Is there a point when you actually have too much magic?

[zen]

Hi

Simple question, but I'd like to know your views.

I was looking at making a really filthy magic phase for an upcoming WAAC tournament and came up with the following:

Level 4 with Bound POD and Dark Steed
Level 2 with Sacrificial Dagger
Level 2 with Focus Familiar and Dark Pegasus
Level 2 with Lifetaker or Darkstar Cloak

Plus the Twilight Cloak on my Assassin

That's 12 or 13 PD basic and 2 Bound Items. Add at least another 2 from the SD for 14/15 basic. There are also a possible 5x PoDs.

Is there a point when you actually have too much magic?

[Layne]

The point where you have too much magic is the point where you don't have enough other stuff. Those girls cost you about 1000pts as they are, something like that, yeah? The question is, will you have enough points left to build an army that can protect them?

[Joyfulcheese]

Nope Just means you'll dominate them in the magic phase unless they've a lot of magic resistance and a heck of alot of DD's. Just be sure to tailor the spell lores to try and best make the most of your opponent.

[zen]

It is a lot of points, but not too many when you factor in the total list value of 2300 points (sorry, I should have said this in the opening post).

If you just take the top 3, then that's only 800 points and still gives 10 basic PD, +2 for the SD kills for 12 basic, and you've still got 2 bounds and 4x PoDs.

[Colonel]

Its too much magic when you face a the 4 khorne jugger heralds plus lotsa hounds list and they all have MR3, and a banner that give you -2 to cast.. and suddenly its paper meets scissors.

Some say its too much of whatever when your opponent isn't having any fun.

I think its too much of anything when the tactics that differentiate fantasy from 40k or yahtzee are gone.

[Kinslayer]

i made a 4k list with Morathi, Malekith, a lvl 4 and 2 lvl 2's.

If i got each POD off, including the bound one, and rolled full amount each time, thats 38 power dice a turn.

So yes there is a point where you can have too much magic, but i think Tzeentch holds the title not us.

[Zeth]

Anything more then a caddy is to much magic for DE, and I'd argue you don't even need that.

Your spending ~1k points on a phase that does not often win the game. It is a phase that is the least reliable in all of warhammer ans is largely effected by your opponent. While at the same time it on average causes less damage then an equal amount of shooting, and our magic can only really cause damage. Then neither the magic phase or shooting phase are largely destructive and are mostly supplemental board control. Either assisting mobile armies, or for the non-mobil armies they require it to control the board.

So yeah you can spend lots of points on magic, and there are fewer diminishing returns then a shooting phase but in general the magic phase and ours specifically is not the best place to be spending points.

[Kinslayer]

Zeth, your comment makes a good point about magic relying on the enemy too (through dispel rolls). But i would not go as far as to say it does not often win the game.

I tend to find the magic phase swings a lot of turns, the enemy can line up a perfect charge and wham you black horror them and they flee and can no longer charge.

Its a vital phase of the game, and one which has both turned around and won me games in the past.

[Zeth]

I didn't say it was useless, there is very little in the game that is useless. I said it was unreliable and inefficient. Two things that are needed to continually win games.

To black horror an opposing unit and make it flee 5 things need to happen.

First you need to roll the spell, something that is not very likely. 66% on a level 4.
Second you need to either cast it first or not have a previous spell get miscast.
Third your opponent needs to of used all his scrolls, and dice or fail to dispel with his dice.
Fourth you need to be fighting against an army that is not immune to psych. So not DoC, TK, VC, or effect any of the ItP units.
Fifth your opponent needs to fail their LD test, something that is not likely and some armies will very rarely do. Like WoC, HE, Dwarves, Lizardmen.

Can a magic phase win you a game? Sure, is it likely? No, to much is unreliable within the phase, and DE magic is even less reliable and expensive then the average. Magic is a support phase and one we don't do well.

hats 38 power dice a turn

This is also not a useful way to look at a magic phase. Number of dice in no way represents how powerful the phase is. Especially considering that 10 of those dice are just used to create more dice, and you average 33 dice and not 38.

