Lore of Beasts vs. heavens

About to finalize a List for a tournament in two weeks  (open list, no changes to your list adter submission to the organizers). Local meta suggests there will be a lot of elves (high, dark, wood) appearing, and a lot of magic spam.

Would like some input on which lore to take for my SM. i have a lv2 butcher carrying the hellheart and using Maw, and the SM has glittering scales, scroll and gruts sickle.  i'm on the fence about which lore to take.

Beasts: will be easier to cast with the sickle, great buffs with Wyssans ad Impenetrable Pelt,, if i get the buffs off i can Make way with the characters and form a wall in front of my IG (playing MMU with ogres, IG, multiple LBs and mournfangs). The amount of buffs also helps to divide his power dice sice he'll want to devote some dice to dispelling ongoing buffs on hs magic phase. Curse of Anraheir has great tactical value. Also,  just bought me a Chimera model and am itching to put that bad boy on the table with a Transformation :p in summary: lots and lots of buffs to make really killy/defensive characters, soak up his power dice, and counter the inevitable hexes thrown my way.

Heavens: really cheap casting cost, wich combed with the Sickle, can ensure  I get to cast a lot of spells, hopefully too many for my opponent to dispel. Signature spell is great. Comet can counter shooty armies, and create bottlenecks in the field. Boosted windblasts are great for ruining my opponents' multicharge setups. That hex spell prevents HKBs. Convergence is basically a dragonhide banner for more than one turn. The sheer tactical versatility of the lore is great.

Any advice/arguments for one or the other?

Heavens can be one of the best lores in the game (It is the best besides Shadow... But I digress).  It has a fantastic combat winning sig and some fantastic hexs and augments.  Combine that with the fact it has the most iconic spell in warhammer (comet) and only one meh spell (Chain Lightning) I would say heavens. I would give Heavens a 9/10

As A beastmen player I have used Lore of Beasts alot and let me be frank... It is terrible.  Sure its sig is good but it is a mandatory two+ dice sig which I dislike to a great degree.  Combine that with spells that are just gimicky (transformation and Pelt) and one very underhwhelming MM (Flock).  It has one gem spell that some people still ebate about (Curse) and one spell that is great for armies without cannons (Spear).  Over all Beasts gets a 5/10 from me.

To be honest, both Lores are situational at best and proper usage will rely on your particular build.  If you have enough characters to support it, Beasts can be very useful.  Heavens is best used with enough shooting to make it worthwhile.

Without knowing more than MMU, I really can't give you any useful advice.  A little more information would certainly help.  What are you planning on taking?

Oh yeah ok:

9 guts Std of discipline (character bunker) full cmd
6 ogres IF, mus, std
3 mournfangs HA IF mus
3 mournfangs HA IF mus
6 belchers (had to put them together, couln't afford 2 musicians) mus
2 blasters
3 single sabretusks

Bruiser bsb, enchanted shield, sword of striking, ironcurse icon
Butcher lv2 LotGM IF Hellheart
SM lv4 IF dispel scroll, glittering scales, gruts sickle

Mournfang?  Leadies?  Cannons?  Yah Heavens is the lore for you.

One thing is your SM has two arcane items which is a no no

Oof yeah forgot the Sickle is Arcane (for some reason i just always keep thinking it's a weapon-- brainfart). Oh well. Fencers blades it is then.

Yeah with the sickle gone heavens is looking more feasible. Well that solved itself then.

I just ran a shooting list with a level 4 heavens SM and it was pretty nasty.  Two units of eight LB each and two IB's.  Bubble harmonic convergence on the first turn allowed a reroll on the IB shot (rolled a 1, imagine that), and 13 ones on one units shooting (again terrible roll).  After that it became the spell to dispel.  Had iceshard, wind blast, and comet as well.  Those are my favorite in a shooting list.

I love heavens, half damage, half debuff make it a great lore on the way in and once you are there.

Yes, Heavens seems to fit your build better than Beasts.  Just as a small aside, what is the point of the 6 Bulls?  With all your characters in the Ironguts, it's certainly a weak link and an easy spot for an opponent to target to get some quick points on the table.

I ran heavens for the "umpteenth" time to crappy effect once again this weekend. My level 4 failed to get the comet or harmonic, so... yeah. Oh and my streak of failing to get Flaming Sword for my firebelly continues...

To make a long story short, my opponent used Calming on my heavens SM all game, but my firebelly was able to toss single dice fireballs at chameleon skinks at his leisure - not that they did very much though. But yeas, he basically saved all of his dice for iceshard/and curse. I was still able to win the game though (Watchtower Scenario).

On a fun side note, I was able to force him to take 7 look out sir rolls in 1 turn. Hooray for ironblaster double-flank cross fire!

If the frog is devoting all his effort into stuffing heavens, that should tell you all you need to know about the lore.

I'll be the discentinig voice in the wilderness here and say "Beasts!"

  As A beastmen player I have used Lore of Beasts alot and let me be frank... It is terrible.  Sure its sig is good but it is a mandatory two+ dice sig which I dislike to a great degree.  Combine that with spells that are just gimicky (transformation and Pelt) and one very underhwhelming MM (Flock).  It has one gem spell that some people still ebate about (Curse) and one spell that is great for armies without cannons (Spear).  Over all Beasts gets a 5/10 from me.

