Goonhammer Reviews: Idoneth Deepkin Fourth Edition Battletome (Updated July 8, 2025)

Thank you to Games Workshop for providing us with a copy of the Idoneth Deepkin Battletome and now the pitched battle profiles for us to update the review with!

This article has been updated July 8, 2025 to reflect pitched battle profiles.

Bursting forth once more from beneath the waves of the Mortal Realms, the Idoneth Deepkin are here to raid for souls and chew calamari, and they’re all out of calamari. Deepkin have been quite strong on the sly this edition, with a winrate growing over time as players honed in on the strongest units (Aspect of the Storm, turtle, morrsarr) but not generating as much chatter as other high winrate armies due to getting played quite a bit less. This battletome represents quite a big shift in rules for Deepkin, and is one of the larger revisions to an army so far this edition, and not always for the better. There’s a bunch new here but off the bat if you run the same models in the same way as you did before the battletome, your army probably got worse.

A note on points: if we don’t mention somethings points here, it’s because they are unchanged from the last Battlescroll.

Changes from the Faction Pack

The most important thing to note is of course that basically all of the little fish attack companion weapons that various heroes had are now gone, but usually with compensation of an extra attack on the ‘real’ weapon. This is in a vacuum a good thing, but it does mean we forever lose out on the joy of killing a big model with a fish. I’ll always have the memory of Be’lakor dying to a swordfish.

The really big change you’ve probably already seen on WarCom is that the Battle Traits have been massively rewritten. The two abilities representing your ability to deploy from reserves are gone and Tides of Death has undergone a radical transformation. Instead of one track that you move through over the course of the game, there are now tracks: Tides of the Sea and Tides of the Storm. These are fiddly in how they’ve been worded to get the concept to fit into AoS 4’s ability structure but the core concept is familiar: you get an ability in the first battle round, a different one in the second battle round and another different one in the third battle round. Seasoned Deepkin players will note that the fourth battle round ability has gone. So in the first hero phase of the game you’ll pick an ability and that will set you down the track of either sea or storm and you can choose to either move on to the next ability in that track in the next battle round OR start again from scratch on the other track. Progress isn’t “saved” in any way, so if you switch you start again from the beginning. Both tracks have the ‘big’ ability tied to battle round three, so I think realistically you’re not changing until after then, and the change becomes in effect your battle rounds four and five abilities.

Tides of the Sea is basically the old Tides of Death with one key change. First is still -1 to be hit if you didn’t charge, second is still run and shoot/charge and three is still strike-first but ONLY for the turn you pop it in not the whole phase. That’s a pretty drastic reduction in efficacy for the army. Deepkin games have historically lived or died on that phase, and I’m worried that there’s not enough boosts elsewhere to soothe the loss of a full battle round.

Tides of the Storm is brand new. First we get Unpredictable Tide which lets you pick a unit that isn’t in combat to be removed from the battlefield and set up again wholly within 7″ of a battlefield edge and more than 9″ from enemy units. This is your old teleport and it’s OK. Just one unit is a bit limiting for getting a turn 1 alpha off, but it’s quite handy if you’re using it in battle round four for sneaky objective or battle tactic play. Second is Inexorable Tide which is -1 Rend for attacks that target Deepkin units for the battle round. Nice! This army can be seriously fragile even with the defensive tech available to it, and this genuinely helps a lot, especially for the 4+ save cavalry. Run and charge on the second round in the other tide is nice to have, but I found I didn’t always use it and it’s only actually relevant in your turn, this is much more widely applicable and helps you get to that third battle round. What you get in the third battle round here is Storm’s Wrath which is straight up just Crit (Mortal) for the melee weapons of your entire army for the turn. Despite being an alpha army, Deepkin can struggle for rend so this does help. It’s less “safe” than striking first, but I think this tide warrants testing to see how it stacks up. I’ll be giving starting with this and swapping to Sea in the fourth battle round a go for my initial games to see how it lands, but given Sea is just worse than it was before I find this more interesting.

