Also, to be perfectly honest, the D weapon is a melee weapon. It's not that hard to NOT get assaulted by a Walker. At best, he's gonna swing that D weapon only a couple of times a game.

Sure it does- It says "make your own fun" instead of complaining about the options that people have the option to take.

 Brometheus wrote:
Hoo boy.

Just played a 1500pt vs. 30 GK Terminators and a Librarian as Thousand Sons with Ahriman, 5 spawn, a Predator and a Helbrute.

I won, and I didn't need a Heldrake to do it. That's not saying that I'm some uber player- No, his terminators did roll a lot of 1's and I had lots of good psychic tests..

Tell me how the game is broken?

Players make choices. You CHOOSE to bring that Wraithknight/Riptide x3/Imperial Knight. I'm not saying anything that hasn't already been said here, of course.. CHOOSE who and what YOU play against. Nothing wrong with that, friends. : ]

No, the inherent problem is when you choose to bring the obviously best option to help you win a game, and your opponent, who has a different philosophy, chooses to bring an appropriately crafted list to represent the way a specific faction or sub faction is supposed to fight, respecting things like apparent rarity of troop types etc.

Then he spends 2-3 hours engaged in what is effectively a complex unpacking/packing exercise with his models.

Wouldn't it be lovely if both players could choose whatever the hell they wanted and have a fun game where both had a chance of victory or spend time beforehand in extensive negotiations as to what fun the other player was allowed to have?

 Brometheus wrote:
Hoo boy.

Just played a 1500pt vs. 30 GK Terminators and a Librarian as Thousand Sons with Ahriman, 5 spawn, a Predator and a Helbrute.

I won, and I didn't need a Heldrake to do it. That's not saying that I'm some uber player- No, his terminators did roll a lot of 1's and I had lots of good psychic tests..

Tell me how the game is broken?

Players make choices. You CHOOSE to bring that Wraithknight/Riptide x3/Imperial Knight. I'm not saying anything that hasn't already been said here, of course.. CHOOSE who and what YOU play against. Nothing wrong with that, friends. : ]

As a complete n00b I took my brand new less than half painted Necron army and effortlessly wiped the floor with the Dark Eldar army of a guy who's been playing them for years and had a won couple of tournament with them in his day, and I didn't even use fliers to do it- just a bunch of footslogging Immortals, a couple of Barges and a squad of Wraiths.

There was nothing he could do- His melee units got the crap beat out of them even when they were the ones doing the assaulting, his shooting was mostly ineffectual and anything my guns got pointed at went up in flames almost automatically.

I really hope his DE get relevant again sometime soon- he's a great player with awesome painting skills and a beautiful army, and it's a shame to see it gather dust on the shelf.

Spent far too much time on this forum this week [half term yay] and most of the threads boil down to arguments between pissed off people who used to be massively into GW but for whatever reason decided to quit, and those who still play and really enjoy it.

I, for one, think 6th is great. Love flyers, pre-measuring, allies, wound allocation, hull points, re-focus on psykers, Escalation etc. etc. Not saying the rules are flawless, far from it. but for me, they're loads of fun. I'm 34 and have been into 40k since I was about 9, and the game has never been balanced. GW makes cool models, then adds rules. It's always been this way, and better for it imo.

The way GW is going is to allow whoever to ally with whoever. Superheavies look like they will become part of the core rules. Random charts are here to stay. I like this, and will continue to play. If this is a game breaker for you, then leave. Personally I think quitting the game to play other systems but then spending your time posting negative comments on 40k forums is a little sad, but the internet is free so whatever.

So, it is a game, a really fun game, but has never, and will never, be balanced. GW's priority from day 1 has been to make cool models and then think about rules.

 tyrannosaurus wrote:
Spent far too much time on this forum this week [half term yay] and most of the threads boil down to arguments between pissed off people who used to be massively into GW but for whatever reason decided to quit, and those who still play and really enjoy it.

What a massive over simplification.

I haven't quit, I still play regularly, I even enjoy the games where I don't fall over RipWraith spam or whatever.

I am still well aware that the game has huge room for improvement, I am frustrated that GW don't really seem to care to do so particularly.

As you mention half term, I assume you're a younger player, so perhaps you haven't quite grasped the idea that one can criticise something and acknowledge it is flawed yet still consume it and enjoy it?

While people like you mention DO exist, on this very board no less, it is a mistake to try and draw a line between black and white when the reality is multiple shades of grey.

 Galorian wrote:

 Brometheus wrote:
Hoo boy.

Just played a 1500pt vs. 30 GK Terminators and a Librarian as Thousand Sons with Ahriman, 5 spawn, a Predator and a Helbrute.

I won, and I didn't need a Heldrake to do it. That's not saying that I'm some uber player- No, his terminators did roll a lot of 1's and I had lots of good psychic tests..

Tell me how the game is broken?

Players make choices. You CHOOSE to bring that Wraithknight/Riptide x3/Imperial Knight. I'm not saying anything that hasn't already been said here, of course.. CHOOSE who and what YOU play against. Nothing wrong with that, friends. : ]

As a complete n00b I took my brand new less than half painted Necron army and effortlessly wiped the floor with the Dark Eldar army of a guy who's been playing them for years and had a won couple of tournament with them in his day, and I didn't even use fliers to do it- just a bunch of footslogging Immortals, a couple of Barges and a squad of Wraiths.

There was nothing he could do- His melee units got the crap beat out of them even when they were the ones doing the assaulting, his shooting was mostly ineffectual and anything my guns got pointed at went up in flames almost automatically.

I really hope his DE get relevant again sometime soon- he's a great player with awesome painting skills and a beautiful army, and it's a shame to see it gather dust on the shelf.

I know who you are talking about, his main issue was he was stuck in 5th edition mindset, and played as such.

I mean, last i faced him it was against the PDF tau (pre codex), and he just gave me free kills left and right by awkward positioning of units (clearly underestimating my shooting power in an army with nothing BUT shooting power), and fielding unit far less impressive the i could expect Deldar to-he army was mostly foot-sluggers, and he was hiding behind an ADL with his bulk of the force.
That's not how I know Deldar to play.....
Especially not in a turny when people are expected to be more brutal then usual.

Yes, he won at his days, but he played as if it is still "his days" back when SW and GK superelites were your biggest problems and not as if the meta has shifted to great numbers of guns all over the place.
And his lists are made as such-they are built to take down the 5th edition armies.
When the same veteran is being pummeled by not one, but two different new players, each with another army, and one of them with a remarkably weak codex (back then, now its amazing), the issue is probably not power creep, something in the veteran just broke.

His main problem, is that he played his single DE army type TOO MUCH, and got stuck in its mindset, and did not adapt to th changes in the rules and the meta quite well.
Maybe the eventual new codex will make him look at his army again from the ground up, because that's what new codcies tend to do-and when he starts from scratch he will work it out.
Heck, after his long brake, if he starts from scratch right now, it can work. as long he wont fall back into old habits.


As for the lack of noise in the 40k groups-its not despite the upcoming turny, its BECAUSE. we are hiding our aces, and getting all sneaky-like.
AFAIK, you are the only one to know what on earth I have up my sleeve, and even you only have a general concept of how it works.
When the turny will actually take place, I think we will see a massive climb of noise, especially if the organizers will set up good batreps of the fights going on there-these things attract attention.



Back to the main issue.
Honestly, I love the concept behind every single change I've seen so far, its the implants of such that disappoints me.
Mainly, playtesting.
You may argue they DO playtest, but they obviously don't do a good job at it.
Yes, you dont need a 100% math formula for things, but I can count things that are grossly overpowered and should have been caught: C'tan, reverent, IA riptides with support commanders, screamerstar, seer council, IH superchaptermaster. these combos and superheavies should have been killed long before the print came out.
Also, some things are just grossly undercosted like the annialation barges, night scythes, baleflamer helldrakes, vendettas, and i'm sure there are a few others, who just are obviously too good for the price, and a simple price hike would solve them.
On the other hands, some things are grossly OVERcosted, or plain badly built like stealth suits, rippers, 1k sons, the entire raven guard tactics, etc...(CSM suffers quite a few of these)

GW needs to either fire and replace the beta testers for not catching the most obvious exploits, or the people writing the rules for not listening to the betatesters. (or, if the test period is too short, make it longer and get more testers)
Once they figure out how to properly test the game, it will become a much better game.

 azreal13 wrote:


As you mention half term, I assume you're a younger player, so perhaps you haven't quite grasped the idea that one can criticise something and acknowledge it is flawed yet still consume it and enjoy it?
.

Assumption is wrong, I'm a teacher [34, but still consider myself a 'younger' player ] Seems somewhat contradictory to criticise something and still enjoy it at the same time. So you're saying you think Escalation is gak but you really like it?

I'll admit, I oversimplified things a little, but I find it a little galling that GW make a brilliant model, firmly grounded in established fluff, and then a large number of posters come out of the woodwork to criticise. Seems like sour grapes to me, especially as most of their posts begin with "I don't play 40k anymore, but...]

Criticizing something and still liking it is usually because you think its generally good, but with little effort could have been much better.

That applies to most 40k. it would take very little effort to playtest it better and make preemptive fixes to the obvious balance beakers.

I have rarely seen anyone that do not like the MODELS and fluff (except that time with ward fanboying his codecies, and the dreadknight/centurions that are just silly design "space marine in a space marine"), its the rules and company policies that makes us facepalm time after time, and as customers-we want better.

The Rulebook wrote: The rules are just a framework to support an enjoyable game

Emphasis mine, and probably the most important rule. It's a framework. Don't like the game? Change it until you do. I could go on about how you can do this, but really, it ranges from tweaking rules to outright playing something else.

Just sayin'.. Threads don't need to be created to tell people that you're quitting. Just go, and the rest of us who enjoy it will stay... and we'll keep fighting Wraithknight/whatever lists (or choosing to not play against them).

