Sandeep: Considerations for Errata

[WWHSD]

8 hours ago, Hollingydale said:

If a player is reliant on arcane storm to make the game a success then they will just need to adapt their play style, which should be easy enough. Perhaps using commands to get +ve to attacks, perhaps using sandeeps long forgotten Gada, perhaps not using it at all and using sandeep for other things just as moving models or summoning. Or maybe just targeting models out in the open.

If you were already summoning the  Gamin, having Arcane Storm as a  is now dropping you to a straight flip if the target has cover. Even with the bonus from the Gamin you're at a on the damage flip if it was hard cover. Having a crap model engage Sandeep would make him either need to deal with that model or move away to attack the target that he wanted to. Arcane Storm becomes a much less useful action to borrow. It seems like most of the time I have a model Beacon Arcane Storm they are either engaged, attacking something engaged, or attacking a model in cover. It cuts down on the number of models that would be able to use it to trigger Student of All. Arcane Storm being a  gives Sandeep's opponents something else they can use to get Sandeep reacting to them instead of doing whatever it is that he wants to do. 

There's only so much useful model moving Sandeep can do since he pushes models directly towards him and with his cap on summoning I find that in the turns after the first Sandeep is typically only able to summon 0-1 models.  

[Flippin' Wyrd George]

2 hours ago, WWHSD said:

If you were already summoning the  Gamin, having Arcane Storm as a  is now dropping you to a straight flip if the target has cover. Even with the bonus from the Gamin you're at a on the damage flip if it was hard cover. Having a crap model engage Sandeep would make him either need to deal with that model or move away to attack the target that he wanted to. Arcane Storm becomes a much less useful action to borrow. It seems like most of the time I have a model Beacon Arcane Storm they are either engaged, attacking something engaged, or attacking a model in cover. It cuts down on the number of models that would be able to use it to trigger Student of All. Arcane Storm being a  gives Sandeep's opponents something else they can use to get Sandeep reacting to them instead of doing whatever it is that he wants to do. 

There's only so much useful model moving Sandeep can do since he pushes models directly towards him and with his cap on summoning I find that in the turns after the first Sandeep is typically only able to summon 0-1 models.  

Yes, the projectile drops you to a straight flip in cover.

Yes, this means a negative damage flip for hard cover.

Yes, Sandeep or another model will need to deal with enemy engagements.

Yes, arcane storm will be less useful to borrow and harder to pull off.

Yes, student of all will be harder to pull off (though an oxfordian next to an academic can still copy anything and have a tome in their duel, so not really)

Yes, sandeep might need to move before he moves models around but he has near the best place in the game as a (0).

None of these proposed changes are going  to make Sandeep unplayable or bad, it will just mean that slightly more resources, thoughtful target selection and careful positioning will be required which I promise you is very very necessary.

 

And I disagree that Sandeep is summoning 0-1 models. You will usually have one good mask and be able to spend a soulstone to get two models out in the first turn no problem, if the situation demands it. Heck, spend two stones if the situation demands and save your mask for models to copy the place.

 

[Cedar]

Changing the Student of All to require  instead of   or discarding a soulstone to work as well as adjusting beacon from -1 CA to -2 CA is good enough for me. Combining it with allowing model with IE to draw cards only when they are killed/sacrificed by enemy model would bring him to reasonable power level. 

[raderk]

ItW with shielding is great for melee sandeep - he can go into the middle and if he is then he wants to kill things asap to so his shielding would go down anyway soon. But if Sandeep takes more prefered backline supporter role he becames way too tanky to deal with him reliably (with all his activations and such). I would move his tanky abilites to the upgrade so melee build wont be nerfed while supporter require more careful positioning.

That + projectile to arcane storm and slightly bigger penalty to the Student of All and here you are, very strong master but with exploitable weaknessas as it should be.

[WWHSD]

1 hour ago, Hollingydale said:

And I disagree that Sandeep is summoning 0-1 models. You will usually have one good mask and be able to spend a soulstone to get two models out in the first turn no problem, if the situation demands it. Heck, spend two stones if the situation demands and save your mask for models to copy the place.

 

I was writting about summoning 0-1 Gamin in turns after the first because Sandeep’s summons are capped. 

 

1 hour ago, Hollingydale said:

None of these proposed changes are going  to make Sandeep unplayable or bad, it will just mean that slightly more resources, thoughtful target selection and careful positioning will be required which I promise you is very very necessary.

I don’t think that most of them would make him unplayable or bad individually. The problem comes when you start stacking them. 

The problem with Sandeep if I understood you correctly is that he doesn’t give you any reason to choose other Arcanist masters. You replied to me (in this thread or the other one) that you felt that you probably would have done as well in recent tournaments with other masters if Sandeep wasn’t a universally good pick. That doesn’t seem like it demands significant nerfing. 

