Splintermind reactions

Have you guys listened to the splintermind codex reviews?

They end pretty negative.

What's your take of the situation?

I stopped listening to them after Psychic Awakening, as I got fed up of paying to listen to them rant about how 'ungrateful and toxic' Drukhari players were.

I'm really surprised to hear that they are negative about the codex, they were on the playtesting team. I don't suppose you could share what their issues were?

No I didn"t. But I listened like 2 minutes at the end, where they said that this Codex basically has units that are superpower and others that are useless.

Considering that this happens everwhere, that there's no perfection, I can see almost the 95% of the choices having a value here.
So yeah, I pretty disagree with them.

Perhaps they are the truest of the true kin. They are satisfied when we are lamenting the state of things, but unhappy when we are satisfied.

I mean, their Sslyth Party Bus commercial is more relevant than it has been for a few years, isn't that worth something?

Seemed to me that their general vibe was “things got a lot better, but there are a lot of things that could have been simpler, the rules interactions are complicated and dense, some things lost a lot of options, they didnt add any new anything to the book other than the “veteran” units, and it’s whack that there are no new models”.
Their dissatisfaction probably stems from being playtesters and knowing what could have been.
They are definitely harsh on it, and even admit they might be too close to the canvas on it.

I mean, I don't agree with them.
I only bemoan the the Archon can only kill marines with the Djinn Blades and that's it.

It seems to me that they are salty about PfP being our mono faction bonus.

Huh, with the Splintermind section being removed I thought it stopped being a thing. I only listened the first half, but they actually had sensible points. It was clear they had a lot of time reflecting on it and obviously Brian was hit since he effectively can't run his Harlequins with Coven anymore.

Still, they are right that removing PfP when doing soup is absolute overkill. The Archon's design has problems and there are other obvious isssues which aren't deal breaking, but wouldn't have taken much effort to change.

I started to agree less and less when I was listening to the podcast in the past, but they really had good points this time.

Thanks, that makes sense.

They are primarily Aeldari players rather than specifically Drukhari.

I tend to agree that the Archon is one of the few misses in our new codex. I'm far less bothered about the PfP, but I think it's tricky balancing a bonus for being mono faction so that it is significant enough to be an incentive to stay within your codex without it feeling that you are crippled if you do soup.

harlokin wrote:

Thanks, that makes sense.

They are primarily Aeldari players rather than specifically Drukhari.

I tend to agree that the Archon is one of the few misses in our new codex. I'm far less bothered about the PfP, but I think it's tricky balancing a bonus for being mono faction so that it is significant enough to be an incentive to stay within your codex without it feeling that you are crippled if you do soup.

well in EVERY other codex its added extra rules they lose, we were privelaged enough to lose our core army rule, SM keep angels of death (5 rules in one), necrons reanimate, deathguard are disgustingly resiliant. But dark eldar get stage fright in front of their extended family

Im miffed because i ran Kabals and wraithhosts (vect would be proud)

Grimcrimm wrote:

harlokin wrote:

Thanks, that makes sense.

They are primarily Aeldari players rather than specifically Drukhari.

I tend to agree that the Archon is one of the few misses in our new codex. I'm far less bothered about the PfP, but I think it's tricky balancing a bonus for being mono faction so that it is significant enough to be an incentive to stay within your codex without it feeling that you are crippled if you do soup.

well in EVERY other codex its added extra rules they lose, we were privelaged enough to lose our core army rule, SM keep angels of death (5 rules in one), necrons reanimate, deathguard are disgustingly resiliant. But dark eldar get stage fright in front of their extended family

Im miffed because i ran Kabals and wraithhosts (vect would be proud)

Hm. While I'm not effected by this I understand your grief.

I'm glad I play mono-true kin.

I have the same problems. I have no clue what to do with my Harlequins now. In my opinion they don't have enough models to make a full army with. Unless you spam a crap of troupes and Starweavers. But I'm not a fan of making the same model 5 times.
I used to run them wil Coven as well. Guess that's over now.

Gelmir wrote:

I have the same problems. I have no clue what to do with my Harlequins now. In my opinion they don't have enough models to make a full army with. Unless you spam a crap of troupes and Starweavers. But I'm not a fan of making the same model 5 times.
I used to run them wil Coven as well. Guess that's over now.

Something says to me that Harlequins are going to have the chance to be insert in any Aeldary Detatchment without breaking any rule.

