Follow the links above for the associated info. We're working on the rules and details for the other events as we speak, and should have it all up and ready next week.
We are super excited for the BAO 2012 this year! This is the event that made it all happen for us, and we want to make this year the biggest, best event in the Western United States.
We anticipate this event selling out, so be sure to grab your tickets once they go up for sale, which should be in the next few days.
And, as for prize support, it will be very generous, but the grand prize for the 40K Championships:
First Place 40K Champion: A PAINTED 1750 army of the winner's choice!
That's right, a PAINTED army by Frontline Gaming's paint service!
Best of Army Prize!
This is a great idea introduced to us by Kasil, one of our blog readers. This is a prize given to the person who performs best with their army. So, the best Blood Angels, Dark Angels, Space Wolf, Space Marine, Black Templar, Tau, Sisters of Battle, Imperial Guard, Chaos Space Marines, Grey Knights, Chaos Daemons, Eldar, Dark Eldar, Necrons and Tyranid player will receive a prize and the knowledge that they were the best player of that army at the Bay Area Open!
Prize: A trophy proclaiming their accomplishment and a Battleforce of their choice!
If this player wins another prize, they will still get the trophy, but will receive the larger prize of the two they win, not both.
First Place for the Team Tournament:
Two complete "Table in a Box" tables of terrain of their choice!
That's right, two complete tables of terrain, painted up for them! Click here for more info on this: http://www.frontlinegaming.org/custom-terrain/304-2/ (This can be exchanged for an equal dollar amount ($400) of prize support in GW product!!)
Warmahordes Prize Support for EVERY Day of the Event!
Trophies for placing!
First Place: $200 in Privateer Press product of your choice! One model of your choice in your prize support painted by Golden Daemon winning painter, Tyson Koch! http://www.figurepainters.com/
Second Place: $100 in Privateer Press product of your choice!
Third Place: $75 in Privateer Press product of your choice!
Best Painted: $50 in Privateer Press product of your choice!
Fastest Caster Kill: $35 in Privateer Press product of your choice!
Wooden Spoon (worst record): $30 in Privateer Press product of your choice!
Door Prizes!
More information to follow!
Tickets will be up for sale next week.
And if you guys see any loop holes in the rules, etc. please let me know! Thanks.
Hückleberry wrote:Looking forward to attending this again. Me and the crew will be there. I got to talk Paul into bringing his IG instead of Tau this time lol.
Poor Tau, I enjoyed the one (?) Tau army that was at BAO last year. It was really well done. Reece, do you foresee this selling out quickly? I need to convince my wife to make the trip again and that may take a little while!
Hückleberry wrote:Looking forward to attending this again. Me and the crew will be there. I got to talk Paul into bringing his IG instead of Tau this time lol.
Poor Tau, I enjoyed the one (?) Tau army that was at BAO last year. It was really well done. Reece, do you foresee this selling out quickly? I need to convince my wife to make the trip again and that may take a little while!
Well, perhaps I will commit to bringing the Tau heat.
I don't see how these missions really give them any fighting chance though. If anything there are even MORE objectives than normal for them to contest/capture which is always the most difficult thing.
I am saying now that I will be there! I need to get some tourney practice with my Deathwing before Adepticon and I heard great things about BAO from Christian and Stave Stiff.
The listing on the website says that the Saturday event for Warmachine is 50 points, but uses Casual 35 point time limits.
So... the 50 point tournament uses the round time limits of a casual 35-point tournament, which is... the round time limit of a 50 point tournament?
In all seriousness, why are you using casual time limits for any of the events? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to have what amounts to an eternity to conduct my turn, but that only widens the gap between players who are experienced with timed turns and those who are not.
Hückleberry wrote:Anything in the Apoc 2 book that is game changing?
Unfortunately so. Lucius pattern Dreadnought drop pods (drop pod with no storm bolter but Assault Vehicle, only carries Dreadnoughts), Deathstorm drop pods (heavy support Drop Pod that fires d3 Whirlwind missiles against every unit within 12" when it lands and can be upgraded to fire d3 assault cannon volleys at every unit instead), and Hades Breaching Drills are all legal in this book.
Perhaps even worse, IG can take stationary Manticore platforms for 100 points each, and can take 1-3 of those per slot. Further, these have 7" templates with Strength 9 AP 2 (and can upgrade to standard missiles as per Codex).
All game balance issues aside, allowing FW special units IMO starts us down a dangerous path where more and more special materials are needed for players to know what forces are out there. Further, a lot of this stuff is really expensive in terms of money-- the Lucius-pattern Drop Pods in particular-- and it opens the door to IMO justifiable questions as to whether people are "buying an advantage."
Hückleberry wrote:Anything in the Apoc 2 book that is game changing?
Unfortunately so. Lucius pattern Dreadnought drop pods (drop pod with no storm bolter but Assault Vehicle, only carries Dreadnoughts), Deathstorm drop pods (heavy support Drop Pod that fires d3 Whirlwind missiles against every unit within 12" when it lands and can be upgraded to fire d3 assault cannon volleys at every unit instead), and Hades Breaching Drills are all legal in this book.
Perhaps even worse, IG can take stationary Manticore platforms for 100 points each, and can take 1-3 of those per slot. Further, these have 7" templates with Strength 9 AP 2 (and can upgrade to standard missiles as per Codex).
All game balance issues aside, allowing FW special units IMO starts us down a dangerous path where more and more special materials are needed for players to know what forces are out there. Further, a lot of this stuff is really expensive in terms of money-- the Lucius-pattern Drop Pods in particular-- and it opens the door to IMO justifiable questions as to whether people are "buying an advantage."
Wow. I wouldn't even unpack my army if the guy across from me had the 9 manticore platforms.
Hey everyone, sorry for the delayed response, been crazy busy.
@Leenus
Fantasy rules are going up tonight, won't be fully done (we are implementing a very simple comp system for Fantasy by popular request) but the main idea will be there.
@Janthkin
We're making a new Rubric this year. I'll have it up shortly, sorry for the broken link.
@Disdainful
I'll check with the Warmachine TO to see if that is a typo. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.
@Yakface
Well, we can't make the missions perfect for everyone, but we are trying to balance them out as much as possible.
And as Will said, we will be allowing units from imperial Armor Apocalypse Second Edition. Let me clarify what that means as some of what people are saying here is not accurate.
We are only allowing this one book because the units therein have been marked as cleared for normal 40K use. The others have not (unfortunately, would have loved to see tetras and Hazard suits).
@Blackmoor
We'll be very sorry to miss you this year if you don't make it buddy, but honestly, not much to fear in the IA book that we are specifically talking about.
The book adds units to armies that mostly needed the help. There is nothing in there that is game breaking.
@Fetterkey
You must be talking about a different book(s). The Hades Breaching drill is not in this one. The Manticore platform is not in it, The Deathstorm is not in it either. The Lucius is, but it is nerfed quite a bit (higher cost, fast attack slot, chance the unit coming out of it immobilizes itself). I think you are talking about something different. I have played against the Lucious several times, it honestly isn't as good as people think it will be. It is good, but hardly game breaking. There are many ways to play around it.
@thread
Imperial Armor Apocalypse Second Edition is the newest 40K supplement. In it, there are specific units that are marked as Warhammer 40,00 approved. We are ONLY talking about this book, not any of the other IA books.
Before anyone goes too crazy and jumps to conclusions, let me say that the entire Frontling Gaming crew (all avid tournament goers/competitive gamers) believes these will IMPROVE the game as almost to a unit, they are appropriately costed (far more so than many codex units), with good rules and mostly boost armies that were lagging behind.
For example, IG got 3 units, 1 of which you will NEVER see in competitive play, the other 2 compete with Vendettas for space and are cool, but not very powerful. IG effectively got nothing that grants an advantage. Neither did Grey Knights. Space Wolves did, but the units in their Codex are better than damn near anything in the IA book.
Eldar got a lot of very good stuff. Good. They needed it. Tyrnaids got some good units as well. Bravo, I would like to see more bug armies at our event.
Orks also got some good units, but again, the standard Battlewagon list that is dominant won't change. The units they already have are better than what they gain access to.
Space Marines got some good stuff, and great, they were lagging behind as well.
My point being, we value game balance and we think this book IMPROVES it, not the opposite, and I feel very confident in saying that our opinions on the matter are solid.
We are requiring that the player have the models, no substitutions.
And as for buying an advantage? Sure, you can look at it that way, but you can make the same argument for someone buying a mechanized army. That is subjective.
Players will be required to have the rules for the unit they are using.
Quite frankly, we don't see this impacting the tournament meta very much. We anticipate seeing a few units here and there. I will bet money, right now, that the army that wins, will be the same type of army we see winning at most events. I hope to be wrong as variety is the spice of life! But, I think a good player, with a list he knows out of the codexes, will come out on top.
Sorry, that last post was from me, Luis was logged into the work computer.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Hückleberry wrote:
Fetterkey wrote:
Hückleberry wrote:Anything in the Apoc 2 book that is game changing?
Unfortunately so. Lucius pattern Dreadnought drop pods (drop pod with no storm bolter but Assault Vehicle, only carries Dreadnoughts), Deathstorm drop pods (heavy support Drop Pod that fires d3 Whirlwind missiles against every unit within 12" when it lands and can be upgraded to fire d3 assault cannon volleys at every unit instead), and Hades Breaching Drills are all legal in this book.
Perhaps even worse, IG can take stationary Manticore platforms for 100 points each, and can take 1-3 of those per slot. Further, these have 7" templates with Strength 9 AP 2 (and can upgrade to standard missiles as per Codex).
All game balance issues aside, allowing FW special units IMO starts us down a dangerous path where more and more special materials are needed for players to know what forces are out there. Further, a lot of this stuff is really expensive in terms of money-- the Lucius-pattern Drop Pods in particular-- and it opens the door to IMO justifiable questions as to whether people are "buying an advantage."
Wow. I wouldn't even unpack my army if the guy across from me had the 9 manticore platforms.
IG Tauros (Scout buggie)
Venator (big scout buggie)
Valkyrie Sky Talon (carries buggies and sentinels)
Aquila Lander
Arvus Lighter (No weapons! haha)
Space Marines (note, a lot of this is Codex Marines/Dark Angels ONLY)
Contemptor Dreads (Very expensive, fleeting av13 dreads with improved guns. Psyfilmen are better at shooting and cheaper, Ironclads are about as good in combat and cheaper)
Conemptor mortis (very expensive shooting dread, psyfilmen is better, predators put out same/close firepower for less points) in action here: http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2011/12/40k-battle-report-deathwing-vs-death.html Seige Dread (normal dread with flamestorm cannon)
Achiles Land Raider (not as good as it was. 325 points, holds 6 models, no assault ramps, -1 on the damage chart for penetrating hits only.)
Caestus assault ram (275 pt, flying av13 transport, pretty damn good unit, but very expensive and dies like a Predator)
Lucius Dread Drop Pod (65pts, fast attack slot, dread can assault out of it but 1/6 chance to immobilize. No deathwind upgrades)
Orks
Squigoth (cheap monstrous creature that carries orks, Necron Spider is better, Battlewagon is better)
Warkopta (fast, open topped av10 ork skimmer, and it's a big model. Again, cool, but battlewagon is better)
Kustom Meka dread (expensive ork dread with KFF)
Lifta Wagon (Expensive ork tank with gun that can blow itself up. Probably won't see it.)
Grot Tank Mob (awesome unit, not ultra competitive, little tanks with a single gun.)
Grot Mega-Tank (Bigger grot tank, av12, not that awesome)
Grot Bomb Launcha (twin linked, single shot battle cannon)
Eldar
Wraithseer (HQ, psyker wriathlord. Really helps a Footdar list...and we all know how OP Footdar are! haha)
Fire Storm (Falcon chasis with twinlinked 6 shot str6 gun)
Hornet Squadron (very good, fast skimmer, like more expensive war walkers)
Warp Hunter (falcon chasis powerful, short ranged weapon, like wraith guard but bigger)
Tau
Piranha TX-42 (fast, open topped skimmer with melta weapon)
DX-6 Remora drone (big drone, fast skimmer, seeker missiles, burst cannon)
Battlesuit Commander R-Alai (cool character with some special guns)
Crons
Tomb Stalker (good assault monster, scarabs are better)
Dark Eldar
Reaper (Big haywire cannon skimmer, Ravager is better)
Tantalus (Giant skimmer, lots of str 5, ap2 shots. Ravager is better)
Raven (good flyer with twin dark lance and lots of poisoned shots)
Chaos
Chaos Contemptor (very expensive, fleeting, av13 dread. Cool unit, but costs a boat load, Oblits are a better buy)
Giant Spawn spined beast (decent assault monster)
Hell Blade (fast skimmer with a reaper auto cannon)
Dreadclaw (drop pod that can move again after landing at the same speed and type as a devilfish)
That's it. Nothing too crazy.
And, we aren't married to this idea. We are building an event we want people to enjoy. We think these units make it MORE enjoyable, not less.
If the majority of people out there are truly opposed to it, we'll change it, but after a lot of deliberation we felt it would be better to include them.
Brother-Captain Pancho wrote:@Fetterkey
You must be talking about a different book(s). The Hades Breaching drill is not in this one. The Manticore platform is not in it, The Deathstorm is not in it either. The Lucius is, but it is nerfed quite a bit (higher cost, fast attack slot, chance the unit coming out of it immobilizes itself). I think you are talking about something different. I have played against the Lucious several times, it honestly isn't as good as people think it will be. It is good, but hardly game breaking. There are many ways to play around it.
@thread
Imperial Armor Apocalypse Second Edition is the newest 40K supplement. In it, there are specific units that are marked as Warhammer 40,00 approved. We are ONLY talking about this book, not any of the other IA books.
Ah. The error was on your end, then, since you had said Imperial Armor Apocalypse 2, which is a different book from Imperial Armor Apocalypse Second Edition (another reason why these things are confusing and problematic for gamers).
Unfortunately, this book is in fact substantially more unbalanced-- it contains the most broken unit in any FW book, the Land Raider Achilles. The Land Raider Achilles, for those of you who don't know, is a Land Raider that has twin-linked multi-melta sponsons and a Thunderfire cannon in the heavy bolter spot. It can only transport 6 models and doesn't have assault ramps, but it is immune to Lance and Melta and all penetrating hits suffer -1 on the Damage chart. Many armies legitimately cannot kill it at all aside from inflicting tons of glancing damage results. Further, the LRAchilles can somehow take a Siege Shield, making its one weakness-- getting immobilized in terrain-- completely impotent. It's basically the melta bunker from hell. All you have to do is put five Scouts in it and drive onto objectives, ignoring the opponent's firepower completely.
