Smoke and Mirrors - 1/5
This is specific to the asur really. Just like Beasts plus 1 to cast is more useful to Beastmen than Wood Elves Smoke and Mirrors is more useful to armies like Chaos and Dark Elves. First off we have access to excellent defensive items for our Wizards and second we always want to swap out of combat but we rarely have a tough fighty foot character to swap in.
Miasma - 4/5
It is a nice two dicer that can enhance your movement superiority or make you a little better in combat or keep the enemies bit shooty unit from being so effective against your fragile units. I don't really understand casting this one as a 10+ because you only every really need one of the four things and a 10+ spell for an archmage is a 3 dicer if you want 80%+ chance of making it happen, which smells inefficient.
Steed - 1/5
You can't charge...possibly the worst spell in any lore for the Asur.
Enfeebling Foe - 3/5
This is an important edge in combats where they have Str 4 or 5. I would suggest if they are Str 6+ your wasting your time hoping for a 3 on the D3. It also looks handy against chargers who have reduced Str in subsequent rounds. Forget you have this spell until you need it and hope the other guy doesn't value it highly enough.
Withering - 5/5
This is one of the best spells available to the Asur in any lore. It is a 3 dicer that you sometimes want to 4 dice or even 5 dice. How many more points would spears or archers be if they were 1-3 str higher for the purposes of wounding things? Everyone knows how good this spell is for Asur and that makes forcing it at the right time an issue. But it is the spells only issue.
Pendulum - 1/5
If you want to kill warmachines buy some fast elements this spell is awful at everything else.
Pit - 3/5
Skaven, Dark Elves, Daemons and Warriors are all less vulnerable to this. Unless you play Lizardmen very frequently then you shouldn't expect this spell to do the business. The reason it is still a 3 is many opponents havn't figured that out yet and will dispel with prejudice. That and the other low I armies in the game of course.
Mindrazor - 3/5
I havn't, in four games, successfully cast Mindrazor. I successfully cast Withering every game in part because I have access to Mindrazor. Unlike Dwellers or Purple Shiney Death it isn't worth your archmage probably exploding to get off so its pretty dispellable in most situations, being a solid five dice cast. Added to that most of our hard hitters are high strength when it counts anyways - either through lances or great weapons or because you have squeezed in withering due to the threat of Mindrazor.
Overall then the lore looks great at face value but after actually using it it doesn't do two things I want from a lore. First it doesn't turn an otherwise lost game. By relying on augmenting your units your relying on your units to exist. Second there isn't an obvious way to misdirect your opponent.
A few times I would put my dice into two piles, after the initial miasma ofc. A six and a three. I then look up and down the battle line and move the dice about. Then I announce Withering on three. My opponent sees a cast requiring him to either risk not dispelling what I use my six dice on or play the maybe dispel everything game. Good players will let the spell go most of the time I think. I then just end the magic phase...no need to risk a miscast and I have the spell I want anyways.
Things like this I am good at and they help me win games. Shadow doesn't provide a lot of opportunity to fo this because its spells are obviously good when they are good. Maybe I am wrong but I think Shadow is very good but not great as a lore.
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