Edit: "Accept any challenge, no matter the odds", but it's all optional.. Everything. Isn't it?

 liquidjoshi wrote:

The Rulebook wrote: The rules are just a framework to support an enjoyable game

Emphasis mine, and probably the most important rule. It's a framework. Don't like the game? Change it until you do. I could go on about how you can do this, but really, it ranges from tweaking rules to outright playing something else.

Which is fine for anyone who plays in a small, established group.

For those of us who play in larger clubs, or play pick up games in stores with people you don't potentially know (which seems to be quite common in the US) it just isn't feasible.

Not to mention it abdicates responsibility for making a tight, unambiguous ruleset, something which still wouldn't stop people changing and modifying it if they wanted to, just without all the associated nonsense that is entailed with playing 40K with a new opponent now.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 tyrannosaurus wrote:

 azreal13 wrote:


As you mention half term, I assume you're a younger player, so perhaps you haven't quite grasped the idea that one can criticise something and acknowledge it is flawed yet still consume it and enjoy it?
.

Assumption is wrong, I'm a teacher [34, but still consider myself a 'younger' player ] Seems somewhat contradictory to criticise something and still enjoy it at the same time. So you're saying you think Escalation is gak but you really like it?

I'll admit, I oversimplified things a little, but I find it a little galling that GW make a brilliant model, firmly grounded in established fluff, and then a large number of posters come out of the woodwork to criticise. Seems like sour grapes to me, especially as most of their posts begin with "I don't play 40k anymore, but...]

Well, younger than me, if not by much.

It is absolutely possible to enjoy something and be aware of how it could be improved, I'm surprised you seem to be struggling with this idea, considering the education of our future citizens has been entrusted to you I'd expect that to be well within your mental capacity to understand, even if you didn't necessarily agree.

For the record, I think Escalation is a cool idea, which given a few subtle alterations (a subset of rules for D weapons for non Apoc games, a slightly less generous list of eligible units, or at least some adjusted profiles and points values to allow for the greater impact some units can have in smaller games) I would welcome.

Frankly though, the least fun game I've had recently was a 750pt league game where my opponent brought a Wraithknight, and I brought a more interesting than competitive list, and a few key dice rolls going against me meant that my one chance at dealing with it went down in flames.

While there are objectively 'better' or 'worse' codexes, and while there are objectively 'better' or 'worse' units within those books, sometimes to the exclusion of whole sections of the force org, or where there is one choice that stands head and shoulders above the others, and while the core rules fairly substantially favour the play styles of certain armies or builds over others, then the likes of Escalation are small potatoes in terms of the work that needs to be done.

 liquidjoshi wrote:

The Rulebook wrote: The rules are just a framework to support an enjoyable game

Emphasis mine, and probably the most important rule. It's a framework. Don't like the game? Change it until you do. I could go on about how you can do this, but really, it ranges from tweaking rules to outright playing something else.

Maybe that works if you play in a regular club but not when you play at a game store in pick-up groups, unless you play to be TFG who goes around with a list of amendments to the rules before every game.

That's why rules need to be balanced, because I'd wager most gamers play pick-up games at a FLGS on miniatures night, and not in a group where they can have guidelines for what goes and what doesn't.

I almost wonder if this is a cultural thing; it's always seemed to me that in the Europe and especially the UK most gaming goes on with established gaming clubs that meet in/rent out areas to play or play in somebody's basement/garage, where most people know each other or it's "This is my mate Jim, he's interested in joining the club" so its a friend of a friend. In the US most of our gaming is done via pick-up games at a game store; there are clubs but they are much less frequent so it's not easy for us to have club guidelines and the like, because you're going to be seen as a donkey-cave if you hand a prospective opponent a list of "house rules" before an impromptu game. Besides general things like how many points, if Escalation is being used and if you're lucky some quick talk about casual vs. competitive, you're going to play against whatever the other person decides they want to field.

 azreal13 wrote:


Well, younger than me, if not by much.

It is absolutely possible to enjoy something and be aware of how it could be improved, I'm surprised you seem to be struggling with this idea, considering the education of our future citizens has been entrusted to you I'd expect that to be well within your mental capacity to understand, even if you didn't necessarily agree.

For the record, I think Escalation is a cool idea, which given a few subtle alterations (a subset of rules for D weapons for non Apoc games, a slightly less generous list of eligible units, or at least some adjusted profiles and points values to allow for the greater impact some units can have in smaller games) I would welcome.

Frankly though, the least fun game I've had recently was a 750pt league game where my opponent brought a Wraithknight, and I brought a more interesting than competitive list, and a few key dice rolls going against me meant that my one chance at dealing with it went down in flames.

While there are objectively 'better' or 'worse' codexes, and while there are objectively 'better' or 'worse' units within those books, sometimes to the exclusion of whole sections of the force org, or where there is one choice that stands head and shoulders above the others, and while the core rules fairly substantially favour the play styles of certain armies or builds over others, then the likes of Escalation are small potatoes in terms of the work that needs to be done.

As you're also a vet I'll ignore the implication that I'm mentally deficient - we teachers are a thick skinned bunch due to the daily attacks by politicians and the right-wing press!

Glad you also like Escalation. In regards to the codex balance, as I'm sure you're aware after being in the hobby for a number of years, this has always been the case. I remember playing against a Space Wolf force in 5th and being tabled in two turns. I had a hiatus from playing 40k during 3rd and 4th but from what I can see there were also huge imbalances during these incarnations.

If your point is that 40k is unbalanced, then yes, you're right ofc. If it is that it's more unbalanced in 6th than it used to be, then I disagree, as I think the allies rule goes a long way to alleviating this. If it is that the game has always been unbalanced and needs to go towards more balanced core rules and codexes, then again you're probably right, but it will never happen.

As you know from being a vet, 40k started when GW employees took the Fantasy miniatures and came up with rules for them [hence 'Space Orks']. When they were then asked to put together a ruleset [Rogue Trader], they insisted on having separate miniatures, but the approach was always 'models then rules', and this will never change. Which I think is a good thing, as it promotes creativity, reduces limitations, and leads to badass kits like the Knight.

 tyrannosaurus wrote:

 azreal13 wrote:


Well, younger than me, if not by much.

It is absolutely possible to enjoy something and be aware of how it could be improved, I'm surprised you seem to be struggling with this idea, considering the education of our future citizens has been entrusted to you I'd expect that to be well within your mental capacity to understand, even if you didn't necessarily agree.

For the record, I think Escalation is a cool idea, which given a few subtle alterations (a subset of rules for D weapons for non Apoc games, a slightly less generous list of eligible units, or at least some adjusted profiles and points values to allow for the greater impact some units can have in smaller games) I would welcome.

Frankly though, the least fun game I've had recently was a 750pt league game where my opponent brought a Wraithknight, and I brought a more interesting than competitive list, and a few key dice rolls going against me meant that my one chance at dealing with it went down in flames.

While there are objectively 'better' or 'worse' codexes, and while there are objectively 'better' or 'worse' units within those books, sometimes to the exclusion of whole sections of the force org, or where there is one choice that stands head and shoulders above the others, and while the core rules fairly substantially favour the play styles of certain armies or builds over others, then the likes of Escalation are small potatoes in terms of the work that needs to be done.

As you're also a vet I'll ignore the implication that I'm mentally deficient - we teachers are a thick skinned bunch due to the daily attacks by politicians and the right-wing press!

Actually, I was more implying that you were smart enough to know what I meant, and were deliberately misunderstanding me for some reason.

Glad you also like Escalation. In regards to the codex balance, as I'm sure you're aware after being in the hobby for a number of years, this has always been the case. I remember playing against a Space Wolf force in 5th and being tabled in two turns. I had a hiatus from playing 40k during 3rd and 4th but from what I can see there were also huge imbalances during these incarnations.

How did you get I liked Escalation from that? I liked the idea but they cocked it up.

If your point is that 40k is unbalanced, then yes, you're right ofc. If it is that it's more unbalanced in 6th than it used to be, then I disagree, as I think the allies rule goes a long way to alleviating this. If it is that the game has always been unbalanced and needs to go towards more balanced core rules and codexes, then again you're probably right, but it will never happen.

As you know from being a vet, 40k started when GW employees took the Fantasy miniatures and came up with rules for them [hence 'Space Orks']. When they were then asked to put together a ruleset [Rogue Trader], they insisted on having separate miniatures, but the approach was always 'models then rules', and this will never change. Which I think is a good thing, as it promotes creativity, reduces limitations, and leads to badass kits like the Knight.

Allies are lazy and a get out for making each faction rounded and balanced enough to stand on it's own two feet. To echo another poster in another thread, those looking to use allies for benign purposes didn't need permission.

I'm surprised you cite the Knight, an awesome model, but a 25 year old idea, as an example of creativity? I've noticed GW digging deeper into their history over the last year, rather than inventing new stuff, and when we do get new stuff, it is either painfully uninspired (let's give Tau an even bigger suit!) or, well, Centurions.

Models before rules is fine, but it doesn't preclude crap rules, and I'll leave you with the famous quote from Rick Priestley.

Bryan always said that if the studio ever had to mix with the manufacturing and sales part of the business it would destroy the studio. And I have to say – he wasn’t wrong there!

The modern studio isn’t a studio in the same way; it isn’t a collection of artists and creatives sharing ideas and driving each other on. It’s become the promotions department of a toy company – things move on!

This is going to be long, because you're wrong about pretty much everything.

 LeadLegion wrote:
Actually, un-balanced versions of chess are a far better, much more enjoyable and far more accessible for new players. Ever played battle chess? I'm not talking about the old PC game from the 90's. I'm talking about the huge variety of "variant" rules systems which exist that make Chess a better game in terms of enjoyment. I'm talking about, for example, the type of Chess Game that includes playing cards with one off optional rules. Such as "play this card on any pawn you control. That pawn may move backwards one square".

