Eversor Assassin - Feedback required

[Caeltos]

Hello everyone, and welcome to the Eversor Assassin feedback thread.

As you might know, The Eversor Assassin model is currently in the works, and generously made by Lost Son of Nikhel. And this unit, quite funny enough - was drafted by me a long time ago as a unit that I wanted to make in, but he never quite made the cut.

He was originally planned to be an IG sub-commander, and I fiddled with the Vindicare Assassin, but ultimately scrapped that and he became a mini-sub commander for the Grey Knights instead. And in the end, Imperial Guard recieved the Artillery Spotters and the Kaskrins.

Now, with things that are being planned for the future installments - That being the Dreadknights, and the potential for UI optimization that could potentially allow us to make Grey Knights their own respective selectable faction, rather than utilize a placeholder for Space Marine 4th commander, we can explore the possibilities of giving GK's more flexible and specialized commanders.

As with that, the Brother-Captain would serve as a mainline frontline supportive-melee commander. He has the potential to do abit of everything. Similiar to the terms of the Force Commander to some degree. Altho, more lackluster on the anti-vehicle department.

The Eversor Assassin is recieving two different concepts. One being that of a single-entity unit that I am either planning to be;

Concept 1 (Sub-ideas)
A) Buildable (Abit of an overbundance of commanders maybe, so it needs to be explored abit on the general idea, and if it's viable to get all of those commanders in general)
B) Replace Flamestrike(Flamefury?) global-call in with Eversor-Assassin call in. (This goes hand-in-hand with their fluff of being called-in via specialized drop-pods)

Concept 2 (Commander)
The Commander Eversor Assassin relies more heavily on shock-tactics, more akin to the Lictor Alpha, or Warp Spider Exarch. However, being more of a potent melee fighter with alot of high-risk & high reward scenarios. This concept allows us to explore the concept of the unit with his combat drugs, and self-exploding overload of drugs and specialize in how GK's players would prefer to play.

Q: But Caeltos the Eversor Assassin is not really that much of a commanding-unit of the Grey Knights!

Well, true - but neither is an Apothecary I suppose. You have the complimentary Librarian as a commanding unit I guess? Or the Brother-Captain is having a tea-party elsewhere and commanding from a safe-distance. Go wild with your imagination.

Either way, I'd like to hear what you people prefer this unit to be. But be elaborate with your feedback. For say, if we add it as a unit, what kind of role would he actually fullfill in that department, and in what tier?

My personal opinion and gut-feeling is going with a commander. It'll give more variation in how you play as, and against Grey Knights. Seeing as how pivital and important the Brother-Captain is to certain units, we'll be able to shift and make playstyles more unique depending on their commander preference. Unique doesn't have to neccasarily mean for the better, but that's abit of a balance concern, and hench why I've stuck with abit of a high-risk & high-reward unit concept to ease up some of those restrains, also keeping it abit true to some of the GK's overall gameplay element to be abit more intense, ability dependant and alike.

Anyways, what are your thoughts?

[Orkfaeller]

While I'd love to see new commanders for Grey Knights, I dont think I'd want to see the Eversor filling that role.

Especially since we allready got the Vindicare, another Assassins established as a Sub Commander.

While I actually dislike the overall addition of sub commanders I feel this is a character that was ment to be just a sub commander.

A powerful one-man unit that just doesnt really fit into a commanding position and propably doesnt offer enough wargear options in the background that they need to be a commander here to represent them properly.

I'd prefer the actual GK Commander slots to be saved for the potential addition of an Inquisitor or a member of the Ecclesiarchy.

[sk4zi]

yet as i postet right now i think ig has really enough stuff. so i would like to see him as a call in sub commander for GK but it should be a decicion between the iversor and the vindicare.

so i agree with orkfäller

are you planning to add the calidus assasin as well?
its imho the coolest of them.

[Raffa]

Ok lore-wise I accept, he should be a normal unit, and contrary to some beliefs I'm not totally anti-lore. You can also argue (as I've done) that GK T3 should have something other than Terminators and a Land Raider.

But from game perspective, there's just so many reasons to go for the commander option. The Brother-Captain right now is trying to all-in-one be a support commander, tank or brawler depending on what you choose and he's by far the least specialized commander by default. There's a lot that can be done with him turning him into more a tank/support hero, at the expense of some damage-dealing potential, if an Eversor is added. Alternatively he works right now, so at the very least nothing gets compromised by adding another hero since you can only take one.

