Why does Battlecry make the FC immune to Knockback?

[Oddnerd]

Hi all,

Title says it all - what is the balance reason for battlecry conferring knockback immunity?

When a FC manages to close the gap with your army (especially once he has his T2 telespammer combo), knockback abilities like a shotgun blast are usually the fastest and most reliable form of crowd control. When I play IG and he teleports into my army with hammer in hand, I can't even count on my catachans to knock him back and buy me a couple seconds. The suppression helps, but its the knockback that would help create that critical distance between him and any of your many infantry models.

Lots of melee heroes would benefit from knockback immunity on demand, what makes the FC special in this case?

[Torpid]

So that he can actually counter melee?

[Paranoid Kamikaze]

The FC is purely melee (Unless T3 Termie) and even only buffs in melee (Unless T1 Stormshield that no one gets in 1v1's or T2 banner). He needs to be in melee so he has knockback immunity with his default ability.

You could always go Eldar and make an Autarch that knocks back everything including heroes with shields and knockback immune abilities.

[Kvn]

You could always go Eldar and make an Autarch that knocks back everything including heroes with shields and knockback immune abilities.

Autarch doesn't do that. She's only got weapon knockback.

[Ace of Swords]

Hi all,

Title says it all - what is the balance reason for battlecry conferring knockback immunity?

When a FC manages to close the gap with your army (especially once he has his T2 telespammer combo), knockback abilities like a shotgun blast are usually the fastest and most reliable form of crowd control. When I play IG and he teleports into my army with hammer in hand, I can't even count on my catachans to knock him back and buy me a couple seconds. The suppression helps, but its the knockback that would help create that critical distance between him and any of your many infantry models.

Lots of melee heroes would benefit from knockback immunity on demand, what makes the FC special in this case?

Because otherwise battlecry would be useless, he already has an hard time using it with anything that's not the thunderhammer if you add in knockbacks any melee squad will kill him like it's nothing, considering he's also not as tanky as a WB and lacks suppression immunity like a CL/HT.

[Ace of Swords]

You could always go Eldar and make an Autarch that knocks back everything including heroes with shields and knockback immune abilities.

Autarch doesn't do that. She's only got weapon knockback.

paranoid is referring to her combat leap, it's similar to the one the warlock has except it supposely KBs everything (but I think thi should be checked I do remember her KBing BC'ed FCs but that could've been due to a late activation of the BC or similar stuff, this needs labbing).

[Torpid]

Unless recently changed it still knocks back through shields.

In fact it isn't just the autarch, the Avenger Exarchs do it too - they knock back my damn lord commissar all the time. Very bizarre.

[egewithin]

When I play IG and he teleports into my army with hammer in hand, I can't even count on my catachans to knock him back and buy me a couple seconds. The suppression helps, but its the knockback that would help create that critical distance between him and any of your many infantry models.

Now we must focus on this issue, IG has no real counter for this. Teleporter + Thunderhammer combo is just too good for IG. I know we already nerfed the hammer knockback but still, this combo can basicily shut down entire IG army.

Any ideas how to fix it?

[Ace of Swords]

When I play IG and he teleports into my army with hammer in hand, I can't even count on my catachans to knock him back and buy me a couple seconds. The suppression helps, but its the knockback that would help create that critical distance between him and any of your many infantry models.

Now we must focus on this issue, IG has no real counter for this. Teleporter + Thunderhammer combo is just too good for IG. I know we already nerfed the hammer knockback but still, this combo can basicily shut down entire IG army.

Any ideas how to fix it?

chimera

[Cyris]

Any ideas how to fix it?

Sentinel stomp.
HWT further back (presumably the FC is porting into your GM blob).
Split GM after FC teleports.
Retreat GM and execute.
Send GM inside Chimera.
Cata shotgun for the suppression.
MOST IMPORTANT: Keep tabs on the FC. If you see him get these upgrades, keep track of his health/energy. He's at his most dangerous when his health and energy are full. At this time, be on constant vigil - keep your squads separated, keep CC handy, be ready to retreat squads etc. While the FC is very powerful during this big initiate moment, he can't do it again for quite a while. He also can't teleport infinite distance, so keep a sense of where he might be in the fog of war, and how to position your army to compensate for it.

These are basically all ways to stall the FC till Battlecry ends. There is no need to "fix" this. This is the FC's moment of awesome, it cost him a decent amount of req/power to get, costs his whole energy bar, and is rather predictable. Yes, it is very strong. But no, it does not need nerfs. The tracking special was OP, but splitting after he teleports does quite well now. Yes, he will likely force off at least 1 squad. Yes he will likely get kills. Accept this, mitigate it as best you can, and counter. Zone his army from following up. Focus fire him while he's largely immobile. Retreat to a new position, then re-engage after BC is over.

These are comparable to what races besides IG does to counter the FC (split army, avoid blobbing when the FC is ready to initiate, throw a bit of CC at him then kite, retreat squads before taking too many losses). I find him super scary as nids too, and that's even with Toxin Sacs. Eldar have it worse imo, since the DA bleeding hurts much worse then gaunts or GM. Get Mind War if FS and Entangling Web if WSE.

[egewithin]

When I play IG and he teleports into my army with hammer in hand, I can't even count on my catachans to knock him back and buy me a couple seconds. The suppression helps, but its the knockback that would help create that critical distance between him and any of your many infantry models.

Now we must focus on this issue, IG has no real counter for this. Teleporter + Thunderhammer combo is just too good for IG. I know we already nerfed the hammer knockback but still, this combo can basicily shut down entire IG army.

Any ideas how to fix it?

chimera

So yo uare saying that Chimera is a no branier? And Chimera is a MUST? What about without Chimera? Thankfully Cyris is here...

[Ace of Swords]

Now we must focus on this issue, IG has no real counter for this. Teleporter + Thunderhammer combo is just too good for IG. I know we already nerfed the hammer knockback but still, this combo can basicily shut down entire IG army.

Any ideas how to fix it?

chimera

So yo uare saying that Chimera is a no branier? And Chimera is a MUST? What about without Chimera? Thankfully Cyris is here...

Yes it is, it's a center point of the IG army against anyone that can field AoE, it's your counter to nukes, it's the counter to battlecry it's the counter to a lot of stuff and it is a must in every game vs SM for the sheer amount of pressure it puts on the SM which won't be able to kill it without over-investing in AV due to the dps of plasma GMs and their repair rate this should be obvious by now it's been like this since retribution came out and nothing that cyris listed is a reliable counter the only other thing usable is an HWT in a bunker but that can only work on certain maps like calderis 1v1 and is still unreliable because you can't select the target.

[lolzarz]

Because all of the other melee heroes are either immune to weapon knockback in the first place (Chaos Lord, Brother-Captain, Hive Tyrant) or can buy a charge (Ork warboss). All of them also have suppression immunity and can walk through cover, which the force commander doesn't have. The catachans don't do knockback to the above 3 in any scenario and the warboss gets very substantial buffs after the charge. I don't see what's wrong.

[boss]

battlecry fine for the fc only thing that's wrong is the hammer teleport combo way to easy to use and wipe squads or their just forced to press x and hope thay don't lose stuff or bait into setup team which only happened once then they wise up. transports work well vs this put then power fist but at least that's cost a lot to buy. battlecry fine just the hammer teleport combo