But it will be something we'll see in the next Harlequins Codex. As they will fix Ynnari in a future Campaign supplement.
It would be totally flavourish.


I would love to see rules like this for Harlequins, GK and IK, three armies that usually fight with others.

Grimcrimm wrote:

harlokin wrote:

Thanks, that makes sense.

They are primarily Aeldari players rather than specifically Drukhari.

I tend to agree that the Archon is one of the few misses in our new codex. I'm far less bothered about the PfP, but I think it's tricky balancing a bonus for being mono faction so that it is significant enough to be an incentive to stay within your codex without it feeling that you are crippled if you do soup.

well in EVERY other codex its added extra rules they lose, we were privelaged enough to lose our core army rule, SM keep angels of death (5 rules in one), necrons reanimate, deathguard are disgustingly resiliant. But dark eldar get stage fright in front of their extended family

Im miffed because i ran Kabals and wraithhosts (vect would be proud)

I am so with you... I wanted to make a patrol with heavily converted CWE and Wraiths.
This sucks to an unnecessary degree.

It's clear that the Splintermind guys have a BIG issue with PfP and I can't say I disagree with them. Losing PfP in many cases makes Drukhari unplayable. This effectively rules out ever taking allies, doubly so for Coven units. It also makes no sense from a lore perspective.

Cerve wrote:

Gelmir wrote:

I have the same problems. I have no clue what to do with my Harlequins now. In my opinion they don't have enough models to make a full army with. Unless you spam a crap of troupes and Starweavers. But I'm not a fan of making the same model 5 times.
I used to run them wil Coven as well. Guess that's over now.

Something says to me that Harlequins are going to have the chance to be insert in any Aeldary Detatchment without breaking any rule.

But it will be something we'll see in the next Harlequins Codex. As they will fix Ynnari in a future Campaign supplement.
It would be totally flavourish.

I would love to see rules like this for Harlequins, GK and IK, three armies that usually fight with others.

I sure hope you're right. And it would indeed fit the lore. Harlequins used to be IN our dex in the past. It sounds silly to suddenly have stagefright in front of them.

Grimcrimm wrote:

well in EVERY other codex its added extra rules they lose, we were privelaged enough to lose our core army rule, SM keep angels of death (5 rules in one), necrons reanimate, deathguard are disgustingly resiliant. But dark eldar get stage fright in front of their extended family

Im miffed because i ran Kabals and wraithhosts (vect would be proud)

SM lose Chapter Tactics, Necrons lose Elimination Protocols, Deathguard lose Aura of Decay. We gained a core army rule we never had before.

While I agree that I'd prefer to keep PfP and lose Blade Artists or whatever it's called, it makes more narrative sense as it is. A single squad of Drukhari aren't going to get whipped up into a battlefield frenzy the same way a whole army does. On the other hand, a single squad of Drukhari still know how to use a knife.

Losing PfP is definitely an issue but it impacts some units more than others. It does very little for Kabalite Warriors and Scourges, only impacts the advance and charge for Incubi, Mandrakes, and Bloodbrides (the latter can be somewhat mitigated with RG obsession). It's nice on our vehicles but not really necessary--especially for Ravagers and Reapers.

It hurts Coven the most though, for sure.

When the other 2 Aeldari races get updated, I wouldn't be surprised to see specialized detachments of Drukhari added in here and there.

I've only listened to the first one so far but I think they made some good points.

I think they're right that PfP is/was a clunky way of getting rules onto dataslates that those dataslates probably should have had in the first place. Especially when it comes to stuff like Advance and Charge - which seems like it's meant to form a core part of our mobility (we used to have it as an army-wide rule for everything bar Covens), and for invulnerable saves.

With the previous book, getting these rules via FNP this was a little clunky but otherwise not really an issue. The real problem is that now PfP goes away entirely if you take allies. So rather than getting a buff if you take a mono-army (like other factions have received) you're instead penalised for taking allies by having your models losing what amounts to core rules.

It seems very much akin to if Harlequins lost Rising Crescendo any time they allied.

There's also a marked difference in terms of which units get affected by this. Covens, Incubi and most Cult units all suffer heavily, but Kabal units, Scourges and vehicles barely even notice. So rather than a roughly even decrease in power, it comes across more like 'these DE units are allowed to ally but not these DE units'.  

