her personal dice to cast PoD and augment with dagger for the chance to throw the big spell without even reaching into pool dice.

I think when I run a level 4 its going to be focus familiar. This item will interface nicely with PoD as well because you wont have to worry about being out of position to cast certain spells so all four of your spells will be viable in each turn meaning the extra PoD dice will be useful a lot of the time.

I like the L4 with the dagger because it means you'll generally have the dice for her to cast all the relevant spells each turn. With 2 basic pool dice, 3 of her own (saving the last for a late PoD), and +1 per spell attempted, you'll have 8 dice to distribute between 2 and 3 spells, then after PoD, you'll have 2-5 dice for your last spell. The sacrificial dagger is a fair deal on a L2. On a L4, it's an amazing deal.

Supporting that with a L2 means that depending on circumstances, the L2 can take a basic die to give 2 to a low level spell, then roll the 4+ for a shot at PoD to cast their second spell. Sometimes, use 2 dice on PoD and then judge whether they cast the low or high level spell depending on what you roll. Give the L2 the focus familiar, the darkstar cloak or tome of furion depending on what you want.

I agree though....focus familiar vs dagger is a tough choice for a L4.

I think it comes down to if you have her mounted. If she is on a flying mount focus familiar will be important to make sure she gets where she needs to go but still has 360 line of sight. Obviously the familiar enables her to use cover more effectively.

If she is in a unit, the dagger is hard to top. The only issue will be to make sure she is in a large enough unit so that you can sacrifice away without shrinking the unit to much to quickly.

Both of these items are better than the PoD bound item I think.

I don't think 'better than', I think 'coupled together'.

Though the dagger on a lvl4 sounds so cool, I think as Mordru that casting the right spells at the right place is better than guaranteed casting of every spell and the option of more reliability(cancel if you roll a one) or more power. I'm thinking of a lvl4 on darksteed with the familiar, 2 x powerstones, dispel scroll.

For a lvl2, I'm putting her on foot but I still prefer the Lifetaker + tome of furion than the dagger on a lvl2. I think the Lifetaker is an item where if you have room, you take it. It's better than the shooting power of a unit of DRs with rxbs, and better than half a bolt thrower. And the tome of furion is nice because your likely to get at least one of the better spells for a sorc on foot, which I would say are black horror, bladewind, and doombolt, and have the default chillwind.

Lethalis wrote:I don't think 'better than', I think 'coupled together'.

But the Dagger, familiar and PoD bound wand are all arcane items are they not. You would be unable to couple them together on the same model. Each sorceress already has access to pod as a "free" spell anyway and can therefore couple that spell with the dagger or familiar.

Who said anything about putting them in the same model? All o' them in the same army sounds good enough.

Do the power dice from the PoD spell have to be used to cast a spell?
Or can you also use them to dispel remains in play spells during your magic phase like normal power dice?

If you can, then Gut magic is in serious trouble

Do the power dice from the PoD spell have to be used to cast a spell?

As the rumours have told us and which has been confirmed over and over, no they don't. Your sorceress just get a S4 hit for every unused power die.

Or can you also use them to dispel remains in play spells during your magic phase like normal power dice?

I'd say so, unless the spell description says otherwise (unlikely).

Since I got my Spearhead last Wednesday, I've been playtesting alot of different combinations.

So far, my most succesful magic phases have been whilst using a Level 4 Supreme Sorceress with just a Darkstar cloak, and a Level 2 Sorceress either hiding in a wood with the Focus Familiar, or in a big unit of cheap warriors with the Sacrifical Dagger.

Starting the phase every turn using the Lvl2 Sorceress 2 dice to cast PoD in the end was just let through every turn as they quickly learnt that even if they shut down that source of Power dice, it still left my Level 4 Supreme Sorceress with 7 Powerdice and the ability to cast PoD herself.

I frenquently got it off and ended up with 4 powerdice - quickly thrown into a Bladewind was the end of many a Warmachine.

In the end PoD was a nice spell - but it shouldn't be the basis of all your magic plans. Used correctly it can be both useful for hammering home that one spell you want with the new Druchii Sorcery rule, or with a bit of bluffing on low-level Sorceresses can be an awesome tool for drawing out dispel dice.

No pendant on your L4 supreme sorceress? I'd think having that 3+ ward save against excess dice would be important considering how much you're risking miscasts with that magic phase.

we can use those POD dices as soon as possible to avoid being hit , cast in sequence is now my casting style.

decker_cky wrote:No pendant on your L4 supreme sorceress? I'd think having that 3+ ward save against excess dice would be important considering how much you're risking miscasts with that magic phase.

When I say "just" I meant in regards to Scrolls/Power Stones etc. She was using the Black amulet as protection just because I had the extra 35pts spare over the amulet.

Ahhh...cool. I would've gone with the lifetaker in the extra points.

Did you find the black amulet worth 70 pts, or would you have been just as good to use the pendant?

decker_cky wrote:Ahhh...cool. I would've gone with the lifetaker in the extra points.

Did you find the black amulet worth 70 pts, or would you have been just as good to use the pendant?