The only competitive army that I know of that has a plausible way of dealing with it when it is commanded by a good player, aside from Tau, is Necron Scarab Farm lists-- and even then, good screening tactics can mitigate the Scarab rush, and the fact that the thing packs a Thunderfire Cannon should give them serious pause, since that means it can fire 4 blasts per turn, any unsaved wound from which IDs 2 Scarab bases.
You could specifically ban the LRAchilles, but then you have to look at other things, and you're going case-by-case, and now it's back to the bad old days of tons of supplements, not all of which are legal at all events. Forge World rules just aren't ready for prime time. While they are definitely getting better in their rules writing, there are still big issues there. The money and availability issues are just the icing on the cake-- ultimately, requiring players to know rules from 50 dollar books not sold in most stores and not allowed in most games is just not good policy.
While I wish you good luck with your event-- I had a great time last year-- if this FW book is legal I will not be attending.
As a previous BAO attendee who would like to attend again, I must wholeheartedly agree with Fetterkey.
What can my IG army do against a Land Raider achilles? It is immune to melta, autocannons can't scrach it, all legitimate pens get -1. What can me DE army do against a Land Raider achilles? It is immune to lance, so I literally cannot penetrating hit it. The only way I would destroy it would be to roll a million 6s to pen and 5-6s to damage.
@blackmoor
Anyone playing the units, must bring the rules. We're also doing a unit by unit breakdown on or blog. Also, poke around online, you'll find a pdf pretty easily.
@ph3ar
Hiw does ig kill an achilles? Manticore. Demolisher. Basilisk, psyker battle squad, Las cannons, etc. You have lots of options. It is not that big of a deal, honestly.
@fetterkey
It is a 325 point tank, base. In a 1750 game, with 5 objectives per mission, and at leasr another 75-100 points to make it scoring and give it dozer blades, you're talking about a 400 to 425 point investmemt to hold a single objective.
You guys, it really isn't as good as you all make it out to be. we will listen to all appeals, and we will continue to test things, but if anyone chooses to not to come because of the off chance you may play against one unit in a tournament of 128 players and you feel that single unit will beat your entire army, then I honestly don't know what to tell you! Haha, pull a unit at random from the grey knight book, it's probably less balanced. Remember, you don't have to kill a unit to beat it. You play around it, just like a deathstar unit from any other book.
Ya guys, There is honestly no game breaking units in this book. We have all sat down and talked about each individual unit. Before deciding if we were going to allow them. Everything is priced the way it should be.
And again guys, these units are now legal to begin with. And by no means game breaking. If anyone is going to be using a Forgeworld model, they must have the actual model at hand. No conversions.
disdainful wrote:The listing on the website says that the Saturday event for Warmachine is 50 points, but uses Casual 35 point time limits.
So... the 50 point tournament uses the round time limits of a casual 35-point tournament, which is... the round time limit of a 50 point tournament?
In all seriousness, why are you using casual time limits for any of the events? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to have what amounts to an eternity to conduct my turn, but that only widens the gap between players who are experienced with timed turns and those who are not.
-Dis.
I must say I agree with Dis on this. Warmahordes is a game that uses time limits. Playing with in those time constraints is part of being good at the game, an event as large as the BAO which is trying to become the preeminent GT style event on the West Coast really shouldn't be making the games easier. Using the relaxed time limits in a tournament of this size and competitive focus is like riding a bike with the training wheels on. YMMV but I can't say I would want to play in a Warmahordes event on this level that uses the relaxed time limits.
Thanks for your input on the warmahordes event guys, I will talk to the to for that event and see what he has to say about it.
Automatically Appended Next Post: And as for the imperial armor book, let us know if you are oppossed to it via pm. If enough people are against it, we'll drop it. At the end of the day, we want a fun event, we just feel that on the whole the book is an improvement.
So let us know what you're thinking, and remember, this is still the bao: an event that is sure to be well run, fun a great weekend of gaming.
Reecius wrote:Thanks for your input on the warmahordes event guys, I will talk to the to for that event and see what he has to say about it.
Thanks Reece, it is much appreciated. We sent a few guys to the WM event last year and we might be rolling up again (I really want to go but GAMA is the following week so I don't know if I can handle back-to-back trips) and some clarification would be great.
While you're asking about it... what's up with the Tier tournament? Requiring at least Tier 2 for a 50-point event I can see, but at 35 it really sledgehammers some casters right out of the running. It sounds good, but some casters have softball second tier requirements (like, 'Take the Greatbears'... um, yes please!), and some have very restrictive ones.
Reecius wrote:@ph3ar
Hiw does ig kill an achilles? Manticore. Demolisher. Basilisk, psyker battle squad, Las cannons, etc. You have lots of options. It is not that big of a deal, honestly.
The Manticore is decent against it, but even still it gets a -1 on the pen chart.
The odds of a Manticore getting a hit or low value deviation, and then penning, and destroying, a LRA is ~3.7%.
The odds of a lascannon killing a LRA is ~0.9%. Yes, that is less than one percent.
For reference, a melta shot within melta distance has a 25% chance of destroying a normal Land Raider. This is what people usually use to kill Land Raiders.
Do you know how many meltas most armies have, to deal with AV14? A lot. Do you know how common manticores, demolishers, and such are? Very uncommon.
And even if people have non-lance, non-melta ways to kill Land Raiders (much more rare), they have half the chance to kill it, thanks to the -1 to all pens rule.
It's like the old 4 or more Land Raider Daemonhunters "I hope you maxed out on melta!" list, except instead of the Imperial/Chaos, Eldars, and Tau being the only ones that can handle it, only Tau can handle it.
italiaplaya wrote:If anyone is going to be using a Forgeworld model, they must have the actual model at hand. No conversions.
This actually makes using the FW rules much worse, since FW stuff is silly expensive. Personally, I use a lot of FW stuff-- but I know people who don't have the funds to do so. Allowing FW units only with FW models, unlike any other unit in the game, makes it so that people can be "priced out" of making the lists they want. You could argue that this can happen in normal 40k as well, but it's much less likely given the wide variety of substitute models out there. Saying "no substitutes allowed" for the most expensive models that are now legal in your event seems truly misguided.
italiaplaya wrote:If anyone is going to be using a Forgeworld model, they must have the actual model at hand. No conversions.
This actually makes using the FW rules much worse, since FW stuff is silly expensive. Personally, I use a lot of FW stuff-- but I know people who don't have the funds to do so. Allowing FW units only with FW models, unlike any other unit in the game, makes it so that people can be "priced out" of making the lists they want. You could argue that this can happen in normal 40k as well, but it's much less likely given the wide variety of substitute models out there. Saying "no substitutes allowed" for the most expensive models that are now legal in your event seems truly misguided.
I dont know or want to know what is in the apoc books im going up against. Surprises are nice, killing something that is supposed to blindside your army and have no knowledge of how to counter it is nicer.
I think people are looking at this the wrong way with IAApoc 2nd ed books involved. Instead of just refusing to play because you don't know what a few new units do; look at it as an opportunity to play against new and different things.
As stated, the player HAS to have the actual AI book with them. Just ask to read the rules prior to the start of the game, and have the player clearly identify the FW unit in question.
As to the “Not playing because I haven’t read the rules yet”:
How many players out there knows exactly what a Chaos Spawn does, or an IG Ogryn?
So, you'll refuse to play someone because they set out a unit or 2 of Spawn or some Ogryn?
What if someone asked you to play the new Necron book the day it came out? You'd tell them no cause you haven't memorized it yet?
Sounds like weak sauce to me.
The sickest thing in the IAApoc 2nd ed is the Achilles Raider, and after a Glance or 2, and the Thunder Fire cannon is gone, it's really not that bad. (But it’s still sick.)
Everything else has a comparable unit already in the game, just google the FW units a bit and you'll find all the info you need.
Again, this should be an opportunity to challenge yourself as a player against new units, and new tactics.
Not just cry, and refuse to participate because you’ll be seeing things on the table top for the first time.
That's a very noble sentiment, but no one wants to play against something they are not familiar with at the top tables of a tournament. Or at any table for that matter.
If a player doesn't know a unit or ability out of a common codex and has not practiced against it, then that's the players fault. But if all of a sudden a bunch of new units are brought in out of a book that's not commonly available, then that kinda hoses the players who already aren't familiar with it, while providing those that are with a big advantage.
@fetterkey and ph3ar
You guys are making the argument that a single unit is so overpowering that it's mere potential presence means you won't come to a tournament you both had fun at and were planning on attending again, but if they are allowed, you want people to be able to proxy them, therefore increasing the odds that you'd play against them....
Haha, tell me you see the fallacy in that logic.
My intention isn't to offend, it is just funny to me as it appears to be an irrational argument.
We appreciate everyone's input. Our goal is not to force our opinions on anyone, but to make the most fun event we can. If people feel that this will make the event less fun, then we wont do it. We as a team were all very excited at how much this book would shake up the meta and reinvigorate the game, but that's us.
We're going to send an email to all previous attendees and put it to a straight vote. We hear the voices expressed here and understand all concerns, but we also can't allow the opinions of a vocal few to impact the event as a whole.
If the people want ia apoc second ed, we'll allow it, if not, we won't. Simple! And I love simplicity.
cricketofdeth wrote:I think people are looking at this the wrong way with IAApoc 2nd ed books involved. Instead of just refusing to play because you don't know what a few new units do; look at it as an opportunity to play against new and different things.
As stated, the player HAS to have the actual AI book with them. Just ask to read the rules prior to the start of the game, and have the player clearly identify the FW unit in question.
So when you are playing in a tournament where time is already a factor, your want to take a good chunk of time to go over these new units. Not only that, but since they are not out there for much debate you have no idea what the "issues" are concerning these units rules and use. GW is very bad at rules writing, and I imagine that FW is not much better, so who knows if your opponent is trying to pull something over on you?
As to the “Not playing because I haven’t read the rules yet”:
How many players out there knows exactly what a Chaos Spawn does, or an IG Ogryn?
So, you'll refuse to play someone because they set out a unit or 2 of Spawn or some Ogryn?
What if someone asked you to play the new Necron book the day it came out? You'd tell them no cause you haven't memorized it yet?
Sounds like weak sauce to me.
I know how Choas spawn work, and I know what Ogryn do. I am currently learning about Necrons and there tricks. If some one asked me to play the Necron codex the day after it came out in a friendly game I would say ok. But there is a reason why tournaments have a 1 month waiting period before you can use a new codex.
The sickest thing in the IAApoc 2nd ed is the Achilles Raider, and after a Glance or 2, and the Thunder Fire cannon is gone, it's really not that bad. (But it’s still sick.)
Just a glance or two? Is that all? Most everyone has strength 8 weapons, and you will need to roll a '6' just to glance, and then a '6' to knock off a weapon. Good luck with that.
Everything else has a comparable unit already in the game, just google the FW units a bit and you'll find all the info you need.
Again, this should be an opportunity to challenge yourself as a player against new units, and new tactics.
Not just cry, and refuse to participate because you’ll be seeing things on the table top for the first time.
To get to this event I will have to drive for 11 hours (each way) and pay hundreds of dollars for a hotel and travel expenses. I do not want to invest this kind of time an money to be blindsided by rules and units that I have no idea what they can do. If I lived in the Bay Area and I wanted to just roll out of bed and have a bit of fun that would be different, but I don't..
The US's ETC team was looking for a good event on the west coast to be a qualifier for the ETC team. They want a broader cross representation of the country and want to have a quality event out west, and I guess this is not going to be it.
The Lucious Drop Pods are worse than the Achilles and those are in the book as well. Hi2u Mr BA Dreadnaught dropping in and assaulting on turn one. I think the broke as hell deathwind pod is in there too, as well as the transport option big mech deathrolla wagon.... Also, it adds stuff to the already powerful armies with little to nothing for the weaker xenos books.
Seriously, I think its a bad idea to allow IAApoc to be used in the main GT. The team tourney, fine, but not the GT. Remember what Nichols did with just two Lucious pods at the BSB last year?
Anyhow, this matters little to me as I will be playing fantasy if I can make it this year. Is it in the same fairground facility as last time?
Reecius wrote:... We as a team were all very excited at how much this book would shake up the meta and reinvigorate the game, but that's us.
Sadly, it can't really do that until it is more widely available. Trust me, I'm all for supplemental material to 40k mixing the pot since the standard bandwagon-rut cycle has gotten a little staid, but until I can sell it in my shop and anyone can come buy it with ease, it won't be anything more than a curiosity with the potential to create negative play experiences, particularly in a competitive environment.
But, what do I know, I should be bitching pointlessly about the Warmachine tournament no one cares about. Sorry!
Not that what I say carries any weight whatsoever, but I've been following this debate and to me the argument of "the unit information is not widely available, so we can't prepare for it" rings a bit hollow. The TOs are already planning to do an evaluation of every unit in the book. Their blog is directly linked on the site that has the rules for the tournament. Additionally, anyone can order a copy of the book (you can always go in with a couple of friends if all you plan to do is know thy enemy). And, of course, there are other options to getting access to the book. So if people are truly blind-sided by this, then they did not put in any effort what-so-ever to gain intel on these units. Now, that does not mean that there are not valid concerns about some of the units in this book. I just think that if people are getting blind-sided by these units, it's their own fault just as much as it's the fault of someone that doesn't put the effort into knowing the other Codex units out there.
Reading about something online almost never prepares you for the real world game interaction.
That being said, I still think there's plenty of time to figure it out. There just needs to be a definite ruling on the inclusion of the IA book one way or the other so that people don't waste their money ordering this stuff only to find that it can no longer be used.
Phazael wrote:The Lucious Drop Pods are worse than the Achilles and those are in the book as well. Hi2u Mr BA Dreadnaught dropping in and assaulting on turn one. I think the broke as hell deathwind pod is in there too, as well as the transport option big mech deathrolla wagon.... Also, it adds stuff to the already powerful armies with little to nothing for the weaker xenos books.
Seriously, I think its a bad idea to allow IAApoc to be used in the main GT. The team tourney, fine, but not the GT. Remember what Nichols did with just two Lucious pods at the BSB last year?
Anyhow, this matters little to me as I will be playing fantasy if I can make it this year. Is it in the same fairground facility as last time?
Just as a heads up it's been mentioned multiple times that BA's can't take the Lucius anymore and that it has had some significant changes to it.
@Blackmoor
The Achilles only reduces the extra -1 from penning hits so a glancing 5 would weapons destroy and 6 would immobolize.