This has absolutely nothing to do with balance. Adding cards adds complexity, and if the cards come from a shuffled deck it adds randomness, but neither of those things have anything to do with balance. Balance questions would be things like whether or not the value of each card choice is accurate. For example, you might have a choice between upgrading your king to move up to two squares at a time, or upgrading three pawns to move backwards. The game would be balanced if those two options are equally appealing, and unbalanced if one is clearly better than the other (say, the king upgrade is so powerful that it's actually worth four pawn upgrades, not three).

Now, the simple fact here is that balance problems do NOT help the game. If the card system is balanced then it potentially makes the game more interesting by increasing complexity and invalidating the expert's memorized list of perfect chess moves, but if the card system is unbalanced then all you've done is given the inexperienced player more opportunities to fail. The expert will evaluate the options correctly and always take the most powerful ones, while the novice is likely to make mistakes and take weaker options that increase the gap between them and their more experienced opponent. Your argument that adding an unbalanced card system narrows the gap depends on a ridiculous assumption that the expert is going to screw up and take bad choices instead of exploiting the obvious balance mistakes.

No, because certain card combinations allow a novice to win the game against a Chess Master in a half dozen turns.

I don't think you understand what balance is. If the cards are randomly drawn then the existence of winning combinations doesn't make the game unbalanced, since both players have an equal chance of getting them and can't just choose the obvious auto-win and neglect all of the other cards in the game. If the combinations are something you choose then the fact that a novice can beat a master in a few turns is irrelevant, because the master is going to take the same combination. If you create a "win in six turns" combination and make it freely available then it's utter lunacy to assume that the expert player is going to fail to exploit it. And then you have an unbalanced game where the only option is the auto-win combo, and all that matters is skill in executing the auto-win combo. And guess what, that still favors the master.

So why is the card-enhanced version of the game more enjoyable? It's because, as you say, Chess has been solved. So there are no more surprises. Nothing new to delight people that play chess.

What the hell does "if you've solved your current game and are bored with it try playing a new game instead" have to do with balance? If I've played a lot of basketball and get tired of it and then go have fun with baseball it doesn't mean that one is more or less balanced than the other, it just means that trying new things is fun.

Any Balanced Game can eventually be solved. Because any balanced game pays pays vey strict adherence to adherence a mathematical formula, whether intentionally built into the game or not. That being said, a game not intentionally built on a certain mathematical formula is unlikely to be balanced.

First of all, the theoretical solvability of a game is irrelevant. What matters is if it is practical to solve a game. You might theoretically be able to solve a more complex balanced game if you had enough time and computing power, but if you don't have those things then the theory is just an irrelevant math proof. And the simple fact is that, while chess has been solved, the various balanced-but-more-complex chess variants haven't been solved yet (and likely won't be in the foreseeable future).

Second, this has absolutely nothing to do with balance. Games aren't solved because they're balanced, they're solved because they're simple. Basic chess has a (relatively) small number of possible moves to evaluate, especially as you reach endgame situations where only a few pieces are left on the board. Therefore it's possible to attempt every possible move (and then every possible move to follow it, etc) and see which ones lead to winning the game. And then once you've done that you can focus on memorizing the ideal plays. But balance is absolutely irrelevant here, if you destroy balance by allowing black pawns to move like queens then you still have a solvable game, just one where the solution consists of "if your opponent is stupid enough to play white, crush them with your overpowered pawns".

The reason a game like 40k can't be (practically) solved is that the sheer complexity of the rules, combined with the randomness of the dice, is beyond our current ability to evaluate completely. You can come to general conclusions (unit X is overpowered, spam it), but you can never prove that, say, moving unit X exactly 4.5" forward instead of 4.7" is the perfect play to make in a given situation. But this won't necessarily be the case forever, given sufficient computing power you could model an entire game of 40k and come up with the perfect list and the perfect play in every situation.

You mean, by fixing the point values. In other words, by having the point values adhere precisely to the strict mathematical formula that balances the game? The strict formula that will eventually lead to having to memorize an incredible number of strategies that will allow "List A" to win if it comes up against "List B".

First, no, not a formula, because no such formula can exist for a game with as many complex rules as 40k. The way you balance a game like 40k is through cycles of trial and error in playtesting: assign a unit your best guess of an appropriate point value, playtest a bunch, and then adjust the point cost up or down depending on the results. And then you playtest it again and make another change. Eventually you converge on a value that might not be 100% mathematically perfect, but is close enough to make the game enjoyable.

Second, we're not talking about fine-tuning absolutely perfect point values. You don't need a complex formula to realize that Vendettas are too cheap at 130 points. You can argue a lot about whether they should be 170 points or 175 points, but if you publish a codex with 130 point Vendettas you're an incompetent moron.

How many of these models do we want to sell?
How will this miniature at points value X work to shake up the current meta, forcing gamers to go out and buy more of our other models to counteract the presence of this new model?

And guess what: this is incompetent game design. Seriously, why is it so hard to understand that it's bad game design if you willingly say "I don't care about what's good for the game" and deliberately make overpowered rules to sell models?

Even producers of more balanced wargames (such as Warmachine) understand this concept, and deliberately release over-powered models to shake up the meta from time to time.

Except that's stupid game design. Releasing blatantly overpowered new rules changes the metagame, but it's a boring metagame change. A new metagame which consists of "buy $400 worth of Riptides" is a very shallow addition from a strategy perspective. Once you've identified the overpowered addition (or, more likely, netlisted it) all you have to do is buy it. Good game design adds balanced stuff to the game, so that it takes time and skill to analyze the new additions and decide how to change your strategies in response.

However, can anyone deny that WoW is a good game?

Easily. WoW is a slot machine with pretty pictures. It's very good at keeping people addicted, just like casinos make lots of money off stupid people with slot machines, but I don't think it's a very good game. Grinding is boring as hell, and if you take away the gambling addiction aspect of rare items (which are constantly made obsolete by patches so you have to keep gambling) you probably don't have anywhere near that many people playing it.

Peregine is also making the common assumption that GW do not play-test their games. This is utterly incorrect. How do I know this to be the case? Because I and other former hosts of of the Chaos of the Warp podcast (as well as many of our guest hosts, listeners and interviewees) have been play-testers for GW. As have many of the players who regularly attended Chaos of the Warp tournaments.

Sigh. GW doesn't use adequate playtesting. We've seen WD articles describing "playtest" games which consisted of "let's play a cool scenario on our lunch break", and that kind of game isn't providing any useful feedback. And we've seen statements from GW playtesters that GW openly ignored their feedback. And finally we've seen GW publish rules with balance problems and ambiguous (or outright broken) rules that even minimally competent playtesting would have caught. So the conclusion is that GW might have "playtesters", but their playtesting work is laughably inadequate.

So I'll also point out that every single person who actually plays 40K 6th edition (which does not, alas, include Peregrine) is essentially a play-tester for the game, as the very fact that GW releases FAQ's will attest.

This is a joke, because GW doesn't release anywhere near enough FAQs. They did a few around the initial release of 6th edition, but now they're few and far between while obvious rule problems continue to generate long YMDC arguments where nobody has a clear answer. And GW doesn't release balance FAQs/errata at all, so don't even attempt to claim that they're using the community for playtesting.

By the way, many Wow updates are also accompanied by a patch released a few hours or a few days later. This is a simple consequence of the fact that the relative handful of people who test or proof-read a computer game, table-top wargame or even a novel cannot pick up on every error. It's not until release (when the number of eyes looking over a product rises exponentially) that some issues get noticed. GW is no different from anyone else in that regard.

Yes, issues will exist. The point here is that GW's issues are so obvious that missing them is utter incompetence. The fact that everyone makes mistakes shouldn't prevent us from understanding that some people make a lot more mistakes than others.

I personally believe that GW has found that medium with 6th edition 40K.

And you are simply wrong. GW could make major improvements in balance and rule clarity without sacrificing any (meaningful) depth. Their failure to do so is entirely the result of laziness and/or incompetence, not reasonable design priority decisions.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 LeadLegion wrote:
The DA codex was written before we'd had a chance to see just how much the new flier rules would upset the apple-cartl. It came out too soon after the edition change to properly take into account the new meta

And this is unbelievable incompetence! Even decent playtesting should have spotted this problem with plenty of time to fix it. There are only two possibilities here: either GW is too incompetent to manage even basic things like "hey, let's make sure everyone has enough AA", or GW doesn't care enough about the quality of their rules to bother trying.

 BoomWolf wrote:

 Galorian wrote:

 Brometheus wrote:
Hoo boy.

Just played a 1500pt vs. 30 GK Terminators and a Librarian as Thousand Sons with Ahriman, 5 spawn, a Predator and a Helbrute.

I won, and I didn't need a Heldrake to do it. That's not saying that I'm some uber player- No, his terminators did roll a lot of 1's and I had lots of good psychic tests..

Tell me how the game is broken?

Players make choices. You CHOOSE to bring that Wraithknight/Riptide x3/Imperial Knight. I'm not saying anything that hasn't already been said here, of course.. CHOOSE who and what YOU play against. Nothing wrong with that, friends. : ]

As a complete n00b I took my brand new less than half painted Necron army and effortlessly wiped the floor with the Dark Eldar army of a guy who's been playing them for years and had a won couple of tournament with them in his day, and I didn't even use fliers to do it- just a bunch of footslogging Immortals, a couple of Barges and a squad of Wraiths.

There was nothing he could do- His melee units got the crap beat out of them even when they were the ones doing the assaulting, his shooting was mostly ineffectual and anything my guns got pointed at went up in flames almost automatically.

I really hope his DE get relevant again sometime soon- he's a great player with awesome painting skills and a beautiful army, and it's a shame to see it gather dust on the shelf.

I know who you are talking about, his main issue was he was stuck in 5th edition mindset, and played as such.

