I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
yay another proposal that does not fix the main problem and instead makes mono guard unplayable.
1. No, When a cabalite at 6 ppm has a near marine profile with a better gun and equally good traits no.
2. No, rule of three would apply, additionally commisars are overpriced for what they do since the nerf.
3. after the nerf they are fine as you said.
4. how about we lower the point cost for conscripts then back down?
Simply put you have not solved the problem that guard has to stand in for CP for all other imperial armies, the main offender beeing the fact that kurovs aquilla exists, aswell as the fact that CP is giftable to other factions in other detachments.
Stop blaming regular guardsmen for the faults of soup which is now a staple since GW makes more money of it.
Commissars don't make sense for every Regiment. If anything, the Regiments being shown with them(Cadians and Scions notably) are going against their own fluff.
It's really hard to evaluate the power of Imperial Guard in a vacuum because, more often than not, they're not operating in a vacuum. They operate with 1 or 2 other codexes operating alongside an Imperial Guard detachment of CP farming. It would make more sense to deal with the ally system in some way, then see where things settle after that.
With that said, though, I think IG are one of the strongest mono factions anyways. But a limitation on allying in to shore up their weaknesses might be effective regardless.
If you wanted to up the cost more you could add in a HWT as part of the requirement as well.
No. Just no. The issue right now is that you get bodies and fill out choices easily for CP generation. Letting you get more bodies for less slots is not a good idea.
Also, we literally have an Elites slot called "Platoon Commander".
If you wanted to up the cost more you could add in a HWT as part of the requirement as well.
Well it would certainly improve the 18 points per CP that Guard are currently paying to be more in line with other non CP abusive factions.
Tau pay minimum 27 points per CP and are a CP intensive faction
Knights pay 177 points per CP
Everyone knows the fix - CP can only be spent by the army (not faction), thereby making guard CP allies moot. We all know this is the problem. Pure guard armies are not winning tournaments. It's getting silly that every week people suggest a fix that doesn't actually address the core problem.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
Why not just add a clause that every guard player must own a Revolver? Each time he wants to play guard, he has to load at least one bullet into it and play Russian Roulette at the beginning of each of his turns. I'm sure that will fix guard completely.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
1. No thanks. They already wound most things on a 5+ so their damage output is low as is. Perhaps if you made it for all armies that if you move you take a -1 hit penalty but otherwise poor change. The fact that negative modifiers already exist then basically the guardsmen just become obsec holders.
2. A 16pt comissar? Sure but its not necessarily thematic.
3.
4. What does this address? Conscripts are non viable as it is now.
Yes - duh. Castellan is not balanced. Nether is captain smash. 130 points and 1 shots anything that isn't a sanctuary ROI shield knight.
Castellan will get a points increase and perhaps a reduction in stratagem power or increase CP cost (talking Raven here).
Smash Captains may get a limit of 1 per detachment ala Tau Commanders. Otherwise I could see a small points bump but the fact they can one shot something will still be around.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
1. No thanks. They already wound most things on a 5+ so their damage output is low as is. Perhaps if you made it for all armies that if you move you take a -1 hit penalty but otherwise poor change. The fact that negative modifiers already exist then basically the guardsmen just become obsec holders.
2. A 16pt comissar? Sure but its not necessarily thematic.
3.
4. What does this address? Conscripts are non viable as it is now.
Yes - duh. Castellan is not balanced. Nether is captain smash. 130 points and 1 shots anything that isn't a sanctuary ROI shield knight.
Castellan will get a points increase and perhaps a reduction in stratagem power or increase CP cost (talking Raven here).
Smash Captains may get a limit of 1 per detachment ala Tau Commanders. Otherwise I could see a small points bump but the fact they can one shot something will still be around.
1 per list might be the best solution the can make - though that is still pretty problematic. Sending a big unit out on it's own shouldn't mean it gets 1 shot by a 130 point suicide CC unit. Probably a nerf to the 3d6 charge strat is what needs to happen. Can't use it on characters would be the best solution I think. That and or remove the ignore over watch ability.
Xenomancers wrote: 1 per list might be the best solution the can make - though that is still pretty problematic. Sending a big unit out on it's own shouldn't mean it gets 1 shot by a 130 point suicide CC unit. Probably a nerf to the 3d6 charge strat is what needs to happen. Can't use it on characters would be the best solution I think. That and or remove the ignore over watch ability.
The 130 point suicide unit used up 7CP and a relic in the process.
By nerf Descent of Angels you mean remove it? It already costs 2CP, you want to increase it to 3CP?
I dont think you can take everything that is good about the BA without giving something back to the codex. Poor BA players, especially those using the mono-codex list, get shafted.
Id be good with capping units like a space marine captain to one per detachment. Going by the fluff it would be extra ordinary circumstances to have two company captains fighting back to back.
HoundsofDemos wrote: Id be good with capping units like a space marine captain to one per detachment. Going by the fluff it would be extra ordinary circumstances to have two company captains fighting back to back.
Yes this is the most practical along, with a points adjustment, for FAQ/CA.
I don't believe they use FAQ/CA to really change stratagems and relics details.
Xenomancers wrote: 1 per list might be the best solution the can make - though that is still pretty problematic. Sending a big unit out on it's own shouldn't mean it gets 1 shot by a 130 point suicide CC unit. Probably a nerf to the 3d6 charge strat is what needs to happen. Can't use it on characters would be the best solution I think. That and or remove the ignore over watch ability.
The 130 point suicide unit used up 7CP and a relic in the process.
By nerf Descent of Angels you mean remove it? It already costs 2CP, you want to increase it to 3CP?
I dont think you can take everything that is good about the BA without giving something back to the codex. Poor BA players, especially those using the mono-codex list, get shafted.
This thread is about IG but I will reply and that's the end of it.
Space marines in general need massive buffs to their PA units. Captains however become really good when they can basically automatically charge...ignore overwatch and wound Imperial knights on 2's with a base str 4 model with a ton of bonus attacks. Captains aren't supposed to be suicide units anyways - they are ment to be close support duelists that can give some damage and take some with their invo. They aren't supposed to average 30 wounds to super heavies. What should be happening here is a big unit of SG or DC should be doing that damage - but they cost 2-3 times as much. So I'm not talking about a nerf to BA. I'm talking about a buff to a lot of their units and restricting their autocharge mechanics to units that...cant fight twice...can't ignore overwatch...and can be easily targeted after they destroy whatever they charged.
If you wanted to up the cost more you could add in a HWT as part of the requirement as well.
No. Just no. The issue right now is that you get bodies and fill out choices easily for CP generation. Letting you get more bodies for less slots is not a good idea.
Also, we literally have an Elites slot called "Platoon Commander".
Well the idea is that it brings guard slot costing more in line with everyone else. Guard battalion as it stands now is 180pts. Force them to have moree to fill out the slot and it jump up to 300 plus platoon commander pts so getting closer to 400. Less desirable for cp batteries.
Im in complete agreement though for the cp issue. It needs to be limited to the detachment that made it.
Or we could just acknowledge that being able to mix-n-match wildly different armies and enjoy army-wide benefits among them is silly, and start putting some restrictions on that and how CP can be spent.
Broadly speaking, most of the broken stuff in the game, and what all the top end lists are building around, is the unintended synergy that allies allows. Fix that and we'll have a low fewer problems, and a lot fewer reasons to go mucking about with adding silly rules like dynamically changing BS for guardsmen.
By altering the rules to what constitutes a "minimum battalion" for guard, we intrinsically limit their usefulness as CP batteries. Instead of the two commanders, and thee squads of guard, you are not forced to take a few elites.
I wanted to suggest altering the Battalion force for Guard. Basically, everyone else gets two HW/three troops. Make a guard battalion a "Regiment" or something, and make the minimum 2 HQ, 3 Troops, 3 Elites, and at least one Transport.
A patrol should be about 250-500 points, a BN about 750-1000, and a BG should be around 1500-2000pts. For guard. All I am saying is make Guard requirements for the force orgs more tan other armies. Discourage useless CP armies.
I play guard and I think forcing us to take extra units is a good thing. Almost literally 75% of the entire codex never sees anything but the store shelf. Who can honestly say the last time they saw Hydras, Manticores, Wyverns, Salamander scout tanks, Chimeras, Tauroxs, Valkeries, Vultures, or Vendettas? You don't because it's easier to just go Infantry.
I might also mention the lowly Commissar. The practical poster child of the AM, now relegated to the trash heap because it's usefulness is outweighed by other unit's cheese.
AM batallions have a base cost issue - you fix it by increasing the cost of their units - which have been proven mathematically to be far superior to all other infantry. Company commanders are also undercosted. They double the lasgun fire of 2 units for currently half their cost...as well as having 5++ saves and multiple wounds themselves and filling hq requirement.
I think that addressing the CP/soup synergy problem would be far more effective than simple point changes. Point changes are a very broad method to change things and can't really target a single interaction which is causing the problem. I would like to see something to limit taking Guard for CP in other armies. Guard should be taken for their numbers, armour and cost, not to give your elite troops more buffs that have nothing to do with Guardsmen.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
Those are terrible fixes.
1. Infantry just need to be 45 points for the squad. This is a price increase to make them less broke for the price, but not so much so that we go after them like some of you guys did witch hunts on Eldar last edition.
2. Vets get moved back to the Troop section.
3. Make Commanders 35 points. Also another price change without trying to destroy the army.
Trickstick wrote: I think that addressing the CP/soup synergy problem would be far more effective than simple point changes. Point changes are a very broad method to change things and can't really target a single interaction which is causing the problem. I would like to see something to limit taking Guard for CP in other armies. Guard should be taken for their numbers, armour and cost, not to give your elite troops more buffs that have nothing to do with Guardsmen.
guardsmen are undercosted at 4PPM. They cost the exact same as conscripts which are BS 5+. It is clear - the infantryman is too cheap. They cost the same as cultists which have 6+ saves and are literally spammed.. They cost the same as termigants which have 6+ saves and worse guns. It is obvious that the infantry man should be at least 5 points. That is the best place to start.
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greatbigtree wrote: Give everyone equal CP - eliminate use for IGCP battery.
Repoint Strats to account for everyone having the same CP. Make good strats for Knights cost 5 CP, or something like that.
Get rid of recovering CP - eliminate use for IG Commanders.
If we got rid of those things, people would not spend points on IG for the CP, and instead buy things to smash with.
If you wanted to up the cost more you could add in a HWT as part of the requirement as well.
Yeah it would be a great one.
increasing the amount required would be a start.
But overall all the codexes need to be updated frequently enough that all codexes at least can play some resemblance of an army not the imperial soup we see nowadays.
Imperial guard have the issue of not having what they need to be by themselves effectively. (which is why the current vechile system just kind sucks currently for most land slogging armies)
So, I 100% agree something needs to be done about CP farming , but another unit I'd like to address is the shadowsword. I believe it needs a price increase. It's by far the cheapest and most useful superheavy the guard get.
Guards could need some fixing, especially the shadowsword, but they are low priority so i doubt that they will fix them in the FAQ. While infantry could probably use having the cost increased by one point, no one is getting shredded by playing 2000 vs 2030 points, right?
Or how about just increase their cost? Infantry is 5 points/model, Conscript 4 and Veterans 6. It makes zero sense to bring Conscripts to the table when the Guardsmen cost the same, have higher WS and BS, higher leadership, access to special weapons and follow all orders.
bibotot wrote: Or how about just increase their cost? Infantry is 5 points/model, Conscript 4 and Veterans 6. It makes zero sense to bring Conscripts to the table when the Guardsmen cost the same, have higher WS and BS, higher leadership, access to special weapons and follow all orders.
Because guard players want 3ppm conscripts back as they believe they are balanced at 3ppm.
I don't understand why people can't see the glaring issue with the Astra Millicheese codex, but then again people claimed scatbikes were weak and invisibility was ok in 7th.
Someone mentioned Shadow Swords needing a fix? How? Currently there are tons of equal or better units out there, what makes the ShadowSword OP? Price? Because it's a lot different then equivalent knights, or lords of war. Don't touch El Jeffe.
bibotot wrote: Or how about just increase their cost? Infantry is 5 points/model, Conscript 4 and Veterans 6. It makes zero sense to bring Conscripts to the table when the Guardsmen cost the same, have higher WS and BS, higher leadership, access to special weapons and follow all orders.
Because guard players want 3ppm conscripts back as they believe they are balanced at 3ppm.
I don't understand why people can't see the glaring issue with the Astra Millicheese codex, but then again people claimed scatbikes were weak and invisibility was ok in 7th.
Because Conscripts were nerfed as they were one of the few units at that time with easy access to Morale immunity.
Since then, we've seen Conscripts nerfed by the addition of "Raw Recruits"(to perform an Order, they need to pass a 4+ roll on a D6) to their unit entry in the Codex, reduction of unit max size from 50 to 30 tops, and the Commissar nerf.
We've also seen Morale immunity become far more widespread via traits like Iyanden.
So if they're okay with Morale immunity being more widespread, Conscripts can get their points dropped back down and/or Commissars can see a reversion. Remember that the whole point between those two units being nerfed was for soup--looks like that worked out great, right?
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JNAProductions wrote: Honestly, I'd rather see Company Commanders stay at 30, but with Refractors being an upgrade.
Then they'd have to drop even further. Refractors are baked into their points cost.
That said, swapping the Refractors with Carapace Armor instead of Refractors base and making Refractors an upgrade isn't entirely unreasonable.
There are two tiers of troops, balance wise, as I see it currently:
IG/Fire Warriors/DE/AdMech
Marines/CWE/Necrons/Nids
There are also some outliers further along the way I'd consider trash tier, but they aren't balanced around eachother - Storm Guardians et al get to hang out there.
In the first tier, IG are pointed fairly. Compare them to Fire Warriors, Kabs, or AdMech, 5ppm is far too high.
In the second tier, IG are undercosted. Compare them to Tacs, Guardians, Necron Warriors, or Gaunts, and 4ppm is far too low.
When IG were *the* outlier, very early in the edition, 5ppm would have been the perfect fit. Now, a fix to IG requires fixing everything else in that tier as well - otherwise, you're unfairly nerfing IG. Conversely, you could fix Tacs to be fairly costed around what IG cost - but would need to fix CWE/Necrons/Nids/etc too.
Either way, setting the points values just for IG Troopers doesn't fix the game. And a middleground solution makes nobody happy - IG are now downright worse than half the armies, but they're still downright better than half the armies.
Now, I prefer the second group. Perhaps it's personal bias (my Dire Avengers and my Tacs are my two favorite units). I think it's more because there's more room for careful balance with bigger numbers.
In either case, it needs a wider-range points cost change than just IG. Perhaps we'll get that in CA, but I highly doubt it.
For the most part, I liked what I saw for points in Kill Team (aside from weapons costs). That's probably not what CA is going to do, but it'd be great.
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Iyanden isn't anything like the morale immunity for Eldar as Commisars were for IG. It sure sounds like it. On paper, it seems like it. But the same rule on different armies is not the same thing.
Consider a 6+ FnP. Guard would love that. Certainly worth at least +1ppm. Now consider it on DG. Not gonna do a whole lot for them - doesn't stack with their rules.
Similarly, when you have a 30-50 model unit (depending on when) with low LD at dirt-cheap ppm, losing at most just one guy from morale is great. Because if you shoot half their models dead, they'd have lost a gakton more models.
On the other hand, when you have a 5-man unit with LD8, what does that rule do for you? Here:
-Lose 3 guys: 1/6 chance to lose 1 guy in LD - no impact from the buff
-Lose 4 guys: 1/6 chance to lose 1 guy, and the buff doesn't matter. But there's also a 1/6 chance to lose 2 of your 1 remaining guy... so the buff doesn't matter
-Lose 5 guys: No morale check
The vast majority of CWE units are fielded as 5-mans, by fluff, tradition, iconic army structure, and crunch. Guardians are the one squad it's likely to make a difference - but they're twice the cost of Conscripts. They are not a horde unit. (Although we should share a laugh at the Iyanden trait being best used by an Uthwe Black Guardian army...) Even for Guardians, though, Iron Hands (6+++) or Raven Guard (-1-to-hit outside 12") does more for durability.
I agree that armies far too easily ignore LD. But Iyanden is a minor example of that, at best.
Bharring wrote: There are two tiers of troops, balance wise, as I see it currently:
IG/Fire Warriors/DE/AdMech
Marines/CWE/Necrons/Nids
There are also some outliers further along the way I'd consider trash tier, but they aren't balanced around eachother - Storm Guardians et al get to hang out there.
In the first tier, IG are pointed fairly. Compare them to Fire Warriors, Kabs, or AdMech, 5ppm is far too high.
In the second tier, IG are undercosted. Compare them to Tacs, Guardians, Necron Warriors, or Gaunts, and 4ppm is far too low.
When IG were *the* outlier, very early in the edition, 5ppm would have been the perfect fit. Now, a fix to IG requires fixing everything else in that tier as well - otherwise, you're unfairly nerfing IG. Conversely, you could fix Tacs to be fairly costed around what IG cost - but would need to fix CWE/Necrons/Nids/etc too.
Either way, setting the points values just for IG Troopers doesn't fix the game. And a middleground solution makes nobody happy - IG are now downright worse than half the armies, but they're still downright better than half the armies.
Now, I prefer the second group. Perhaps it's personal bias (my Dire Avengers and my Tacs are my two favorite units). I think it's more because there's more room for careful balance with bigger numbers.
In either case, it needs a wider-range points cost change than just IG. Perhaps we'll get that in CA, but I highly doubt it.
For the most part, I liked what I saw for points in Kill Team (aside from weapons costs). That's probably not what CA is going to do, but it'd be great.
I basically agree.
The one thing I'll say, though, is that I don't think it's as simple as adjusting point costs for non-IG troops. I think there are several issue at the moment:
1) Soup. As long as Soup is all benefits and no drawbacks, then competitive players will just use the most efficient troops available to them from across all armies.
2) Lack of role. So many troops simply have no discernible role, because of how the game operates. Yeah, they can hold objectives, but so can a tank. And that tank will usually do a whole lot more while sitting on said objective. Yeah, troops are (in theory) slightly better at holding objectives than non-troops... but that makes no difference when your troops are scattered in bloody pieces across the battlefield because they tried to take an objective off a tank.
For all 5th edition's faults, I think one of the best things it did was make it that troops - and only troops - could score objectives. It gave troops an actual reason to exist which wasn't predicated on their ability to match the firepower and durability of more elite units. As it stands, there's really very little purpose to troops beyond being cheap detachment fillers.
2.5) Confused role. Related to the above but more of an issue with regard to mechanical ability. Tactical marines (and marines in general) are in this really awkward place where they want to be elite units and yet also cheap enough to be spammed. Probably not helped by them basically being hemmed in by other units and the limited stat blocks.
To my mind, Primaris Marines were a horrible, horrible idea. It seems like it would have been far more sensible to simply give those stats and roles to regular marines. That way, GW could have made marines feel like actual elites and focused on that role - instead of making them these weird pseudo-elites who are just middling at everything.
Anyway, we've also got Guardians - who seem designed to sit near the back, babysitting a long-range heavy weapon . . . except that their weapons have a range of 12". What.
Then there are Necron Warriors, which look good on paper but just end up waddling around firing ineffectual guns.
3) Special Rules. Not always a major factor but can be important. I mention them mainly because of Necron Warriors - which are currently saddled with Resurrection Protocols (which is supposed to give them survivalist but in reality just locks them into 20-man squads and rarely even matters) and Gauss (now just an extra -1 on their weapons, which is supposed to help against vehicles but doesn't do nearly enough to be relevant). This is noteworthy because Necron Warriors basically *are* those two special rules. They don't bring special or heavy weapons, they don't have a sergeant or melee weapons. They're entirely reliant on those rules to be functional.
4) I also think more dedicated infantry-support could help. e.g. rather than just making auras affect everything, perhaps limit them to infantry models - or even specifically troops. Or have auras be more effective on troops (e.g. reroll 1 auras could let troops reroll all misses). That way commanders can actually help pull troops up and make them more effective, rather than it being better for them to just pick the already good units and buff them even more. I find this particularly obnoxious in the case of the DE Archon. He has no mobility options (wings, jetbike etc.), his aura doesn't work inside, into, or out of a transport, he can only buff a tiny fraction of the DE army, and virtually all the infantry he's capable of buffing want to stay in transports. So, rather than buffing DE Infantry, he just ends up sitting at the back with a group of Ravagers. This, to me, just smacks of terrible design.
Now, granted, I don't think this is as big of an issue as the others - but it's definitely something that could be done to help out armies with struggling troops or infantry.
Add 50% to the points cost of all units that don't share 2 or 3 faction keywords with your warlord. This would allow some soup, but adds more difficult decisions to list building. Admittedly, I don't know all of the faction keywords on all of the datasheets, so there are probably some unforeseen interactions.
For all 5th edition's faults, I think one of the best things it did was make it that troops - and only troops - could score objectives. It gave troops an actual reason to exist which wasn't predicated on their ability to match the firepower and durability of more elite units. As it stands, there's really very little purpose to troops beyond being cheap detachment fillers.
This, is the single best idea since Flesh lights. I love this. I had no idea that was the old way. That could even make Fast attack vehicles like Sentinels viable again!
Bharring wrote: There are two tiers of troops, balance wise, as I see it currently:
IG/Fire Warriors/DE/AdMech
Marines/CWE/Necrons/Nids
There are also some outliers further along the way I'd consider trash tier, but they aren't balanced around eachother - Storm Guardians et al get to hang out there.
In the first tier, IG are pointed fairly. Compare them to Fire Warriors, Kabs, or AdMech, 5ppm is far too high.
In the second tier, IG are undercosted. Compare them to Tacs, Guardians, Necron Warriors, or Gaunts, and 4ppm is far too low.
When IG were *the* outlier, very early in the edition, 5ppm would have been the perfect fit. Now, a fix to IG requires fixing everything else in that tier as well - otherwise, you're unfairly nerfing IG. Conversely, you could fix Tacs to be fairly costed around what IG cost - but would need to fix CWE/Necrons/Nids/etc too.
Either way, setting the points values just for IG Troopers doesn't fix the game. And a middleground solution makes nobody happy - IG are now downright worse than half the armies, but they're still downright better than half the armies.
Now, I prefer the second group. Perhaps it's personal bias (my Dire Avengers and my Tacs are my two favorite units). I think it's more because there's more room for careful balance with bigger numbers.
In either case, it needs a wider-range points cost change than just IG. Perhaps we'll get that in CA, but I highly doubt it.
For the most part, I liked what I saw for points in Kill Team (aside from weapons costs). That's probably not what CA is going to do, but it'd be great.
I basically agree.
The one thing I'll say, though, is that I don't think it's as simple as adjusting point costs for non-IG troops. I think there are several issue at the moment:
1) Soup. As long as Soup is all benefits and no drawbacks, then competitive players will just use the most efficient troops available to them from across all armies.
2) Lack of role. So many troops simply have no discernible role, because of how the game operates. Yeah, they can hold objectives, but so can a tank. And that tank will usually do a whole lot more while sitting on said objective. Yeah, troops are (in theory) slightly better at holding objectives than non-troops... but that makes no difference when your troops are scattered in bloody pieces across the battlefield because they tried to take an objective off a tank.
For all 5th edition's faults, I think one of the best things it did was make it that troops - and only troops - could score objectives. It gave troops an actual reason to exist which wasn't predicated on their ability to match the firepower and durability of more elite units. As it stands, there's really very little purpose to troops beyond being cheap detachment fillers.
2.5) Confused role. Related to the above but more of an issue with regard to mechanical ability. Tactical marines (and marines in general) are in this really awkward place where they want to be elite units and yet also cheap enough to be spammed. Probably not helped by them basically being hemmed in by other units and the limited stat blocks.
To my mind, Primaris Marines were a horrible, horrible idea. It seems like it would have been far more sensible to simply give those stats and roles to regular marines. That way, GW could have made marines feel like actual elites and focused on that role - instead of making them these weird pseudo-elites who are just middling at everything.
Anyway, we've also got Guardians - who seem designed to sit near the back, babysitting a long-range heavy weapon . . . except that their weapons have a range of 12". What.
Then there are Necron Warriors, which look good on paper but just end up waddling around firing ineffectual guns.
3) Special Rules. Not always a major factor but can be important. I mention them mainly because of Necron Warriors - which are currently saddled with Resurrection Protocols (which is supposed to give them survivalist but in reality just locks them into 20-man squads and rarely even matters) and Gauss (now just an extra -1 on their weapons, which is supposed to help against vehicles but doesn't do nearly enough to be relevant). This is noteworthy because Necron Warriors basically *are* those two special rules. They don't bring special or heavy weapons, they don't have a sergeant or melee weapons. They're entirely reliant on those rules to be functional.
4) I also think more dedicated infantry-support could help. e.g. rather than just making auras affect everything, perhaps limit them to infantry models - or even specifically troops. Or have auras be more effective on troops (e.g. reroll 1 auras could let troops reroll all misses). That way commanders can actually help pull troops up and make them more effective, rather than it being better for them to just pick the already good units and buff them even more. I find this particularly obnoxious in the case of the DE Archon. He has no mobility options (wings, jetbike etc.), his aura doesn't work inside, into, or out of a transport, he can only buff a tiny fraction of the DE army, and virtually all the infantry he's capable of buffing want to stay in transports. So, rather than buffing DE Infantry, he just ends up sitting at the back with a group of Ravagers. This, to me, just smacks of terrible design.
Now, granted, I don't think this is as big of an issue as the others - but it's definitely something that could be done to help out armies with struggling troops or infantry.
Not saying you are wrong... but I believe too many people is reading too much into it... when it as easy as making Infantry Squads, Kabalites, Firewarriors and Skitarii Rangers/Vanguards +1ppm... (And I play Tau, firewarrior heavy lists)... and then, from there, make bigger changes to the game and system.
But I disagree with making troops only score objetives. For all of is faults, in 8th, troops are the most usefull they have been in many, many years. Only Eldar and Space marine troops feel underwhelming. Orks, Tyranids, Tau, Imperial Guard, Dark Eldar, Necrons (Their troops are in the context of the faction, usable, at least inmortals, but the faction needs buffs), Adeptus Mechanicus, Custodes... all have very usefull troops.
Galas wrote: [spoiler]
Not saying you are wrong... but I believe too many people is reading too much into it... when it as easy as making Infantry Squads, Kabalites, Firewarriors and Skitarii Rangers/Vanguards +1ppm... (And I play Tau, firewarrior heavy lists)... and then, from there, make bigger changes to the game and system.
I'm not so sure. Increasing the cost of those models will do nothing to fix Tacticals, Necron Warriors, Guardians etc.
Also, why Kabalites? I can understand the complaints against Guardsmen, since they appeared in all the top 10 Imperial Soup lists. However, I'm not seeing the same for Kabalites. Indeed, only one person in the top 10 had taken any Kabalites at all, and then just a single squad of them to unlock Agents of Vect (in a way which normally wouldn't even work but which was apparently permitted by NOVA).
Hence, I'm struggling to see 6pt Kabalites as being that much of an issue.
Grumblewartz wrote: Everyone knows the fix - CP can only be spent by the army (not faction), thereby making guard CP allies moot. We all know this is the problem. Pure guard armies are not winning tournaments. It's getting silly that every week people suggest a fix that doesn't actually address the core problem.
This. Soup with IG is a problem the ig itself is not.
Galas wrote: [spoiler]
Not saying you are wrong... but I believe too many people is reading too much into it... when it as easy as making Infantry Squads, Kabalites, Firewarriors and Skitarii Rangers/Vanguards +1ppm... (And I play Tau, firewarrior heavy lists)... and then, from there, make bigger changes to the game and system.
I'm not so sure. Increasing the cost of those models will do nothing to fix Tacticals, Necron Warriors, Guardians etc.
Also, why Kabalites? I can understand the complaints against Guardsmen, since they appeared in all the top 10 Imperial Soup lists. However, I'm not seeing the same for Kabalites. Indeed, only one person in the top 10 had taken any Kabalites at all, and then just a single squad of them to unlock Agents of Vect (in a way which normally wouldn't even work but which was apparently permitted by NOVA).
Hence, I'm struggling to see 6pt Kabalites as being that much of an issue.
You don't see Skitarii Rangers or Tau Firewarriors either, because you can't just look at the top 10 armies of a tournament (with a different format than normal warhammer) and believe that only the units that place there are the only that deserve nerfs and changes. You can't justify 5ppm Imperial Guard with 6ppm Kabalites, and 7ppm Firewarriors. They are mathemathically too good for their cost and don't allow design space. Is better to make them more expensive than to make SM, Necron Warriors, etc... cheaper, because you just have then power creep: You need more models, you have less space because the more units you have being cheaper with point costs so low, the more difficult is to balance them between them, etc...
They are two different issues. Making Tacticals and Necron warriors cheaper won't make Infantry Squads or Kabalites worse, and making Infantry Squads and Kabalites more expensive won't make the other infantry better.
TLR: Firewarriors and Kabalites maybe don't enter the top 10 ITC for many reasons. But they are still mathematically too good and being that cheap doesn't allows for design space and proper balance changes at that point level.
You don't see Skitarii Rangers or Tau Firewarriors either, because you can't just look at the top 10 armies of a tournament (with a different format than normal warhammer) and believe that only the units that place there are the only that deserve nerfs and changes.
Perhaps not, but traditionally one uses evidence to prove why a unit needs nerfing.
Galas wrote: You can't justify 5ppm Imperial Guard with 6ppm Kabalites, and 7ppm Firewarriors.
So maybe leave their costs alone?
This is only an issue in the first place because you're so desperate to increase the cost of guardsmen.
TLR: Firewarriors and Kabalites maybe don't enter the top 10 ITC for many reasons. But they are still mathematically too good and being that cheap doesn't allows for design space and proper balance changes at that point level.
If you really want to increase design space then the first step would be to simply double the cost of everything, thus giving you more space to modify unit costs without stepping on the toes of similar units.
I actually like the idea of doubling the cost of everything, but alas, It won't happen.
And increasing the cost of cheap infantry is not for some arbitrary reason. It is needed because theres just no more room in the low brackets to fit stuff. Also, we need games with less models, no more.
And also, because Infantry Squads are just too durable for their cost, so the solution is to make EVERYTHING ELSE cheaper, or take the 3-4 infantry units that are undercosted, and make them more expensive.
The firepower of Tau Firewarriors is insane, for example. Wounding literally everything with 5's, their Overwatch hability, being OB-sec, and their 4+ (3+ in cover) save... I can't expres enough how dirty I feel playing with tons of them.
Yeah, maybe they aren't good enough to win top tables agaisnt soup armies... that doesn't mean they aren't a problem.
In 7th edition, weren't Flyrants a problem? Weren't Tau a problem? You didn't saw them winning tournaments because Daemon Infinite armies and Eldar where so OP. That does not mean they are not a problem.
People need to learn that when 60% of the game is fine and relatively balanced with one another and 20% is so much powerfull, the solution is not to make everything as powerfull, but to nerf the outliers. Also, buff the 20% that is very, very weak.
I think, and this is just my personal grumpy old man opinion, that the game would seem much less broken if Dakka implemented some sort of post-count filter for new users to prevent them posting "fix" threads below a certain level.
Seems like any Tom Dick or Harry can just fire up an account and start bitching.
To be honest I prefer to be able to have a under-sized squad (Like 8 Firewarriors or 6 Tactical Marines) and only pay for the models I have instead of paying for more, like I have to do in AoS, because I have the 5 minotaur unit from Mierce but they come in packs of 3.
To be honest I prefer to be able to have a under-sized squad (Like 8 Firewarriors or 6 Tactical Marines) and only pay for the models I have instead of paying for more, like I have to do in AoS, because I have the 5 minotaur unit from Mierce but they come in packs of 3.
AOS way is really annoying and quite unnatural. Units always come in predetermined increments. There can be no 43 zombies wandering around; on no, the zombies prefer neat round numbers! It may make sense for armies with strict hierarchy and structure, but it is nonsensical and gamey for most of the stuff.
going back to the OP's original suggestion, one thing that could be done is to return to the days of 5th edition's guard FOC chart. where the guard could not TAKE Infantry squads as troops. instead they took infantry PLATOONS.
So a troops slot for the guard would consist opf a platoon of Mandatory: 1 Platoon Commander, 2 infantry squads and or vetearn. and could include an additional 3 infantry squads (and or vet squads) , 0-5 Heavy weapons squads, 0-2 special weapons squads, and 0-1 conscript squads.
this would address a number of the guards problems, it'd reduce the "overly cheap CP battery" issue, it'd allow conscripts to be made nice and dirt cheap (because you had a "infantry squad tax" for them) and proably would be of minimal problems to anyone actually running a guard list anyway.