PoD really only gives on 1 extra die per mage on average. At the cost of needing to cast an extra spell that might miscast. Not to mention 33% of the time this spell does nothing but make your magic phase more risky, and the other 66% is more likely to just allow you to get a higher casting value spell of rather then an extra spell.

[Kinslayer]

I didn't say it was useless, there is very little in the game that is useless. I said it was unreliable and inefficient.

i didnt say you did

[Zeth]

No you just presented a unlikely scenario that poorly demonstrates how the magic phase actually works. Claiming that because every once in a while 4+ largely chance based dice rolls in a row can go in your favor makes our magic phase game winning in general is deceptive and unrealistic.

[Colonel]

Zeth, if you are suggesting DE magic is not cost effective I think most here would disagree. We have the tools to make it highly effective, and the ability to hunt our opponents mages to shut down their defences.

A hail of arrows will be as effective as Zens proposed magic load if he plans to just take direct damage spells, but the ability to chose lores for each game that break your opponents strengths can be much more powerful.

How many crossbow shots will be needed to kill a banshee?

[Zeth]

Zeth, if you are suggesting DE magic is not cost effective I think most here would disagree. We have the tools to make it highly effective, and the ability to hunt our opponents mages to shut down their defences.

I'm not only suggesting it I'm stating it rather bluntly. Our magic is one of the weakest magic phases in the game. PoD is not a powerful enough spell to supplement our pathetic arcane choices, significantly overcosted mages, and weak racial lore.

Not to mention our magic does nothing that we don't already do very well.
Every one of the spells in our list (except chillwind which is an exceptional spell) is sub-par for a racial lore.

A hail of arrows will be as effective as Zens proposed magic load if he plans to just take direct damage spells, but the ability to chose lores for each game that break your opponents strengths can be much more powerful.

The general problems with the unreliability and poor design of the magic phase present themselves as we branch into other lores. Also at such times as using the other lores we really notice how weak our magic phase in relation to the standard. We pay significantly more for a mage then empire (with weaker arcane items to boot, not to mention the prayers and War Alter) and they have the same offensive power as our mage with the only exception being PoD. You may think that an average of 1 more dice per mage after casting a spell is worth 40 points per mage
I disagree.

How many crossbow shots will be needed to kill a banshee?

Two if its a lifetaker.

[Thomus darkblade]

Frankly I'm With Zeth on this one. Our Wizards are too expensive considering their abilities, Our Lore choices, while improved still are largely damage inducing, not game winning.
IMO The point of magic in Warhammer is to stop the other guys magic, Dispel scrolls and magic dice do it best, but we have null shards, the ring of hotek, and the crystal of midnight, not to mention access to some of the best mage hunters in the game: in core.
This weekend i will be bringing a no- magic list to a Tournament. I'll let you guys know how i do.

[Dggrj]

I third that, Zeth and Thomus. After my first 5 or so games with our new book I've got to say that I find I can't even get an effective magic phase without overspending on it. One of my opponents plays Brets. He spends 255 points on two level 1's with some scrolls and gives his two biggest units MR1 and has 5 DD (as well as 2-3 scrolls). That pretty effectively shut down my magic phase when I took 2 level 2's with the dagger on one and ToF on the other (hoping variety + PoD would work well) at about 400 points. And my magic defense (4DD) did not reliably block a crucial mistress of the marsh. Granted that was luck, but the balance was really not in my favor on a per point basis.

[Entreri bloodletter]

The point where you have too much magic is the point where you don't have enough other stuff. Those girls cost you about 1000pts as they are, something like that, yeah? The question is, will you have enough points left to build an army that can protect them?

I agree completely with Arnold, that there is a point where too much magic just takes too much away from the rest of your army and just doesn't add enough to the army as a whole. I think anything past a Lvl 4 and a Lvl 2 or 3 Lvl 2's is too much. Already those are about 800 points and to me is considered a pretty heavy magic phase.

I've had some success with that setup but I still need a few more games under my belt before I make a definite decision, last edition magic was IMO better because our troops weren't very good. Now the troops and the magic are better so its a tossup.

