Armies power ranking

With the addition of many new armies since I took a small break from playing with the birth of my daughter, I was wondering what the army power ranking looked like. I know this isn't an exact science and that some books have bad match ups, but I'd like to know, generally speaking, which armies are considered stronger then others. I was having a conversation with both my brothers (one plays HE, the other DE) and they were under the impressions that OK were still one of the top book and that their own books were weaker, which I don't agree with. So, plz post your  own rankings and thoughts behind it if you'd like. I'm hoping some competitive player will give their input.

Here's the ranks I propose:

Top Tier: The best of the best!
High Middle Tier: Stronger then most, but not quite the best
Middle Tier: The average Joes!
Low Middle Tier: The not so average!
Bottom Tier: While it's not impossible to win with these guys, they start with 2 strikes against most opponents.

Discuss please!

First of all congratulations and welcome back! This list is by tier, not in any order within the tiers themselves
Top:
Dark Elves
- well your one brother is wrong, what can't his army do
High Elves
- so is the other brother, stupid ward saves and really good magic, decent chaff and tough MMU or horde blocks
Skaven
- there really isn't much they can't handle with even their all comers list, still a tough fight for many
Warriors
- this one got me, its a tried and tested book now so the tricks are out there and so are the solutions, but they are some really good tricks so I think they're still up there
Mid-High:
Vampires
- like WoC the tricks are known, but the solutions easier to come by and the tricks themselves aren't third eye powerful or nurgle princes, blenders are still nasty
Empire
- jack of all trades still has a solution to almost everything, strong armies come out of this one
Dwarfs
- slightly better shooting, ludicrously easy access to stubborn, two great rules for doing hammer and anvil, plus actual ability to have harassment units and chaff make this a harder matchup now
Daemons
- they have a few units and two special characters that are ridiculously overpowered/underpriced which is why they are auto-includes, this makes their power level higher than I think it should be, without 3-4 of their crutches they'd be a lot lower because of the overall pitiful writing in the book, another tricky choice for me
Mid:
Ogres
- people know our tricks for the most part and so we aren't as as scary, we can still wreck face but we have to work at it more now at least from my own experience and what I've seen
Chaos Dwarfs
- very limited options makes for fairly similar lists across the board, and the counters to the k'daii and war machines are easy to find in almost every army
Wood Elves
- The last tough choice for me, only played them once but this is where I place them based on that and what I've read/seen
Low-Mid:
Lizardmen
- the Slann crutch is gone and was not replaced leaving the book lacking anything truly outstanding, lots of good support units and very limited core makes for a lackluster showing most of the time
Orcs and Goblins
- solid but hampered by animosity and a lot of unpredictability that we've all seen muck the whole plan up
Bottom:
Beastmen
- Didn't transfer over as nicely as skaven did, just too much they can't handle easily or things they can't do well at all
Tomb Kings
- do they even have a good matchup?
Bretonnia
- can be made to work, as tournaments have shown but they rely on too many stars aligning for the game to go swimmingly

edited to accentuate tier titles

Thanks for the congratulations, it's been a terrific year and I'm really blessed with a wonderful girl!

Really interesting read!!! I have faced High Elves and Daemons so far. I played the 7th and the 8th edition HE and had not much problem both times, probably because of list design on my brother's part and a bit of strategy. I did lose once to him. As for Daemons, I lost the only time I played, he wrecked me 1st turn with the Nurgle Spell Combo and Epidemius. His army was fully buffed in one turn and my unit of Ironguts was all but dead. The army itself looked liked it had some no brainer choices and stong combos, so I would tend to agree that they are a top army.

You haven't placed Wood Elves anywhere. Where do you  think they belong?

I am also interested in reading what everyone else thinks.

I put Wood Elves in mid-tier, they are far more usable now but still require a degree of technical finesse that takes longer to attain.

THere's a few of those I gotta disagree with Latteokapi! Well, here's my own list:


Top Tier:
High Elves - Gotta agree on this actually. Can do nearly everything and have ridiculously powerful Elite units and good magic.
Dark Elves - Same things can be said. Perhaps slightly better core, slightly weaker Elites, but that balances out nicely enough
Warriors of Chaos - Amusingly imbalanced, but the power builds are so hard it makes everyone cry.