I mean, last i faced him it was against the PDF tau (pre codex), and he just gave me free kills left and right by awkward positioning of units (clearly underestimating my shooting power in an army with nothing BUT shooting power), and fielding unit far less impressive the i could expect Deldar to-he army was mostly foot-sluggers, and he was hiding behind an ADL with his bulk of the force.
That's not how I know Deldar to play.....
Especially not in a turny when people are expected to be more brutal then usual.

Yes, he won at his days, but he played as if it is still "his days" back when SW and GK superelites were your biggest problems and not as if the meta has shifted to great numbers of guns all over the place.
And his lists are made as such-they are built to take down the 5th edition armies.
When the same veteran is being pummeled by not one, but two different new players, each with another army, and one of them with a remarkably weak codex (back then, now its amazing), the issue is probably not power creep, something in the veteran just broke.

His main problem, is that he played his single DE army type TOO MUCH, and got stuck in its mindset, and did not adapt to th changes in the rules and the meta quite well.
Maybe the eventual new codex will make him look at his army again from the ground up, because that's what new codcies tend to do-and when he starts from scratch he will work it out.
Heck, after his long brake, if he starts from scratch right now, it can work. as long he wont fall back into old habits.


As for the lack of noise in the 40k groups-its not despite the upcoming turny, its BECAUSE. we are hiding our aces, and getting all sneaky-like.
AFAIK, you are the only one to know what on earth I have up my sleeve, and even you only have a general concept of how it works.
When the turny will actually take place, I think we will see a massive climb of noise, especially if the organizers will set up good batreps of the fights going on there-these things attract attention.



Back to the main issue.
Honestly, I love the concept behind every single change I've seen so far, its the implants of such that disappoints me.
Mainly, playtesting.
You may argue they DO playtest, but they obviously don't do a good job at it.
Yes, you dont need a 100% math formula for things, but I can count things that are grossly overpowered and should have been caught: C'tan, reverent, IA riptides with support commanders, screamerstar, seer council, IH superchaptermaster. these combos and superheavies should have been killed long before the print came out.
Also, some things are just grossly undercosted like the annialation barges, night scythes, baleflamer helldrakes, vendettas, and i'm sure there are a few others, who just are obviously too good for the price, and a simple price hike would solve them.
On the other hands, some things are grossly OVERcosted, or plain badly built like stealth suits, rippers, 1k sons, the entire raven guard tactics, etc...(CSM suffers quite a few of these)

GW needs to either fire and replace the beta testers for not catching the most obvious exploits, or the people writing the rules for not listening to the betatesters. (or, if the test period is too short, make it longer and get more testers)
Once they figure out how to properly test the game, it will become a much better game.

You may be right about the DE, but I have serious doubts about the tourney- so far as Tal tells it there's like 3-4 people who've registered (though that may have changed since last we spoke, I'll have to ask him about it after the registration closes).

I didnt, because i'm waiting for the last possible moment.

Also. possibly, the other clubs had bigger registrations (there are 3 turnies, and you cant register to more then one. maybe the dates and locations of the others were more comfortable to most?)

Part of the reason turnies get less-then-optimal attendence here, is that not everyone is like us, capable and wiling to bring out the big guns.
The younger groups, more casual ones, don't even bother-they don't have the time to dedicate to it, nor the army to put up a list to compete, or the skills to take it into hardcore mode.
They know that even if they win-they cant claim the rewards.
The serious ones...well, be both know they are mostly in the technion club, and that many people are like me and want to wait for the last possible moment before committing to anything.

 BoomWolf wrote:
I didnt, because i'm waiting for the last possible moment.

Also. possibly, the other clubs had bigger registrations (there are 3 turnies, and you cant register to more then one. maybe the dates and locations of the others were more comfortable to most?)

Part of the reason turnies get less-then-optimal attendence here, is that not everyone is like us, capable and wiling to bring out the big guns.
The younger groups, more casual ones, don't even bother-they don't have the time to dedicate to it, nor the army to put up a list to compete, or the skills to take it into hardcore mode.
They know that even if they win-they cant claim the rewards.
The serious ones...well, be both know they are mostly in the technion club, and that many people are like me and want to wait for the last possible moment before committing to anything.

Fair enough.

I got into second edition when I was 12-13 years old and the kids in the neighborhood just played last man standing multiplayer games until someone won. I couldn't imagine how that would go today- the kid with the divorced parents and the shiniest toys would wipe everyone else off the table.

This is slightly a tangent to the whole whirlwind that this thread has spiraled into, but:

Why (why, why, why) is balance always written in terms of the model's rules?

GW has a game where models have rules, and points costs. It would be a lot simpler, and a lot more elegant, for GW to try to balance the 'game' by altering points costs, rather than by altering model (or army) rules. Heck, you could rebalance the entire game on a few sheets of paper!

I think it is fine for models to have cool, even insane, rules, so long as those rule reflect the feel of the 40K universe. Does getting whacked by a Knight's Chainsword kill you dead, dead, dead? Yes! So fine--make the model behave in the game like it is supposed to behave in the fluff. Are marines supposed to be kickass warriors whose armor protects them from almost any threat? Fine, make them that way and stop putting out tons of AP3 weaponry!

Having said that, then balance the game using the points. If Knights kill almost anything in CC, then make them expensive! If graviton weapons are really supposed to kill heavily armored, insanely well protected models more easily than an unarmed grot, fine---but make them expensive! If some unit is supposed to be awesome and kick-ass, then just make them awesome and kick-ass---and then charge a bunch of points for it!

I'm all for the game having as many, or more, amazing, over-the-top, deadly units, models, and weapons, but that shouldn't mean that all of those things need to be points-costed conservatively.


To contrast this with chess, chess doesn't use a points cost system at all. It does use a bit of 'rarity', in that 'more capable' pieces are limited in number compared to the basic pawn, and chess is balanced by having identical army compositions with identical rules for pieces on both sides.

Warhammer doesn't (and shouldn't) have identical army compositions, nor should all sides have identical rules (where a basic troop for every army has the same stat line). But it also doesn't have to achieve (or approach) game balance by having each army have access to all of the same special rules, either. It can work towards a 'balanced game' by adjusting points values so that more effective models cost more in the game.

This is one of my two biggest frustrations with GW and new editions of the rules and army books. Rather than fixing points values, GW changes the rules to 'rebalance' units, and basically throws away several years of stress-testing. "Hey, the Rhino Rush is super-effective! Should we make Rhinos cost more?" "No, let's change the rules for assaults, and the rules for disembarking, and the rules for damaging vehicles. See what that does." If the Rhino (or whatever) is working the way the Rhino is supposed to behave in the fluff, but it's become a prevalent, overwhelming tactic, then obviously it is more effective than its points cost would suggest. Adjust that.

(The other frustration being, of course, armies/models whose rules don't reflect how the army/unit is supposed to be working in the 40K universe.)

Changing points costs rather than rules would have so many beneficial knock-on effects that I just can't understand why it isn't done:

Players would be encouraged to feel free to experiment with many different units and models, because a 'more powerful' unit would be countered by increased availability of less powerful units.

Expanding model collections would be encouraged, because there wouldn't be a few "right builds" for each army, but instead, a wide variety of builds spanning the power vs. cost axis.

Edition shifts would not be as pronounced, as units wouldn't suddenly change in capability or performance, but would shift in points cost, meaning that army lists might change, but not need to be reinvented.

Small points battles would be interesting as an choice between powerful, but scarce units, and many less powerful units, and large scale games would encourage many of the more powerful, expensive options, over spamming 'points-effective' options.

It would be easy to rebalance design errors mid-edition by simply changing a points cost in an errata.



Of course, I realize that there is the specter of abusive combinations or spammed choices, where a unit which is not particularly effective (and thus, not a candidate for being expensive) become much more effective when taken in combination, or when taken in large numbers. While that might seem like an argument against my idea of balancing through points costs, it is really more of an argument against the concept of points costs for models or units in general. So long as you allow a player to generate their own army composition, you are going to have combinations of units which are more or less effective. That can only be avoided through some other sorts of restrictions on army composition (hard limits, required combinations, something...).

I just feel like GW has spent 6 editions reinventing the game, rather than spending 6 editions getting the rules 'right' and balancing the points costs correctly. They aren't any closer to balancing the game than they were in 1st edition, since they keep changing the game while trying to adjust the balance. It would be like adjusting the mixture of ingredients in your cake recipe, but also changing the type of cake you were making each time!

The problem with points costs are that for the most part, they are spiraling ever downward since 2nd edition. Everything keeps getting cheaper to make 1500-2000pt games include more models. Armies of 6th edition can be about 75%-100% larger than 2nd or 3rd edition. Look at Space Marine armies, where a tactical marine used to be 30pts.

Points costs and rules need to be differing ends of a scale, which change in opposite ways at the same time.

The entire first half of Peregrine's argument is based on one fundamental flaw: the failure to recognize the mathematical relationship between game balance and the number of variables (or to, use your own words, "complexity") present in the game.

In other worlds, the more complex the game, the less balanced it will be.

Why? Because they more variables there are, the harder it is to take into account the ramifications of every possible combination of those variables.

This is not, as Peregrine seem's to suggest, my opinion. This is a mathematically proven model which you can find in a good number of academic texts related to game design. Or to put it another way, any of you can go and read the proof yourself if you don't believe me.

My response to the second part of Peregrine's argument is much the same: GW is out to make money. The don't care if the game is balanced. They only care that the game is "balanced enough" to keep making them money.

Peregrine, I don't think you appreciate the connection between this desire to make cash and the various decisions made by the design studio with regards to rules mechanics and game balance.

Basically, GW needs to make a profit to keep the shareholders happy and the share price up. It deliberately under-prices certain units and produces certain death-star combinations in order to increase sales (and because it will shake up the meta). Under-pricing Riptides so that every Tau player immediately goes out and buys a number of their expensive new kits is hardly incompetence. Incompetence suggests they don't know what there doing. The Design team know exactly what they are doing in this respect. By churning over the meta in this way, they don't just recoup the exorbitant costs of the moulds and initial print run of the new model. They also create a knock on effect whereby gamers playing other factions go out and buy hard counters to these new, suddenly prevalent models.