[Flippin' Wyrd George]

2 hours ago, WWHSD said:

I was writting about summoning 0-1 Gamin in turns after the first because Sandeep’s summons are capped. 

 

I don’t think that most of them would make him unplayable or bad individually. The problem comes when you start stacking them. 

The problem with Sandeep if I understood you correctly is that he doesn’t give you any reason to choose other Arcanist masters. You replied to me (in this thread or the other one) that you felt that you probably would have done as well in recent tournaments with other masters if Sandeep wasn’t a universally good pick. That doesn’t seem like it demands significant nerfing. 

I think I would have done as well as, without wanting to sound arrogant, I think am a fairly good player who can pick up most things and succeed and have proven this without Sandeep. But it is certainly a much tougher challenge without him.

Most tournament I attend I don't run Arcanists as it is not very fun for new opponents to get beaten 10-0 by Sandeep, which reliably would happen until top tables are reached. And it's not very fun for me either.

 

But this is not about me, this is about Sandeep. He is too good in his current state. At the Welsh GT this weekend there were 4 Arcanist players, 3 of which I know for a fact ran Sandeep across their games. I cannot account for the fourth as I did not see who they were running, but I suspect it was the same. That alone should tell you there is a problem with him competitively 

[WWHSD]

3 minutes ago, Hollingydale said:

I think I would have done as well as, without wanting to sound arrogant, I think am a fairly good player who can pick up most things and succeed and have proven this without Sandeep. But it is certainly a much tougher challenge without him.

Most tournament I attend I don't run Arcanists as it is not very fun for new opponents to get beaten 10-0 by Sandeep, which reliably would happen until top tables are reached. And it's not very fun for me either.

 

But this is not about me, this is about Sandeep. He is too good in his current state. At the Welsh GT this weekend there were 4 Arcanist players, 3 of which I know for a fact ran Sandeep across their games. I cannot account for the fourth as I did not see who they were running, but I suspect it was the same. That alone should tell you there is a problem with him competitively 

There’s a lot of unfun stuff for new players to face. I’m not sure that I’d put the typical Sandeep crew in the top 5.

3 out of 4 Arcanist players running Sandeep every round suggests a problem with faction balance. How those Sandeep only players were placing in relation to the rest of the field is what would point to whether he is a problem competitvely. 

While both of these are problems, their criticality and manner in which they are addressed should differ. If the “Sandeep is unbeatable and the best master in the game” crowd is correct then Sandeep should catch a nerf to address that. If it is instead a matter of Arcanist faction balance, that needs to be addressed with changes to other masters and models within the faction that accompany some tweaks to Sandeep.

I believe it to be much more a case of the later and should be addressed as such. Treating it as the former will likely result in Sandeep being balanced too far downward.

[hemgath]

23 hours ago, WWHSD said:

While both of these are problems, their criticality and manner in which they are addressed should differ. If the “Sandeep is unbeatable and the best master in the game” crowd is correct then Sandeep should catch a nerf to address that. If it is instead a matter of Arcanist faction balance, that needs to be addressed with changes to other masters and models within the faction that accompany some tweaks to Sandeep.

Completely agree with that... We must wait because actualy (on logfaux or in UK tournament for exemple) Sandeep is not the best master for result... and in my personnal advice the problem is certainly when you face a new encounter Sandeep is generally really better than other master... so take an other master is for fun not for win (Ironside and Marcus have a little possibilityes and you can forget Ramos Kaeris and Meifeng for competitive game)

[Rillan]

 

23 hours ago, WWHSD said:

3 out of 4 Arcanist players running Sandeep every round suggests a problem with faction balance.

Completely agree with this. Our community had 3 now 1 +1 Arcanist players (one just joined) where 2 of us found it out that if u want to pull it out then play Sandeep or change faction and we changed it to Guild and Neverborn while last one plays Sandeep + Marcus and sees others masters as garbage. Time will show out what will choose our new friend...

[retnab]

Just had a thought, what if Actions borrowed by Beacon couldn't use triggers? So you could let someone (0) interact, but unless they're Sandeep they can't do it while engaged, and only Sandeep has access to the push Action's heal trigger? It wouldn't hurt Sandeep at all, but it would affect how good he makes his crew.

[cbtb11235813]

59 minutes ago, retnab said:

Just had a thought, what if Actions borrowed by Beacon couldn't use triggers? So you could let someone (0) interact, but unless they're Sandeep they can't do it while engaged, and only Sandeep has access to the push Action's heal trigger? It wouldn't hurt Sandeep at all, but it would affect how good he makes his crew.