Top-Mid:
Skaven - They've got some powerful stuff, but certain other things really mess them up, as does their random reliability. With Skaven it's often the case you have to push hard or go home.
Ogre Kingdoms - We've got some very hard units and the best cannon in the game. We do suffer from poor WS and Lore selection though, as well as devastatingly vulnerability to Purple Sun.
Chaos Dwarves - Really sadistic warmachines and possibly the most devastating monster in the game in the Destroyer. Slowness can hurt though, as with Dwarves, but here you've got a lot of stuff to counter it.
Daemons - Oh these are nasty when they want to be. Some units are bizarrely balanced mind, and you do find most lists looking a bit Nurgley. But when you break them, you break HARD.

Mid Tier:
Empire - Some good units, some bad. It's a mixed blessing, and they can't jack of all trades anywhere near as well as the Elves can.
Wood Elves - Got a much better boost, and can hold their own easily. They just struggle to stand on the same level as the other Elves in a few key areas, such as CC blocks.
Orcs and Gobbos - Unreliable, but they pack some hard CC units and can spam warmachines like there's no tomorrow. Quite a few nasty units too for the unprepared.
Dwarves - Very powerful, but the whole having to be charged half the time thing does hurt them. It's not difficult for some armies with good CC units to really hit them hard.

Mid-Low:
Beastmen - It's easy to underestimate just how hard the basic Gor is, and Minos and Bestigor can kick ass despite being a bit overpriced. They pack a lot of redirectors now too - just a pity that they have no warmachines and their rares are so bad it makes your eyes bleed.
Lizardmen - Similar to Beastmen really. Better magic and the world's most annoying skirmishers, and good core. Steggies aren't too bad either. Overall though a lot of units are overpriced, and the magic's gone down to just plain average.

Bottom:
Tomb Kings - A fun list hampered with irrational restrictions at every corner. You can pull some competent builds to tournaments, but you're basically like High Elves but if 90% of your unit selection was terrible instead of good. Magic restrictions REALLY hurt.
Brettonians - You're basically just Knights. Some useful similar units, but overall it's hard not to look at other armies with Knightly Core and wonder if you'd be better off jumping ship.



My honest opinions. I put Empire down a bit because their list is a bit synergy dependent and if you can smash the Stank and fend off the Demigryphs Empire struggle a fair bit. Beasts went up because Gor Blocks are so damn cheap yet powerful, and the Elites are either very good redirectors or hard CC units (well, mostly) - you just have to look past the things that went wrong, like the Lore of the Wild or the rares.

In general I would agree with pretty much everything that's been posted here except I might be tempted to shuffle Chaos Dwarfs up a bit.
Whilst it is true that most armies can tailor towards dealing with them, for some reason most people I talk to say that it never seems to come off and they always seem to sneak in a win or draw despite detailed tailored lists. The gods of Hashut must just love them evil stunties.

G_H

Hey Psychichobo, you forgot VC! I'll disagree with us having the best cannon in the game, we have the second best thanks to Ward.

Hey Psychichobo, you forgot VC! I'll disagree with us having the best cannon in the game, we have the second best thanks to Ward.

I knew I 'd forget someone! Same place as you put them TBH. They still have one annoying magic phase.

Can the Skullcannon bounce accurately like ours? I feel that makes all the difference personally. Plus, it's flaming right? That'd stop it from hurting the typical Daemon Prince much...


Though to be fair it's more painful looking at Empire, who have genuinely overpriced cannons for no discernible reason....

Can the Skullcannon bounce accurately like ours? I feel that makes all the difference personally. Plus, it's flaming right? That'd stop it from hurting the typical Daemon Prince much...


Though to be fair it's more painful looking at Empire, who have genuinely overpriced cannons for no discernible reason....

Skullcannon can't do the bounce trick ours can, but since it's flaming it can take care of chimeras, hell pits, trolls our own regen buffed units far more easily than we can

Dwarfs pay 120 for their cannons now, but comapring the two, dwarfs get access to runic upgrades and WS4 T4 stubborn crew, empire gets a 60" range instead of 48"... so yeah what am I thinking, either empire pays a little too much or the other three cannon armies pay too little

My experience is somewhat limited, but my best friend does play Daemons and he usually brings the strongest lists out there. It seems that Daemons of Nurgle with some flame canons can make a pretty tough list, at least for us Ogres. To me, they deserve a spot in the High Mid Tier. At least, High Elves players can bring a lame counter to the whole Daemon army with the Banner of the Shame Dragon.

Phazael has often said that the VC scream list can be pretty hard to beat and I was surprised not to see VC ranked higher.