There's an additional weirdness in that Black Heart's main bonus is centred around improving PfP. So if you take them as allies, their main bonus improves a rule you no longer get.    

Does any other subfaction in the game have this sort of issue? I guess I just find it weird that this isn't even acknowledged by the book in any way. BH doesn't get any alternative or lesser bonus in allied detachments (e.g. getting PfP without the +1).

I just find myself wondering whether this was a last-minute change where the implications weren't really thought through.

EDIT: One of the reasons I think this will be awkward is that the Ynnari rules now have to give us back some of our core rules in order to even be considered. But this now creates difficulties in terms of what bonuses Ynnari can give without them being redundant for other Eldar. e.g. if Ynnari give Advance and Charge, that will be great for us but Harlequins have it anyway. Likewise, if Ynnari give us a 5++ save, many of our units will be thankful but Harlequins will just sigh.

I hope they have solution for this, it just seems like a difficult situation to be starting from.


All that said, one thing that did surprise me from the podcast was that they seemed to hold BH in quite low regard. Notwithstanding the above issue with allying, I'd considered it one of the strongest subfactions. It gets 3 separate bonuses, the only warlord trait and artefact worth taking among any of the Kabals, and it gets extra synergy and bonuses in an RSR detachment. To me at least it seemed to be one of the strongest Kabals, even with the changes to Agents of Vect.

I'm relatively neutral on this issue. I'm adjusting and accepting what it means. I started by splashing Harlequin now I have a very playable Harlequin army all on its own.
What is bothering me about the PFP table and the idea of losing it is that for factions like DE and Tau, et al, that have no access to psykers - back in 7th the argument was that we had PFP instead of psychics. And it appeased me to think of it that way. That I could get compounding benefits instead of casting spells. Tau, too, have some neat things with experimental systems, and other rules-breaking things. Markerlights, for example, are a neat replacement for psychics.
But, if that's what sold me on how to accept that we have NOTHING in psychics, it is a newly difficult pill to swallow that we lose it the minute a Troupe shows up, or I bring my Wraith Knight (one actually converted to look Dark Eldary).
Selling me on "Your army ability is -1AP when you roll 6's! Rejoice for it is speshul."
No. No it isn't. Not even a little.

edit: and important enough to reiterate: this odd ruling barely affects me from game to game. I play solid DE, pure craftworld, pure Harly almost always. But the idea of it is baffling. Why impose it at all? I really like this PFP table but I'm not over here wringing my hands and twirling my moustaches and laughing maniacally about all the poor bastards that will fall before me because of my compounding awesomeness by turn five.....

Edit 2: Maybe for Ynnari? Maybe this is their way to prevent all Eldar soup unless it's under the Ynnari umbrella? I can almost get behind that - if the Ynnari souping is reworked to make it more all inclusive.

I tend to agree with the Splintermind hosts about changing PfP and the ripple effect is has on our codex. However, I've always known them to be cautiously optimistic or at least playing their armies for the love of the faction and not because of the power.
This, along with the generally positive vibes I am getting from several pre-release articles (Skari, Vanguard Tactics, Goonhammer to name a few) doesn't gel with the general sense of negativity towards the end of the episode.

sekac wrote:

SM lose Chapter Tactics, Necrons lose Elimination Protocols, Deathguard lose Aura of Decay. We gained a core army rule we never had before.

While I agree that I'd prefer to keep PfP and lose Blade Artists or whatever it's called, it makes more narrative sense as it is. A single squad of Drukhari aren't going to get whipped up into a battlefield frenzy the same way a whole army does. On the other hand, a single squad of Drukhari still know how to use a knife.

Losing PfP is definitely an issue but it impacts some units more than others. It does very little for Kabalite Warriors and Scourges, only impacts the advance and charge for Incubi, Mandrakes, and Bloodbrides (the latter can be somewhat mitigated with RG obsession).  It's nice on our vehicles but not really necessary--especially for Ravagers and Reapers.

It hurts Coven the most though, for sure.

When the other 2 Aeldari races get updated, I wouldn't be surprised to see specialized detachments of Drukhari added in here and there.

Chapter Tactics are akin to our Obsessions. Do SM lose Angels of Death when they take other non-SM detachments? I don't believe they do.

