In the early day of 6th edition screamers and flamers were the damage dealers in an all Tzeentch army, but you were forced to take Pink Horrors to round out the army and score objectives. Most daemon players would take other troops choices, but I remained true to my devotion to the changing tides of the aether. I liked taking them in squads of 10-20 to keep them alive and deal some damage. I routinely ran a large blob squad of 19 horrors and the Changeling plus a Herald. This was a mixed bag.
Pros:
Survivable 4++ save (rerolled near Fateweaver)
Massed fire (60+ shots at 18″)
Great overwatch potential (often poor actual results)
Cons:
Large deepstrike footprint
360-455 points that can mishap
Low BS shooting
Now that I have a copy of the rulebook I can confirm the rules that have been leaked before. Namely that they are now 9 points, minimum squads of 10 and gain ward charges as the squad size increases.
One big drawback is the loss of overwatch, but this is countered with the increased 6″ range on the shooting attack.
I’ll compare their efficiency against terminators, marines and guard. Given that flamers and screamers were majorly hurt by the new codex the horrors will have to stand up to various threats if a Tzeentch mono-build is to remain viable.
Some complained that my comparison before factored in disproportionate squad sizes, and while this was true the point per kill levelled the playing field. This time I will compare squads of the same point cost to please the nay-sayers. It just so happens that you can get 17 new horrors for the same cost as 9 old horrors. Since 9 is the number of Tzeentch there must be something to this…
thanks for running the numbers. It’s not the randomness that’s the issue, it’s the poor game design. I would happily have randomness in the game, so long as I had a safety net. Assault D3 shots PER horror…sure that’s random. What about 3+ D3 AP…that’s random that I can live with. But spending 180 points, for possibly 4 shots…that’s just poor game design. Or ineptitude. Or both.
On a side note, the Skull cannon had sooo much potential. I just don’t know what Cruddace was thinking…
I had a chance to try it out today. What’s even more frustrating is having your 290 point unit (including Herald) do nothing because of a Deny The Witch roll.