@Thread
Honestly I don't have a huge problem with most of the items mentioned. I do see some armies struggling heavily against Achilles (DE mostly). For this reason I'd vote no on at least this unit. To be fair a lot of non-tournament heavy players that attend (and there will be many) will have no idea what this thing is. And putting it on the table will ruin a DE players day. We're not talking in this case about how the top end of players deal with things. We're talking about the majority of your attending gamer base.
On the overall I pick up the Imperial Armour books because I like the reads and they have some neat stuff. If they were legal I'd probably have added more FW to my stuff instead of entire new armies. Ask the player base and see what they think. However I know you guys are going for 40k at it's base and adding in FW takes away from that. If I lived in Cali I'd be there either way and walking away with the big prize
Phazael wrote:The Lucious Drop Pods are worse than the Achilles and those are in the book as well. Hi2u Mr BA Dreadnaught dropping in and assaulting on turn one. I think the broke as hell deathwind pod is in there too, as well as the transport option big mech deathrolla wagon.... Also, it adds stuff to the already powerful armies with little to nothing for the weaker xenos books.
Seriously, I think its a bad idea to allow IAApoc to be used in the main GT. The team tourney, fine, but not the GT. Remember what Nichols did with just two Lucious pods at the BSB last year?
Anyhow, this matters little to me as I will be playing fantasy if I can make it this year. Is it in the same fairground facility as last time?
Seems like a lot of people are making blind statements without actually looking thru the book. All the units that have been "allowed" have been changed to become more balanced whether thru some changes in there rules and/or there point cost.
Such as the Lur. Drop pod. It is a fast attack choice that only Space Marines, Black Templars, Space wolves, and Dark Angels can take. So no BA Talon Dreads coming out of it. Also, if you choice to assault out of it, you have to roll a dangerous terrain test. Giving you a 1 in 6 chance to become immobilized.
The deathwing pod, and big mech deathrolla wagon were not added either.
I think the issue is that reality does not match the theory. In theory, more units = more variety = more fun.
In reality it works more like this:
No one takes the crappy, or so, so units, because it's unlikely anyone will take the time convert / buy the FW version just to have a meh unit. So you've effectively limited the pool of actual new units that people will use.
If there's a great/underpriced option people either 1. spam it (because they are allowed to convert) or 2. only one or two guys actually get to take advantage of the unit, because they spent the extra money to have the FW option on rare occasions (e.g. a handful of tournaments a year).
Because of the perception of FW and the limited availability / experience, people do not feel fairly defeated if they lose to those units. It's a perception thing, but at the end of the day it's not fun to lose to something because you didn't realize it could do XYZ, because you only had a few minutes to read its rules before the game.
I think events like Adepticon's Apoc works, because in that instance, everything is SO wacky that the very point of the event is to see crazy units and play against things you've never seen. But when you add a tiny bit of crazy to an event, it typically creates a large negative without a large enough benefit in return. You need to go all or nothing. A tournament about using wacky Apoc style units or a tournament about the core units.
To get to this event I will have to drive for 11 hours (each way) and pay hundreds of dollars for a hotel and travel expenses. I do not want to invest this kind of time an money to be blindsided by rules and units that I have no idea what they can do. If I lived in the Bay Area and I wanted to just roll out of bed and have a bit of fun that would be different, but I don't..
The US's ETC team was looking for a good event on the west coast to be a qualifier for the ETC team. They want a broader cross representation of the country and want to have a quality event out west, and I guess this is not going to be it.
You know three months in advance what rules will be used, how can you be blindsided?
Maybe I need to brush up on the LR achilles rules, but I would think that DE could just haywire grenade the thing to death. I'm bringing DE to the tournament and I don't mind FW stuff. I'll be honest I'd rather not see an Achilles across the table but it would never stop me from enjoying or attending an event.
Yes, you could possibly haywire it to death. But it's extremely unlikely unless you put haywire grenades on a ton of different wych units. The odds are extremely low you'd kill it and if you take less than 3-4 units of haywire armed units it's extremely likely you'll lose the haywire unit long before it's useful. Overall it's a very, very ugly unit to include in a tournament where you'd like to have more variety of codexes appearing.
Outside of that unit everything else seems reasonable but I will admit to neither owning that particular book or having pirated a copy
Honestly this thing isn't that bad. It's significantly more than a regular LR and loses it's weapons and gets immobilized exactly the same on a glance. I can tell you that I don't worry as much about the pens on my LR's as the lucky glances that immobilize them in my deployment zone.
I think that's an oversimplification. While I agree that it's possible to glance it to death not all armies are designed like imperial ones and can't take 18+ ML's or 12 TL St8 Shots supported by tons of rending st7. It gets much dicier for Necrons, Dark Eldar, and to an extent Tyranids.
Naturally it's just my two cents but I can see some major issues with quite a few builds. That said I think the model is bitchin and given a chance to use one I'd buy one in a heartbeat
I think that's an oversimplification. While I agree that it's possible to glance it to death not all armies are designed like imperial ones and can't take 18+ ML's or 12 TL St8 Shots supported by tons of rending st7. It gets much dicier for Necrons, Dark Eldar, and to an extent Tyranids.
Naturally it's just my two cents but I can see some major issues with quite a few builds. That said I think the model is bitchin and given a chance to use one I'd buy one in a heartbeat
Who says you need to glance it to death? Immobilize it and it's threat is neutered (unless it's already on an objective... ). Honestly it's powers aren't nearly as good as the abilities a GK landraider gets (for less points too).
If I really wanted to, I could take two in a 1750 Deathwing list, but I'd have those two and 21 terminators and frankly I don't see that being an unstoppable list.
Blackmoor wrote:The US's ETC team was looking for a good event on the west coast to be a qualifier for the ETC team. They want a broader cross representation of the country and want to have a quality event out west, and I guess this is not going to be it.
Hahaha, Alan, buck up, buddy! No need for the defeatist attitude. We are putting this to a vote. We would be honored and proud to have the BAO send some players to represent America in the ETC, but at the end of the day, we are committed to building the best event we can for our attendees, and that is more important to us.
We will put this to a vote, and by Sunday, we will have a final decision.
If any of you have strong feelings about this, check your email inbox.
@Dok
Dok, hahaha, you made it to the top table for the finals of the BAO last year and you'd never played against Imperial Guard! You are a perfect example of a good player playing through a lack of knowledge, and of the fact that players don't come to events even knowing the information in the codexes
Ozymandias wrote:Who says you need to glance it to death? Immobilize it and it's threat is neutered (unless it's already on an objective... ). Honestly it's powers aren't nearly as good as the abilities a GK landraider gets (for less points too).
If I really wanted to, I could take two in a 1750 Deathwing list, but I'd have those two and 21 terminators and frankly I don't see that being an unstoppable list.
The threat is "neutered"...
It just becomes an AV 14, -1 on pen table bunker, with two twin-linked multimeltas, a thunderfire cannon, and oh yeah, another multi melta just for good measure. Many times more powerful than a standard land raider.
And if it's on an objective? Might as well pack up if you aren't Tau.
@reece: Yeah, I like to close my eyes and hope that the bad guard doesn't touch me at night. I'm trying to get my hands on the book right now and see what kind of craziness is gonna be dropped on my face in the last round.
It just becomes an AV 14, -1 on pen table bunker, with two twin-linked multimeltas, a thunderfire cannon, and oh yeah, another multi melta just for good measure. Many times more powerful than a standard land raider.
And if it's on an objective? Might as well pack up if you aren't Tau.
Two twin-linked multimeltas will do squat if it's stuck in it's deployment zone. "Many times more powerful than a standard land raider..."!? Please.
I'd fight that over a GK Land Raider that ignores shakens and stuns and has a S7 assault cannon any day of the week!
It just becomes an AV 14, -1 on pen table bunker, with two twin-linked multimeltas, a thunderfire cannon, and oh yeah, another multi melta just for good measure. Many times more powerful than a standard land raider.
And if it's on an objective? Might as well pack up if you aren't Tau.
Two twin-linked multimeltas will do squat if it's stuck in it's deployment zone. "Many times more powerful than a standard land raider..."!? Please.
I'd fight that over a GK Land Raider that ignores shakens and stuns and has a S7 assault cannon any day of the week!
Yes, you can definitely curb its power if you manage to immobilize it in the deployment zone. Heck, if you are an IG player with 9 vendettas, you have a massive 28% chance to kill or immobilize it if you fire 1200 points of your army at it!
And if you are DE darklight spam with 20 dark lances/blasters, you have a very respectable 19% chance to immobilize it if you shoot your entire army at it!
Reecius wrote:@fetterkey and ph3ar
You guys are making the argument that a single unit is so overpowering that it's mere potential presence means you won't come to a tournament you both had fun at and were planning on attending again, but if they are allowed, you want people to be able to proxy them, therefore increasing the odds that you'd play against them....
Haha, tell me you see the fallacy in that logic.
My intention isn't to offend, it is just funny to me as it appears to be an irrational argument.
I can see how that might be confusing, but it's actually two separate arguments.
Argument 1: I feel that FW rules are poorly designed and often unbalanced and that they should not be allowed.
Looking only at the Space Marine rules, which I am most familiar with, the LRAchilles can't be stopped by several armies, the Siege Dreadnought is objectively better than a normal multi-melta Dreadnought (25 points of upgrades, plus special rule for penetrating vehicles, plus option to take HKMs, all for 15 points?), the Caestus Assault Ram is essentially the Stormraven from hell, and the Lucius Drop Pod-- while IMO no longer unbalanced-- is poorly designed. Generally speaking, units that allow pseudo-guaranteed assaults are unfun and shouldn't be in the game. GW has noticed this and fixed this in recent Codices, with units like Callidus Assassins losing their "automatically assault anything" prowess. If I go to a 40k event, I would prefer to play without such options being allowed.
Argument 2: If FW units are allowed, they should be allowed under the same restrictions as every other model-- namely, that substitutes and conversions are legal.
I don't think that FW units should be available to players. BUT-- given that an option is available to players-- it should be as available to as many players as possible to maintain a level playing field and maintain consistency with everything else in the game.
Conversions for other units that are expensive in money are permitted-- should someone be prevented from using Long Fangs if he doesn't want to pay 9 dollars per missile launcher bit? When I attended the Bay Area Open last year, I saw a LOT of Long Fangs that were holding hunter-killer missiles instead of real missile launchers. Similarly, I saw several Hydras that were made from converting a Chimera with an Aegis Defense Line turret instead of paying for the extremely expensive (though awesome) official FW kit, and lots and lots of Rifleman/Psyfleman Dreadnoughts made with similar conversions instead of the official FW arms. I feel that conversions and personalization are ultimately an important part of the hobby, and I don't see why it should be restricted for the units that are most inaccessible to players otherwise.
If you want to say "no conversions," that's fine, but I'd expect everyone with HKM Long Fangs, Aegis Defense Line Hydras/Dreadnoughts, etc. to be kicked to the curb as well. Preventing conversions for the models that are the most expensive of all seems both inconsistent and likely to result in a non-level playing field.
I think that's an oversimplification. While I agree that it's possible to glance it to death not all armies are designed like imperial ones and can't take 18+ ML's or 12 TL St8 Shots supported by tons of rending st7. It gets much dicier for Necrons, Dark Eldar, and to an extent Tyranids.
Naturally it's just my two cents but I can see some major issues with quite a few builds. That said I think the model is bitchin and given a chance to use one I'd buy one in a heartbeat
Necrons glance everything, and they now have things that can penetrate armor easily (Phaeron+15-20 warriors, scarab swarms, doom scythes). Dark eldar average 15-20 dark lances)thats still about 1-2 glances / round. Nids have trygons, monstrous creatures that reroll val to hit rolls from what I remember. I think 1 or 2 players might take it, but from what ive heard its 325 points so thats a big chunk to take a risk on in an army.
I had a blast at the bay open last year. It was one of the best tournies Ive ever been too. I was a big fan of playing the book missions, and keeping the game the way it was designed to be so that armies (like my tau) can play without janky missions. The new missions the BAO is running heavily favor marines over all other armies. Thats ok I still felt I could bring either of my armies and do very well. However adding in the FW models is a huge mistake. Marines are already over powered in these scenarios and adding in the overpowered nonsense they get in a Apocolypse book isnt fair to other armies that didnt get a complete "update" in this book.
Ill play in the tourney either way but making people buy FW to stay equal in a competetive event isnt right. Id be alot happier if there were a FAQ to go along with this book.
I think that's an oversimplification. While I agree that it's possible to glance it to death not all armies are designed like imperial ones and can't take 18+ ML's or 12 TL St8 Shots supported by tons of rending st7. It gets much dicier for Necrons, Dark Eldar, and to an extent Tyranids.
Naturally it's just my two cents but I can see some major issues with quite a few builds. That said I think the model is bitchin and given a chance to use one I'd buy one in a heartbeat
Necrons glance everything, and they now have things that can penetrate armor easily (Phaeron+15-20 warriors, scarab swarms, doom scythes). Dark eldar average 15-20 dark lances)thats still about 1-2 glances / round. Nids have trygons, monstrous creatures that reroll val to hit rolls from what I remember. I think 1 or 2 players might take it, but from what ive heard its 325 points so thats a big chunk to take a risk on in an army.
Sorry dude, doesn't hold up. Necrons can glance things within 24" (30" with a Phaeron Lord). 20 shots is 2 glances. .Scarab swarms dissapear thanks to the thunderfire. Doom Scythes aren't consistent. I play Necrons and I see a huge amount of problems against one. Dark Eldar's 20 Dark Lances require the entire army to bail out of their transports and be within 18". So to get 2 glances on a vehicle I have to shoot my entire and be within rapid fire range of my opponent outside of my transports? Yes Nids do have Trygons but most of the more solid builds don't include them right now. They are easy meat for Long Fangs and IG since it's almost impossible to get a cover save. 90% of people that take Carnies don't take the CC variant so that's out too. Like I said, I'd love to have and field one and an event other than Adepticon would be amazing. However I can realistically see it causing major problems with a lot of Xenos races. Saying you can handle something like that with your entire army for example isn't really addressing the issue.
I don't really have a dog in this fight though because it's unlikely I'd be able to make this event anyway as much as I'd love to. I think a vote is a great idea. Let the people interested in attending decide
Reecius wrote:@fetterkey and ph3ar
You guys are making the argument that a single unit is so overpowering that it's mere potential presence means you won't come to a tournament you both had fun at and were planning on attending again, but if they are allowed, you want people to be able to proxy them, therefore increasing the odds that you'd play against them....