DingK wrote:

I tend to agree with the Splintermind hosts about changing PfP and the ripple effect is has on our codex. However, I've always known them to be cautiously optimistic or at least playing their armies for the love of the faction and not because of the power.
This, along with the generally positive vibes I am getting from several pre-release articles (Skari, Vanguard Tactics, Goonhammer to name a few) doesn't gel with the general sense of negativity towards the end of the episode.

sekac wrote:

SM lose Chapter Tactics, Necrons lose Elimination Protocols, Deathguard lose Aura of Decay. We gained a core army rule we never had before.

While I agree that I'd prefer to keep PfP and lose Blade Artists or whatever it's called, it makes more narrative sense as it is. A single squad of Drukhari aren't going to get whipped up into a battlefield frenzy the same way a whole army does. On the other hand, a single squad of Drukhari still know how to use a knife.

Losing PfP is definitely an issue but it impacts some units more than others. It does very little for Kabalite Warriors and Scourges, only impacts the advance and charge for Incubi, Mandrakes, and Bloodbrides (the latter can be somewhat mitigated with RG obsession).  It's nice on our vehicles but not really necessary--especially for Ravagers and Reapers.

It hurts Coven the most though, for sure.

When the other 2 Aeldari races get updated, I wouldn't be surprised to see specialized detachments of Drukhari added in here and there.

Chapter Tactics are akin to our Obsessions. Do SM lose Angels of Death when they take other non-SM detachments? I don't believe they do.

Sorry, I meant Combat Doctrines. The whole devastator/tactical/assault setup.

The "progressive" benefit as the game goes on mechanic. Every army so far loses that if they take allies.

I would say that by the end of their second episode reviewing it, they were pretty down on it, and started pretty down on it. However, listening all the way through, there weren't a ton of things that individually sounded all that bad, and on the whole there was more "this is pretty awesome actually" than there were "this is a thing I hated". It really seems like their bad vibes stem from missed opportunities and probably the frustration of feeling like your feedback is being ignored when you are playtesting something you really care about.

Ripper.McGuirl wrote:

I would say that by the end of their second episode reviewing it, they were pretty down on it, and started pretty down on it. However, listening all the way through, there weren't a ton of things that individually sounded all that bad, and on the whole there was more "this is pretty awesome actually" than there were "this is a thing I hated". It really seems like their bad vibes stem from missed opportunities and probably the frustration of feeling like your feedback is being ignored when you are playtesting something you really care about.

I'm at like 1 hour of the part 1 and they already said "you're not going to play Hellions anyway".

...seriously? I can't say that I'm in line with them...







Ok I almost ended Part1. And I hear that Part2 is even worse.
I don't wanna be THAT guy, really....but jeez.....seems that these guys don't even know 9th edition at all....
Poisoned Tounge is the best Obsession in the book? Goonhammer already shows the maths about it..
"It is better because you just have to shoot, no need to go in melee" IN NINENTH EDITION?! Wtf guys? This is a full melee edition, what kind of game are you playing?
"You're not going to play Hellions", "Coven lost a lot" (we already got the math on AotF vs old PoF).
BlackEarth is weird, it's not a really good Obsession because PoF doesn't affect a lot shooty units....
Did they even 1) know the game; 2) read the book?


I dunno, it seems another edition for them.

Cerve wrote:

I'm at like 1 hour of the part 1 and they already said "you're not going to play Hellions anyway".

...seriously? I can't say that I'm in line with them...







Ok I almost ended Part1. And I hear that Part2 is even worse.
I don't wanna be THAT guy, really....but jeez.....seems that these guys don't even know 9th edition at all....
Poisoned Tounge is the best Obsession in the book? Goonhammer already shows the maths about it..
"It is better because you just have to shoot, no need to go in melee" IN NINENTH EDITION?! Wtf guys? This is a full melee edition, what kind of game are you playing?
"You're not going to play Hellions", "Coven lost a lot" (we already got the math on AotF vs old PoF).
BlackEarth is weird, it's not a really good Obsession because PoF doesn't affect a lot shooty units....
Did they even 1) know the game; 2) read the book?

I still think they made a lot of good points. e.g. I thought their commentary on the Archon's design and the lack of focus was pretty spot on (allowing DE HQs - especially the Archon - to have Master-Crafted pistols, Agonisers etc. would have gone a long way, I think). I also agreed with them about GW often changing an entire rule to fix just one thing - such as changing how Look Out Sir worked because of one problematic interaction, so now you instead have Harlequin Death Jesters and Solitaires don't work at all as they're supposed to.