That seems like it would be effective. It would also stop the + to damage trigger on Arcane Storm. This seems like a good balance without crippling Beacon

[KingCrow]

2 hours ago, retnab said:

Just had a thought, what if Actions borrowed by Beacon couldn't use triggers? So you could let someone (0) interact, but unless they're Sandeep they can't do it while engaged, and only Sandeep has access to the push Action's heal trigger? It wouldn't hurt Sandeep at all, but it would affect how good he makes his crew.

I actually really like this idea.  I think using this idea and putting a  on Arcane Storm would be enough of a nerf to enable more counterplay to Sandeep and not enable his crew as much. 

People are still going to complain about his "tankiness" though.  I personally think ItW is perfect for a model that is supposed to be the foundation of his crew.  If anything were to happen to reduce his "tankiness", I would like to see ItW changed to a built-in suit on his Df that allowed him to pass off damage to a Gamin within 3-6 inches.  That way he is still able to survive but it takes more resources and he's hurting his own models that he summons.  Kind of like a play off of The Dreamer. 

[so_diogenes]

Instead of adding the  to arcane storm or making it so that actions taken by beacon can't declare triggers, what about making it so only tactical actions or only attack actions could be used by beacon? 

 

It seems like a common complaint is that people can't keep track of what sandeep players models can do, I think this could simplify that a bit.

[cbtb11235813]

13 minutes ago, so_diogenes said:

Instead of adding the  to arcane storm or making it so that actions taken by beacon can't declare triggers, what about making it so only tactical actions or only attack actions could be used by beacon? 

 

It seems like a common complaint is that people can't keep track of what sandeep players models can do, I think this could simplify that a bit.

That seems like an odd complaint. It's only 4 actions (2 attack and 2 tactical: ranged cast attack, a pull, a place, and an interact), and they are all printed on his card. I would understand if actions on upgrades could be used, because that would be much more to keep track of

[so_diogenes]

1 hour ago, cbtb11235813 said:

That seems like an odd complaint. It's only 4 actions (2 attack and 2 tactical: ranged cast attack, a pull, a place, and an interact), and they are all printed on his card. I would understand if actions on upgrades could be used, because that would be much more to keep track of

Agreed, but it's not my complaint (see sandeep thread, page 8ish I think) I was just coming up with a way to address it.

In other threads (and maybe that one too) people have talked about using a cheat sheet to mark off which of his actions have been taken via beacon both for when they're playing against and as a Sandeep crew. 

 

[anencephalous]

I voted for his ItW.

It is neither fluff thematic nor tactically fair. If you are going to have a do everything master (of which we have several, like, for example, the Dreamer), you need to make it eminently killable.

Now I am not going to suggest he go down to 6 wounds, but I would suggest that ItW combined with Arcane Shield is too damn good.

Ideally he would go to 10 wounds with no ItW. That way he can still do lots of stuff, but you are going to need to think hard about his placement on the field.

 

[Thottbot]

13 minutes ago, anencephalous said:

I voted for his ItW.

It is neither fluff thematic nor tactically fair. If you are going to have a do everything master (of which we have several, like, for example, the Dreamer), you need to make it eminently killable.

Now I am not going to suggest he go down to 6 wounds, but I would suggest that ItW combined with Arcane Shield is too damn good.

Ideally he would go to 10 wounds with no ItW. That way he can still do lots of stuff, but you are going to need to think hard about his placement on the field.

 

this is the thing i hate most about sandeep, if he was more like colette and colette was more like sandeep everyone would be happy

[dannydb]

The main issue i have with Sandeep is the fact he is so go in melee in my mind, lower his Gada stat and get rid of impossible to wound (maybe make his arcane shield to show his magic prowess, maybe -2 rather than -1 to compensate) yer maybe make beacon only minions and academics only (would make tuterlage a better option)

[mojopin]

Those  to attacks like those horrible furious castings is what annoys me the most. Its such a big boost to all the crew including henchmen, enforcers. Sandeep crew ends flipping all the high cards, obliterating things even in cover (from where he pushes you out)...

Vanasuba making 4dmg around when killing It is also a big, Big pain.

I would nerf that upgrade that gives those positive flips reducing range to 3 inches or granting bonuses only to restricted models.

[WWHSD]

13 minutes ago, mojopin said:

Vanasuba making 4dmg around when killing It is also a big, Big pain.

I would nerf that upgrade that gives those positive flips reducing range to 3 inches or granting bonuses only to restricted models.

Banasuva does 1 damage and +1 Burning in 2 when he dies. He can also borrow the Ice Gamin's ability that deals damage to do another 2 damage. He only gets the borrowed ability until the end of the turn. If you kill him before he activates he won't have the extra damage. This damage is also dealt to friendly models within range so it is something that can be used against the player with Banasuva as well.