I think you have missed how narrow the spread has become with the higher pace of new books. This is one explanation to why people rank apparently differently, as most newer books are just close in power level.

 : )

List composition and general quality are probably a better indication of strength, but here's a rough layout of how I see the armies stacking up next to each other. By tiers and in alphabetical order then,

Top
Daemons - Your choice of greater daemon, couple of nurgle blocks, 2 skillcannons, top it off with something to fill up points. Durable combat blocks w/ poison, access to speedy units, strong magic, and they probably get to shell you for free in the magic phase. Despite the randomness of the chaos gifts, I don't think they've left the top tier.

DE - The strongest of the elf books at the moment due to hatred. A strong army in all four phases, the new book allows for a variety of potent strategies to defeat opposing armies.

Warriors - Superior combat units and broken characters. A very difficult matchup with few exceptions.


High-Mid
Dwarves - Time will tell if the new dwarves drop down to the mid tier, right now I feel they are up fairly high. They field incredibly competitive combat troops, and between vanguard and gyro copters they can use them much more effectively. Their shooting went down half a peg due to increased costs, but the infantry revamp more than makes up for it.

High Elves- All the tools (except cannons) to be a top tier army, but expensive T3 troops without much armor hold them back. Frosthearts and ward saves only go so far and the rest of it's made of glass. The army isn't very forgiving and requires a refined list with a coordinated plan to be successful.

Empire - Jack of all trades, master of none. The occasional matchup will be difficult, but barring any dice disasters a well designed empire list will take off your toys and grind the rest out in combat.

Skaven - Potential to be very powerful, almost broken, but plagued by a ceaseless influx of inferior underlings who are obviously working for a rival to erode the clan's standing with the council and snatch defeat from the jaws of victory!

Vampires - Blender lord, zombie screams, crypt horrors, having to kill everything over and over to make any progress. Unless the vampire dies you're probably getting a minor victory at best. That key vulnerability keeps them out of the top tier for me. 


Mid
Ogres - Certainly a strong army, but lacking the tricks that put some of the others over the top. The butcher tax is a degrading influence, as are mediocre weapon skill, low initiative, and poor leadership. Too many armies can use those levers against us, so us fat lads plop down firmly mid-pack.

OnG - The empire's random evil twin. Dependency on the dice gods drops them down a tier, but when gork (or maybe mork) is paying attention they work pretty much the same way, with the same level of success. 

WE - Not sure quite where to park the hippy elves yet, the book has changed so much I'm not sure where they fit in on a scale like this. Some things improved and some things got worse, magic is a huge change for the better, I could see them moving up in the meta as asrai generals figure out the tricks.


Low-Mid
Lizards - Uber characters combined with pokey units. There's some all stars like the cowboy saurus heroes but everything else relies on the slaan to carry the team. Shut him down or take him off and the rest of it just underwhelms.

Beasts - Not the worst army out there, but the army selection has holes in it that leave much to be desired. The combat phase can be nasty but the ranged support just isn't there.

Brets - Oddly enough I think brets are uniquely suited to take on warriors, one of the top tier. Against cannons and steadfast blocks though, they are facing an uphill battle. Not a bad army, just lacks synergy in 8th.


Low
TK - I feel low is bit misleading. Difficult to play is more accurate I think. TK can field one of the nastiest magic phases, and back it up with a potent shooting phase. they can even dish it out in combat with a bit of luck. Unfortunately, they have all the drawbacks of being undead with none of the perks, and are probably the least forgiving army out there. One bad roll can break the game, and you know there will be a few bad rolls in the course of six turns.

I think you have missed how narrow the spread has become with the higher pace of new books. This is one explanation to why people rank apparently differently, as most newer books are just close in power level.

 : )

Yes indeed Joakim, a much narrower spread, but still one nonetheless of course. I'd be interested to see the results of another "rank the armies and vote down the weak one" on one of the larger forums, war seer, dakka etc. Last one was in Oct and I believe it went 1. WoC 2. Skaven 3. Ogres, and then the two elves who were competitive at the time

God Tier-
Dark Elves:
They have an answer for everything and its generally cheaper than anyone else.  They have the strongest magic phase in the game, strongest movement phase in the game, best chaff in the game, and a core unit that other armies would kill to have as a special unit.  The only army that they even remotely struggle with are artillery based empire and ethereal heavy vamps, and even then it is a build specific thing.  They also have some degree of difficulty with an army that curtails their movement, like Slaanesh DoC.