BrianDavion wrote: going back to the OP's original suggestion, one thing that could be done is to return to the days of 5th edition's guard FOC chart. where the guard could not TAKE Infantry squads as troops. instead they took infantry PLATOONS.
So a troops slot for the guard would consist opf a platoon of Mandatory: 1 Platoon Commander, 2 infantry squads and or vetearn. and could include an additional 3 infantry squads (and or vet squads) , 0-5 Heavy weapons squads, 0-2 special weapons squads, and 0-1 conscript squads.
this would address a number of the guards problems, it'd reduce the "overly cheap CP battery" issue, it'd allow conscripts to be made nice and dirt cheap (because you had a "infantry squad tax" for them) and proably would be of minimal problems to anyone actually running a guard list anyway.
Why does everyone think Platoons will make things better?
They won't. They were atrocious then, they'll be atrocious now. No army should have to take multiple units for a single Troops choice.
You want to fix the "overly cheap CP battery issue"? Then you remove the ability for anything larger than a Patrol, Outrider, Spearhead, Vanguard Detachment, or a Superheavy Auxiliary Detachment to be taken as an Allied force.
Make it so if you want to take anything other than those you have to be sharing a minimum of two faction keywords across your army. It'll have a bonus effect of tagging Chaos and Eldar soup and potentially Tyranids+GSC stuff that could be coming down the pipeline.
It keeps Allies as a viable thing but it drastically limits the amount of CPs that can be brought by your Allies(unless you're literally just stacking stuff from the same book or doing stuff like Marines where they have the Adeptus Astartes and Imperium keywords). Couple it with a few things here and there to further address some of the sillier outliers; I'm fond of Astra Militarum getting a rule called "We are but mortals..."(or something to that effect) where they can never be the Warlord if there's an Adeptus Astartes, Adeptus Custodes, Adeptus Mechanicus, Adeptus Ministorum, Adepta Sororitas, or Inquisition Character in the army.
Boom, there goes your Grand Strategist nonsense in these regards for Imperial Soup.
BrianDavion wrote: going back to the OP's original suggestion, one thing that could be done is to return to the days of 5th edition's guard FOC chart. where the guard could not TAKE Infantry squads as troops. instead they took infantry PLATOONS.
So a troops slot for the guard would consist opf a platoon of Mandatory: 1 Platoon Commander, 2 infantry squads and or vetearn. and could include an additional 3 infantry squads (and or vet squads) , 0-5 Heavy weapons squads, 0-2 special weapons squads, and 0-1 conscript squads.
this would address a number of the guards problems, it'd reduce the "overly cheap CP battery" issue, it'd allow conscripts to be made nice and dirt cheap (because you had a "infantry squad tax" for them) and proably would be of minimal problems to anyone actually running a guard list anyway.
Why does everyone think Platoons will make things better?
They won't. They were atrocious then, they'll be atrocious now. No army should have to take multiple units for a single Troops choice.
You want to fix the "overly cheap CP battery issue"? Then you remove the ability for anything larger than a Patrol, Outrider, Spearhead, Vanguard Detachment, or a Superheavy Auxiliary Detachment to be taken as an Allied force.
Make it so if you want to take anything other than those you have to be sharing a minimum of two faction keywords across your army. It'll have a bonus effect of tagging Chaos and Eldar soup and potentially Tyranids+GSC stuff that could be coming down the pipeline.
It keeps Allies as a viable thing but it drastically limits the amount of CPs that can be brought by your Allies(unless you're literally just stacking stuff from the same book or doing stuff like Marines where they have the Adeptus Astartes and Imperium keywords). Couple it with a few things here and there to further address some of the sillier outliers; I'm fond of Astra Militarum getting a rule called "We are but mortals..."(or something to that effect) where they can never be the Warlord if there's an Adeptus Astartes, Adeptus Custodes, Adeptus Mechanicus, Adeptus Ministorum, Adepta Sororitas, or Inquisition Character in the army.
Boom, there goes your Grand Strategist nonsense in these regards for Imperial Soup.
A relatively easy and limited adjustment could be made just by modifying the Grand Strategist trait to only work on Guard stratagems. That way the bulk of the recycling is kept paired with the Guard strats with which they were designed but other Imperial armies wouldn't be able to take advantage. They'd still get some back from kurov's but that's 1 per enemy stratagem which is a very different beast to rolling per cp you spend. Would even be a slight nerf to Guard in that using Insane Bravery would be two non recyclable CP spent.
To be honest I prefer to be able to have a under-sized squad (Like 8 Firewarriors or 6 Tactical Marines) and only pay for the models I have instead of paying for more, like I have to do in AoS, because I have the 5 minotaur unit from Mierce but they come in packs of 3.
AOS way is really annoying and quite unnatural. Units always come in predetermined increments. There can be no 43 zombies wandering around; on no, the zombies prefer neat round numbers! It may make sense for armies with strict hierarchy and structure, but it is nonsensical and gamey for most of the stuff.
Honestly, non-neat numbers really bother me. I rather leave 12 points off my Necron list than purchase the 11th Necron Warrior.
To be honest I prefer to be able to have a under-sized squad (Like 8 Firewarriors or 6 Tactical Marines) and only pay for the models I have instead of paying for more, like I have to do in AoS, because I have the 5 minotaur unit from Mierce but they come in packs of 3.
AOS way is really annoying and quite unnatural. Units always come in predetermined increments. There can be no 43 zombies wandering around; on no, the zombies prefer neat round numbers! It may make sense for armies with strict hierarchy and structure, but it is nonsensical and gamey for most of the stuff.
Honestly, non-neat numbers really bother me. I rather leave 12 points off my Necron list than purchase the 11th Necron Warrior.
I do the same. Thats why I hated the 7-man box of plague marines. I use units of 5 or 10 But the "buy unist by packs" wouldn't work with neat numbers, but with how many come in a box. If one unit comes at 3 in a box, forget having a 5-man or 10-man unit. It will be 3-6-9-12. So yeah, a big loss of flexibility.
BrianDavion wrote: going back to the OP's original suggestion, one thing that could be done is to return to the days of 5th edition's guard FOC chart. where the guard could not TAKE Infantry squads as troops. instead they took infantry PLATOONS.
So a troops slot for the guard would consist opf a platoon of Mandatory: 1 Platoon Commander, 2 infantry squads and or vetearn. and could include an additional 3 infantry squads (and or vet squads) , 0-5 Heavy weapons squads, 0-2 special weapons squads, and 0-1 conscript squads.
this would address a number of the guards problems, it'd reduce the "overly cheap CP battery" issue, it'd allow conscripts to be made nice and dirt cheap (because you had a "infantry squad tax" for them) and proably would be of minimal problems to anyone actually running a guard list anyway.
Why does everyone think Platoons will make things better?
They won't. They were atrocious then, they'll be atrocious now. No army should have to take multiple units for a single Troops choice.
You want to fix the "overly cheap CP battery issue"? Then you remove the ability for anything larger than a Patrol, Outrider, Spearhead, Vanguard Detachment, or a Superheavy Auxiliary Detachment to be taken as an Allied force.
Make it so if you want to take anything other than those you have to be sharing a minimum of two faction keywords across your army. It'll have a bonus effect of tagging Chaos and Eldar soup and potentially Tyranids+GSC stuff that could be coming down the pipeline.
It keeps Allies as a viable thing but it drastically limits the amount of CPs that can be brought by your Allies(unless you're literally just stacking stuff from the same book or doing stuff like Marines where they have the Adeptus Astartes and Imperium keywords). Couple it with a few things here and there to further address some of the sillier outliers; I'm fond of Astra Militarum getting a rule called "We are but mortals..."(or something to that effect) where they can never be the Warlord if there's an Adeptus Astartes, Adeptus Custodes, Adeptus Mechanicus, Adeptus Ministorum, Adepta Sororitas, or Inquisition Character in the army.
Boom, there goes your Grand Strategist nonsense in these regards for Imperial Soup.
I agree with most of what you say but why would mechanicus, ministorum and sororitas automatically outrank the imperial guard? outside specific situations i see no reason for that (sorry for the out of topic)
BrianDavion wrote: going back to the OP's original suggestion, one thing that could be done is to return to the days of 5th edition's guard FOC chart. where the guard could not TAKE Infantry squads as troops. instead they took infantry PLATOONS.
So a troops slot for the guard would consist opf a platoon of Mandatory: 1 Platoon Commander, 2 infantry squads and or vetearn. and could include an additional 3 infantry squads (and or vet squads) , 0-5 Heavy weapons squads, 0-2 special weapons squads, and 0-1 conscript squads.
this would address a number of the guards problems, it'd reduce the "overly cheap CP battery" issue, it'd allow conscripts to be made nice and dirt cheap (because you had a "infantry squad tax" for them) and proably would be of minimal problems to anyone actually running a guard list anyway.
Why does everyone think Platoons will make things better?
They won't. They were atrocious then, they'll be atrocious now. No army should have to take multiple units for a single Troops choice.
You want to fix the "overly cheap CP battery issue"? Then you remove the ability for anything larger than a Patrol, Outrider, Spearhead, Vanguard Detachment, or a Superheavy Auxiliary Detachment to be taken as an Allied force.
Make it so if you want to take anything other than those you have to be sharing a minimum of two faction keywords across your army. It'll have a bonus effect of tagging Chaos and Eldar soup and potentially Tyranids+GSC stuff that could be coming down the pipeline.
It keeps Allies as a viable thing but it drastically limits the amount of CPs that can be brought by your Allies(unless you're literally just stacking stuff from the same book or doing stuff like Marines where they have the Adeptus Astartes and Imperium keywords). Couple it with a few things here and there to further address some of the sillier outliers; I'm fond of Astra Militarum getting a rule called "We are but mortals..."(or something to that effect) where they can never be the Warlord if there's an Adeptus Astartes, Adeptus Custodes, Adeptus Mechanicus, Adeptus Ministorum, Adepta Sororitas, or Inquisition Character in the army.
Boom, there goes your Grand Strategist nonsense in these regards for Imperial Soup.
I agree with most of what you say but why would mechanicus, ministorum and sororitas automatically outrank the imperial guard? outside specific situations i see no reason for that (sorry for the out of topic)
IF a commander of a Adeptus Astartes, Adeptus Custodes or Adepta Sororitas force wanted to take control they could and it would be a rare Imperial Commander would would not defer to such "children " of the God Emperor esepcially at the level of conflict being portrayed by a typical 40k engagement. However they are often happy to let the Guard do for the most part unless it conflicted with something they were doing and are quite often highly focussed on a specific mission.
The Inquisition is easy - you do what they say. However they dont always take direct command.
Adeptus Ministorum,Adeptus Mechanicus, - more tricky both have imense power but neither has the Divine Patronage of official power to take control. They can do it but its not automatic at all.
When my marines ally with guard the warlord is always a marine character, even though that's not optimal. I try to keep my armies fluffy an some IG officer commanding marines would just seem wrong.
Depends on the chapter. For yours, it'd be unfluffy for the Marine to not relieve the IG commander. For mine, it would be unfluffly for a small force of Wings of Dawn to relieve the commander of the broader force they are supporting. The Marine ranking officier is in charge of the Wings of Dawn and whatever assets are provided to them to do their part, but only of their part: the IG ranking officer should have more familiarity and visibility to the far-right flank at any given times than the Captain who's breaching the far-left flank with his Tacs.
On the other hand, it would be unfluffy for the Wings of Dawn ranking officer to not relieve the commander if they are taking over the operation. In this case, you'd see the Captain in about the center of the force, and the Marines spread throughout.
Both scenarios are fluffy.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Re: points for the whole unit -
Sometimes, I just want to take a 6th guy. Not necessarily for the points - my Swooping Hawks and Fire Dragons squads are both 6-mans. I rarely ever field them as 5-mans. It's just not who they are.
That doesn't mean you can't do as you say - it's been done previously.
The base unit - 5 Marines - costs 65 points. You may add additional Tac Marines at the cost of 10ppm. Thus, you can have any number of Marines, but the total cost is not evenly divisible by the number of methods.
Another option is to upcharge (or even downcharge if you're encouraging small squads) the Sarge. So you make the Tac Marine Sarge 25ppm, and Tacs 10ppm. 5-mans are now 65 pts. 10mans are 115 pts. Alternately, if you want larger squads to be disincentivised, you could do Sarge as 5ppm and Tacs as 15 - still 65 for a 5-man, but prohibitively expensive to take a 10man.
Now, these numbers are just to show the concept, not to state what the points really should be.
I agree with most of what you say but why would mechanicus, ministorum and sororitas automatically outrank the imperial guard? outside specific situations i see no reason for that (sorry for the out of topic)
On paper, Mechanicus are their own line of command.
Ministorum are zealots who make Commissars look like happy fun people.
Sororitas are the Daughters of the Emperor, with their ranks containing literal saints.
Honestly the biggest reason is simply to showcase that the Imperium is a fractured entity with too many chefs in the kitchen.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
You can't just reduce their BS, as its connected to the lore, that's like making SM's BS 4 to balance them (if they were OP) That's a terrible way to start balancing armies. Having the same BS as tau is just daft.
Eldar are no longer top tier, just get used to it.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
The first BS change would just further increase the stand-and-shoot issue.
I think that an effective solution to the infantry problem would be to return Command Squads to play. There's already a precedent for a small squad having the Character rule in St. Celestine, so an IG Company Command Squad could consist of an officer and 4 upgradable veterans for about 55 points base. Add to this a 5 point increase in the cost of Guardsmen, and I think that presents a reasonable increase in the cost of infantry firepower, bring them down to acceptable levels.
The first BS change would just further increase the stand-and-shoot issue.
I think that an effective solution to the infantry problem would be to return Command Squads to play. There's already a precedent for a small squad having the Character rule in St. Celestine, so an IG Company Command Squad could consist of an officer and 4 upgradable veterans for about 55 points base. Add to this a 5 point increase in the cost of Guardsmen, and I think that presents a reasonable increase in the cost of infantry firepower, bring them down to acceptable levels.
Nope. Not one of these ideas is solid.
So we bring Command Squads back. CP batteries sometimes already show up with Primaris Psykers instead of Officers if the intention is literally just to hold space and generate CPs, with the added bonus of a Psyker.
"Bringing back" the old Guard book is not and never will be an answer. Not with the way the game is now.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
The first BS change would just further increase the stand-and-shoot issue.
I think that an effective solution to the infantry problem would be to return Command Squads to play. There's already a precedent for a small squad having the Character rule in St. Celestine, so an IG Company Command Squad could consist of an officer and 4 upgradable veterans for about 55 points base. Add to this a 5 point increase in the cost of Guardsmen, and I think that presents a reasonable increase in the cost of infantry firepower, bring them down to acceptable levels.
The thing is Guard perfectly fit into 8th edition. There isn't a lot of changes you could make across the board that wouldn't end up making them unplayable. You'd have to change issues with 8th to actually balance them. Other armies need to be cheaper, they don't have the ability to take on the infantry and the armour of guard. Having enough dakka to deal with the tide and also having enough AP dakka etc is an issue especially with high costed armies Winning a points game against them ass well as trying to table them are so hard.
The first step is restrictions on soup. When everyone is running the same Guard + Custodes or Guard + Knights lists you've got a clear and obvious problem.
Allies needs a lot of fixing. Regardless of what armies are involved, Chaos, Imperial, or Xenos, the top tables are *all* allies/soup lists.
CP should not be shared among different factions, and in fact I'd be ok with even more restrictions on that. Cherrypicking the best units from different armies that cover each others inherent and intended weaknesses also needs to be addressed. The whole concept needs to be reigned in, armies need to be armies again, not a handful of disparate units and characters from distinct forces.
Vaktathi wrote: Allies needs a lot of fixing. Regardless of what armies are involved, Chaos, Imperial, or Xenos, the top tables are *all* allies/soup lists.
CP should not be shared among different factions, and in fact I'd be ok with even more restrictions on that. Cherrypicking the best units from different armies that cover each others inherent and intended weaknesses also needs to be addressed. The whole concept needs to be reigned in, armies need to be armies again, not a handful of disparate units and characters from distinct forces.
Yeah that's always been an issue. If you are fighting with two battalions that's fair as the person is obviously fighting for lore sake, as we can't get rid of allies as its important for the universe, lore, game etc., but having a battalion of guard and a unit of dawneagle jetbikes should be heavily penalised.
Marmatag wrote: The first step is restrictions on soup. When everyone is running the same Guard + Custodes or Guard + Knights lists you've got a clear and obvious problem.
really it is currently imperial knight vallient plus slamguinius variant blood angels and Guard CP farm as the template strongest list. seriously at NOVA and several tournaments lately that is THE list. not many other lists can deal with it.
Vaktathi wrote: Cherrypicking the best units from different armies that cover each others inherent and intended weaknesses also needs to be addressed. The whole concept needs to be reigned in, armies need to be armies again, not a handful of disparate units and characters from distinct forces.
The cherrypicking complaint is pretty damn silly when some factions have only a handful units to choose from while others have way over hundred! How is that fair?
Vaktathi wrote: Cherrypicking the best units from different armies that cover each others inherent and intended weaknesses also needs to be addressed. The whole concept needs to be reigned in, armies need to be armies again, not a handful of disparate units and characters from distinct forces.
The cherrypicking complaint is pretty damn silly when some factions have only a handful units to choose from while others have way over hundred! How is that fair?
It's not at all silly, especially with the larger long established factions. Ultimately the core allies/detachment mechanics allow you to take the best bits of several factions without having to play them within any sort of context or balance paradigm they were originally intended for. That is a problem, and a glaringly obvious one.
Not every faction has a hundred units to choose from. I get that. However, thats not really what the allies system should be addressing.
A lot of those smaller factions arent really self contained forces and never should have been treated as such and should have been generic add-ins that take normal FoC slots for traditional factions (e.g. Inquisition), or should have been much better fleshed out to begin with. AdMech for instance, they're basically a half dozen units with a couple variations of weapons swap, they don't even have a faction transport.
Vaktathi wrote: It's not at all silly, especially with the larger long established factions. Ultimately the core allies/detachment mechanics allow you to take the best bits of several factions without having to play them within any sort of context or balance paradigm they were originally intended for.
Why you think the armies were 'originally designed' to be played mono? Rules were pretty extensively rewritten for this edition, and the writers knew allying was possible when they wrote the codices. Besides, you could already mix 'factions' back in the Rogue Trader! So this idea that the allying is somehow not 'intended' is a compete fabrication.
Not every faction has a hundred units to choose from. I get that. However, thats not really what the allies system should be addressing.
Why?
A lot of those smaller factions arent really self contained forces and never should have been treated as such and should have been generic add-ins that take normal FoC slots for traditional factions (e.g. Inquisition), or should have been much better fleshed out to begin with. AdMech for instance, they're basically a half dozen units with a couple variations of weapons swap, they don't even have a faction transport.
But such factions work just fine with the current ally system. Almost like that was intended!
Vaktathi wrote: It's not at all silly, especially with the larger long established factions. Ultimately the core allies/detachment mechanics allow you to take the best bits of several factions without having to play them within any sort of context or balance paradigm they were originally intended for.
Why you think the armies were 'originally designed' to be played mono? Rules were pretty extensively rewritten for this edition, and the writers knew allying was possible when they wrote the codices. Besides, you could already mix 'factions' back in the Rogue Trader! So this idea that the allying is somehow not 'intended' is a compete fabrication.
Not every faction has a hundred units to choose from. I get that. However, thats not really what the allies system should be addressing.
Why?
A lot of those smaller factions arent really self contained forces and never should have been treated as such and should have been generic add-ins that take normal FoC slots for traditional factions (e.g. Inquisition), or should have been much better fleshed out to begin with. AdMech for instance, they're basically a half dozen units with a couple variations of weapons swap, they don't even have a faction transport.
But such factions work just fine with the current ally system. Almost like that was intended!
Because allies as an option is a lore option, sisters of battle fight with guard or astartes, to not have that would be odd. it not made for you to have an advantage. But it shouldn't be allying to get the most powerful cheese from every army as armies themselves have a few OP units but are offset with more bread and butter. You are trying to justify your want to use cheesy soup lists. You can justify it from the current rules but not for balance or fairness, Any gak player can play a soup list and do far better than he should and if you like playing actual armies and have a sense of fairness it puts you at a disadvantage. In essence you are just showing that you need an edge to win.
No, my soup armies are unxompetive messes as they're based on my model preferences and not on what's OP. Cherrypicking OP units is a problem only because OP units exist! Fix them!
Tighten up the guards ridiculous CP farm. Have it only happen on 6s and 1 per strat used since they can roll for opponents as well. That's it.
The rest? Tighten up allies. You shouldn't be able to use warlord traits or strats from a codex that isn't your main force. Your main force? The codex that takes up the most points in your list.
Crimson wrote: No, my soup armies are unxompetive messes as they're based on my model preferences and not on what's OP. Cherrypicking OP units is a problem only because OP units exist! Fix them!
Its not a problem because OP units exist, its that people with character flaws, use all the OP units in soup lists. You can't not have OP units, an Imperial knight or revenant titan, have to be OP. If every unit was the same level it would be a boring game.
Vaktathi wrote: It's not at all silly, especially with the larger long established factions. Ultimately the core allies/detachment mechanics allow you to take the best bits of several factions without having to play them within any sort of context or balance paradigm they were originally intended for.
Why you think the armies were 'originally designed' to be played mono?
The ones that have been clearly defined factions with the same units, strengths, weaknesses, and setup for every previous edition, and that have fully fleshed out product lines that aren't missing critical capabilities and entire FoC slot options or basics like transports and that largely lack any rules relating to operating or interacting with units of other factions?
Not saying that GW didn't write rules intending to allow allies, they obviously did, but looking at the codex rules, these armies have all their traditional strengths and weaknesses, and extremely few unit abilities that work or can even be applied between factions. The only interactions with other forces is generally at the army detachment level, which all core rulebook stuff, not anything fundamentally built into an armies codex. Essentially they wrote the faction rules the same way they have been for the last 20 years, and added inter-faction cooperation in at a different level in a different book, and as such we get the superpals mix-n-match armies that dominate tables we see now.
Its a problem of execution. Basically the allies rules are in there to let people play with whatever toys they want or happen to have, not for balanced interaction of integrated fighting forces.
Rules were pretty extensively rewritten for this edition, and the writers knew allying was possible when they wrote the codices.
And the exact same statement could be made of 6E and 7E, and boy did that not end well.
Besides, you could already mix 'factions' back in the Rogue Trader!
Yeah, with a tiny fraction of the units, wargear, factions, unit types, etc that exist now, with no fixed army lists/codexes, and a recommended 3rd party GM and a universe very different from 8E's incarnation of the 41st millenium. Totally different game and universe. SM's could wield shuriken catapults and were T3 and only had a 5+ save against Lasguns back then too, and I'm not able to jave any force lead by a Khornate Jokaero wielding a Graviton Cannon and neither Zoats nor Squats exist anymore . Rogue Trader has very little connection to the modern 40k.
So this idea that the allying is somehow not 'intended' is a compete fabrication.
GW very obviously meant to include allies rules, as obviously they did include them. However, it's not hard to see that GW are not writing rules with allies abuse shenanigans in mind and are constructing codexes as self contained armies without thought as to how they interact with others or even with much direct interaction ability at all.
Not every faction has a hundred units to choose from. I get that. However, thats not really what the allies system should be addressing.
Why?
For the reasons I gave right below that statement...
But such factions work just fine with the current ally system. Almost like that was intended!
I mean, if you think Cap'n Smashface with a couple Knights and some guard Groupies is "working"...ok, but I don't.
Crimson wrote: No, my soup armies are unxompetive messes as they're based on my model preferences and not on what's OP. Cherrypicking OP units is a problem only because OP units exist! Fix them!
Its not a problem because OP units exist, its that people with character flaws, use all the OP units in soup lists.
Yes, how dare tournament people play to win! What awful folk.
Crimson wrote: No, my soup armies are unxompetive messes as they're based on my model preferences and not on what's OP. Cherrypicking OP units is a problem only because OP units exist! Fix them!
Its not a problem because OP units exist, its that people with character flaws, use all the OP units in soup lists.
Yes, how dare tournament people play to win! What awful folk.
We are obviously not talking about tournaments. And I'm not saying they are bad people. Having that level of competitiveness is a character flaw, especially in a 'game'.
Crimson wrote: No, my soup armies are unxompetive messes as they're based on my model preferences and not on what's OP. Cherrypicking OP units is a problem only because OP units exist! Fix them!
"Cherrypicking OP units" is a problem when you're able to take them with no consequence. There's no penalty for taking a Brigade or Battalion of Guard to flesh out a Custodes Captain Bike SC Detachment with CPs.
When we talk about "cherrypicking units", very rarely are people talking about Harlequin Troupes or other fluffy bits.
Imposing limitations or requirements on top of troops will not prevent people from running guard soup any more than banning ogryn or mandating they take a tank would. The only way to adjust the guard to prevent souping without hurting the guard directly is to explicitly attack the reasons people are souping them, for example:
1) Your warlord's detachment is the only detachment that can generate or spend CP for any reason.
2) Abilities and relics that generate CP can not be taken in mixed armies.
3) IG abilities and relics that generate CP can not be taken in mixed armies.
Something along the lines of one of these would do a lot more to address the CP battery builds that seem to drive people crazy...
Not that I have a problem with them... *cough*
Bharring wrote: There are two tiers of troops, balance wise, as I see it currently:
IG/Fire Warriors/DE/AdMech
Marines/CWE/Necrons/Nids
There are also some outliers further along the way I'd consider trash tier, but they aren't balanced around eachother - Storm Guardians et al get to hang out there.
I'm genuinely curious about where battle sisters would rank on your list. At 9ppm with a space marine weapon and stat line (sans one WS, S, and T) and a 6++.
"Cherrypicking OP units" is a problem when you're able to take them with no consequence. There's no penalty for taking a Brigade or Battalion of Guard to flesh out a Custodes Captain Bike SC Detachment with CPs.
There is a penalty, a detachment slot and bunch of points. If that's not enough then the point cost is wrong.
When we talk about "cherrypicking units", vöery rarely are people talking about Harlequin Troupes or other fluffy bits.
Then when designing all these restrictions to the soup better make sure to not throw those people who want to ally a Harlequin Troupe under the buss!
Crimson wrote: No, my soup armies are unxompetive messes as they're based on my model preferences and not on what's OP. Cherrypicking OP units is a problem only because OP units exist! Fix them!
"Cherrypicking OP units" is a problem when you're able to take them with no consequence. There's no penalty for taking a Brigade or Battalion of Guard to flesh out a Custodes Captain Bike SC Detachment with CPs.
When we talk about "cherrypicking units", very rarely are people talking about Harlequin Troupes or other fluffy bits.
Yeah, until a tournament player includes them in their list, and then EVERYONE is talking about those units.
Like Drukhari, who went from an army everyone liked to see, why don't more people play Drukhari? I never see them, they're so great looking, I mean-
*codex drops, five seconds later*
OH MY GOD THESE fething DRUKHARI I HATE THEM THEYRE THE STUPIDEST FACTION EVER UGH EVERYONE PLAYS THEM
Really, there's only two people on the forums who go around complaining about every army (bar space marines) and how OP they are regardless of how many competitive events they actually win. The hate train bandwagon just shows up when a faction shows up frequently in a couple of tournaments. Then theyre the dumbestest thing ever and should never be allowed and all their weapons should cost 50 points and they should be nerfed to BS6+.
I gotta tell you I am super duper pumped for people to start complaining that Orks should really be BS6+ because now they have dakkadakkadakka and only hitting on 6s but then having to roll and then reroll sixteen buckets of dice would be such a fluffy rule, so much fun.
I figure we just gotta wait for two tournaments where orks are anywhere near the top ten to start seeing that pop up in every other proposed rule thread alongside the "marines should be 2ppm" and "thing that beat me in my last game should be nerfed" posts.
"Cherrypicking OP units" is a problem when you're able to take them with no consequence. There's no penalty for taking a Brigade or Battalion of Guard to flesh out a Custodes Captain Bike SC Detachment with CPs.
There is a penalty, a detachment slot and bunch of points. If that's not enough then the point cost is wrong.
When we talk about "cherrypicking units", vöery rarely are people talking about Harlequin Troupes or other fluffy bits.
Then when designing all these restrictions to the soup better make sure to not throw those people who want to ally a Harlequin Troupe under the buss!
Well you could allow Harlequins and armies like that to not have restrictions, but still have restrictions on what they don't need to help them as an army, like long ranged units etc. but to still not allow them to soup for cheese sake or restrict them somehow in the best way you can so that they aren't put at a disadvantage. I mean that is the only actual way to bring balance to the game without ruining it. GW have to stop thinking black and white with an all encompassing of game rules, they need to be flexible so armies can work. Because its 8 editions and they've never really had balance.
"Cherrypicking OP units" is a problem when you're able to take them with no consequence. There's no penalty for taking a Brigade or Battalion of Guard to flesh out a Custodes Captain Bike SC Detachment with CPs.
There is a penalty, a detachment slot and bunch of points. If that's not enough then the point cost is wrong.
It's not. The issue, and I can't believe I have to keep fricking saying this, is that you can ally Brigades or Battalions in. It brings in a frigging ton of Command Points for a minimal investiture for the Imperium--and you can bet your ass that if other factions had a similar chance to do it, the tournament goons would be doing it.
Period. End of fething story. There is no debate beyond this.
When we talk about "cherrypicking units", vöery rarely are people talking about Harlequin Troupes or other fluffy bits.
Then when designing all these restrictions to the soup better make sure to not throw those people who want to ally a Harlequin Troupe under the buss!
A Harlequin Troupe can fit in a Patrol. It can fit in a Vanguard, a Spearhead, or an Outrider Detachment as well.
When you're taking a Battalion or Brigade? You're not "allying". You're bringing a second army.
I think a lot of the imbalance is built into the game with allies, lets be honest, Allies and OP units moves plastic. CP farms being what they are GW sold in US$ $145 in troops ($29x5) and another usually $30-50 in HQ so a cool $200 almost required to compete. combine this with the new knights and you have another almost required purchase so $170 or $370 in before space marine captains (though to be fair these are already in most collections and I think slamguinius was unintended to be that awesome for the points)
Give it a few months and chapter approved will probably deal with cp somehow and nerf guard. not enough huge knights are sold yet and people are saving to buy them so I bet they stay the same for another year. I also expect blood angels captains to be nerfed.
"Cherrypicking OP units" is a problem when you're able to take them with no consequence. There's no penalty for taking a Brigade or Battalion of Guard to flesh out a Custodes Captain Bike SC Detachment with CPs.
There is a penalty, a detachment slot and bunch of points. If that's not enough then the point cost is wrong.
Or we could acknowledge the fact that something can be fine in one context, but not another, especially when issues not covered by points or slots, such as Stratagems and CP are in play.
Having jetbike captains in an army with a grand total of 8 or 9 CP is one thing, its another when they have access to double that, and meatshields that remove concerns about numbers which the jetbike captains would otherwise have to worry about.
When you're taking a Battalion or Brigade? You're not "allying". You're bringing a second army.
So what? If I want to make a crusade which has roughly equal amount of Black Templars and SoB why should I not be allowed to do that? Or why should an Ynnari army not be allowed to draw equally from Craftwords and Dark Eldar?
G00fySmiley wrote: I think a lot of the imbalance is built into the game with allies, lets be honest, Allies and OP units moves plastic. CP farms being what they are GW sold in US$ $145 in troops ($29x5) and another usually $30-50 in HQ so a cool $200 almost required to compete. combine this with the new knights and you have another almost required purchase so $170 or $370 in before space marine captains (though to be fair these are already in most collections and I think slamguinius was unintended to be that awesome for the points)
Give it a few months and chapter approved will probably deal with cp somehow and nerf guard. not enough huge knights are sold yet and people are saving to buy them so I bet they stay the same for another year. I also expect blood angels captains to be nerfed.
The Long War podcast was talking about this last knight. Juice said for every table at nova there was at least 1 castellan knight so gw sold $170 per table in the event of a new model.
On the positive side he said there were GW reps openly talking about a change to CP regeneration and CP farms
Having jetbike captains in an army with a grand total of 8 or 9 CP is one thing, its another when they have access to double that, and meatshields that remove concerns about numbers which the jetbike captains would otherwise have to worry about.
Context is important and matters.