[Jrg]

im a new player so im not greatly experience but i can look at the facts and make a up see the obvious, I agree with zeth and the others other exploring the points given and adding a few things up i must admit our magic looks kinda weak, especially as im versing mainly magic heavy armies like V.C and for what i spend on offensive magic they can get like 1/3 0r twice as much its stupid. i find it hard to defend my self against it as i believe that spending 150pts on a scroll caddy when other armys get it for 100/110pts.

[Fa'loui]

Personally i think that the effect magic has on a game depends on the pointslimit of the game.

In anything under 2k, magic is neglectable,

At 2K, i think you need to go either all out on magic, combined with hordes of DRbodyguards for the sorc's and harpies to take out shooting and magic of the opponent, and play pointdenial and catch-me-if-you-can-but-i-know-you-cant, or just take a single L1 with a single scroll and give some units nullstones

Starting from 3K and up we can Bring real heavy magic to the table ( morathi at 500pts is to expensive for 2K, not for 3K), and i think you should start of with Morathi, and then som L2's. At 3K you always have to have at least some magic defence, because now enemies can really hurt with their magic, so i advise 1-2L1, 2 scrolls, and some nullstones



I dont really like dispelscrolls, hence i never take more then 1 in 2K and under, i just think that 55 points for a unit of harpies is more effective on the long run then 50 points of scrolls
The nullstones are really good for their pointscost, at a measly 15 points ( this means COK and Exec's can take 1 on their champion who hasnt got anything better to take anyways) and i think some nullstones and harpies are better magic defence then scrolls and our own sorc's

In general i nearly always take a L1 to have acces to chillwind , or the lore of metal or fire if the opponents have a weakness against it.

But i cant completly agree with zeth, certain spells ( pit of shades and chillwind) will nearly always give you an edge in the game, but as he writes, you need to have the luck to roll the spell ( tome of furion can help here). And i really think we can have a good army with a heavy magicphase starting from 2.5K and upwards

[Killerk]

My last game played ( 5k gamve vs the dvarves) had 1 supream and 5 2nd levle, which did nothing important!!!! (I rolled pretty bad on spells plus 70% spells I rolled had at leas one 1 on the roll, rolled masses of miscasts, usually used 2 max 3 dice for casting, so it was pretty horrible) so if its not your day magic can be a big disappointment.

The worst thing was, I had no units I wanted the sorceress in, most of my infantry units had 2 sorc. in the front rank, just paralyzed my army, I was afraid to charge. it was just devastating . Never before Did I have a problem where to put my sorc. and never gave much thought to the problem, until now.

REMEMBER IF GOING MAGIC HEAVY HAVE A LOT OF UNITS TO STICK YOUR MAGES IN OTHERWISE CERTINT UNITS WILL BE JUICY TARGETS.

[The_vicar]

I think its a bit like a witch elf, your choice of mages and items, its all crazy and if it works its gonng to be brutal but if it does not work its just going to be messy and leave you exposed. You have no scrolls, does it make a difference, not really if you can take like flames of the phoenix in a unit but i like the reliability of taking out any of his spells that could make a mess of my units. I think its a bit to much but then you've not posted the rest of you're list so its hard to judge given what we say, but personally i think its to much.

Magic is essential in warhammer fantasy battle, because its a fantasy game and i like the unreliability of the magic phase as it adds uncertainty, i don't want certainty, victory could be the roll of a handful of dice way or not. For me taking magic out the equation just leaves percentiles and averages, this unit has this much chance of killng this unit, that bores my bollocks off thats 40k. Thats might be an over simplification, but magic adds judgement and a certain level of excitement in regards to what can be achieved with little or not much with more.

[Voiddisciple]

I've never run a game where I can (or could) beat an opponent with Magic. In my opinion, the 'job' of magic is not to obliterate a unit, but to assist your combat units in hand to hand- either by pushing combat resolution in your favor, or debuff spells like Transmutation of Lead, Shades of Death and Word of Pain. I've thrown three or four magic missiles a turn with a level four High Sorceress, with the only goal to pull off a Word of Pain at the end of the phase to make a close combat swing in my favor.
If you build a list with the expectation that you can use magic to sweep the enemy off the table, you're playing the wrong list. But we can play a very competitive magic phase with support casters, not unlike Wood Elf Spellsingers.