The 4+ save was nice, but to be honest out of the 4 most recent test games I played 3 were against S4 basic troops which meant I could have saved 35pts.

I also only took out about 3 models with the save in combat when they charged my Supreme Sorceress.

So I was a little dissapointed, but I suppose its really more of a Dreadlord item for getting stuck in the middle of combat and laughing as people fall over stabbing themselves.

Milney wrote:

decker_cky wrote:
I also only took out about 3 models with the save in combat when they charged my Supreme Sorceress.

So I was a little dissapointed, but I suppose its really more of a Dreadlord item for getting stuck in the middle of combat and laughing as people fall over stabbing themselves.

...Although the possibility of a sorceress being able to frequently cast soul stealer while in combat wearing the amulet is a fun idea. And one day it will come off bigtime. Probably against a chaos lord or something.

I think PoD is definately an awesome addition to our magic phase which will put our magical potential up to competing with the best out there.
I will probably open with afew low priority spells before casting PoD. Those first few spells will probably make it through because the opponent has to preserve dice and scrolls for the PoD's and bigger spells that comes after. At any rate it will take a very powerfull defence to shut down our magic. We will henceforth blast through the defences of the standard caddy lists forcing our enemy to focus their list on magic or accept our free reign in the magic phase. On the other hand Ring of Hotek is nearly enough to cripple the enemy casting even before our scrolls and DD.
So magically we potentially have a powerhouse of a magic phase and even without going this path we have a reliable magic defence.
Suddently with these upgrades the HE's anti magic spell(cant remember its name) seems like the only thing which can really take down our magic but if we focus on magic we can blast through that.

Overall the Druchii finally has the potential of being the magical powerhouse I always thought they should be. Still I would have loved having a longer list of Bound spells in our magic items list. That would have been the icing on our cake.

Anyway Im not going to complain about the very long time we have had to wait for our new list. GW seems to have made a good job.
Perhaps maybe the rhb for Corsairs could have been done better. I found a subject I can whine about forever!

I whipped up a new 'magic heavy' list today, with a lvl 4 with the dagger and 3 lvl 2's, one with the Darkstar Cloak and two with Power stones. With that, this spell just looks unbelievable. Casting this spell first would put all kinds of pressure on the opponent- cast with one sorc, if it goes off use those dice immediately, then move on to the next caster. Spells are going to start going off all over the place, especially with the lvl 4, who can toss it on one die and if that fails, stab a spear elf to get another die.

This spell makes a magic heavy list just insane!

The problem of the dagger with the Level 4 is that of flexibility. To be effective she has to be stuck in the front rank of a slow moving and vulnerable spear men unit. Undeniably though, the ability to add in an extra dice to all your castings is extremely powerful (like the slann ability).

But with so many spells requiring LOS, how do you protect her from dive bombing fellbats, furies, fast cav in a front line unit?

The ASF assasin in the unit is one way, but thats going to be expensive (~160 points), which is another cost that has to be factored in. On the whole I think that the focus familiar offers both flexibility and power. In combination with shadow or the new dark lore, +6" LOS is awesome. Think 18" unseen lurker...heck even the D6 S4 hits to every unit within 12" is viable now as its way less likely to affect your troops.

The great plan I'm going to use is a single 4th level, with sacrificial dagger, ItP-item and 2 scrolls in a 30 spearmen.

First, start casting with 1 dice the power of darkness spell. Then add. one power dice from the dagger. The enemy must use dispell dice or you will do terrible destruction.

Ok, 2 - 3 DD or a scroll from the enemy is out, and you still have 4 spells to cast with 5 dice. Let's say that you will use 3 spells (1 dice for a chill wind perhaps + dagger power), then 2 dice for another spell (+ dagger) and then the last spell with 2 dice (+ dagger). You will do better if you get the PoD through. Amazing!

That's a pretty smart combo. But there will die alot of spearmen, hopefully it'll be worth it.
I just re-read the Daggers entry and yes it is better than I originally thought. Having the chance to re-roll AFTER you rolled your inital casting value is really good as it gives you more options.

izirath wrote:Having the chance to re-roll AFTER you rolled your inital casting value is really good as it gives you more options.

Yup.

"Whoops! Rolled a 3 for PoD! Come here, little spearman! Mommy sorceress wants to have a word with you..."

or...

"Hmm... I rolled one 1. Maybe I'd better think really hard about whether or not I want to use the dagger... (and possibly get a second 1)."

How to choose Dagger or Familiar for one sorc?
I expect the answer might depend on the Lore.

It depends more on there mount options. If on a mount the focus familiar lets you avoid facing issues and use cover to stay out of harms way.

I see using a dagger on a level 2 in a unit of spearmen and the familiar on a level 4. A level 4 without a ward save will be rare sight in my lists simple because of the extra power dice hits and so many miscasts results inflicting hits as well there combined effect risks too much damage to the sorceress. Ward saves are of course generally useful as well.

.PoD is very nice, but remember however that it is not nice to miscast when all of your sorceresses are loaded up with PoD power dice . I'd advice to use the PoD dice as soon as possible, before going to the next mage for PoD.