AND on top of that, they also encourage a significant percentage of players with older codices to go out and buy an entire new army for the new faction so that they field these uber-powered new models themselves.

So, by under-pricing certain models, they ensure three things from a sales perspective:

*They recoup their initial costs quickly.
*They get a spike in sales figures.
* They shake up the existing meta.

Most importantly from our perspective, they shake up the meta so we don't get bored with the status quo. These meta-changes are what keep players engaged in a game.

Again, that is not my opinion. This another fundamental premise of game design. It's the difference between happily playing through the same game and the same missions for eight or nine years (aka WoW before they re-wrote some of the early missions) and playing through a game once or twice before abandoning it.

It's not that the design studio are incompetent, it's just that they are driven by the need to sell models. The fact they are able to do that and keep us coming back for more tells me they are in fact very good at what they do. It's not easy to find a happy medium between game balance, play-ability, and sales.

The fact GW are still making a profit despite the inceasing number of competitors suggests that the majority of GW gamers are satisfied enough with the current "game balance" to keep playing the game.

 LeadLegion wrote:
The entire first half of Peregrine's argument is based on one fundamental flaw: the failure to recognize the mathematical relationship between game balance and the number of variables (or to, use your own words, "complexity") present in the game.

In other worlds, the more complex the game, the less balanced it will be.

Why? Because they more variables there are, the harder it is to take into account the ramifications of every possible combination of those variables.

Actually, the flaw is yours.

The more complex the game, the harder it becomes to balance, yes, not that it will inherently be less balanced. If a more complex game suffers lack of balance, it speaks only to the effort or competence of the designers, not to some inherent impossibility in the task.

This is not, as Peregrine seem's to suggest, my opinion. This is a mathematically proven model which you can find in a good number of academic texts related to game design. Or to put it another way, any of you can go and read the proof yourself if you don't believe me.

My response to the second part of Peregrine's argument is much the same: GW is out to make money. The don't care if the game is balanced. They only care that the game is "balanced enough" to keep making them money.

You don't seem to appreciate the connection between this desire to make cash and the various decisions made by the design studio with regards to rules mechanics and game balance.

Basically, GW needs to make a profit to keep the shareholders happy and the share price up. It deliberately under-prices certain units and produces certain death-star combinations in order to increase sales (and because it will shake up the meta). Under-pricing Riptides so that every Tau player immediately goes out and buys a number of their expensive new kits is hardly incompetence. Incompetence suggests they don't know what there doing. The Design team know exactly what they are doing in this respect. By churning over the meta in this way, they don't just recoup the exorbitant costs of the moulds and initial print run of the new model. They also create a knock on effect whereby gamers playing other factions go out and buy hard counters to these new, suddenly prevalent models.

AND on top of that, they also encourage a significant percentage of players with older codices to go out and buy an entire new army for the new action so that they field these uber-powered new models themselves.

So, by under-pricing certain models, they ensure three things from a sales perspective:

*They recoup their initial costs quickly.
*They get a spike in sales figures.
* They shake up the existing meta.

Most importantly from our perspective, they shake up the meta so we don't get bored with the status quo. These meta-changes are what keep players engaged in a game.

Again, that is not my opinion. This another fundamental premise of game design. It's the difference between happily playing through the same game and the same missions for eight or nine years (aka WoW before they re-wrote some of the early missions) and playing through a game once or twice before abandoning it.

It's not that the design studio are incompetent, it's just that they are driven by the need to sell models. The fact they are able to do that and keep us coming back for more tells me they are in fact very good at what they do. It's not easy to find a happy medium between game balance, play-ability, and sales.

The existence of other companies, making money and growing, that are producing more balanced games, with apparently much happier fan bases undermines pretty much all of this. There is a middle ground here, but GW, appropriately, have failed to find the balancing point.

As I've said on numerous occasions, one doesn't need to play 40K in order to play 40K.

 Anfauglir wrote:
Is it just me or does anyone else hear "arse face" when listening to that song?

Always.

@ Arzael: It's my presentation of the argument that is flawed. As the number of variables increases, the prospect of being able to perfectly balance a game becomes so improbable as to be effectively impossible (in practical terms) very, very quickly.

You can use the million monkeys with type-writers argument here, but there comes a point in statistics where the likelihood of a given event occurring becomes so improbable that it becomes essentially irrelevant in practical terms.

As with regards to failing to find the balance point, I would argue again that we have no proof beyond anecdotal evidence that the reason these other companies are performing so well is due to player concerns over how 40K is balanced. Many of the factors I listed as possible reasons for the decline in 40K sales a few posts back are also potential factors for why other companies are growing.

P.S: You're right about the human skill element. The mathematical model doesn't take into account the skill of the design team who are trying to get a game as close to perfect balance as possible. It's easier for a game with fewer variables to approach perfect balance, but a sufficiently skilled design team can make a more complicated game that is better balanced than a similar (but simpler) game with fewer variables.

Da Butcha wrote:
This is slightly a tangent to the whole whirlwind that this thread has spiraled into, but:

Why (why, why, why) is balance always written in terms of the model's rules?

GW has a game where models have rules, and points costs. It would be a lot simpler, and a lot more elegant, for GW to try to balance the 'game' by altering points costs, rather than by altering model (or army) rules. Heck, you could rebalance the entire game on a few sheets of paper!

...
...!

Sometimes it's rules and sometimes it's point costs. Being realistic it can be the combinations that are the problem.

The Space Wolves' Long Fangs were overpowered because you could take so many of them and fill in aspects of Heavy Support with space magic, not because the rules or points were in themselves unfair.

The Riptide isn't ridiculous until you can add Eldar space magic as well as marker lights thanks to the Ally rules.

Looking at Fliers, how would you cost them fairly when some armies don't have any AA capability?

Yep, you're still wrong about everything. But nice job trying to move the goalposts and abandon your argument that balance is bad in favor of "the rule suck, but they suck because GW wants to sell models".

 LeadLegion wrote:
In other worlds, the more complex the game, the less balanced it will be.

No, the more complex the game is the more effort it will take to balance. And remember, we're not asking for mathematically perfect balance. If GW improved balance to the point that the worst possible matchup between reasonably well-designed lists was 60/40 instead of 90/10 most people would be pretty happy with the game, even if it wasn't a perfect 50/50.

My response to the second part of Peregrine's argument is much the same: GW is out to make money. The don't care if the game is balanced. They only care that the game is "balanced enough" to keep making them money.

IOW, lazy and/or incompetent game design. I really don't see how "GW doesn't care enough to bother making a better game" is supposed to support your claim that poor balance is somehow good for the game and a game with better balance would be a step down in fun. In fact this thoroughly demolishes your argument because it's a pretty clear statement that GW has plenty of room to fix balance problems caused by lack of effort without getting into any questions of deliberate imbalance as a metagame driver.

Peregrine, I don't think you appreciate the connection between this desire to make cash and the various decisions made by the design studio with regards to rules mechanics and game balance.

I understand it perfectly well, because that's exactly what I've been accusing GW of doing: putting short-term profits ahead of making a good game. This might be good for business, at least in the immediate future before you've sacrificed so much quality that you start to feel the effects of lost customers, but that doesn't mean that you're making a high-quality product.

Most importantly from our perspective, they shake up the meta so we don't get bored with the status quo. These meta-changes are what keep players engaged in a game.

No, these metagame changes are NOT what keep people engaged. A well-designed and balanced metagame keeps people engaged, because there are lots of subtle details to analyze to figure out the best new strategies. 40k, on the other hand, lacks this balance. The "meta-change" of a new release consists of identifying the most overpowered balance mistakes and then spamming them. Within a day or two of a new release everyone has figured it all out, and all that's left is deciding whether or not you want to spend another $500 on Vendettas/Riptides/whatever to remain competitive. That's an incredibly shallow metagame that doesn't really keep anyone interested. The sad truth is the most interesting metagame discussion with a new release is the arguments about whether the obvious overpowered thing is worth banning or not.

It's not that the design studio are incompetent, it's just that they are driven by the need to sell models. The fact they are able to do that and keep us coming back for more tells me they are in fact very good at what they do. It's not easy to find a happy medium between game balance, play-ability, and sales.

Absolutely not. Continued sales does NOT mean that the game designers are doing a good job, because it neglects three important factors: the people who buy 40k stuff because they love the fluff/models and don't care much about the rules, the short-term customers who buy lots of stuff up front and probably abandon the game before they even build enough of an army to play a real game, and the people who keep playing because GW's dominance of the retail side of the business has made it so that their choices are playing a GW game or not playing any game at all. And if you look at GW's statements about their target market you'll find that long-term customers who keep playing long enough for new releases and metagame shifts to be a factor are a small minority of GW's customers and not really the target of their business strategy.

The fact GW are still making a profit despite the inceasing number of competitors suggests that the majority of GW gamers are satisfied enough with the current "game balance" to keep playing the game.

Not even close. GW's profits are declining significantly, and sales volume is declining even more which means that fewer people are playing GW games. The main reason they're continuing to make a profit at all is their previous dominance of the market gave them so much inertia that it will take a while for these problems to kill the company. A company with that kind of market share isn't going to die overnight unless they make a catastrophically stupid decision, and GW hasn't done that yet.

Also, I love how we've gone from "40k's rules are good and improving balance would be bad for the game" to "40k's rules are adequate enough that not too many of GW's customers are quitting". Don't you think you've got pretty low standards here?

Hi Peregrine. I'm off to bed now so I won't be able to post a full reply until the morning.

However, I can't help but feel that as you much as you like to call people out on logical fallacy's, you're using more than a few logical fallacys of your own here.