That’s a lot of words for an army that now has I guess the fewest battle traits in the game, with the two tides effectively being one ability. It’s a bit sad. I don’t mourn the loss of the reserve deployment, but it would have been nice to throw something else in as a bit of flavour. Bring Forgotten Nightmares back or something.

For changes in battle formations we’re just looking at Soul Raid Ambushers now letting you pick two targets for Unpredictable Tide. That was previously one of the more interesting formations but I really struggle to see it stacking up to the unchanged Akhelian Beastmasters, even though Beastmasters now comes with a 20 point price tag.

Heroic traits has Ancient Pride getting renamed to the much funnier Form of the Fangmora but not actually changing in rules and therefore will still be stapled to the Aspect of the Storm every game. Nightmare Legacy is now considerably better, no longer requiring a set up or targeting one unit for a dice roll control score change it’s just a flat -3 control to enemies within 6″. That being said, you’re still not going to take it. Hunter of Souls is now a deployment phase ability that lets you choose Anti-Infantry/Cavalry/Monster (+1 Rend) for your melee weapon, which is a nice bit of flexibility, I appreciate the mechanic. You might take it, I mean you probably wont, but it’s not terrible.

The tweaks continue in the artefacts and we get another flavour renaming with Delicious Morsels becoming Lifekelp Pod. There’s a miniscule boost to Dritchleech, which still hands out -1 to cast in an 18″ aura but now if an enemy in that aura fails to cast you get to Heal (1) which I guess is better than 0. The headline change here is to Armour of Cythai which totally loses its cool unique ability and now hands out -1 to hit to enemy units in combat provided that you haven’t charged. Given the thing that always wanted this armour (the Aspect of the Storm) wants to be charging every opportunity it gets, I think players will switch out to Lifekelp Pod in most instances. The armour is still good on an Aspect of the Sea, at least, and does now cost 0 points.

Over in the Lore of the Deeps, Arcane Corrasion is gone and has been replaced by Counter-Current, which casts on a 7 with an 18″ range to pick a visible enemy and half their run and charge rolls. That’s a really fucking good spell and you will actually cast this. I’m not sure why we had to lose a spell to have it added? There’s room for four, I’m never quite sure why everything this edition is at this arbitrary number of 3. Finally there’s the new Manifestation Lore, which just has the one spell to summon the new Incarnate of the Deep. We’ll talk about that more in “What’s New?” but just know that this bad boy casts on an 8.

Warscroll Changes

There’s quite a lot here as well, actually, so we’ll keep it snappy. Volturnos lost a point of rend from the Astra Solus, which is good because he was just in absolutely every list, you couldn’t move for players running Volturnos. Honestly I am perplexed by this. Volturnos should be a beast in combat! I don’t know if this is a reaction to his having always on Strike-First in his AoR but that strikes me as an odd way to balance what should be an iconic unit for the army but just isn’t. Volturnos did get 20 points cheaper, but honestly is still overcosted at 230 points for such a squishy hero.

The Aspect of the Sea goes up to 7 attacks with its trident to make up for the loss of its fish. It’s still not going to set the world alight in melee, but it’s welcome. More welcome is it’s very good warscroll spell going down to a casting value of 7. I think we’ll see an uptick in the Sea, especially for people wanting to run the Incarnate as it’s the most reliable way to summon it. I wont mention every hero weapon change, but it’s worth noting that the Aspect of the Storm going up to 7 attacks as well is probably the most meaningful of these lost-fish changes, as those are quality rend 2 damage 3 attacks on the charge.

The Akhelian King is now a lot more interesting, which is nice for a unit that often had to be taken for regimental reasons. It’s fight-after-me ability is gone, but in it’s place Crest of the Wave – if it charges then Deepkin units attacking an enemy in combat range of the King get +1 rend. +1 rend is really very good, I like this a lot more now but it does compete with a new option we’ll talk about later.