Custodes were specifically designed to work with allies. They have rules which sole purpose is to boost allies. If a Jetbike Captain is OP with allies it is OP, period.
If anything I find it unfair that Orks Necrons and Tau are stuck with only their own units, while others get to cherrypick and min-max to their heart's content. Arguing that giving everyone some way, if it's only ever so slight possibility, to get some allies is somehow too unbalanced is just nuts. As if the current system ain't busted already. That Imperium players should have the possibility to make their army from potentially hundreds of units, but that Orks players shouldn't be allowed to take even a single non-Ork faction unit.
Current faction based ally system ain't that fluffy anyway, as if there are no reason in the lore for fielding inter-faction armies - mercenaries, mind control, a brief ceasefire till the bigger threats gone or using a unit to represent something that doesn't have rules. For example, using daemon rules with some cool converted models to represent imperial ghosts fighting alongside the living.
I'd prefer a refinement of 7th eds system, one where every faction has at least some, if ever so restricted, chance to get units from other factions.
Hell, the current system is even restricting GW sales, since players have no insentive to buy models outside of their collected factions. An Eldar player has no reason to buy to buy an imperial knight, since they can't field it with their current collection.
G00fySmiley wrote: I think a lot of the imbalance is built into the game with allies, lets be honest, Allies and OP units moves plastic. CP farms being what they are GW sold in US$ $145 in troops ($29x5) and another usually $30-50 in HQ so a cool $200 almost required to compete. combine this with the new knights and you have another almost required purchase so $170 or $370 in before space marine captains (though to be fair these are already in most collections and I think slamguinius was unintended to be that awesome for the points)
Give it a few months and chapter approved will probably deal with cp somehow and nerf guard. not enough huge knights are sold yet and people are saving to buy them so I bet they stay the same for another year. I also expect blood angels captains to be nerfed.
I like the idea of CP's but the game does not need so many, when you can have a command point for practically every decisions its just absurd. There should be a cap for them. I'd have a battalion and an 3 auxiliaries at the most, that way you can encourage armies instead of soup but you really don't need more than 8 or 9 command points, as most armies can't even get brigades other than guard orks etc. Brigades are exclusive and even if they can get a brigade, they won't have auxiliaries and they'll be an army of troops.
Morgasm the Powerfull wrote: If anything I find it unfair that Orks Necrons and Tau are stuck with only their own units, while others get to cherrypick and min-max to their heart's content. Arguing that giving everyone some way, if it's only ever so slight possibility, to get some allies is somehow too unbalanced is just nuts. As if the current system ain't busted already. That Imperium players should have the possibility to make their army from potentially hundreds of units, but that Orks players shouldn't be allowed to take even a single non-Ork faction unit.
Current faction based ally system ain't that fluffy anyway, as if there are no reason in the lore for fielding inter-faction armies - mercenaries, mind control, a brief ceasefire till the bigger threats gone or using a unit to represent something that doesn't have rules. For example, using daemon rules with some cool converted models to represent imperial ghosts fighting alongside the living.
I'd prefer a refinement of 7th eds system, one where every faction has at least some, if ever so restricted, chance to get units from other factions.
Hell, the current system is even restricting GW sales, since players have no insentive to buy models outside of their collected factions. An Eldar player has no reason to buy to buy an imperial knight, since they can't field it with their current collection.
*puts on tinfoil hat*
I actually think somehow GW knew with 6th and 7th allies people would buy small armies as allies. I wanted an ally for my orks of every faction possible, and made them. When GW took allieas from some factions I actually think it was part of the plan. People who bought small detachments of allies suddenly need to fill out those armies and buy more models if they want to keep being able to play them
Morgasm the Powerfull wrote: If anything I find it unfair that Orks Necrons and Tau are stuck with only their own units, while others get to cherrypick and min-max to their heart's content. Arguing that giving everyone some way, if it's only ever so slight possibility, to get some allies is somehow too unbalanced is just nuts. As if the current system ain't busted already. That Imperium players should have the possibility to make their army from potentially hundreds of units, but that Orks players shouldn't be allowed to take even a single non-Ork faction unit.
Current faction based ally system ain't that fluffy anyway, as if there are no reason in the lore for fielding inter-faction armies - mercenaries, mind control, a brief ceasefire till the bigger threats gone or using a unit to represent something that doesn't have rules. For example, using daemon rules with some cool converted models to represent imperial ghosts fighting alongside the living.
I'd prefer a refinement of 7th eds system, one where every faction has at least some, if ever so restricted, chance to get units from other factions.
Hell, the current system is even restricting GW sales, since players have no insentive to buy models outside of their collected factions. An Eldar player has no reason to buy to buy an imperial knight, since they can't field it with their current collection.
*puts on tinfoil hat*
I actually think somehow GW knew with 6th and 7th allies people would buy small armies as allies. I wanted an ally for my orks of every faction possible, and made them. When GW took allieas from some factions I actually think it was part of the plan. People who bought small detachments of allies suddenly need to fill out those armies and buy more models if they want to keep being able to play them
*tin foil hat off*
That's standard 40k. We've all gone through this. formations saw me buy loads of drop pods, but I don't care about how dear they are as, I collect as well and in the future they might become a must have. You just have to ride the ups and downs of 40k changes. Plus GW have to do this now as they most likely won't be a model company in the future when 3D printing evolves. Also the reason for them focusing so much on being a publishing company.
skchsan wrote: Smash captain is useless without AMCP farm. The unit by itself is by no means broken.
Its weird its almost like IG infantry, BA smash captains and the Knight Castellan are all fine when contained to their own codex and only become an issue when combined in soup
Morgasm the Powerfull wrote: If anything I find it unfair that Orks Necrons and Tau are stuck with only their own units, while others get to cherrypick and min-max to their heart's content. Arguing that giving everyone some way, if it's only ever so slight possibility, to get some allies is somehow too unbalanced is just nuts. As if the current system ain't busted already. That Imperium players should have the possibility to make their army from potentially hundreds of units, but that Orks players shouldn't be allowed to take even a single non-Ork faction unit.
Current faction based ally system ain't that fluffy anyway, as if there are no reason in the lore for fielding inter-faction armies - mercenaries, mind control, a brief ceasefire till the bigger threats gone or using a unit to represent something that doesn't have rules. For example, using daemon rules with some cool converted models to represent imperial ghosts fighting alongside the living.
I'd prefer a refinement of 7th eds system, one where every faction has at least some, if ever so restricted, chance to get units from other factions.
Hell, the current system is even restricting GW sales, since players have no insentive to buy models outside of their collected factions. An Eldar player has no reason to buy to buy an imperial knight, since they can't field it with their current collection.
*puts on tinfoil hat*
I actually think somehow GW knew with 6th and 7th allies people would buy small armies as allies. I wanted an ally for my orks of every faction possible, and made them. When GW took allieas from some factions I actually think it was part of the plan. People who bought small detachments of allies suddenly need to fill out those armies and buy more models if they want to keep being able to play them
*tin foil hat off*
That's standard 40k. We've all gone through this. formations saw me buy loads of drop pods, but I don't care about how dear they are as, I collect as well and in the future they might become a must have. You just have to ride the ups and downs of 40k changes. Plus GW have to do this now as they most likely won't be a model company in the future when 3D printing evolves. Also the reason for them focusing so much on being a publishing company.
true about units going up and down, but how quickly GW has put out kits and even whole armies recently I am not so sure. As for 3d printing... well I am unconvinced on it based on pricing alone. maybe for large collectors there will be value in it (but not many of thier players fall in that category. I can't really ever see it to be cheaper to buy the printer, plastic etc and being cheaper than just building an army if you just want 1 also the idea of pay over time vs a printer and filament. start with kill teams and a box or 2, scale up to bigger games with time and absorb a $5-600 army over 2 years.
Having jetbike captains in an army with a grand total of 8 or 9 CP is one thing, its another when they have access to double that, and meatshields that remove concerns about numbers which the jetbike captains would otherwise have to worry about.
Context is important and matters.
Custodes were specifically designed to work with allies. They have rules which sole purpose is to boost allies.
They have what, one ability that interacts with other factions? Maybe two if I'm forgetting something? Not a whole lot. Even if we accept this however, it doesn't mean that such is functioning as intended and that points costs are the issue.
If a Jetbike Captain is OP with allies it is OP, period.
Curiously, Custodes armies with jetbike captains that lack allies seem to be functional but not anything anyone complains about nor something that dominates top tournament placings.
We could also just replace Jetbike Captain with BA smashface captain and have the same equation and problem.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
Fixing Guard really needs to be an exercise in fixing CP. Something like generating 1 per round with a +1 if your Warlord is alive and on the table. Maybe a +1/turn if all your detachments are battle forged. Basically a modified version of Kill Teams' method.
Morgasm the Powerfull wrote: If anything I find it unfair that Orks Necrons and Tau are stuck with only their own units, while others get to cherrypick and min-max to their heart's content. Arguing that giving everyone some way, if it's only ever so slight possibility, to get some allies is somehow too unbalanced is just nuts. As if the current system ain't busted already. That Imperium players should have the possibility to make their army from potentially hundreds of units, but that Orks players shouldn't be allowed to take even a single non-Ork faction unit.
Current faction based ally system ain't that fluffy anyway, as if there are no reason in the lore for fielding inter-faction armies - mercenaries, mind control, a brief ceasefire till the bigger threats gone or using a unit to represent something that doesn't have rules. For example, using daemon rules with some cool converted models to represent imperial ghosts fighting alongside the living.
I'd prefer a refinement of 7th eds system, one where every faction has at least some, if ever so restricted, chance to get units from other factions.
Hell, the current system is even restricting GW sales, since players have no insentive to buy models outside of their collected factions. An Eldar player has no reason to buy to buy an imperial knight, since they can't field it with their current collection.
*puts on tinfoil hat*
I actually think somehow GW knew with 6th and 7th allies people would buy small armies as allies. I wanted an ally for my orks of every faction possible, and made them. When GW took allieas from some factions I actually think it was part of the plan. People who bought small detachments of allies suddenly need to fill out those armies and buy more models if they want to keep being able to play them
*tin foil hat off*
That's standard 40k. We've all gone through this. formations saw me buy loads of drop pods, but I don't care about how dear they are as, I collect as well and in the future they might become a must have. You just have to ride the ups and downs of 40k changes. Plus GW have to do this now as they most likely won't be a model company in the future when 3D printing evolves. Also the reason for them focusing so much on being a publishing company.
true about units going up and down, but how quickly GW has put out kits and even whole armies recently I am not so sure. As for 3d printing... well I am unconvinced on it based on pricing alone. maybe for large collectors there will be value in it (but not many of thier players fall in that category. I can't really ever see it to be cheaper to buy the printer, plastic etc and being cheaper than just building an army if you just want 1 also the idea of pay over time vs a printer and filament. start with kill teams and a box or 2, scale up to bigger games with time and absorb a $5-600 army over 2 years.
The more people buy the technology the cheaper it will be, remember how expensive mobile phones used to be. Also you don't need to buy one. Someone will buy one and everyone will buy it from people that do, like the Chinese market. It will be as cheap as a normal printer, its not a matter of if, but when.
Having jetbike captains in an army with a grand total of 8 or 9 CP is one thing, its another when they have access to double that, and meatshields that remove concerns about numbers which the jetbike captains would otherwise have to worry about.
Context is important and matters.
Custodes were specifically designed to work with allies. They have rules which sole purpose is to boost allies.
They have what, one ability that interacts with other factions? Maybe two if I'm forgetting something? Not a whole lot. Even if we accept this however, it doesn't mean that such is functioning as intended and that points costs are the issue.
If a Jetbike Captain is OP with allies it is OP, period.
Curiously, Custodes armies with jetbike captains that lack allies seem to be functional but not anything anyone complains about nor something that dominates top tournament placings.
We could also just replace Jetbike Captain with BA smashface captain and have the same equation and problem.
I ally guard with custodes as its lore wise but I never ally my jetbikes with my other armies its just OP and not justified and lame. I might ally a few custodian guard though.
skchsan wrote: Smash captain is useless without AMCP farm. The unit by itself is by no means broken.
Right. Guard's endless CP trick is the first thing that needs to be fixed.
Ok lets say IG gets nerfed to a point it they are no longer worth taking. Now IG players may not be happy, but I don't care much about them. But what about those people that play BAs? Their whole thing was taking IG and cpts, if the CP farm is not there, they suddenly have no way to play, and it is not like they can make better meq lists, then say normal marines or even DAs.
Also what about factions that can soup without actually doing for the CP. Eldar soups, don't soup for CP, they soup for vect and craftworld stratagems on their Inari units.
skchsan wrote: Smash captain is useless without AMCP farm. The unit by itself is by no means broken.
Right. Guard's endless CP trick is the first thing that needs to be fixed.
Ok lets say IG gets nerfed to a point it they are no longer worth taking. Now IG players may not be happy, but I don't care much about them. But what about those people that play BAs? Their whole thing was taking IG and cpts, if the CP farm is not there, they suddenly have no way to play, and it is not like they can make better meq lists, then say normal marines or even DAs.
Also what about factions that can soup without actually doing for the CP. Eldar soups, don't soup for CP, they soup for vect and craftworld stratagems on their Inari units.
If CP farm is the crutch you need to make your army work, it's not a good army.
Vaktathi wrote: Curiously, Custodes armies with jetbike captains that lack allies seem to be functional but not anything anyone complains about nor something that dominates top tournament placings.
We could also just replace Jetbike Captain with BA smashface captain and have the same equation and problem.
Because guard being able to generate infinite CP utterly breaks the CP system, so of course anything relying on CP for punch gets insane boost from that. How hard this simple thing can be to understand? The problem is not being able to ally guard in general, it is the carzy CP generation. Get rid of CP generating abilities, and soup issues are like 90% fixed.
This doesn't mean units like Jetbike Captains and Castellans cannot be OP in themselves. I am sure they would perform well in non-infinite CP meta as well, but obviously they cannot compete with the infinite-CP backed versions of themselves.
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FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: Honest Question: Make everything fair - Limit every list to 10 CP. No regen. Everyone gets 10, how you spend it is your problem.
Make it scale with the game size and it sounds fine to me.
skchsan wrote: Smash captain is useless without AMCP farm. The unit by itself is by no means broken.
I disagree. Smash captains get work done with or without a AMCP farm. I wouldn't call him "broken" but he's clearly superior to other, similar choices. The AM farm does make him better, but it certainly doesn't take a 'useless' unit and turn it into a 'must take'.
The same can be said for Infantry. Infantry aren't broken. They are very, very efficient. Too efficient I would suggest. They are also not 'fine' in a mono Guard list either because they invalidate Conscripts that were clearly undercosted at 3ppm.
I understand why people get so defensive about the possibility of nerfing things in your army of choice but it is not healthy for the game long term and it is not healthy for your army. If a unit is nerfed, it means all those units it shares a codex with are buffed in relation to it. Wouldn't it be more fun for all you AM players if there was an actual decision to make when selecting a troop? If one troop had certain strengths over another but also had weaknesses? Perhaps an increase to the cost of Infantry could be accompanied by a buff to Commissars so they do something useful again? It wouldn't even be particularly difficult to do - have Commissars give -1 loss from morale or -2 if the unit is Conscripts. Now the negative of Conscripts not always accepting orders and their low LD is balanced by their cheaper cost and effective leadership shenanigans with Commissars in relation to Infantry.
Soup isn't going away. CP and Stratagems aren't going away. If the game was *perfectly* balanced, soup would not be an issue in and of itself. The only way soup armies will change is if the units that make the majority of their composition change too.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: Honest Question: Make everything fair - Limit every list to 10 CP. No regen. Everyone gets 10, how you spend it is your problem.
The only problem with this is there is still a massive advantage to allies with no disadvantage. This means that allies will always be greater than any mono dex (this applies to all factions that can soup) There should be some type of disadvantage to soup or some type of bonus for mono factions
Ok lets say IG gets nerfed to a point it they are no longer worth taking. Now IG players may not be happy, but I don't care much about them. But what about those people that play BAs? Their whole thing was taking IG and cpts, if the CP farm is not there, they suddenly have no way to play, and it is not like they can make better meq lists, then say normal marines or even DAs.
Marines in general are bad and need boosting, and sooner couple of anomalously powerful things like Guilliman or Smash Captains stop inflating their tournament results sooner this can happen.
Also what about factions that can soup without actually doing for the CP. Eldar soups, don't soup for CP, they soup for vect and craftworld stratagems on their Inari units.
I'm not sure this is a huge problem though. If some stratagems are too good they can be nerfed. Ynnari of course need a total redesing, so that it is actually worth to field a full fluffy Ynnari army instead of just mini detachment for boosting one unit (They need to give weak buffs to many units instead of crazy powerful buff to one unit.)
I disagree. Smash captains get work done with or without a AMCP farm. I wouldn't call him "broken" but he's clearly superior to other, similar choices. The AM farm does make him better, but it certainly doesn't take a 'useless' unit and turn it into a 'must take'.
Yep. Even in a pure BA army he has easily the CP needed to oneshot a many times more expensive units. Seems kinda crazy to me. And of course this build is miles better than any other BA captain build, so it is poor internal balance.
Vaktathi wrote: Curiously, Custodes armies with jetbike captains that lack allies seem to be functional but not anything anyone complains about nor something that dominates top tournament placings.
We could also just replace Jetbike Captain with BA smashface captain and have the same equation and problem.
Because guard being able to generate infinite CP utterly breaks the CP system, so of course anything relying on CP for punch gets insane boost from that. How hard this simple thing can be to understand?
I get that it's an issue. I'm all for Kurov and GS being changed or even going away. However, it's not the only problem with allies, it's just one way they can be broken. We've had major sustained ongoing issues with allies going back to when they reintroduced them six years and three editions ago. The way GW is going about allies, as a mechanic to let people play with anything they want to slap on a table together, and not for balanced integration of distinct forces, encounters problems in many different respects.
The problem is not being able to ally guard in general, it is the carzy CP generation. Get rid of CP generating abilities, and soup issues are like 90% fixed.
It would solve some problems, absolutely, but its attacking a symptom not the underlying cause, and we would still have many issues. Guard CP farms aren't the core of all allies issues, one need only look at the Eldar soup armies present on top tables to see that.
The only problem with this is there is still a massive advantage to allies with no disadvantage. This means that allies will always be greater than any mono dex (this applies to all factions that can soup) There should be some type of disadvantage to soup or some type of bonus for mono factions
Soup has exactly the similar 'advantage' over mono army than Astra Militarum has over, say Harlequins. More stuff, more choices. This is how the game has always been. So until all factions have exactly equal amount of options crying about this sort of 'advantage' is foolish. You have limited points. Disadvantage of taking one thing is that now you have no points to take another thing.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: Honest Question: Make everything fair - Limit every list to 10 CP. No regen. Everyone gets 10, how you spend it is your problem.
The only problem with this is there is still a massive advantage to allies with no disadvantage. This means that allies will always be greater than any mono dex (this applies to all factions that can soup) There should be some type of disadvantage to soup or some type of bonus for mono factions
Additionally you'd see even more of the factions that have the really good stratagems, like doubleshooting, etc.
So long the stratagems are not balanced that would only somewhat solve the problem.
The only problem with this is there is still a massive advantage to allies with no disadvantage. This means that allies will always be greater than any mono dex (this applies to all factions that can soup) There should be some type of disadvantage to soup or some type of bonus for mono factions
Soup has exactly the similar 'advantage' over mono army than Astra Militarum has over, say Harlequins. More stuff, more choices. This is how the game has always been. So until all factions have exactly equal amount of options crying about this sort of 'advantage' is foolish. You have limited points. Disadvantage of taking one thing is that now you have no points to take another thing.
No soup has a far greater advantage.
Every codex has built-in fluff weaknesses
Take for example tau which have lots of dakka but crappy CC capabilities. They might get an in-faction support such as kroot but these will never be able to match the CC efficiency as a CC designed codex like BA ^
This is the inherent imbalance. When you can soup armies with completely different roles and strategems for those roles you will always be able to make a more diverse and robust army list than any individual codex in the game. It also develops another issue in balance and this comes with points adjustment. Any attempt to balance the soup by changing the points disproportionately hurts the mono dex as compared to soup. What you get left with is a bunch of codexes that are useless except for 1-2 ingredients that are only effective in soup
The only problem with this is there is still a massive advantage to allies with no disadvantage. This means that allies will always be greater than any mono dex (this applies to all factions that can soup) There should be some type of disadvantage to soup or some type of bonus for mono factions
Soup has exactly the similar 'advantage' over mono army than Astra Militarum has over, say Harlequins. More stuff, more choices. This is how the game has always been. So until all factions have exactly equal amount of options crying about this sort of 'advantage' is foolish. You have limited points. Disadvantage of taking one thing is that now you have no points to take another thing.
No it isn't, not everyone is like you, people like myself play for fun and part of that fun is to have a themed army, not unrealistic and boring soup. Back in 2nd edition it was fantastic, there wasn't this kind of ridiculous soup back then. I honestly don't know why people play soups other than wanting to win more than have fun. I mean winning a game of 40k is meaningless. Its like taking pride at winning a game of monopoly.
The only problem with this is there is still a massive advantage to allies with no disadvantage. This means that allies will always be greater than any mono dex (this applies to all factions that can soup) There should be some type of disadvantage to soup or some type of bonus for mono factions
Soup has exactly the similar 'advantage' over mono army than Astra Militarum has over, say Harlequins. More stuff, more choices. This is how the game has always been. So until all factions have exactly equal amount of options crying about this sort of 'advantage' is foolish. You have limited points. Disadvantage of taking one thing is that now you have no points to take another thing.
No it isn't, not everyone is like you, people like myself play for fun and part of that fun is to have a themed army, not unrealistic and boring soup. Back in 2nd edition it was fantastic, there wasn't this kind of ridiculous soup back then. I honestly don't know why people play soups other than wanting to win more than have fun. I mean winning a game of 40k is meaningless. Its like taking pride at winning a game of monopoly.
The annoying part is there is very good thematic reasons for soup as well as practical
>Your IG is planetary guard working alongside the UM in a campaign
or
>you already have an UM army and want to slow build IG while you start to test stuff in games
The thing is both of these are very valid and real reasons why some people soup. What's annoying is the people doing this would still do it if there was some sort of drawback for playing soup. The reason you see pushback on these forums for fixing how amazing soup is, is that people who abuse it don't actually want it to be any less powerful
No soup has a far greater advantage.
Every codex has built-in fluff weaknesses
This is the inherent imbalance. When you can soup armies with completely different roles and strategems for those roles you will always be able to make a more diverse and robust army list than any individual codex in the game.
You will also always be able to make more diverse and robust army with Astra Militarum than with Harlequins! It is exactly the same thing! Certain codices may have certain weak areas, but this is mostly by accident than by design. Guard for example have many surprisingly powerful close combat elements.
It also develops another issue in balance and this comes with points adjustment. Any attempt to balance the soup by changing the points disproportionately hurts the money dex as compared to soup. What you get left with is a bunch of codexes that are useless except for 1-2 ingredients that are only effective in soup
Utter nonsense. It is exactly the current situation that codices are poorly balanced that leads to cherrypicking the couple of things that are accidentally undercosted. These units would be the best things in their respective codices in mono meta too.
The only problem with this is there is still a massive advantage to allies with no disadvantage. This means that allies will always be greater than any mono dex (this applies to all factions that can soup) There should be some type of disadvantage to soup or some type of bonus for mono factions
Soup has exactly the similar 'advantage' over mono army than Astra Militarum has over, say Harlequins. More stuff, more choices. This is how the game has always been. So until all factions have exactly equal amount of options crying about this sort of 'advantage' is foolish. You have limited points. Disadvantage of taking one thing is that now you have no points to take another thing.
No it isn't, not everyone is like you, people like myself play for fun and part of that fun is to have a themed army, not unrealistic and boring soup. Back in 2nd edition it was fantastic, there wasn't this kind of ridiculous soup back then. I honestly don't know why people play soups other than wanting to win more than have fun. I mean winning a game of 40k is meaningless. Its like taking pride at winning a game of monopoly.
The annoying part is there is very good thematic reasons for soup as well as practical
>Your IG is planetary guard working alongside the UM in a campaign
or
>you already have an UM army and want to slow build IG while you start to test stuff in games
The thing is both of these are very valid and real reasons why some people soup. What's annoying is the people doing this would still do it if there was some sort of drawback for playing soup. The reason you see pushback on these forums for fixing how amazing soup is, is that people who abuse it don't actually want it to be any less powerful
Ok, so you have admited the reason why you don't want Imperial Guard nerfed. All the pushback agaisnt proper Imperial Guard nerfs is because people who abuse it don't actually want it to be any less powerful.
if we are gonna assume the intentions of other posters lets go all the way.
No soup has a far greater advantage.
Every codex has built-in fluff weaknesses
This is the inherent imbalance. When you can soup armies with completely different roles and strategems for those roles you will always be able to make a more diverse and robust army list than any individual codex in the game.
You will also always be able to make more diverse and robust army with Astra Militarum than with Harlequins! It is exactly the same thing! Certain codices may have certain weak areas, but this is mostly by accident than by design. Guard for example have many surprisingly powerful close combat elements.
It also develops another issue in balance and this comes with points adjustment. Any attempt to balance the soup by changing the points disproportionately hurts the money dex as compared to soup. What you get left with is a bunch of codexes that are useless except for 1-2 ingredients that are only effective in soup
Utter nonsense. It is exactly the current situation that codices are poorly balanced that leads to cherrypicking the couple of things that are accidentally undercosted. These units would be the best things in their respective codices in mono meta too.
Yeah sorry but if the IG codex had anything similar to smash captains or Castellan knights you would see mono guard crushing tournaments. Guards have supplement units in there codex that give them some CC option and some large firpower but nothing like what you unlock with soup. Your argument is crushed by recent evidence like every top 10 list at nova being soup.
No it isn't, not everyone is like you, people like myself play for fun and part of that fun is to have a themed army, not unrealistic and boring soup. Back in 2nd edition it was fantastic, there wasn't this kind of ridiculous soup back then. I honestly don't know why people play soups other than wanting to win more than have fun. I mean winning a game of 40k is meaningless. Its like taking pride at winning a game of monopoly.
Well certainly then you don't mind losing to the soup!
But no, my reasons for doing soup are purely themating and aesthetic. I am certainly not choosing the most powerful elements. I choose the models I like. I have never used any CP regenerating item or trait, no Smash or Jetbike Captains. And that's the thing, I don't want my already questionably effective imperial mess be nerfed because some people in tournaments keep bringing the most broken things from several codices.
The only problem with this is there is still a massive advantage to allies with no disadvantage. This means that allies will always be greater than any mono dex (this applies to all factions that can soup) There should be some type of disadvantage to soup or some type of bonus for mono factions
Soup has exactly the similar 'advantage' over mono army than Astra Militarum has over, say Harlequins. More stuff, more choices. This is how the game has always been. So until all factions have exactly equal amount of options crying about this sort of 'advantage' is foolish. You have limited points. Disadvantage of taking one thing is that now you have no points to take another thing.
No it isn't, not everyone is like you, people like myself play for fun and part of that fun is to have a themed army, not unrealistic and boring soup. Back in 2nd edition it was fantastic, there wasn't this kind of ridiculous soup back then. I honestly don't know why people play soups other than wanting to win more than have fun. I mean winning a game of 40k is meaningless. Its like taking pride at winning a game of monopoly.
The annoying part is there is very good thematic reasons for soup as well as practical
>Your IG is planetary guard working alongside the UM in a campaign
or
>you already have an UM army and want to slow build IG while you start to test stuff in games
The thing is both of these are very valid and real reasons why some people soup. What's annoying is the people doing this would still do it if there was some sort of drawback for playing soup. The reason you see pushback on these forums for fixing how amazing soup is, is that people who abuse it don't actually want it to be any less powerful
No it isn't, not everyone is like you, people like myself play for fun and part of that fun is to have a themed army, not unrealistic and boring soup. Back in 2nd edition it was fantastic, there wasn't this kind of ridiculous soup back then. I honestly don't know why people play soups other than wanting to win more than have fun. I mean winning a game of 40k is meaningless. Its like taking pride at winning a game of monopoly.
Well certainly then you don't mind losing to the soup!
But no, my reasons for doing soup are purely themating and aesthetic. I am certainly not choosing the most powerful elements. I choose the models I like. I have never used any CP regenerating item or trait, no Smash or Jetbike Captains. And that's the thing, I don't want my already questionably effective imperial mess be nerfed because some people in tournaments keep bringing the most broken things from several codices.
No but I have a big problem playing un-thematic boring lists. If yours is thematic and theirs is a stupid soup then it ruins the whole illusion. No one plays soups for thematic reasons and there is no thematic reasons, no armies are going to be that unorganised that units are in one big pile on with that many factions. 4 different armies all supporting one unit, I mean come on do they not have vox, with one factions saying we got this.
Yeah sorry but if the IG codex had anything similar to smash captains or Castellan knights you would see mono guard crushing tournaments.
Jesus on a pogo stick! It is because those units are OP and CP regeneration is OP. If Knights are flat out better than equal points worth of Astra Militarum superheavy tanks, then there is an issue with point somewhere!
The only problem with this is there is still a massive advantage to allies with no disadvantage. This means that allies will always be greater than any mono dex (this applies to all factions that can soup) There should be some type of disadvantage to soup or some type of bonus for mono factions
Soup has exactly the similar 'advantage' over mono army than Astra Militarum has over, say Harlequins. More stuff, more choices. This is how the game has always been. So until all factions have exactly equal amount of options crying about this sort of 'advantage' is foolish. You have limited points. Disadvantage of taking one thing is that now you have no points to take another thing.
No it isn't, not everyone is like you, people like myself play for fun and part of that fun is to have a themed army, not unrealistic and boring soup. Back in 2nd edition it was fantastic, there wasn't this kind of ridiculous soup back then. I honestly don't know why people play soups other than wanting to win more than have fun. I mean winning a game of 40k is meaningless. Its like taking pride at winning a game of monopoly.
The annoying part is there is very good thematic reasons for soup as well as practical
>Your IG is planetary guard working alongside the UM in a campaign
or
>you already have an UM army and want to slow build IG while you start to test stuff in games
The thing is both of these are very valid and real reasons why some people soup. What's annoying is the people doing this would still do it if there was some sort of drawback for playing soup. The reason you see pushback on these forums for fixing how amazing soup is, is that people who abuse it don't actually want it to be any less powerful
Ok, so you have admited the reason why you don't want Imperial Guard nerfed. All the pushback agaisnt proper Imperial Guard nerfs is because people who abuse it don't actually want it to be any less powerful.
if we are gonna assume the intentions of other posters lets go all the way.
You have to work on your reading comprehension because I didn't say anything like that. Every person in the thread arguing against an IG nerf is because
1. It doesn't do anything to stop the actual problem
2. Hurts mono dex players which there is 0 evidence is OP Instead, people should be looking to reign in or eliminate CP regeneration and add in some sort of drawback for soup
Every single top 10 list at nova contained either
1. soup
2. CP farm
3. both
yet not one was a mono guard list
It also develops another issue in balance and this comes with points adjustment. Any attempt to balance the soup by changing the points disproportionately hurts the money dex as compared to soup. What you get left with is a bunch of codexes that are useless except for 1-2 ingredients that are only effective in soup
Utter nonsense. It is exactly the current situation that codices are poorly balanced that leads to cherrypicking the couple of things that are accidentally undercosted. These units would be the best things in their respective codices in mono meta too.
This is the crux of the matter. Poor balancing both internally and externally leads to soup lists that cherry pick the best units from all available options.
Although, as 8th is currently designed with unique stratagems on a codex-by-codex basis and soup "unlocking" all of them a soup list will always be superior to a mono-list. If for nothing else than a soup player has access to 3x the number of stratagems as a mono player. If this was somehow restricted, soup would be no more or less attractive (assuming perfect balance of units across all codexes).
Yeah sorry but if the IG codex had anything similar to smash captains or Castellan knights you would see mono guard crushing tournaments.
Jesus on a pogo stick! It is because those units are OP and CP regeneration is OP. If Knights are flat out better than equal points worth of Astra Militarum superheavy tanks, then there is an issue with point somewhere!
No because knights need to be point for point better then similar options like baneblades or mono knight players will never have a chance of winning anything. Things like knights only become OP with the edition of soup. Just like BA need captains with better options then anything guard can bring or they will never win a game
BA should be better than IG in CC Knights should be bigger and meaner than anything IG can bring
What needs balancing is soup there needs to be a drawback of cherrypicking each codex
No but I have a big problem playing un-thematic boring lists. If yours is thematic and theirs is a stupid soup then it ruins the whole illusion. No one plays soups for thematic reasons and there is no thematic reasons, no armies are going to be that unorganised that units are in one big pile on with that many factions.
