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I never leave home without the D, I always bring at least one .

 Peregrine wrote:

 Fezman wrote:
Or, failing that, why didn't they just come out and write something like "LOW are legal in all games, like it or lump it?" That at least would have been better than leaving it to you to deal with.

That's exactly what they did. LOW are explicitly included in the core rulebook and legal in all games. The fact that certain players want them to require special permission doesn't mean that what GW said is in any way unclear.

I go on the rule that everything in the core book is legal. I think if superheavies are in there and you start banning them there's technically nothing to stop me, for instance, agreeing to play against Space Marines as long as the opponent promises not to use ATSKNF. I'd be stuck if I didn't treat everything in the book as legal as I've often in the past had to flip through the book to point out some rule that an opponent has forgotten exists.

However, I haven't got the core book for this edition yet, and the way this thread reads to me is as though there's a special paragraph that makes it mandatory to get opponent's permission before using superheavies. If no such section exists, then I'd be of the opinion that I can ask for them not to be used...but tough luck if the other player says no. I certainly wouldn't refuse a game with someone who insisted on using them (mind you, that could be because these days I'm just happy to actually get a game).

I still don't feel like they "deserve" to be in regular games. But they are, so I just go with it.

 Fezman wrote:
However, I haven't got the core book for this edition yet, and the way this thread reads to me is as though there's a special paragraph that makes it mandatory to get opponent's permission before using superheavies.

There is no such paragraph in the rules as published by GW. Certain players just want there to be a rule like that and expect veto power over their opponent's LoW choices. The closest thing to "permission" in the rules is that you have to agree on everything about the game, including "obvious" things like both players using the same point total for their army. So technically both players have to agree to include a superheavy, but both players also have to agree to include a tactical squad, there's nothing special about LoW choices that requires additional permission.

Superheavies were an optional extra for some years and a lot of players disliked them and refused to play with them.

While Games Workshop has now force fed them into the core rules, I think it was a bad idea and has led to this bickering about what it is reasonable to allow or not.

It is obvious that lots of players still don't want to play with LoW (or Imperial Armour, etc). It is equally obvious that lots of players do want to play with these things and are upset that the other players are refusing to play.

People cannot be forced to play games they don't like, so I don't know what these rules changes have achieved other than to splinter the player base, cause discontent and possibly to drive people away from the game.

This is all GW's fault.

How is it GW's fault? Perhaps for making Superheavies in the first place?

Superheavies have been in the game for a long time.
Now that GW makes them legal for 40k instead of relying on houserules they are suddenly "splintering the playerbase"?
But when they were banned everything was fine..
This sounds a lot like: "GW is at fault because they did something I disagree with."

 Fezman wrote:
the way this thread reads to me is as though there's a special paragraph that makes it mandatory to get opponent's permission before using superheavies.

There is a special paragraph making it mandatory to get permission before using *anything*.
That means a Lord of War is just as legal as a unit Ork Boyz.

For making them "mandatory" in the core rulebook.

Everyone was happy when they were in Apocalypse. People who wanted to play with them bought Apocalypse and played Apocalypse games. People who didn't want to play with them didn't.

I disagree with the new system because I think it is a bad policy of game design, not just for toeraggery.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
For making them "mandatory" in the core rulebook.

Everyone was happy when they were in Apocalypse. People who wanted to play with them bought Apocalypse and played Apocalypse games. People who didn't want to play with them didn't.

I disagree with the new system because I think it is a bad policy of game design, not just for toeraggery.

This. The problem isn't superheavies, it's making superheavies anything but optional "opponent's permission" (and I liked when special characters were permission only, too) because of what this thread has illustrated: It makes it harder to get rid of them, when they unbalance the game. Couple that with bullgak like making some special characters LoW and you blur the line even more, to where now you can't just say ban LoW because what if somebody has a fluffy Goff army with Ghazghkull? Okay so you allow Ghaz but not titans, that makes you biased.

I really think that decisions such as making some characters LoW was a deliberate atempt to ingrain the idea that LoW are allowed for regular games, because of what I said above. It's now much harder to justify banning them as either you ban them outright or ban some but not others and once you get to that line, what's to stop you from saying no Riptides? No Wraithlords? No flyers? No Space Marines or Eldar or Tau?