Lotann has had a ground up rewrite and is a wizard now. His spell hands out Crit (auto-wound) on a 7 to cast, which is handy for an army that largely wounds on a 4+. Lotann’s also got a pair of abilities that are too complex for what they achieve. Every time an enemy unit is destroyed he gets a token, he can spend that token as a reaction to an Isharann wizard declaring a spell ability and they can then re-roll the casting roll if they want. Lotann’s lost his ability to be an Isharann Emissary sub-hero and has gone up to 110 points, but that still leaves him as the joint cheapest wizard in-faction and the cheapest Hero with a regiment that can take anything.

Still over in Isharann the Soulrender has a mild improvement in their Hangman’s Knot autokill ability no longer being once per battle. This will come up all of never in a real game. The Soulscryer lost it’s fiddly +1 to wound vs an enemy hero ability without replacement. Finder of Ways is now a reaction to either Unpredictable Tides or Steed of Tides and it lets the unit being set up ignore the usual set up requirements and instead set up wholly within 12″ of the Soulscryer and more than 7″ from enemy units. This was a solid alpha ability before but it’s much more difficult to use now, as you don’t typically want 5 wound 5+ save heroes that close to the enemy and you can only move one unit via those set up abilities unless you burn a battle formation on it to get the Soulscryer up there too. I used to like the Soulscryer a lot, but I think it loses out to Lotann in the small hero wizard stakes. Whilst we’re wizarding, the Tidecaster has finally come down 30 points to a more sensible 120. Her regiment (just Namarti and Emissaries) sucks and she isn’t a sub-hero, plus her ability is not the highest impact so I was hoping for a drop to at least bring her to parity with Lotann and the Soulscryer. As it stands, she’s really your third choice for cheap wizard if neither of those are bringing anything to your particular list.

The Akhelian Thrallmaster has lost the fighting stance stuff and now just has a 12″ aura of crit (2 hit). This is a nice change, you lose out on the flexibility of the hero being defensive but you get a nice simple aura to work with rather than a single unit in combat range. At 90 points now these are getting appropriately cheap for a unit whose sole job is to buff your most basic of infantry. The loss of -1 to be wounded hurts Namarti builds, as Namarti are very squishy, but that’s where the new Namarti Thralls warscroll comes in. Not content with a rework in Scourge of Ghyran, non-Ghyran thralls now have Anti-Monster and Anti-Infantry on their Lanmari, which is easier to remember than the extra damage vs monsters bit. Sweeping Blows is now a reaction to their declaring a fight ability and if you deal any damage with that fight ability, any enemy unit you damaged gets -1 to wound. This is a massive improvement over the old scroll, and they’ve stayed the same points which is very welcome. Thralls have been rubbish for too long, let them on the tables. Whilst we’re on Namarti, a quick note that Namarti Reavers have gone up 10 points to 140, which puts them more in line with similar units like Blissbarbs.

For Akhelians there’s changes to both kinds of eel. It’s pure nerf for Ishlaen Guard who lose Anti-Infantry from their Helsabres. Note quite sure why this unit got this change, most competitive deepkin players had moved back to Morrsarr. Speaking of: Morrsarr Guard swap Anti-Infantry for Anti-Cavalry on their Voltspears. This swap being a good or bad thing is obviously match up dependent, but as a meta call in AoS4 I think it’s a nice sidegrade. Cavalry is still a menace. There’s also been a change to their charge mortals, which now trigger on a 3+ rather than a 4+, but the d3 mortals on a 6 has now gone. This will make them more consistent in damage output, but the potential to spike has gone away. I am neutral on this. In fiddly points news, the Akhelian Leviadon has gone down 10 to 480 which is fine and honestly a bit surprising, I was expecting it to go up if anything.

Finally, the Gloomtide Shipwreck gets a new ability that lets units move through it despite being impassable (you still can’t set up or finish a move on it). Enemies that move through it take 2+ d3 mortals. Quite like this as a quality of life change for Namarti who might want to deploy around it for the defensive boost, makes unpacking your deployment a bit easier.

