I want to take a look at the claims of the Iron Lotus as being not worth it and not matching its fluff. I’ve tried to be as fair as I can with this, not letting personal opinion sway me.
First the fluff a place where the Iron Lotus stats and what is written about it do not always add up. First paragraph is some background about fighting schools in general, we don’t hear specifically about the Iron Lotus or as their school is known the School of Scything Flowers until the second paragraph. Here it mostly notes the schools speed for defense while agility, grace and hypnotic are other adjectives ascribed to the school. The third paragraph mentions they use a whip and that shields and parry are of no use against them. That one opponent might get attacked by them but their mate won’t see what is coming. The last paragraph is about their Rank 1 leader the Black Lotus that armor means nothing against her and they possess superhuman speed.
So first speed, the Iron Lotus barely have this. They start in deployment C which is nice but when I think speed and agility I think of ability to react to what is going on in the battlefield and a 5” movement is one of the worst movements out there. They can sprint and they have a defensive ability that allows for some movement but they have a hard time getting to or stopping opponents from getting to objectives. With the defensive ability those that survive could be said to be average or barely more than average. They are certainly not speedy. You see speed, agility and grace in their four dodges. I see nothing stat wise that is hypnotic but okay.
The whip comment is weird since what Iron Lotus’ ignore one of on their attacks is a dodge, its not a parry or armor and it is only one dodge. So their whip training does none of what it says except that they can attack one person and end up hitting another, which is true through the Black Lotus Inspire or if they use the Offensive Insights of the Black Lotus or Madame Mui they get to hit neighbors of their enemy. Good.
Yet then the paragraph about the Black Lotus half is true. They don’t have any amount of Sundering. They do get faster, much faster and their attack allows them to move some more and possibly attack. However they are stuck with a slow unit. If the unit even had the Legionnaire ability to move 2” after moving towards someone they could keep up with the Black Lotus. It seems odd.
As a Rank 1 unit. It is equal in flimsiness to most. It is hit 40% of the time, dodges 40% and can generate backlash 20%. All average but slightly better against magic attacks. One wound, one resilience. Standard. 1 attack die with the ability to get rid of one of an opponents dodge. Fine. Enlightenment which is Shael Han’s thing. Sure. Sidestep, something that will trigger 40% of the time against one die attack models and much less often against anyone else. They are 5” move, the slowest of all Rank 1 infantry. Tied with Deepmen and Union Workers. Start in Zone C which makes them “faster” than Deepmen, so let’s say that puts them on par with 6” Zone B.
So what you have is something completely average. It doesn’t hit hard, it can’t take a hit, it can’t react well to the battlefield movement, it brings Enlightenment and a move if you successfully dodge an attack ability which will trigger rarely. Given Enlightenment being the thing Iron Lotus has to make it special we now have to compare it to the other Rank 1 Enlightenment unit the Legionnaire. The Legionnaire is effectively same in speed, one inch faster but starts 5 inches back. This sounds significantly slower but it means it can react to the battlefield more moving side to side as well as forwards and backwards and one of its abilities allows it to get another 2” of movement so really the Legionnaire should count as being as fast if not faster than the Iron Lotus. It also has one attack die but it replaces Parry instead of Dodge so that’s even. The other ability Healing Vapors is when in contact with a friendly model they have a 50% chance of ignoring a hit. This is far and away superior to Sidestep. It has a 50% chance of going off (when in contact admittedly) versus the 40% or less for Sidestep and it keeps you from dying which Sidestep helps you get away if you don’t die. Healing Vapors is a 50% chance of defense against a Shield Bash or other forced move that causes damage to the person hit by it. So it mitigates the way certain armies play with certain troops. It is a significant ability compared to Sidestep and Legion Tactics plus their faster move makes them on par or should be counted as being faster than Iron Lotus so the Iron Lotus lose out and don’t offer anything that the Legionnaire can’t do better except hit people who have dodges but no parries on their card and in a tournament that won’t matter unless you know what everyone in the tournament plays before the match.
To be fair the Legionnaire has a different defense chart with one dodge, two parries and three magics. Having dodge and parry means its weak to Feint and Follow Through while Iron Lotus are only hurt by Follow Through, however the extra Magic means that magic attacks are 10% less effective against them, good for surviving up to your opponent and the extra magic plays into both the Dragon Legion Keeper and The Winterhawk’s training. Both arguably better trainings than either the Black Lotus or Madame Mui’s or even just as best trainings in Shael Han so far. Madame Mui’s is great if you know you will be facing Hadross.
Given this it seems the Iron Lotus struggle to find a place in Shael Han. Their leaders provide some decent Insights but even then since all but two specialists provide offensive Insights the Insights of the Legionnaires are more important honestly. Legionnaires provide two of the three defensive Insights while Iron Lotus leaders provide two of the eight offensive ones. I hope that someday they see a rules change/errata/something to make them an interesting and effective choice. As it is they pique my interest because I would want to play with more female sculpts on the table.