Can't agree with this at all.  Yes, wildform is a 2 dice spell, but as a buff it does what it takes TWO maw spells to do.  The MM spell is great against heavy armor targets, such as empire or chaos knights.  I'm not terribly fond of the amber spear, but it's great for warmachine/monster/ogre hunting.  Pann's Pelt can give you a wall of virtually invulnerable ogre characters (even Mindrazor has issues with T8).  Curse is a great hex that will make an opponent seriously reconsider if he wants to charge.  Savage Beast is one of the most vicious buffs in the game, even nastier than Mind Razor.  With multiple characters to cast it on, you'll tear through just about any unit like a blender.  And finally, there's Transformation, which can turn you into a monster capable of tanking a unit all by yourself.

Honestly, it's personal play style.  But Ogres with a near-full list of beast spells are almost unstoppable.

I love me some Lore of Beasts (I would never step outside without it on my Beastmen army, personally), but the way this guy is set up, Heavens fits the bill better. If he were running beefy blocks stuffed with characters, I would agree with you - Beasts would be amazing.

...True, Heavens would probably be a better lore for this list.  Or just straight Maw.

Savage Beast is one of the most vicious buffs in the game, even nastier than Mind Razor.  With multiple characters to cast it on, you'll tear through just about any unit like a blender. 

This is a joke right?  You do know what mind razor does?  Savage is cool as it gives you 3 more attacks (strength does not matter unless you are fighting warsphinx as +1S would do)  But it is not Mind Razor by a longshot.  Mindrazor deletes units, Savage just dents them

This is a joke right?  You do know what mind razor does?  Savage is cool as it gives you 3 more attacks (strength does not matter unless you are fighting warsphinx as +1S would do)  But it is not Mind Razor by a longshot.  Mindrazor deletes units, Savage just dents them

I was going to say almost the same thing, only slightly less polite, so, um, thanks, and have a Gnoblar.

The spells are actually somewhat comparable, but only if you are playing with, say, five characters in the front rank of a single unit.

Agreed, and only really useful in a star with characters.

That being said, Beast lore is very nice on Ogres overall but I still prefer Maw (yes Death and Heavens are third choices at best).

This is a joke right?  You do know what mind razor does?  Savage is cool as it gives you 3 more attacks (strength does not matter unless you are fighting warsphinx as +1S would do)  But it is not Mind Razor by a longshot.  Mindrazor deletes units, Savage just dents them

Oh gee, three characters in a unit.  Sounds like a general, a butcher/firebelly, and a BSB.  No ogre player runs those, far less puts them in a single unit! 

Mindrazor has the advantage of being able to effect rank and file troops, but the increase in attacks is what makes Savage preferable in my mind.  No only does the strength boost (combined with the ogre's natural strength) effectively eliminate armor, but the massive increase in number of attacks vastly increases the number of hits.  Sure, just about every hit from a mindrazored unit will wound, but that's of little comfort if you're only getting 5 or 6 hits.  3 characters in the front rank will crank out anywhere from 18 to 22 attacks, never mind any supporting attacks.  Even with just a single character, it's a huge boost in combat potential.  Finally, I think that Savage Beast stacks better with other buffs within the Lore, whereas mindrazor only really combines well with miasma, and it's not really that powerful of a combo, to boot.

I stand by my statement.  Savage Beast is just as good as Mindrazor in the abstract.  The superiority of one over the other is situational.

That being said, Beast lore is very nice on Ogres overall but I still prefer Maw (yes Death and Heavens are third choices at best).

I agree.  I run a level 4 Maw and a Level 2 Beast.  I think the synergy of their mutual buffs is fantastic.

The thing with mind razor is the armies that make effective use of it have 15-20 attacks coming out of the unit, with good weapon skill and low str, often with rerolls to hit.

So they go from hit on 3s and wound on 5s (full saves) to hit on 3s and wound on 2s (no saves).

it's a huge difference in damage out.

Savage beast in an ogre army (assuming the 3 characters frontage and the SM with fencers) will likely have you with something like:
19 attacks, hit on 3s wound on 2s no saves + supporting attacks (i'd assume iron guts here so 9 attacks that hit on 4s and wound on 2s).

The big difference between these two setups is that to reliably get savage you need beast on a level 4, which isn't something most people seem overally fond of as compared to mind razor you just need to take a level 4 shadow which is easy for many armies who can take advantage of this tactic to do since shadow as a whole is a superior lore.  Also that generally speaking the mind razor units will be striking at before ogres, as such they will take reduced attacks in.

due to ogres being such beat sticks to start with savage is actually comparable (damage output wise) to mind razor on blocks of elfs/empire, assuming you don't loose a character before striking.

Oh, I was never arguing that SHADOW was superior to BEAST.  I was comparing the specific spells.  And yes, alot of it matters on just who has what cast on them.  Again, situational.  But in the situation is specified, which is an EXTREMELY common situation, an ogre unit with characters and Savage will cause more damage than a unit with mindrazor.

My initial comment was as devil's advocate.

My main complaint is people who make unqualified, blanket statements (here's looking at you Johhny  ).  And you'll notice that in every post here, I specified when, if, and how something would be useful.