Continuing along with our coverage of this month's Battlescroll, this article (as you probably guessed and likely the reason you clicked on it) covers all of the Destruction factions, what they now have, or lost, and how they're looking into the fresh new meta. 

Gloomspite Gitz

Key Changes

• Appropriate increases on Squig Herd and Squig Boss.
• Necessary drops on spiders and Mangler Squigs.
• Loonboss on Giant Cave Squig and Squigboss with Gnasha-squig become Moonclan Agitators.

Being able to take a Squigboss in another regiment and then give him the +2” move for infantry buff is very good, making it easier for himself to keep pace with a Squig Herd to keep buffing them; with careful placement you’ll get that buff on some accompanying Rockgut Troggoths as well to make them much quicker. On the other hand Loonbosses on Giant Cave Squigs being able to do this isn’t anything to write home about but can be a way to take one and stay lower-drop.

Squig Herd has finally gone up in cost. But only just! Up 10 points is incredibly minor on this unit and won’t stop players taking two reinforced units of them; it might stop the spam of five or six reinforced units, however. Squigbosses similarly have gone up 20 points which is fair since they’re what makes a Squig Herd so good by adding Crit Mortals to their attacks. I’m a bit confused as to why the Dankhold Troggboss had to get more expensive here, it’s only 10 points but on an already-expensive monster, especially given the lack of ward and no ability to gain one; maybe this is in response to the new Prized Beast Honour Guard ability where a Troggboss could join Trugg’s regiment and be on +1 to hit all game? Seems a little too niche for a points increase when Bodyguard is still going to be a better pick nearly every time. 

On the drops-side of this scroll all big spiders, Mangler Squigs, and both types of Fanatics are down in cost. Good! None of these have seen much play because they’re just expensive and not great. Mangler Squigs see the heftiest drops coming down a whole 40 points on both variants; does this make them cheap enough to take? Hard to say, the Loonboss has also changed to give a +1 to hit instead of +1 to wound once per game which will actually help squigs out a lot. So maybe you’ll see the character version on tables. I doubt it, it’s still 220 points for a unit with 5+ armour save, 14 health, and no ward. Dies a little too easily from ranged threats. 

Overall these are good changes and while they’ve meant I’ve had to change up my list considerably to get back to something I’m happy with it’s a good thing for the game as a whole. Squig Herd still feel cheap when they get to do their thing but they’re also easy enough to kill that 220 points for a reinforced unit is probably about right. 

Bonesplitterz

Key Changes

• Hahahahaha.
• No, seriously, there's literally nothing.

o7

Orruk Megaboss. Credit: Rich Nutter

Ironjawz

Key Changes

• Points drops on characters and Maw-Gruntas.
• Tuskboss on Maw-grunta can now join Gordrakk/Maw-Krusha’s regiment as a Tusk-Wrangler.
• Zoggrok Anvilsmasha gains the Headstompa role.
• Minor wording update on Maw-gruntas’ Unstoppable Momentum ability.

Not much for the beleaguered Ironjawz here, although not too surprising given that we’ve had the trailer for the new Orruk Warclans book and can assume it’s not too far away. Of the biggest significance here is the addition of a keyword to let a Tuskboss on Maw-grunta join a regiment lead by either Gordrakk or the generic Megaboss on Maw-Krusha. Combined with the new Prized Beast Honour Guard ability for a permanent +1 to hit buff on all of its weapons, and a 20 point drop (paired with a 40/50 point drop on the Krusha/Gordrakk), that’s a pretty tempting offer. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still not incredible, but permanently fixing a bit of Ironjawz’ hitting-on-fours disease is definitely welcome and we’ll take what we can get.

Elsewhere, Zoggrok Anvilsmasha (and Klonk!) can now join Gordrakk and both flavours of Megaboss as an in-regiment hero. This maybe opens up him being included with the Field Sergeant upgrade to speed up a bunch of Brutes or Ardboyz, but a buff based on a dice roll and a firm 180 point price mean that there are plenty of other things vying for your points budget.

Rounding out the points changes, the Megaboss on foot dropped by 20, which is welcome given he’s an auto-include in most lists that contain Brutes, and the Ardboy Big Boss dropped by 10 to 120 points, still not enough to ever consider taking him outside of the most dedicated Ardboyz skew list. Alongside the Tuskboss’ 20 point drop, the Maw-grunta Gouger and Maw-grunta with Hakkin’ Krew go down by 10 and 20 points, respectively.

Finally, all three Maw-grunta units get a minor update to their Unstoppable Momentum ability, now triggering when they actually make a Charge move rather than when they use the Charge ability. Just some tidying up to make sure they don’t build up momentum points by failing charges.

