Strong tidal currents prevent the Nauticans from making landfall.

Apologies to anyone waiting for the next Nautican Army list update.

Immense deep water pressures and strong opposing currents in the Warhammer oceans at the weekend robbed me of most of the free time I thought I would have.

There are no further changes to the planned updates I just haven't had the opportunity to write them up yet :(

Nautican Warhammer Army List Changes

Changes to Core, Special and Rare Units, Characters and Magic Items

We are planning to make several changes to the Nautican Army "Book" this weekend (6th-8th Nov 09).

There has been a lot of playtesting since the last update and many unit discussions.

We're going to ramp up Wave Breakers slightly (at no extra points cost - as already mentioned on this blog)

There will be 2 new characters

- A sprat hero (I'm not sure hero is the right word !). Who can lead a unit of coral hunters thus making them skirmishers or a unit of Crest Riders thus improving their Breaking Wave charge. The hero will be able to join other sprat units throughout the game.

- an Octobipod hero (probably to be called Octun) to lead the Octobipods or operate alone. He will be the same profile as the Blue Ring Octobipod champion but with +1 leadership (ie. 7 rather than 6). Additionally, he will exude an inky mist which will bestow a -1 to hit modifier on him and any Octobipod unit he is with (against missile fire alone)

Zhurf is being removed

Several Changes to magic items, including new items, simplification and removal of others. This is to make the magic items more selectable and balanced.

Changes to existing Aqua Lore spells to make them slightly more specialised and offensive - yes, they will be able to cast swear words against the enemy ! Only joking :)

Probably removal of Deep Divers which have been superseded by sprats that did not exit prior to the deep diver's inclusion. Also, Octobipods with their poisonous attacks have, to some extent, reduce the need for raged poison weapons.

A new Rare unit which will grant magical benefits upon nearby spellcasters and make the army as a whole slightly more magically resistant. This Rare unit will most likely take the form of a Nautican Artifact, possibly a throne. This is still be worked on, it currently has 3 different forms (I haven't made the final choice yet and the player may be given some options for this unit to customise it for their army selection)

We would really like to include some dolphin mounts in the army but sourcing the models is proving a real pain unless you fancy paying for some solid silver ones ! If anyone knows where we could get our hands on 28mm lead/tin dolphins we'd really appreciate it if you let us know !

I'm working hard on getting all this done in time, thanks for your patience so far.

Sigmar

PS. One last thing, once the army list has been updated I will re-activate the voting polls on the right of this blog so please cast your votes so we have an idea what you make of the new army list.

About Trident Guard and Wavebreakers

Breaking Waves over the Tridents...

This post continues from where I left off on the crest rider post underneath this one.

A concern has arisen about the power "gap" between Wavebreakers and the famous (probably to become infamous) Oceanic Trident Guard.

Trident Guard are good, let's make no bones about it. They're probably one of the more combat effective rank and file elite units in the Warhammer world.

Just saying that has probably given a lot of ammo to the Nautican army detractors. Afterall, nobody likes a unit that, on the face of their profile, might seem just too good.

The thing is, when taken in context of the whole army the Trident Guard are far from overwhelming. The reason I say this is because there are two restrictions on their use (special unit and bodyguard rules). Secondly, the army is very reliant on them and as a consequence becomes vulnerable in other areas if the Nautican player piles too many points into the Trident Guard units and uses up all their special unit slots.

It shouldn't be too difficult for enemies to conjure up a plan to deal with the trident guard so I wouldn't expect an army full of trident guard to perform particularly well against well balanced enemies. If for example an army included 4 trident guard units then it could have no magic users or special characters or any other special units.

On top of this, take into account that the Nautican Lords and Heroes are not that great and you must take one for each trident guard unit you deploy. They are roughly the equivalent of elves but with fewer useful magic items on offer.

So, we've decided to try to bridge the gap between the Trident Guard and the other Nautican core units.

Rather than including a new unit we're going to tweak the Wave Breakers a little.

A final decision has yet to be made but they will probably gain +1 strength. My buddy was thinking maybe +1 to their weapon skill too but I'm not so sure about that.

I have been rifling through the other army books and I now think the Wavebreakers were slightly too expensive before (compared to say Chaos Marauders or the Empire rank and file when you take into account their detachment rule benefits). So the Wavebreaker points cost will probably remain the same.

As soon as we've decided I'll update the army list.

Thanks for reading,
Sigmar.