Haha, tell me you see the fallacy in that logic.
My intention isn't to offend, it is just funny to me as it appears to be an irrational argument.
I can see how that might be confusing, but it's actually two separate arguments.
Argument 1: I feel that FW rules are poorly designed and often unbalanced and that they should not be allowed.
Looking only at the Space Marine rules, which I am most familiar with, the LRAchilles can't be stopped by several armies, the Siege Dreadnought is objectively better than a normal multi-melta Dreadnought (25 points of upgrades, plus special rule for penetrating vehicles, plus option to take HKMs, all for 15 points?), the Caestus Assault Ram is essentially the Stormraven from hell, and the Lucius Drop Pod-- while IMO no longer unbalanced-- is poorly designed. Generally speaking, units that allow pseudo-guaranteed assaults are unfun and shouldn't be in the game. GW has noticed this and fixed this in recent Codices, with units like Callidus Assassins losing their "automatically assault anything" prowess. If I go to a 40k event, I would prefer to play without such options being allowed.
Argument 2: If FW units are allowed, they should be allowed under the same restrictions as every other model-- namely, that substitutes and conversions are legal.
I don't think that FW units should be available to players. BUT-- given that an option is available to players-- it should be as available to as many players as possible to maintain a level playing field and maintain consistency with everything else in the game.
Conversions for other units that are expensive in money are permitted-- should someone be prevented from using Long Fangs if he doesn't want to pay 9 dollars per missile launcher bit? When I attended the Bay Area Open last year, I saw a LOT of Long Fangs that were holding hunter-killer missiles instead of real missile launchers. Similarly, I saw several Hydras that were made from converting a Chimera with an Aegis Defense Line turret instead of paying for the extremely expensive (though awesome) official FW kit, and lots and lots of Rifleman/Psyfleman Dreadnoughts made with similar conversions instead of the official FW arms. I feel that conversions and personalization are ultimately an important part of the hobby, and I don't see why it should be restricted for the units that are most inaccessible to players otherwise.
If you want to say "no conversions," that's fine, but I'd expect everyone with HKM Long Fangs, Aegis Defense Line Hydras/Dreadnoughts, etc. to be kicked to the curb as well. Preventing conversions for the models that are the most expensive of all seems both inconsistent and likely to result in a non-level playing field.
We're going to stand pretty firm on our ruling for the FW models. Players must have the actual model to use it. Now, it all comes down to whether or not you guys as the players want to allow these units in our tournament or not. After votes have been counted up, we'll let everyone know.
Hey now, I'm looking forward the BAO. Just one thing, either there's a typo on this page schedule of events or this is going to be a two day minimalist de-escalation tournament (which is awesome)
I don't have a dog in this fight either, as I will be playing Fantasy if I can make it up there.
I missed that BA cannot take the Luc. Pod, but do you really think it matters? Oh boy, a 1 in 6 chance my basic Dread won't start turn one face raping your rear guard shooting unit. What are the odds of said dread getting off that easily if it were sitting in the open for a turn? I'd say the extra couple points and largely pointless fast attack slot are not that much of a trade. Not everyone are Space Wolves and have a fist guy with counterattack sitting in every unit. Tau and Eldar can get royally screwed by even one of these. And yeah Space Wolves can put their new seige style contemptor dreadnaughts inside one of them, giving them an AV13 walker with WS5. Have fun with that one when it hits you turn one before your vehicles even have a chance to move.
As to every army getting some units, thats just plain false. The MEQs all got new AV13 Contemptor Dreads, Achilles Raiders, Cestus Rams, and most got the Lucius Pod. All are good to outright broken. Guard got... an Ork Truck and a gunless Valkerie to carry it? Eldar got the Wraithseer (descent), Hornet (oh, joy a less overpriced Vyper), and the overpriced Fire Prism copy. Nids got more spore mines and a slow moving MC that sucks in HtH. Orks got the Mek Wagon and the various walkers. Tau got a Special Character and two Piranna type units. Necrons and DE each got one meh unit. Sisters and GKs got jack, but no one cares there. Point being, there was hardly an even distrobution of units, useful or otherwise, in this book.
I think Reece is looking at this book from the prism of a SW/Guard player, who really don't mind anything in that book, but if I were a Xenos player I wouldn't even bother trying because that book widens the gulf between the MEQ and Xenos armies even more. If you are reading this Reece, bust out your Nids (or better yet, Tau) and play a test game against one of your crew where he is fielding an Achilles and two Luc Pod mounted Contemptor Dreads and it will give you a clearer picture of why people are iffy on IA2.
@Fetterkey
The reason we would only allow FW models the first year is because it makes identification of already new units easier on players. If someone has a scratchbuild, it makes identifying a new unit that much harder. Plus, it opens the door to abuse with modeling for advantage, etc. Basically, it causes more problems than it solves, in our opinions. Perhaps in the future, if theses units become official (which little birdies are telling me they will) then it won't be such a big deal.
As for pricing people out of the winner's circle? I disagree. A Mech IG army costs more than a space marine army with 3 Achilles and 3 Lucius patter Drop Pods. I don't feel that argument holds water, but that is my opinion.
@RogueTraderX
haha, thanks for catching the typo! Fixed it.
@Phazael
I actually almost never play my wolves outside of tournaments. I played my IG for the first time in ages yesterday at a tournament. I play predominantly Crons, Bugs, Eldar and Khorne CSM these days.
As for your points, they are all valid, and I don't want to bog this down with an argument as to what unit is or is not broken, OP, or what have you. Everyone has different points of view on that, just like they do with units in the normal codexes.
Suffice it to say, that in our opinions as TO's, not players, looking at the game balance, we feel that this book improves balance.
Why?
Weaker armies got cool units that improve them. Bugs, and especially Eldar got a boost (those units are AWESOME for Eldar).
DE got cool units that are on par with what they have.
IG and GK effectively got nothing and didn't need it.
Wolves got cool stuff, but what they have now is better.
Vanilla Marines got a big boost. Good. They needed it.
Orks got characterful units that don't add much, but they would be fun to play against.
But again, this is a pointless debate as it comes down to opinion. I think Footdar is good, so what do I know! haha.
Also, as for the Lucius drop pod, I played against the Old (better) Lucius in a few tournaments. In real tournaments. Most people haven't even played against these units that are upset about them.
If you KNOW a unit is coming in turn 1 to assault you, plan for it. My opponent dropped down, assaulted a tank I fed him, he killed it. Next turn, I killed the dread and the drop pod.
He gave me two kill points and a larger chunk of my army than he took. Advantage me.
Tactics overcome units. Alwyas have, always will.
If someone put an Achilles across the table from me, I wouldn't care. Play around it, ignore it, whatever, it won't beat my entire army by itself, that is silly to even think. You don't have to kill it to win.
For that points investment, it isn't that hot. I can think of a lot of cheaper units that hold an objective better, are more survivable, etc. But again, that is just me.
At the end of the day, we want this event to be fun, and that is what matters most. We can all go on and on about out views on it, but what the most people want, we will provide.
The event will still be fun, there honestly will probably not be that many FW units if this does pass as most people will just use their normal armies, and I bet the winner is a standard list we see winning most events.
We will know with certainty Sunday how people feel.
Either way, we really look forward to a great weekend of gaming!
I respect what you guys are trying to do here, but I dunno. I think fundamentally we have different views of how the game is balanced right now and hence we aren't likely to agree on what changes like these may bring. Personally I think that Vanilla Marines don't really need a "boost," as IMO they still have what it takes to hang in competitive play. Indeed, I think some of the new units this update gives them are quite over the top.
Regardless, though, I've just looked over my schedule and it turns out that I will not actually be in the area that week, so I suppose it doesn't really matter what I think here. No matter what happens, I wish you well with this event!
Fetterkey wrote:I respect what you guys are trying to do here, but I dunno. I think fundamentally we have different views of how the game is balanced right now and hence we aren't likely to agree on what changes like these may bring. Personally I think that Vanilla Marines don't really need a "boost," as IMO they still have what it takes to hang in competitive play. Indeed, I think some of the new units this update gives them are quite over the top.
Regardless, though, I've just looked over my schedule and it turns out that I will not actually be in the area that week, so I suppose it doesn't really matter what I think here. No matter what happens, I wish you well with this event!
As a person who might attend, I must second my agreement with Fetterkey.
While you think that IA2e adds some nice boosts for the weaker races, I am of the exact opposite opinion.
It gives extremely strong units to Marines, who are already very strong on their own, and gives pseudo, non-useful, or no units to the xenos, IG, SoB.
Additionally, your reasons for not allowing converted FW units makes zero sense.
If you don't want people modeling for advantage, you must also outlaw converted normal units.
If you don't want people being confused by conversions of Forgeworld units, you have already failed by allowing forgeworld, which will confuse those people anyway.
Ozymandias wrote:*wonders if it is worth it to buy two LR Achilles and hope to draw Ph34r in the first round*
Luckily for us the odds of my going if IA:2e is allowed are diminished. If I am going to attend a tournament where specific armies get significant boosts, I had better be playing one of those armies. I'm bad enough already without handicapping myself.
Reece, I know you're committed to taking a vote and running with the results but I wish you'd stand strong by your decision.
The idea that people don't want to come play in a tournament because 'X' units will be allowed just makes me shake my head. I mean, I get it. You don't want to play in a game where you lose to something you don't care to play against. But it always makes me sad to see people get this caught up about their toy soldier games that they're basically afraid of what they're unfamiliar with.
Let's just say to play the Devil's advocate that GW came out tomorrow and said that Imperial Armor rules were 'fully official' (whatever that means). Now what? Do you all quit the game and stop attending tournaments? Or do you just suck it up and try to enjoy the game while besting some new stuff, some of which may seem especially nifty and powerful until you get some experience against it and then like most things that seem horrible you realize that there are probably some ways around it, either through list building or else with certain tactics.
I mean, seriously, there is absolutely NOTHING in IA 2nd edition that is even close to being as bad as what you find in the Grey Knight codex.
At the end of the day just relax and enjoy playing games of toy soldiers! Are you really that afraid of losing a game on the 'top' tables in a tournament because of some Imperial Armor unit that you want to keep your toys at home and pout about it?
I know that's a gross over-simplification and I'm not trying to put people down but frankly the attitude just saddens me and I don't know how else to really express it.
I just think everyone should lighten up, enjoy your game and y'know what? If you lose because of an Imperial Armor unit, now you have something good to complain about for the next year. Or you can just relax and not worry so much about losing games of toy soldiers...that's always an option too!
My only heartache over allowing FW units (with official FW models) is the timing. It's Christmas. Gotta get toys for the kids. And the kids of family friends. The tree, decorating the house (and tearing it all down). The never ending get-togethers arranged by She Who Must Be Obeyed.
3 months notice around all of that is not enough time to scrape the pennies together, buy the models AND the $50 book, build, and paint. Not to mention playtesting so you know HOW your new toy works and are familiar with its rules (don't you hate playing a guy who does not even know his own Army?).
On a side issue, GW has really just put out this caveat of AI units that are now "40K approved." Is a major Tournament the FIRST place we want to run headlong into this? It may be better to allow these units to filter through the community at the League and RTT level (gaining acceptance and commonality) before amping them up to the top level.
I just think its a bad idea, especially when the game is already so slanted against Xenos armies. But, at the end of the day, its Reece's decision and knowing the effort that goes into these events, I don't begrudge him this indulgence. I guess its largely pointless to argue, because the format already favors the holy trinity of SW, IG, GK already. The addition of IA2 will just reinforce it.
Automatically Appended Next Post: @Yak-
I am going to have to disagree about the IA2 vs GK codex comment, though. There really is nothing approaching the game changing nature of the Achilles or Luc. Pod in the GK book. GKs are all around powerful, but they do not have a unit that flat out autowins against many armies (Achilles) or completely alters someones entire deployment tactics (Luc, Pod for 65pts) to compensate. Purifiers and Vinicares are annoying, but they are not immortal and neither is going to make the enemy reserve their entire army to counter them.
Phazael wrote:@Yak-
I am going to have to disagree about the IA2 vs GK codex comment, though. There really is nothing approaching the game changing nature of the Achilles or Luc. Pod in the GK book. GKs are all around powerful, but they do not have a unit that flat out autowins against many armies (Achilles) or completely alters someones entire deployment tactics (Luc, Pod for 65pts) to compensate. Purifiers and Vinicares are annoying, but they are not immortal and neither is going to make the enemy reserve their entire army to counter them.
Warp Quake vs. Daemons or Drop pod lists (really, much of the codex vs. Daemons); Sanctuary and Cleansing Flame vs. Tyranids or Orks; Fortitude vs. traditional target priority & army design (need a lot more AT).
Just a few examples. I've been primarily a Tyranid player for the past couple years, and GK are a much nastier thing to encounter than an Achilles (which is just one tank, albeit I'm not a fan of the Thunderfire cannon it carries) or a Lucius (which I can partially mitigate through careful bubblewrap with 'gants or gargoyles).
yakface wrote:Let's just say to play the Devil's advocate that GW came out tomorrow and said that Imperial Armor rules were 'fully official' (whatever that means). Now what? Do you all quit the game and stop attending tournaments? Or do you just suck it up and try to enjoy the game while besting some new stuff, some of which may seem especially nifty and powerful until you get some experience against it and then like most things that seem horrible you realize that there are probably some ways around it, either through list building or else with certain tactics.
I am not limited to "quit the game or suck it up". If only the IA:2e units were available, I would switch to Marines count as Iron Warriors and finally make my dream siege army with the Achilles and Siege Dreadnoughts, and be extremely overpowered to boot. If more IA units were made available I might tool up my IG with IA units (breaching drills). In neither case would I follow your false choices of "quit or suck it up".
I don't have a horse in this race as I will be running the Narrative Event at the BAO, but I completely to agree with Yakface. In my opinion nothing in the 40k official list of IAApoc 2nd ed is broken, the early books like IA's 1-3 are where the really bad stuff can be found, and FW are redoing them to bring them up to date for 6th.
I am currently going through IA's 4-10 to decide which FW lists and units, I intend on allowing them in the narrative event. I'd love to see the Death Korps of Kreig or Vraksian traitor guard on the tabletop in the intended form if players want to bring them.
@ph3ar
If you live close to Martinez, come by our shop and play that dream army of yours (in proxy) and we'll video tape it and put it up on our blog. You can choose the army I play, any of mine and I will use a stock standard tournament list, not tailored.
This isn't an ego challenge either, please don't take it that way. It is simply me showing that nothing in that book is broken.
As others have said, there is far worse stuff in the codexes, now.