Why is an Inquisitorial task force consisting of several Imperial elements unthematic? Why is Ad Mech backed up by Questoris Mechanicus Knights unthematic? Why is Yvraine leading a bunch of Eldar from different factions unthematic?
Asmodios wrote: No because knights need to be point for point better then similar options like baneblades or mono knight players will never have a chance of winning anything.
This is so wrong it hurts my head. Knights and similar options like Baneblades should be exactly balanced against each other. What makes you think Knights wouldn't have a chance of winning anything otherwise? They have a codex' worth of relics, warlord traits, households and stratagems dedicated to them. Even if the Baneblade and IK had exactly the same stats, weapons and points cost, the IK would be better because of all those juicy codex items.
Asmodios wrote: No because knights need to be point for point better then similar options like baneblades or mono knight players will never have a chance of winning anything.
This is so wrong it hurts my head. Knights and similar options like Baneblades should be exactly balanced against each other. What makes you think Knights wouldn't have a chance of winning anything otherwise? They have a codex' worth of relics, warlord traits, households and stratagems dedicated to them. Even if the Baneblade and IK had exactly the same stats, weapons and points cost, the IK would be better because of all those juicy codex items.
Yeah, so all those "juicy items" make them better....
No because knights need to be point for point better then similar options like baneblades or mono knight players will never have a chance of winning anything.
So if someone wants to play a IG superheavy tank company, by your logic they should just be screwed? Points exist for a reason. They should be commensurate to the effectiveness of the unit regardless of the originating codex.
Things like knights only become OP with the edition of soup.
Knights were always meant to work with allies. They were recently in same codex with Ad Mech and in the last edition had combined formation with them!
Asmodios wrote: No because knights need to be point for point better then similar options like baneblades or mono knight players will never have a chance of winning anything.
This is so wrong it hurts my head. Knights and similar options like Baneblades should be exactly balanced against each other. What makes you think Knights wouldn't have a chance of winning anything otherwise? They have a codex' worth of relics, warlord traits, households and stratagems dedicated to them. Even if the Baneblade and IK had exactly the same stats, weapons and points cost, the IK would be better because of all those juicy codex items.
Yeah, so all those "juicy items" make them better....
Aye, which is what I said above. Correct me if I misunderstood but it seemed you believed Knights needed to be flat better than a Baneblade or [insert superheavy here] because otherwise Knights wouldn't win anything? This doesn't make any sense to me.
With respect to Soup armies, I'm not a terribly competitive player anymore, but even then I almost never see allies used to make cool interesting and thematic armies. It's invariably always for power reasons or "its the only way I could get to 2k". Over the last three editons the number of well thought out and coherently thematoc allied armies I have seen can be counted on one hand.
With respect to the superheavies, Knights and Baneblades are different. A Knight generally has a more skilled pilot/crew, is able to fight in melee effectively, and is highly mobile, a Baneblade or variant historically has greater raw firepower and armor/resilinecy. Broadly equivalent but very different in function.
Asmodias - the Ynnari did not have a CP farm. It had soup, and followed the same blueprint. And Ynnari do for Eldar what CP farm does for IoM. So your point is worth considering, but there is a technical incorrectness.
No because knights need to be point for point better then similar options like baneblades or mono knight players will never have a chance of winning anything.
So if someone wants to play a IG superheavy tank company, by your logic they should just be screwed? Points exist for a reason. They should be commensurate to the effectiveness of the unit regardless of the originating codex.
Things like knights only become OP with the edition of soup.
Knights were always meant to work with allies. They were recently in same codex with Ad Mech and in the last edition had combined formation with them!
Yes and no.... because we aren't playing chess. In order to give armies their flavor from lore, they need to exceed at certain things. I should never be able to build an IG or Tau force that's going to win in CC against khorne. The way you win is instead playing to your armies strengths. Tau has to rely on firepower and guard on overwhelming numbers. Why play Thousand sons if everyone can cast like you do? Why play nurgle if everyone is as durable as you are? Why play BA if everyone is just as good in CC? Unless you want to play mirrored armies where all you use are different looking pieces but everything plays the same you are going to need inherently different units and thus flavor.
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Bharring wrote: Asmodias - the Ynnari did not have a CP farm. It had soup, and followed the same blueprint. And Ynnari do for Eldar what CP farm does for IoM. So your point is worth considering, but there is a technical incorrectness.
That's why i listed 3 things that they had in common go read my previous points. Soup is the only thing that occurred in all 10
Asmodios wrote: No because knights need to be point for point better then similar options like baneblades or mono knight players will never have a chance of winning anything.
This is so wrong it hurts my head. Knights and similar options like Baneblades should be exactly balanced against each other. What makes you think Knights wouldn't have a chance of winning anything otherwise? They have a codex' worth of relics, warlord traits, households and stratagems dedicated to them. Even if the Baneblade and IK had exactly the same stats, weapons and points cost, the IK would be better because of all those juicy codex items.
Yeah, so all those "juicy items" make them better....
Aye, which is what I said above. Correct me if I misunderstood but it seemed you believed Knights needed to be flat better than a Baneblade or [insert superheavy here] because otherwise Knights wouldn't win anything? This doesn't make any sense to me.
Those items do make them better than baneblades its why you see IG with Knights at all the top tables instead of baneblades
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
For a newbie who plays Imperial Guard, can someone explain the problems to me? I've played 3 times, with a 1K guard list. 3 squads of guardsmen (each with a mortar team) and 3 LR tanks (plus a tank commander, psyker, and HQ commissar dude. Oh, and one basilisk too). In each game, the guardsmen are vaporized in the first turn or two. They literally do nothing. The tanks tear up the enemy. Each game, the guard has won. Once barely, it was pretty much a tie, and twice they tabled the enemy.
I reckon 1K is not the perfect sized game to get a feel for this, but are others finding that guardsmen are really good? Or is there some other aspect of playing guard that I just haven't picked up on yet?
No but I have a big problem playing un-thematic boring lists. If yours is thematic and theirs is a stupid soup then it ruins the whole illusion. No one plays soups for thematic reasons and there is no thematic reasons, no armies are going to be that unorganised that units are in one big pile on with that many factions.
Why is an Inquisitorial task force consisting of several Imperial elements unthematic? Why is Ad Mech backed up by Questoris Mechanicus Knights unthematic? Why is Yvraine leading a bunch of Eldar from different factions unthematic?
Several units in the same board, following no army or unit cohesion. A few maybe. Do you think armies are sent into battle just mixed in a big free for all?
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Vaktathi wrote: With respect to Soup armies, I'm not a terribly competitive player anymore, but even then I almost never see allies used to make cool interesting and thematic armies. It's invariably always for power reasons or "its the only way I could get to 2k". Over the last three editons the number of well thought out and coherently thematoc allied armies I have seen can be counted on one hand.
With respect to the superheavies, Knights and Baneblades are different. A Knight generally has a more skilled pilot/crew, is able to fight in melee effectively, and is highly mobile, a Baneblade or variant historically has greater raw firepower and armor/resilinecy. Broadly equivalent but very different in function.
Exactly, saying they do it for thematic reasons is just ridiculous.
"For a newbie who plays Imperial Guard, can someone explain the problems to me?"
Because at the top end of the competitive scene, the IG's Knights and Smash Captains (/Custodes) tear everything up. Their opponents can't afford to devote the dakka necessary to kill 30/60/120 Guardsmen in 1 turn without getting wrecked even faster.
Asmodios wrote: Those items do make them better than baneblades its why you see IG with Knights at all the top tables instead of baneblades
Knights are better than Baneblades in terms of raw point efficiency right now.
Wouldn't you prefer it if they were brought more in line with each other? If a mono-AM player could take a Baneblade or another super-heavy and not feel like he's gimping his own list? Not ignoring Vaktathi's point about broad equivalence.
The same can be said for AM Infantry, (or Smash Captains, or [insert flavour of the meta unit here]), it shouldn't be a no brainer choice because they are flat better than Conscripts, there should be a decision to be made. It also shouldn't be such a no brainer to put them in a soup list.
Although, as 8th is currently designed with unique stratagems on a codex-by-codex basis and soup "unlocking" all of them a soup list will always be superior to a mono-list. If for nothing else than a soup player has access to 3x the number of stratagems as a mono player. If this was somehow restricted, soup would be no more or less attractive (assuming perfect balance of units across all codexes).
This is kinda fair point and the reason I think mono armies maybe should have couple of extra CP to compensate (We obviously first need to get rid of the infinite CP for it to matter.) Though bear in mind that in reality many stratagems are linked to specific units and you don't unlock a full suite by just bringing anything from that faction. For example, my Primaris marine army is unable to use eight of the 19 non-chapter specific stratagems as not appropriate units or equipment exist in a pure Primaris force. So in practice the situation is that whatever units you bring from whatever codex, you get at least some stratagems to use on them, which seems fine to me.
Several units in the same board, following no army or unit cohesion. A few maybe. Do you think armies are sent into battle just mixed in a big free for all?
What had no cohesion was your paragraph.
These are forces that exist in the fluff. These are forces that are used in GW examples.
But yeah, than you for perfectly demonstrating the ludicrous anti-soup mentality. 'Oh no, other people like to build their armies differently than me, kill it with fire!'
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Asmodios wrote: Yes and no.... because we aren't playing chess. In order to give armies their flavor from lore, they need to exceed at certain things. I should never be able to build an IG or Tau force that's going to win in CC against khorne. The way you win is instead playing to your armies strengths. Tau has to rely on firepower and guard on overwhelming numbers. Why play Thousand sons if everyone can cast like you do? Why play nurgle if everyone is as durable as you are? Why play BA if everyone is just as good in CC? Unless you want to play mirrored armies where all you use are different looking pieces but everything plays the same you are going to need inherently different units and thus flavor.
No on is saying all factions should be the same merely that they should pay appropriate cost of their effectiveness. And yeah, Guard is not gonna win against Khorne with melee, they win by shooting. But if they choose to use a part of their points for BA allies, thus having less shooting but more melee, that should be OK too.
Although, as 8th is currently designed with unique stratagems on a codex-by-codex basis and soup "unlocking" all of them a soup list will always be superior to a mono-list. If for nothing else than a soup player has access to 3x the number of stratagems as a mono player. If this was somehow restricted, soup would be no more or less attractive (assuming perfect balance of units across all codexes).
This is kinda fair point and the reason I think mono armies maybe should have couple of extra CP to compensate (We obviously first need to get rid of the infinite CP for it to matter.) Though bear in mind that in reality many stratagems are linked to specific units and you don't unlock a full suite by just bringing anything from that faction. For example, my Primaris marine army is unable to use eight of the 19 non-chapter specific stratagems as not appropriate units or equipment exist in a pure Primaris force. So in practice the situation is that whatever units you bring from whatever codex, you get at least some stratagems to use on them, which seems fine to me.
Although, as 8th is currently designed with unique stratagems on a codex-by-codex basis and soup "unlocking" all of them a soup list will always be superior to a mono-list. If for nothing else than a soup player has access to 3x the number of stratagems as a mono player. If this was somehow restricted, soup would be no more or less attractive (assuming perfect balance of units across all codexes).
This is kinda fair point and the reason I think mono armies maybe should have couple of extra CP to compensate (We obviously first need to get rid of the infinite CP for it to matter.) Though bear in mind that in reality many stratagems are linked to specific units and you don't unlock a full suite by just bringing anything from that faction. For example, my Primaris marine army is unable to use eight of the 19 non-chapter specific stratagems as not appropriate units or equipment exist in a pure Primaris force. So in practice the situation is that whatever units you bring from whatever codex, you get at least some stratagems to use on them, which seems fine to me.
Several units in the same board, following no army or unit cohesion. A few maybe. Do you think armies are sent into battle just mixed in a big free for all?
What had no cohesion was your paragraph.
These are forces that exist in the fluff. These are forces that are used in GW examples.
But yeah, than you for perfectly demonstrating the ludicrous anti-soup mentality. 'Oh no, other people like to build their armies differently than me, kill it with fire!'
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Asmodios wrote: Yes and no.... because we aren't playing chess. In order to give armies their flavor from lore, they need to exceed at certain things. I should never be able to build an IG or Tau force that's going to win in CC against khorne. The way you win is instead playing to your armies strengths. Tau has to rely on firepower and guard on overwhelming numbers. Why play Thousand sons if everyone can cast like you do? Why play nurgle if everyone is as durable as you are? Why play BA if everyone is just as good in CC? Unless you want to play mirrored armies where all you use are different looking pieces but everything plays the same you are going to need inherently different units and thus flavor.
No on is saying all factions should be the same merely that they should pay appropriate cost of their effectiveness. And yeah, Guard is not gonna win against Khorne with melee, they win by shooting. But if they choose to use a part of their points for BA allies, thus having less shooting but more melee, that should be OK too.
Yeah, it should be ok but there also needs to be a downside to taking that BA melle into your list or you end up with...... well what we have now. As of right now imperium chas and eldar have huge advantages by being able to plug up codex weaknesses with soup while armies like Tau do not have this option
Yeah, it should be ok but there also needs to be a downside to taking that BA melle into your list or you end up with...... well what we have now. As of right now imperium chas and eldar have huge advantages by being able to plug up codex weaknesses with soup while armies like Tau do not have this option
The downside should be that by using those points for melee, you thus have less points for shooting. If the end results are not balanced, then the point costs are wrong.
Yeah, it should be ok but there also needs to be a downside to taking that BA melle into your list or you end up with...... well what we have now. As of right now imperium chas and eldar have huge advantages by being able to plug up codex weaknesses with soup while armies like Tau do not have this option
The downside should be that by using those points for melee, you thus have less points for shooting. If the end results are not balanced, then the point costs are wrong.
The issue is one of context. If I have access to a ton of powerful shooting, thats one thing. If I have access to a ton of powerful CC or resiliency buffs, that's one thing. I have access to both, then I can leverage that to create something more powerful than either in their original context, building on synergy that otherwise may not exist. These things are not always straight conversions, and there is a reason different armies often pay different points for often very similar or identical things. Points costs do not, and cannot be expected to, cover that by themselves.
Yeah, it should be ok but there also needs to be a downside to taking that BA melle into your list or you end up with...... well what we have now. As of right now imperium chas and eldar have huge advantages by being able to plug up codex weaknesses with soup while armies like Tau do not have this option
The downside should be that by using those points for melee, you thus have less points for shooting. If the end results are not balanced, then the point costs are wrong.
No, the end result is you have something to handle literally everything in the game which is why you see soup and nothing else dominate the competitive scene. Every one of these options is not broken in their own book
Yeah, it should be ok but there also needs to be a downside to taking that BA melle into your list or you end up with...... well what we have now. As of right now imperium chas and eldar have huge advantages by being able to plug up codex weaknesses with soup while armies like Tau do not have this option
The downside should be that by using those points for melee, you thus have less points for shooting. If the end results are not balanced, then the point costs are wrong.
The issue is one of context. If I have access to a ton of powerful shooting, thats one thing. If I have access to a ton of powerful CC or resiliency buffs, that's one thing. I have access to both, then I can leverage that to create something more powerful than either in their original context, building on synergy that otherwise may not exist. These things are not always straight conversions, and there is a reason different armies often pay different points for often very similar or identical things. Points costs do not, and cannot be expected to, cover that by themselves.
Vaktathi wrote: The issue is one of context. If I have access to a ton of powerful shooting, thats one thing. If I have access to a ton of powerful CC or resiliency buffs, that's one thing. I have access to both, then I can leverage that to create something more powerful than either in their original context, building on synergy that otherwise may not exist. These things are not always straight conversions, and there is a reason different armies often pay different points for often very similar or identical things. Points costs do not, and cannot be expected to, cover that by themselves.
I'm not buying that. Space Marines for example have access to both powerful melee and shooting units, and staggering selection of different units in general, so certainly they should be able to leverage this versatility and dominate? But that's not the case.
Yeah sorry but if the IG codex had anything similar to smash captains or Castellan knights you would see mono guard crushing tournaments.
Jesus on a pogo stick! It is because those units are OP and CP regeneration is OP. If Knights are flat out better than equal points worth of Astra Militarum superheavy tanks, then there is an issue with point somewhere!
No because knights need to be point for point better then similar options like baneblades or mono knight players will never have a chance of winning anything. Things like knights only become OP with the edition of soup. Just like BA need captains with better options then anything guard can bring or they will never win a game
BA should be better than IG in CC Knights should be bigger and meaner than anything IG can bring
What needs balancing is soup there needs to be a drawback of cherrypicking each codex
Scatterbikes weren't broken guys. It was those pesky Riptide Wings that made them LOOK overpowered.
Vaktathi wrote: The issue is one of context. If I have access to a ton of powerful shooting, thats one thing. If I have access to a ton of powerful CC or resiliency buffs, that's one thing. I have access to both, then I can leverage that to create something more powerful than either in their original context, building on synergy that otherwise may not exist. These things are not always straight conversions, and there is a reason different armies often pay different points for often very similar or identical things. Points costs do not, and cannot be expected to, cover that by themselves.
I'm not buying that. Space Marines for example have access to both powerful melee and shooting units, and staggering selection of different units in general, so certainly they should be able to leverage this versatility and dominate? But that's not the case.
There's all sorts of reasons why it may not be the case in any specific instance. Ideally that means they did a good job balancing the army. It may mean they borked a bunch of stuff and its underpowered. That said, there is lots of stuff SM's do not have. They do not have hordes or vast numbers. They do not have anything like a Flyrant, nor do they have heavy artillery like the Guard does, nor the same broad spectrum of powerful psychic buffs that Eldar do.
When you have the ability to pick and choose and mix-n-match from many armies, this issue becomes *dramatically* more pronounced.
Asmodios wrote: Those items do make them better than baneblades its why you see IG with Knights at all the top tables instead of baneblades
Knights are better than Baneblades in terms of raw point efficiency right now.
Wouldn't you prefer it if they were brought more in line with each other? If a mono-AM player could take a Baneblade or another super-heavy and not feel like he's gimping his own list? Not ignoring Vaktathi's point about broad equivalence.
The same can be said for AM Infantry, (or Smash Captains, or [insert flavour of the meta unit here]), it shouldn't be a no brainer choice because they are flat better than Conscripts, there should be a decision to be made. It also shouldn't be such a no brainer to put them in a soup list.
They are currently balanced though as your not taking designed play style into account.
The issue with making a knight and a baneblade/shadowsword point for point as efficient is that the mono knight player can now never win an objective based game.
Knights have no acess to objective secured. They need to kill everything as quickly as possible, they either table or loose.
If they aren't more damaging per point than codex's with obsec etc they have no way to win.
Ice_can wrote: They are currently balanced though as your not taking designed play style into account.
The issue with making a knight and a baneblade/shadowsword point for point as efficient is that the mono knight player can now never win an objective based game.
Knights have no acess to objective secured. They need to kill everything as quickly as possible, they either table or loose.
If they aren't more damaging per point than codex's with obsec etc they have no way to win.
Just wanted to point out the "objetive secured" is pointless in killpoint games. Therefore under your system, knights would be point for point better for no reason if you were playing killpoint based games.
They are currently balanced though as your not taking designed play style into account.
The designed playstyle that includes using allies?
The issue with making a knight and a baneblade/shadowsword point for point as efficient is that the mono knight player can now never win an objective based game.
Knights have no acess to objective secured. They need to kill everything as quickly as possible, they either table or loose.
If they aren't more damaging per point than codex's with obsec etc they have no way to win.
But what if the IG army is composed entierly of tanks? You can do that. It is the same issue.
They are currently balanced though as your not taking designed play style into account.
The designed playstyle that includes using allies?
The issue with making a knight and a baneblade/shadowsword point for point as efficient is that the mono knight player can now never win an objective based game.
Knights have no acess to objective secured. They need to kill everything as quickly as possible, they either table or loose.
If they aren't more damaging per point than codex's with obsec etc they have no way to win.
But what if the IG army is composed entierly of tanks? You can do that. It is the same issue.
Guard have the cover with Obsec Leman russes in spearheads (the one faction that gets obsec vehicals)
I still think the best way to go about balance is to have everything pointed in a vacuum. The points cost of a unit should be what it is worth, not what it is worth in relation to other things that just happen to exist in the codex. Space marines shouldn't have to pay extra points for having a wide selection of units, guard shouldn't have to pay extra points for melee units, and tyranids shouldn't have to pay extra points for shooting units etc. Having two units in two different codexes be the exactly the same, but pointed differently is utterly bonkers to me.
Sure this means that naturally certain combos become OP, but then you can nerf the SYNERGY between the two units that are causing the problem instead of nerfing the points cost of one unit and making it useless OUTSIDE of that synergy.
Ice_can wrote: They are currently balanced though as your not taking designed play style into account.
The issue with making a knight and a baneblade/shadowsword point for point as efficient is that the mono knight player can now never win an objective based game.
Knights have no acess to objective secured. They need to kill everything as quickly as possible, they either table or loose.
If they aren't more damaging per point than codex's with obsec etc they have no way to win.
Just wanted to point out the "objetive secured" is pointless in killpoint games. Therefore under your system, knights would be point for point better for no reason if you were playing killpoint based games.
Do people actually play matched play games for kill points as they are totally imbalanced as heck?
But the knight are more efficient at killing enemy superheavies much less efficient at removing 4ppm infantry squads. Strengths and weaknesses. One homogenized fest of blandness isn't going to be good
w1zard wrote: I still think the best way to go about balance is to have everything pointed in a vacuum. The points cost of a unit should be what it is worth, not what it is worth in relation to other things that just happen to exist in the codex. Space marines shouldn't have to pay extra points for having a wide selection of units, guard shouldn't have to pay extra points for melee units, and tyranids shouldn't have to pay extra points for shooting units etc. Having two units in two different codexes be the exactly the same, but pointed differently is utterly bonkers to me.
Sure this means that naturally certain combos become OP, but then you can nerf the SYNERGY between the two units that are causing the problem instead of nerfing the points cost of one unit and making it useless OUTSIDE of that synergy.
Yes, absolutely.
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Ice_can wrote: Guard have the cover with Obsec Leman russes in spearheads (the one faction that gets obsec vehicals)
True. I was originally talking about super-heavy tank company (or at least thinking about one as we were talking about Baneblades...)
Point is that not bringing objective holders is a choice. You can make a full Baneblade army or a full Knight army or you can bring some Skitarii for the Knights or Infantry Squads for Baneblades, and it is really not a different thing. Getting fixated on 'pure' factions is silly. Particularly silly in case of Knights as they were literally in the same book with Ad Mech still in this edition.
w1zard wrote: I still think the best way to go about balance is to have everything pointed in a vacuum. The points cost of a unit should be what it is worth, not what it is worth in relation to other things that just happen to exist in the codex. Space marines shouldn't have to pay extra points for having a wide selection of units, guard shouldn't have to pay extra points for melee units, and tyranids shouldn't have to pay extra points for shooting units etc. Having two units in two different codexes be the exactly the same, but pointed differently is utterly bonkers to me.
Sure this means that naturally certain combos become OP, but then you can nerf the SYNERGY between the two units that are causing the problem instead of nerfing the points cost of one unit and making it useless OUTSIDE of that synergy.
So how exactlly do you nerf the synergy between a psycher with -1 to hit and a superheavy tank vrs it being applied to a heavy eeapons squad?
Ice_can wrote: So how exactlly do you nerf the synergy between a psycher with -1 to hit and a superheavy tank vrs it being applied to a heavy eeapons squad?
Off the top of my head? A rule saying that psychic powers originating from non-LOW units cannot be applied to LOW units?
w1zard wrote: I still think the best way to go about balance is to have everything pointed in a vacuum. The points cost of a unit should be what it is worth, not what it is worth in relation to other things that just happen to exist in the codex. Space marines shouldn't have to pay extra points for having a wide selection of units, guard shouldn't have to pay extra points for melee units, and tyranids shouldn't have to pay extra points for shooting units etc. Having two units in two different codexes be the exactly the same, but pointed differently is utterly bonkers to me.
Sure this means that naturally certain combos become OP, but then you can nerf the SYNERGY between the two units that are causing the problem instead of nerfing the points cost of one unit and making it useless OUTSIDE of that synergy.
So how exactlly do you nerf the synergy between a psycher with -1 to hit and a superheavy tank vrs it being applied to a heavy eeapons squad?
You can restrict the targets of psychic powers. Maybe it works only on INFANTRY or BIKERS. Or specifically do not work on TITANIC units. Pretty easy. Assuming it would be a problem in the first place, of course.
Ice_can wrote: So how exactlly do you nerf the synergy between a psycher with -1 to hit and a superheavy tank vrs it being applied to a heavy eeapons squad?
Off the top of my head? A rule saying that psychic powers originating from non-LOW units cannot be applied to LOW units?
Or increased difficulty to cast for buffs that target units of X power level and higher.
Ice_can wrote: Guard have the cover with Obsec Leman russes in spearheads (the one faction that gets obsec vehicals)
True. I was originally talking about super-heavy tank company (or at least thinking about one as we were talking about Baneblades...)
Point is that not bringing objective holders is a choice. You can make a full Baneblade army or a full Knight army or you can bring some Skitarii for the Knights or Infantry Squads for Baneblades, and it is really not a different thing. Getting fixated on 'pure' factions is silly. Particularly silly in case of Knights as they were literally in the same book with Ad Mech still in this edition.
Why is pointing out that certain units as written in their codex are balanced. Players shouldn't be forced into bringing allies to play the codex they wont.
Soup being better than mono is a problem but not one you fix by balancing everything assuming maximum synergy or that every faction plays the same.
The obvious target as the the balance to Soup is just remove the battle firged CP if your Amy wide keyword is Imperium, Choas or Aldari.
It's common enough it captures all soups and gives souping a downside. However it still allows allies , just makes them have a downside that can be tuned
Vaktathi wrote: The issue is one of context. If I have access to a ton of powerful shooting, thats one thing. If I have access to a ton of powerful CC or resiliency buffs, that's one thing. I have access to both, then I can leverage that to create something more powerful than either in their original context, building on synergy that otherwise may not exist. These things are not always straight conversions, and there is a reason different armies often pay different points for often very similar or identical things. Points costs do not, and cannot be expected to, cover that by themselves.
I'm not buying that. Space Marines for example have access to both powerful melee and shooting units, and staggering selection of different units in general, so certainly they should be able to leverage this versatility and dominate? But that's not the case.
Space marines are very much hampered by only having 1 wound. That doesn't cut it in this edition for such expensive models/units. They die nearly as easily as guard lol especially when their weapons can kill a 2 wound model in one go. So the versatility kind of doesn't make them dominant. I mean they are bottom of middle tier.
Losing 3 while the obvious offenders farm many times that amount doesn't do much. Nerf the farming and feeding the elite allies far too many CPs and see where we end up.
Ice_can wrote: Why is pointing out that certain units as written in their codex are balanced. Players shouldn't be forced into bringing allies to play the codex they wont.
Some factions have only handful of units while some have over a hundred. There inevitably will be some situatuations where a faction with more options has a better tools for some specific situation. Insisting faction purity when factions are far from equal to begin with is futile. Knights and Ad Mech Combined have far fewer units than either Marines or Guard alone. Also 'Codex' is pretty arbitrary. Ad Mech and Knights used to be in the same codex. Also, wanting to play a tank company or pure Primaris army is ultimately similar choice than wanting to play pure Knight army, the player chooses to restrict themselves to certain units for thematic reasons.
The obvious target as the the balance to Soup is just remove the battle firged CP if your Amy wide keyword is Imperium, Choas or Aldari.
It's common enough it captures all soups and gives souping a downside. However it still allows allies , just makes them have a downside that can be tuned
That is definitely my favoured way to restrict soup, if we assume restrictions are necessary. CP regen needs to go though, or it doesn't matter. Furthermore, there probably should be some exceptions for minifactions like Inquisition or Assassins.
Space marines are very much hampered by only having 1 wound.
My marines have two wounds...
And I know marines are not good, that was kinda the point...
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Eldarain wrote: Losing 3 while the obvious offenders farm many times that amount doesn't do much. Nerf the farming and feeding the elite allies far too many CPs and see where we end up.
Yes. CP farming is the biggest offender. That's why I'd prefer if they would start by getting rid of it first, and only implement further soup nerfs if that doesn't cut it.
Ice_can wrote: Why is pointing out that certain units as written in their codex are balanced. Players shouldn't be forced into bringing allies to play the codex they wont.
Some factions have only handful of units while some have over a hundred. There inevitably will be some situatuations where a faction with more options has a better tools for some specific situation. Insisting faction purity when factions are far from equal to begin with is futile. Knights and Ad Mech Combined have far fewer units than either Marines or Guard alone. Also 'Codex' is pretty arbitrary. Ad Mech and Knights used to be in the same codex. Also, wanting to play a tank company or pure Primaris army is ultimately similar choice than wanting to play pure Knight army, the player chooses to restrict themselves to certain units for thematic reasons.
The obvious target as the the balance to Soup is just remove the battle firged CP if your Amy wide keyword is Imperium, Choas or Aldari.
It's common enough it captures all soups and gives souping a downside. However it still allows allies , just makes them have a downside that can be tuned
That is definitely my favoured way to restrict soup, if we assume restrictions are necessary. CP regen needs to go though, or it doesn't matter. Furthermore, there probably should be some exceptions for minifactions like Inquisition or Assassins.
Space marines are very much hampered by only having 1 wound.
My marines have two wounds...
And I know marines are not good, that was kinda the point...
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Eldarain wrote: Losing 3 while the obvious offenders farm many times that amount doesn't do much. Nerf the farming and feeding the elite allies far too many CPs and see where we end up.
Yes. CP farming is the biggest offender. That's why I'd prefer if they would start by getting rid of it first, and only implement further soup nerfs if that doesn't cut it.
My bad I didn't read the last bit of your sentence for some reason.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
For a newbie who plays Imperial Guard, can someone explain the problems to me? I've played 3 times, with a 1K guard list. 3 squads of guardsmen (each with a mortar team) and 3 LR tanks (plus a tank commander, psyker, and HQ commissar dude. Oh, and one basilisk too). In each game, the guardsmen are vaporized in the first turn or two. They literally do nothing. The tanks tear up the enemy. Each game, the guard has won. Once barely, it was pretty much a tie, and twice they tabled the enemy.
I reckon 1K is not the perfect sized game to get a feel for this, but are others finding that guardsmen are really good? Or is there some other aspect of playing guard that I just haven't picked up on yet?
Thanks in advance for helping this new kid out...
No, they're not arguing that your basic 4pt guardsman with a lasgun is too good. Or priced wrong for what he himself actually does. Not even if you give him a special/heavy weapon.
The problem they're going on about is the Command Points, how many you get per Detachment (see p242-p245 of the main rulebook), the fact that you can spend these Command Poins on any Stratagem your combined force has access to, and arguing about how to solve it.
1) "Armies" can be made up of multiple detachments. These don't have to be from the same codex. They don't have to be the same sizes of detachments either. All they have to do is contain the minimum squads for whatever size of whatever detachment is chosen. So you can make 1 detachment of IG. And another of Blood Angels. And another of Knights. And so on until you run out of points.
2) You'll note that each size of detachment tells you how many command points you get for taking it.
Of these, the Battalion detachment grants you the most command pts for the least investment: 2 HQ, & 3 troops. In this case that's 3 squads of basic IG (120 pts) + whatever 3 mortars & the 2 HQ units cost. I don't own a Guard codex yet, so lets just call it = 200 pts.
So 200 pts gets me access to +3 Command points.
Clearly their tournaments are running enough pts that 3 (or more?) Battalions are viable. 3 Battalions = +9 Command Points. These pts in turn get spent buffing up some already pretty awesome unit. Seems close combat oriented Blood Angel characters are the favorite (I don't own a BA codex either, but based on my knowledge of prior editions I have a very clear vision of the carnage....)
3) So you take some IG just for the extra Command pts. You give them mortars to make them useful. And then you park them way out of the way/just close enough to contest objectives & take pot shots at units out of sight. If you kill or plink a wound off something? Bonus! Doesn't matter - because they're only really there to provide those Command pts.
And apparently there's wargear you can invest in that allows your spent Command Points to replenish each turn.
4) Now you spend the rest of your pts on 2 more Battalion sized detachments (because you really want those +6 Command Points) of whatever the most effective/over-powered things you can access are. Don't forget to buy whatever bit of wargear those forces have to regain Command points!
These are the parts of your army that're going to go kill your opponent.