To Ghyran or not to Ghyran

That is the question. We now have totally rewritten scrolls for both Battletome and Scourge of Ghyran flavours of Thrallmaster and Thrall so the inevitable question is which do you run (if you run them at all)? Unlike other Ghyran units these aren’t flat upgrades and both units now provide a different role. Your battletome Thrallmaster is cheaper and has a more aggressive approach, though the crit effect does clash with the possible crit mortals turn. Ghyran Thrallmaster is a curious mix of defensive with the passive rend reduction and offensive with the pre-game move. The Thralls themselves also offer pretty different playstyles: battletome Thralls will end up slightly more resilient once in a fight, whilst Ghyran Thralls are better at providing an active screen (with the caveats we mention in our Scourge of Ghyran review).

The choice really comes down to how you want to run them: if you want a light skirmish line in front of your army to do a bit of chip damage as they die to the enemy then you probably want a minimum sized unit or two of Scourge of Ghyran Thralls and no Thrallmaster. If you want something that’s more of a combat block and you’re planning to go a more infantry & Isharann heavy route with the army then you’ll probably get more mileage out of the battletome Thralls, the more defensive tech you can stack on them with the existence of Soulrenders the better. With these you’ve got the choice of Thrallmasters but I’d lean towards Scourge of Ghyran to layer another level of defence on. Giving an enemy effectively -1 to wound and -1 to rend is not too shabby on such a cheap unit.

What’s New?

Quite a lot is new! Exciting! We’ve got AoS’ second ever Incarnate in the guise of the Incarnate of the Deep. Honestly, at this point I was expecting to never see an Incarnate again and for the Krondspine to quietly disappear next edition. But here we are. It’s a cool idea for a Deepkin manifestation, and infinitely preferable to like a shoal of fish on a big base or some other bullshit it could have been. Statwise it’s very similar to the Krondspine: moves 10″, 12 Health. The major differences are that it has a 4+ save, but has 1 less rend on its melee profile. So you get something that’s tankier but slightly less killy. Given that the Lore of the Abyss that this summons from costs 0 points, this is quite cheeky. Ability wise you get the expected rule that banishments inflict 6 damage rather than actually banishing, and then you get some tendril summoning. Every hero phase you can roll a dice, with a +1 in your own phase. On a 4+ you can remove a tendril from the board if you like, and if there’s fewer than two you can plop one down wholly within 9″ of the Incarnate (note there being no restriction on being more than 9″ from enemy models, they can be set up into combat). Abyssal Tendrils themselves can’t move and have 6 health with a 6+ save. 4 attacks with rend 1 and d3 damage are “fine” and will help the Incarnate’s damage out a bit. The key rules here are that your tendrils can roll a dice vs an enemy unit in combat’s Health characteristic and if they beat it the target unit is ensnared. Ensnared units can’t use commands and the tendrils get +1 to hit them. You can fight the tendrils separately if you like, but if you remove the main Incarnate the tendrils go with them. Overall, it’s pretty good. The big base is very welcome, and the tendril stuff is cool but there’s not much else too exciting going on here. That it summons on an 8 means you’re basically tied to the Aspect of the Sea trying to cast this. A sole Isharann wizard trying to rawdog an 8 probably isn’t worth bothering with, and there’s generic manifestion lores that will suit you better.