As for our reasoning on not allowing proxy FW models, you may not think it makes sense, but it is rooted in logic. You are free to disagree. And besides, you know that we have the best intentions of our attendees at heart, hell, last year you came to the event without an army and I let you play mine! We are all about making things fun.
@Fetterkey
Thank you for respectfully agreeing to disagree. I may not share your point of view, but you stayed classy in expressing your opinion, and I respect that. Too bad you can't make it this year, we'll miss having you.
@Yakface
I respect your opinion, and agree with you in principle as I often do. However, we have a significant investment of both time and money in this event. It is a lot easier to draw a hard line in the sand based on what we believe is the best course of action if less were at stake, but when we stand to lose our shirts if enough people don't want to come, then we are ultimately the ones who suffer.
@BDJV
That will be awesome! I love the Apoc themed armies and hope to see them, too!
@Thread
There was some talk about the BAO not getting the nod to have a spot for the ETC American team if we do include IA2 units.
I want to unequivocally squash that rumor. I KNOW with absolute certainty that including IA2 units in the BAO would not remove us from offering a qualifier for the event, but would actually be seen FAVORABLY as it shows that the winner had the ability to play through new and unexpected situations.
I can't say how I came across this information yet out of respect to my source, but I can state for 100% certain that what I said is true.
Reecius wrote:@ph3ar
If you live close to Martinez, come by our shop and play that dream army of yours (in proxy) and we'll video tape it and put it up on our blog. You can choose the army I play, any of mine and I will use a stock standard tournament list, not tailored.
This isn't an ego challenge either, please don't take it that way. It is simply me showing that nothing in that book is broken.
As others have said, there is far worse stuff in the codexes, now.
As for our reasoning on not allowing proxy FW models, you may not think it makes sense, but it is rooted in logic. You are free to disagree. And besides, you know that we have the best intentions of our attendees at heart, hell, last year you came to the event without an army and I let you play mine! We are all about making things fun.
@Fetterkey
Thank you for respectfully agreeing to disagree. I may not share your point of view, but you stayed classy in expressing your opinion, and I respect that. Too bad you can't make it this year, we'll miss having you.
@Yakface
I respect your opinion, and agree with you in principle as I often do. However, we have a significant investment of both time and money in this event. It is a lot easier to draw a hard line in the sand based on what we believe is the best course of action if less were at stake, but when we stand to lose our shirts if enough people don't want to come, then we are ultimately the ones who suffer.
@BDJV
That will be awesome! I love the Apoc themed armies and hope to see them, too!
@Thread
There was some talk about the BAO not getting the nod to have a spot for the ETC American team if we do include IA2 units.
I want to unequivocally squash that rumor. I KNOW with absolute certainty that including IA2 units in the BAO would not remove us from offering a qualifier for the event, but would actually be seen FAVORABLY as it shows that the winner had the ability to play through new and unexpected situations.
I can't say how I came across this information yet out of respect to my source, but I can state for 100% certain that what I said is true.
99% sure I can make it regardless of the decision on IA2e. If you are a qualifier for ETC then I am also 99% certain I will be playing 40k not Warmahordes.
disdainful wrote:The listing on the website says that the Saturday event for Warmachine is 50 points, but uses Casual 35 point time limits.
So... the 50 point tournament uses the round time limits of a casual 35-point tournament, which is... the round time limit of a 50 point tournament?
In all seriousness, why are you using casual time limits for any of the events? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to have what amounts to an eternity to conduct my turn, but that only widens the gap between players who are experienced with timed turns and those who are not.
-Dis.
I must say I agree with Dis on this. Warmahordes is a game that uses time limits. Playing with in those time constraints is part of being good at the game, an event as large as the BAO which is trying to become the preeminent GT style event on the West Coast really shouldn't be making the games easier. Using the relaxed time limits in a tournament of this size and competitive focus is like riding a bike with the training wheels on. YMMV but I can't say I would want to play in a Warmahordes event on this level that uses the relaxed time limits.
I am not sure if you are aware of this but the SR2012 round times are already accelerated one tier from the SR 2011. As such the turn rounds would be exactly the same as they were last year using this format.
disdainful wrote:The listing on the website says that the Saturday event for Warmachine is 50 points, but uses Casual 35 point time limits.
So... the 50 point tournament uses the round time limits of a casual 35-point tournament, which is... the round time limit of a 50 point tournament?
In all seriousness, why are you using casual time limits for any of the events? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to have what amounts to an eternity to conduct my turn, but that only widens the gap between players who are experienced with timed turns and those who are not.
-Dis.
Hello,
I am the one that will be running the Warmahordes Tournaments.
The 35 point times int he 50 point games was probably a typo and will be fixed.
Regarding the times. In the new SR2012 rules all the times have been stepped down one level. So what is a normal timed turn in SR2010 is now called "Casual". So in reference to what you are playing now with SR2010 all of them are standard timed and one is accelerated.
For the Friday Tournament I wanted something a little different. We have Saturday and Sunday for "normal" tournaments It is only Tier 1 requirement and it will get some armies out there to play against that you rarely see. Yes this is a tournament, but we are here to have fun and experience new things too!
disdainful wrote:The listing on the website says that the Saturday event for Warmachine is 50 points, but uses Casual 35 point time limits.
So... the 50 point tournament uses the round time limits of a casual 35-point tournament, which is... the round time limit of a 50 point tournament?
In all seriousness, why are you using casual time limits for any of the events? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to have what amounts to an eternity to conduct my turn, but that only widens the gap between players who are experienced with timed turns and those who are not.
-Dis.
I must say I agree with Dis on this. Warmahordes is a game that uses time limits. Playing with in those time constraints is part of being good at the game, an event as large as the BAO which is trying to become the preeminent GT style event on the West Coast really shouldn't be making the games easier. Using the relaxed time limits in a tournament of this size and competitive focus is like riding a bike with the training wheels on. YMMV but I can't say I would want to play in a Warmahordes event on this level that uses the relaxed time limits.
I am not sure if you are aware of this but the SR2012 round times are already accelerated one tier from the SR 2011. As such the turn rounds would be exactly the same as they were last year using this format.
disdainful wrote:The listing on the website says that the Saturday event for Warmachine is 50 points, but uses Casual 35 point time limits.
In all seriousness, why are you using casual time limits for any of the events? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to have what amounts to an eternity to conduct my turn, but that only widens the gap between players who are experienced with timed turns and those who are not.
-Dis.
Actually, wouldn't having more give players not as experience with time turns a better chance, as they will be more likely to finish their turns and be able to move most of their armies? Yes, players experienced with time turns will have more time to think, but that will always be true.
Reecius wrote:@ph3ar
If you live close to Martinez, come by our shop and play that dream army of yours (in proxy) and we'll video tape it and put it up on our blog. You can choose the army I play, any of mine and I will use a stock standard tournament list, not tailored.
*ph34r
Some day I hope to be able to test that army out, once I have a marine army and am skilled enough to put it to the test. Right now I am only in the planning phases of my force -- if it gets completed in record time you might see me at the tournament with LRA and Siege Dreads.
disdainful wrote:The listing on the website says that the Saturday event for Warmachine is 50 points, but uses Casual 35 point time limits.
In all seriousness, why are you using casual time limits for any of the events? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to have what amounts to an eternity to conduct my turn, but that only widens the gap between players who are experienced with timed turns and those who are not.
-Dis.
Actually, wouldn't having more give players not as experience with time turns a better chance, as they will be more likely to finish their turns and be able to move most of their armies? Yes, players experienced with time turns will have more time to think, but that will always be true.
I have always viewed strict time constraints part of Warmahorde's competitive nature. If those players not as experienced with time constraints want a chance at the top prizes they should play with more time constraints. The whole field shouldn't be handled with kid gloves. I have always viewed Warmahordes as the "play like you've got a pair" truly competitive, no kid glove, game. Maybe that is just our local meta but WM is supposed to be fully competitive, running on all cylinders, no holds barred and in my experience that would mean not dumbing down the game in any way. However the likelihood of my playing in the Warmahordes event rather than 40k is low so I will bow out since no one else seems concerned with this issue.
@Overwatch: I appreciate your impute regardless though. And agree that the hard core aspect appeals to me personally. I went to gencon this year and played in the hard core and quite enjoyed it.
Menelker wrote:Regarding the times. In the new SR2012 rules all the times have been stepped down one level. So what is a normal timed turn in SR2010 is now called "Casual". So in reference to what you are playing now with SR2010 all of them are standard timed and one is accelerated.
Ok.. so to be clear: the 35 point tournaments have 10 minute turns, and the 50 point tournament have 12 minute turns. Is that correct?
Menelker wrote:Actually, wouldn't having more give players not as experience with time turns a better chance, as they will be more likely to finish their turns and be able to move most of their armies? Yes, players experienced with time turns will have more time to think, but that will always be true.
You would think so, but it's been my experience that the opposite is true. If a player isn't used to timed turns, he's going to be under the gun whether he has a couple extra minutes or not; he's going make errors in order to keep to the time, whereas giving more time to a player experienced with timed turns means they have a much reduced chance of making mistakes. In effect, you're letting the better players get a near-perfect turn every time, which is going to put the other players at a greater disadvantage. The shorter turns help level the field because everyone has to make quick decisions and live with errors, no matter their skill level.
Granted, after the first couple of rounds of swiss everyone should be playing against opponents of equivalent skill level so it washes out, but those first couple rounds will be rough.
1) The Zero Comp Guys running this event ARE, as a group, 1 of, if not The, TOP ranked group of 40k players in the USA. I will not say World because I have not checked those numbers but I’m sure they are up there in the TOP on that list too. I know these guys both from playing against them across the table and hanging out with them outside of the Tournament scene. THEY KNOW MATHHAMMER GUYS. I know they have studied this book and would not have even considered Apoc2 if they didn’t feel it was a viable option. It might just be me but it seems like they are not getting the respect they have EARNED and DESERVE from some of you here.
2) I understand people want to make their point about my opponents “ROCK” Unit is to powerful versus my “Scissors” Unit, but come on that’s 40k.
3) Now here’s the one really crazy argument. “FW is expensive for me and this gives an unfair advantage to someone with more money! We should be able to Proxy them” I cannot believe this one guys. This game is about expendable cash. How many Power Gamers out there drop $400+, easily, on a whole new Army every time a new Power Codex comes out? This is not any deferent. These Power Gamers are the guys that have been stomping through Tournaments ever since the Tournament scene began but even though they drop that kind of cash they don’t seem to be winning every GT.
4) Like the Zero Comp guys, I could “debate” about each and every one unit that is already in the standard different Codexs that could deal with these new units but I think there is already enough of that debating going on by the Zero Comp and other more respected guys out there than I. I have been working pretty hard to know the game and get some experience in the Tournament scene, so while I might not be a total Noob when it comes to 40k, I KNOW I’m a Noob when it comes to forum “debating”. ;-)
So just as far as the Apoc2 Book goes I believe there are some very strong Units in there but again I trust in Zero Comp and RESPECT the hell out of their judgment. They have put together some great Tournaments and have already, after hearing your responses to the Apoc2 option, put this up for a vote, which is pretty cool that they respect the gamers enough to do this. I will study the Apoc2 book, reading through all the rules thoroughly, Reece and only then put my vote in and I hope everyone else will do the same.
Either way guys I will be there to play. I look forward to gaming and just hanging out with some great guys both on the Zero Comp team and just great folks I have met while playing this game. LET GAME!
p.s. I’m sure about another 20 post have happened in the time it took me to finish this post on my iPhone. Hope it doesn’t derail the debating too much… And please ignore any and all typos.
Reecius wrote:
@Thread
There was some talk about the BAO not getting the nod to have a spot for the ETC American team if we do include IA2 units.
I want to unequivocally squash that rumor. I KNOW with absolute certainty that including IA2 units in the BAO would not remove us from offering a qualifier for the event, but would actually be seen FAVORABLY as it shows that the winner had the ability to play through new and unexpected situations.
I can't say how I came across this information yet out of respect to my source, but I can state for 100% certain that what I said is true.
Since I said it, let me clarify it.
Also I am not on the US ETC, nor do I speak for it.
But I will tell you that the American ETC team has been looking for a quality event out west to help the selection process for the US ETC team. Right now they have a couple of players in Texas, and the rest are in the North East (and yes, from where I am, Ohio is in the NE).
If you look at this year’s qualifying rules, they have the best battle point winner of Da Boyz GT, Adepticon, and Wargames Con get an invite to join the team, and an aggregate winner who scored the highest in those events plus (in an effort to add some West Coast diversity to the team) they also added the Slaughter in Space tournament in the Fall (which unfortunately the SCGWL guys dropped when they went to a format of 40K in the Spring, and WHF in the Fall).
The problem we have right now is that all of the West Coast tournaments are miles behind the top events on the East Coast. Even the Nova Open in its second year had over 200+ attendees, and even the biggest tournaments on the West Coast events can get even half that much.
I have been a vocal proponent to try to get a qualifying event on the West Coast, (Having your tournament as a possible ETC qualifier was not even on your radar until I said it), and it was my hope that the Bay Area Open would become the flagship West Coast tournament event, but with the addition of Forge World somewhere along the line it stops being Warhammer 40K. Now it is on the level of events like the Grand Waaagh, and the Broadside Bash. The ETC team might as well choose one of those events since all of them have about the same attendance, and all of them have their flaws. Right now (IMO) the Slaughter in Space is still the best tournament to help pick an ETC member. .
In the end it is Ben “Spacecurves” call on the selection process of the American ETC Team for 2013, so only he knows what the future has for the selection process.
Who knows, maybe I am wrong, and this is the way of the future. I am going to be on a few podcasts coming up and I would like to get some of the host's ideas on the matter of including these Forge World units to tournaments.
ph34r wrote:
I am not limited to "quit the game or suck it up". If only the IA:2e units were available, I would switch to Marines count as Iron Warriors and finally make my dream siege army with the Achilles and Siege Dreadnoughts, and be extremely overpowered to boot. If more IA units were made available I might tool up my IG with IA units (breaching drills). In neither case would I follow your false choices of "quit or suck it up".
But what you're saying is that you'd utilize the Imperial Armor rules if they were allowed...that's my whole point of 'sucking it up'. Right now, Imperial Armor is 'official' as much as any rules that are allowed by a tourney organizer. If for some reason every tourney organizer decided to utilize these rules all of a sudden it wouldn't seem like a 'choice' as it does to many people, you'd just have to deal with it like any other powerful thing in the game and that's my whole point.
Because there is an easy line in the sand to draw with Imperial Armor, people are okay with effectively enforcing 'comp' in this situation by saying 'no, I think those things are too scary and therefore I want to exclude all of it', even though that means the 98% of the other IA units, many of which are useful and cool without being that scary get tossed out with the 'nasty' 2%.
Its basically like everyone has gotten together and decided that because the Grey Knights are too powerful, we're simply going to exclude them from tournaments. Obviously there's big a difference in that a codex is definitely considered more of a 'core' part of the game, but the point I'm trying to make is that the decision to not include these rules seems to be borne ultimately out of a fear of losing to something that is powerful...and I personally think that is a bad reason to continue to make a decision that restricts so many cool things from the game.
Reecius wrote:
@Yakface
I respect your opinion, and agree with you in principle as I often do. However, we have a significant investment of both time and money in this event. It is a lot easier to draw a hard line in the sand based on what we believe is the best course of action if less were at stake, but when we stand to lose our shirts if enough people don't want to come, then we are ultimately the ones who suffer.
No, I totally get it, and I wouldn't expect anything else, frankly. The only thing I would caution is that often times the people who are most against something are always the most vocal as well (because fear and negativity tends to push people into action).
There are obviously a number of reasons that people don't like seeing IA rules in tournaments, but one of the big ones is that people are unfamiliar playing against those rules because they rarely get a chance to do so. And that's really the self-fulfilling prophecy that I would love to be broken more. Basically the idea is: Players don't like IA rules because they're unfamiliar with them. --> They're unfamiliar with them because they never see them in tournaments --> They never see them in tournaments because so few tournaments allow them. --> Tournaments don't allow them because players don't like IA rules. --> Players don't like IA rules because they're unfamiliar with them.
See the cyclical loop which sits atop fear and a bit of ignorance that continually feeds itself? And of course add into that the fact that many players don't buy FW models because they don't want to drop the cash on models they can't use in tournaments, which also helps to feed into the lack of FW models/IA rules that allows people to be familiar with them.
So I think that even if you do get a few people who very anti-IA and don't show up to the event, if you're able to suck it up and push through and still allow IA rules, then maybe those players that attend will see that the sky doesn't fall and over time the word will spread with more and more people getting increasingly relaxed about IA rules and more comfortable with the idea of playing with and against them.
---
With all that said, I do have a question for you. Obviously as the TO, you guys are totally within your rights to utilize and exclude any set of rules you would like. However, I may have misunderstood, but it seems like your basis for allowing the IAA 2nd edition rules (and no other IA rules) is because somehow you feel as though the units in IAA 2nd edition are somehow 'more official' than other IA rules. Am I correct on this?
Because I don't see any basis for that in IAA 2nd edition. Yes, the unit entries are now 'stamped' with either a '40K' or 'Apoc' in the book, but this is not the same 'official' stamp they use in White Dwarf for things like the Night Spinner (that stamp just says 'official' on it).
The 'stamps' in IAA 2nd edition simply denote at a glance whether the unit is designed for 40K or just Apoc...something you just had to read more closely to find out in the other books.
But the preamble of IAA 2nd edition makes it perfectly clear how 'official' these rules are, as compared to other IA books (emphasis mine):
"This unit is intended to be used in 'standard' games of Warhammer 40,000, within the usual limitations of Codex selection and force organization charts. As with all our models these should be considered 'official', but owing to the fact that they may be unknown to your opponent, its best to make sure that are happy to play a game using Forge World models before you start."
As you can see, the IAA 2nd edition preamble clearly says that the models in IAA 2nd edition are as official as any of their other models...which in the case of a tournament means they are as official as the TO says they are.
Therefore, I personally don't see any basis from that perspective that the rules in IAA 2nd edition are any more 'official' than any other IA unit in another book.
Again, as the TO, you have all the power to allow/not allow whatever you want, but I just wanted to get clarification from you as to exactly why you are considering allowing ONLY the IA units from IAA 2nd edition.
Is it because you feel the book is much more balanced than the other books (so you're excluding the other books because they contain a higher level of imbalance) or is it because you feel somehow that IAA 2nd edition is somehow more 'official' than the previous books, despite my argument above?
Phazael wrote:
@Yak-
I am going to have to disagree about the IA2 vs GK codex comment, though. There really is nothing approaching the game changing nature of the Achilles or Luc. Pod in the GK book. GKs are all around powerful, but they do not have a unit that flat out autowins against many armies (Achilles) or completely alters someones entire deployment tactics (Luc, Pod for 65pts) to compensate. Purifiers and Vinicares are annoying, but they are not immortal and neither is going to make the enemy reserve their entire army to counter them.
I really don't want to get into long-winded arguments about which units are more or less powerful than other units because its one of those never-ending discussions that ultimately falls to personal opinion. However, I will at least put up my viewpoint on a couple of these things and then let that part of the discussion rest because there can be no real winner (so I'll put it into spoiler tags to hopefully avoid derailing the overall conversation):
Spoiler:
When it comes to Grey Knights vs. a Lucius and/or Achillies, all I know is that if you gave Grey Knight players the choice between having Psy-riflemen Dreads in their army or either Lucius Pods or Achillies Land Raiders, I think very few intelligent players would pick either of those over the Dreads.
I don't believe the Lucius OR the Achillies are 'broken' anymore. Are they powerful nasty units? Absolutely. But not more than Thunderwolf Lords, Psy-rifleman Dreads, etc.
The Lucius is now 65 points, takes up a FA slot on its own and gives you a 1 in 6 chance of immobilizing your Dread the turn it arrives. These 3 factors mean you can't really design a whole army around it. If you do, you've now sunk all your FA slots and 195 points into generally worthless Drop Pods, and your opponent still has a few ways to counter, namely:
1) If the Pod player gets the first turn, they just put everything into reserve.
2) They bubble wrap their expensive stuff and counter-attack after you land.
Now, can this army still totally wreck certain builds in certain situations? Absolutely. But there are also plenty of builds that can counter it relatively easy and that's not even taking into consideration any immobilized results you end up rolling on your Dreads while trying to charge. That really means a Lucius heavy army (3 of them) will almost never be a tournament winner. He will likely wreck a few opponents on the way, but then he'll run into someone who knows what to do and get his butt handed to him.
So the much better way to play with a Lucius is probably taking only one and using it as a very nasty deterrent to try to get your opponent to go into reserve. In that role I think the army stands a much better chance of winning a tournament, but its by no means game-breaking. Its just a really powerful tool like 3 Psy-rifleman dreadnoughts or 3 Long Fang squads that allows players to excel.
The Land Raider Achillies is exactly the same, if not worse than the Lucius in this regard. Is it nearly unstoppable against certain army builds? Yep. Does this make it bad game design? Yeah, I totally agree with that. But it isn't game breaking because it is pointed correctly. While it will dominate certain scenarios against certain opponents against other armies it will get hammered and being 325 points means losing it at the wrong time can totally cripple the army...so again you run into a situation where the player will likely toast a bunch of people but will ultimately run up against something that eats the Achillies for breakfast.
For example, I am MUCH more fearful of regular Land Raiders than I am the Achillies. Their long-ranged Lascannons and the ability to disgorge and charge a nasty CC unit is much more devastating to me. My Kans and Dreads can suck up long-ranged Thunderfire shots at them all day long (if they even want to fire at that unit) and if they really want to hit me with their twin-linked Multi-Meltas within close range, it means I'd now be within assault range of the Achillies.
So a Kan Wall, for example would actually really love to see Achillies, because it means you've put more points into a vehicle that isn't that much harder to destroy once the Kans get into combat (which is the only way I can kill Land Raiders anyway)...but most critically it lacks the ability to dump and charge an assault unit, which is really the thing that makes Land Raiders a problem for me normally.
So Achillies...is it nasty? Yep. It is bad rules design? Yep. Is it 'broken' (in that its inclusion nearly guarantees that the player will win a tournament)? Not in the least.
I mean, just think about a Space Wolf army. If you take an Achillies, not only does that mean you're losing out on 5 Long Fangs, but it also costs 2 1/3 times the cost of that Long Fang squad with 5 Missile Launchers! As an opponent, personally I'd much rather see a single Achillies over those 5 extra Missile Launchers.
My concern is not that they are unbeatable (clearly they are not), but rather that it creates situations that put certain armies completely in the dog house against them. I know if I pulled my nids out of retirement and drove eight hours to play and got my hive guard units turn one charged by two dreads or spent a game or two chasing around an immortal thunderfire cannon, I would be pretty pissed. My point to Reece is that the inclusion of these units further aggravate what is already a very heavily Marine Centric event.
I also agree that if you let one book in you should probably let them all in. I mean if a turn one dread charge is fair for marines, then surely a hades drill team is alright for guard. The tons of suit and drone variants for tau are actually balanced and should see play, if anything. Some of the Chaos stuff is actually pretty balanced, too, from prior books. I also think the Badab war alternate space marine chapters are fine and all of those are certainly more balanced (and easier to explain to an opponent) than the Achilles or Cestus. The IA2 only choice seems very odd and arbitrary.
yakface wrote:
When it comes to Grey Knights vs. a Lucius and/or Achillies, all I know is that if you gave Grey Knight players the choice between having Psy-riflemen Dreads in their army or either Lucius Pods or Achillies Land Raiders, I think very few intelligent players would pick either of those over the Dreads.
yakface wrote:
I mean, just think about a Space Wolf army. If you take an Achillies, not only does that mean you're losing out on 5 Long Fangs, but it also costs 2 1/3 times the cost of that Long Fang squad with 5 Missile Launchers! As an opponent, personally I'd much rather see a single Achillies over those 5 extra Missile Launchers.
This is a false argument. Psy-rifleman Dreads and Long Fang squads are just about the most point efficient units in the game. On top of that, they perform necessary roles for their respective armies. Of course good GK and SW players will stick with their inexpensive, highly efficient choices. Especially given the specialized nature of those armies.
Normal Marine players are the ones who will benefit from these units. They have fewer "auto-includes" and can actually build an army around them. I don't know if the Achilles is an 0-1 choice, but two of them with a couple of min-sized scout units could form a pretty powerful core of a Marine army. I think it's a bit harder to build an army around Lucius Pods, but I'm sure it's possible.
I can totally understand why they are only allowing the IAApoc 2nd ed. Look at it this way, you've gotta start somewhere so they chose the most recent IA book.
Look at the response that has been had from that one choice, now imagine if they said all IA books are legal for the BAO tourneys, it would be much worse.
ph34r wrote:
Because there is an easy line in the sand to draw with Imperial Armor, people are okay with effectively enforcing 'comp' in this situation by saying 'no, I think those things are too scary and therefore I want to exclude all of it', even though that means the 98% of the other IA units, many of which are useful and cool without being that scary get tossed out with the 'nasty' 2%.
To be honest, I don't think allowing this book is going to cause people to bring that specified "other 98%" of the book, because "useful and cool" might as well be a synonym for "bad unit." But if they think it's worth it to completely change the intent and concept of the Vanilla Marine codex design in exchange for the slim glimmer of hope that someone brings that awful Dark Eldar skimmer with the big haywire gun, I guess it's worth it.
On an unrelated note, I think it's hilarious how people constantly cite arguments to the effect of "Hey guys, relax, nothing in here is as overpowered as Grey Knights." Doesn't that set off warning bells to anyone else? It shortens pretty easily to "Hey guys, Grey Knights are overpowered." I guess we've all come to terms with that as a community, and we can move forward, stronger.
ph34r wrote:
Because there is an easy line in the sand to draw with Imperial Armor, people are okay with effectively enforcing 'comp' in this situation by saying 'no, I think those things are too scary and therefore I want to exclude all of it', even though that means the 98% of the other IA units, many of which are useful and cool without being that scary get tossed out with the 'nasty' 2%.
To be honest, I don't think allowing this book is going to cause people to bring that specified "other 98%" of the book, because "useful and cool" might as well be a synonym for "bad unit." But if they think it's worth it to completely change the intent and concept of the Vanilla Marine codex design in exchange for the slim glimmer of hope that someone brings that awful Dark Eldar skimmer with the big haywire gun, I guess it's worth it.
On an unrelated note, I think it's hilarious how people constantly cite arguments to the effect of "Hey guys, relax, nothing in here is as overpowered as Grey Knights." Doesn't that set off warning bells to anyone else? It shortens pretty easily to "Hey guys, Grey Knights are overpowered." I guess we've all come to terms with that as a community, and we can move forward, stronger.
Meh, go back 2 years and you'll see the same statements but substitute Space Wolves for Grey Knights. There is always an OP codex in 40k. 4th ed had Mechdar, early 5th had Orks, Mid 5th had IG/SW late 5th has GK. People don't want to see anymore than 1 OP thing at a time, and out of that fear they don't want IAA2e. I would prefer not having IAA2e because I would rather not have to buy the book or comb the net searching for info and then play a bunch of proxy games to figure out how to beat the units. I certainly am not running out to buy any and if my Contemptor Dread shows up it will be a Venerable GK Dread not a contemptor.
Actually, Reece. Would I be allowed to use my Contemptor as a normal Dread if we do use the IAA2e? I wouldn't want to cause confusion so I understand if the answer is no.
disdainful wrote:The listing on the website says that the Saturday event for Warmachine is 50 points, but uses Casual 35 point time limits.
So... the 50 point tournament uses the round time limits of a casual 35-point tournament, which is... the round time limit of a 50 point tournament?
In all seriousness, why are you using casual time limits for any of the events? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to have what amounts to an eternity to conduct my turn, but that only widens the gap between players who are experienced with timed turns and those who are not.
-Dis.
I must say I agree with Dis on this. Warmahordes is a game that uses time limits. Playing with in those time constraints is part of being good at the game, an event as large as the BAO which is trying to become the preeminent GT style event on the West Coast really shouldn't be making the games easier. Using the relaxed time limits in a tournament of this size and competitive focus is like riding a bike with the training wheels on. YMMV but I can't say I would want to play in a Warmahordes event on this level that uses the relaxed time limits.
I am not sure if you are aware of this but the SR2012 round times are already accelerated one tier from the SR 2011. As such the turn rounds would be exactly the same as they were last year using this format.
Yeah I Think the causal time limits are in response to the lowered turn limits of SR2012. The Base time of all events will be accerated one level, so a Causal event next year will be the same as one this year.
Warmachine and Hordes are still a growing community and while I'd personally prefer a more hardcore approach to tournaments, personal experience as a TO has shown the Nor Cal Warmachine community is a bit shy of timed events and this really hurts event turn outs. At this point in out community growth, I'd rather have a event that has more people then one that's more competitive.
disdainful wrote:The listing on the website says that the Saturday event for Warmachine is 50 points, but uses Casual 35 point time limits.
So... the 50 point tournament uses the round time limits of a casual 35-point tournament, which is... the round time limit of a 50 point tournament?
In all seriousness, why are you using casual time limits for any of the events? Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to have what amounts to an eternity to conduct my turn, but that only widens the gap between players who are experienced with timed turns and those who are not.
-Dis.
I must say I agree with Dis on this. Warmahordes is a game that uses time limits. Playing with in those time constraints is part of being good at the game, an event as large as the BAO which is trying to become the preeminent GT style event on the West Coast really shouldn't be making the games easier. Using the relaxed time limits in a tournament of this size and competitive focus is like riding a bike with the training wheels on. YMMV but I can't say I would want to play in a Warmahordes event on this level that uses the relaxed time limits.
I am not sure if you are aware of this but the SR2012 round times are already accelerated one tier from the SR 2011. As such the turn rounds would be exactly the same as they were last year using this format.
Yeah I Think the causal time limits are in response to the lowered turn limits of SR2012. The Base time of all events will be accerated one level, so a Causal event next year will be the same as one this year.
Warmachine and Hordes are still a growing community and while I'd personally prefer a more hardcore approach to tournaments, personal experience as a TO has shown the Nor Cal Warmachine community is a bit shy of timed events and this really hurts event turn outs. At this point in out community growth, I'd rather have a event that has more people then one that's more competitive.
While I understand and respect that I can't get behind it. I view WM/H as the preeminent competitive miniatures game (and I am hardcore 40k player) and so taking out that aspect rubs me the wrong way.
Gah! I said I wouldn't comment about Warmahordes anymore!
ph34r wrote: I am not limited to "quit the game or suck it up". If only the IA:2e units were available, I would switch to Marines count as Iron Warriors and finally make my dream siege army with the Achilles and Siege Dreadnoughts, and be extremely overpowered to boot. If more IA units were made available I might tool up my IG with IA units (breaching drills). In neither case would I follow your false choices of "quit or suck it up".
But what you're saying is that you'd utilize the Imperial Armor rules if they were allowed...that's my whole point of 'sucking it up'. Right now, Imperial Armor is 'official' as much as any rules that are allowed by a tourney organizer. If for some reason every tourney organizer decided to utilize these rules all of a sudden it wouldn't seem like a 'choice' as it does to many people, you'd just have to deal with it like any other powerful thing in the game and that's my whole point.
Because there is an easy line in the sand to draw with Imperial Armor, people are okay with effectively enforcing 'comp' in this situation by saying 'no, I think those things are too scary and therefore I want to exclude all of it', even though that means the 98% of the other IA units, many of which are useful and cool without being that scary get tossed out with the 'nasty' 2%.
Its basically like everyone has gotten together and decided that because the Grey Knights are too powerful, we're simply going to exclude them from tournaments. Obviously there's big a difference in that a codex is definitely considered more of a 'core' part of the game, but the point I'm trying to make is that the decision to not include these rules seems to be borne ultimately out of a fear of losing to something that is powerful...and I personally think that is a bad reason to continue to make a decision that restricts so many cool things from the game.
The easy solution is to ban those 2% units.
However you, and the people advocating for FW units, would not do this because they don't care about the 98% of fluffy/fun/weak units. They just want their 2%. It's really easy to break down your argument, as far as you have communicated it to me where I stand. You say there's no point throwing out IA because only a few of the units are broken. I say cool, allow IA but ban those broken units. If you are unwilling to ban the broken units, how transparent does that make your excuse seem?
Would I be okay with IA:A2e if it provided units to all armies equally? Yes, 100%.
But it doesn't. It mega buffs marines, gives orks and eldar some decent stuff, and then doesn't do jack for Nids, Necrons, DE, Guard, SoB.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Dugg wrote:3) Now here’s the one really crazy argument. “FW is expensive for me and this gives an unfair advantage to someone with more money! We should be able to Proxy them” I cannot believe this one guys. This game is about expendable cash. How many Power Gamers out there drop $400+, easily, on a whole new Army every time a new Power Codex comes out? This is not any deferent. These Power Gamers are the guys that have been stomping through Tournaments ever since the Tournament scene began but even though they drop that kind of cash they don’t seem to be winning every GT.
So logically you are in 100% opposition to scratch builds, alternate builds, and other such conversions that do not use stock GW models?
If you are opposed to banning scratch builds and conversions, you must ban all such things from the standard codexes.
This means all the HKM long fangs, guns glued on top razorbacks, aegis defense line hydras, orks count as IG, and XYZ counts as grey knights must be banned.
Or maybe you realize how mad people would get if that happened, and arbitrarily would impose a "no conversion" policy on FW?
NinjaRay wrote:Warmachine and Hordes are still a growing community and while I'd personally prefer a more hardcore approach to tournaments, personal experience as a TO has shown the Nor Cal Warmachine community is a bit shy of timed events and this really hurts event turn outs. At this point in out community growth, I'd rather have a event that has more people then one that's more competitive.
That's a legitimate concern. It takes a while to get a group used to timed turns. However, that seems more like a concern for the local store/community level, as opposed to an event like BAO that is (theoretically) going to have a broader draw of players from the Western US, and is positioning itself to be the west-coast tournament event.
All this aside, I'll go regardless if I can make it.
I agree GKs are really really strong, but until they start winning instead of SW and Guard, I am not convinced they are the best. Stong? Yes. Annoying? Probably. Broken? Against the armies not in the holy trinity, most likely. But Wolves are king until they get dethroned.
Warhammer 40K Narrative Event tickets and information now up! This is going to be a really cool event for those of you who don't really care much for competitive play 40K!
Automatically Appended Next Post: The votes are in and the results have been tallied!
Warmachine and Hordes voted to keep the casual time limits as they are essentially the same as they were last year.
Fantasy voted for a light Comp system.
40K votes came in just about 50/50 for and against IAApoc 2 units in the Singles. Of those, the yays were all of the opinion: sure, sounds cool. The nays were split in half between preferring not to, but not caring that much, and half being strongly opposed.
So, considering essentially 75% of the crowd didn't care that much, and 25% cared a lot, we decided to go with that.
In closing, IA2Apoc units will NOT be allowed in the singles Championships.
However, we only had a single vote against IA units in the Team Tournament.
Therefore, we will allow IA units (from all books) in the Team Tournament with the following restrictions: No super Heavies or Gargantuan Creatures. Only the most current version of the rules can be used, the players must have the actual Forgeworld Model (no proxies or counts as this year), and the actual Book (no photocopies, etc.). The following units are banned: Hades Breaching Drill, Land Raider Achilles, and the Lucius Pattern Drop Pod. Each teammate on a team may have one such unit (totaling 2 per team).
Thanks for the feedback, guys! We appreciate it and really look forward to the biggest, and best BAO yet!
No deadline. We have 32 Fantasy tickets up for sale, if we sell out early, we'll add 32 more slots, if not, we'll sell tickets up to the day of the event. However, we will be increasing ticket prices as we get closer to the event.
Dugg wrote:The Zero Comp Guys running this event ARE, as a group, 1 of, if not The, TOP ranked group of 40k players in the USA. I will not say World because I have not checked those numbers but I’m sure they are up there in the TOP on that list too.
Not knocking the group or anything but I don't see them on the list of "top clubs" even in the US:
Dugg wrote:The Zero Comp Guys running this event ARE, as a group, 1 of, if not The, TOP ranked group of 40k players in the USA. I will not say World because I have not checked those numbers but I’m sure they are up there in the TOP on that list too.
Not knocking the group or anything but I don't see them on the list of "top clubs" even in the US:
Our club for the most part is new, we're more then likely not even on there as a team. As individually players however, 3 of us are in the top 50 in the US. Frankie had been number 1 for quite some time back in May, along with Reece in the top 5 around that same period of time.
3 of us are in the top 5 for the South West ranking area.
Rankingshq isnt much, but being the only "ranking" we have for 40k it is pretty cool to look at.
@Dok
No, only units. Thanks for pointing that out, I will update it on the rules section.
@Buzerker
I had never even heard of the Club ranking system! Haha
We have never registered in events as a club, so that is why we aren't on there. But as Will said, we have won or placed top 10 in many big events, for what that's worth.
@Reece, Sign us up as a club. I think its pretty easy and we can see where we stand. It dosent matter too much but I always thought RankingnsHQ was a fun thing.
I'll be signing up for the event right after New Years and looking forward to it. Is it going to be in the same place? I thought the location was great last time.
Yeah, same place, Grimgob. We really like the venue, too, and it allows us to keep our ticket price the lowest of any major GT, while also having as good or better prize support, which is awesome.
Then we will start signing up for events as a team/club from now on so we can start tracking our stats. RankingsHQ is a lot of fun, and we all do well individually, might as well group our rankings together to get recognition for our team!
Oh, I agree. But one step at a time, you know? People reacted pretty strongly to ia2 units. This year we'll dip our toe in the water, see how it goes and hopefully open things up for next year.
Are you playing in the singles and doubles this year?
I'm waiting on my vacation to get approved, but me and my buddy were thinking of heading up after work Thursday to play in the doubles on friday. It sounds pretty fun.
That really suck, I was really planning to go and play with my Black Templars with all the new FW toys. I would like to see a single tournament with IA2 allowed. I'm just sad to see players killing the game with something that they are either afraid or don't know the rules.
Our club for the most part is new, we're more then likely not even on there as a team. As individually players however, 3 of us are in the top 50 in the US. Frankie had been number 1 for quite some time back in May, along with Reece in the top 5 around that same period of time.
3 of us are in the top 5 for the South West ranking area.
Rankingshq isnt much, but being the only "ranking" we have for 40k it is pretty cool to look at.
Reecius wrote:@Dok
I had never even heard of the Club ranking system! Haha
We have never registered in events as a club, so that is why we aren't on there. But as Will said, we have won or placed top 10 in many big events, for what that's worth.
Ah. Easy fix then.
You don't need to register in events as a club. You simply go to Rankings HQ, register under your name (if you haven't done so already) and specify that you are a member of Team Zero Comp. Then all other members who do the same will contribute to this new club ranking. I suggest you all do so and see where you are ranked. Should be fun.
I read it the other night. I think Reece has to register the club in his name, then some how we can request to be members by looking up the club on RHQ, Reece then has has to accept our request, and then it adjusts the ranking based on everyone accepted in the club.
Grimgob wrote:I read it the other night. I think Reece has to register the club in his name, then some how we can request to be members by looking up the club on RHQ, Reece then has has to accept our request, and then it adjusts the ranking based on everyone accepted in the club.
Yeah, RankingsHQ changed their upload process and I still have not sat down to figure it out, I think you have to upload the results twice or something. The first time nothing happened.
Looking forward to having you, madfjohn!
Big announcement!!!
Best of Army Prizes
This is a great idea introduced to us by Kasil, one of our blog readers. This is a prize given to the person who performs best with their army. So, the best Blood Angels, Dark Angels, Space Wolf, Space Marine, Black Templar, Tau, Sisters of Battle, Imperial Guard, Chaos Space Marines, Chaos Daemons, Eldar, Dark Eldar, Necrons and Tyranid player will receive a prize and the knowledge that they were the best player of that army at the Bay Area Open!
Prize: A trophy proclaiming their accomplishment and a Battleforce of their choice!
If this player wins another prize, they will still get the trophy, but will receive the larger prize of the two they win, not both.
The best of army idea is awesome. I mean, I'm planning to win overall, but that's definitely a good consolation prize to people that drop a game early and want to keep playing.
Reecius wrote:Yeah, RankingsHQ changed their upload process and I still have not sat down to figure it out, I think you have to upload the results twice or something. The first time nothing happened.
Looking forward to having you, madfjohn!
Big announcement!!!
Best of Army Prizes
This is a great idea introduced to us by Kasil, one of our blog readers. This is a prize given to the person who performs best with their army. So, the best Blood Angels, Dark Angels, Space Wolf, Space Marine, Black Templar, Tau, Sisters of Battle, Imperial Guard, Chaos Space Marines, Chaos Daemons, Eldar, Dark Eldar, Necrons and Tyranid player will receive a prize and the knowledge that they were the best player of that army at the Bay Area Open!
Prize: A trophy proclaiming their accomplishment and a Battleforce of their choice! If this player wins another prize, they will still get the trophy, but will receive the larger prize of the two they win, not both.
Dok wrote:The best of army idea is awesome. I mean, I'm planning to win overall, but that's definitely a good consolation prize to people that drop a game early and want to keep playing.
I would agree it is a good idea but i will be playing Grey Knights and am apparently not eligible since they aren't on the list
Reecius wrote:Yeah, RankingsHQ changed their upload process and I still have not sat down to figure it out, I think you have to upload the results twice or something. The first time nothing happened.
Looking forward to having you, madfjohn!
Big announcement!!!
Best of Army Prizes
This is a great idea introduced to us by Kasil, one of our blog readers. This is a prize given to the person who performs best with their army. So, the best Blood Angels, Dark Angels, Space Wolf, Space Marine, Black Templar, Tau, Sisters of Battle, Imperial Guard, Chaos Space Marines, Chaos Daemons, Eldar, Dark Eldar, Necrons and Tyranid player will receive a prize and the knowledge that they were the best player of that army at the Bay Area Open!
Prize: A trophy proclaiming their accomplishment and a Battleforce of their choice! If this player wins another prize, they will still get the trophy, but will receive the larger prize of the two they win, not both.
Dok wrote:The best of army idea is awesome. I mean, I'm planning to win overall, but that's definitely a good consolation prize to people that drop a game early and want to keep playing.
I would agree it is a good idea but i will be playing Grey Knights and am apparently not eligible since they aren't on the list
We did it on purpose. They're not allowed to win any prizes . Just messing around we just forgot about them.
This is basically what I did with the Vegas Tournaments last year, and people really liked it we made all of the trophies out of army specific terrain pieces. I have refined the format for this year somewhat so the overall winner is not determined the same way as in the Throne of Skulls rather it is basically determined in the more standard RTT/GT.
Wish I could get out to some of your events but can't spend money on travel until I get solid employment again.(gotta save every penny).
Not being able to get a solid job for almost three years has really put a cramp on my road trip, and I really miss it. Once I finally get some thing that looks to last I will be back in the swing of things.
vhwolf wrote:Not being able to get a solid job for almost three years has really put a cramp on my road trip, and I really miss it. Once I finally get some thing that looks to last I will be back in the swing of things.
I totally feel you bro, I am in the same position too. Lucky for me the BAO is 10 mins from my front door. This also allows me to lend a hand and run the Narrative event.
italiaplaya wrote:We did it on purpose. They're not allowed to win any prizes . Just messing around we just forgot about them.
Poor Grey Knights, so much hate lately. . I am digging the idea of best army tho.
Reecius wrote:Yeah, RankingsHQ changed their upload process and I still have not sat down to figure it out, I think you have to upload the results twice or something. The first time nothing happened.
I see you got the Club Registered under you Reecius. Just gotta get your fellow club mates to register now. Since as it stands now, your a club of one.
Dok wrote:Hey Reece, how will Bjorn be handled in the missions if you can somehow kill him? d3 kill points and an objective?
You're welcome for this query Reece, you're welcome.
Dok, good call on the KP thing we totally forgot about that, not that it mattered, but it could next time. On a side note, I have been practicing the missions and they are quite challenging.
But don't forget, he also becomes an objective YOU an claim to win the game, which happens to me all the time. I made it to the finals in Adepticon for just that reason in a crazy close game against a DE player.
OverwatchCNC wrote:
You're welcome for this query Reece, you're welcome.
Dok, good call on the KP thing we totally forgot about that, not that it mattered, but it could next time. On a side note, I have been practicing the missions and they are quite challenging.
For F's sake, it's like one of those zen riddles. "How many thunder hammers does it take to fell a fell hand?"
OverwatchCNC wrote:
You're welcome for this query Reece, you're welcome.
Dok, good call on the KP thing we totally forgot about that, not that it mattered, but it could next time. On a side note, I have been practicing the missions and they are quite challenging.
For F's sake, it's like one of those zen riddles. "How many thunder hammers does it take to fell a fell hand?"
9 wasn't enough. 15 next time?
Already got my ticket Reece but I'll let a few of the guys know. I think Brandon is going to try his hand at 40k this year rather than WM. Although he took 3rd first day and 1st second last year in WM he seems pretty amped to do 40k this year. Are both events selling quickly, just so I can let him know?
Hey everyone, grab your tickets, soon! The hotel is nearing full, so please call in and get your room now. They told me they are already out of double rooms.
Not really, more than last year for sure, but not as many as you'd think. Right now it is actually a good dispersion of armies with Grey Knights a slight leader, but not significantly so.
@madfjohn
It sure will! We are really excited for it.
@Leenus
The L2 team is coming (the Quake City Rumble guys) and they haven't bought their tickets yet, so we expect the same attendance as last year, at least.
Reese:
Does the 400 point unit comp hit apply to characters as well? I ask this because dragon mounted lords suck balls and greater daemons all cost more than that base.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also, is there any hotel worth a crap in the area or should I pack a plastic sheet to sleep on?
As ph3ar said, we're in the Bay Area of California.
@Phazael
Yes, the comp hit is across the board. However, the comp is really minor in Fantasy. If you take a point or two hit on comp but still win your games, you're fine.
The Days Inn and Suites is a good spot, I stayed there last time and enjoyed it. Not the Ritz, but it's close, cheap and totally sufficient.
Just to clarify, characters count for the 400 point penalty? Personally I would have just instituted model count caps in units, because this is not exactly going to stop the 100 man slave trains.
Carl from the Independent Characters Podcast just signed up for the 40K Narrative event, so join up if you want to play and hang out with them in a laid back, story driven event.
I got a ticket, but not certain if I will make it. It depends on finding a hotel that does not make me want to vomit and finding a descent place to fly nearby. Recommendations?
Also, on the Fantasy comp system, are the negatives cumulative? In other words, if I have to units that are over 400 points, do I eat two penalties or just one?
~Q
Oakland Int'l is closest, but SFO & SJC aren't exactly far away. I'd suggest just finding the cheapest Southwest or Jet Blue commuter flight, and going from there.
You might also carpool up; as soon as you have 2 people, it's much cheaper to drive than fly.
I'd rather pay a little more money to not have to sit my ass in a car for 8 hours both ways, plus its getting close enough that I need to have my own firm plans instead of relying on people who may flake out.
Automatically Appended Next Post: How long a drive is it from SFO to the event venue? Might fly to there.
Phazael wrote:I'd rather pay a little more money to not have to sit my ass in a car for 8 hours both ways, plus its getting close enough that I need to have my own firm plans instead of relying on people who may flake out.
How long a drive is it from SFO to the event venue? Might fly to there.
Solution: have less-flaky friends?
1-1.5 hours, depending on the route you choose & traffic.
And when you consider airports and the additional time they add (i.e. 1.5 hour flight, 1.5 hours early, .5 hours debarking and getting stuff, 1 hour drive to the venue) your looking at a not to far off time frame and a much cheaper trip if you're carpooling.
Money is not the issue. Sitting in a car concentrating on the road and being bored as hell is the main issue. At least when I fly (first class) I get to do things to alleviate boredom. My early career as a consultant burned me out on long drives.
Ok, ticket bought. I will be there friday, if anyone wants a partner for the team thing I can be the odd man out. I can toss a small 40k army in a bag to check if no one cares about it being pro painted (not checking my fantasy army to the airline monkeys). I will even run someone elses army if they want. I could easily bring the melecrons to add to someone elses army, too.
Any idea if the hotel is completely sold out or not? Also, first class to SFO from LAX was something like 360 which is pretty cheap.
Not 100% yet, but it sounds like some of the Bell of Lost Souls crew will be at the Bay Area Open this year, battling for that ETC slot!
I don't want to say who yet, as it isn't rock solid, but I wanted to share that with the community. Grab your ticket and have a chance to play against some really great players!
Grimgob and Balckmoor, looking forward to having you guys again!
I do not know if I will be coming. I wanted to go an use this as a tune up for Adepticon, but I have a lot going on right now.
I booked a plane ticket from Phoenix to Oakland, but it looks like I am going to start a new job in LA a week before the BAO so it is iffy if I am going to make it.
I sent the info to Reecius so he can amend the main post. For the Warmachine tournaments I am Removing the Basic Painting requirements. This is in response to player feedback. Having all painted armies makes for a more enjoyable tournament and to reward that I am adding prizes for painting specifically and with a raffle each round for prizes for people who have painted their armies.
Blackmoor wrote:Jon, do you have a partner for the team tournament yet?
Sorry, haven't checked this thread for a while now.
Yep, Janthkin and I are playing in the team event. Can the (very arguably) worst two codexes come together to lay a smack-down on people? We shall see.
Orks and nids aren't the worst codices. As a matter of fact, they're quite strong, especially in objectives-games. Go tervi-boy horde with hive lootas!
Blackmoor wrote:Jon, do you have a partner for the team tournament yet?
Sorry, haven't checked this thread for a while now.
Yep, Janthkin and I are playing in the team event. Can the (very arguably) worst two codexes come together to lay a smack-down on people? We shall see.
lol, I thought that you and Janthkin teamed up.
I was talking to Jon "The Man" Willingham who was on the fence about going. We teamed up a year and a half ago for second place at the Wargames Con team tournament and was wondering if he wanted another go at it.
What I was going to ask you for was a ride up, but you normally go early to visit friends and family.
jy2 wrote:Orks and nids aren't the worst codices. As a matter of fact, they're quite strong, especially in objectives-games. Go tervi-boy horde with hive lootas!
jy2 wrote:Orks and nids aren't the worst codices. As a matter of fact, they're quite strong, especially in objectives-games. Go tervi-boy horde with hive lootas!
Bzzzzt! Try again.
Tervi-kroots with hive-heads and crisis-stealers?
They're not that bad and actually have quite a bit of synergy with endless screens and extra shooty shooty aliens.
Yep, i'm on the fence as surprise knee surgery is happening tomorrow! I've been playing way 2 much soccer lately. I might be in crutches for 6 weeks, so playing a tournament on crutches could be cumbersome. I did want to make an appearance so at least one ETC member is there. I may still go with crutches anyway, Goatboy said he would push me around in a wheel chair if need be. Hello army display board on wheels!!!
Well at least I can tell people I used to be good at 40k... until I took an arrow to the knee.
Yep, i'm on the fence as surprise knee surgery is happening tomorrow! I've been playing way 2 much soccer lately. I might be in crutches for 6 weeks, so playing a tournament on crutches could be cumbersome. I did want to make an appearance so at least one ETC member is there. I may still go with crutches anyway, Goatboy said he would push me around in a wheel chair if need be. Hello army display board on wheels!!!
Well at least I can tell people I used to be good at 40k... until I took an arrow to the knee.
I'll let you know Allen!
They don't allow cripples to the Bay Area Open and especially in my house!
Yep, i'm on the fence as surprise knee surgery is happening tomorrow! I've been playing way 2 much soccer lately. I might be in crutches for 6 weeks, so playing a tournament on crutches could be cumbersome. I did want to make an appearance so at least one ETC member is there. I may still go with crutches anyway, Goatboy said he would push me around in a wheel chair if need be. Hello army display board on wheels!!!
Well at least I can tell people I used to be good at 40k... until I took an arrow to the knee.
I'll let you know Allen!
They don't allow cripples to the Bay Area Open and especially in my house!
News flash! Tastetaste and Bloodofkittens caught in discrimination scandal! More after the jump!
And don't forget that its alright to give someone a thumbs down for sports if you only make it through their turn (and its 3rd turn and they went first)!
For those interested into some hobby related stuff for the BAO narrative event.
I have 4 blog posts up pertaining to the narrative event with more coming leading up to the BAO. I will be putting up all the event special characters and their bodyguards, showing a bunch of the finished terrain and be talking about the special event cards that will be used.
I should have a new audio file by the end of the week also. I hope to offer all involved a grand old time creating an epic story on the tabletops!
Blackmoor wrote:Anyone looking for a carpool from LA to The BAO?
Leaving Friday coming back Sunday night?
I'm probably leaving Thursday night around 8-9pm and probably coming back Sunday night (although if you're not coming with me I might try to leave early Monday and drive back).
Hey guys, here is a preview of the quality of terrain I will be bringing to the Narrative event. I have 13 square feet of this forest terrain that I am in the process of refurbishing. I also have a bunch of buildings that are to be painted this weekend.
The table for the event should be a treat for gamers to play on and eye catching to boot!
Plus I am doing a few fixes on this mountain piece as well.
Glad to have you again, buddy. Better show them Texans what's what!
Automatically Appended Next Post: Oh, and Ticket sales have been going crazy this past week. We still have some space, but it is very limited. Be sure to grab your ticket while they are still up for sale!
BDJV wrote:Hey guys, here is a preview of the quality of terrain I will be bringing to the Narrative event. I have 13 square feet of this forest terrain that I am in the process of refurbishing. I also have a bunch of buildings that are to be painted this weekend.
The table for the event should be a treat for gamers to play on and eye catching to boot!
Plus I am doing a few fixes on this mountain piece as well.
Looks like an idyllic setting for some destruction. Can't think of a better place to crush the enemies of the imperium.
BDJV wrote:Hey guys, here is a preview of the quality of terrain I will be bringing to the Narrative event. I have 13 square feet of this forest terrain that I am in the process of refurbishing. I also have a bunch of buildings that are to be painted this weekend.
The table for the event should be a treat for gamers to play on and eye catching to boot!
Looking good! I'm starting to worry about my lack of painting skills. I AM NOT WORTHY!!!
Just registered for the fantasy event, can anyone direct me to where army lists are supposed to be submitted? I know they are due today so I am cutting it fine!
BDJV wrote:Hey guys, here is a preview of the quality of terrain I will be bringing to the Narrative event. I have 13 square feet of this forest terrain that I am in the process of refurbishing. I also have a bunch of buildings that are to be painted this weekend.
The table for the event should be a treat for gamers to play on and eye catching to boot!
Looking good! I'm starting to worry about my lack of painting skills. I AM NOT WORTHY!!!
LOL, not to worry matey, having painted model proves that you worthy by default!
Unfortunantly I can't devote 2 days for this tourney but I am planning on attending the Narative Event on Saturday. I take it there are still tickets available for that?
@ph3ar
That's too bad, hopefully you can make it next year.
@Zathras
Yes there is still space, but please sign up asap so that you can join in on the conversation the narrative group is having about what to expect.
Zathras wrote:Unfortunantly I can't devote 2 days for this tourney but I am planning on attending the Narative Event on Saturday. I take it there are still tickets available for that?
Please do, it would even the sides up! What army were you planning on bringing? We have upped the points to 2100 per player, just FYI.
Zathras wrote:Unfortunantly I can't devote 2 days for this tourney but I am planning on attending the Narative Event on Saturday. I take it there are still tickets available for that?
Please do, it would even the sides up! What army were you planning on bringing? We have upped the points to 2100 per player, just FYI.
I'm planning on bringing Necrons to the fight.
2100 points? I'll see what I have though it looks like I'll need to use some second ed models to fill out my list
Reecius wrote:@Zathras
Yes there is still space, but please sign up asap so that you can join in on the conversation the narrative group is having about what to expect.
Will do as soon as I get paid this upcoming week....should be Tuesday or Wednesday.
2100 points? I'll see what I have though it looks like I'll need to use some second ed models to fill out my list
Awesome we needed another baddie! Once you register and we bring you into the conversation, I am sure that if you come up short one of the other players could fill in any points deficit.
I thought that If you win kill point and you win objectives but lose cap and control you win. If you say win kill points lose cap and control and tie objectives then you draw. I belive you have to win 2/3 the mission objectives to get a win.
Grimgob wrote:I thought that If you win kill point and you win objectives but lose cap and control you win. If you say win kill points lose cap and control and tie objectives then you draw. I belive you have to win 2/3 the mission objectives to get a win.
Each book mission is a single victory condition. Cap and Control, Kill Points and Seize Ground. You win each mission as normal. Whoever wins the most missions, wins the game.
For example, if you have both cap and control objectives, and won on kill points, but your opponent had more seize ground objectives, you won 2 missions, he won 1. Therefore, you win the game.
Grimgob wrote:I thought that If you win kill point and you win objectives but lose cap and control you win. If you say win kill points lose cap and control and tie objectives then you draw. I belive you have to win 2/3 the mission objectives to get a win.
I just noticed something Grimgob. It is possible to win, afaik, if you win 1 missions and tie the other two. For example we play round 1, which would be awesome ::wink wink reece:: , and I win on KPs but we tie C&C and Seize Ground I would still win because I won a mission and we drew the other two. If I am wrong please correct me Zero Comp team!
Five days until I see you guys up there. Dumped the masque since a couple people got butthurt about it at the bsb and made a list with no two units alike!