Firstly, your argument that the conversation shift from one topic (balance) to another (sales) means my position has changed is a case of "one does not follow the other". The fact the conversation has moved on to a different topic does not mean I have abandoned my stance on the previous topic.
It simply means that we have moved on to a different topic.

Secondly, The rules do not "suck". Those are your words. Not mine. I like the rules as they are, and have said as much repeatedly. Now you're projecting your world view into mine. You're assuming that because I'm aware, like you, that GW's design process is motivated in part by sales that I must also share your belief that the rules "suck". J

ust because the rules are designed with sales in mind it does not mean they "suck" anymore than a computer game sucks because it's operating system is generated with sales in mind.

I'll say it again just to be clear: The fact that I acknowledge that certain GW rules elements are driven by sales rather than game balance, does not mean I think those particular rules (or even the rules in general) "suck".

So, that's two instances of "one does not follow the other" and one of "Mind Projection Fallacy" in the first two lines of your post.

Secondly, you're using a "strawman argument" by claiming that I've said balance is bad. In fact, I've made it clear that some degree of balance is necessary in a game. I said "perfect balance" makes a game less engaging enjoyable for many players. I also said that improving balance does not necessarily make a game more enjoyable or improve the play experience.

This was the basis of my argument that the game is fine as it is. "Good enough for most of us", is how I've put it.

Another point that I argued was that to make the game more balanced, GW would probably have to reduce the number of variables involved, limiting the choices available to players and creating a situation much more akin to Warmachine. A game that, while itself is arguably closer to being balanced in many ways, still is not balanced enough to reduce the effects of random chance to a degree that most competitive players are happy with.

At no point, did I claim that balance was itself inherently bad. Although I can certainly understand why someone with their own agenda might choose to interpret my comments to mean a much.

Anyway back to the rest of those logical fallacy's you love to call other people out on:

You're using anecdotal evidence to explain a statistical trend. I've talked about this already so I don't see the need to explain what I mean by that again

You're continued insistence that that GW sales are falling because gamers are upset with the balance of the game is not only an Appeal to Probability, it is also an Argument from Silence (claiming that because there is no evidence that it isn't the reason, that it must in fact be the reason) and an Argument from Repitition (on the grounds that you clearly believe that repeating the statement often enough will make us believe it). It may also be an example of Fallacy of the Single Cause (the assumption that there is only one overriding cause for a given effect) but that could be down to a mis-reading of you argument on my part.

Essentially, while I am using factual evidence and mathematical proofs to support my arguments, you are using your opinions as evidence to support more of your opinions.

By the way. The logical fallacy of moving the goal-posts is what happens when evidence presented with regards to a specific claim or argument is ignored by the other party and some other evidence is requested. Moving the goal-posts is not, as you seem to think, what happens when someone abandons their position with regards to a given topic or argument to adopt another(which we've already established that I haven't done).

I know I haven't yet addressed most of the points you raised in that last post, but it's after midnight here and I've had a long day. I'll post up a reply to your other discussion points in the morning.

Actually, LeadLegion, one of the most damning evidence that Games Workshop's sales are falling is the fact that their revenue hasn't seen any growth despite the constant price hikes. In fact, it has been in decline for awhile. Basic math says that since one factor has increased while the result hasn't means the other factor has decreased. This is based on their own reports.

As for the (kind of) main argument I simply do not understand why people keep defending Games Workshop sense of balance. It's amateurish at best and for a company with the resources it has it's inexcusable. If Games Workshop wanted to it could have a top notch writing staff with the kind of change they're bringing in. The old excuse that Games Workshop is a models company first and a game company second is plain silly. How is making Sentinels crappy good for sales? Sure, Wraithknights, Riptides and Vendettas are moving like crack but there is a ton of models that are just sitting around. If the games was internally balanced then those models would move too in addition to the big monsters. The Riptide is a cool model regardless of it's rules.

Sadly, Games Workshop seems to have realized making big stupid overpowered models is good at moving plastic but it's going to kill the growth of the game. Not everyone is going to have the change to afford a Riptide, WraithKnight or a Knight and they won't like the fact that someone can stomp on them just because they could shell out the money for the big stupid crap.

Whilst a well balanced game does not guarantee an enjoyable game, I would say that it can be an important ingredient in creating an enjoyable game.

To abuse the chess analogy a bit more, whilst it can occasionally be good sport to spot your opponent a piece if you're significantly better than they are, playing a player of equal skill missing a piece consistently can be frustrating.

Likewise in a 40k game, while playing unbalanced armies can provide an interesting challenge when done occasionally, playing that way all the time can be frustrating.

Perhaps the easiest way, at least given the rules we have, is to come up with a handicap factor where armies get extra points based on their relative power.

Tau and Eldar might have a factor of 1.00, where they get 100% of the agreed points limit.

Space Marines on the other hand might have a factor of 1.10, which means they get 110% of the agreed points limit.

Tyranids might get a 1.15 gaining 15% more points.

Orks might have a factor of 1.2, gaining 20% more points.

This of course would require trial and error to get rough benchmark figures.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
Actually, LeadLegion, one of the most damning evidence that Games Workshop's sales are falling is the fact that their revenue hasn't seen any growth despite the constant price hikes. In fact, it has been in decline for awhile. Basic math says that since one factor has increased while the result hasn't means the other factor has decreased. This is based on their own reports.

No one here (least of all me) has been denying that GW profits and sales are declining. I'm simply pointing out that the tendency to blame this decline on a single factor (usually it's either "because game balance sucks" or "because the prices are too high) is over-simplistic, deceptive and unhelpful. I've already listed a good half-dozen factors that could also be contributing to GW's declining sales just a few posts back.. It's impossible for us to know for sure which of these factors (if any) is more significant than the others.

Secondly, no one here is defending GW's sense of balance. I'm certainly not claiming that 40K is balanced. In fact , I'm suggesting the opposite. I'm basically stating that the game is "balanced enough" for us to enjoy it. What I am doing is explaining the factors that contribute to the current "balance" or "im-balance" of the game and how the current game balance came about.

However, there are certain other posters here who have a vested interest in twisting my central argument:

"the current game balance is good enough for most of us, and that's good enough."

....into a subtly different argument which is far more difficult to defend ("40K is balanced") in order to strengthen their own arguments. It is a "straw-man" argument that is being perpetuated by other users on this forum and I'm afraid you've possibly been taken in by it.

Grammar Girl describes it better than I ever could, so I've pasted her explanation of what a "Staw Man" argument is below.

A Straw Man:
Debaters invoke a straw man when they put forth an argument--usually something extreme or easy to argue against--that they know their opponent doesn't support. You put forth a straw man because you know it will be easy for you to knock down or discredit. It's a way of misrepresenting your opponent's position.

It can be annoyingly effective because in response you may be lured into clarifying what your position is not instead of talking about what your position is, and studies have shown that when you repeat a lie, even if you are repeating it to refute it, the repetition can reinforce the misinformation in the minds of some people

- See more at: http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/what-is-a-straw-man-argument#sthash.HkccPfGn.dpuf

So, the simple fact that I'm having to explain what I'm really saying so often is actually strengthening Peregrine's argument. Which is itself based on a fallacy of repetition. Basically, he's repeating the same opinions again and again (despite having no evidence to back up his position) in the hopes that it will convince people to adopt his position. It's not accidental. Peregrine might get the nomenclature wrong from time to time, (such as when he incorrectly describes my participation in moving the conversation on to a new topic as "moving the goal posts") but he knows how to use logical fallacy to strengthen his argument. This is despite his being so quick to call other people out for using logical fallacy's (even when they are not

Essentially, by providing a reasoned refutation of his points, I've given Peregrine a platform to repeat his unbalanced, unbiased arguments time and again.

The trap here is that if I continue to speak out against him, Peregrine gets to continue spouting his biased vitriol for as long as he likes. If I don't continue to reply, he can point to my silence and claim I've stopped arguing because I no longer disagree with him.

Peregrine, has a good career waiting for himself in marketing, law or politics.

P.S With regards to Peregrine's last post: In debates, a common strategy is to make this accusation in order to re-claim audience support when you feel you are losing the debate. Studies have shown that simply stating that the other party has "moved the goalposts" produces a knee-jerk psychological reaction that makes a reader assume that the goal-posts have indeed been moved. Why? because moving the goalposts mid-debate is a despicably underhanded thing to do. The common assumption is that no-one would possibly make that accusation unless it was true. Many people therefore take the accusation at face value, without bothering to examine for themselves whether or not the goal-posts really have been moved. Thereby casting doubt on the accused party's entire position

I'm not saying that this was the case. Peregrine may not have been aware of the psychological weight behind the statement. I'm just pointing out the effects that such an accusation can have on the ability to analyse an argument logically.

The only people I see not using facts are the ones who are trying to defend GW's policies or using the old "change the rules if you don't like it" ridiculousness...

I'm not defending them. I'm explaining what those policies are and why they exist.

As to your second point, I really don't understand why you have such a huge aversion to using house rules? Have you never played a custom scenario with your friends?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Freman Bloodglaive wrote:

Perhaps the easiest way, at least given the rules we have, is to come up with a handicap factor where armies get extra points based on their relative power.

Tau and Eldar might have a factor of 1.00, where they get 100% of the agreed points limit.

Space Marines on the other hand might have a factor of 1.10, which means they get 110% of the agreed points limit.

Tyranids might get a 1.15 gaining 15% more points.

Orks might have a factor of 1.2, gaining 20% more points.

This of course would require trial and error to get rough benchmark figures.

This is probably by far one of the better "handicap" ideas I've come across. I think you're right about the amount of trial and error involved and I'm not entirely sure how practical it would be. But for purposes of converting a "fun" game like 40K into something balanced enough for tournament play in it's current incarnation it could be a good starting point. It doesn't change the FOC chart or limit the choices of players who have a better codex.