Into proper new units we have Mathaela, Oracle of the Abyss. Technically a foot wizard, but they do move 10″ and fly, which is actually handy. Their melee output is predictably bad but equally predictably they doesn’t want to be there. More surprising is that they has a gun, and that’s it’s pretty decent poke for a small hero. 18″ range, 3 shots, damage d3. They’re a wizard with the warscroll spell Crushing Pressure which casts on a 7 and picks a visible enemy within 18″, you roll a number of dice equal to their Health (capped at 10) and do a mortal on a 4+. You will rarely want to cast this, given they’re just power level 1 and the lore is decent. The spice here is a combat phase ability to pick 3 units wholly within 12″ and give their companion weapons +1 attack. Now all the fish attacks are gone, you’re just left with Akhelians for companion attacks but thankfully eels, sharks and turtles all have excellent companion attacks. At 160 points Mathaela is very interesting indeed. They’re spending for just being a wizard (1), but 160 is the same as an Akhelian King and I think this is a real choice (where I end up leaning towards Mathaela). They’ve both got very similar regiments with all Deepkin, the King has slightly more flex on sub-hero, but I doubt an army with either of these would be chasing an Akhelian Raidmaster anyway. Both want to buff your Akhelian units in melee – if you run the numbers on a reinforced block of eels then Mathaela’s +1 companion attack ends up doing very slightly more damage than the extra rend from the King. Given they’re also a bit easier and safer to use than a King and that being a wizard is generally preferable to being a combat hero that would tip the scale to Mathaela for me.

Then we run into the new Ikons, and I’m feeling a bit underwhelmed. They’re both little combat heroes (6 health, 4+ save, 7″ move) with a buff for themselves and a buff for the army and they’re both quite cheap at 120 for the Storm and 130 for the Sea. First the Ikon of the Storm gets quite a few attacks with 7, but they’re not the highest quality. Once per game they get to fight twice with the usual fight-last on the second swing. Other than that they’ve got a passive to stop enemies from retreating away from them and another to let friendlies retreat and still shoot/charge. This one’s pretty rough. Even fighting twice the damage numbers aren’t great and quite frankly, who are you wanting to fight twice into that wont just kill you in between activations? I’m struggling with what this unit is trying to achieve. Then we get the Ikon of the Sea who I like a little better. Fewer attacks, but they’re higher quality. On the charge the Sea does more damage than the Storm, and does a little bit less when not charging. It’s going to be charging though, as it gives itself run and charge and has an ability to pick a friendly unit in combat range and give it +1 charge dice (for probably a 3d6). Realistically if there’s a use-case here, it’s with Soul Raid Ambushers to punt this and a scary combat threat into your opponent’s lines and still have good odds at making the charge in after the inevitable redeploy. I’ve seen chat about the ability of the Sea to give Gotrek a 3d6 charge and if that’s your bag then go off, King. Competitively I still don’t think a 3d6 charge gets Gotrek for where he needs to be for the points, I’d almost always rather have a block of eels.

Armies of Renown

You know the deal – super restricted unit selection, no Regiments of Renown, and you lose all of the default battle traits/enhancements/spells etc.

First Phalanx of Ionrach

Note: as written one of the core battle traits of this army basically doesn’t function. The “Sword of Gwynnar” ability is keyed to your combat phase and the declare step requires the target to not be in combat and then gives it strike-first that it can’t use. This is so obviously a copy paste/typing error that I’m assuming it will be immediately fixed, so have reviewed on that assumption. However, I’ve seen it come up enough online to just make a quick note here.

Volturnos + any Akhelian unit. Volty gets an always-on strike-first. Then there’s some fiddly stuff. In your hero phase you get d3 asydrazor points and there are three abilities that each cost a point to use. They all target one friendly unit, but aren’t once-per turn, so you can blow your load just on one ability a few times if you want (and have the points). In the movement phase you can hand out retreat & shoot/charge. In the charge phase it’s +1 to charge and in the combat phase it’s strike-first. You’re really here for d3 strike-firsts a turn, and using the retreat and charge as and when you need to. I find this system odd, the first two abilities are fine and the combat phase one is extremely good which puts the asydrazor point economy in a super weird place. d3 points is nothing for handing out +1 to charge or whatever, but massive for striking-first. I think this needed longer in the oven.