But yeah, they also said some stuff that definitely surprised me. As you say, it's odd that they don't seem to acknowledge how improved Hellions are now. I also found it strange that they seemed to think BH was weak when it seems like one of the stronger Kabals.

That said, I will defend one thing - I'm pretty sure they didn't say Poison Tongue was the strongest Kabal but rather one of the ones that felt the closest (mechanically) to how they imagined Dark Eldar working. They said this about another one as well but I can't remember which it was.

I haven't really listened to Splintermind in the past (not a big fan of podcasts). Do they ever do battle reports or such? Would be interesting to see what sort of tactics they're using if they're eschewing melee with DE.

Soulless Samurai wrote:

Cerve wrote:

I'm at like 1 hour of the part 1 and they already said "you're not going to play Hellions anyway".

...seriously? I can't say that I'm in line with them...







Ok I almost ended Part1. And I hear that Part2 is even worse.
I don't wanna be THAT guy, really....but jeez.....seems that these guys don't even know 9th edition at all....
Poisoned Tounge is the best Obsession in the book? Goonhammer already shows the maths about it..
"It is better because you just have to shoot, no need to go in melee" IN NINENTH EDITION?! Wtf guys? This is a full melee edition, what kind of game are you playing?
"You're not going to play Hellions", "Coven lost a lot" (we already got the math on AotF vs old PoF).
BlackEarth is weird, it's not a really good Obsession because PoF doesn't affect a lot shooty units....
Did they even 1) know the game; 2) read the book?

I still think they made a lot of good points. e.g. I thought their commentary on the Archon's design and the lack of focus was pretty spot on (allowing DE HQs - especially the Archon - to have Master-Crafted pistols, Agonisers etc. would have gone a long way, I think). I also agreed with them about GW often changing an entire rule to fix just one thing - such as changing how Look Out Sir worked because of one problematic interaction, so now you instead have Harlequin Death Jesters and Solitaires don't work at all as they're supposed to.


But yeah, they also said some stuff that definitely surprised me. As you say, it's odd that they don't seem to acknowledge how improved Hellions are now. I also found it strange that they seemed to think BH was weak when it seems like one of the stronger Kabals.

That said, I will defend one thing - I'm pretty sure they didn't say Poison Tongue was the strongest Kabal but rather one of the ones that felt the closest (mechanically) to how they imagined Dark Eldar working. They said this about another one as well but I can't remember which it was.

I haven't really listened to Splintermind in the past (not a big fan of podcasts). Do they ever do battle reports or such? Would be interesting to see what sort of tactics they're using if they're eschewing melee with DE.

I agree with your points. I mean, it is true tha the Codex have some issues (PfP that doesn't work with allies, an ALL the toughts they have on it, for example, or the Archon that seems lacking a bit). But overall I can't stand their focus on the Codex. It still one of the best works of GW in my opinion (I would say that this codex brings me memories about 3th Chaos Codex..), and....you know what? It seems to me that they didn't know the 9th at all. I mean they sounds so happy about the shooting part, when this edition is all about fight on objectives, and huge blos on the table. I can't get it.

It scares me because these were the PLAYTESTERS for this edition. And one of them neither plays this army, is a Craftworld player, wtf..? You could have Skari, Lawrence, Nanavati, Siegler, Lennon, Box (which admit that Drukhari were his first army at all), so...yeah I don't get it.

One of the things that they also mentioned, that I struggle with as well, is how goddamn complicated all the interactions are. That is partly my issue with 8th/9th in general, where I can’t look at a unit and know what it does without knowing 57 other things that alter it. I do think it is most noticeable on the archon. “If you upgrade him, take this obsession, take that warlord trait, take this relic, build your army this way, and put him near these units (but not those ones), he’s a badass!”. There are a lot of things in the book like that. When I look at Poisoned Tongue, I think “woah that one is the best” because it just works and is easy to remember. I get lost when the answer is “well, yeah, but if you take these two custom obsessions and combine them, and keep track of 6’s to hit and wound, and put them in a raider with splinter racks....” etc etc.
Again, this is my issue with the recent editions (which also do tooonnnss of stuff that are improvements on previous editions), snd it seems extra prevalent in this book. So on that front, and on feeling generally neglected by there only being one updated model, I tend to agree with them.
But also, frak it, let me roll two drugs on my 20 man unit of hellions and go cause some mayhem!