And you buff them up each turn with Stratagems paid for with those Command Points & annihilate someone as quickly as possible.
Ice_can wrote: Why is pointing out that certain units as written in their codex are balanced. Players shouldn't be forced into bringing allies to play the codex they wont.
Some factions have only handful of units while some have over a hundred. There inevitably will be some situatuations where a faction with more options has a better tools for some specific situation. Insisting faction purity when factions are far from equal to begin with is futile. Knights and Ad Mech Combined have far fewer units than either Marines or Guard alone. Also 'Codex' is pretty arbitrary. Ad Mech and Knights used to be in the same codex. Also, wanting to play a tank company or pure Primaris army is ultimately similar choice than wanting to play pure Knight army, the player chooses to restrict themselves to certain units for thematic reasons.
This is bollocks.
AdMech still has access to a limited selection of Knights from their book. They even had Armigers added via a free download/Forgebane and put out updated points for them.
Don't believe me? Look here and see for yourself.
You're also missing that the "faction purity" being insisted upon is you not being able to dump a Brigade of Guardsmen in to fuel up a Knightmare army. It's not a limiting factor on the Knights themselves, it's preventing you from abusing things.
The obvious target as the the balance to Soup is just remove the battle firged CP if your Amy wide keyword is Imperium, Choas or Aldari.
It's common enough it captures all soups and gives souping a downside. However it still allows allies , just makes them have a downside that can be tuned
That is definitely my favoured way to restrict soup, if we assume restrictions are necessary. CP regen needs to go though, or it doesn't matter. Furthermore, there probably should be some exceptions for minifactions like Inquisition or Assassins.
There is. Read the BRB on pg 245. They're called "AUXILIARY SUPPORT DETACHMENTS" and they can only include a single unit but remove a CP from your totals.
But nobody uses them, now do they?
Eldarain wrote: Losing 3 while the obvious offenders farm many times that amount doesn't do much. Nerf the farming and feeding the elite allies far too many CPs and see where we end up.
Yes. CP farming is the biggest offender. That's why I'd prefer if they would start by getting rid of it first, and only implement further soup nerfs if that doesn't cut it.
Then you're willingly blinding yourself to the issue. CP farming doesn't mean fethall to Guard outside of being ran as soup. Kurov's and Strategist only apply when you're actually burning Stratagems--I can't run Overlapping Fields of Fire enough to justify a Brigade+Kurov+Grand Strategist. I can't run Jury Rigging, Consolidate Squads, flipping Vortex Missiles and Fire on My Position enough to justify those last two. Not when a fluffy player playing pure Cadian Guard can get better mileage out of Laurels of Command and Superior Tactical Training.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
No thanks. Guard is fine as is. What the guard needs is horse cavalry and air cavalry.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: I was considering how to effect the Guard, without altering points, and I may have discovered an answer. What about:
1. Guard squads now have a ballistic skill of 5+, 4+ if no movement in last turn. Vet squads keep their 3+
2. Guard squads now need to have a commissar for every 3 squads. So you are forcing a point increase, but thematically it makes sense.
3. Scions get no changes, they cost a ton as is.
4. Every squad of Conscripts now requires a commissar, no matter the size.
This forces point increases, while maintaining lore and effectiveness. And btw, I rock guard, so these changes effect me. But still, I would be okay with these.
Thoughts?
No thanks. Guard is fine as is. What the guard needs is horse cavalry and air cavalry.
How about air horse cavalry? Rough Riders on Pegasus mounts.
Ice_can wrote: Why is pointing out that certain units as written in their codex are balanced. Players shouldn't be forced into bringing allies to play the codex they wont.
Some factions have only handful of units while some have over a hundred. There inevitably will be some situatuations where a faction with more options has a better tools for some specific situation. Insisting faction purity when factions are far from equal to begin with is futile. Knights and Ad Mech Combined have far fewer units than either Marines or Guard alone. Also 'Codex' is pretty arbitrary. Ad Mech and Knights used to be in the same codex. Also, wanting to play a tank company or pure Primaris army is ultimately similar choice than wanting to play pure Knight army, the player chooses to restrict themselves to certain units for thematic reasons.
This is bollocks.
AdMech still has access to a limited selection of Knights from their book. They even had Armigers added via a free download/Forgebane and put out updated points for them.
Don't believe me? Look here and see for yourself.
You're also missing that the "faction purity" being insisted upon is you not being able to dump a Brigade of Guardsmen in to fuel up a Knightmare army. It's not a limiting factor on the Knights themselves, it's preventing you from abusing things.
The obvious target as the the balance to Soup is just remove the battle firged CP if your Amy wide keyword is Imperium, Choas or Aldari.
It's common enough it captures all soups and gives souping a downside. However it still allows allies , just makes them have a downside that can be tuned
That is definitely my favoured way to restrict soup, if we assume restrictions are necessary. CP regen needs to go though, or it doesn't matter. Furthermore, there probably should be some exceptions for minifactions like Inquisition or Assassins.
There is. Read the BRB on pg 245. They're called "AUXILIARY SUPPORT DETACHMENTS" and they can only include a single unit but remove a CP from your totals.
But nobody uses them, now do they?
Eldarain wrote: Losing 3 while the obvious offenders farm many times that amount doesn't do much. Nerf the farming and feeding the elite allies far too many CPs and see where we end up.
Yes. CP farming is the biggest offender. That's why I'd prefer if they would start by getting rid of it first, and only implement further soup nerfs if that doesn't cut it.
Then you're willingly blinding yourself to the issue. CP farming doesn't mean fethall to Guard outside of being ran as soup. Kurov's and Strategist only apply when you're actually burning Stratagems--I can't run Overlapping Fields of Fire enough to justify a Brigade+Kurov+Grand Strategist. I can't run Jury Rigging, Consolidate Squads, flipping Vortex Missiles and Fire on My Position enough to justify those last two. Not when a fluffy player playing pure Cadian Guard can get better mileage out of Laurels of Command and Superior Tactical Training.
If Guard mono have no use for grand strategist and Kurov's why can't they just be banned from matched play?
Asmodios wrote: Those items do make them better than baneblades its why you see IG with Knights at all the top tables instead of baneblades
Knights are better than Baneblades in terms of raw point efficiency right now.
Wouldn't you prefer it if they were brought more in line with each other? If a mono-AM player could take a Baneblade or another super-heavy and not feel like he's gimping his own list? Not ignoring Vaktathi's point about broad equivalence.
The same can be said for AM Infantry, (or Smash Captains, or [insert flavour of the meta unit here]), it shouldn't be a no brainer choice because they are flat better than Conscripts, there should be a decision to be made. It also shouldn't be such a no brainer to put them in a soup list.
They are currently balanced though as your not taking designed play style into account.
The issue with making a knight and a baneblade/shadowsword point for point as efficient is that the mono knight player can now never win an objective based game.
Knights have no acess to objective secured. They need to kill everything as quickly as possible, they either table or loose.
If they aren't more damaging per point than codex's with obsec etc they have no way to win.
Isn't the fix for that to give Knights a unit that has objective secured rather than make them better than everyone else's super heavies by default?
Knights are clearly imbalanced compared to other super heavies - you can pick any one of them and Knights perform better. This is the definition of imbalanced.
Asmodios wrote: Those items do make them better than baneblades its why you see IG with Knights at all the top tables instead of baneblades
Knights are better than Baneblades in terms of raw point efficiency right now.
Wouldn't you prefer it if they were brought more in line with each other? If a mono-AM player could take a Baneblade or another super-heavy and not feel like he's gimping his own list? Not ignoring Vaktathi's point about broad equivalence.
The same can be said for AM Infantry, (or Smash Captains, or [insert flavour of the meta unit here]), it shouldn't be a no brainer choice because they are flat better than Conscripts, there should be a decision to be made. It also shouldn't be such a no brainer to put them in a soup list.
They are currently balanced though as your not taking designed play style into account.
The issue with making a knight and a baneblade/shadowsword point for point as efficient is that the mono knight player can now never win an objective based game.
Knights have no acess to objective secured. They need to kill everything as quickly as possible, they either table or loose.
If they aren't more damaging per point than codex's with obsec etc they have no way to win.
Isn't the fix for that to give Knights a unit that has objective secured rather than make them better than everyone else's super heavies by default?
Knights are clearly imbalanced compared to other super heavies - you can pick any one of them and Knights perform better. This is the definition of imbalanced.
Your equating balanced to the same.
Something can be better than something at one aspect of the game and weaker in another and still be balanced. It up to the players to leverage their strengths against their opponents weakness.
But why has a solving the guards insane CP generation once again be redirected into everything else is souo is OP without answering the question of why Guard are the constant enabler for imperial soup?
But why has a solving the guards insane CP generation once again be redirected into everything else is souo is OP without answering the question of why Guard are the constant enabler for imperial soup?
Because you seem to believe that people are ignoring issues when in reality they're trying to point out the crux of the matter and you don't like it?
But why has a solving the guards insane CP generation once again be redirected into everything else is souo is OP without answering the question of why Guard are the constant enabler for imperial soup?
Because you seem to believe that people are ignoring issues when in reality they're trying to point out the crux of the matter and you don't like it?
No I'm sticking to a scientific analysis method of correlation.
It's been IG+Custodes, IG plus Slamguinius, IG plus Slamguinius and Knight's as the top imperial soup armies for a long time now.
You dont see Custodes plus knight's, custodes plus Slamguinius or slamguinius plus knight's winning events.
Therfor the correlation is between IG plus X is the problem
Why is IG plus X always the best option, what is it that IG do that no other faction can match. CP generation at minimal points.
So if we remove guard's extremely cheap CP generation we can than see what the true soup vrs mono codex meta is.
However the choas and Aeldari Soup can be used to extrapolate what an non infinite CP meta looks like and it's still soupy, but a lot less cheesey.
What is something that can effect all soup lists with a single rule, the Battleforged 3CP (Ok you don't get those if your amy keyword is Aeldari, Choas or Imperium) a down side to soup that can be used to broadly balance soup vrs mono codex.
However that doesn't work if guard still have infinite CP for chump change points.
If Guard mono have no use for grand strategist and Kurov's why can't they just be banned from matched play?
Because there are mono-Guard builds that can theoretically make use of them, and why should their stuff be banned if nobody else's is?
So People playing fluff lists should take a beasting just so the one warlord trait and relic that should never have been given to Guard can stay. Yeah right god forbid guard loose the brokenness thats superchargeing Imperial Soup because it might effect the abillity of a guard Trip LOW army or LemanRuss spam army to use strategums. (But I though "guard strategums are and not worth spaming." If they are that poor what does it matter if you need to bring 180 points of Infantry, Thats less than many armies spend on an HQ choice.
No I'm sticking to a scientific analysis method of correlation.
You're really not. You're assuming that causation is correlation.
It's been IG+Custodes, IG plus Slamguinius, IG plus Slamguinius and Knight's as the top imperial soup armies for a long time now.
You dont see Custodes plus knight's, custodes plus Slamguinius or slamguinius plus knight's winning events.
Therfore the correlation is between IG plus X is the problem
Why is IG plus X always the best option, what is it that IG do that no other faction can match. CP generation at minimal points.
So if we remove guard's extremely cheap CP generation we can than see what the true soup vrs mono codex meta is.
However the choas and Aeldari Soup can be used to extrapolate what an non infinite CP meta looks like and it's still soupy, but a lot less cheesey.
What is something that can effect all soup lists with a single rule, the Battleforged 3CP (Ok you don't get those if your amy keyword is Aeldari, Choas or Imperium) a down side to soup that can be used to broadly balance soup vrs mono codex.
However that doesn't work if guard still have infinite CP for chump change points.
You're assuming that because people are saying soup is the problem that they're not acknowledging other parts. You're literally ignoring that myself and others have said in that the ability to take a large detachment of cheap troops is the core issue.
That's why I keep saying that Brigades & Battalions need to be locked out from the ability to be Allied in.
It's interesting that you seem to ignore that suggestion all the time while shouting that Guard players are "ignoring" the issue.
If Guard mono have no use for grand strategist and Kurov's why can't they just be banned from matched play?
Because there are mono-Guard builds that can theoretically make use of them, and why should their stuff be banned if nobody else's is?
So People playing fluff lists should take a beasting just so the one warlord trait and relic that should never have been given to Guard can stay. Yeah right god forbid guard loose the brokenness thats superchargeing Imperial Soup because it might effect the abillity of a guard Trip LOW army or LemanRuss spam army to use strategums. (But I though "guard strategums are and not worth spaming." If they are that poor what does it matter if you need to bring 180 points of Infantry, Thats less than many armies spend on an HQ choice.
Do you really think that a triple Baneblade or a Russ Spearhead are going to be lists that burn through a lot of stratagems?
It's been IG+Custodes, IG plus Slamguinius, IG plus Slamguinius and Knight's as the top imperial soup armies for a long time now.
You dont see Custodes plus knight's, custodes plus Slamguinius or slamguinius plus knight's winning events.
Therfore the correlation is between IG plus X is the problem
Why is IG plus X always the best option, what is it that IG do that no other faction can match. CP generation at minimal points.
So if we remove guard's extremely cheap CP generation we can than see what the true soup vrs mono codex meta is.
However the choas and Aeldari Soup can be used to extrapolate what an non infinite CP meta looks like and it's still soupy, but a lot less cheesey.
What is something that can effect all soup lists with a single rule, the Battleforged 3CP (Ok you don't get those if your amy keyword is Aeldari, Choas or Imperium) a down side to soup that can be used to broadly balance soup vrs mono codex.
However that doesn't work if guard still have infinite CP for chump change points.
You're assuming that because people are saying soup is the problem that they're not acknowledging other parts. You're literally ignoring that myself and others have said in that the ability to take a large detachment of cheap troops is the core issue.
That's why I keep saying that Brigades & Battalions need to be locked out from the ability to be Allied in.
It's interesting that you seem to ignore that suggestion all the time while shouting that Guard players are "ignoring" the issue.
A battalion of Custodes allied with another of SoB or Blood angles isn't a problem going by results and it's not like Top players haven't been searching those codex for the most broken combos.
Grand Strategists and Kurov's is broken. Even if you can't take a battalion there will still be a Company comander warlord with that combo in evey list as that combo is just that broken.
Your proposal to destroying allies to protect one codex from loosing 1 warlord trait and 1 Relic. While leaving soup as still a problem
Choas and Aeldari soups also arn't relying on Battalions of allies its an allied detachment of minimum points for Agents of Vect which you haven't affected with your battalion/brigade suggestions.
It doesn't affected Choas who run Thousand sons supreme comand as their allied detachment. You have however prevented a Korn player from being able to bring a Choas spacemarine battalion and a demon battalion
A battalion of Custodes allied with another of SoB or Blood angles isn't a problem going by results and it's not like Top players haven't been searching those codex for the most broken combos.
And why aren't those problems? Because two battalions isn't going to be enough CPs to make the Custodes and BA silliness work.
Grand Strategists and Kurov's is broken. Even if you can't take a battalion there will still be a Company comander warlord with that combo in evey list as that combo is just that broken.
If you can't take a Battalion or Brigade, you can't get the CPs to regenerate. How is this so hard for you?
Having a Patrol with a Company Commander and Kurov's Aquila and Grand Strategist grants you +0 CPs.
Your proposal to destroying allies to protect one codex from loosing 1 warlord trait and 1 Relic. While leaving soup as still a problem
I've also addressed this with the idea of making it so that outside of a purely Guard army, Guard characters cannot be your Warlord. But hey let's just pretend I've said nothing.
Choas and Aeldari soups also arn't relying on Battalions of allies its an allied detachment of minimum points for Agents of Vect which you haven't affected with your battalion/brigade suggestions.
It doesn't affected Choas who run Thousand sons supreme comand as their allied detachment. You have however prevented a Korn player from being able to bring a Choas spacemarine battalion and a demon battalion
Actually it does affect Chaos, because I quite literally have said that Spearhead, Outrider, Vanguard, Auxiliary Superheavy Detachment, Superheavy Detachments and Patrols would be the only allied detachments allowed. Fortification Networks are a given but Air Wing Detachments shouldn't be ally-accessible either.
I don't really care about Agents of Vect. It was supposed to be a way to mitigate soup, and it seems to do an okay job. Drukhari stuff is currently designed around smaller Detachments and low investments for multiple Allied Detachments in the same army. There's nothing to really be done against this without rejigging the book.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: You're still pulling the same mental gymnastics Eldar players did with their codex last edition.
You keep saying this.
It doesn't make it true.
I've outlined pretty well why I think the Battalions and Brigades should be removed from the running for what you can take as Allies. I've suggested a rule that prevents Grand Strategist from being present anywhere but a purely Guard army. I've suggested removing Mortars from Guard Infantry Squads to reduce their appeal.
Clearly, I'm as bad as the players who kept insisting that Scatbikes were "fine because Marines had Gladius/Skyhammer" and "blobsquads exist".
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: You're still pulling the same mental gymnastics Eldar players did with their codex last edition.
You keep saying this.
It doesn't make it true.
I've outlined pretty well why I think the Battalions and Brigades should be removed from the running for what you can take as Allies. I've suggested a rule that prevents Grand Strategist from being present anywhere but a purely Guard army. I've suggested removing Mortars from Guard Infantry Squads to reduce their appeal.
Clearly, I'm as bad as the players who kept insisting that Scatbikes were "fine because Marines had Gladius/Skyhammer" and "blobsquads exist".
Your suggestions would massively hurt completely nonproblematic ally builds. Your ideas are bad, please stop.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: You're still pulling the same mental gymnastics Eldar players did with their codex last edition.
You keep saying this.
It doesn't make it true.
I've outlined pretty well why I think the Battalions and Brigades should be removed from the running for what you can take as Allies. I've suggested a rule that prevents Grand Strategist from being present anywhere but a purely Guard army. I've suggested removing Mortars from Guard Infantry Squads to reduce their appeal.
Clearly, I'm as bad as the players who kept insisting that Scatbikes were "fine because Marines had Gladius/Skyhammer" and "blobsquads exist".
Your suggestions would massively hurt completely nonproblematic ally builds. Your ideas are bad, please stop.
And you've yet to show a "completely nonproblematic ally build" that would be significantly hurt. Your arguments are bad and the fact you've resorted to an ad hominem suggests you know it.
People keep pissing and moaning about Guard. People keep pissing and moaning about soup. But when push comes to shove, they always find something that they think justifies why "Guard should just be nerfed" instead of soup getting hit.
There's mechanisms in the fricking rulebook for corner case Allies like Inquisitors and Assassins. They impose penalties. They're called "Auxiliary Support Detachments". They give you a single unit and remove a Command Point from your pool. It's (shock! gasp!) a penalty for cherrypicking something that likely isn't from your book.
And you've yet to show a "completely nonproblematic ally build" that would be significantly hurt.
Any allied force which has about equal parts of different factions would be effectively banned. That is completely crazy. Joint crusade of SOB and Black Templars is not an issue.
Your arguments are bad and the fact you've resorted to an ad hominem suggests you know it.
No, I'm just tired of your nonsense. Your detachment of reality is nearing truly trumpian levels.
People keep pissing and moaning about Guard. People keep pissing and moaning about soup. But when push comes to shove, they always find something that they think justifies why "Guard should just be nerfed" instead of soup getting hit.
Yes, because Guard is the thing that contributes the most problematic element. And you yourself have said that mono guard doesn't need the CP regen, so getting rid of it should be a non issue.
There's mechanisms in the fricking rulebook for corner case Allies like Inquisitors and Assassins. They impose penalties. They're called "Auxiliary Support Detachments". They give you a single unit and remove a Command Point from your pool. It's (shock! gasp!) a penalty for cherrypicking something that likely isn't from your book.
Right. Because bringing a single Inquisitor or an Assassin is totally worth losing a CP, and that's why all the top lists do so... Wait, they don't.
The issue, the way I see it, is that a lot of people want Guard nerfed to hell and back. Removing Grand Strategist or making it the same as the other CP regen Warlord Traits, and removing or reworking Kurov's Aquila is fine. But the OP's suggestions... Not so much.
And you've yet to show a "completely nonproblematic ally build" that would be significantly hurt.
Any allied force which has about equal parts of different factions would be effectively banned. That is completely crazy. Joint crusade of SOB and Black Templars is not an issue.
Of course it's not an issue--but neither are Steel Legion lists packed with Chimeras for every Infantry Squad, Cadian Spearheads with Pask and a bunch of Russes,
One just has to look at the lists from the Nova thread to see the issue. Brigade(12 CPs) of Guard, obligatory Grand Strategist+Kurov's Aquila(usually Catachan), Battalion(5 CPs) of Blood Angels with 2x Captains and 3, and a House Raven Knight.
Seeing the problem yet?
Remove the ability for the Grand Strategist if there's a non-Guard character present, remove the ability for the Battalion and all of a sudden...that's a lot of those CPs disappearing.
Your arguments are bad and the fact you've resorted to an ad hominem suggests you know it.
No, I'm just tired of your nonsense. Your detachment of reality is nearing truly trumpian levels.
Then put me on ignore and stop trying to engage me. You've done nothing but try to play the "blame the Guard" game and even in that regard you're really doing nothing but trying to say that "Soup's fine, it's just YOUR army makes it OP so nerf YOUR army".
Nerf soup and CP generation, then figure out if there's actually a problem.
People keep pissing and moaning about Guard. People keep pissing and moaning about soup. But when push comes to shove, they always find something that they think justifies why "Guard should just be nerfed" instead of soup getting hit.
Yes, because Guard is the thing that contributes the most problematic element. And you yourself have said that mono guard doesn't need the CP regen, so getting rid of it should be a non issue.
Actually what contributes the most problematic element is that people can stack the deck by taking a Brigade and a Warlord as an 'auxiliary' element effectively to feed whatever beatstick they're bringing with Command Points.
There's mechanisms in the fricking rulebook for corner case Allies like Inquisitors and Assassins. They impose penalties. They're called "Auxiliary Support Detachments". They give you a single unit and remove a Command Point from your pool. It's (shock! gasp!) a penalty for cherrypicking something that likely isn't from your book.
Right. Because bringing a single Inquisitor or an Assassin is totally worth losing a CP, and that's why all the top lists do so... Wait, they don't.
That's kind of the point I'm making...?
GW's designers effectively live in a separate reality from tournament play. They wrote in mechanisms for things they almost definitely considered 'fluffy' like a single Inquisitor or Assassin or a unit of Custodes or whatever. They thought it would mandate a CP penalty of 1.
Tournament players, whose lists inevitably end up shaping oh everything,
Automatically Appended Next Post:
JNAProductions wrote: The issue, the way I see it, is that a lot of people want Guard nerfed to hell and back. Removing Grand Strategist or making it the same as the other CP regen Warlord Traits, and removing or reworking Kurov's Aquila is fine. But the OP's suggestions... Not so much.
This is actually the biggest reason why I've been pushing lately for the addition of a rule for the Guard and their characters. Making it so they 'defer' to any Astartes, Inquisition, Sororitas, or Mechanicus and thus can't be the Warlord would be a way of removing Grand Strategist from the Allies pool.
No because knights need to be point for point better then similar options like baneblades or mono knight players will never have a chance of winning anything.
So if someone wants to play a IG superheavy tank company, by your logic they should just be screwed? Points exist for a reason. They should be commensurate to the effectiveness of the unit regardless of the originating codex.
Things like knights only become OP with the edition of soup.
Knights were always meant to work with allies. They were recently in same codex with Ad Mech and in the last edition had combined formation with them!
This is typical of dakka.
Do you know that a Shadowsword can be hitting on 2s, rerolling, with a 2+ save and -1 to hit? Declaring Shadowswords have no synergy but Knights do is freaking bonkers. And these guys come with baked-in allies, because they're a part of imperial guard. So any CP nerf will not affect them.
Of course it's not an issue--but neither are Steel Legion lists packed with Chimeras for every Infantry Squad, Cadian Spearheads with Pask and a bunch of Russes,
One just has to look at the lists from the Nova thread to see the issue. Brigade(12 CPs) of Guard, obligatory Grand Strategist+Kurov's Aquila(usually Catachan), Battalion(5 CPs) of Blood Angels with 2x Captains and 3, and a House Raven Knight.
Seeing the problem yet?
YES!
Remove the ability for the Grand Strategist if there's a non-Guard character present, remove the ability for the Battalion and all of a sudden...that's a lot of those CPs disappearing.
Or just remove Grand Strategist+Kurov's Aquila and other CP regenerators. No need to restrict people choosing the warlord they want, and you've said mono guard doesn't need CP regen, so they're not hurt either.
And if you remove the ability to ally battalion or brigade, you're just effectively banned the SOB & BT crusade you just earlier conceded was not a problem.
That's kind of the point I'm making...?
GW's designers effectively live in a separate reality from tournament play. They wrote in mechanisms for things they almost definitely considered 'fluffy' like a single Inquisitor or Assassin or a unit of Custodes or whatever. They thought it would mandate a CP penalty of 1.
Tournament players, whose lists inevitably end up shaping oh everything,
I don't think that's the point of Auxiliary. It costs one CP because you can bring just one specific thing, without having to pay for other units in the detachment. Ally rules were fully intended to utilise all detachments.
Yes, because Guard is the thing that contributes the most problematic element. And you yourself have said that mono guard doesn't need the CP regen, so getting rid of it should be a non issue.
Actually what contributes the most problematic element is that people can stack the deck by taking a Brigade and a Warlord as an 'auxiliary' element effectively to feed whatever beatstick they're bringing with Command Points.
This is where the flaw is in that argument when that guard brigade is the largest detachment by points its not a Brigade and a warlord as an "auxiliary" element.
The Slamguinius Battalion and the Knight in a Super Heavy Auxiliary detachment are the auxiliaries.
It's a Guard primary force, all they will do it ditch the Blood angles for anoth guard battalion and keep the knight and pump CP into it.
Game is still broken.
Do you know that a Shadowsword can be hitting on 2s, rerolling, with a 2+ save and -1 to hit? Declaring Shadowswords have no synergy but Knights do is freaking bonkers. And these guys come with baked-in allies, because they're a part of imperial guard. So any CP nerf will not affect them.
We're going to break this down:
Shadowswords are a 4+ to hit, base. It degrades as it suffers wounds.
They have a special rule called "Shadowsword Targeters" where they can add 1 to any hit rolls for shooting attacks that target a model with the "TITANIC" keyword. That means things like other Baneblade chassis, Knights, Titans, Wraithknights, etc.
If they are a Cadian Shadowsword, then they can take advantage of the Cadian stratagem "Overlapping Fields of Fire". OFoF requires that the target suffer an unsaved wound during the Shooting phase, and after that happens--you can then add 1 to hit rolls when targeting that specific unit.
If they are Cadian and remain stationary then they can take advantage of "Born Soldiers"(reroll 1s to hit if the unit did not move during the preceding Movement phase) during Shooting.
Shadowswords have a 3+ save base. Their "2+ save" comes from using the "Take Cover!" stratagem on them, where you pay 1 CP when your opponent targets one of your units. Until the end of the phase, that specific unit gets to have +1 to its Cover Saves.
The "-1 to Hit" comes from Nightshroud, a 6 Warp Charge Value Psyker ability that requires you to field a Psyker...or from Smoke Launchers, which prevent you from shooting for that turn.
So to sum up:
They can get these things, but it requires specific things to be present. They're not just running around with these things all the time. It requires specific Regiments, timing, and outside elements.
Of course it's not an issue--but neither are Steel Legion lists packed with Chimeras for every Infantry Squad, Cadian Spearheads with Pask and a bunch of Russes,
One just has to look at the lists from the Nova thread to see the issue. Brigade(12 CPs) of Guard, obligatory Grand Strategist+Kurov's Aquila(usually Catachan), Battalion(5 CPs) of Blood Angels with 2x Captains and 3 units of Scouts, and a House Raven Knight.
Seeing the problem yet?
YES!
So you're just engaging in confirmation bias? Coolcoolcool.
The Captains tended to all have a CP Regen Relic as well, maybe BAs should get theirs nerfed too.
Remove the ability for the Grand Strategist if there's a non-Guard character present, remove the ability for the Battalion and all of a sudden...that's a lot of those CPs disappearing.
Or just remove Grand Strategist+Kurov's Aquila and other CP regenerators. No need to restrict people choosing the warlord they want, and you've said mono guard doesn't need CP regen, so they're not hurt either.
I said that most mono-Guard lists won't. There's a few builds I can think of that would get use out of it--but it tends to be more of an Open/Narrative Play thing.
"Fire On My Position" is a great example of this. I don't know anyone who runs it seriously, but it's a very fluffy & thematic. Same thing goes for Vortex Missile.
And if you remove the ability to ally battalion or brigade, you're just effectively banned the SOB & BT crusade you just earlier conceded was not a problem.
No, I've made it so that you have to do it all as one big mishmashed force(forfeiting your army traits) or you have to figure out a way to use Spearhead, Vanguard, Outrider, and Patrol Detachments.
It's almost like I've actually been playtesting these ideas...
That's kind of the point I'm making...?
GW's designers effectively live in a separate reality from tournament play. They wrote in mechanisms for things they almost definitely considered 'fluffy' like a single Inquisitor or Assassin or a unit of Custodes or whatever. They thought it would mandate a CP penalty of 1.
Tournament players, whose lists inevitably end up shaping oh everything,
I don't think that's the point of Auxiliary. It costs one CP because you can bring just one specific thing, without having to pay for other units in the detachment. Ally rules were fully intended to utilise all detachments.
So explain why you never tend to see players use the Auxiliaries?
Oh right. Because players focus on Command Point totals, not fluff.
Yes, because Guard is the thing that contributes the most problematic element. And you yourself have said that mono guard doesn't need the CP regen, so getting rid of it should be a non issue.
Actually what contributes the most problematic element is that people can stack the deck by taking a Brigade and a Warlord as an 'auxiliary' element effectively to feed whatever beatstick they're bringing with Command Points.
This is where the flaw is in that argument when that guard brigade is the largest detachment by points its not a Brigade and a warlord as an "auxiliary" element.
The Slamguinius Battalion and the Knight in a Super Heavy Auxiliary detachment are the auxiliaries.
It's a Guard primary force, all they will do it ditch the Blood angles for anoth guard battalion and keep the knight and pump CP into it.
Game is still broken.
I'd suggest you actually look at the point totals. I don't have Blood Angels or Knights books to go from, but the Guard side of things for most of those lists might have been numerically significant but pointswise it was as trimmed down as it could be.
Kanluwen wrote: Their "2+ save" comes from using the "Take Cover!" stratagem on them, where you pay 1 CP when your opponent targets one of your units. Until the end of the phase, that specific unit gets to have +1 to its Cover Saves.
Which is also illegal, as that stratagem was changed to only apply to infantry units.
Seriously, everyone shut up about ShadowSwords being OP. With a hell of a lot of wasted points you can give them +1 to hit. You can re-roll 1 failed shot, ONE. UNO. UN. UM. EINS. JEDEN. This thing can put out over 40 shots in a single turn. You get to re-roll 1. AT 4+. 3+ if you spend three hundred points on a friggin command salamander, which YOU CANT EVEN BUY ANYMORE.
There is no way to get this thing under 3+. So stop with all the Bullshoot about 2+ OMFGITZOPOMFGHAXER. It's a walking target that can't get past turn 3 in any sort of competitive game. Last of all, there are ZERO ZILCH NADA stratagems that go with this giant pile of dakka. You can play tricks with it's deployment, thats it.
IT IS IN NO WAY AS POWERFUL AS THE KNIGHTS THAT ARE STOMPING ALL OVER THE TOURNAMENTS RIGHT NOW.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: Seriously, everyone shut up about ShadowSwords being OP. With a hell of a lot of wasted points you can give them +1 to hit. You can re-roll 1 failed shot, ONE. UNO. UN. UM. EINS. JEDEN. This thing can put out over 40 shots in a single turn. You get to re-roll 1. AT 4+. 3+ if you spend three hundred points on a friggin command salamander, which YOU CANT EVEN BUY ANYMORE.
There is no way to get this thing under 3+. So stop with all the Bullshoot about 2+ OMFGITZOPOMFGHAXER. It's a walking target that can't get past turn 3 in any sort of competitive game. Last of all, there are ZERO ZILCH NADA stratagems that go with this giant pile of dakka. You can play tricks with it's deployment, thats it.
IT IS IN NO WAY AS POWERFUL AS THE KNIGHTS THAT ARE STOMPING ALL OVER THE TOURNAMENTS RIGHT NOW.