Top Tier-
High Elves- Even without the I Win banner, this army has shooting on par with Woodies, some of the best monsters in the game, and some of the strongest elites in the game.  What separates them from Dark Elves is a lack of strong core options and a lot less point efficiency in the army.  The elites are good, but you pay a fair price for them.

Daemons-  Lots of ways to construct the army and very strong combat lords drive this list.  Beasts of Nurgle are without question the most undercosted unit in the entire game.  Their biggest problems are that they struggle against any combat elf army (even without the I Win Banner) and vulnerable lord choices making them undesirable in a cannon infested meta.

Empire-  A wall of 1+ armor backed up by a Light Council and multiple war machines is no joke.  Their biggest issues are the introduction of Waywatchers into the metagame and suspect leadership.

Upper Mid Tier-
Warriors of Chaos-  There is one net build everyone knows by now.  Outside of that, they are jam packed with tons of overpriced infantry with suspect leadership.  If they ever do get into mele combat, they dominate.  So much of this army depends on what list it brought and if the enemy has cannons.

Orcs and Goblins-  Night Goblin or Savage Orc built lists are actually pretty solid, especially when backed up by a wall of artillery and Foot of Gork.  Black Orcs let you neutralize animosity on the critical units, if you want.  The army suffers against ethereal chaff and bad runs of luck, however.

Skaven-  Pretty much like the greenskins, but with better long range offense and less combat.  The biggest problems for Skaven right now are Ogres being popular and everyone more or less being familiar with most of the common skaven tricks.  Unscrupulous characters can still fire two Warp Lightning Cannons and slow play to a turn three minor win, but those guys never win tournaments doing that.

Middle Tier-
Ogre Kindoms-  Good solid all around options, but nothing game breaking.  Ogres are probably the best balanced book in the game at the moment.  The problems they have are generally metagame related.  Specifically, they struggle against elf builds and the more common Warriors builds, both of which are frequent opponents in tournament play.  Also like the Skaven, Ogres are so popular that they have become a known commodity and people know how to stop the major tricks.  On the flipside, Ogres match up very well against a number of the other higher tier armies, so it is not unusual to see them win an event with a bit of luck.

Vampire Counts-  Many armies struggle with ethereal units, mega killy lord choices, and killing basic undead fast enough to overcome Invocation spam.  If you are not facing one of those armies, however, it is a tough game.  Vamps really do well in a gunline heavy metagame, but if the field is packed with Daemons and Elves, its not going to go well for them.

Brettonians-  All the tools of the game are at their disposal, along with some nifty psychology protection rules.  They can do a little bit of everything, but they are not top dog at anything.  This is probably the most average army in warhammer, all around.  As such, they have the potential to take on anyone, but they are not especially well matched against any particular enemy.  The coming waywatcher craze is likely to deflate them a bit, as well.

Lower Mid Tier-
Lizardmen-  Nice solid balanced selection of units, but some seriously overpriced head scratchers are in this book.  The biggest issues with this book is that you have to invest heavily in fighting characters to contend with ethereal and a general lack of movement.  The fact that the book still lends itself to Slaan centric builds (with a weaker slaan) tends to create predictable games where the goal simply becomes to sack the slaan.

Chaos Dwarves-  Many annoying abilities that frustrate people abound in this army.  Unfortunately, outside of the Kadai, almost anything that is not a war machine is massively overcosted.  This is not an army, but a boring obstacle course that you either have the tools to overcome or do not.  These days, people know how to handle the Kadai and cannons from other books nearly always win the artillery war.

Wood Elves- While the new book is a major improvement and a genuine thorn in the side of the 1+ armor spam armies that have been popular of late, it is at its heart a static gunline army.  Outside of a couple very recognizable units, it has zero combat punch, so with most T4 infantry heavy armies, you can simply run straight ahead and skunk it that way.  The bright spot is that it makes a pretty decent counter to Dark Elves and Empire, so it is going to be one of those Ogre like armies that can win it all with the right draws.

Bottom Tier-
Dwarves-  Chaos Dwarves with better combat and shooting, but no magic or monsters make for some of the most universally boring games in all of warhammer.   The only thing the new book changed is that now you are likely facing a wall of stubborn and the entire game is decided by the grudge roll before you even deploy.  Also, what happens to a pit of artillery behind a big horde of I2?  Purple Sun; that's what happens.  About the only good thing this army has going for it is that it poses a major problem for both Daemons and the WoC netbuild.