For a heroic trait you get a free use of one of the battle trait abilities once per game, for a unit wholly within 12″. It’s good, you’ll obviously always use that. The artefact is a bafflingly awful Ward (6+). The coolest thing here is a new enhancement, Bond-beast Traits, which are like mount traits but for one of your cavalry units. I love this idea! For Deepkin it feels really fitting. There are (of course) three to choose from. Voidchill Darkness makes the unit -1 hit if it charged that turn. Deep Connection ignores the effect of the Companion weapon ability (which means the mount attacks will benefit from both of Volturnos’ buffs), and Swift-finned Skirmisher lets you treat a roll of 1-3 on a redeploy as a 4. All of these seem pretty viable – Voidchill on a reinforced unit of Ishlaen Guard makes for a nice anvil whilst Deep Connection on Morrsarr Guard will give you the biggest possible hammer on a “go” turn with Volturnos.

Overall I think it’s pretty playable as AoRs go. If you’re doing the pure Akhelian thing it’s viable compared to vanilla, as you’ll get that strike-first much earlier. That being said, the central mechanic is kind of annoying, and being tied to a d3 will lead to some real feels bad games. Playing around with lists now that the points are out, I quite often find that “sensible” lists here end up with a floating 130 points, so I suspect if we see Ikons outside of Gotrek botherers then it will be here.

Wardens of the Chorrileum

“I wonder what they’ll do for the inevitable Namarti AoR” you wondered. I bet you didn’t think it was this. You’ve gotta take an Eidolon (but you can only have one) and then it’s Namarti, Isharann and Infantry Akhelian units (the latter being the way they get the Thrallmaster in there). The Eidolon then must deploy in reserves. Following this, in each turn you can earn at most one chorrileum spirit point (this book loves a Weird Point) for achieving one of: casting a spell on an 8+, destroying an enemy unit within 12″ of an Isharann, having one of your Namarti units destroyed whilst within 12″ of an Isharann or contesting an objective you control. Once you have 3 magic coral points you can summon your Eidolon in the combat phase, anywhere on the board that you like, and every enemy unit it’s in combat with takes d3 mortals. This is a fucking insane mechanic. Finally in battle traits there’s a new rampage for Eidolons that lets them fight twice with the mandatory fight-last on the second one. Pretty tasty on an Aspect of the Storm (though they wont count as charging if they get summoned into combat, so lose out on the +1 damage).

Moving on, the heroic trait lets the hero have an unmodifiable control score of 10 if it’s contesting the same objective as a unit of Namarti. If you need this, that means your stuff is likely about to get demolished by someone charging it, but if you can keep the hero safe then control 10 could be spicy in that scenario. The artefact is a bit more easy to use, once per battle you can pick a Namarti unit that’s been destroyed and set up a replacement with half the models, with the usual restrictions. Then you get the new Incarnate as your manifestation lore and a spell lore with two spells in it. Slipstream casts on a 6 and lets a friendly unit do a d6″ move that can’t pass through or end in combat range. Essence of the Chorrileum casts on a 6 and lets you return d6 Namarti to a unit or heal anything else for d3.

This one’s pretty out there. The cap on point-earning makes me worry that the Eidolon half of the rules are built around is not gonna show up until like battle round 3, which is almost certainly too late for an army that is otherwise built around 1 health 5+ save infantry. I wouldn’t take this to a tournament, but you could probably have some bonkers casual fun with it. I feel like the real limiter here is the model selection, if you could shove even some limited Akhelian units in I’d be a lot happier, but as it is you’re going to end up having to paint and play with ~90 Namarti models, which sounds miserable.

Regiments of Renown

Bloodthirsty Shiver

300 points gets you two Allopexes, a saving of 20 points over the cost for Deepkin themselves. Two sharks is a pretty nice thing to have access to actually, Deepkin have so much fast stuff that they haven’t always seen the light of day but for other armies there’s a lot to love here: fast moving, multi-phase units that can get a lot done on the battlefield. There’s even an element of control from their ability to reduce charge dice against monsters and cavalry. In addition you get the Hunt of the Bloodthirsty Shiver ability, which triggers in your hero phase if both Allopexes are in each other’s combat range and lets you pick one of two abilities: either -1 to hit or crit (2 hits), with both requiring the Allopexes to remain in combat range to keep the abilities active. Honestly, I like this as an RoR. No hero tax and a tight focus on what it wants to provide.

