Elathain's Soulraid
Welcome to our rundown of Elathain’s Soulraid. Make sure you catch our podcast coverage of the release. For everything out with this release window, follow these links:
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Thanks go to GW for providing a review copy to make this content possible.
Introduction
[D]AVY, [P]HIL, [B]RIAN, [S]KYLER & [Z]ACH
P: Stealing souls is no easy job, but there were no better fish.. I mean elves for the job back in first edition. Will they have the same ability to control the board like they did back then? Let’s find out.
WARSCROLl
S: With an inspire meant to realize the prowess of the deepkin in the High Tide, what are we looking at for Round 2? Each fighter will be on 2-Defence dice, with increased accuracy including healthy access to Cleave & Ensnare, and Move 5 for all to boot! Deadly! And much akin to the Soulraid of old. One extra note would be that this time around if Tammael is resurrected into Round 2 while it's underway, he will not auto-inspire - so that's a neat little wrinkle to navigate.
Z: Previously, they had access to different abilities depending on being inspired or uninspired in addition to the sat changes. I think porting some of that over would feel limiting on the single sided warscroll. Leveraging your leveled stats in the middle round will be crucial to playing them well.
S: Narratively and mechanically cool. For Round 1, Flood Tide showcases you'll never leave a clash of blades against the Soulraid with sure-footing. Love it. And a fun consideration to play around on both sides of the table. For Round 2, this +1 Move combos with their Inspires to bump even the creature kin up to 5 Move. Quite the reach! Lastly, Round 3 sees the Ebb Tide so it makes sense narratively for this to offer the lowest impact in offering Grapple.
Z: I like that the flood tide ability doesn't require the attack to be successful. Really lends itself to a counterpunch style. High Tide lets you make up the distance if you hang back or your opponent decided not to risk the stagger tokens. Ebb tide adding in grapple for another way to mess with positioning in the last round will certainly have its moments.
S: Riptide Harpoon is perfect. Gives Tammael's Range 2 Harpoon one hell of an accuracy boost at the trade off of charging. Means taking the threat of a Range 2 attack offline for the remainder of a round, but the threat of Tammael resurrecting and regaining this benefit means you might let him sit on his Charge token a minute - which is a splendid wrinkle to consider.
Z: I've always liked the balancing act he's had of 'do I charge for the better attack or stand here to make more attacks?’
S: With Tammael at 4 Health, I'm actually quite surprised to see that he can come back repeatedly and without any trade offs. That's incredible...
Z: With the 4 health and lack of bounty for re-killing him, I'm guessing this will look more like a once per game than it used to.
S: Love. This was Duinclaw's whole schtick before, and with Spinefin completely reworked this edition, it's cool that they both share this.
Z: With the fish's function gutted this edition, I'm glad to see him able to benefit from this.
S: Ummm... reads again, rubs eyes, reads again. Where the hell is the once per game on this one? Hot damn! So, couple of thoughts on that, this could either prove to be something that folks need to keep in mind and discover how to play around akin to being across the table from Grandfather's Gardeners... or we'll see this ability get reigned in in the future. (Time will tell, but on first read I know where I land.) At 4-Health, you need 4 successful attacks from 1-2 damage fighters to take her down. At 2 Dodge, it gets harder to slip those attacks through. And that's before she heals or tosses on Great Fortitude. Not to mention you're never moving her off a token with attacks alone! Good luck getting her 2-Bounty.
Z: I thought we'd learned not to do this after the Skinnerkin ordeal. Guess not. Unless you can scrounge together 4 damage worth of pings (including one that works on vulnerable) this puts the warband at effectively 17 wounds. With each successful attack that doesn't slay her go ahead and add 1 to that number. Absolutely wild ability with no limit.
FIGHTERS
Uninspired
S: Hello Elathain, good to see you once again. An excellent leader and an exact port stats-wise from 1st edition.
Z: That ranged attack feels much more lacking this edition, but it's not there to be extremely efficient. The great accuracy on the melee attack more than makes up for it.
Inspired
S: Seeing 2-Save on Elathain is absolutely wild! Getting him to 2-Save was often a worthy choice of an upgrade slot in 1st edition. Means you can go ham in Round 2 with much less worry of being punished for it.
Z: He was always a massive threat round 2, now he's significantly harder to deal with.
Uninspired
S: An extra health over 1st edition. I think she's a reasonable and reliable fighter when graded on merit of stats alone... but once you factor Phantasmal Forms in she flips to monstrous.
Z: Without Phantasmal Forms she's a perfectly fine fighter I'd be happy to have. If you figure that effectively adds +2 health most games to this profile she becomes an absolute monster.
Inspired
S: Flips swords to hammers. A fuirious accuracy bump! Notably not on 2-Block (a change from 1st Ed), but with the extra health packed in I think that's fine - and especially with Elathain already enjoying that boon.
Z: 2 dodge will do just fine if you can guarantee stand-fast. Don't forget she's actually 5 speed here, so no running away to not deal with Phantasmal Forms.
Uninspired
S: I love that he's worth 2-Bounty. I understand and accept it as trade-off for being able to bring him back. What floors me is that he's 4-Health. That takes this warband up from 16 Health to 20 as soon as he's resurrected, and 24 if managed a second time.
Z: I think it's safe to say this will be among the least tabled warbands in the game. Don't want to overlook that attack being range 2, 3 hammers, 2 damage when you charge. Pretty great for a fighter you can bring back.
Inspired
S: Exactly his previous High Tide profile (well, with that extra health I've already mentioned). The only other thing this edition changes up with Tammael is forgoing an extra damage he had when charging into a Range 3 Harpoon throw, but I think it's a perfectly reasonable adjustment bringing him into the new edition.
Z: It's one less range, but you're basically replacing the old harpoon throw with this melee weapon on the charge now.
Uninspired
S: The best model in all of AoS is back! And this time he can even wield weapons and hold treasure! With his built in push tricks, those new strengths will certainly be exercised.
Z: 2 shields, 3 health and free pushes, pretty much everything I want out of a token holder. He even kept his two damage attack.
Inspired
S: Outside of the extra move he sees here while inspired, the rest of his stat lines (uninspired and inspired) are exactly as they once were including seeing Cleave here.
Z: 3 swords with cleave is nothing to sneeze at. At 5 move with High Tide he's certainly the fastest crab in the west.
Uninspired
S: Oh, Spinefin. You have a non-zero Move stat and attack profile. It feels so wrong! I imagine Spinefin will be mostly used as a Delving and Holding piece with the constant, nail-biting question hanging over your head of "is my opponent holding a ping?"
Z: Look how they massacred my boy. It's so wrong to see him be a real fighter, but I can't imagine trying to cram his old rules onto the warscroll and still have room for other things.
Inspired
S: Sure. Ha. I don't know what else to add except long live 1st edition Spinefin!
P: Good riddance demon fish!
Z: Decent chance to hit and overrun that dodge fighter on a token if you need it. Probably not in a great spot if you need that, though.
Summary
P: While not as tricky without the fish mechanics of old, these new warscroll feels a bit inevitable. Sturdier than you’d expect, some very solid stats, and decent utility with resurrection and pushes. I figured something would have to change with this warband, but I honestly thought they might be a little tamer than the previous edition… I love the models so I can deal with getting beat down on the regular. Get ready to be terrorized by sea elves once more!