Beastmen-  There is one functioning netbuild with some minor variations, but most armies know how to deal with it.  Overpriced everything, severe leadership issues, and the worst shooting phase in all of warhammer add up to the current state of this army.  Any viable build is going to spend nearly half its points on characters, leaving less for the overpriced units.  Outside of a few matchup quirks, there is not much going for these guys.  This is an army for people who want to challenge themselves, though it is such a rare army that you can catch novice players off guard with it.

Tomb Kings-  You almost need a separate basement tier for this army.  Aside from MMU archer spam and construct hoards, this army has no major strengths.  Experienced players tend to have no issue dusting this army, but in soft scored events with comb banding, you can get a good finish by eeking out a 3-2 record and painting well.  Unlike Beastmen, there is no catching people off guard with this army.  The one favorable thing it has going for it is the Mask wrecks havoc on armies with a strong dependency on their leadership bubble.  The downside is that most of those armies are in the toilet tiers, as well.


That is how I see the armies in GT play, based on observations, games, and results.  It is fair to note that most events I have gone to have been won by mid and mid-high armies, but that has a lot to do with soft scores clamping down on major assclownery.  For frame of reference, here is the last two years of GTs I have been at and some of the top finishers:

QCR13- Ogres Overall, DE General
BAO13- Ogres Overall, Lizardmen Best General
Broadside14- Empire Overall, Empire Best General
West Coast14- Orcs Overall, Vamps Best General
Waaghpaca14- Warriors Overall, High Elves Best General
Alamo 13- Vampires Overall, Daemons Best General
QCR12- High Elves Overall, Dark Elves Best General
BAO12- Skaven Overall, Warriors Best General
Broadside13- Ogres Overall, Daemons Best General
West Coast13- Orcs Overall, Skaven Best General
Waaghpaca13- Warriors Overall, Skaven Best General
Alamo12- Bretts Overall, Vampires Best General

I might have goofed one or two of those, but its easy to see some trends when it comes to soft score events.

Phazael, I agree that DE are the top army, but they don't have the strongest magic phase; that goes to a magic-oriented TK army.  And given that the only successful TK armies are magic-oriented, that's not really a sticking point.

Between the casket, Heiro-Titan, Arkhan, and whatever support casters you like, no one can cast as many spells (and good ones, once you rule out the Nehekaran requirement with Arkhan) as reliably as TK.  When your main caster casts at an average +7, your support casters cast at a +3 or +4, and you're generating 2d6+1d3+3 power dice per turn (with an addition DP on a 5+ for every wound you cause with Arkhan's spells), your magic phases have to be seen to be believed.

DE have the sac dagger to effectively double their magic dice on their main mage, who incidentally is not stuck using a sub par lore like TK.  DE can also make their mages extremely mobile to maximize the use of certain spells, while the fastest TK wizard is stuck with a 10 inch flight move, at best.  TK get a ton of dice that essentially amount to six dice casket every turn, in most cases, and if they want to do anything beyond that they have to sink tons of points into multiple wizards, a heirotitan, and a casket.  Sadly, a single DE wizard with any halfway decent lore and a Sac Dagger still out dices and out casts that setup for a fraction of the cost.  And of course if they try to spam enough wizards to pull off a light council,. they have sunk almost half their points into wizards and autolose to anyone packing a hellheart.  In fact, an ogre player packing Gruts is actually generating more magic than a decked out TK magic phase with better spells to cast, to say nothing of actually powerful magic armies like lizards, DE, or HE.

In the entire time this book has been out, the best I have ever seen it do in a magic phase and tournament was the guy at QCR last year who ran a L1 with a scroll and a pair of caskets, because unlike the vast bulk of the TK lore, caskets are worth trying to dispel.  The TK magic phase is one giant trap of generating extra dice and mostly being stuck with a worse version of the butcher tax to use them on.  Really, aside from maybe smiting, I don't even bother trying to dispel anything that is not the casket when I face them, unless I am flush with dice.  Hell, even my mageless woodies just ignored the bulk of their magic the last two times I faced them.  A lot of garbage is still garbage.

Very interesting read Phazael!

Your list does differ a lot from the others. I am surprised to see you rank VC a bit low as well as Dwarves and WE, but I understand why when I read your post.

There's really not much arguing that DE, HE and Daemons are the top army books judging from the lists we've had so far. I'll be happy to discuss that with both my brothers .

I'm also really about the standing of Ogres. I feel like our book is what a solid book should be: strong but not overpowered and with weaknesses that allow certain armies to shine against us while not totally shafting us.