That was just what GW wanted; to make people who want to ban overpowered, unbalanced things from the game appear to be the bad guy. Before, it was reasonable to agree no flyers or superheavies, because they unbalanced the game. Now both of those things are in the core rules, so it's about as reasonable as saying that you hate Dark Eldar so you won't play against them, or ATSKNF is broken so you won't play against Marines. Just another example of GW's kitchen sink and "Anything you buy you should be able to use in a game" mentality.

how the hell were you "reasonably" allowed to ban flyers at any point? When did this happen? i must have missed a whole section of 6th ed?

 Kilkrazy wrote:
For making them "mandatory" in the core rulebook.

Everyone was happy when they were in Apocalypse. People who wanted to play with them bought Apocalypse and played Apocalypse games. People who didn't want to play with them didn't.

I disagree with the new system because I think it is a bad policy of game design, not just for toeraggery.

I don't know what toeraggery means, but the rest of this post sums up my feelings perfectly.

I Lurve them in Apoc games. I loathe them in "normal" 40k games.

Also, a caveat to the most important rule (Have Fun!) is: I don't have to like what you like, donkey-cave.

 ausYenLoWang wrote:
how the hell were you "reasonably" allowed to ban flyers at any point? When did this happen? i must have missed a whole section of 6th ed?

Before 6th edition IIRC they were optional in a supplement, just like Escalation/LoW was.

Yes, I don't like flyers either, or fortifications. OTOH I do like FIBUA.

They all used to be optional expansions.

IDK if FIBUA has been put into 7th edition.

WayneTheGame wrote:

 ausYenLoWang wrote:
how the hell were you "reasonably" allowed to ban flyers at any point? When did this happen? i must have missed a whole section of 6th ed?

Before 6th edition IIRC they were optional in a supplement, just like Escalation/LoW was.

FW and APOC models... the rest were fast skimmers that in 6th were made flyers

Kangodo wrote:
How is it GW's fault? Perhaps for making Superheavies in the first place?

Superheavies have been in the game for a long time.
Now that GW makes them legal for 40k instead of relying on houserules they are suddenly "splintering the playerbase"?
But when they were banned everything was fine..
This sounds a lot like: "GW is at fault because they did something I disagree with."

 Fezman wrote:
the way this thread reads to me is as though there's a special paragraph that makes it mandatory to get opponent's permission before using superheavies.

There is a special paragraph making it mandatory to get permission before using *anything*.
That means a Lord of War is just as legal as a unit Ork Boyz.

LOW weren't popular for several reasons, one of them being that many players didn't like playing with or against them. But they were always optional before. Now that they're in the core books and as optional as tac squads, it means an aspect of the game that many players don't find fun is a larger part of the game, so the game itself becomes unfun. You have three choices.
1. You can play anyways at a diminished level of enjoyment.
2. Refuse to play against LOW and look like TFG.
3. Stop playing 40k and find a game that fits better with what you find enjoyable.

I'm not the only one to choose option 3 and GW really needs to take a long look at that.

 MWHistorian wrote:
LOW weren't popular for several reasons, one of them being that many players didn't like playing with or against them. But they were always optional before. Now that they're in the core books and as optional as tac squads, it means an aspect of the game that many players don't find fun is a larger part of the game, so the game itself becomes unfun. You have three choices.
1. You can play anyways at a diminished level of enjoyment.
2. Refuse to play against LOW and look like TFG.
3. Stop playing 40k and find a game that fits better with what you find enjoyable.

I'm not the only one to choose option 3 and GW really needs to take a long look at that.

Exalted. This is exactly it. You can do #1 and "deal with it", or do #2 and look like the jerk for refusing to play with a "core" part of the game; as I said this whole LoW are core thing is I think deliberate to blur the line and make it harder to ban things, because if you ban one core thing you can ban any core thing, and that can get silly e.g. saying "I don't think superheavies belong in standard games of 40k" is now just as stupid as saying "I don't like Tau and refuse to play them". People who didn't think that superheavies belong in the scale of a typical 40k game (i.e. NOT 28mm Epic) can now be told to suck it up, because GW says that superheavies *do* belong in any size game.

Seems more like a case of "Stop liking what I dont like" to me rather than GW doing anything.

Heaven forbid people get to play with the fancy models they bought.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Seems more like a case of "Stop liking what I dont like" to me rather than GW doing anything.

Heaven forbid people get to play with the fancy models they bought.

Then you clearly didn't understand a word of what was being said.

 MWHistorian wrote:

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Seems more like a case of "Stop liking what I dont like" to me rather than GW doing anything.

Heaven forbid people get to play with the fancy models they bought.

Then you clearly didn't understand a word of what was being said.