3 sub-commanders gets a big no no from me, I mean come on when the race only has 1 hero you wanna add another sub? lulz. I know people don't like the Libby but he's worth keeping and has his uses (if only vs Chaos), but if you were intending to replace him with the Eversor that would be the best solution as a unit.

But this pretty much sums up for me why Eversor is better as a hero:

It'll give more variation in how you play as, and against Grey Knights. Seeing as how pivital and important the Brother-Captain is to certain units, we'll be able to shift and make playstyles more unique depending on their commander preference.

The Commander Eversor Assassin relies more heavily on shock-tactics, more akin to the Lictor Alpha, or Warp Spider Exarch. However, being more of a potent melee fighter with alot of high-risk & high reward scenarios. This concept allows us to explore the concept of the unit with his combat drugs, and self-exploding overload of drugs and specialize in how GK's players would prefer to play.

There's lots of potential for building him like this, and I'm pretty sure (from the BL book I read about assassins trying to kill Horus) there's a lot of variety in the Eversor's gear and tools, oh plus there's just so much more you can do with a hero. On a race that needs another hero

[Caeltos]

While I'd love to see new commanders for Grey Knights, I dont think I'd want to see the Eversor filling that role.

Especially since we allready got the Vindicare, another Assassins established as a Sub Commander.

While I actually dislike the overall addition of sub commanders I feel this is a character that was ment to be just a sub commander.

A powerful one-man unit that just doesnt really fit into a commanding position and propably doesnt offer enough wargear options in the background that they need to be a commander here to represent them properly.

I'd prefer the actual GK Commander slots to be saved for the potential addition of an Inquisitor or a member of the Ecclesiarchy.

The Wargears are not a problem for the Eversor Assassin. They are fairly easy, and they offer a nice interaction with the rest of the Grey Knight army in-matter of fact. Espicially since I've been looking through the fluff/tabletop for inspiration.

Essentially when you think about the Eversor Assassin is the general ideas for wargear;

- Combat Drugs (Fury, Terminus, Destroyer) - Each one can be explored as a wargear
- Their modifications in their DNA/Body/All that shaningans , etc - fast reactions
- Last-attempt Self-Explode element (Since we can alterate the cost of repurchasing commanders, this gives it more value and room for exploring as well)

And with not being in a commanding position, like I said - you'll have to give it abit of an excuse for the sake of gameplay. Instead of having a commander present, YOU are the commander, or something along those lines. All said and done, the fluff interpretation has to step aside on this topic.

The most important is the gameplay and how it feels. For an ex. how the a Commander- Eversor Assassin would interact with his army would be, for a wargear that has this ability;

Terminus
The Eversor Assassin becomes invulnerable to all damage, but quickly loses energy for the course of duration. Should he go below 25 energy, he will explode in a violent fashion, taking down any units in his area.

This encourages you to utilize the energy funneling mechanics of the Grey Knights. It has the potential to allow the Eversor Assassin to be the one-man army, and at the same time can reward players to interact with their commander and their units. It also leads to the potential for counterplay with dealing with the Strike Squad to cause an explosion on the Eversor Assassin. But he needs to be position everything accordingly, so in the case Eversor Assassin doesn't blow him up in the process.

Just that element alone makes him stick out, and makes up for some funny moments, and potential intense moments as well.

Either way, The Inquisitior Lord is 100% guaranteeed to be a commander.

[BaptismByLoli]

I'd vote for Concept 2 and not Concept 1 Btw can we have a voting option here as well?

Reason

1. Why not Concept 1?

• Grey Knights don't need another, 'Sub-Commander'

Grey Knights already have the Librarian and Vindicare Assassin. Now, imagine a GK player fielding a Librarian to shroud the Eversor as he goes in for the kill if not for the Damage resistance offered by Infiltration. Combine that with Bro Cap's Ward, Mind Blades and We Are The Hammer ability. Add in a Vindicare to help either
A) Soften them up
B) Pressure Walkers, Vehicles etc
And finally, let's not forgot that we have other unit as well like Double SS, Interceptors, Termies etc. This kind of composition is gonna be ridiculous to overcome IMO. Especially if the GK player knows what he's doing. It'll make suppression teams all the more riskier vs GK.