Phazael, I've noticed you talk a lot about the prominence of six-dicing spells in the games you've seen. I don't tend to see this this much - do you feel it's that necessary for a lot of strategies? I never do these days, it fails too much for me. Spamming little spells seems to work better for my Ogres.

I mean, if I were Tomb Kings, I'd be rocking Arkhan and throwing out spells that actually intimidate people rather than weird half-assed buffs. Those excessive dice generating lists are wasted when you've got such a mishmash weak lore otherwise (though I've seen some good effects with Light lvl 4's alongside a Khemri Lvl 4 or Khatep, but that's all buffing which involves the weak CC units).

Same here; the only time I see 6-dicers are either from warlocks (cuz they don't care about miscasts) or on the super-killy spells.  And personally I've found the folks who can reliably cast multiple spells with fewer dice.  You might stop one or two, but the next two or three get you.  That's what the TK do.  I've seen them cast 6-8 spells a turn (counting the dual LoDs), and not a one of them was Nekeharan.  They were all death or light.

I'm going to echo what the above two have said. The only six dicing I see on a regular basis is on warlocks, a throned up life mage or a high elf mage in a Banner of Stupid unit. I use LotGM and certainly don't need to six dice bubbleguts to win matches, nor do I need to six dice anything else really with the other lores we can take.

Spells I see routinely 6 diced in tournaments:  Cacophonic, Bubble Guts, Mind Razor, Purple Sun, anything on the Popemobile, Fiery Convocation, Dwellers, PSun, and Bubble Blight. Dreaded 13th and Transformation of Kadon are two other spells you only see 6 diced, but they are less frequent these days.  If you go through a tournament and don't see at least one of those in a game, you are pretty fortunate.  Usually it is to brute force a game breaker past a scroll, but just as often the spells themselves are so hard to cast that they mandate 6 dice casts.

Rapid fire spells works when the spells are all easily cast and pose significant threats, preferably every turn.  Tomb Kings can generate lots of dice (at significant point investment), but very little of their book lore is worth stopping except the casket, especially early in a game.  Smite on a horde of archers?  Big deal. Six more S3 hits is not going to make or break you but its the only credible early threat spell.  The casket is the one spell that can hurt you realistically early and its an innate bound.  Now, you can add a bunch of death or light guys to the list, but you are then dropping almost half of your points into the magic phase.

If this all sounds far fetched, then I suggest trying what the guy at QCR did last year and running two caskets and a L1, dumping the saved points into additional constructs and combat troops.  Then every magic phase, just casket or double casket, depending on the dice pool.  Its a lot more points effective.

Yup, 5 minutes after writing my previous post I hit myself for somehow missing Purple fun and Cacobomb players. Must be my brain blocking the former out from some of the trauma I've seen and experienced

I am so sick of Purple Sun that I listed it twice, LOL.  And I don't even play armies that are vulnerable to it, lately, but man every car ride back from a tourney with my wife involves her bitching about getting PSunned at some point in the event (she plays mono Nurgle DoC).

Ironically, I had a tourney where I never encountered a Purple Sun, and instead got thrown down two unscattering Pit of Shades. Pah.


See, 6-dicing BubbleGuts is a thing I'd never do, simply as I feel that lobbing a decent amount of dice into the smaller one and a toothcracker and then some heavens stuff gives you better results (god bless the delightfully cheap Comet).

I dunno, might just be what I end up getting in the face though. I've not fought a Slaaneshi Lore Warrior List and I don't see Life that often for some reason. I've seen it with the Sun pretty often though, and I've not fought a High Elf player who wanted to Fiery Convocation my Ogres (I'm dreading seeing it on a generic T3 unit though), so might just be because of the army I play.

That, and I've fought people bluffing Mindrazor by chucking a few cheap dice into the Withering or Enfeebling and then I have the choice to try and stop it or save my dice for a potential mindrazor that never comes and I just end up 6-dice dispelling a really half-assed last spell. Pff.

Oh wells. At least we can all agree that Purple Sun is the wrongest spell in the game (The majority of players I see refuse to use it unless they're dirty WAAC players like the guy I fought with the shoe-sized Herdstone).

PSun on a normal infantry wizard is somewhat acceptable, because of its shortish range.  But really, it should have been a T based test so that there was a kill spell for each major stat, instead of Ini getting double stuffed.  What is rage inducing is when the WoC DP slams face first into your main block and just six dices that every damn turn and there is zero you can do about it.