Read the units rules please
It hits anything with titanic on 3+ due to its inbuilt +1 targeters
Suffers no penalties for moving and shooting
Reroll's wounds on the volcano cannon base when wounding on 2+
-5AP so invulnerable saves only.
2D6 damage
If its vostrian it can have first born pride for 2+ to hit or the comand tank you mentioned
If it Tallarn it's outflanked so gets first shot.
For 92 pts it can rock a -1 to hit and +1 save.
To get to a 2+ requires the enemy unit to have the "Titanic" keyword and the Shadowsword to be given "Cadian" as its Regimental keyword, with a Stratagem played after something else inflicts an unsaved Wound to the target.
I can understand that yeah, you can have a Shadowsword with a 2+...but how many "Titanic" units are there really in the game outside of FW? Mortarion, Magnus, Lord of Skulls, Baneblades, Knights, Wraithknights, Stompas, and the Stormsurge.
So a Cadian Heavy Weapons Team/Squad or Leman Russes inflict an unsaved Wound to one of those things, you blow Overlapping Fields of Fire to ensure a 2+...is that really such a big deal?
Shadowswords are meant to be Titankillers. Is it so bad that they actually succeed in that role?
I'm all for the "Shadowsword Targeters" rule to only apply to the Volcano Cannon and to impose a negative to Hit modifier when firing at non-Vehicle or Monster targets.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: Seriously, everyone shut up about ShadowSwords being OP. With a hell of a lot of wasted points you can give them +1 to hit. You can re-roll 1 failed shot, ONE. UNO. UN. UM. EINS. JEDEN. This thing can put out over 40 shots in a single turn. You get to re-roll 1. AT 4+. 3+ if you spend three hundred points on a friggin command salamander, which YOU CANT EVEN BUY ANYMORE.
There is no way to get this thing under 3+. So stop with all the Bullshoot about 2+ OMFGITZOPOMFGHAXER. It's a walking target that can't get past turn 3 in any sort of competitive game. Last of all, there are ZERO ZILCH NADA stratagems that go with this giant pile of dakka. You can play tricks with it's deployment, thats it.
IT IS IN NO WAY AS POWERFUL AS THE KNIGHTS THAT ARE STOMPING ALL OVER THE TOURNAMENTS RIGHT NOW.
Read the units rules please
It hits anything with titanic on 3+ due to its inbuilt +1 targeters
It hits anything with Titanic on 3+ before it degrades. Once it degrades, it goes to 4s and 5s.
Suffers no penalties for moving and shooting
A lot of "Titanic" units have this rule. So what?
Reroll's wounds on the volcano cannon base when wounding on 2+
Rerolls Wounds on the Volcano Cannon when targeting Titanic units. If you're going to tell someone to read the unit's rules, at least make sure you copy them correctly.
-5AP so invulnerable saves only.
2D6 damage
If its vostrian it can have first born pride for 2+ to hit or the comand tank you mentioned
If it Tallarn it's outflanked so gets first shot.
For 92 pts it can rock a -1 to hit and +1 save.
The rest of this is just stating things. The Salamander Command Tank that he mentioned is a Forge World unit and no longer physically sold.
The Shadowsword can probably use a points increase, though is hardly a headliner of top table armies in 8E. The issues with Guard allies are just the most prominent facet of the larger issue of the Allies rules simply being far too open and permissive. You could drop KA and GS (and I honestly dont care if they do at this point, I can live with that) and we'd still see top tables be nothing but soup lists regardless of Imperial/Chaos/Xenos, albeit perhaps of a different flavor.
My biggest problem with Baneblades is not how killy they are (I won with my 3 lass predator agaisnt one full baneblade army...but to be honest, one of my predators survived agaisnt one round of shooting vs a Shadowsword, his shooting was abysmal. But even ignoring that, I had the other two predators out of LOS), but the fact that they are a beast in CC. Charging one Baneblade is a suicide, but if you don't charge him, he will charge you, and then it will hit you on 2+ with that stratagem.
In that same tournament, the last list I fought was another 3-baneblade list, and with that second one I didn't had that much luck. He destroyed one predator first turn, I failed miserably to do damage to him, and then he ran over me with 3 hellhounds and the baneblades, smashing everything in sight.
Because no matter how "weak" Imperial Guard seems on ITC tournaments (With a ton of rules that goes agaisnt their desired style of play), and compared with Soup, mono-guard has a ton of very powerfull lists.
If Shadowswords need a points increase then knights need nerfs across the board.
As a guard player, I am fine with losing Kurov's Aquila, Grand Strategist, or both. As long as they are replaced with something decent. CP regen is a really stupid mechanic that shouldn't be in the game.
The stupid game mechanic is when you can take three or four different allies to make some total cheesevall army list. Total cancer. How can you balance each faction and also try to keep them balanced as a soup list as well? If you want to play imperial guard then PLAY IMPERIAL GUARD.
w1zard wrote: If Shadowswords need a points increase then knights need nerfs across the board.
As a guard player, I am fine with losing Kurov's Aquila, Grand Strategist, or both. As long as they are replaced with something decent. CP regen is a really stupid mechanic that shouldn't be in the game.
I think most people want Knights to take a small hit. They were abysmal before the codex, but now they're just stupid good.
w1zard wrote: If Shadowswords need a points increase then knights need nerfs across the board.
As a guard player, I am fine with losing Kurov's Aquila, Grand Strategist, or both. As long as they are replaced with something decent. CP regen is a really stupid mechanic that shouldn't be in the game.
Some Imperial Knights need nerfs, yeah (Others need some buffs, but thats internal balance, it happens with every codex) . A 100% Imperial Knight force can have 12 CP. So, enough CP to do their stuff, even without an IG Battery.
I just wanted to point out how fast people loses perception of whats powerfull and what isn't when they stop being the top-dogs. Baneblades are VERY good (Ok, not all of them, but you know what I mean). They are inferior to Imperial Knights, ok, I understand that. But that does not make them any less good, compared with everything that isn't a Imperial Knight.
You only need to face a Baneblade list (And yeah, Imperial Guard for you. One list can have 3 baneblades, 3 Hellhounds, and a couple of Infantry Squads and some HQ like Straken) with a middle of the pack army to see how powerfull they are.
Imperial Guard are to 8th what Tau where to 7th. They are bullyes. Maybe they aren't powerfull enough to win tournaments by themselves and they are taken as soup (Just like Tau with Riptides), but outside those 2-3 tournament lists that are superior to them, they are capable of destroying, if they really want, any other faction.
And yeah yeah yeah I know warhammer changes from one place to another and I know how many Grey Knights players out there destroy all Imperial Guard lists they face.
Galas wrote: Imperial Guard are to 8th what Tau where to 7th. They are bullyes. Maybe they aren't powerfull enough to win tournaments by themselves and they are taken as soup (Just like Tau with Riptides), but outside those 2-3 tournament lists that are superior to them, they are capable of destroying, if they really want, any other faction.
If we are just assuming mono-codexes. Guard aren't even the top. I would argue that Eldar and posibly even DE are better than guard, though not by much. The problem is that those three codices are so much better than the others it's not even funny.
Eldar > Dark Eldar > Guard >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Mid tier codices like Tau and Tyranids >>>>>>>>>>>>> Low tier codices like Space Marines >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Grey Knights
If it were just one codex that were the outlier I would say fine, nerf it. However that isn't the case. There are at least two, arguably more codices that can compete with guard on a mono vs mono codex level. Nerfing guard because they happen to be one of the better mono-codices seems wrong, especially since mono-guard is not the problem, and soup guard is.
Eldar > Dark Eldar > Guard >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Mid tier codices like Tau and Tyranids >>>>>>>>>>>>> Low tier codices like Space Marines >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Grey Knights
If it were just one codex that were the outlier I would say fine, nerf it. However that isn't the case. There are at least two, arguably more codices that can compete with guard on a mono vs mono codex level. Nerfing guard because they happen to be one of the better mono-codices seems wrong, especially since mono-guard is not the problem, and soup guard is.
But certainly the proper response is to nerf the Guard and Eldar and buff the Marines, so that everybody ends up roughly on the mid tier?
Except that mono guard when taken to tournaments often finishes below tau and Tyranids in ranking. For instance, a top player brought mono guard to BAO and finished below tau. So why is the assumption always made that mono IG is above these other other factions with no real data to back up such a claim?
Asmodios wrote: Except that mono guard when taken to tournaments often finishes below tau and Tyranids in ranking. For instance, a top player brought mono guard to BAO and finished below tau. So why is the assumption always made that mono IG is above these other other factions with no real data to back up such a claim?
To be fair, mono guard is pretty rare. Brandon Grant was just one of the last top tier players to hold out playing mono guard.
The only things really holding mono guard back right now are:
1. Guard super heavy tanks lose to a Castellan with a 3++, and two lose if they go second since you can only outflank one of them.
2. Most guard shooting is hurt too much by eldar negative to hit stacking.
When you remove those elements, mono guard are very capable of being top teir, the current meta is just against parts of their toolbox.
Also, must people aren't going to play mono guard, or mono anything, in a game that allows allies. If there was something that forced people to use mono armies, I find it hard to believe that guard wouldn't be above anything other than negative to hit eldar, who counter them, and dark eldar's "everything is underpriced" codex. It's hard to tell though if you're only looking at mono guard lists in the wider allies meta.
Asmodios wrote: Except that mono guard when taken to tournaments often finishes below tau and Tyranids in ranking. For instance, a top player brought mono guard to BAO and finished below tau. So why is the assumption always made that mono IG is above these other other factions with no real data to back up such a claim?
You tell me why everyone allied in support for their Scatterbikes and you have your answer.
Asmodios wrote: Except that mono guard when taken to tournaments often finishes below tau and Tyranids in ranking. For instance, a top player brought mono guard to BAO and finished below tau. So why is the assumption always made that mono IG is above these other other factions with no real data to back up such a claim?
To be fair, mono guard is pretty rare. Brandon Grant was just one of the last top tier players to hold out playing mono guard.
The only things really holding mono guard back right now are:
1. Guard super heavy tanks lose to a Castellan with a 3++, and two lose if they go second since you can only outflank one of them.
2. Most guard shooting is hurt too much by eldar negative to hit stacking.
When you remove those elements, mono guard are very capable of being top teir, the current meta is just against parts of their toolbox.
Also, must people aren't going to play mono guard, or mono anything, in a game that allows allies. If there was something that forced people to use mono armies, I find it hard to believe that guard wouldn't be above anything other than negative to hit eldar, who counter them, and dark eldar's "everything is underpriced" codex. It's hard to tell though if you're only looking at mono guard lists in the wider allies meta.
Except lots of people play mono guard (myself included). All your comment shows is most people taking guard to a tournament include soup because mono guard isn't powerful enough to really push you up the rankings.
Regardless, all this really does is show that there's no actual data that mono guard will be trouncing what was said to be mid-tier codexes. People should stop posting this as undeniable fact until there is some sort of evidence to back it up. from the moment the conscript nerf hit there is no evidence to show that mono IG is anymore powerful then armies like TAU that people consider fair
Asmodios wrote: Except that mono guard when taken to tournaments often finishes below tau and Tyranids in ranking. For instance, a top player brought mono guard to BAO and finished below tau. So why is the assumption always made that mono IG is above these other other factions with no real data to back up such a claim?
To be fair, mono guard is pretty rare. Brandon Grant was just one of the last top tier players to hold out playing mono guard.
The only things really holding mono guard back right now are:
1. Guard super heavy tanks lose to a Castellan with a 3++, and two lose if they go second since you can only outflank one of them.
2. Most guard shooting is hurt too much by eldar negative to hit stacking.
When you remove those elements, mono guard are very capable of being top teir, the current meta is just against parts of their toolbox.
Also, must people aren't going to play mono guard, or mono anything, in a game that allows allies. If there was something that forced people to use mono armies, I find it hard to believe that guard wouldn't be above anything other than negative to hit eldar, who counter them, and dark eldar's "everything is underpriced" codex. It's hard to tell though if you're only looking at mono guard lists in the wider allies meta.
Except lots of people play mono guard (myself included). All your comment shows is most people taking guard to a tournament include soup because mono guard isn't powerful enough to really push you up the rankings.
Regardless, all this really does is show that there's no actual data that mono guard will be trouncing what was said to be mid-tier codexes. People should stop posting this as undeniable fact until there is some sort of evidence to back it up. from the moment the conscript nerf hit there is no evidence to show that mono IG is anymore powerful then armies like TAU that people consider fair
I will at least agree that I am in the camp of "let's fix soup so as to make it not insanely better than mono codex, then let's balance the mono codexes."
I guess it is a good for people with ok or good codex. The removal of soup, for people with bad books that used other codex as a way to have a minimal chance at winning, is going to be devastating. But I maybe wrong.
Karol wrote: I guess it is a good for people with ok or good codex. The removal of soup, for people with bad books that used other codex as a way to have a minimal chance at winning, is going to be devastating. But I maybe wrong.
It wouldn't be any more devastating than having a bad book is currently. But then it will also be easier to see where the problems are and how to fix them.
And I don't want soup removed, I just want it to not be the best option 100% of the time. I think this can be done by making soup worse, making mono better than it is now, or a combination.
I haven't tried it, but I think that a minimal army of GKs with some IG and either some BAs or custodes jetbikers would at worse work. And I don't think there is a way to make an army with the GK codex better, without writing a whole new codex and maybe adding some units on top of it, then playing a Soup.
Plus for anyone who had the money and actually bought the units to help their bad army it would imo be much worse then just having a bad army, Just by the virtue of the fact that you spend cash on a second, maybe even third codex, and the models to go with those. If you suddenly can't use them, it is much worse then just having a bad book and a bad army. I doubt there are many GK players around the world buying more GK stuff.
Karol wrote: I haven't tried it, but I think that a minimal army of GKs with some IG and either some BAs or custodes jetbikers would at worse work. And I don't think there is a way to make an army with the GK codex better, without writing a whole new codex and maybe adding some units on top of it, then playing a Soup.
Plus for anyone who had the money and actually bought the units to help their bad army it would imo be much worse then just having a bad army, Just by the virtue of the fact that you spend cash on a second, maybe even third codex, and the models to go with those. If you suddenly can't use them, it is much worse then just having a bad book and a bad army. I doubt there are many GK players around the world buying more GK stuff.
I don't think anyone is arguing that you shouldn't be able to soup (if people are it's very small). What most people want to see is some sort of drawback to souping and/or a buff to mono. Currently taking soup is the best option 100% of the time. Ideally, that person would be able to still use army x,y and z that they purchased it's just that bringing x,y and z together should be roughly equal to bringing any single army mono.
Karol wrote: I haven't tried it, but I think that a minimal army of GKs with some IG and either some BAs or custodes jetbikers would at worse work. And I don't think there is a way to make an army with the GK codex better, without writing a whole new codex and maybe adding some units on top of it, then playing a Soup.
Plus for anyone who had the money and actually bought the units to help their bad army it would imo be much worse then just having a bad army, Just by the virtue of the fact that you spend cash on a second, maybe even third codex, and the models to go with those. If you suddenly can't use them, it is much worse then just having a bad book and a bad army. I doubt there are many GK players around the world buying more GK stuff.
If I could snap my fingers and "fix" soup, it would be with the intention of making soup a good option, but not the only one. I see it going something like:
1. Balance CP so that pretty much all factions have similar access to CP, determined by the way they build their army. You shouldn't be picking a faction just because it means you'll have more CP.
There are likely a few ways to do this. I like the reverse CP generation idea where you start with X CP and then have to spend them on detachments, but there are plenty of other ways that this could be accomplished.
2. Give a substantial reward for lists with only one faction in them. Right now there is rarely a reason not to take at least one other book in order to access their strategems to get around the fact that you can only use each of yours once a phase. Having two or three sets of strats also let's you blow a lot of them on the first turn or so, which usually gets you an advantage mono armies can't get.
I'm not sure more CP is enough of a reward for being mono, but it might be. I'd just worry that factions with only a few good stràts would not really need more CP, and some allied lists might be overly starved.
I think the trickle per turn CP system where you get 3 or so CP a turn and they can roll over to the next turn might be a good solution to this problem, because although the allied force had access to more stratagems, they wouldn't be able to use them all at once.
Alternatively, a rule allowing mono armies to use their strats twice per phase instead of once would up their power and also let them double up on unit-stratagem combos like sternguard, etc.
Or, maybe you'd have to pick one list of strategems to use, and any allies you bring are just for what that unit can offer. Again there are plenty of solutions.
Fixing the problem of soup isn't going to fix bad armies. That has to be done in other ways. Marines of all kinds need a redesign. Points, strategems, abilities, and statlines all over the game need some tweaking. Soup is it's own problem, and each problem should be handled one at a time.
There are definitely some Stratagems where it makes sense for balance for it to be once per turn. However, certain ones not being able to be used multiple times is silly.
The best example? True Grit in the Space Wolves codex. If you use it on one squad, all the sudden everyone else can't do it. Granted if you used all the CP you had in one turn, suddenly EVERYONE forgets I guess. I dunno.
I'm sure there would be some that would be over powered.
One idea I had that would require a real revamp, is to have different levels of strategems.
Something like:
Level 1: use these as many times a turn as you want
Level 2: once per game turn
Level 3: once per game
I've also thought it would be cool if you had limited "slots" for stratagems, and could only use the ones you picked for those slots during the list building phase. Something like two level 3 strats, three level two, and four level 1. Then allies would be a way to build your deck, but you'd still be limited to a certain number of abilities.
Karol wrote: I haven't tried it, but I think that a minimal army of GKs with some IG and either some BAs or custodes jetbikers would at worse work. And I don't think there is a way to make an army with the GK codex better, without writing a whole new codex and maybe adding some units on top of it, then playing a Soup.
Plus for anyone who had the money and actually bought the units to help their bad army it would imo be much worse then just having a bad army, Just by the virtue of the fact that you spend cash on a second, maybe even third codex, and the models to go with those. If you suddenly can't use them, it is much worse then just having a bad book and a bad army. I doubt there are many GK players around the world buying more GK stuff.
I don't think anyone is arguing that you shouldn't be able to soup (if people are it's very small). What most people want to see is some sort of drawback to souping and/or a buff to mono. Currently taking soup is the best option 100% of the time. Ideally, that person would be able to still use army x,y and z that they purchased it's just that bringing x,y and z together should be roughly equal to bringing any single army mono.
You probablly right. Sometimes I wish GW just FAQ all armies to be bad, and then there would be no problems playing with it. Because it sure looks as if they aren't able to write good rules for most of their armies.
Probablly going to be some point hikes, CP spent only on detachments that generated the CP and some back door rules change for eldar to not be hurt too much, or soup without actually souping.
Crimson wrote: But certainly the proper response is to nerf the Guard and Eldar and buff the Marines, so that everybody ends up roughly on the mid tier?
Sure, you can go that route, but it means also nerfing mono-eldar, mono-DE and basically rebalancing all of the codices.
There is a difference between a "strong" codex and an "overpowered" one. I'm not sure the guard codex fits into the latter category.
Why don't we fix soup first (which is a much worse offender than mono-guard I think we agree), and then revisit mono-codices later when we can get a better picture. If guard need nerfs then I would be happy to listen to ideas.
Right now I think a good first step is to remove CP regenerators from the game and replace them with something decent. Maybe the next step is to look at how CP are distributed during the list-building stage.
Like craftwords player i can`t sympathize with the guard, when the reapers and warlock were nerfer to the ground, GM did`t give anything in return to the craftwords.
The min that have to be done is:
1. Guard min 20 per squad 45 points per 10 units.
2. All fractions to regain CP only on +6.
That is the starting point if guard spam don`t stop increase point to 5.
I feel like a lot of the proposed guard nerfs would just replace guard element with minimum skitari units alongside engineers repairing imperial knights at this point. all minimum 20 man squads does is ensure this happens. the elimination or extreme limiting of regen CP suggestions though are something that should 100% happen.
As for mono guard.. I am hoping it changes with my codex in orktober, but as an ork player it feel like even mono guard is something I cannot deal with, and then add soup to turn it to 11 and... yea. additionally if I bring any non tournament level list vs mono guard its an uphill battle, but then again it could be that my meta had guard players bringing shadow swords and a lot of leman russes which are both units in need of small adjustments. though Ironically my blue tide of nearly 100 tac marines beats them as they cannot put out that many wounds on 3+ armor, but tha tis more counter meta than anythign else.
I do think some guard stuff could use rebalancing though, some stronger, and some weaker. I do think guardsman due to orders and rules are worth 5 ppm. in the grand scheme of things it is not going to hurt mono guard that much, it would just make the other cheaper imperium factions seem like options IE mechanicum, guard, and evebn other guard options. on the buff side a tempestus scion should go down in points to closer to 8 ppm. Scions are just not worth 2.5 guardsman, but worth 1.6 guardsman if guard are 5ppm at that point both seem like viable options.
Lets by honest here. What drives change in the corporate world? Money. What drives money? People buying armies. GW makes WAAAAAAY too much money off guard players as opposed to other armies, to go messing with it, and making it so people DON'T buy guard armies. Just off models alone people spend 2-4x what they do on say, a Knight army, or a SM army. Guard makes GW money. They will never change how guard squads are made up, because they would need to radically alter how the boxed units are set up, thus increasing price, and driving down customers.
The only changes that will occur are rule/point changes. How much a guardsman costs, or how many CP a relic can regenerate before it pops.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: Lets by honest here. What drives change in the corporate world? Money. What drives money? People buying armies.
What drives people to buy armies? Meta change. The Knights codex, probably sold a tonne of knights to people as the meta shifted, and all the top players (and the wannabe top players, and the netlisters) all ran out to grab their new shiny knight to compete. And after the coming codex's, and CA, it'll shift again, and they'll all be out buying more stuff once someone figures out if what the latest and greatest flavor of cheese is.
But anyway, a fix to tone down the advantages of soup probably should come first, then worry about how well the guard is competing after it has to stand on its own a bit more.
Kcalehc wrote: What drives people to buy armies? Meta change. The Knights codex, probably sold a tonne of knights to people as the meta shifted, and all the top players (and the wannabe top players, and the netlisters) all ran out to grab their new shiny knight to compete. And after the coming codex's, and CA, it'll shift again, and they'll all be out buying more stuff once someone figures out if what the latest and greatest flavor of cheese is.
But anyway, a fix to tone down the advantages of soup probably should come first, then worry about how well the guard is competing after it has to stand on its own a bit more.
Guardsmen need to be 5 ppm. The maths has been done to death on this and we can see clearly that at 5 ppm Infantry are one of the most durable and damaging units in the game (still better than Fire Warriors). At 4 ppm Infantry are a joke. There isn't going to be any 4.5 ppm units, they will go up a point each, as they should.
In addition GW needs to fix soup so it isn't always the most attractive way to play.
Stop pretending we can't properly assess if an individual unit is too strong because of soup. We absolutely can and have. These units need nerfs to be brought in line with every other unit in the game.
Marin wrote:Like craftwords player i can`t sympathize with the guard, when the reapers and warlock were nerfer to the ground, GM did`t give anything in return to the craftwords.
The min that have to be done is:
1. Guard min 20 per squad 45 points per 10 units.
2. All fractions to regain CP only on +6.
That is the starting point if guard spam don`t stop increase point to 5.
All that will do is invalidate conscripts even more. Agree on the 6+ as a start however. Oh, and cry me a river your toys got nerfed. It's not like you have other viable options in your codex going on 4 editions now is it?
An Actual Englishman wrote:Guardsmen need to be 5 ppm. The maths has been done to death on this and we can see clearly that at 5 ppm Infantry are one of the most durable and damaging units in the game (still better than Fire Warriors). At 4 ppm Infantry are a joke. There isn't going to be any 4.5 ppm units, they will go up a point each, as they should.
In addition GW needs to fix soup so it isn't always the most attractive way to play.
Stop pretending we can't properly assess if an individual unit is too strong because of soup. We absolutely can and have. These units need nerfs to be brought in line with every other unit in the game.
You cannot judge a units effectiveness when it is mixed with allies - it needs to be in a mono faction to determine if it is or isn't requiring an adjustment. Soup can and will create synergy combos that make a unit such as guard infantry amazing, either as a support to the damage dealers or as a screen to the expensive stuff.
But, run them by themselves and suddenly they aren't all that great. I can't take anyone seriously that 10 infantry models are the most durable and damaging unit in the game. Unless people enjoy being 12" away to be FRFSRF constantly by multiple units. Hell, even the big tournaments show it - constant guard batteries in soup but nearly nothing of a mono guard getting into the high ranks.
You cannot nerf the guard as well as nerf soup. You stop them being the auto take in soup lists is enough. Nerfing infantry as well is just sour grapes IMHO.
An Actual Englishman wrote:Guardsmen need to be 5 ppm. The maths has been done to death on this and we can see clearly that at 5 ppm Infantry are one of the most durable and damaging units in the game (still better than Fire Warriors). At 4 ppm Infantry are a joke. There isn't going to be any 4.5 ppm units, they will go up a point each, as they should.
In addition GW needs to fix soup so it isn't always the most attractive way to play.
Stop pretending we can't properly assess if an individual unit is too strong because of soup. We absolutely can and have. These units need nerfs to be brought in line with every other unit in the game.
You cannot judge a units effectiveness when it is mixed with allies - it needs to be in a mono faction to determine if it is or isn't requiring an adjustment. Soup can and will create synergy combos that make a unit such as guard infantry amazing, either as a support to the damage dealers or as a screen to the expensive stuff.
But, run them by themselves and suddenly they aren't all that great. I can't take anyone seriously that 10 infantry models are the most durable and damaging unit in the game. Unless people enjoy being 12" away to be FRFSRF constantly by multiple units. Hell, even the big tournaments show it - constant guard batteries in soup but nearly nothing of a mono guard getting into the high ranks.
You cannot nerf the guard as well as nerf soup. You stop them being the auto take in soup lists is enough. Nerfing infantry as well is just sour grapes IMHO.
Judging IG Infantry against other similarly costed units they outperform all but GSCultists significantly. Not by a small amount. Significantly. As I said in my post above, they are mathematically better than Fire Warriors even when they are increased to 5ppm.
The synergies you've described exist both in a soup list and in a pure IG list. They can act as a support to damage dealers in IG lists, they can and do screen expensive stuff in IG lists. In those lists that are primarily guard or mono guard the synergies are, I would argue, even greater because they can then benefit from specific psychic powers and other defensive techniques that make them far superior than their cost would suggest.
No one runs them by themselves, not a pure IG player nor a soup player so that point is entirely moot. Also don't strawman, no one has ever said that 10 infantry models are the most durable and damaging unit in the game. They are simply the most points efficient unit in the game by a huge margin when compared to other units. You're also wrong re mono guard making the high ranks of tournaments, it has been stated already but at the BAO a Guard player was the second highest ranked mono list, the first list was Tau. Also as far as any Imperium lists are concerned in the competitive meta, "pure" anything lists don't really exist, particularly when we consider that there is absolutely no downside to souping.
In contrast to your statement, armies that are primarily Guard (ie - those that spend more points on a Guard detachment than any other) have been doing extremely well (read - too well) competitively for some time, here's how they placed in the ITC over the last few months;
August - most top 3 results in all ITC events (best faction) July - most top 3 results in all ITC events (best faction) June - 4th most top 3 results in all ITC events
May - 2nd most top 3 results in all ITC events
April - most top 3 results in all ITC events (best faction) March - 4th most top 3 results in all ITC events
They also feature in almost every Imperium soup list, even when they aren't the primary faction.
So I think it's pretty justified to nerf those units in the guard dex that are clearly outperforming their peers. The biggest culprit of this is, without question, Infantry squads. There are others that also need to be brought in line with everything else in the game.
I really wish people would stop defending something that is clearly too good. It's obvious through mathematics in a vacuum. It's obvious from real life experience. It's obvious from tournament results backing up all the theory. At this point it's blindingly obvious that certain units are not priced properly, yet whenever this is raised I see far more IG players defending their units rather than accepting the facts.
Mono Guard are not an issue, anyone who thinks they are either haven’t rolled enough dice and are keyboard warriors, or are just subpar players. Nerfing Guard further would just make them a bottom tier book.
The issue is Knights/Custodes/some SM builds spamming IG battalion detachments to purchase CP’s to use on their Knights/Shield Captains etc.
Cut out the middle man. Increase the points of a Shield Captain moderately and ad a rule which says “if this model is your Warlord and your entire army contains the Custodies keyword gain +5 CP”
Knights are trickier because I feel they’re meant to be run alongside other Imperium forces. I think increasing the CP cost of their juiciest stratagems is the answer. An army composed of towering Knights with IG platoons at its feet is fluffy enough to want to keep in the game, the power just needs to be turned down a notch.
If you want to shake up the top 10, a change to Guard CP abilities would do that. But other nerfs - even 5 or 6 ppm guardsmen - wouldn't have much of an impact.
If you want Tacs (outside Gman lists) really be a thing, or Silver Tide, or CWE troops holding their own, or some variation on that? Then you want 5ppm Guardsmen. It won't impact tournies, and it's possible that mono-Guard may actually need help after such a change (and/or non-Troops in those other books also need addressing). But it makes Guardsmen more "balanced" compared to other "tier-2"-balanced units.
However, if you rebalance Guardsmen to match other "tier-2" balanced units, you've now made them strictly worse than other "tier-1" units: Kabs, Fire Warriors, etc. Like above, the other units in those relevant dexes might even the battlefield.
I would bet 5ppm Guardsmen mono-IG armies would beat mono-Tau armies on average, but 4ppm Guardsmen mono-IG armies would be beat by mono-DE armies on average. 4ppm Guardsmen are clearly better than Tacs. 5ppm Guardsmen are clearly worse than Kabs.
People are looking for different things. A CP change is what's needed to fix what we saw at NOVA. But fixing NOVA and other GTs isn't the same as fixing the local FLGs.
People are looking for different things. A CP change is what's needed to fix what we saw at NOVA. But fixing NOVA and other GTs isn't the same as fixing the local FLGs.
In my experience, any "fixing the local FLGs" tends to be done more on a personal level than a technical level. Eventually the people bringing tournament lists either just can't find opponents and move out of that FLGs or get crushed in an event and cease playing or come back to the FLGs with much more toned down stuff, starting the cycle again.
Tournaments like Nova and the like? Whole different ballgame. They have their own missions, rules, etc--it makes balancing for them pointless.
That said, Command Point changes need to be done and hard. Drukhari and Imperial Knights have had things where they get bonuses for their 'signature' Detachments--that's a good way to look at this. But then the 3 limit for Detachments becomes an issue that again has to be addressed for tournaments that make up their own rules. I'm still a big fan of the idea of just not letting Guard characters be your Warlord. Between Kurov's and Grand Strategist it means you're getting CPs back when you OR your opponent do Stratagems which is where the issue comes up alongside the simple fact of Brigades/Battalions providing a good chunk.
3 CP for the generic strats from being battleforged
5 CP for a guard battalion only for guard strats and the generics
Guard are supposed to have a lot of CP, that's one of the niches in 8th. Lots of basic line infantry and officers, organized command, ect. If you restrict CP to factions then you fix the guard CP farm issue.
CA needs to also change all cp generation abilities to only work on a 6.
glados wrote: Mono Guard are not an issue, anyone who thinks they are either haven’t rolled enough dice and are keyboard warriors, or are just subpar players. Nerfing Guard further would just make them a bottom tier book.
A bottom tier book? You're joking right? I refer you to the list above showing primary Guard armies to be outperforming others consistently. Also no one has said it's "mono Guard". The problem is certain units in the Guard book, namely Infantry and Commanders.
Bharring wrote: If you want Tacs (outside Gman lists) really be a thing, or Silver Tide, or CWE troops holding their own, or some variation on that? Then you want 5ppm Guardsmen. It won't impact tournies, and it's possible that mono-Guard may actually need help after such a change (and/or non-Troops in those other books also need addressing). But it makes Guardsmen more "balanced" compared to other "tier-2"-balanced units.
However, if you rebalance Guardsmen to match other "tier-2" balanced units, you've now made them strictly worse than other "tier-1" units: Kabs, Fire Warriors, etc. Like above, the other units in those relevant dexes might even the battlefield.
I would bet 5ppm Guardsmen mono-IG armies would beat mono-Tau armies on average, but 4ppm Guardsmen mono-IG armies would be beat by mono-DE armies on average. 4ppm Guardsmen are clearly better than Tacs. 5ppm Guardsmen are clearly worse than Kabs.
There shouldn't be any "Tier 1' or 'Tier 2' units. If you consider Fire Warriors at their current points to be "Tier 1", I'll remind you that Infantry at 5ppm still outperform them. I'm not convinced 5ppm Infantry models are strictly worse than Kabs either, but if they are, Kabs also need to have a price change.