The upgrade that gives positive flips is already limited to affecting models within 3. 

[mojopin]

45 minutes ago, WWHSD said:

The upgrade that gives positive flips is already limited to affecting models within 3. 

Thanks @WWHSD. You are right!

Last sandeep list I Saw in action (this weekend) had:

Medical automaton (to avoid enemy alphas). 3x mages. Raptor (cheap activación able to reorder top deck) . Snow (warding runes and something else). Myranda (imbuyed). Sandeep with positive flips to initiative.

 

About vanasuba I usually get him in my deployment zone turn one with that +2 dmg when dying already on him :s. I find It difficult to avoid him getting there when he can borrow pushes, teleports or get pushed by mages. (Many Times with a lurking myranda nearby)

About the positives upgrade its true its only 3'! maybe its the gaming being able to move to where its needed that tricked me think It was a bigger aura. Anyway its the biggest deal to me.

Those mages with positives handing slow, burning and pushes, are fearsome. My opponent usually summon an inmobile firegamin with ice gaming giving positives near him and a couple mages near him or being able to push near him.

Thats a fire line difficult to overcome (with my non nicodem ressers at least). Im not so worried by sandeep abilities or stats itself. Most of the times he doesnt smell a tiny bit of action himself .

maybe if those positives where granted only to minions that would help.

That said I love playing against him I consider It as a great challenge that I enjoy. It doesnt frustrates me but I can understand It can be slightly overpowered.

 

[WWHSD]

6 minutes ago, mojopin said:

Thanks @WWHSD. You are right!

Last sandeep list I Saw in action (this weekend) had:

Medical automaton (to avoid enemy alphas). 3x mages. Raptor (cheap activación able to reorder top deck) . Snow (warding runes and something else). Myranda (imbuyed). Sandeep with positive flips to initiative.

 

About vanasuba I usually get him in my deployment zone turn one with that +2 dmg when dying already on him :s. I find It difficult to avoid him getting there when he can borrow pushes, teleports or get pushed by mages. (Many Times with a lurking myranda nearby)

About the positives upgrade its true its only 3'! maybe its the gaming being able to move to where its needed that tricked me think It was a bigger aura. Anyway its the biggest deal to me.

Those mages with positives handing slow, burning and pushes, are fearsome. My opponent usually summon an inmobile firegamin with ice gaming giving positives near him and a couple mages near him or being able to push near him.

Thats a fire line difficult to overcome (with my non nicodem ressers at least). Im not so worried by sandeep abilities or stats itself. Most of the times he doesnt smell a tiny bit of action himself .

maybe if those positives where granted only to minions that would help.

That said I love playing against him I consider It as a great challenge that I enjoy. It doesnt frustrates me but I can understand It can be slightly overpowered.

 

If you are playing Ressers and Banasuva is borrowing the Ice Gamin's explosion ability instead of it's Frozen Heart ability, try tossing some Horror duels or other nasty things that attack Wp at Banasuva. He's Wp 4 and probably can't cheat fate (upgrade dependent) so can be easy to lock down. If the Ice Gamin is the model with the  flips it probably isn't going to be close enough for Banasuva to steal an ability from the next turn. 

 

[WWHSD]

I’ve said this before but want to toss this out there again, if there are nerfs heading Sandeep’s way I’d really like to see Moment of Weakness gets matching errata that essentially reverts the errata to his card. It would be nice if they gave also gave something a little extra to make it a real option to his other limited upgrades that enables a different playstyle.

Maybe give it Instinctual as well. It would pair nicely with the other book 5 upgrade, Tutelage, and could make models with zero actions like the Gunsmith interesting picks for Sandeep.

[Da Git]

Just a thought but rather than hitting Sandeep's Cache, what if Sandeep's Commands & Visions upgrades went up to 3ss.  Would that make the A Moment of Weakness more attractive?

Also, for all of Gada interactions, change "after damaging" to "after damaging, but before prevention".  That way, the opponent can't just Soulstone it away (but the Black Joker still matters).

[LeperColony]

It's not the only fix, or even necessarily a fix, but I feel the Impossible to Wound and Arcane Shield are not only too effective together, they are counter-decision, which is not good.

An ability like Arcane Shield puts the question as to when the player should expose themselves to greater risk.  But ItW significantly reduces the consequences of that decision, which makes for a dynamic that is unattractive from a design standpoint.

When multiple abilities compliment each other, that synergy is generally to be encouraged, imo.  But when the synergy is really just a matter of negating drawbacks, you have to be sure you're not reducing the importance of decisions.