Murknob with Belcha-banna. That Gobbo

Kruleboys

Key Changes

• Points drops on a few things.
• Murknob with Belcha-banna becomes a Mob Wrangler.
• Swamp Beast is a thing now.

Small changes here. Skumdrekk and both types of Killaboss go down 20 points, and Gobsprakk gets 30 points cheaper. Slittaz drop to 90 points per 10, which is a nice cheap screen, and the Sloggoth drops to 150.

The main changes here are about getting Kruleboyz mostly hero-based monsters into regiments not as the leader, to take advantage of the new Prized Beast ability. To that end, the Breaka-boss on Mirebrute Troggoth, generic Vulcha, and Snatchaboss on Sludgeraker Beast get the new Swamp Beast role, allowing them to join Gobsprakk’s regiment. The Killaboss on Great Gnashtoof also gets it for some reason, despite not being a monster. The Murknob also gains the Mob Wrangler role, letting him join various other heroes’ regiments without taking up a precious regiment slot. Not huge changes overall; if I had to guess I’d suggest some people are going to save enough points for an extra unit of Hobgrot Slittaz to screen with. The Sludgeraker is a nice target for Prized Beast’s hit buff, and the Murknob is quite a good choice for a Field Sergeant, given the huge amount of Gutrippaz we’re seeing in most lists.

Photo credit: keewa

Ogor Mawtribes

Key Changes

• Monsters add 2 to Trampling Charge rolls.
• Lower chant values on Call the Blizzard and Pulverising Hailstorm.
• More hero-in-regiment options to use new Honour Guard abilities.

Those prayers were pretty difficult to chant reliably on a 10+ so moving down to a 4+ means you should be getting them out turn two with relative ease, especially if you add in a Magical Intervention; just don’t roll a 1! Huskards on Stonehorns and Thundertusks, as well as Icebrow Hunters, can be a Voice of the Everwinter to join a Frostlord's (either mount) regiment. This opens up both Icebrow and Bloodpelt Hunters to be a Field Sergeant for extra movement on your infantry units as well as Huskards to be a Prized Beast. Extra mortal damage on the charge with Trampling Charge is nice to see, too, meaning that it will never fail and do between 5-6 mortal damage every time in a Beast Handlers army. Whether you’re building towards an infantry or monster heavy list will determine which of the two Honour Guard abilities you’re trying to take and I don’t love that for the extra movement you’re needing to take a Hunter and having to deploy and use him a certain way. 

The monster side of the army is definitely looking at a lot better being able to take fewer regiments while having Huskards for prayers. You could now field six Stonehorns (two of each kind) plus a Thundertusk Beastrider at 2000 points, and if you manage to get all seven monsters charging then that’s between 35 and 45 points of mortal damage before you’ve made any attack rolls; that includes one of the Frostlords’ rampage doing D3 on a 3+ roll on the top end of damage. Of course with those base sizes those won’t all be going into the same unit (unless it’s huge and spread out) but is a devastating amount of damage in one go. Being a two regiment army you have every chance of forcing your opponent to go first as well. If you happen to own seven monsters give this a go and please let me know how it goes, I’m dead curious. 

Mancrusher Gargants. Credit: Fowler

Sons of Behemat

Key Changes

• Mancrusher points drops.
• Extra attacks for all Mega-Gargants.
• Prized Beast on a Mega-Gargant! 

Mancrushers and Mancrusher Mobs drop 30 points each making them much easier to take in some lists that involve more expensive big-guys like Kragnos and Brodd. All of the Mega-Gargants get two additional stomp attacks helping their damage output and the Beast-smasher gets an extra attack with his damage 5 club. Sons of Behemat have always been a very weird skew army, like Imperial Knights in 40k or Horus Heresy, turning the game into a stat-check: can your opponent dish out enough damage or not? 

One very good thing here is giving a Mega-Gargant the Prized Beast Honour Guard ability for a permanent +1 to hit, which is nice, but even better: ignoring the Battle Damaged ability to keep maximum control score until death. That’s nuts and can easily swing games on its own. 

That all said it might still be better to simply take four megas in a King Brodd's Stomp list but I really like the idea of four little individual Mancrushers running around helping out with battle tactics and on weirder battleplans like Starstrike and The Vice. 

The Regiment of Renown version of each of these Mega-Gargants did get 30 points cheaper which is nice, making it a little easier to slot into your existing non-Sons army. 

The list I’m eyeing up now is:

1. King Brodd
   • Beast-smasher Mega-Gargant (Monstrously Tough, Kingslaughter Cowl)
   • Mancrusher
2. Gate Breaker Mega-Gargant (or other mega of choice)
   • Mancrusher
   • Mancrusher
   • Mancrusher

More Updates

This isn't all of it! There's further updates for just about every faction which we're splitting up down the nearly-gone Grand Alliance matrix. Check out the rest of our coverage here.

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