But do people don't see mono guard being played because it is bad, IMO it is not the case ? Or mono guard is not seen, because adding something like a ravellan or some custodes or slam cpts is just so vastly superior, that if you do own IG models you will just always go for soup?
I've said it before and I'll say it again utill proven otherwise. Meta chasers are not GW's core audience nor their biggest scource of income.
Pretty much all meta chasers I know use secondhand.
if you're gna rank mono lists, take only mono lists for your sample. Soup is inherently more powerfull unless counterbalanced. CWE are probably n°1 if you do but being ranked n°4 isn't bad either.
glados wrote: Mono Guard are not an issue, anyone who thinks they are either haven’t rolled enough dice and are keyboard warriors, or are just subpar players. Nerfing Guard further would just make them a bottom tier book.
A bottom tier book? You're joking right? I refer you to the list above showing primary Guard armies to be outperforming others consistently. Also no one has said it's "mono Guard". The problem is certain units in the Guard book, namely Infantry and Commanders.
Bharring wrote: If you want Tacs (outside Gman lists) really be a thing, or Silver Tide, or CWE troops holding their own, or some variation on that? Then you want 5ppm Guardsmen. It won't impact tournies, and it's possible that mono-Guard may actually need help after such a change (and/or non-Troops in those other books also need addressing). But it makes Guardsmen more "balanced" compared to other "tier-2"-balanced units.
However, if you rebalance Guardsmen to match other "tier-2" balanced units, you've now made them strictly worse than other "tier-1" units: Kabs, Fire Warriors, etc. Like above, the other units in those relevant dexes might even the battlefield.
I would bet 5ppm Guardsmen mono-IG armies would beat mono-Tau armies on average, but 4ppm Guardsmen mono-IG armies would be beat by mono-DE armies on average. 4ppm Guardsmen are clearly better than Tacs. 5ppm Guardsmen are clearly worse than Kabs.
There shouldn't be any "Tier 1' or 'Tier 2' units. If you consider Fire Warriors at their current points to be "Tier 1", I'll remind you that Infantry at 5ppm still outperform them. I'm not convinced 5ppm Infantry models are strictly worse than Kabs either, but if they are, Kabs also need to have a price change.
God, you sound bitter over guard. Anyone would think they are winning all the tournaments as a mono faction and people use them in soup because they must be super strong! /sarcasm.
Let's be real here, guardsmen aren't the issue. It's meta players using guard to gain silly amounts of CP for elite armies to spam the best meta units currently. An infantry squad isn't better than fire warriors or other infantry. They are a unit that require a 20pts babysitter (at the bare minimum) to give them a free gimmick that are situational and easily countered with careful play.
So that 40pts of guard become 60pts to have a once a turn gimmick. But let's just keep carping on about how guard are the imbalance because hyper competitive players found an exploit. Armies MUST be balanced by their mono faction standings in tournaments. Judging the army on soup effectiveness will unjustly punish the mono faction players.
The issue is infinite CP ability. Fix that, and suddenly you don't get 2+ blood angels captains or jetbike Shiel captains with all the bezels and whistles doing all the work.
I think guard players are confusing the need to fairly priced guardsmen as a desire to nerf their book.
Currently, the guard codex is not that viable competitively as a mono faction due to eldar's ability to stack -1 to -3 to hit. No one should want that. Eldar need nerfs, and/or a lot of shooty guard units need buffs. I think it's important to be aware this is the case.
The issue is that right now the only good thing about guard is that they have very cheap bodies. These bodies take up board space very well, are more durable than most other units for their points. They also have access to buffs that make them very dangerous in melee.
Guard players don't see these as an issue because they are really the only thing keeping their codex afloat. I think it's quite possible that if the only thing that changed was a nerf to guard, then there wouldn't be a competitive imperial list capable of taking in eldar consistantly. I think that's a very valid concern.
So although I do think that the infantry squad being somewhat objectively too good is an issue because of how automatic a choice they are for imperium armies, I think it's only one of many changes that need to take place to help better balance the game.
I guess my question to guard players is: "what other changes would you want to see for guard that would make up for an increase to basic guard being 5ppm?" For me, capping negatives to hit at -1 from an enemy source and -1 from yourself (like moving with a heavy weapon) would be a good change for guard. I'm also sure there are plenty of bad guard units that need points or rule changes.
jcd386 wrote: I guess my question to guard players is: "what other changes would you want to see for guard that would make up for an increase to basic guard being 5ppm?" For me, capping negatives to hit at -1 from an enemy source and -1 from yourself (like moving with a heavy weapon) would be a good change for guard. I'm also sure there are plenty of bad guard units that need points or rule changes.
Honestly it isn't much of a nerf, its just an odd obsession behalf of some players, being charged 30-60 points more for the infantry part of a 2000 point force is within the margin of I-forgot-a-few-bits-from-the army-at-home range.
All Guard players though have their hobby horses of units they would love to take but find underperform. Some are merely average compared to others, some sub-par, some don't fit into a logical force structure. My pet hate is Hydra and their lack of utility against fliers (on average 4 str7, -1sv, 2w hits if it doesn't move... I mean why can't they either do some real damage as currently wild weasel missions are silly easy for most fliers against it, or have a special rule giving the flier -1 to hit next turn because it is having to duck and weave...) but I would have to go for chimera - priced as light tanks they don't really perform and thematically having a battle bus that is more valuable than the infantry it is meant to deliver means the troops support it not the other way round. My solution would be to drop the toughness of all Chimera variants bar the hellhound by 1 (hellhounds are structurally reinforced for their close support job) and their BS to 5+, with a +1 to hit for the main weapon (as they aren't offensive units like Leman Russ and the secondary weapons are more close in defense weapons, well bar the Hellhound again) with any turreted weapon not getting -1 to hit for moving. You would then get a points drop to 60 points.
Chimeras are trash. Hydras are trash. Sentinels are beyond trash. Any hellhound variant besides the actual hellhound is trash. Rough riders are trash. Sanctioned psykers are trash. Ratlings are trash. Veterans are trash. Special weapon squads are trash. Company command squads are trash. Commissars are trash. Conscripts are beyond trash. Ogryn (not bullgryn) are trash. Creed is trash. Yarrick is trash. Vendettas are trash.
Basically any guard vehicle that's not a hellhound, a basilisk, or a manticore is pretty bad due to no invuln save.
There's a few gems in the guard codex, but I feel like a mono-guard army can't hold a candle to a lot of other mono armies. That's probably a bit hyperbolic.
But this forum is widely known for its seething hatred of imperial guard. Nothing new there.
ThePorcupine wrote: Chimeras are trash. Hydras are trash. Sentinels are beyond trash. Any hellhound variant besides the actual hellhound is trash. Rough riders are trash. Sanctioned psykers are trash. Ratlings are trash. Veterans are trash. Special weapon squads are trash. Company command squads are trash. Commissars are trash. Conscripts are beyond trash. Ogryn (not bullgryn) are trash. Creed is trash. Yarrick is trash. Vendettas are trash.
Basically any guard vehicle that's not a hellhound, a basilisk, or a manticore is pretty bad due to no invuln save.
There's a few gems in the guard codex, but I feel like a mono-guard army can't hold a candle to a lot of other mono armies. That's probably a bit hyperbolic.
But this forum is widely known for its seething hatred of imperial guard. Nothing new there.
And along with the point increase to the infantry squads, those under performing units should get point reductions. The codex need better internal balance.
ThePorcupine wrote: Chimeras are trash. Hydras are trash. Sentinels are beyond trash. Any hellhound variant besides the actual hellhound is trash. Rough riders are trash. Sanctioned psykers are trash. Ratlings are trash. Veterans are trash. Special weapon squads are trash. Company command squads are trash. Commissars are trash. Conscripts are beyond trash. Ogryn (not bullgryn) are trash. Creed is trash. Yarrick is trash. Vendettas are trash.
Basically any guard vehicle that's not a hellhound, a basilisk, or a manticore is pretty bad due to no invuln save.
There's a few gems in the guard codex, but I feel like a mono-guard army can't hold a candle to a lot of other mono armies. That's probably a bit hyperbolic.
But this forum is widely known for its seething hatred of imperial guard. Nothing new there.
And along with the point increase to the infantry squads, those under performing units should get point reductions. The codex need better internal balance.
I'd just like to temper the enthusiasm for more points reduction, by pointing out that a number of those "Trash" units are still better than the comparable units in a number of other codex's.
Sentinels are beyond trash.
? Really? Armoured ones bring little I feel but the scout ones are decent heavy weapons platforms for the price (35 points) and toughness (T5, W6, Sv4+) with good mobility (9" and strategems) and a very useful against some armies ability to push forward pre game. And of course are a cheap fast attack option.
Any hellhound variant besides the actual hellhound is trash.
Well -1 to hit when moving doesn't help the poor things.
Rough riders are trash.
I think you meant to write 'fun'.
Sanctioned psykers are trash.
And yet are a staple of many lists...
Ratlings are trash.
You really are a kill joy - do you think they should be able to conduct frontal assault? They are mean tto hide, shoot and scurry back to hiding.
Veterans are trash.
Can't comment as haven't used them.
Special weapon squads are trash.
Except when they are my catachan flamer squads, or a special weapon tastic loadout for a valkrie.
Company command squads are trash.
Oh fair enough, they only seem to turn up as a BS3+ anti tank squad or sniper squad.
Commissars are trash.
Don't seem to feel these any more sadly. Need their original rule back.
Conscripts are beyond trash.
Yes.
Ogryn (not bullgryn) are trash.
No they are just not needed as other units do the job as well as others. There is nothing wrong with them per say in isolation.
Yarrick is trash.
Nah - the old man is a solid unit and a nightmare for Ork armies, upping your firepower by 50%
I think a large part of the disagreement here is that we're really looking at multiple different armies. I would think that the vast, vast majority of casual players or even semi-competitive tournament players run mono-armies, or in this case, mono-IG. Then you have armies that are "Primary IG" or "Soup with IG," and those strike me as a whole different beast. Unfortunately with the current ally mechanics, I don't see any way that all three of those can be simultaneously balanced.
It's reasonable for a mono-IG player to look at all of this and be irritated or disgusted, as a lot of the nerfs that people are suggesting would really hammer those casual and semi-competitive mono-G lists. While the most common call for the nerfbat is the Infantry Squad, it's easy to find in this forum (General Discussion) people asking for nerfs to Infantry Squads, Company Commanders, Platoon Comanders, Hellhounds, Leman Russes, Basilisks, Manticores, Veterans, Conscripts, Scions, Heavy Weapons Squads, Bullgryns, Strakken, and Baneblades + variants, along with some warlord traits, Regimental tactics, stratagems, and heirlooms, and probably other things on top of those that I have missed. That is absurd.
Secondly, for the mono-IG players in casual, semi-competitive, or competitive environments, there is a very obvious hard counter to their army, and everyone knows it. The second you put IG up against an army with a good chunk of -1 to hit, the IG player's chances of getting smashed are drastically increased. That's not even to speak of those -1 penalties stacking against certain armies, where it is basically an auto-loss for IG.
So when people come into these forums over and over again and scream and cry for IG nerfs across the board because they just lost to a BA/Custodes/Knight + IG list, I think it's pretty reasonable for the mono-IG players to get defensive and double down. I play Space Marines primarily at the moment (Imperial Fists, specifically), and I understand that playing against IG can be very difficult. I've played against them at various points levels now (500-2000 points), at various levels of play, and I've won more than I've lost. They are not some unbeatable colossus, and the people treating them as such are the reason for so much irritation here. If you're actually interested in fixing some things, that's fine, but if you come in and scream "NERF NERF NERF!" you're going to hit a lot of resistance.
Yeah. I recognize that imperial soup lists are kind of a problem these days. It's knights smash captains and custodes with guard. Are the knights the problem? Maybe. But before knights were even out, smash captains and custodes with guard still dominated pretty hard. The common factor is guard. I recognize that.
But there are ways to remove this super soup without nerfing guard.
1. Make the guard stuff guard-specific. Have the grand strategist warlord trait only trigger when a guard stratagem (or command reroll) are used.
2. Make it a requirement that you can include 1 platoon commander for every 250 points in your list and 1 company commander for every 500 points.
Boom. You nerf CP regen for soup lists. You force soup to invest significantly more into guard if they want to bring guard commanders. And you do it all without nerfing mono-guard in the slightest, or doing really confusing several faction-specific CP pools nonsense. And it still feels very guard.
Here's how you get a 2+ save Shadowsword: Psychic Barrier, Warp Charge 6. Gives that tank a 2+ for a full turn.
Here's how you get that -1 to hit: Nightshroud, Warp Charge 6. Gives that tank a full -1 to hit against all shooting.
pretty funny that Kanluwen didn't know about the psychic powers that are available to him.
There's also that forgeworld tank that if parked 6" away from the shadowsword gives it full hit rerolls.
Why am i raising this?
Because Knights don't have this synergy. Saying that Knights are OP? Yeah, okay, they are, but so are these baneblade variants. A T8, 2+, -1 to hit is unkillable by quite a few armies. You park it on the table and your opponent literally has no choice but to play around it to win. Without the ITC format, you could flop this plastic schlong on the table and declare a win condition against Tyranids, Necrons, Genestealer Cults, Tau, Pure Dark Eldar, Pure Space Marines, etc.
It's also worth pointing out that Baneblade variants aren't turned off by assault in the same way knights must fall back to shoot.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Knights are probably THE vehicle that should be allowed to fire in combat.
Nothing should be able to fire like 30 heavy bolter shots into things that are base to base with it. That makes me sick to my stomach.
Sorry that's on top of its insane Knight level melee.
Thematically it makes more sense to fire at little dudes next to your feet than to imagine the Baneblade firing its weapons at a target that close though, yes?
I was talking strictly on that end. Knights obviously don't need help with melee haha
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Knights are probably THE vehicle that should be allowed to fire in combat.
Nothing should be able to fire like 30 heavy bolter shots into things that are base to base with it. That makes me sick to my stomach.
Sorry that's on top of its insane Knight level melee.
Thematically it makes more sense to fire at little dudes next to your feet than to imagine the Baneblade firing its weapons at a target that close though, yes?
I was talking strictly on that end. Knights obviously don't need help with melee haha
ThePorcupine wrote: Chimeras are trash. Hydras are trash. Sentinels are beyond trash. Any hellhound variant besides the actual hellhound is trash. Rough riders are trash. Sanctioned psykers are trash. Ratlings are trash. Veterans are trash. Special weapon squads are trash. Company command squads are trash. Commissars are trash. Conscripts are beyond trash. Ogryn (not bullgryn) are trash. Creed is trash. Yarrick is trash. Vendettas are trash.
Basically any guard vehicle that's not a hellhound, a basilisk, or a manticore is pretty bad due to no invuln save.
There's a few gems in the guard codex, but I feel like a mono-guard army can't hold a candle to a lot of other mono armies. That's probably a bit hyperbolic.
But this forum is widely known for its seething hatred of imperial guard. Nothing new there.
I'm not sure there is a wide seething hatred for the Guard on here, largely thats confined to a couple of posters. That said, yeah the interal balance of the Guard book is, as is tradition, awful, and half the army never sees the tabletop.
I really want to use my Chimeras. Unfortunately they've been absolute garbage for literally every single edition of this game except one (5th). 93pts for a typical ML/HB Chimera with a 4+BS is absurd, especially for transporting squads of T3 5+sv dudes who cost half what their ride does. If they were 70pts after kit, great, but at almost a hundred they sit on the shelf.
Marmatag wrote: Maybe trash relative to the Hellhound, which is balls-out awesomesauce.
It's like saying, "I have in my left hand this million dollars. In my other hand, i only have 200k :( My right hand needs money, buff right hand."
Have any recent tournament-winners, or even successful mono-Guard armies, used Chimeras? I've only seen them universally panned this edition, as they pay a premium to carry a squad of cheap cannon fodder while supplying a middling amount of firepower. Even regular Hellhounds aren't as popular/good as the Artemia-pattern.
I could see the Hellhound made a bit more expensive and the Chimera made a bit cheaper, but mostly I'm with Vaktathi here- nerfing Guard altogether is kind of overreaction to bad internal balance.
Edit: And to be clear, I would like to see soup heavily nerfed as a mechanic. Some games, like Warmachine, run on mixing and matching subfactions, but in 40K you have Imperial armies that can mix-and-match while xenos factions have no choice but to run a pure faction. It's just not possible to balance the game without making soup armies sufficiently disadvantageous that they're not the go-to.
Marmatag wrote: Because Knights don't have this synergy. Saying that Knights are OP? Yeah, okay, they are, but so are these baneblade variants. A T8, 2+, -1 to hit is unkillable by quite a few armies. You park it on the table and your opponent literally has no choice but to play around it to win. Without the ITC format, you could flop this plastic schlong on the table and declare a win condition against Tyranids, Necrons, Genestealer Cults, Tau, Pure Dark Eldar, Pure Space Marines, etc.
It's also worth pointing out that Baneblade variants aren't turned off by assault in the same way knights must fall back to shoot.
For real, dawg? Lets compare point costs and the firepower here.
Your stock baneblade (baneblade cannon, demolisher cannon, twin HB) with the two astropaths you'll need to give it 2+ armor and -1 to hit is = 504 points
Knight castellan w/2 twin siegebreakers, plasma decimator, volcano lance, 2 twin meltaguns, and 2 shieldbreaker missiles (the most popular variant, it seems), if my math is correct = 604 points
The baneblade, on average, hits 5.25 times with its main cannon that's S9 -3ap 3D, and once with the demolisher that's S10 -3ap d6D, and 3 times with its heavy bolter S5 -1ap 1D
The castellan, on average, hits 5.33 times with its siegebreakers that are S7 -1ap d3D, 4.67 hits with plasma decimator that's S8 -3ap 2D, 2.33 hits with volcano lance that's S14 -5ap 3d3D, 1.33 hits with shieldbreaker missile S10 -4ap d6D, and 2.67 hits with meltas S8 -4ap d6D
The firepower is in a different league entirely. It's about twice that of the baneblade. Just for funsies I'm gonna mathhammer these two things shooting at each other. And I'll even assume the guard got first turn and didn't fail their psychic tests to put on the 2+ armor and -1 to hit on the baneblade.
Baneblade shoots castellan (who immediately rotates shields for 3+ invuln). Baneblade cannon wounds 3.5 times, 1.17 shots get through invuln = 3.5 damage. If they started at long range, that would be it. If they're up close then demolisher wounds 0.66 times 0.22 get through invuln = 0.77 damage. heavy bolters = 0.33 damage. Total 4.6 damage.
Now the knight shoots back. It's still firing at full strength. 4 hits with siegebreakers = 0.89 damage. 3.5 hits with decimator = 1.75 wounds = 1.17 damage. 1.75 hits with lance = 9.36 damage. shieldbreaker = 1.94 damage. meltas = 2.91 damage. For a grand total of 16.27 wounds. About 3.5 times what the baneblade did to the knight.
And if the baneblade didn't get turn 1, may the emperor have mercy. Siegebreakers = 1.78 damage. Decimator = 3.89 damage. Lance = 12.42 damage. Shieldbreaker = 3.11 damage. Meltas = 4.67 damage. Total 25.87 damage (or about 5.6 times what a baneblade can do to a knight). In fact, on average rolls, a castellan can ONE SHOT a baneblade.
Lets go wild. Lets go shadowsword, the titan killer! 3 hits with volcano. 2.92 wounds. 0.97 get through invuln save. 6.81 damage.. Plus heavy bolters 0.33 damage for a total of 7.14 damage. Not even enough to bracket a knight.
Like... why would you bother if for 100 points more you can have firepower and survivability that utterly dwarfs the baneblade or any of its variants.
People don't need to bring Chimeras when they can bring Hellhounds. You can't make the case that a unit isn't used, so therefore it is bad, when there is an undercosted unit fulfilling the same general role.
Marmatag wrote: Maybe trash relative to the Hellhound, which is balls-out awesomesauce.
It's like saying, "I have in my left hand this million dollars. In my other hand, i only have 200k :( My right hand needs money, buff right hand."
Have any recent tournament-winners, or even successful mono-Guard armies, used Chimeras? I've only seen them universally panned this edition, as they pay a premium to carry a squad of cheap cannon fodder while supplying a middling amount of firepower. Even regular Hellhounds aren't as popular/good as the Artemia-pattern.
I could see the Hellhound made a bit more expensive and the Chimera made a bit cheaper, but mostly I'm with Vaktathi here- nerfing Guard altogether is kind of overreaction to bad internal balance.
Edit: And to be clear, I would like to see soup heavily nerfed as a mechanic. Some games, like Warmachine, run on mixing and matching subfactions, but in 40K you have Imperial armies that can mix-and-match while xenos factions have no choice but to run a pure faction. It's just not possible to balance the game without making soup armies sufficiently disadvantageous that they're not the go-to.
Chimeras are bad because GW overpriced all transports look at rhinos, devilfish, landraider even repulsives and its more tank than transport.
Mono nothing is winning GT's at this point, yet as has been pointed out time and again that guard have been a constant of all top imperial soup armies aince the codex dropped.
Marmatag wrote: Because Knights don't have this synergy. Saying that Knights are OP? Yeah, okay, they are, but so are these baneblade variants. A T8, 2+, -1 to hit is unkillable by quite a few armies. You park it on the table and your opponent literally has no choice but to play around it to win. Without the ITC format, you could flop this plastic schlong on the table and declare a win condition against Tyranids, Necrons, Genestealer Cults, Tau, Pure Dark Eldar, Pure Space Marines, etc.
It's also worth pointing out that Baneblade variants aren't turned off by assault in the same way knights must fall back to shoot.
For real, dawg? Lets compare point costs and the firepower here.
Your stock baneblade (baneblade cannon, demolisher cannon, twin HB) with the two astropaths you'll need to give it 2+ armor and -1 to hit is = 504 points
Knight castellan w/2 twin siegebreakers, plasma decimator, volcano lance, 2 twin meltaguns, and 2 shieldbreaker missiles (the most popular variant, it seems), if my math is correct = 604 points
The baneblade, on average, hits 5.25 times with its main cannon that's S9 -3ap 3D, and once with the demolisher that's S10 -3ap d6D, and 3 times with its heavy bolter S5 -1ap 1D
The castellan, on average, hits 5.33 times with its siegebreakers that are S7 -1ap d3D, 4.67 hits with plasma decimator that's S8 -3ap 2D, 2.33 hits with volcano lance that's S14 -5ap 3d3D, 1.33 hits with shieldbreaker missile S10 -4ap d6D, and 2.67 hits with meltas S8 -4ap d6D
The firepower is in a different league entirely. It's about twice that of the baneblade. Just for funsies I'm gonna mathhammer these two things shooting at each other. And I'll even assume the guard got first turn and didn't fail their psychic tests to put on the 2+ armor and -1 to hit on the baneblade.
Baneblade shoots castellan (who immediately rotates shields for 3+ invuln). Baneblade cannon wounds 3.5 times, 1.17 shots get through invuln = 3.5 damage. If they started at long range, that would be it. If they're up close then demolisher wounds 0.66 times 0.22 get through invuln = 0.77 damage. heavy bolters = 0.33 damage. Total 4.6 damage.
Now the knight shoots back. It's still firing at full strength. 4 hits with siegebreakers = 0.89 damage. 3.5 hits with decimator = 1.75 wounds = 1.17 damage. 1.75 hits with lance = 9.36 damage. shieldbreaker = 1.94 damage. meltas = 2.91 damage. For a grand total of 16.27 wounds. About 3.5 times what the baneblade did to the knight.
And if the baneblade didn't get turn 1, may the emperor have mercy. Siegebreakers = 1.78 damage. Decimator = 3.89 damage. Lance = 12.42 damage. Shieldbreaker = 3.11 damage. Meltas = 4.67 damage. Total 25.87 damage (or about 5.6 times what a baneblade can do to a knight). In fact, on average rolls, a castellan can ONE SHOT a baneblade.
Lets go wild. Lets go shadowsword, the titan killer! 3 hits with volcano. 2.92 wounds. 0.97 get through invuln save. 6.81 damage.. Plus heavy bolters 0.33 damage for a total of 7.14 damage. Not even enough to bracket a knight.
Like... why would you bother if for 100 points more you can have firepower and survivability that utterly dwarfs the baneblade or any of its variants.
How are you magically getting a 3++ rotate Ion is only +1 invulnerable save which is 5++ base.
You also left out the baneblades autocannon or sponsons.
I've lost knights to single shooting rounds from a baneblade or massed russes more than enough times to be able to say IGLoW are a threat to knights. Also the baneblade always gets to shoot first due to apple CP to send on outflanking etc.
Sentinels are beyond trash.
? Really? Armoured ones bring little I feel but the scout ones are decent heavy weapons platforms for the price (35 points) and toughness (T5, W6, Sv4+) with good mobility (9" and strategems) and a very useful against some armies ability to push forward pre game. And of course are a cheap fast attack option.
Any hellhound variant besides the actual hellhound is trash.
Well -1 to hit when moving doesn't help the poor things.
Rough riders are trash.
I think you meant to write 'fun'.
Sanctioned psykers are trash.
And yet are a staple of many lists...
Ratlings are trash.
You really are a kill joy - do you think they should be able to conduct frontal assault? They are mean tto hide, shoot and scurry back to hiding.
Veterans are trash.
Can't comment as haven't used them.
Special weapon squads are trash.
Except when they are my catachan flamer squads, or a special weapon tastic loadout for a valkrie.
Company command squads are trash.
Oh fair enough, they only seem to turn up as a BS3+ anti tank squad or sniper squad.
Commissars are trash.
Don't seem to feel these any more sadly. Need their original rule back.
Conscripts are beyond trash.
Yes.
Ogryn (not bullgryn) are trash.
No they are just not needed as other units do the job as well as others. There is nothing wrong with them per say in isolation.
Yarrick is trash.
Nah - the old man is a solid unit and a nightmare for Ork armies, upping your firepower by 50%
Sentinels are bad because they're a fast scouting unit that still hits on 5's while moving. Heavy Flamer Catachan ones are ok.
Hellhounds - Basically, the base hellhound is pretty solid, esp as catachans.
Psykers - If he meant the squad of psykers then yeh they're bad. The Primaris and Astropath are both quite good if you have any individual unit you care about. Pask, A baneblade variant, etc. Toss -1 to hit on them. Even a regular tank commander can be worth it.
Rough Riders - they're kind of neat and can fill a role as a distraction unit. Definitely not competitive.
Ratlings - Haven't used them
Vets - Pretty bad now that they aren't troops. I wouldn't say "trash" but not good. You can take scions as troops instead.
Special Weapons Squads - bad in general but have some niche applications. Too many eggs in one basket, and it's a super fragile basket. Transports to protect them are way too expensive. After a Chimera and the SWS itself you could just take a leman russ. Where they have some value is in reserve. Take the relic dagger on a platoon officer and outflank a melta SWS and pop up turn 2 or 3 near a target and reroll 1's to hit. If you're running Tallarns send 2 SWSs and a squad of hellhounds outflanking.
Conscripts - *sigh* All GW had to do was make it so that orders and commissars didn't work on them and then leave them at 3ppm. The old Commissar rule was perfectly fine for every unit in the army except conscripts. If they had just nerfed conscripts like that then they would still serve a purpose as a blob to swarm objectives and be good at it.
Edit: I've actually had a little success with SWSs with grenades. They're low profile enough to not draw lots of fire, they're cheap, and they add in some decent anti infantry.
Dr. Mills wrote: God, you sound bitter over guard. Anyone would think they are winning all the tournaments as a mono faction and people use them in soup because they must be super strong! /sarcasm.
Let's be real here, guardsmen aren't the issue. It's meta players using guard to gain silly amounts of CP for elite armies to spam the best meta units currently. An infantry squad isn't better than fire warriors or other infantry. They are a unit that require a 20pts babysitter (at the bare minimum) to give them a free gimmick that are situational and easily countered with careful play.
So that 40pts of guard become 60pts to have a once a turn gimmick. But let's just keep carping on about how guard are the imbalance because hyper competitive players found an exploit. Armies MUST be balanced by their mono faction standings in tournaments. Judging the army on soup effectiveness will unjustly punish the mono faction players.
The issue is infinite CP ability. Fix that, and suddenly you don't get 2+ blood angels captains or jetbike Shiel captains with all the bezels and whistles doing all the work.
I'm not sure you understand the meaning of sarcasm.
20 - 60 pts extra might not sound like much to you. But in the context of "suddenly I can't take x" it can have a massive impact. Infantry outperform other, similarly priced units. Either those units they outperform are buffed, or Infantry are nerfed. Since most units are in the same ball park, it makes sense to nerf Infantry rather than buff a ton of other units.
An Actual Englishman wrote: Also no one has said it's "mono Guard". The problem is certain units in the Guard book, namely Infantry and Commanders.
Because being charged 50 points more for a typical guard army will bring them back into line... Or of course make zero difference.
That's a nice story. Perhaps it will make a difference though? Perhaps you can't take a battalion as easily because you can't take all those mortars? Perhaps you have to drop another key piece of wargear.
Regardless, perhaps it just makes sense that Infantry are priced properly? Of course if 5ppm is too little, they could be increased to 6, if you feel that would be better for the game.
ThePorcupine wrote: *checks codex* Ah. Shoot. Baneblades do come with one autocannon. Sorry. Missed that.
As for how I get 3++, it's the wardlord trait Ion Bulwark to give em 4++ base. And you can have two warlords for only 1 CP using Exalted Court.
While you can use the warlord trait you didn't state that you where including that.
Also banblades take sponsons and regiment traits.
Castellans are undercosted by probably 50 points but in a pure knights list they get 1 turn of rotating ions maybe 2.
Giving your knight a 4++ base for 1CP for the rest of the battle is a no brainer. It will always be on there. As for regimental traits and sponsons, do you really want sponsons on that thing? If you do, your regiment would probably be tallarn to outflank it and keep it safe for 1 turn.
If you want to take 4 lascannon sponsons on your tank, you can add 1.56 to the average damage output vs a knight. I don't think it makes a big difference.
Your math on the Shadowsword seems to forget that they get +1 to hit against Titanic units. And if it's cadian it gets reroll ones to hit and potentially another +1 to hit for 2CP with the stratagem. If it's vostroyan it can get a +1 to hit for just 1 CP. And since the knight is assumed to use CPs...
Marmatag wrote: People don't need to bring Chimeras when they can bring Hellhounds. You can't make the case that a unit isn't used, so therefore it is bad, when there is an undercosted unit fulfilling the same general role.
So, Hellhound aside, whats particularly functional about a Chimera at its current pricepoint?
It's rolling in at almost a hundred points to carry a squad that costs almost half as much, while putting out a pathetic amount of firepower, which is not terribly confidence inspirng. A classic ML/HB Chimera at 93pts is killing a whopping 0.55 MEQ's or 1 GEQ on the move. A Rhino, which I also think is slightly overcosted, sporting double stormbolters at 74pts, is killing 0.66 MEQ's a turn (albeit with a bit less range) on the move. That gives us 169pts per wound for the Chimera and 109pts per wound for the Rhino.
The Chimera is objectively overcosted for its role and firepower output, Hellhounds have no bearing on that.
Marmatag wrote: People don't need to bring Chimeras when they can bring Hellhounds. You can't make the case that a unit isn't used, so therefore it is bad, when there is an undercosted unit fulfilling the same general role.
So, Hellhound aside, whats particularly functional about a Chimera at its current pricepoint?
It's rolling in at almost a hundred points to carry a squad that costs almost half as much, while putting out a pathetic amount of firepower, which is not terribly confidence inspirng. A classic ML/HB Chimera at 93pts is killing a whopping 0.55 MEQ's or 1 GEQ on the move. A Rhino, which I also think is slightly overcosted, sporting double stormbolters at 74pts, is killing 0.66 MEQ's a turn (albeit with a bit less range) on the move. That gives us 169pts per wound for the Chimera and 109pts per wound for the Rhino.
The Chimera is objectively overcosted for its role and firepower output, Hellhounds have no bearing on that.
The heavy weapon penalty really hurts guard vehicles. Russes, hellhounds and baneblades ignore it and are unsurprisingly the most popular choices. Well, artillery doesn't need to move so add them as well.
RIP sentinels and chimera. Especially plasma sentinels. Which is a shame since they look pretty cool.
Marmatag wrote: People don't need to bring Chimeras when they can bring Hellhounds. You can't make the case that a unit isn't used, so therefore it is bad, when there is an undercosted unit fulfilling the same general role.