I understand it completely, I disagree with your rationalization, trying to make your decision the 'moraly superior' one then blaming GW for finally letting people use those expensive models they bought.

As eloquently as you put it or whatever reasons you try to shoe-horn, its simply a case of "Stop liking what I dont like"

You dont like LOW, you dont want people to use them. People like LOW, they want to use them, and per the rules they can now.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:

 MWHistorian wrote:

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Seems more like a case of "Stop liking what I dont like" to me rather than GW doing anything.

Heaven forbid people get to play with the fancy models they bought.

Then you clearly didn't understand a word of what was being said.

I understand it completely, I disagree with your rationalization, trying to make your decision the 'moraly superior' one then blaming GW for finally letting people use those expensive models they bought.

As eloquently as you put it or whatever reasons you try to shoe-horn, its simply a case of "Stop liking what I dont like"

You dont like LOW, you dont want people to use them. People like LOW, they want to use them, and per the rules they can now.

No one said anything about not using them, we just don't find them fun in our games. You can go play whatever you want. If I don't find it fun, why should I play?

Then dont play them, but trying to rationalize your way of thinking as the right way is just "sour grapes"

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Then dont play them, but trying to rationalize your way of thinking as the right way is just "sour grapes"

Again, you're not understanding.
I'm not rationalizing that playing without LOW is "the right way." (show me a quote where I said that.) All I'm saying is that I don't find it fun for me. You may find it fun and that's fine, but I don't like playing with or against them. Now that they are no longer optional, the game is less fun for me. (See previous post about what my three options were.) I chose #3 and left the game because the elements I find unfun were becoming a larger portion of the game. You can continue to play as you see fit. Neither of us is right or wrong, but I am saying that GW is wrong because LOW isn't very popular and the move does nothing to gain new players but only pushes some current players away.

Havent you quit a while ago anyways? How does this recent development affect you?

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
Havent you quit a while ago anyways? How does this recent development affect you?

Because it's part of the reason I quit.

I think for the people like me who don't like superheavies in smaller games, we don't want them REMOVED, what we want is a tight, solid core game and then have things like superheavies, fliers, allies tacked on as optional extras. NOT the other way around where you have a convoluted core game that includes a whole bunch of stuff that doesn't make a lot of sense and then have to trim away at it to get back to a solid core game.

It's not that we don't want people to have fun in a way that's different to the way we want to have fun, it's that we want better structured rules that are modular and consistent for different play styles without making anyone feel like they're being ostracised for wanting or not wanting certain things in their games.

 MWHistorian wrote:
LOW weren't popular for several reasons, one of them being that many players didn't like playing with or against them. But they were always optional before. Now that they're in the core books and as optional as tac squads, it means an aspect of the game that many players don't find fun is a larger part of the game, so the game itself becomes unfun. You have three choices.
1. You can play anyways at a diminished level of enjoyment.
2. Refuse to play against LOW and look like TFG.
3. Stop playing 40k and find a game that fits better with what you find enjoyable.

I'm not the only one to choose option 3 and GW really needs to take a long look at that.

But they were popular. Lots of people had Superheavies and many felt bad for not being able to take them in normal games.
Now I can sometimes decide to use them in a game of WH40k without having to wait for our biennial Apocalypse.

Could your three options please be any more biased?
I absolutely hated playing against Imperial Guard, I would rather fight Imperial Knights than the IG.
But they were in the rules, so I had to deal with it and I couldn't ask people to NOT play them since they didn't have another army.
Luckily I can always ask my opponent to take a step back with LoW's and contrary to your statement that will not make me a 'TFG'.

But it seems you don't like to play against them.
Perfect solution: Don't play them! It's that easy.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
For making them "mandatory" in the core rulebook.
Everyone was happy when they were in Apocalypse. People who wanted to play with them bought Apocalypse and played Apocalypse games. People who didn't want to play with them didn't.
I disagree with the new system because I think it is a bad policy of game design, not just for toeraggery.

So you are here to tell me that everyone was happy?
Well, I was quite happy with my 150 euro model that I only fielded once every 18 months. There are no words to express that awesome feeling of buying a model and than never playing with it.

Kangodo wrote:

 MWHistorian wrote:
LOW weren't popular for several reasons, one of them being that many players didn't like playing with or against them. But they were always optional before. Now that they're in the core books and as optional as tac squads, it means an aspect of the game that many players don't find fun is a larger part of the game, so the game itself becomes unfun. You have three choices.
1. You can play anyways at a diminished level of enjoyment.
2. Refuse to play against LOW and look like TFG.
3. Stop playing 40k and find a game that fits better with what you find enjoyable.