Any feedback, alternate viewpoints are not just welcome but encouraged!
First the fluff a place where the Iron Lotus stats and what is written about it do not always add up. First paragraph is some background about fighting schools in general, we don’t hear specifically about the Iron Lotus or as their school is known the School of Scything Flowers until the second paragraph. Here it mostly notes the schools speed for defense while agility, grace and hypnotic are other adjectives ascribed to the school. The third paragraph mentions they use a whip and that shields and parry are of no use against them. That one opponent might get attacked by them but their mate won’t see what is coming. The last paragraph is about their Rank 1 leader the Black Lotus that armor means nothing against her and they possess superhuman speed.
So first speed, the Iron Lotus barely have this. They start in deployment C which is nice but when I think speed and agility I think of ability to react to what is going on in the battlefield and a 5” movement is one of the worst movements out there. They can sprint and they have a defensive ability that allows for some movement but they have a hard time getting to or stopping opponents from getting to objectives. With the defensive ability those that survive could be said to be average or barely more than average. They are certainly not speedy. You see speed, agility and grace in their four dodges. I see nothing stat wise that is hypnotic but okay.
The whip comment is weird since what Iron Lotus’ ignore one of on their attacks is a dodge, its not a parry or armor and it is only one dodge. So their whip training does none of what it says except that they can attack one person and end up hitting another, which is true through the Black Lotus Inspire or if they use the Offensive Insights of the Black Lotus or Madame Mui they get to hit neighbors of their enemy. Good.
Yet then the paragraph about the Black Lotus half is true. They don’t have any amount of Sundering. They do get faster, much faster and their attack allows them to move some more and possibly attack. However they are stuck with a slow unit. If the unit even had the Legionnaire ability to move 2” after moving towards someone they could keep up with the Black Lotus. It seems odd.
As a Rank 1 unit. It is equal in flimsiness to most. It is hit 40% of the time, dodges 40% and can generate backlash 20%. All average but slightly better against magic attacks. One wound, one resilience. Standard. 1 attack die with the ability to get rid of one of an opponents dodge. Fine. Enlightenment which is Shael Han’s thing. Sure. Sidestep, something that will trigger 40% of the time against one die attack models and much less often against anyone else. They are 5” move, the slowest of all Rank 1 infantry. Tied with Deepmen and Union Workers. Start in Zone C which makes them “faster” than Deepmen, so let’s say that puts them on par with 6” Zone B.
So what you have is something completely average. It doesn’t hit hard, it can’t take a hit, it can’t react well to the battlefield movement, it brings Enlightenment and a move if you successfully dodge an attack ability which will trigger rarely. Given Enlightenment being the thing Iron Lotus has to make it special we now have to compare it to the other Rank 1 Enlightenment unit the Legionnaire. The Legionnaire is effectively same in speed, one inch faster but starts 5 inches back. This sounds significantly slower but it means it can react to the battlefield more moving side to side as well as forwards and backwards and one of its abilities allows it to get another 2” of movement so really the Legionnaire should count as being as fast if not faster than the Iron Lotus. It also has one attack die but it replaces Parry instead of Dodge so that’s even. The other ability Healing Vapors is when in contact with a friendly model they have a 50% chance of ignoring a hit. This is far and away superior to Sidestep. It has a 50% chance of going off (when in contact admittedly) versus the 40% or less for Sidestep and it keeps you from dying which Sidestep helps you get away if you don’t die. Healing Vapors is a 50% chance of defense against a Shield Bash or other forced move that causes damage to the person hit by it. So it mitigates the way certain armies play with certain troops. It is a significant ability compared to Sidestep and Legion Tactics plus their faster move makes them on par or should be counted as being faster than Iron Lotus so the Iron Lotus lose out and don’t offer anything that the Legionnaire can’t do better except hit people who have dodges but no parries on their card and in a tournament that won’t matter unless you know what everyone in the tournament plays before the match.
To be fair the Legionnaire has a different defense chart with one dodge, two parries and three magics. Having dodge and parry means its weak to Feint and Follow Through while Iron Lotus are only hurt by Follow Through, however the extra Magic means that magic attacks are 10% less effective against them, good for surviving up to your opponent and the extra magic plays into both the Dragon Legion Keeper and The Winterhawk’s training. Both arguably better trainings than either the Black Lotus or Madame Mui’s or even just as best trainings in Shael Han so far. Madame Mui’s is great if you know you will be facing Hadross.
Given this it seems the Iron Lotus struggle to find a place in Shael Han. Their leaders provide some decent Insights but even then since all but two specialists provide offensive Insights the Insights of the Legionnaires are more important honestly. Legionnaires provide two of the three defensive Insights while Iron Lotus leaders provide two of the eight offensive ones. I hope that someday they see a rules change/errata/something to make them an interesting and effective choice. As it is they pique my interest because I would want to play with more female sculpts on the table.
Any feedback, alternate viewpoints are not just welcome but encouraged!