So, Hellhound aside, whats particularly functional about a Chimera at its current pricepoint?
It's rolling in at almost a hundred points to carry a squad that costs almost half as much, while putting out a pathetic amount of firepower, which is not terribly confidence inspirng. A classic ML/HB Chimera at 93pts is killing a whopping 0.55 MEQ's or 1 GEQ on the move. A Rhino, which I also think is slightly overcosted, sporting double stormbolters at 74pts, is killing 0.66 MEQ's a turn (albeit with a bit less range) on the move. That gives us 169pts per wound for the Chimera and 109pts per wound for the Rhino.
The Chimera is objectively overcosted for its role and firepower output, Hellhounds have no bearing on that.
The heavy weapon penalty really hurts guard vehicles. Russes, hellhounds and baneblades ignore it and are unsurprisingly the most popular choices. Well, artillery doesn't need to move so add them as well.
RIP sentinels and chimera. Especially plasma sentinels. Which is a shame since they look pretty cool.
I think GW really missed the mark by not having all <Tank> units ignore the penalty to move with heavy weapons. Negatives to hit are so incredibly punishing for BS4+ guard (they lose 33% of their hits) that it really changes how their weapons work. Space Marines at BS3+ are hurt by this as well, though not quite as much (they lose 25% of their hits).
It's silly that dark eldar vehicles can move and shoot their heavy weapons as well as get all of the bonuses of <fly> while imperium vehicles are generally terrible at everything.
ThePorcupine wrote: Chimeras are trash. Hydras are trash. Sentinels are beyond trash. Any hellhound variant besides the actual hellhound is trash. Rough riders are trash. Sanctioned psykers are trash. Ratlings are trash. Veterans are trash. Special weapon squads are trash. Company command squads are trash. Commissars are trash. Conscripts are beyond trash. Ogryn (not bullgryn) are trash. Creed is trash. Yarrick is trash. Vendettas are trash.
Basically any guard vehicle that's not a hellhound, a basilisk, or a manticore is pretty bad due to no invuln save.
There's a few gems in the guard codex, but I feel like a mono-guard army can't hold a candle to a lot of other mono armies. That's probably a bit hyperbolic.
But this forum is widely known for its seething hatred of imperial guard. Nothing new there.
I'm not sure there is a wide seething hatred for the Guard on here, largely thats confined to a couple of posters. That said, yeah the interal balance of the Guard book is, as is tradition, awful, and half the army never sees the tabletop.
I really want to use my Chimeras. Unfortunately they've been absolute garbage for literally every single edition of this game except one (5th). 93pts for a typical ML/HB Chimera with a 4+BS is absurd, especially for transporting squads of T3 5+sv dudes who cost half what their ride does. If they were 70pts after kit, great, but at almost a hundred they sit on the shelf.
Most of the armies have half of the units not played, that does not mean guards should not be nerfed. Currently guards are swish army knife and that make them to strong in competative and about local community probably everything is viable there.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Exactly. That would've been the equivalent of saying to not nerf Scatterbikes simply because Banshees were garbage.
You keep going to the well of Scatterbikes, and it's important to note that Scatterbikes weren't making it so that Wraithknights could utilize some ability that cost them a finite resource.
I don't believe I said that problem stuff shouldn't be nerfed, I only agreed with the assesment that the Guard book is filled with it's own fair share of garbage, that the Chimera's issues are it's own and not because it's outshone by other units like the Hellhound, and that the Guard-specific hate isn't a widespread thing on the board.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Exactly. That would've been the equivalent of saying to not nerf Scatterbikes simply because Banshees were garbage.
You keep going to the well of Scatterbikes, and it's important to note that Scatterbikes weren't making it so that Wraithknights could utilize some ability that cost them a finite resource.
Scatterbikes were just super optimized.
Math already proved Infantry are optimized against a range of targets, like Scatrerbikes, and you keep blaming the CP.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Exactly. That would've been the equivalent of saying to not nerf Scatterbikes simply because Banshees were garbage.
You keep going to the well of Scatterbikes, and it's important to note that Scatterbikes weren't making it so that Wraithknights could utilize some ability that cost them a finite resource.
Scatterbikes were just super optimized.
Math already proved Infantry are optimized against a range of targets, like Scatrerbikes, and you keep blaming the CP.
The "math" keeps being done in such ridiculous ways that it would be impossible for it to not prove that.
I'm going to keep blaming CP until we stop seeing Guard taken as part of soup. End. Of. Story. We're not seeing mono-Guard dominating tournaments. We're seeing SOUP, predicated upon using the Guard as batteries, dominating those tournaments.
You're arguing that the two things are the same, while ignoring that there's another factor at play.
Guard aren't a problem and haven't been for about a year. The problem is greedy space marine players who will try to take anything nice the guard finally has and keep it for themselves.
These people got a primarch back and they're still not happy! They get a whole new line of models and do nothing but complain.
Sadly entitled space marine players won't be happy until guard are nerfed back to last edition levels, and they're given free razorbacks again. Its sad to see for narrative reasons, but restricting them to mono-faction lists would remove any temptation to ruin the game for the rest of us.
Kanluwen wrote: We're not seeing mono-Guard dominating tournaments.
Which is not super relevant tbh. Tau weren't dominating tourneys either but commanders got very specifically targeted... something to do with them being op, while the other options sucked. Funnily enough, nerfing the problem unit and buffing the weak units (i.e. everything but drones) pushed tau up rather than down...
But let's say Guardsmen go up in price, while certain other options go down. It could theoretically cancel out in mixed/balanced armies while punishing people who only take infantry *cough* soup *cough*. Then people could take their appropriately costed chimeras for a change. Heck, if chimeras dropped 20-30 pts, armored fist squads would even come out cheaper!
Now, I am under no illusion that this will stop CP farms, but from my experience Guardsmen are worth 5 pts relative to most things. Whether it happens before or after soup restrictions is largely irrelevant to me.
The "math" keeps being done in such ridiculous ways that it would be impossible for it to not prove that.
Would you mind providing a scenario that would be acceptable to you?
After playing in a tournament yesterday and facing an endless guard army with Smash Captains I have to agree with some posters that I'd like to see a Guard army stand completely on its own. The current CP regeneration is ridiculous and having them feed a completely different paradigm of a unit(Blood Angel) has converted me to the fact that allies should be removed or at least severely limited.
Also, having a Guard army be on its own might better reveal how good or bad it is. Having another entity attached blurs the army quality and might end up having GW nerf IG just to satisfy soup imbalance, something I worry about with Craftworld and Ynnari/drukhari soup. It would force IG/Craftworld players to rely on allies to keep their army working if their core/pure army is nerfed too hard.
Eldarsif wrote: After playing in a tournament yesterday and facing an endless guard army with Smash Captains I have to agree with some posters that I'd like to see a Guard army stand completely on its own. The current CP regeneration is ridiculous and having them feed a completely different paradigm of a unit(Blood Angel) has converted me to the fact that allies should be removed or at least severely limited.
Also, having a Guard army be on its own might better reveal how good or bad it is. Having another entity attached blurs the army quality and might end up having GW nerf IG just to satisfy soup imbalance, something I worry about with Craftworld and Ynnari/drukhari soup. It would force IG/Craftworld players to rely on allies to keep their army working if their core/pure army is nerfed too hard.
BAO - second best mono army placing.
Last 6 months primary Guard lists (more point spent on Guard units than any other detachment) have been dominating competitive scene. This isn't Guard just taken for a cheap CP battery by the way. These are primary Guard armies with allies.
I posted actual stats to back this up a few pages back but because certain people didn't want to hear it, it went completely ignored.
Kanluwen wrote: We're not seeing mono-Guard dominating tournaments.
Which is not super relevant tbh. Tau weren't dominating tourneys either but commanders got very specifically targeted... something to do with them being op, while the other options sucked. Funnily enough, nerfing the problem unit and buffing the weak units (i.e. everything but drones) pushed tau up rather than down...
Commanders were specifically targeted because people were effectively fielding Crisis Teams consisting of Commanders rather than actually fielding Crisis Teams.
It would be like if Marines were fielding 5x Captains instead of Tactical or Intercessor Squads.
But let's say Guardsmen go up in price, while certain other options go down. It could theoretically cancel out in mixed/balanced armies while punishing people who only take infantry *cough* soup *cough*. Then people could take their appropriately costed chimeras for a change. Heck, if chimeras dropped 20-30 pts, armored fist squads would even come out cheaper!
So breaking this nonsense down...
Guardsmen going up in price would just shift what gets used in soup.
People aren't taking Chimeras because of "inappropriate costs", it's because they aren't great and are inappropriately costed.
Now, I am under no illusion that this will stop CP farms, but from my experience Guardsmen are worth 5 pts relative to most things. Whether it happens before or after soup restrictions is largely irrelevant to me.
They're not, but thanks for your delightfully incorrect insight.
The "math" keeps being done in such ridiculous ways that it would be impossible for it to not prove that.
Would you mind providing a scenario that would be acceptable to you?
Take a basic squad of each thing, no buffs, and go from there.
Every instance of "scenario" done for the math inevitably goes into FRFSRF, Cadian doctrines, blah blah blah.
Eldarsif wrote: After playing in a tournament yesterday and facing an endless guard army with Smash Captains I have to agree with some posters that I'd like to see a Guard army stand completely on its own. The current CP regeneration is ridiculous and having them feed a completely different paradigm of a unit(Blood Angel) has converted me to the fact that allies should be removed or at least severely limited.
Also, having a Guard army be on its own might better reveal how good or bad it is. Having another entity attached blurs the army quality and might end up having GW nerf IG just to satisfy soup imbalance, something I worry about with Craftworld and Ynnari/drukhari soup. It would force IG/Craftworld players to rely on allies to keep their army working if their core/pure army is nerfed too hard.
BAO - second best mono army placing.
Last 6 months primary Guard lists (more point spent on Guard units than any other detachment) have been dominating competitive scene. This isn't Guard just taken for a cheap CP battery by the way. These are primary Guard armies with allies.
I posted actual stats to back this up a few pages back but because certain people didn't want to hear it, it went completely ignored.
Mono Army != "more points spent on Guard units than any other detachment".
And yes, it does still account for "Guard just taken for a cheap CP battery" in many cases.
Eldarsif wrote: After playing in a tournament yesterday and facing an endless guard army with Smash Captains I have to agree with some posters that I'd like to see a Guard army stand completely on its own. The current CP regeneration is ridiculous and having them feed a completely different paradigm of a unit(Blood Angel) has converted me to the fact that allies should be removed or at least severely limited.
Also, having a Guard army be on its own might better reveal how good or bad it is. Having another entity attached blurs the army quality and might end up having GW nerf IG just to satisfy soup imbalance, something I worry about with Craftworld and Ynnari/drukhari soup. It would force IG/Craftworld players to rely on allies to keep their army working if their core/pure army is nerfed too hard.
BAO - second best mono army placing.
Last 6 months primary Guard lists (more point spent on Guard units than any other detachment) have been dominating competitive scene. This isn't Guard just taken for a cheap CP battery by the way. These are primary Guard armies with allies.
I posted actual stats to back this up a few pages back but because certain people didn't want to hear it, it went completely ignored.
2nd best BAO army.... so I’m assuming you wanna see Tau nerfed before guard because they were the #1 mono army?
Wow over the last 6 months soup has been dominating? You must have been the first person to noticed this trend. Surely mono IG finishing behind tau once and then being part of soup means we have to nerf IG into the dirt
Kanluwen wrote: Mono Army != "more points spent on Guard units than any other detachment".
And yes, it does still account for "Guard just taken for a cheap CP battery" in many cases.
BAO second best mono army was Guard.
So they were "second best"...but you're still talking about mono armies as though they're not a rarity.
When you spend more points on Guard than on any other faction in your list they are clearly not just a "cheap CP battery".
When your points are spent filling out a Brigade for CPs and the heavy lifting is done by a Knight Castellan and two Slamguinius Captains, the "more points spent" metric means nothing. It's a caveat for you to point at so you can justify your ridiculous stance that Guard are broken and that it's NOT the sharing of Command Points and that it's NOT the ability for a Guard Officer to be chosen as the Warlord over two frigging Marine Captains and a Knight.
Kanluwen wrote: Mono Army != "more points spent on Guard units than any other detachment".
And yes, it does still account for "Guard just taken for a cheap CP battery" in many cases.
BAO second best mono army was Guard.
So they were "second best"...but you're still talking about mono armies as though they're not a rarity.
When you spend more points on Guard than on any other faction in your list they are clearly not just a "cheap CP battery".
When your points are spent filling out a Brigade for CPs and the heavy lifting is done by a Knight Castellan and two Slamguinius Captains, the "more points spent" metric means nothing. It's a caveat for you to point at so you can justify your ridiculous stance that Guard are broken and that it's NOT the sharing of Command Points and that it's NOT the ability for a Guard Officer to be chosen as the Warlord over two frigging Marine Captains and a Knight.
But hey, you do you.
He is right on this point. Mono guard is a thing, mono guard with 3 smash captains is on a whole other level of competitiveness. Saying that primary guard being good means that mono guard is good, is definitely not true.
If we do not have clear results coming from MONO guard lists, then we have nothing, and a single result at BAO counts as nothing.
Not to mention that even if mono guard lists proved to be at the top, nothing says that the problem lies in the guardsmen. Actually i would look first at hellhounds.
That said, i do believe that guardsmen are more a 5 point model than a 4 point model, it's just that it's a really low priority issue. There are at least 10 other changes the game needs before that.
Kanluwen wrote: Mono Army != "more points spent on Guard units than any other detachment".
And yes, it does still account for "Guard just taken for a cheap CP battery" in many cases.
BAO second best mono army was Guard.
So they were "second best"...but you're still talking about mono armies as though they're not a rarity.
When you spend more points on Guard than on any other faction in your list they are clearly not just a "cheap CP battery".
When your points are spent filling out a Brigade for CPs and the heavy lifting is done by a Knight Castellan and two Slamguinius Captains, the "more points spent" metric means nothing. It's a caveat for you to point at so you can justify your ridiculous stance that Guard are broken and that it's NOT the sharing of Command Points and that it's NOT the ability for a Guard Officer to be chosen as the Warlord over two frigging Marine Captains and a Knight.
But hey, you do you.
He is right on this point. Mono guard is a thing, mono guard with 3 smash captains is on a whole other level of competitiveness.
Saying that primary guard being good means that mono guard is good, is definitely not true.
If we do not have clear results coming from MONO guard lists, then we have nothing, and a single result at BAO counts as nothing.
Not to mention that even if mono guard lists proved to be at the top, nothing says that the problem lies in the guardsmen. Actually i would look first at hellhounds.
That said, i do believe that guardsmen are more a 5 point model than a 4 point model, it's just that it's a really low priority issue. There are at least 10 other changes the game needs before that.
The difference is You don't see 3 smash captain marine lists, you don't see A Castellan backed up by another imperial faction.
Guard has been the consistent ingredient in soup from the very start along with being consistently one of the top mono factions, which is kinda rediculous when you consider that soup lists are packing so many advantages.
Simply put bringing 20+CP to any given game is a huge advantage even it it's only being spent on command re-rolls.
But as to that brigade not contributing are you serious, hellhounds, infantry squads and mortar spam as Catachan are doing big work at covering both knights and marines big weakness of not being able to deal with cheap infantry spam.
In addition to the advantage that cheap infantry gives with board control and hence scoring objectives.
Take a basic squad of each thing, no buffs, and go from there.
???
But I did. Multiple times, and they come out ahead in every scenario against other unbuffed infantry. And when I do that people are all like "but you have to consider the faction as a whole" so I do the math again but with buffs affecting both sides, and guard still win handily. And then people go "orders are different from auras so it's not the same" and then just declare all the math unrepresentative. Or even better, that the comparison involves units that don't have the same role and so is wrong.
And it really baffles me when people downplay the effects of FRFSRF, saying it doesn't do much because it's S3. I mean, 3 guard infantry squads can use FRFSRF to keep up with a double tapping Russ Punisher's firepower, and that's at long range. At half range, the punisher is completely outdone. And most Guard players seem to think that the punisher needs a point increase, so...
The difference is You don't see 3 smash captain marine lists, you don't see A Castellan backed up by another imperial faction.
Ice_can wrote: Guard has been the consistent ingredient in soup from the very start along with being consistently one of the top mono factions, which is kinda rediculous when you consider that soup lists are packing so many advantages.
Guard has a number of advantages that makes them appealing for soup, cheap if occasionally less effective units (which lets you get the same number of units for less points), an unmatched ability to generate and recycle CP (which is where the root of the issue is) and a fairly flexible roster with good answer's to most problems that can be thrown at you. They make a solid foundation to pull in units from other codex's to do more specilised work while letting guard take care of the basics, in short Guard's purpose in soup is to be an enabler, they allow the more elite units from other codex's to go do what they're good at and buffs them as well by supplying a gak load of CP.
Ice_can wrote: Simply put bringing 20+CP to any given game is a huge advantage even it it's only being spent on command re-rolls.
Agreed and it should be the first thing to be nerfed. Cut down the recyling that's possible in soup and lets see how things stand, will guards presence in soup drop down and be replaced by other factions? will monoguard stay steady or drop a bit? Either way, nerf the CP aspect of the problem then go in for point adjustments afterwards if there are still blatant issues.
Ice_can wrote: But as to that brigade not contributing are you serious, hellhounds, infantry squads and mortar spam as Catachan are doing big work at covering both knights and marines big weakness of not being able to deal with cheap infantry spam.
That's the whole point of soup, to cover different armies weaknesses. The real problem in those lists isn't the guard units (or monoguard would be placing better) it's the CP generation they bring to to the table that then gets spent on the soup elements.
Ice_can wrote: In addition to the advantage that cheap infantry gives with board control and hence scoring objectives.
That's true of every cheap troop unit though, it's the whole reason you bring cheap troops in any army, for board control and objectives.
Bringing 20 cp to the fight is an enormous advantage, no questioning that, and that is exactly the reason why they are the preferred faction when it comes to souping in CP intensive stuff.
Do we really have reasons to say that mono guard is a top faction though? Without souping, would it be competitive?
It has many many weaknesses after all. Folds to hit penalties, folds to flying assaults, has no invul saves, limited melee options, bad transports...
Seriously, they are not this invincible faction they are being made out of. What they have is the fact that the basic combination of screens and firepower is effective, and they are the best at it. Plus they have some really good super heavies.
They have a lot of bad matchups though:
1) CWE (hit penalties and shining spears)
2) Drukhari (everything)
3) Kinghts (17 Catachan basilisks required to down a single 4++ knight, good luck)
4) Tau (we shoot better than you and don't care about your screens)
Guards are good at ONE thing and that's it.
I could be wrong, but until i see actual results i'm gonna stand by my analysis.
That said, please GW nerf Artemis Hellhound, that thing is broken.
Take a basic squad of each thing, no buffs, and go from there.
???
But I did. Multiple times, and they come out ahead in every scenario against other unbuffed infantry. And when I do that people are all like "but you have to consider the faction as a whole" so I do the math again but with buffs affecting both sides, and guard still win handily. And then people go "orders are different from auras so it's not the same" and then just declare all the math unrepresentative. Or even better, that the comparison involves units that don't have the same role and so is wrong.
And it really baffles me when people downplay the effects of FRFSRF, saying it doesn't do much because it's S3. I mean, 3 guard infantry squads can use FRFSRF to keep up with a double tapping Russ Punisher's firepower, and that's at long range. At half range, the punisher is completely outdone. And most Guard players seem to think that the punisher needs a point increase, so...
I've seen plenty of mathhammer of firewarrior's vs guardsmen but I don't think I've ever seen one run with the range starting at 30" or higher, it's always starting at 24" negating the range advantage pulse rifles get over lasguns, on the same vein if you take buffs into account you could also run the numbers on firewarriors with 42" pulse rifles from the bor'khan trait and a pulse accelerator drone.
Take a basic squad of each thing, no buffs, and go from there.
??? But I did. Multiple times, and they come out ahead in every scenario against other unbuffed infantry. And when I do that people are all like "but you have to consider the faction as a whole" so I do the math again but with buffs affecting both sides, and guard still win handily. And then people go "orders are different from auras so it's not the same" and then just declare all the math unrepresentative. Or even better, that the comparison involves units that don't have the same role and so is wrong.
And it really baffles me when people downplay the effects of FRFSRF, saying it doesn't do much because it's S3. I mean, 3 guard infantry squads can use FRFSRF to keep up with a double tapping Russ Punisher's firepower, and that's at long range. At half range, the punisher is completely outdone. And most Guard players seem to think that the punisher needs a point increase, so...
My simple math says that a firewarrior shoot better than a guardsmen at T4,6,7 and 8 targets (slightly more wounds and at longer range) and that a kabalite wins on every target with more than T3. A devourer gant wins against T4, 6 and 7 (and is assault). Against TEQ even primaris interecessors shoot better than them.
You have to consider all the possible profiles when making comparisons, and honestly i do not see this "mathematical superiority".
Kanluwen wrote: Mono Army != "more points spent on Guard units than any other detachment".
And yes, it does still account for "Guard just taken for a cheap CP battery" in many cases.
BAO second best mono army was Guard.
So they were "second best"...but you're still talking about mono armies as though they're not a rarity.
When you spend more points on Guard than on any other faction in your list they are clearly not just a "cheap CP battery".
When your points are spent filling out a Brigade for CPs and the heavy lifting is done by a Knight Castellan and two Slamguinius Captains, the "more points spent" metric means nothing. It's a caveat for you to point at so you can justify your ridiculous stance that Guard are broken and that it's NOT the sharing of Command Points and that it's NOT the ability for a Guard Officer to be chosen as the Warlord over two frigging Marine Captains and a Knight.
But hey, you do you.
The fact that mono Guard are taken at all, given that there's absolutely no disadvantage to souping, shows how incredibly strong Guard are. I don't see mono Knights. I very rarely see mono SM or BAngels. Mono Guard are much more common than you'd have us believe though.
Ah of course. The 'heavy lifting' is done by every other unit that isn't a Guard unit, in that army spending more points on Guard models than any others. Of course. How could I forget the heavy lifting?! I'm sure those hellhounds, infantry and mortars contribute nothing but CP all game. Your bias is really, really telling. Its obvious that all elements of the holy trinity of Slam Captain, Castellan and various Guard units need to have changes because they are getting taken in a competitive setting far more than any other units in the game by a country mile. It doesn't take a genius to see the units need balancing. Stop making excuses for broken things.
I've seen plenty of mathhammer of firewarrior's vs guardsmen but I don't think I've ever seen one run with the range starting at 30" or higher, it's always starting at 24" negating the range advantage pulse rifles get over lasguns, on the same vein if you take buffs into account you could also run the numbers on firewarriors with 42" pulse rifles from the bor'khan trait and a pulse accelerator drone.
Do we really need to say that a unit with 30" range will outshoot a unit with 24" when targeting units at 30" range? But if you really want to know, a 10-man Fire warrior team will kill 2 Guardsmen at 30". Which I brought up before, and factored into my scenario. Of course, it was dismissed by someone who said FW and Guardsmen don't have the same role and so are incomparable.
But since you seem more reasonable let's give it a go:
1) No buffs:
- 12 fire warriors (84 pts)
- 20 Guard (80 pts)
Round 1 at 24-30"
- FW kill 2 Guardsmen
- Guard move 6", and get within 24". Kill 2 FW Round 1 losses: 2 Guardsmen (8pts) 2 FW (14 pts)
I really don't need to continue, since it only gets worse for the tau.
2) Steel Legion guard with commander vs Borkan tau with fireblade and accelerator drone
- 20 Guard + 1 C Commander (110 pts)
- 12 FW + 1 Fireblade + 1 drone (132 pts)
Round 1 at 42"
- FW kill 2 Guard
- Guard move 15" with "Move! Move! Move!" to get within 27" of the FW Round 2 at 27"
12 FW vs 18 Guard
- FW retreat 6" (33" total away) and fire: 2 kills
- Guard advance and get within 24", use "Forwards for the Emperor": 2 kills
Round 3:
10 FW vs 16 Guard
- FW move up to within 21": 7 kills
- Guard move up to within 18", FRFSRF: 5 kills
Round 4:
5 FW vs 9 Guard
- FW shoot: 3 kills
- Guard FRFSRF: 3 kills
Round 5:
2 FW vs 6 Guard
- FW shoot: 1 kill
- Guard FRFSRF: 2 kills
Guard win.
Of course, depending on terrain and the board, the Guard could have made it into combat by round 4, which still nets a win for them.
Note: commander and fireblade contributions (other than buffs) were ignored since I was focusing on the squad outputs. If you want to know, the fireblade would have killed 5 guard total, and the c commander would have killed 1-2 FW if he gets into combat at round 4, but that would have locked down the FW and fireblade from shooting for the last turn saving 3 Guardsmen. So, maybe 2 more guard die than shown above, but the end result is the same.
Now, you may be wondering why I chose to compare 110pts of guard vs 132 pts of tau, well, because if guard go to 5pts that would be 130pt vs 132pts.
Edit: I'd like to take a moment to appreciate how saying the orders makes the whole scenario more cinematic. Hands down my favorite part of playing guard.
Kanluwen wrote: Mono Army != "more points spent on Guard units than any other detachment".
And yes, it does still account for "Guard just taken for a cheap CP battery" in many cases.
BAO second best mono army was Guard.
So they were "second best"...but you're still talking about mono armies as though they're not a rarity.
When you spend more points on Guard than on any other faction in your list they are clearly not just a "cheap CP battery".
When your points are spent filling out a Brigade for CPs and the heavy lifting is done by a Knight Castellan and two Slamguinius Captains, the "more points spent" metric means nothing. It's a caveat for you to point at so you can justify your ridiculous stance that Guard are broken and that it's NOT the sharing of Command Points and that it's NOT the ability for a Guard Officer to be chosen as the Warlord over two frigging Marine Captains and a Knight.
But hey, you do you.
The fact that mono Guard are taken at all, given that there's absolutely no disadvantage to souping, shows how incredibly strong Guard are. I don't see mono Knights. I very rarely see mono SM or BAngels. Mono Guard are much more common than you'd have us believe though.
Ah of course. The 'heavy lifting' is done by every other unit that isn't a Guard unit, in that army spending more points on Guard models than any others. Of course. How could I forget the heavy lifting?! I'm sure those hellhounds, infantry and mortars contribute nothing but CP all game. Your bias is really, really telling. Its obvious that all elements of the holy trinity of Slam Captain, Castellan and various Guard units need to have changes because they are getting taken in a competitive setting far more than any other units in the game by a country mile. It doesn't take a genius to see the units need balancing. Stop making excuses for broken things.
Wow someone managed to bring a mono army..... What other people would do something crazy like that.... other than like 75% of the players I know. Seriously though they finished behind Tau, that everyone says are fine, clearly they need to be nuked.
The obvious solution to soup is to nuke all the ingredients so that all these books are even worse mono and more reliant on soup. Yup, that is obviously the answer. We wouldn't want to do something crazy like add a drawback to soup so that it isn't the obvious choice 100% of the time..... I mean what would that solve?
Spoletta wrote: Bringing 20 cp to the fight is an enormous advantage, no questioning that, and that is exactly the reason why they are the preferred faction when it comes to souping in CP intensive stuff.
Do we really have reasons to say that mono guard is a top faction though? Without souping, would it be competitive?
It has many many weaknesses after all. Folds to hit penalties, folds to flying assaults, has no invul saves, limited melee options, bad transports...
Seriously, they are not this invincible faction they are being made out of. What they have is the fact that the basic combination of screens and firepower is effective, and they are the best at it. Plus they have some really good super heavies.
They have a lot of bad matchups though:
1) CWE (hit penalties and shining spears)
2) Drukhari (everything)
3) Kinghts (17 Catachan basilisks required to down a single 4++ knight, good luck)
4) Tau (we shoot better than you and don't care about your screens)
Guards are good at ONE thing and that's it.
I could be wrong, but until i see actual results i'm gonna stand by my analysis.
That said, please GW nerf Artemis Hellhound, that thing is broken.
1) You mean alitoc and it's-2 to hit army wide, yeah well they suck for everyone. But your catachan just run forward and punch them to death you hit like marines for less than 1/3 the points before charictors, which make you hit like 3 marines.
Try that with marines or tau then you'll value what you have.
2) Drukari just got a number of undercosted synergies and the most broken strategum yet.
3) Really every game I've played knights vrs guard the guard player lost the game buy making poor decisions. Guard can easily win vrs knights if guard players would stop trying mono tactic their army.
4) If your loosing to Tau with guard you need to rethink your list as guard have all the tools to smash tau currently. The difference might be T'au's current best build is the same vrs just about everything short of pure knights. Not sure it changes that much even then. While guards best build varies depending on regiment.
Transports are game wide overcosted in 8th edition that's not unique to guard.
Let's assume that all the math for Infantry Squads was done, that it didn't take liberties (e.g. including buffs without including the cost of the buffing models) and that it was accurate.
I feel it worth noting that, earlier in 8th, there were numerous threads showing that Necron Warriors were extremely overpowered and completely broken compared to all other troops. And they had the math to demonstrate this conclusively.
The only problem was that the outcome of this math, whilst containing no numerical errors, utterly failed to reflect reality. In theory, Necron Warriors were these unstoppable monoliths that could regenerate infinitely, had amazing basic weapons and would win any and all firefights. However, on the table, Necron warriors are slow, cumbersome blobs which struggle to get into optimum range of most targets and lack the firepower to inflict meaningful damage (relative to their cost) even when they do. What's more, whilst mathhammer allowed them to infinitely reccur, in reality they are almost always either focused down in one turn or else just ignored while the opponent kills the actual threats in the Necron army. In either case, their revival ability (which looked amazing when mathhammered) was rendered almost entirely worthless.
This is why I am reluctant to take the word of people who say they can prove with maths that Infantry Squads are undercosted, because the math frequently fails to tell the whole story. There are too many variables that are never accounted for but which nevertheless have a huge impact on a given unit's effectiveness.
It is also why I would like to see Soup addressed before tweaking Imperial Guard. As it stands, we see Infantry Squads being used in Soup armies partially to aid in CP generation and partially to act as screening units and objective holders. However, in spite of what the math purports to show, they are only used as anvil units. The lists that use them always have Knights, Custodes, Smash-Captains etc. to act as hammers.
If IG were forced to work alone, they would still have their anvil infantry squads, but they would be severely lacking in a Hammer unit. And I really don't think Infantry Squads will be able to perform this role effectively. Thus, IG will be good at holding their own objectives but will likely struggle to advance up the field to take objectives further up the table. Similarly, whilst decent screening units, I think Infantry Squads will struggle to bring their firepower to bear. With an optimal range of 12" and a 6" move, they're liable to suffer the same sort of issue as Necron Warriors. Heavy weapons might help with this to some extent, but will also make them even more defensive and unwilling to move in the process. And God Emperor help you if you want to use the Cadian doctrine with them.
My point is, I think if armies were forced to play on their own, Infantry Squads would be far less of an issue and highlight their weaknesses.
I freely admit that I could be wrong, but we simply can't know for certain until allies are fixed so that IG doesn't have free access to Hammer units (and non-IG don't have free access to Anvil/screening units and CP generation).
If, after soup is fixed (to the point where mono armies have at least an even chance of winning), Infantry Squads are still causing issues even in mono-IG armies, then I will be more than happy to support increasing their cost to 5pts per model.
The fact that mono Guard are taken at all, given that there's absolutely no disadvantage to souping, shows how incredibly strong Guard are.
This just in: If you enter a tournament, you are not allowed to play something just because you enjoy it. You must use the most competitive army possible, even it it means including units you have no interest in using or armies you have no interest in playing. Do that or GTFO.
"Guards are OP. Even compared with unbalanced infantry like Tau Firewarriors at 7ppm or Kabalites at 6ppm they are op, and only become balanced with Guard being 5ppm, showing how strong they are now, and how strong they would be at 5ppm"
"Show me the math"
"Ok there you have it"
"Well... math doesn't show anything! The variables, the variables!"
This is what people said to Auticus when he said that skeletons in AoS where absolutely OP, just by pure mathematical power. A couple of months after that, you had skeletons hordes left and right sweeping people and everyone complaining about them.
R: Firewarriors and Kabalites maybe don't enter the top 10 ITC for many reasons. But they are still mathematically too good and being that cheap doesn't allows for design space and proper balance changes at that point level.
and not worth spaming." If they are that poor what does it matter if you need to bring 180 points of Infantry, Thats less than many armies spend on an 