I'm not the only one to choose option 3 and GW really needs to take a long look at that.

But they were popular. Lots of people had Superheavies and many felt bad for not being able to take them in normal games.
Now I can sometimes decide to use them in a game of WH40k without having to wait for our biennial Apocalypse.

Could your three options please be any more biased?
I absolutely hated playing against Imperial Guard, I would rather fight Imperial Knights than the IG.
But they were in the rules, so I had to deal with it and I couldn't ask people to NOT play them since they didn't have another army.
Luckily I can always ask my opponent to take a step back with LoW's and contrary to your statement that will not make me a 'TFG'.

But it seems you don't like to play against them.
Perfect solution: Don't play them! It's that easy.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
For making them "mandatory" in the core rulebook.
Everyone was happy when they were in Apocalypse. People who wanted to play with them bought Apocalypse and played Apocalypse games. People who didn't want to play with them didn't.
I disagree with the new system because I think it is a bad policy of game design, not just for toeraggery.

So you are here to tell me that everyone was happy?
Well, I was quite happy with my 150 euro model that I only fielded once every 18 months. There are no words to express that awesome feeling of buying a model and than never playing with it.

No, we're here to tell you that it's GW fault for making a problematic game. If they were better at making rules, they'd make LOW fun so that everyone would want to play with and against them. Instead they create a sharp divide in the already fractured player base.

After my last game, I'm more likely to refuse to play yet another cookie cutter Waveserpent spam + Wraithknights and as many Psykers as possible to give as many rerolls as possible list than I am some interesting unit I probably haven't seen before or very rarely, regardless of it's relative power level.

Perhaps if someone who plays one of these lists can explain to me where the fun lies in playing when your response to almost literally everything is "measure threat range of unit, place Waveserpent outside of threat range if possible, shoot unit until dead, repeat?"

Sure, some LoW are very strong, a handful are possibly broken, but when there's gak like this in the game, arguing about their inclusion is fiddling while Rome burns somewhat.

The divide is only being caused by those who are unwilling to compromise, who thinks their 'fun' trumps everyone elses fun by giving biased choices.

The only divide is the one that is being made by the players, GW simply put all cards on the table, its the players who are saying some cards are valid and some arent .

How can GW be 'fracturing the player base' by giving more options how to play? They're saying everything is fair game, and leaving the 'dividing' to the players unwilling to compromise

 MWHistorian wrote:
No, we're here to tell you that it's GW fault for making a problematic game. If they were better at making rules, they'd make LOW fun so that everyone would want to play with and against them. Instead they create a sharp divide in the already fractured player base.

How could they make them more fun by changing the rules?
You either like big models with a gigantic point-cost or you don't.
I dislike playing against IG, no amount of rules could ever change that unless they change the core idea behind the army.

But to try and get an end to this thread: LoW are now a legal and official part of regular 40k.
You can either play them or you can not play (against) them, your choice.
No amount of complaining about their addition is going to get them removed.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
The divide is only being caused by those who are unwilling to compromise, who thinks their 'fun' trumps everyone elses fun by giving biased choices.

The only divide is the one that is being made by the players, GW simply put all cards on the table, its the players who are saying some cards are valid and some arent .

How can GW be 'fracturing the player base' by giving more options how to play? They're saying everything is fair game, and leaving the 'dividing' to the players unwilling to compromise

They are not giving more options for how to play, they are giving fewer.

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
How can GW be 'fracturing the player base' buy giving more options how to play? They're saying everything is fair game, and leaving the 'dividing' to the players unwilling to compromise

It has nothing to do with how many options there are -- most people would generally say more options means for more possibilities which means more potential fun.

The issue is that by attaching a points-value to each, it implies a level of effectiveness proportionate to that value. When the effectiveness of a unit is out of whack compared to its points cost, it can potentially ruin the game by making it unbalanced.

Not that I think LOW are necessarily unbalanced. In fact, I'd be happy to try playing against one if my friend had it. If it absolutely destroyed me, I'd probably either ask that he didn't play it anymore or we'd have to enter lengthy negotiations on how to make it balanced. Of course, this could be true with anything -- riptides, wave serpents, etc.

What people are saying is GW's fault is that things aren't more balanced out of the box. It would appear that with a little more effort, they could be better balanced, but GW doesn't seem interested or compelled to act.