• Melee Build GK's will now be more of a pain

Right, pretty premature but when you say Eversor Assassin, I think T3 Lictor. A fragile, high melee dps model. Add that with other Tanky GK units, Bro Cap buffs, and units such as disrupting Interceptors and/or tanky Terminator variants and I promise you, Eversor won't have a problem getting down and dirty with the enemies of the Imperium. This makes fragile range-based army such as IG or Eldar a tough MU vs GK. Because simply put, they now have simply too many Melee Stuff to contend with and Catas, Shees and Ogryns just ain't gonna make the cut when Plasma SS/IST are firing at Ogryns/Banshee/Catas who are busy fighting off Bro Cap, Eversor, Interceptors. It's just too much mid-game pressure IMO unless he tries something radical like double shury and (double) rangers. Not sure how IG is gonna fight that off though unless it's the Inqui. The Eversor will just be putting some serious pressure on Melee Units and at tieing up range units painfully, especially when supported

1. Why Concept 2?

• Innovation

Sounds like a BS reason I know but honestly, to me, certain build complement certain Commander perfectly. And by adding in a sneaky melee assassin as Commander who will surely be good at harassing, capping or tieing up stuff yet be extremely fragile as compared to Bro Cap, this will cause other players to instead focus more on what to get next instead of just the trip IST build off the gate. They'll be forced to try new builds such as Interceptors for Line Breaker rather than the speed buffed Bro Cap, Rhino to help tank damage and kite Melee units like Sluggas or Banshee's etc rather than the Bro Cap who can very easily stand toe-to-toe with them.

[Forestradio]

I would prefer a commander.

3 sub-commanders is a big no-no. Too much potential for overlapping buffs, and too much non-bleeding entities that inflict a lot of bleed on your opponent. You could argue that investing in only single entities is a high risk, high reward strategy that punishes you hard for losing units, but it still doesn't sit well with me.

I know people don't like the Libby

I can honestly say that I prefer the GK libby over the Vindicare and use him more often.

[lolzarz]

What I'd suggest is promote our Grey Knights Librarian to commander and let Eversor take his place. A blood-crazed assassin who can't even control his own mental faculties is in no condition to command an army. The Librarian, on the other hand, is an intelligent and respected battle-brother.

[Indrid]

I think he could work either way quite well.

I know that many of us think of them as "commanders", which is perhaps perpetuated by myself since I refer to them as such in commentary, they're actually referred to as "heroes" in-game iirc. A clever terminology use my Relic which opened up a lot of less fluffy choices of leaders - Mekboy, LA, RA, WSE, KN, Apo etc - while all having the possibility of being powerful characters in the fluff, they're very seldom associated with leading forces and giving orders. You could argue that the role of an assassin would completely eliminate even the possibility of this, which is a fair point.

The Eversor is a good choice for a commander/hero slot because it gives some really nice wargear options as Caeltos said. They have a myriad of associated weapons, bio-modifications, surgical enhancements, drugs and so on. A lot that you could play with. Remember - just because it's not in the TT Codex, doesn't mean it's not in the entirety of the vast WH40k Universe. Obviously, you want to avoid things that go fundamentally against fluff, but things that suit the theme and background are fine IMO, even if they are not directly findable in any source. Lots of characters in novels and background materials use/have/are unique things - that's how you create interesting characters! Look at Yarrick - uses a xenos power claw and fires lasers out of his eye. If the LC hero had those options in retail without it already being established by Yarrick, people would scratch their heads without thinking of the obvious story element behind it (ie he killed an Ork and took it, the eye is to replace an eye he lost).

Back to the Eversor - it would be nice to see him have a unique mechanic that used his drop-pod in some way. I'm pretty excited by the SMA (which Caeltos is not involved with, iirc) because it's gonna be probably using mechanics that no other commander has.

But yeah, looking forward to it. LSON has done a great job with the model so far.

[Torpid]

Commander please, GK need more versatility in that respect and I don't really like the idea of yet another subcommander for them, that would be the most obnoxious thing to fight against ever.

[Cheah18]

are you planning to add the calidus assasin as well?
its imho the coolest of them.

*Culexus

I will not stop harping on about that until he's in the game, just a heads up

----

If we were to make Eversor a sub-commander (which makes more sense then having him as a commander to me) then couldn't we have it so you can only get him OR vindicare? And not both? like GuO and Phobos

[Atlas]

The example Caeltos gave me was a really cool idea. Would like to see Eversor commander.

