12. If You Don’t Have Anything Nice to Say…
Welcome back everyone! Retribution as a community has been through some ups and downs over the past few months as we slip farther and farther behind the curve with each passing CiD update. My own personal challenges have led to a lack of content update, but the recent announcement of the Legacy Retribution CiD has given us something positive to look forward to!
Let’s start with the “why” of our current situation. The salt pillars are already rising around us as other factions react with envy to these upcoming accommodations. Why exactly is Ret so special and what is so terrible that our current situation demands extra attention?
At it’s core, Retribution as a faction was not designed to function effectively under the exclusive constraints that Mk3 Theme-Machine is built around. Our foundations both in fluff/fiction and on the tabletop are built around combined arms and the cooperation between the various factions that make up The Retribution of Scyrah. Our faction books speak of the conflicts that Dawnguard and Mage Hunters go through working together and our signature tabletop presentation has always made a healthy blend of combined arms (save for a brief foray into the Will of the Nine…) Breaking down our faction into individual components and preventing them from working together has left huge holes in our lineup and a competitive void that has been difficult to overcome. This combined with the lack of a proper CiD since the Themepocalypse has left us in a suboptimal place to say the least.
That being said, the upcoming CiD is going to be a huge step in the right direction that I think we are all looking forward to. So what are our big problems and what sort of expectations can we have going into this?
- Character Myrmidons. We missed the boat on this one, plain and simple. The idea of introducing character warjacks and warbeasts into theme lists didn’t come around until after ours had already been published. Here we can expect Moros to go into Shadows of the Retribution, and Discordia into Forges of War. We can HOPE we see Imperatus and Hemera get dropped into Legions of Dawn as well.
- Forges of War expansion. Easily our worst theme primarily due to the incredible model restrictions we are left to work with. SOMETHING is going to happen here. There are various speculations and cries for the inclusion of Vyre myrmidons, or additional units and I would expect to see one of these come to light, maybe not both.
- Shadows of Retribution adjustment. This theme looks great at first glance, but quickly falls apart when trying to actually build for it. The only options that count towards free points are units themselves, of which our options are limited. Mage Hunter solos don’t count towards points, and we can’t take free UAs with our free point slots. These restrictions feel arbitrary and cramp list design in an already excessively restricted theme. This is an atypical theme force design and the overall strength of Shadows is way too low to warrant the additional frustration.
- Destors. Do literally anything with these idiots. They actually got NERFED from mk2 to mk3!! I don’t even know where to start with such a maligned unit, but half of their rules simply don’t work in their current incarnation. Expect some changes here.
- Warcasters. We’re very likely to see a small selection of Warcasters get some tweaks. I would expect Goreshade4 to get his feat looked at. His kit is lackluster enough as it is and certainly doesn’t deserve one of the worst feats in the game as further punishment for it. Ravyn and Vyros2 would also be great candidates as well.
Regardless of what PP decides to put on the table for us, I can’t wait to pick through it and work with everyone to help sort things out. I would also like to kick off my return with an AMA.
My next blog post will include a question and answer session from the community. Comment here, on Facebook, or message me directly and I’ll get to as many as I can!
Let’s start with the “why” of our current situation. The salt pillars are already rising around us as other factions react with envy to these upcoming accommodations. Why exactly is Ret so special and what is so terrible that our current situation demands extra attention?
At it’s core, Retribution as a faction was not designed to function effectively under the exclusive constraints that Mk3 Theme-Machine is built around. Our foundations both in fluff/fiction and on the tabletop are built around combined arms and the cooperation between the various factions that make up The Retribution of Scyrah. Our faction books speak of the conflicts that Dawnguard and Mage Hunters go through working together and our signature tabletop presentation has always made a healthy blend of combined arms (save for a brief foray into the Will of the Nine…) Breaking down our faction into individual components and preventing them from working together has left huge holes in our lineup and a competitive void that has been difficult to overcome. This combined with the lack of a proper CiD since the Themepocalypse has left us in a suboptimal place to say the least.
That being said, the upcoming CiD is going to be a huge step in the right direction that I think we are all looking forward to. So what are our big problems and what sort of expectations can we have going into this?
- Character Myrmidons. We missed the boat on this one, plain and simple. The idea of introducing character warjacks and warbeasts into theme lists didn’t come around until after ours had already been published. Here we can expect Moros to go into Shadows of the Retribution, and Discordia into Forges of War. We can HOPE we see Imperatus and Hemera get dropped into Legions of Dawn as well.
- Forges of War expansion. Easily our worst theme primarily due to the incredible model restrictions we are left to work with. SOMETHING is going to happen here. There are various speculations and cries for the inclusion of Vyre myrmidons, or additional units and I would expect to see one of these come to light, maybe not both.
- Shadows of Retribution adjustment. This theme looks great at first glance, but quickly falls apart when trying to actually build for it. The only options that count towards free points are units themselves, of which our options are limited. Mage Hunter solos don’t count towards points, and we can’t take free UAs with our free point slots. These restrictions feel arbitrary and cramp list design in an already excessively restricted theme. This is an atypical theme force design and the overall strength of Shadows is way too low to warrant the additional frustration.
- Destors. Do literally anything with these idiots. They actually got NERFED from mk2 to mk3!! I don’t even know where to start with such a maligned unit, but half of their rules simply don’t work in their current incarnation. Expect some changes here.
- Warcasters. We’re very likely to see a small selection of Warcasters get some tweaks. I would expect Goreshade4 to get his feat looked at. His kit is lackluster enough as it is and certainly doesn’t deserve one of the worst feats in the game as further punishment for it. Ravyn and Vyros2 would also be great candidates as well.
Regardless of what PP decides to put on the table for us, I can’t wait to pick through it and work with everyone to help sort things out. I would also like to kick off my return with an AMA.
My next blog post will include a question and answer session from the community. Comment here, on Facebook, or message me directly and I’ll get to as many as I can!
As someone that has to play your regularly, I'm very happy that Ret will be improving as a faction as it is better for the health of the game, though could you get a little worse so I may still stand a chance?
ReplyDeleteSerious question time, What do you think of allowing cross house unit or solo choices similar to other factions allowing one merc/minion unit and solo in their lists? Would that allow for the flexibility needed in Ret while still staying flavorful?