It's a good house rule for tournaments to adopt, much like Bay Area Open scenarios and changing the 2++ re-reollable save into 2++/4++.

As you say, it would need a good amount of play-testing as well as other refinements to make it payable though. Do the codices that get more points that the base allowance get access to another FOC? Or do they use the same number of FOC's as everyone else? That's just one issue that popped into my head.

Again, I'm not sure how practical the concept is, but I like the idea of it.

*sigh* Better explain my position again to head off yet another straw man argument:

****The stats suggest that 40k is still played by more people than any other wargame. Therefore "40k is balanced enough for most of us. therefore 40K is balanced enough". Note that "most of us" means most people who play 40K. Most people who play 40K do not participate in high-level tournament play.

***40K is not designed for tournament play and is not balanced for tournaments. I don't see anything wrong with adopting house rules in tournament play to make the game more balanced for the minority of people who want to play in a tournament environment.

***I do not have any problem with the adoption of house rules in a casual gaming environment either. As I've already said, we allow the use of fan-codices in our games.

***Supporting the use of rule house does not mean I think the game requires the use of house rules to be enjoyable.

***I do have a problem with the concept that official 40K rules should be re-written as a tournament friendly game at the expense of the casual gamer.

***I do have a problem with the poor level of "technical" writing in the rulebooks that leave game rules open to ambiguity. However, that is not a game balance issue. That is a writing quality issue. The two are related, but still separate.

***I do have a problem with people who haven't even played the current edition (or even a recent edition) of the game, but who seem to think they are still experts on the game regardless.

None of these views are mutually exclusive or contradictory. They are not black and white. Please don't misconstrue them as such.

Been waiting a while to find a good use for this one, I believe LeadLegion's arguments qualify:

 LeadLegion wrote:
I'm not defending them. I'm explaining what those policies are and why they exist.

As to your second point, I really don't understand why you have such a huge aversion to using house rules? Have you never played a custom scenario with your friends?

In the US at least the majority of games are pick-up games at a game store, not custom scenarios with friends. You can't reasonably make house rules beyond the basics (e.g. how many points, what supplements, if you're lucky "casual vs. competitive" lists) or you'd never find a game because who wants to be given a sheet of house rules by a stranger before a game?

Most games that I've been a part of and seen go like the following:

Person A: Up for a game?
Person B: Sure, I have my Tau army. What are you playing?
Person A: Salamanders.
Person B: Cool. Points?
Person A: I only have 1500.
Person B: No problem. No Escalation?
Person A: Right.
Person B: Casual or competitive?
Person A: Casual.
Person B: Sounds good, give me a few minutes to work up a list.

The extra rules (Flyers, Fortifications, Escalation, etc.) are what should have stayed the domain of "custom scenarios with your friends" instead of being positioned as things usable for any old game.

WayneTheGame wrote:

 LeadLegion wrote:
I'm not defending them. I'm explaining what those policies are and why they exist.

As to your second point, I really don't understand why you have such a huge aversion to using house rules? Have you never played a custom scenario with your friends?

In the US at least the majority of games are pick-up games at a game store, not custom scenarios with friends. You can't reasonably make house rules beyond the basics (e.g. how many points, what supplements, if you're lucky "casual vs. competitive" lists) or you'd never find a game because who wants to be given a sheet of house rules by a stranger before a game?

Most games that I've been a part of and seen go like the following:

Person A: Up for a game?
Person B: Sure, I have my Tau army. What are you playing?
Person A: Salamanders.
Person B: Cool. Points?
Person A: I only have 1500.
Person B: No problem. No Escalation?
Person A: Right.
Person B: Casual or competitive?
Person A: Casual.
Person B: Sounds good, give me a few minutes to work up a list.

The extra rules (Flyers, Fortifications, Escalation, etc.) are what should have stayed the domain of "custom scenarios with your friends" instead of being positioned as things usable for any old game.

I don't think the majority of games are played via FLGS, nor can this be accurately quantified- you appear to be basing this off of your personal experiences and then applying it as a blanket statement to why 'house ruling won't work'.

I will agree that for pickup games the 6e ruleset (with the introduction of Allies, Fortifications, Escalation, etc..) is very unforgiving and unbalanced for this style of play. As has been discussed to death at this point by many posters though is that GW is no longer catering to this style of play (the argument is not whether this is a good/bad idea, balanced, or fiscally endearing). The current state of the game is anything goes, and this is not problematic when played casually.

So it's not so much that the ruleset is bad (opinion), so much that the ruleset is not accommodating to a particular style of play. This is unfortunate for those do not have smaller casual circles to game with (although I would argue that if you regularly play at an FLGS to find your games, there is no excuse not to at least attempt to create a casual circle).

Home rules/home brew/modification is a godsend. Don't like something? Tweak it yourself.

Name a single PC game that has not been improved via mods. I'll wait.

@ Galorian: I don't see what a tuning fork with legs has to do with anything

But nah. Moving goalposts is when you ask for proof of a given point, them ignore that proof and ask for more proof. So nope, doesn't apply. Cos all I did was move on from banging my head against a wall to talking about something construcitive

@Xenosterminus: Well put. I pretty much agree with everything you've just said.

I don't know if it's been said earlier in this thread, but asymmetrical/narrative games can be a lot of fun.
for example 500pts of space marines in a "hunter-killer" list vs 750 pts of IG armor. It can be fun to break the rules with your opponent, experiment with alternative FOCs and point limits etc and it really makes for more fun, diverse casual play.

 LeadLegion wrote:
@ Galorian: I don't see what a tuning fork with legs has to do with anything

But nah. Moving goalposts is when you ask for proof of a given point, them ignore that proof and ask for more proof. So nope, doesn't apply. Cos all I did was move on from banging my head against a wall to talking about something construcitive

@Xenosterminus: Well put. I pretty much agree with everything you've just said.

Moving goalposts can also be commencing an argument with one position, and subtly (or sometimes, not) changing that position.

For a perfect example, pick an argument with a woman, then watch what happens when she realises that you're correct half way through. All of a sudden the scope of the argument will change to ensure that you are, once again, wrong.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Squidmanlolz wrote:
I don't know if it's been said earlier in this thread, but asymmetrical/narrative games can be a lot of fun.
for example 500pts of space marines in a "hunter-killer" list vs 750 pts of IG armor. It can be fun to break the rules with your opponent, experiment with alternative FOCs and point limits etc and it really makes for more fun, diverse casual play.

But this sort of thing should be firmly in the hands of the player. Frankly, some armies need something approaching a 50% head start just for a fair game if you play the rules as they're written, which is where the problem lies.

 azreal13 wrote:

 LeadLegion wrote:
@ Galorian: I don't see what a tuning fork with legs has to do with anything

But nah. Moving goalposts is when you ask for proof of a given point, them ignore that proof and ask for more proof. So nope, doesn't apply. Cos all I did was move on from banging my head against a wall to talking about something construcitive

@Xenosterminus: Well put. I pretty much agree with everything you've just said.

Moving goalposts can also be commencing an argument with one position, and subtly (or sometimes, not) changing that position.

For a perfect example, pick an argument with a woman, then watch what happens when she realises that you're correct half way through. All of a sudden the scope of the argument will change to ensure that you are, once again, wrong.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Squidmanlolz wrote:
I don't know if it's been said earlier in this thread, but asymmetrical/narrative games can be a lot of fun.
for example 500pts of space marines in a "hunter-killer" list vs 750 pts of IG armor. It can be fun to break the rules with your opponent, experiment with alternative FOCs and point limits etc and it really makes for more fun, diverse casual play.

But this sort of thing should be firmly in the hands of the player. Frankly, some armies need something approaching a 50% head start just for a fair game if you play the rules as they're written, which is where the problem lies.

I just don't see this (casually, admittedly).

Very rarely have games been so one-sided, regardless of the armies being played, that it seems like particular scenarios are drastically unbalanced or in a particular players favor before any dice are rolled.

Granted, this is with the assumption neither player, if they are playing a better book, are abusing (yes, spamming the best a book has to offer is abuse, especially against worse books) the best they have to offer. I am not condoning taking 'bad lists', as many here would put it, just that it just isn't as common of an issue to what I would classify the 'common' player will encounter.

So while it is certainly my opinion/observation that the game is not in nearly as bad of shape as a lot of people claim, when you approach the game with the same mindset GW designed it with- it's much harder to find problems and definitely easier to enjoy the game. The more serious you take it the less you will enjoy it.

The fact that you're enjoying the game and not finding huge issues is a massive plus for you, the fact that a lot of people are posting they find the game poorly written and unbalanced to the point where they are finding it frustrating to, or almost to, the point of stopping playing, suggests your viewpoint may well be in the minority, possibly to the point of irrelevance.

The game is infinitely more workable if you play as a stable social group. I suspect you'll find that most people calling for a top-down fix, rather than a house fix don't have that luxury.

Besides, GW are supposed to sell models and kits that require an investment of time and effort in order to work as they are intended, not rulesets.

 azreal13 wrote:
The game is infinitely more workable if you play as a stable social group. I suspect you'll find that most people calling for a top-down fix, rather than a house fix don't have that luxury.

QFT. The game (at least its present incarnation) seems to be designed under the assumption that you're playing with a social group that all know each other or at the very least have someone who can vouch for them so you can have sort of a gentleman's agreement over what is fair and what is looked down on. That doesn't appear to be the case for a lot of players though, who don't have the luxury of a social group but play at a third-party location (e.g. a game store) and have to rely on what amounts to strangers showing up for a game; in most cases you never really become more than acquaintances with these people even if you regularly play them at the store.

The whole idea of just houseruling troublesome things away breaks down in that regard because you can't expect a random player to adhere or even know about your house rules, and be willing to use them while it's a lot easier to have "Club Guidelines" posted on your club's website/clubhouse/whatever and make sure all new members follow it.

 azreal13 wrote:
The fact that you're enjoying the game and not finding huge issues is a massive plus for you, the fact that a lot of people are posting they find the game poorly written and unbalanced to the point where they are finding it frustrating to, or almost to, the point of stopping playing, suggests your viewpoint may well be in the minority, possibly to the point of irrelevance.