Namarti Shore Raid

Aaaand we’re back to traditional RoR quality. 300 points gets you a Thrallmaster and 10 each of Namarti Thralls and Reavers, for a grand saving of 30 points. The gimmick here is that you must deploy the entire regiment in reserve and then it comes on in your movement phase wholly within 7″ of a table edge, within combat range of another unit in the RoR, and more than 9″ from any enemy units. Then each unit can make a d3″ move. This sucks. 10 Thralls are doing nothing for you, even out of a cheeky slightly-closer-than-usual deep strike and giving them crit (2 hits) does nothing to change this equation other than force you to spend points on a hero that basically doesn’t even interact with the Reavers.

Sample Lists

The One-Drop Blunt Instrument- click to expand

We’re not reinventing the wheel here, this is a successful list archetype that’s still going to broadly work. Each Leviadon can follow around a unit of Morrsarr and in doing so you’ll end up with an army that’s entirely covered in Ward (5+) and will be a nightmare to shift. It’s a ball of pain that’s tough to shift, fast, and also hits really hard. Obvious downsides are that there’s no wizards and nothing to run around trying to do battle tactics, but you can worry about the latter once your enemy is dead. The toughest choice will be Tide, but I think this is one that might want to stick to old reliable Tide of the Sea. You don’t want to be putting individual bits of this list into reserves really, and the quantity of companion attacks here means you will be losing value from the Crit (Mortals) vs the Strike-First. Plus, Leviadons Crit (Mortal) anyway.

The First Phalanx- click to expand

Yeah look OK you can double turtle this army as well but here I’ve instead decided to double down on the cool thing that this AoR does and that’s boost up a unit of Morrsarr Guard as much as you can boost them. Deep Connection removing the negative from the companion weapon ability opens up some real opportunities here and if you can line everything up right then a unit of Morrsarr with +1 to hit, +1 attack and +1 rend across both profiles is an absolute monster of a unit. Even with just the d3 asydrazor points to work with, you can pretty much guarantee a fight-first for it every turn as well.

I'd like to play with new stuff please- click to expand

“Please don’t make the third sample list have a Leviadon and multiple units of Morrsarr Guard” yeah sorry about that, I’m still not super hot on Namarti. This is the sort of list I’m actually hoping to play in the near future – trying out lots of new bits to see what I like and what I don’t. the Ghyran Thralls give you a cheeky screen and units with potential objective/battle tactic play, Mathaela boosts up your tri-core of Akhelian units, and the Aspect of the Sea with Endless Sea-Storm is your best bet for getting the Incarnate out nice and quickly. There’s wiggle room here too – if it turns out that the teleport shenanigans aren’t much cop there’s points to spare to grab Akhelian Beastmasters again and the Soulscryer can sub out to Lotann for even more spellcasting power on the Eidolon at the cost of a drop.

Final Thoughts

Mixed emotions. Like I said up top, I think if you have an army and just keep running it in the same way you’ve been doing all edition it’s straight up worse now, but it’s probably fine. I don’t love that it’s all-in on one quite limited battle trait and I’m underwhelmed by some of the new warscrolls. The change most players either with or against Deepkin will feel is to the tides – the safety bubble of a full battleround of strikes-first is gone now and this makes an already fragile army even more so. Deepkin have always been an army that posts decent winrates but low play rates. It’s hard to paint, it’s hard to play, and this battletome has chosen to double down on the latter (and the former! Oh my god painting the Incarnate is an experience) so I would expect to see this trend continuing – you wont see many, and they’ll take a good pilot to perform well with.

Undeniably, there is also a lot of cool stuff in here – one good AoR and one good RoR is about as good as it gets for a battletome it seems – and it is positive that the design team are moving away from the faction packs as we get deeper into the edition, I just wish now that they could move beyond the arbitrary limits they have set themselves how much space a book can dedicate to battle traits/heroic traits/artefacts etc. If you’ve had more than 3 good ideas, put them in the book.

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