[Cadeyrn]

I've played the "max magic" list in the previous edition, the result of which was almost always either a big win or a big loss, and always one player not having any fun.

I say this because of two things:

1) the games take a long long time. My magic phase was slow as I had to plan out both what to cast, and in which order so that I minimized miscast chances, but also maximized the chances of the important spells getting through.
Add to all that the fact that your opponent probably has a strong shooting or CC phase, and the turns start to take forever

2) Because your all or nothing on magic (and probably shooting, because you don't have enough points left for solid CC) you end up playing the hit-and-run, flee from everything, never engage in CC tatics. This can also slow down the game because you have to be so carefull when moving not to let yourself get trapped.
While these tatics can win games against the unprepaired, they just aren't fun for your opponent

In the end I'd say bust out the magic phase from hell once in a while to keep your friends on their toes, but I didn't enjoy it as my mainstay army.

[Lakissov]

I have to disagree with Zeth, although he does have some very valid points. I just think that he is not figuring one thing into the picture: the versatility that magic gives; to me, the biggest gain for our magic phase in the new book is not the power of darkness and even not the new magic items (although they are indeed nice), but the ability to choose two more lores (+fire +metal) and the improved dark lore.

Fire lore: allows you to deal with nurgle and with undead and with anything else with regeneration
Metal: kills characters
Death: damage and the chance to get the -3Ld spell
Shadow: the chance to get unseen lurker or pit (but i don't like other spells)

dark lore:
good against gunlines due to chillwind and bladewind (second one kills warmachines, even dwarven ones)
good against hordes if you get black horror

now consider the fact that in a tournament environment, when you meet a new opponent, you can take a new lore with all your spells.
Lizardmen? Hi, I use Dark lore
Dwarfs? same
Vampires? fire and metal
nurgle? fire and metal
khorne? dark (it also has a spell which hurts enemy CC)
O&G? dark and death
and so on

so a magic-heavy army is not really inefficient; it can be efficient if you build the army and play it to exploit magic's greatest strength - versatility

[Schlorgadorb]

To me, Word of Pain is the best spell the dark elves can get. Every game where I've gotten that spell on at least 2 wizards, I have won. I've won other games too, but if I get word of pain, I'm happy. The -3 leadership spell is great! Especially when used in combination with Black Horror, or say, a dragon popping in out of nowhere. It'd just be nice if we could pick our spells. but whatever... it does make sense that only high elves can do that...

When I use magic I can often cast spells with like, 4 dice. I was in a tournament once and I was getting used to casting on numbers like 14. You do not dispel that unless your crazy, or have a dispel scroll. Which if they did, that was usually the spell that was dispelled.

I think the best magic phase, is the magic phase that cripples your opponents. I use it to get rid of war machines that are pissing me off, panic archer units, cut down the numbers on infantry, kill of a rank or two, and then make my hand to hand win more effectively. For me, thats what it all comes down to. Once in hand to hand, I want my infantry that come with what they are, to just be flat out better than everyone else. And with the proper balance of magic, I can do that.

[Archon_matt]

Quite frankly I think Magic is something to be used in conjunction with other stuff to totally kick arse.
My favourite lores are Fire and Dark, and I always take one of each, always swapping one spell on each sorc out for Fireball/Chillwind. Why? Chillwind is, quite frankly, a roxxorz missile and I use it to screw up archer units before making them flee.
Actually, correction to my statement. I take Dark magic again in favour of Fire if the opponent is shooty. If they have no shooting, I take two lores of fire.
ANYWAYS I tend to use magic to give myself an edge (eg taking out archer's shooty-ness), kill unkillable stuff (eg vs ethereals/fireball vs regen/flammable units), or to break half-panicked units. Panicking something once in the shooting phase and again in the magic phase is hurty