True, but you can say the same about a number of models that start off Highly Impetus, like 45thers, Magister Knights, etc. They also lose the advantages, including the impetus order. My only point was that the rationale (as far as I could tell) for the difference between the Orc/Mobile Brigada and the Hospitaller was the downsides of Frenzy, which are pretty big.
While it does mean you can no longer take cover, it also gives you a free order. I had that specific order win me a game at the Michigan GT this past weekend. Without that extra order my Hospitaller Doc would not have been able to kill the guy holding my beacon in Capture and Protect, which swung the game from 4-3 to 7-0 in a single order. Besides being generically useful on a BS14 HI that wants to move in close, and wants to have orders spent on it. And besides, it turns off in a fireteam, which is exactly where you want models to be cheaper, when you are taking multiple of them!
That's not the rationale; that's the excuse. The rationale is that MO is popular and making it more powerful/these minis cheaper is better for the bottom line.
It's not really a "free" order, since it comes with some pretty hefty downsides, including not being able to control where your mini goes. In your example if the closest enemy model had not be in the direction you wanted it would not have been useful. I don't buy that. Making any particular force more powerful is a short term win, long term failure, just ask GW. Further from what I can tell from forum scuttlebutt, the Hospitallers are already popular, so giving them a boost is not necessarily, unlike other profiles, which are less popular, like ORCs, KotHS or Teutons. It will be interesting to see what happens with them.
Funnily enough I wonder if dropping Fusiliers (and thus Bipandra) was actual a balancing decision. Because we know that there are Wildcard Santiagos (and there may be others) and that would have allowed for a 5-trooper Fusilier Core using Bipandra and a Wildcard Knight. That might actually have been an unblalanced-good option (or at least seen as overshadowing the Order Sergeants) and dropped accordingly.
The other thing that removing Fusiliers does is force you to use a Knight Lieutenant. Good job we just got a Wildcard Specialist Spitfire Lt!
Bipandra and three 10 point fusiliers would surely be more than order sergeants i would have thought? Sent from my SM-A520F using Tapatalk
Who cares? Fusis needed to get out of MO. If there was a balance decision it may have been to limit MO to HI Lt's which is kinda brilliant IMO. I guess we will find out when we see if OS get a Lt profile. More likely were just seeing an evolution of faction design where not every sectorial has to share the same line troops.
I'm certainly not at all against mechanically encouraging a Knight Lt. If only there was CoC to back them up! Maybe on one of the other Knights getting reviewed, probably not the Teutons, but maybe the Sepulcher?
Sepulchre CoC almost feels like too much to ask for at this point. Obvious Lt may well be an intended weakness, offset by the fact they can be a 2W high ARM trooper in a Fireteam.
I'd like to see the KoTHS become relevant. If MO is restricted to HI Lts then he will have a niche role as a shell game Lt, at least. CoC would be a good call too. While I'm wishing, maybe they could make a Multirfile profile as well.
Yes, the Order Sgts as the currently stand are just inferior as cheerleaders. They DO have some interesting options, mostly Spec Sgts, but for cheap orders Fusies beat them pretty handily. Removing the Fusies probably should have been done a long time ago. Now the big question in my mind is if we'll see a drop in Order Sgt cost, and since they're in the big 300 pt box (combi + aux bot, HRL, Hacker) and the Hospitallers were dropped in price to make the box 300 pts, it seems unlikely.
They're are WYSIWYG ways to build the 300pt box to 315-320 points, so we can't completely rule out a drop in Sarge points. I always felt it was weird that Sarges kept their prices in the N2>N3 transition despite the fact religious got a price drop.
i think CB views big HI like aquila or characters like Joan as more emblematic of pano than the puny boys in blue. If we saw joan leave, then id say you could be onto something
Considering how many of the nations that make up PanO are Catholic majority I've always taken the idea of the church or MO splitting away with a fairly large dash of salt.
Additionally, when you read about how enmeshed in society the Church and the Orders are, while a break away is possible, it's highly unlikely.