The game is infinitely more workable if you play as a stable social group. I suspect you'll find that most people calling for a top-down fix, rather than a house fix don't have that luxury.

Besides, GW are supposed to sell models and kits that require an investment of time and effort in order to work as they are intended, not rulesets.

Perhaps this '6.5/7th' edition will remedy this?

I can't even say that with a straight face.

I know it's been discussed to death as something not particularly viable, but how many conglomerate efforts have been placed into playtesting some sort of universal 'patch' to address the glaring issues with the game?

Clearly there are shared opinions, and the people that are not opposed to or already house rule would not frown upon such a concept. The only hurdle, I think, would be overcoming the challenge of pickup game incorporation, but again pickup games are really the only area I feel 40k doesn't work with anymore so perhaps that is a lost cause.

I'm fairly sure I have it in me, not to just house rule, but to totally overhaul the rules system, to the point where I feel I can get it 90+% compatible with codexes and offer a much more balanced, tactical game (note - more balanced, to approach anything close to really balanced one would probably need to overhaul points costs too)

I'm also fairly sure I can persuade my local club to adopt it if I get it sufficiently right.

Doesn't help anyone who wants to play in the local GW or a shop in the next town over though, and that's why we need a top down fix and why house ruling is limited, and despite what you're saying, you're the first person I've ever seen assert that pick up games are in any way a minority, nearly every game I've played in the last 3 years since starting again has been a pick up game, even if organised a week in advance. I play at a club, who else is there varies from week to week - this sort of set up seems to be the norm in the UK for many, and pick up games in stores seems to be the norm for many in the US.

Those who play at home in social groups may well be less vocal, but fixing the game for the pick up crowd won't affect them in the slightest, and even if the PUC are a minority, they're an undoubtedly a significant and vocal one, and it would do GW well to try and keep them happy.

What they need to do is very simple:

* Balance the "core" rules of the game to be suitable for competitive/tournament/pick-up game play e.g. remove Battle Brothers, remove some randomness

* Add "optional" rules, this would include Flyers (rework existing transports), Escalation, Fortifications and the like.

The optional rules would need a disclaimer or something basically stating that they are meant for adding depth to narrative/campaign/story-driven games and require your opponent's permission to use, with an added disclaimer saying they are not intended for use in pick-up games or competitive games.

Assuming balanced standard rules this is the best of both worlds - None of the broken stuff in pickup games or tournaments, but if you are doing a narrative game and want to do some cool things, then you have the rules at your disposal because both of you would agree to do it.

All of these additional rules muck up a competitive setting but are perfectly fine if you're having some huge Siege of Terra-like battle with titans and a huge castle and the like, and that's where it should stay instead of allowing Bob to turn up to a game and drop down a Revenant or a huge heap of fortifications because the rules let him buy it for his army.

 azreal13 wrote:
I'm fairly sure I have it in me, not to just house rule, but to totally overhaul the rules system, to the point where I feel I can get it 90+% compatible with codexes and offer a much more balanced, tactical game (note - more balanced, to approach anything close to really balanced one would probably need to overhaul points costs too)

I don't think a top-down overhaul would work if your aim is to fix the game whilst keeping it compatible with the existing Codices. So many of 40K's problems come from the Codices themselves, that an overhaul of one requires the overhaul of another.

Why not just standard rules and a tournament ruleset that plays off the BRB with balance.

So you want to play official tournaments here are the guidelines.

Beer and pretzels? Just the normal rules.

But this would require them to have a tournament rules team.

 LeadLegion wrote:
Peregrine said:

"Now let's try to "improve" chess by the GW method: destroying balance. Let's make it so each player chooses their color, and both players can play the same color. White functions exactly as it does now, but the black king has an additional rule that black automatically wins the game if the other player doesn't also play black. According to your model this should reduce the skill gap, but in reality it doesn't. No player with more than a basic understanding of the game is ever going to play white, so all you've added is an additional opportunity for an inexperienced player to lose the game."

Actually, un-balanced versions of chess are a far better, much more enjoyable and far more accessible for new players. Ever played battle chess? I'm not talking about the old PC game from the 90's. I'm talking about the huge variety of "variant" rules systems which exist that make Chess a better game in terms of enjoyment. I'm talking about, for example, the type of Chess Game that includes playing cards with one off optional rules. Such as "play this card on any pawn you control. That pawn may move backwards one square".

I think you guys are looking for: Alessio Cavatore’s Shuuro.

The arguing over competitive or balance I think is well covered here:
http://pinsofwar.com/competitive-40k-does-not-exist/

Best quote:

"Being “good at the metagame” of Warhammer 40K takes no skill. It only takes staying abreast with Games Workshop’s latest. If you take a break for 6 months and come back to “competitive” 40K with your 6th-month-old game, you’ll find that things have moved on. Everything you did before those 6th months will mean squat and you will start at the same point any new player starts, once she/he has gotten to the point of knowing the rules and how to avoid obvious mistakes.

Inversely, if you win a Warhammer 40K tournament, it doesn’t say anything about you or your “skills”. All it says is that you brought the right list at the right time. Nothing more."

Tournaments are a laugh since it really is just bring the flavor of the month understand the basic use / deployment and liberal use of "natural rolling" and you can win like a pro!



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 LeadLegion wrote:
*sigh* Better explain my position again to head off yet another straw man argument:

I like summaries!

****The stats suggest that 40k is still played by more people than any other wargame. Therefore "40k is balanced enough for most of us. therefore 40K is balanced enough". Note that "most of us" means most people who play 40K. Most people who play 40K do not participate in high-level tournament play.

Creating "epic" scenarios allows a way to "balance" games, we allowed switching sides and playing again for fun as well. For gaming it works, tournaments are not fun.

***40K is not designed for tournament play and is not balanced for tournaments. I don't see anything wrong with adopting house rules in tournament play to make the game more balanced for the minority of people who want to play in a tournament environment.

Same as above, a well played scenario can be balanced for an even scrap. Just using the rules as they stand are too many variables to allow any form of balance.

***I do not have any problem with the adoption of house rules in a casual gaming environment either. As I've already said, we allow the use of fan-codices in our games.

It allows for what few armies are not covered, we use a modified 2nd edition Squat codex, updated for 6th edition.

***Supporting the use of rule house does not mean I think the game requires the use of house rules to be enjoyable.

The only difficulty is the game is presented that you create a specific point value army and you can go anywhere and play with no modification. This is misleading.

***I do have a problem with the concept that official 40K rules should be re-written as a tournament friendly game at the expense of the casual gamer.

I would suggest one of their famous "supplement" type codex's like Escalation but one that is specific for tournament play. All manor of tweaks could be thrown into that book and then it could be optional for "normal" play.

***I do have a problem with the poor level of "technical" writing in the rulebooks that leave game rules open to ambiguity. However, that is not a game balance issue. That is a writing quality issue. The two are related, but still separate.

The writing is typically very casual I think with the intent to be more accessible to the general public rather than the quasi-legal-exact-wording document it needs to be.

***I do have a problem with people who haven't even played the current edition (or even a recent edition) of the game, but who seem to think they are still experts on the game regardless.

As pointed out, it keeps changing so an "expert" is out of date as early as the next supplement/codex release. People can be experts in pointing out how new rules sets are perceived better or worse than prior however.

None of these views are mutually exclusive or contradictory. They are not black and white. Please don't misconstrue them as such.

Anyone trying to portray any rules from GW in black and white terms will have a fight on their hands; there are many shades of grey.

My focus is for more flexibility to create scenarios I want, not making tighter rules, so the strength of my support for holding GW's feet to the fire is minimal.
Reducing cost I would support more but GW made it clear that they think cost is not a factor worth considering so buying used models is still the norm for me.

Good luck with you two sparring.
I think both groups have many correct statements just that the focus is different and that is where you cannot agree:
1) Casual gaming to play how you want: the rules achieve that goal.
2) Tight rules for tournament play or a more "competitive" environment it is just not there.

I do not see Peregrine getting his way at least with the management GW has now; they do not want to prevent you from justifying getting any model you want (Allies, Escalation).
Unfortunately he is trying to rally the troops in an environment mainly made up of fluff bunnies (40k at least) so he is doomed to disappointment.
I think the more competitive players have moved on to other game systems and he is admirably hanging in there.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 azreal13 wrote:
I'm fairly sure I have it in me, not to just house rule, but to totally overhaul the rules system, to the point where I feel I can get it 90+% compatible with codexes and offer a much more balanced, tactical game (note - more balanced, to approach anything close to really balanced one would probably need to overhaul points costs too)

I don't think a top-down overhaul would work if your aim is to fix the game whilst keeping it compatible with the existing Codices. So many of 40K's problems come from the Codices themselves, that an overhaul of one requires the overhaul of another.

Too dam true.

The 40k rules as presented in the book are actually quite decent when you read them without looking at codices. Its when you take the codices into account, that things begin to fall apart rapidly. Not to mention some of them are poorly written to the point where you have to in effect self nerf to actually have any chance of being in the 'halfway house' between uber competitive and 'fluffy'. The Eldar codex is a prime example, I've never come across a codex where spamming certain units seems to be mandatory until you put limits on it. Thinking outside the box requires rather more thought but wave serpent spam just seems to 'occur' regardless

At least the generally lambasted Tau can do all sorts of funky stuff not just with riptides, but of course with markerlights things just die anyway but in a different fashion

So close yet so far really, its what makes it so frustrating

@Art of war.
If the core rules for 40k were more suitable for the game play of 40k, the codex books would not have to ignore/add to them to get all the factions and options to work...

That is why a Epic Armagedon works so much better with much fewer pages of rules, yet far more game play options.