[Ar-Aamon]

That's an easy call:

What I'd suggest is promote our Grey Knights Librarian to commander and let Eversor take his place. A blood-crazed assassin who can't even control his own mental faculties is in no condition to command an army. The Librarian, on the other hand, is an intelligent and respected battle-brother.

The hellfury replacement is an nice idea.

Why did you dropped the idea to implement the Eversor Assassin in the IG? They are in need of a melee brawler.

[L0thar]

I'm pretty excited by the SMA (which Caeltos is not involved with, iirc) because it's gonna be probably using mechanics that no other commander has.

Wait, SMA? What is it referring to?

[Caeltos]

SMA = Spore Mine Alpha

I have no interactions with that.

[Lost Son of Nikhel]

I would prefer to have as GK commander a GK Librarian instead of the Eversor Assassin, keeping this as a subcommander for GK, maybe exclusive with the Vindicare Assassin. But well, it would requiere fuckton of changes to make that.

Maybe we can call him "Eversor Primus" or something like that.

[Raffa]

Spore Mine Alpha a.k.a. Hexilium.

But seriously, lolwut.

[Aertes]

I completely diagree with the commander option. That will put him above the Vindicare when they are supposed to be similar, just specialized in different ways of killing.

On the other hand, it has just the same sense than the Tiranids Lictor Alpha or Ravener Alpha: none, but those do exist and by the time Dow II came out the Tyranid Prime and the Broodlord (much more acurate heroes for tiranids) existed and where ignored by THQ.

I agree with Nikhel completely: upgrade the GK Librarian to hero and use his T2 slot for the Eversor assassin. It wouldn't requiere that many changes: he could "should) take the Warding Staff and Vortex of Doom options from the Brother-Captain and then fill the rest of his options.

[Torpid]

Indrid already addressed that issue. They're not commanders, they're heroes who get commander armour

Seriously though, the default warboss is inferior in combat to the painboy. The hero at the start doesn't need to be the be all, end all of combat capabilities, it's just a hero to have in your army right from the get go. The lictor alpha (whatever that is) is often less useful than an actual T3 lictor even when he has wargear.

[Aertes]

I'd go with Concept 1 (Buildable); but I don't dispose the Concept 2 (Commander)

If the Eversor were to be a Global Ability, then yet another Global should be replaced to put the Vindicare Assassin there.

I think Assassins should all be treated alike, each of them useful for different situations: Vindicare as shooter against heavy infantry and Eversor as melee fighter against mobs. Then there would be the Culexus as short range shooter and energy sapper and Callidus as anti-hero infiltrator. But well, we have Alpha Raveners and Warp Spdier Exarchs in the game... why not an Assassin commander and if it's the easier option...

[Cheah18]

Then there would be the Culexus as short range shooter and energy sapper...

Me again... don't forget the Culexus's passive effect on beings due to his blankness and wargear. Can have debuffing effects on the enemy and stuff.

[ChrisNihilus]

I completely agree for the Eversor as a Commander.

The Eversor is one of the best and most interesting option available for a Commander.

[Caeltos]

I swear, if I see more post about Culexus Assassin, I'm going to shove a wrench up someones arse.

Stick to the topic.

[Orkfaeller]

So, about that Callidus Assassin...

_________


If you went about that global / subcommander option. Are we actually talking about Drop Pods? I couldnt really find anything on that. Does anyone know if they use the same over all thing as Space Marines?

[Aertes]

A -cough-lexus assassin would be a nice add to...

Seriously. The Eversor as commander hero doesn't sound that bad, considering other commander hero options that THQ made official, but I'd try to keep that as a last chance option in case the Buildable concept can't be arranged properly.

[Broodwich]

Def new commandah, either this everquest guy or promote the librarian

[sk4zi]

i really dont believe that a grey knight space marine would take orders form a normal human. even if he had that assasin training.

so actually the idea to make him a commander is just fluffraping.

i dont like that.

[Orkfaeller]

Assassins are not normal humans.
They are about as human as space marines.

[Lulgrim]

Assassins are still pretty far from Spess. Anyway GK would sort of spit even on normal Space Marines so having non GK in a very prominent role seems out of place.

Even if the heroes in DoW2 are NOT COMMANDERS.

[Raffa]

i really dont believe that a grey knight space marine would take orders form a normal human. even if he had that assasin training.

so actually the idea to make him a commander is just fluffraping.

i dont like that.

...

Have you even read the thread?

:facepalm: