Now that spam is the offical competitive style of list building, how does everyone feel about it? Is it healthy for the game? Is it healthy for the community?
I am wondering if codecies will change this course or just double down on the spam hammer? Also what sort of rift will be created while most armies are still running index spam while a few are running a new codex.
Pancakey wrote: Now that spam is the offical competitive style of list building, how does everyone feel about it? Is it healthy for the game? Is it healthy for the community?
I am wondering if codecies will change this course or just double down on the spam hammer? Also what sort of rift will be created while most armies are still running index spam while a few are running a new codex.
What do you all think dakka?
What do you mean "now"?
Spam has always been a thing in 40k, especially competitive. Leaf blower in 5th was literally "copy paste" the army list.
Technically if you're bringing something like IG you SHOULD be spamming just to have your army fluffy. Multiple infantry squads with similar loadouts, dedicated heavy weapon teams, multiple tanks in similar composition to represent and armored platoon/company joining in, etc. Other armies are different of course but necrons, Tau, orks, and Nids all have spam built into their armies as a background thing.
For competitive, spam is an important part because it increases reliability and allows for fall back plans, as well as just being a hell of a lot easier to remember. For example, would you want to play an IG player who has a unique weapon loadout for every unit he has? 9 infantry squads with different weapons, 3 russes with different weapons, every officer packing some random item or ability.
Or would you rather play the guard player who looks at you and says "every infantry squad is plasma/heavy Bolter, every tank is a demolisher, all officers have shotgun/chainsword, etc"
Not only is the second easier to remember, he'll be much faster during his turn as well
I don't think there is a real "community" to 40K, rather several separate communities.
Spam is effective due to poor rules or loopholes normally (failue to appropriately cost stuff - and people being drawn to tournaments/prize support). Is it "healthy"? Nah, but it's inevitable. You need look no further than the army composition part of this forum.
Q: "I want to run a 1500 point list of X!"
A: "Take these three identical HQ units and six identical units of this..."
Effective? Sure. Exciting? No. Interesting? No. Boring? God yes. I won't even bother playing a list like that. I don't give two gaks about winning, but if you're going to stomp me into the ground at least make it seem cool, or look cool doing it.
Pancakey wrote: It's at a whole new level on the competitive scene due to the new army composition rules.
No, it really isn't. 7th was far worse than this in regards to spam.
Its more a question of if spam is healthy/positive for the game and community.
Automatically Appended Next Post: As 8th ed just dropped and its very clear everyone can and will spam to win. Before there were limits. Now, not so much.
I play an IG superheavy regiment, which in the fluff by definition is disallowed from having other unit types.
If you want to play other unit types, I have a friend who runs a guard infantry regiment with zero vehicles as is fluffy for his regiment. You can fight us together mixing our units (as is also fluffy when the Imperial Guard forms a battlegroup from two existing regiments), but my army if you want to play me is going to be a company of 3-5 vehicles plus, points allowing, the Regiment's integral support units (officers, XOs, maintenance personnel, etc.).
Pancakey wrote: Its more a question of if spam is healthy/positive for the game and community.
Spam is fine. Unbalanced units are bad.
Pancakey wrote: As 8th ed just dropped and its very clear everyone can and will spam to win. Before there were limits. Now, not so much.
Pfft, no there weren't. Again, you didn't play past editions, did you? Because oh man did formations go horrible places.
The last time the game was more balanced than this was early fifth edition. And even then people spammed. Hell people spammed back in 3rd and 4th, and even moreso back in 2nd, given the unbalanced broken mess that 2nd was.
I remember skimmer spam back in 4th, long fang spam in 5th, heldrake spam in early 6th, and riptide spam in 7th.
Spam has always been in 40k its part of the game. Taking multiples of a unit provide consistency and redundancy in a list which is great in a dice game. Its not bad it is what it is.
MrMoustaffa wrote: For example, would you want to play an IG player who has a unique weapon loadout for every unit he has? 9 infantry squads with different weapons, 3 russes with different weapons, every officer packing some random item or ability.
Or would you rather play the guard player who looks at you and says "every infantry squad is plasma/heavy Bolter, every tank is a demolisher, all officers have shotgun/chainsword, etc"
Not only is the second easier to remember, he'll be much faster during his turn as well
Hands down the first one every time. Way more interesting and immersive. It's not that hard to just look at what the model's holding, anyway.
One thing that is interesting is if you actually try to talk to someone about what exactly constitutes spam, it'll turn out that using lots and lots of a unit they like is "not spam". It's only spam if it's a unit they don't like.
DarknessEternal wrote: It's the nature of the units being spammed that is any problem, not that they are being spammed to begin with.
Why are spam units being spammed? If that's the problem, don't blame the symptom.
This basically. If your game has minimal layers of interaction between different units, and all units fundamentally play off similar rules, you ultimately end up reducing unit viability to that optimum of speed, durability, and damage-per-turn, which in turn can reduce the game to one or two units that are best for their cost. Spam is the symptom of poor internal balance.
ross-128 wrote: One thing that is interesting is if you actually try to talk to someone about what exactly constitutes spam, it'll turn out that using lots and lots of a unit they like is "not spam". It's only spam if it's a unit they don't like.
Pretty much. Like thta one guy that said "SPAM IS BAD! (unless it's troops choices then it's okay)".
It can be healthy, if it presents a "bar for entry" to more advanced play.
For example, the Zerg Rush, or 6-pool, or 10-pool, or whatever the kids are calling it these days . The idea in Starcraft is that you build a group of attackers before anyone else can build anything useful and attack with it. It's easily defeated if your opponent knows you're going for it. While lots of people said it was cheesy, the existence of the Zerg Rush as an easy-to-do strategy created a bar for higher-level play. You had to know how to beat a Zerg Rush if you wanted to play well. There was a whole other level of gameplay if you advanced further, but that other level was likely beyond you unless you could beat Zerg Rush.
Spam strategies CAN do the same thing in 40k, but only if there's a higher level of play AFTER the spam. It has to be "spam can only take you so far" in that it's really good, but after that point, really terrible.
40k CAN get there as they continue to tweak and improve, but it needs to have the right combination of threats and answers. If something is terrorrizing the meta, that something is either overpowered for its cost, or there's not enough answers that are effective for their cost.
ross-128 wrote: One thing that is interesting is if you actually try to talk to someone about what exactly constitutes spam, it'll turn out that using lots and lots of a unit they like is "not spam". It's only spam if it's a unit they don't like.
Nazrak wrote: Hands down the first one every time. Way more interesting and immersive
There's nothing immersive about every unit in a professional army being a haphazard slapdash of random crap you threw together just to be "unique". If anything, it's actually anti-immersive.
DarknessEternal wrote: It's the nature of the units being spammed that is any problem, not that they are being spammed to begin with.
Why are spam units being spammed? If that's the problem, don't blame the symptom.
This basically. If your game has minimal layers of interaction between different units, and all units fundamentally play off similar rules, you ultimately end up reducing unit viability to that optimum of speed, durability, and damage-per-turn, which in turn can reduce the game to one or two units that are best for their cost. Spam is the symptom of poor internal balance.
Perfect synopsis of what is happening with as of right now. Complete and utter lack of internal balance. BUT HEY! All units are viable right?
People just complain. Of course people are going to use as many of their best unit as possible.
Why wouldn't you?
But to me, spam would be when you see it everywhere. For instance, Riptide Wing. That was spammed. There is nothing even remotely near that level in 8th.
Marmatag wrote: People just complain. Of course people are going to use as many of their best unit as possible.
Why wouldn't you? .
With an army that has say, 20 different units to choose from you would HOPE that there is some choice as to what is "best". GW did insist all units would be "viable"; is this the case?
And the more important question is , will this easy access to spam for ALL armies be HEALTHY for the warhammer community?
Pancakey wrote: With an army that has say, 20 different units to choose from
What about the armies that barely have eight units to use from?
Any fix to solve "spam" other htan points adjustments to individual units will inevitably have ripple effects that will negatively impact other armies that aren't the problem.
Pancakey wrote: With an army that has say, 20 different units to choose from
What about the armies that barely have eight units to use from?
Any fix to solve "spam" other htan points adjustments to individual units will inevitably have ripple effects that will negatively impact other armies that aren't the problem.
What's wrong with adding more play options in-game, and making techpieces more viable overall?
Insectum7 wrote: Spam is healthy enough, little salty for my taste though.
Well if you are into mechanically separated chicken and bits
Spam means different things to everyone.
Personally i find it to mean taking only the best efficient things in your army as possible and taking a lot of them that the game allows. Is it bad for the game to do so? depends on the game and the people playing it. Tourny level no thats inherently how people play competitive games. Competitive gamers boil down everything and make the best most efficient route possible. that is not limited to 40k thats every game.
For fluff bunnies or casuals? possibly yes. a Spam list isnt necessarily not fluffy but if done so for the purposes of my version of the meaning of taking only the best efficient things in your army then yeah its probably not going to be fun.
All in all Spam is going to make things salty
and we all know competitive gamers can get VERY salty
Voted "Spam is Life" because I like my Russ tanks, and you NEED to have repeated options in most armies. Even if 40k was balanced and "realistic" you'd end up bringing 2-4 of the same troops choice.
Selym wrote: Voted "Spam is Life" because I like my Russ tanks, and you NEED to have repeated options in most armies. Even if 40k was balanced and "realistic" you'd end up bringing 2-4 of the same troops choice.
I totally agree with you. 4 russ isn't the problem. It's armies consisting of 10+ of the same model all with the fly rule. Or 100 undercosted conscripts/flocks. These builds are totally viable now and will be seen in all settings casual and tourney alike.
Conscripts aren't overpowered. They're mildly durable, and that's about it. Aside from durability they have literally nothing else g oing for them, and it's not hard to find units taht can just delete them from the map in a turn or two.
Depends on if its fluffy spam or boring/WAAC spam.
150 boyz spam in a green tide list - fluffy.
All bikes/serpents Saim Hann list - fluffy.
Ravenwing biker list - fluffy.
Guilliman leading 120 conscripts backed up by 4 manticores and StormRavens. Not fluffy (imo).
I think some kinds of spam are okay (like the aforementioned IG and Tyranids examples), but spamming the most powerful units is just a problem, especially if said units are ones that fluffwise would be rare or exotic. 8 Nurgle Daemon Princes? Puh-lease. For one thing, there'd be 7 since that is Nurgle's number, but even that many would rarely take to the field at once. Maybe they need to add a comp limit system kind of like Warmachine/Hordes, where you can only take a certain number of some units. That would curtail the spammy lists nicely and allow for some units to still be taken in numbers.
Like I said, "it's not spam if it's a unit I like".
Though seeing as we'll never get everyone to agree on which units they like, I don't think that's a particularly good metric to actually build the game around.
Now you will only ever see 10 of those models used.
Is that good for the game?
Subjective.
I think what many people mean by "I hate spam" is "I hate when my opponents min/max".
Spamming troops would be expected. In fact, if I'm playing against marines I'd love it if I was facing three or four full tactical squads because that's what the narrative has us believe would be commonly fielded.
Thats not what we see though. What we typically see, barring broken undercost troop choices, is the special forces section spammed.
auticus wrote: In fact, if I'm playing against marines I'd love it if I was facing three or four full tactical squads because that's what the narrative has us believe would be commonly fielded.
Nah you wouldn't, you'd never hear the end of SM players whinging about how its unfluffy for marines to have K/D ratios less than 10,000,000.
Melissia wrote: Conscripts aren't overpowered. They're mildly durable, and that's about it. Aside from durability they have literally nothing else g oing for them, and it's not hard to find units taht can just delete them from the map in a turn or two.
This is not true.
Conscripts are very difficult to remove. Only a few things can remove them in a "turn or two." The unit that comes closest would be a squad of 10x Khorne Berzerkers throwing out 80 dice per turn in melee, having taken 0 casualties on the way there.
Of course, they fight twice, so a smart AM player would just delete conscripts so the berserkers wouldn't get a second fight phase. Then, they could easily erase the Berzerkers.
Any way, can you please list the units that can delete 50 conscripts from the board in a turn or 2?
Melissia wrote: Conscripts aren't overpowered. They're mildly durable, and that's about it. Aside from durability they have literally nothing else g oing for them, and it's not hard to find units taht can just delete them from the map in a turn or two.
This is not true.
Conscripts are very difficult to remove. Only a few things can remove them in a "turn or two." The unit that comes closest would be a squad of 10x Khorne Berzerkers throwing out 80 dice per turn in melee, having taken 0 casualties on the way there.
Of course, they fight twice, so a smart AM player would just delete conscripts so the berserkers wouldn't get a second fight phase. Then, they could easily erase the Berzerkers.
Any way, can you please list the units that can delete 50 conscripts from the board in a turn or 2?
how exactly are IG deleting our own conscripts? You know we don't have Chenkov anymore and we can't willingly fail armor saves right?
As for the whole unkillable conscripts thing they are useless for damage. I hardly even bother shooting with them any more. Even with FRFSRF it usually just does a few wounds at best, since I'm not insane and fielding incredibly unwieldy 50 man units. In addition, if you can snipe the commissar almost anything in the game can wipe conscripts in a turn or two with battleshock. Not just snipers, but deepstriking units, jump units, outflankers, and fliers all have ways to take out the commissar and make the conscripts fold. People need to play the game more and they'd realize that. You should be complaining about 7pt plasma guns in our army, THAT is a legitimate complaint. You also have to realize that if there were units that could reliably wipe conscripts in a single turn, you've invalidated literally every infantry IG list out there. Anything that could reliably wipe a unit of conscripts in 2 turns with no outside support would table any infantry horde army in the game by turn 3-4 if taken in any decent numbers. And considering the conscript shenanigan list is pretty much just a chicken little scenario that many players will never even see, in reality this mythical Uber unit would be wiping out much more reasonable armies like an infantry squad IG army, gaunt swarms, or a green tide. We've just gotten horde armies back to some semblence of usefulness without being mooks following around space marine captains, I understand people are upset that they can't table an infantry horde by turn 3 like they used to but this literally how the horde armies are supposed to work in the background. My god, an infantry IG army winning by numbers so long as you've got officers to keep them in line, how horrible. All of the hordes rely on some mechanic to keep them around and ignore battleshock. All can be countered. Its not easy (because it shouldn't be) but it absolutely can be done.
To the person who suggested a limit of 2 units per type, what the heck does IG do in that case? We have 2 troop choices (IG technically have stormtroopers but that will likely change in the codex) We would be limited to two conscript blobs and 2 infantry squads for our ENTIRE ARMY. That's barely enough Infantry squads to fill one platoon in the old dex, and the conscripts are garbage for damage output. Yes, they take a lot of work to kill, they're a massive wave of infantry, that's literally their purpose in the army. Trying to kill things with conscripts is an exercise in futility. They exist solely to eat charges, screen your more important units, and hold objectives. You would essentially make it so IG would have to spam their elite units just to do damage, ironically defeating the whole point of the limit in the first place. If you up the limit to prevent this (say 5) then armies like space marines don't care because odds are they couldn't afford more than 5 of their super unit anyways. The ideal solution would be to bring back the old force org and force it to be the standard, but so many armies would be invalidated by that it can never happen.
Spamming units in general is not an issue, min max spam is the problem. For example a player taking something like an army of vultures so he can do 240 punisher shots a turn. That's an example of bad spam.
Marmatag wrote: Any way, can you please list the units that can delete 50 conscripts from the board in a turn or 2?
Berserkers, especially with psyker support. Stormraven kitted out for anti-infantry shooting won't take long either, with how many shots it can dole out. Death Company (with power axes and a sangpriest, they wound on a 2+, amusingly, though most people use power swords over axes, for the AP). Squadron of basilisks with HB/HS, or one of wyverns. A 10+ sized unit of Flayed Ones could potentially do it, given four attacks each hitting fairly often and rerolling 1s on to-wound. 30 boyz teleported in to a charge on the conscript squad could turn it in to bloody paste. 30 hormagaunts getting a charge, or potentially 30 termagants with devourers. A swooping hawk squad that pulled off its grenade drop on the conscripts before opening fire with close range rapid fire (especially including an exarch with sunrifle to make the return fire hit on a pathetic 6+). I hvaen't even bothered to look at some armies that have potential options, as I feel this is more than enough to prove my point-- that there's a number of units that could utterly wipe out a conscript squad well before the game ends.
Yes, I'm aware that most of these cost more than the conscript squad in question, and some are tricky to use. But that's as it should be. The only real use of a conscript squad is its durability, so if you want to be able to erase it, you damn well better have to put some effort in to erasing it. Completely nullifying a unit's core and frankly only strength shouldn't come easy, just ask Orks.
People oversell how powerful conscripts are. They're good to be sure. Probably even need to d6 wounds from a commissar instead of 1 or some other minor nerf. But people are going around acting like they're the end of the world, and that you don't need any units other than conscripts, commissars, and commanders to win every game ez-pz.
And yet I've seen no evidence anyone has managed to pull that off in a tournament setting yet.
Melissia wrote: Conscripts aren't overpowered. They're mildly durable, and that's about it. Aside from durability they have literally nothing else g oing for them, and it's not hard to find units taht can just delete them from the map in a turn or two.
This is not true.
Conscripts are very difficult to remove. Only a few things can remove them in a "turn or two." The unit that comes closest would be a squad of 10x Khorne Berzerkers throwing out 80 dice per turn in melee, having taken 0 casualties on the way there.
Of course, they fight twice, so a smart AM player would just delete conscripts so the berserkers wouldn't get a second fight phase. Then, they could easily erase the Berzerkers.
Any way, can you please list the units that can delete 50 conscripts from the board in a turn or 2?
how exactly are IG deleting our own conscripts? You know we don't have Chenkov anymore and we can't willingly fail armor saves right?
When a unit suffers a casualty, you choose which model is removed.
Two melee units charge into 50 conscripts.
Melee unit 1 is nominated and kills 20 conscripts.
You pick the 20 conscripts near Melee Unit 2. There is nothing within range so it cannot fight when it is melee unit 2's turn.
Spam itself has no bearing on the game. If I spam bad units, less people will complain compared to if I spam really good units. Some combinations will be annoying to play against (10 Leman Russes will be quite boring to fight if you don't have enough AT, same for Knights), but on the other hand, all of these combinations can be fluffy and many of them will be terrible.
Perfect synopsis of what is happening with as of right now. Complete and utter lack of internal balance. BUT HEY! All units are viable right?
They mostly are - a single flyer list is not conclusive proof that nothing else is viable. Nor is it impossible for some small modifications to shift the easy choice away from said list.
Perfect synopsis of what is happening with as of right now. Complete and utter lack of internal balance. BUT HEY! All units are viable right?
They mostly are - a single flyer list is not conclusive proof that nothing else is viable. Nor is it impossible for some small modifications to shift the easy choice away from said list.
Pretty much. Brain dead net listers are exacerbating the spam problem by perpetuating the list rather than trying to use their thinky brains to shift some crap around for anti air.
Or just PTFO-- play the fething objective. That air list isn't very good at holding objectives. So take some durable units and hold objectives, instead of taking entirely glass cannons.
I think spam is more than fine in a tournament setting, as everyone is going in doing whatever they can to win.
In a more casual or friendly game I find it incredibly dull.
Is it healthy? Probably not, but as long as people are allowed to do it and as long as some units are more powerful than others then it's never going away.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Sorry, but your army of "one of everything" looks stupid and silly, and doesn't have any cohesion when on the board or in photographs.
GreaterGood? wrote: This edition will be the spam edition. GW has removed any pretense otherwise. The detachment system guarantees it.
Ever since 5th edition, armies consisted entirely of 3 unique units taken in as many spots as you could take them. Ya know, the edition the hipsters claim was "balanced".
7th edition formations were actually the only blip on that paradigm because they forced people to take tax units. The hand wringing that went along with formations only told GW that the fans just wanted to go back to spamming units instead.
We should also take into account what spam actually means.
I brought 1 unit of 6 TWC w/ shields and a wolf lord, with 2 Wulfen units. My opponent told me I spammed Thunderwolves.
Too much salt is unhealthy gentlemen, please monitor it but also keep in mind what 'spam' actually means.
Spamming isn't bad, as long as it's reasonable. I don't mind a couple units of bikers, or termies. If you bring all knights and Magnus then I'm gonna die inside just for the fact that you are a heartless person.
GreaterGood? wrote: This edition will be the spam edition. GW has removed any pretense otherwise. The detachment system guarantees it.
Ever since 5th edition, armies consisted entirely of 3 unique units taken in as many spots as you could take them. Ya know, the edition the hipsters claim was "balanced".
7th edition formations were actually the only blip on that paradigm because they forced people to take tax units. The hand wringing that went along with formations only told GW that the fans just wanted to go back to spamming units instead.
Sure, I agree. 40k players don't actually want a balanced game. But you could take anything you felt like in as many numbers as possible, if the units were balanced between each other, however, that means a space marine is a space marine, is a space marine. Gw isn't interested in making a balanced game, they want a well selling game.
GreaterGood? wrote: This edition will be the spam edition. GW has removed any pretense otherwise. The detachment system guarantees it.
Ever since 5th edition, armies consisted entirely of 3 unique units taken in as many spots as you could take them. Ya know, the edition the hipsters claim was "balanced".
7th edition formations were actually the only blip on that paradigm because they forced people to take tax units. The hand wringing that went along with formations only told GW that the fans just wanted to go back to spamming units instead.
Eh, some 5e armies did do what was called "2+1". Kopach's Nova list had 4 Rhino GH units, 2 Razorback ones IIRC.
Last year's LVO, although he ran a Gladius, Steve Sisk ran different special/heavy loadouts on most his units, and different turret options on each of his Razorbacks, because he wanted to ensure his list was truly all-comers and didn't reply on using the exact same weapons. Both his units of Devestators each had only *one* Grav Cannon and an Armorium Cherub, and those were his only Grav Cannons in the entire army.
It does fly sort of in the face of a lot of armies in a weird way.
There were a surprising amount of unconventional builds you could do in 7th, that lost a lot of their validity in 8th. Getting rid of Deathstars was good of course but a *lot* of other "semi-competitive/interesting at least" options also lost their purpose. Was there any point in randomizing Obliterators, removing teleportation from a Monolith, etc?
GreaterGood? wrote: Sure, I agree. 40k players don't actually want a balanced game. But you could take anything you felt like in as many numbers as possible, if the units were balanced between each other, however, that means a space marine is a space marine, is a space marine. Gw isn't interested in making a balanced game, they want a well selling game.
I wish this myth would die. Balance does not mean that everything is the same.
Spam is very good for the future of the game... If acted upon.
The reason for spam is improperly priced units for their capability. If the same units are making up the vast majority of forces at major tournaments they should be adjusted in each Chapter Approved.
GreaterGood? wrote: Sure, I agree. 40k players don't actually want a balanced game. But you could take anything you felt like in as many numbers as possible, if the units were balanced between each other, however, that means a space marine is a space marine, is a space marine. Gw isn't interested in making a balanced game, they want a well selling game.
The idea that 40k players do not want balance is absurd. It's got to be, what, 95% of all threads here that mainly consist of real live 40k players bitching about how bad GW is at internal and external balance.
I understand that the topic of this thread makes it fun to post spam jokes, or to say that this thread is spam, however it is absolutely a valid topic of discussion, and as such any further joke posts made in this thread purely about spam (posting videos to monty python, etc.) will result in disciplinary action.
Marmatag wrote: Any way, can you please list the units that can delete 50 conscripts from the board in a turn or 2?
Berserkers, especially with psyker support. Stormraven kitted out for anti-infantry shooting won't take long either, with how many shots it can dole out. Death Company (with power axes and a sangpriest, they wound on a 2+, amusingly, though most people use power swords over axes, for the AP). Squadron of basilisks with HB/HS, or one of wyverns. A 10+ sized unit of Flayed Ones could potentially do it, given four attacks each hitting fairly often and rerolling 1s on to-wound. 30 boyz teleported in to a charge on the conscript squad could turn it in to bloody paste. 30 hormagaunts getting a charge, or potentially 30 termagants with devourers. A swooping hawk squad that pulled off its grenade drop on the conscripts before opening fire with close range rapid fire (especially including an exarch with sunrifle to make the return fire hit on a pathetic 6+). I hvaen't even bothered to look at some armies that have potential options, as I feel this is more than enough to prove my point-- that there's a number of units that could utterly wipe out a conscript squad well before the game ends.
Yes, I'm aware that most of these cost more than the conscript squad in question, and some are tricky to use. But that's as it should be. The only real use of a conscript squad is its durability, so if you want to be able to erase it, you damn well better have to put some effort in to erasing it. Completely nullifying a unit's core and frankly only strength shouldn't come easy, just ask Orks.
People oversell how powerful conscripts are. They're good to be sure. Probably even need to d6 wounds from a commissar instead of 1 or some other minor nerf. But people are going around acting like they're the end of the world, and that you don't need any units other than conscripts, commissars, and commanders to win every game ez-pz.
And yet I've seen no evidence anyone has managed to pull that off in a tournament setting yet.
I'm kind of in the middle on this topic. I think conscripts need a minor nerf of some kind, such as 6+ armor. Anyway, I don't think most of the things you listed even begin to remove a conscript blob. That's the point people are trying to make about them. You have to play around them in a non-intuitive way. As a BA player, I can tell you that those DC can't do enough; I've already run those numbers. I don't have 10 axe DC anyway. Also, a dakkaraven has 42 shots only, and most of them wound on 3's and allow full saves. That's not cutting it, either. Especially for the pricetag. BA have no reasonable way to get a conscript blob off the table. They will have to be played around.
GreaterGood? wrote: Sure, I agree. 40k players don't actually want a balanced game. But you could take anything you felt like in as many numbers as possible, if the units were balanced between each other, however, that means a space marine is a space marine, is a space marine. Gw isn't interested in making a balanced game, they want a well selling game.
I wish this myth would die. Balance does not mean that everything is the same.
It does, when you remove any restrictions on what models you can bring. If I can bring guardsmen and marines side by side, balance has to be perfect, or something is going to be too good.
Martel732 wrote: No, doesn't mean that at all. It just means every unit is worth what you pay for it.
That's what I said.. We agree. However, when you've got 30+ choices they cannot and will not all be worthwhile. There will be one "best" unit at each specific role, and you will take only those.
GreaterGood? wrote: Sure, I agree. 40k players don't actually want a balanced game. But you could take anything you felt like in as many numbers as possible, if the units were balanced between each other, however, that means a space marine is a space marine, is a space marine. Gw isn't interested in making a balanced game, they want a well selling game.
I wish this myth would die. Balance does not mean that everything is the same.
It does, when you remove any restrictions on what models you can bring. If I can bring guardsmen and marines side by side, balance has to be perfect, or something is going to be too good.
I'm not sure what you're saying here, but my takeaway from it is that you are implying that being able to take anything you want from all armies is the definition of balance. Or that simply having multiple choices simpy results in everyone taking the same thing. And your later post implies that you believe that having multiple choices guarantees that some will never be taken as they are outright worse.
None of these are the same thing as, or even correlate with, balance. Nor are they true.
We do not expect perfect balance, but we do expect a reasonable fighting chance with most armies, and for most armies to have more than one or two viable builds. We're pretty damn aware that it is supremely unlikely we will get perfect balance, and are happy to accept a "close enough" scenario. Further, balance is not synonymous with homogeneity, nor is homogeneity the only way to cause balance.
I generally like seeing and playing lists that are bringing multiples of only a few non- single model character units. Redundancy means that lists can count on having certain capabilities into turns 3 and 4, whereas one-of-everything lists basically need everything to be standalone good because any one unit can get killed pretty easily. I feel like a good, varied 2k army will generally have maybe 3-6 unique non-character units. It certainly doesn't strike me as a problem for a list to have, say, a few identical Troops picks, a few identical Elites picks, and then a few identical flyers, plus some HQs and maybe transports.
But, yeah, a list that's just 6 flyers plus a token squad is kind of dumb. A list that's just 4 Knights and some token conscripts also strikes me as pretty dumb. Or a list that's a million Brimstones and then a bunch of characters hiding within them. That's the sort of thing that strikes me as un-fun spam.
My current Tau army is comprised of commanders, XV8s, XV25s, XV88s, and drones - now while the weapon loadouts do vary, that is still one 5 different units.
I enjoy having an army of just my favourite models and it also is easier to keep track of unit rules.
Azreal13 wrote: No, you won't. As long as balance is "good enough" only at the very tiniest top end of top competitive tables will it become important.
Basically all people want when they say balance is "don't make my choices actively handicap me beyond the point I can compensate."
Azreal13 wrote: No, you won't. As long as balance is "good enough" only at the very tiniest top end of top competitive tables will it become important.
Basically all people want when they say balance is "don't make my choices actively handicap me beyond the point I can compensate."
This is pretty good way of summing up the issue!
No it really isn't. These kinds of comments imply the two of you are the kind of people who would respond to all Guard units doubling in points costs by saying "You just need to Git Gud Sun".
I shall elaborate.
With a cynical comment stating that any cries for balance are simply just people saying they want to be protected from bad choices, you are saying the following:
1) When people identify a "weaker" thing they fear they cannot use it with skill and cry for balance.
2) These people have thus identified that their skill is insufficient
3) I feel that 40k is more about skill than army selection
4) These people are therefore bad at 40k 5) If they are bad at 40k, it is not the unit that is the problem. The problem is weak crybabies trying to get easy wins.
6) The correct solution is therefore to change the players, not the rules when anyone cries for balance. They must Git Gud.
7) If IG players were to recieve a "double all points costs" rule, they would cry for balance.
8) Refer to point 1 and proceed through to 6.
Spoiler:
Azreal13 wrote: Basically all people want when they say balance is "don't make my choices actively handicap me beyond the point I can compensate."
No, I didn't say "protected from bad choices." Balance doesn't automatically mean you should run whatever you want and have precisely the same chance of winning. If you make bad strategic choices in list building then you should be punished, such as incorporating insufficienct units to fulfill the various roles needed (too much/too little anti tank, etc.)
What you shouldn't be punished for, at least not excessively, is wanting to run, say, Terminator heavy lists purely because Terminators are fundamentally a poor choice. Running Termie heavy lists and suffer a bit through lack of mobility? Fine. Choose insufficient weapon load out options across your units to handle multiple threats? Absolutely. But not simply because the basic unit you've built your concept around isn't good enough for its points.
There's room for less unit focused lists to offer a more optimal performance, but balance should be good enough that your average player can build a sensibly balanced list and feel like they can win, or at least compete.
I can't believe I've been on this board for so many years and I still have to explain this repeatedly.
TLDR There's a distinction between a unit being a poor choice and just flat out poor.
EnTyme wrote: I'm amazed at how many people seem convinced that a month is more than enough time to say "This is the meta. This is what 8th edition is".
Wait until next month! Primaris will be OP! And then Death Guard!
Spam is a symptom of a general lack of intelligence. Spammers who spam units to make an auto win button for themselves are unable to understand that winning at all costs including excessive reflexive financial costs is not the aim of the game hobby or LIFE for that matter. Mostly I blame the collapse of culture around the worship of Mammon but this is beside the point. I would refuse to play with anyone with a netlist of X units and would rather sit at a table and paint while listening to someone else suffer the bad decision to engage with such.
GreaterGood? wrote: Sure, I agree. 40k players don't actually want a balanced game. But you could take anything you felt like in as many numbers as possible, if the units were balanced between each other, however, that means a space marine is a space marine, is a space marine. Gw isn't interested in making a balanced game, they want a well selling game.
I wish this myth would die. Balance does not mean that everything is the same.
Exactly. And not something that is easy to understand if people are always expecting external forces to shape their own internal grasp of fairness.
jeff white wrote: Spam is a symptom of a general lack of intelligence.
Erm... No. Firstly, define spam. Secondly, realise that you'd need to be a genius to win certain spam-based battles. 100-grot army, anyone? Thirdly, sometimes spam is fun and/or fluffy. See 1st Company lists, see Infantry battles, see Tank Companies.
Spammers who spam units to make an auto win button for themselves are unable to understand that winning at all costs including excessive reflexive financial costs is not the aim of the game hobby or LIFE for that matter.
Lots of people think that the point of 40k is to win, regardless of how your opponent feels. These people are generally bad people.
Mostly I blame the collapse of culture around the worship of Mammon but this is beside the point.
Collapse of culture... What culture was there? Ancient Greek philosophers decried the invention of books as culture-destroying. The British Empire took book-keeping as a motto. And worship of who? I don't worship anything, afaik, and have never heard of Mammon.
I would refuse to play with anyone with a netlist of X units and would rather sit at a table and paint while listening to someone else suffer the bad decision to engage with such.
Can't deny that 40k is co-operative and that both players should get something out of the game.
Spam is fine, even fun in some cases. Just a matter of continuing to update the point values as we go to make sure that unit A is in line with unit B, you just happen to take all unit As because you like the model or unit A is better close range then unit B and you want to use a couple tank Cs for your long range power so they cover each other's weaknesses. That kind of thing.
It's also still a very young edition. Maybe flyer lists are doing well not because they are too cheap for their firepower and durability, but because tables aren't using enough area terrain to give infantry cover bonuses yet and that's just a conclusion we come to naturally over the course of months without the need for GW intervention. Let's wait for more then a half dozen events occurring before the first codex release before we decide something like a sweeping change to enforced army compositions needs to be made.
Marmatag wrote: People just complain. Of course people are going to use as many of their best unit as possible.
Why wouldn't you? .
With an army that has say, 20 different units to choose from you would HOPE that there is some choice as to what is "best". GW did insist all units would be "viable"; is this the case?
And the more important question is , will this easy access to spam for ALL armies be HEALTHY for the warhammer community?
This is the problem. Theres really nothing you can do to 100% erase spam. People will spam the most competitive thing. Even in a very and near perfectly balanced game, many players will spam that unit or combo that allows them a 5% mathematical advantage. But if the game is well enough balanced that a player can even taking units that are slithgly worse than the most efficient one and win if they are better players (and have average rolls), then thats totally fine.
Whoa.... I'm out of this thread. I forgot how prevalent the anti-competitive mindset was within the 40k community.
There's no point in even discussing issues when people think:
jeff white wrote: Spam is a symptom of a general lack of intelligence. Spammers who spam units to make an auto win button for themselves are unable to understand that winning at all costs including excessive reflexive financial costs is not the aim of the game hobby or LIFE for that matter. Mostly I blame the collapse of culture around the worship of Mammon but this is beside the point. I would refuse to play with anyone with a netlist of X units and would rather sit at a table and paint while listening to someone else suffer the bad decision to engage with such.
I am wondering if codecies will change this course or just double down on the spam hammer?
It's healthy for GW's business model, but in light of recent price hikes and the prospect of improvements in 3D printing and casting, I expect that a decent enough number of players will respond negatively to it. Veterans who already have large collections and are not price adverse won't really mind, but new players won't appreciate the sticker shock (troops) for long.
No, redundancy spam is not healthy for the game. But not enough people wanted to play warhammer fantasy battle that requires you make decisions during a game in order to win.
The people that spend money want to play a list building game.
T9A exists people. If you want a sci-fi version then its completely possible to do so. ...although I'm sure there is ample competition in other sci fi games.
What is spam? Taking multiple of the same unit? Taking multiple of the same overpowered unit? Because the former is just making a cohesive list and the latter is simply an overpowered lists. I think it's pretty widely held that overpowered lists are bad. So... kind of?
TheCustomLime wrote: What is spam? Taking multiple of the same unit? Taking multiple of the same overpowered unit? Because the former is just making a cohesive list and the latter is simply an overpowered lists. I think it's pretty widely held that overpowered lists are bad. So... kind of?
I have asked for a definition of spam three or four times now and not received an answer. I get the feeling these decriers either think that all units should be unique, or are unable to understand the concept of redundancy being an actually sensible thing that is both realistic and fluffy.
Is 2 or 3 or 4 units of Guardians a "Guardian spam" list?
Is 2 units of Fire Prisms a "Fire Prism spam" list?
And if they were within the definition of spam, why would that even be a bad thing? It makes no sense to bring one of either of those units.
And how about transports? Are they part of spam?
If I bring three HS selections, am I now a HS-spam list?
I can understand not liking people just using the most OP thing over and over, but spam is not itself the problem here.
Spam is unhealthy for the wallet who's spamming....I was wandering if these people spending 400 euro every new edition have other interest in life. 40k and miniature wargames in general are a great a funny hobby, but my way of enjoying it and collect an army is way different. Try the best setting for the unit you find useful and you like, paint them, if possible assemble them with magnets, find your tactic balancing your list against every possible enemy
Marfuzzo wrote: I was wandering if these people spending 400 euro every new edition have other interest in life.
That's really not that much money when spread out over the minimum of 2-3 years that an edition will be around for. TBH the time required to build and paint a new army is much more of an investment than the money to buy it.
No, redundancy spam is not healthy for the game. But not enough people wanted to play warhammer fantasy battle that requires you make decisions during a game in order to win.
The people that spend money want to play a list building game.
T9A exists people. If you want a sci-fi version then its completely possible to do so. ...although I'm sure there is ample competition in other sci fi games.
No, redundancy spam is not healthy for the game. But not enough people wanted to play warhammer fantasy battle that requires you make decisions during a game in order to win.
The people that spend money want to play a list building game.
T9A exists people. If you want a sci-fi version then its completely possible to do so. ...although I'm sure there is ample competition in other sci fi games.
Does T9A thoughtfully address the spam issue?
You be the judge:
This is the only not "spammy" one out of the bunch.
Automatically Appended Next Post: And here is a pile of totally not spammy lists from the chosen ones:
Granted it's a daemon army so I'm not relaly a big fan to begin with, but the only one of those lists that actually appears to have something resembling a theme going on is the last one. Looks like random units thrown together to make a powerlist. Even then there's little variation between the lists here...
Pancakey wrote: "Spam" seems to be a very subjective term in the 40k community!
Right? Some people seem to think it means "more than two in the list". I still think this is a major overreaction to a couple tournaments in a new edition that people are still learning how to build lists for. Give the meta some time to settle before screaming "THISISSOFREAKINGBROKENNERF!!!!!!"
No, redundancy spam is not healthy for the game. But not enough people wanted to play warhammer fantasy battle that requires you make decisions during a game in order to win.
The people that spend money want to play a list building game.
T9A exists people. If you want a sci-fi version then its completely possible to do so. ...although I'm sure there is ample competition in other sci fi games.
Does T9A thoughtfully address the spam issue?
You be the judge:
This is the only not "spammy" one out of the bunch.
Automatically Appended Next Post: And here is a pile of totally not spammy lists from the chosen ones:
So we should never take more than 1 of any unit, not have a cohesive list either in the game or in a picture, and be punished for thinking otherwise. Got it
No, redundancy spam is not healthy for the game. But not enough people wanted to play warhammer fantasy battle that requires you make decisions during a game in order to win.
The people that spend money want to play a list building game.
T9A exists people. If you want a sci-fi version then its completely possible to do so. ...although I'm sure there is ample competition in other sci fi games.
If you really WERE a veteran gamer you'd actually think otherwise. Sincerely, a starter from the very end of 3rd and beginning of 4th edition.
I mean... my proposed list, for 1500 points was 3 characters (ancient, captain, and librarian all in termie armor-- and the librarian I'm only taking because sangpriests don't come in terminator armor), 3 terminator squads, 4 scout squads. For 2000 points, up that to five terminator squads, for 2500 points I could split this off in to two battalions if I wanted to some more scout squads and characters (another lib and a PA captain to support the scout snipers).
This is "spam". But frankly, I think it's also pretty fun and different. It's two groups of core units-- scouts as objective holders, terminators as forward damage dealers, and adding other kinds of units would actually kind of defeat the theme of the list even if those other units would be technically stronger. I don't think anyone would much react with shuddering fear upon seeing it on the table. But this would be made illegal or more expensive in points (and thus essentially illegal anyway) by the various "solutions" to this "problem" put out in this thread.
If you think "spam" lists are a problem in and of themselves, frankly, you're just flat out wrong to begin with-- "spam" lists are simply a tool, like any tool they can be used well or used poorly. If ultimately you're worried about overpowered lists, rather than "spam" lists, however, you're barking up the wrong tree trying to prevent "spam". You can "spam" most units all day without becoming overpowered. The problem isn't "spam", it's unbalanced units.
So fix those units instead of being lazy and and trying to justify a jackhammer when what you really need is a screwdriver.
Well I like the idea of troop spam and then elites and FA either being highlander or based on 1 troop type that 'unlocks' a HQ or heavy/elite or whatever.
ofc that would make it very unwieldy to make all the armies playable. Then again why have detachments since those are just arbitrary allocated units.
I still think points system works best.
max of 50% HQ/Elites
Min of 25% TROOPS
Max of 50 Heavy/Fast Attack
What a "wonderful" solution, so good in fact that it's in search of a problem to solve. And yet none exists.
Just fix the damn overpowered units and stop fething with everyone's army in order to enforce your boring crap limitations and make everyone's list the goddamn same.
What a "wonderful" solution, so good in fact that it's in search of a problem to solve. And yet none exists.
Just fix the damn overpowered units and stop fething with everyone's army in order to enforce your boring crap limitations and make everyone's list the goddamn same.
Actually it is not a solution.....it was pretty much how you played 40k for a decade. And very few armies were 'bleep bleep' the same. Really that is how it was......really.
There will always be overpowered units. You and I both know that. 30 years track record has proven that.
40k decided to add flyers and super heavies into the game. Now they have to make them all playable. I never played a game of epic. I do think that units of infantry had a role different from tanks and titans. Every army had titans to take out titans and infantry to take objectives.
Now we have a game with all those pieces but every army don't have the same tools, ie: titans and infantry. You can but most don't build lists like that. Apoc Games is much more lenient for that since both sides expect that.
I love larger games with flyers and super heavies. It is just that some armies are not made to take out other armies. In epic they would be. In 40k they are not. It is simple.
admironheart wrote: Actually it is not a solution.....it was pretty much how you played 40k for a decade.
No it wasn't.
For most of 40k's life, it was 0-2 HQ choices, 0-3 elites, 2-6 troops, 0-3 fast attack, and 0-3 heavy support.
This setup had absolutely nothing to do with points, and did not prevent "spam", it just made people take the cheapest troops choice options they could find so they could get to making the list of units they actually wanted to use, because troops choices for most non-horde armies were often rather crappy or just didn't fit the theme of the list they wanted to make.
Do not attempt your dishonest historical revisionism on me. I played back then.
25% min troops (which was elites/troops and some Fast Attack)
50% max support (which was vehicles and artillery)
50% max characters (which was Exarchs and apothacaries besides normal HQ choices.
That IS the HONEST historical record. Chill man
That was from Rogue Trader thru the release of 3rd in mid 1998.
Since 80% of all Lore, units, armies, etc were created in RT and 2nd (even if no models or rules) That is the foundation we all have to work from.
Nobody is talking about the unbalanced, broken mess that was 2nd edition except you, then. 2nd was just as bad as seventh edition competitively.
The fact is, your "fix" is broke and unnecessary. There's no reason to have it when you could instead balance out the units and factions better. It creates massive limitations on list building without really solving the core problems.
That is your opinion of 2nd edition. I have a marine player that almost never loses with vanilla marines. He plays about 20 games a year.
Ive seen a bigger mess from other editions imo
After 3rd edition, I think Ive seen where 2nd edition was the next largest playerbase. So it had some popularity.
3rd was all about Tau and DE raider spam. Not much else was competitive short of the best caliber players. So that can be said of most editions.
And we are talking about how armies spam.
Is spam broken? depends seems the concensus.
All I know is there wasn't much spam in 2nd ed cause it is called HeroHammer for a reason. Over the top characters defined it.
8th is DiceHammer as rolling hundreds of dice is defining it.
So you noted how 3rd edition tried to fix 2nd edition, the spam of characters in 2nd (besides blanding them down)
Detachments tried to make a more balanced looking army list.
The results for the last 15+ years will show that hasn't worked the way they wished.
So Detachments may not be the best method to reign in spam (if indeed it is needed)
admironheart wrote: That is your opinion of 2nd edition. I have a marine player that almost never loses with vanilla marines.
And this is supposed to impress upon me the idea that 2nd edition is balanced?
admironheart wrote: Is spam broken? depends seems the concensus.
All I know is there wasn't much spam in 2nd ed cause it is called HeroHammer for a reason. Over the top characters defined it.
I really don't care that you can find a few 2nd edition players out there. Again, none of that really helps here. Spam isn't the problem. Never was. The problem was unbalanced units.
Your stated "solution" (points percent minimums and maximums), which again is a "solution" for a "problem" that doesn't actually exist, would utterly screw over a lot of lists, and a lot of armies. It'd create massive limitations on what people can actually play, and it wouldn't even do anything to balance the game.
Hell, your "solution" (to a problem that doesn't exist) would basically mean that in your effort to try to reduce "spam", you'd CAUSE spam. Because if you're gonna force players to carry 50 battle sisters alongside the other more expensive (and useful) choices every goddamn time they go to play a 2k point game, they might as well take 10 squads of 5 sisters with 2 bolters and 3 storm bolters each. Ten completely identical units taken simply to fill up space. Even with more expensive upgrade, that's at least 6 to eight identical units.
Similarly, all Orks would need to be a minimum of 60 boyz every game, maybe you could throw in some grots in for a laugh I guess. Tau would need around 50 fire warriors with drone support, more without, maybe toss some kroot in but otherwise it's the exact same 500pts every single game. Necrons would need 50 warriors or 30 immortals, so they're in a better spot than a lot of these armies. Inquisition would be utterly screwed, having no troops choices to speak of. The various Eldar and Marine factions would be the least hit by this, because they have actual variety in their troops choices, but they'd still have their list variety be hit hard by only being able to spend 1000 points on heavy and fast attack in every 2k points game. And it's not really any better in smaller or larger games either.
Every single game, every single list, your "solution" would be to require people to bring the exact same things as everyone else. It severely limits player creativity, list variety, and for what purpose exactly-- when it doesn't even solve the goddamn problem of overpowered units! Hell, because you're limited in what points you can spend where, you actually have MORE incentive to take overpowered units than the current list building method!
I mostly lurk but, as a vet Tau player from 3rd, I would like to thank all of the triptide players out there. You alone have done so much to sustain the hobby through your purchases.
I regret to inform you, however, that you were playing only a brief glimpse of the race that is Tau. Much like the original "Nidzilla" lists way back when, your playing style was based on shameful exploitation of the rules (I loved Nidzilla BTW). Blame GW for "imbalance" all you want, YOU chose to play that way and now you feel left out in the cold without you're gimmicks. Meanwhile, the competent players aren't too worried. They don't buy netlists. They bought and painted enough firewarriors long ago.
admironheart wrote: That is your opinion of 2nd edition. I have a marine player that almost never loses with vanilla marines. He plays about 20 games a year.
Ive seen a bigger mess from other editions imo
After 3rd edition, I think Ive seen where 2nd edition was the next largest playerbase. So it had some popularity.
3rd was all about Tau and DE raider spam. Not much else was competitive short of the best caliber players. So that can be said of most editions.
And we are talking about how armies spam.
Is spam broken? depends seems the concensus.
All I know is there wasn't much spam in 2nd ed cause it is called HeroHammer for a reason. Over the top characters defined it.
8th is DiceHammer as rolling hundreds of dice is defining it.
So you noted how 3rd edition tried to fix 2nd edition, the spam of characters in 2nd (besides blanding them down)
Detachments tried to make a more balanced looking army list.
The results for the last 15+ years will show that hasn't worked the way they wished.
So Detachments may not be the best method to reign in spam (if indeed it is needed)
Then he doesn't play anyone who knows what they are doing in 2nd. Vanilla marines were unplayably terrible. Herohammer was a misnomer. It was really about the 150 metal hormagaunts that you had to shoot because rules.
admironheart wrote: Well I like the idea of troop spam and then elites and FA either being highlander or based on 1 troop type that 'unlocks' a HQ or heavy/elite or whatever.
ofc that would make it very unwieldy to make all the armies playable. Then again why have detachments since those are just arbitrary allocated units.
I still think points system works best.
max of 50% HQ/Elites
Min of 25% TROOPS
Max of 50 Heavy/Fast Attack
The point system would not fix spamming. It would just focus the spamming to specific units. Are you really more happy facing scatterlaser eldar jet bike spam than you are facing some other form of spam? Brimstone horror spam is not magically better than any other spam just because brimstone horrors are a troop choice.
CrownAxe wrote: Yeah generally speaking rule sets that required the game to be completely rebooted to fix their problems aren't good rule sets
It's never been the core rules that were issues in 40K. The problem has always come form codexes. New core rules are what refreshes the entire system though, and re-establishes armies at a baseline of sorts.
Then he doesn't play anyone who knows what they are doing in 2nd. Vanilla marines were unplayably terrible. Herohammer was a misnomer. It was really about the 150 metal hormagaunts that you had to shoot because rules.
I came in 1st in a tourney, and 2nd in a 2nd tourney using vanilla marines in 2nd Ed. So whoever was playing vanilla marines in your neighborhood clearly didn't know what they were doing.
But back to percentages. They're not a bad idea, but ideally there would just be mechanical reasons to make an all flyer list (or similar) untenable as a competitive army.
admironheart wrote: Actually it is not a solution.....it was pretty much how you played 40k for a decade.
No it wasn't.
For most of 40k's life, it was 0-2 HQ choices, 0-3 elites, 2-6 troops, 0-3 fast attack, and 0-3 heavy support.
This setup had absolutely nothing to do with points, and did not prevent "spam", it just made people take the cheapest troops choice options they could find so they could get to making the list of units they actually wanted to use, because troops choices for most non-horde armies were often rather crappy or just didn't fit the theme of the list they wanted to make.
Do not attempt your dishonest historical revisionism on me. I played back then.
No really. 2nd Edition really did use a points percentage based system. It wasn't played for a decade but that's what he's talking about.
There is an easy fix for boring and abusive unit spam lists:
1) Play maelstrom
2) Use 4-6 pieces of los blocking terrain. Agree that the ground floor of buildings should block los 3) Don't use broken Forgeworld units of doom.
What is spam? Picking the same unit over and over.
Why would you do this? Usually for competitive reasons. Possibly fluff reasons but if in 7th your "fluff" was "spam the units everyone knows are the best" I wonder what was wagging the dog.
The problem in 40k (and similar games) is that you have a lot of choices for units that serve a very similar role in game. Unfortunately however they are never going to be equally good. One will be better than the others.
This means that a roster of say 20 codex entries can be broken down to just 3-4 "good options" and there is no real reason beyond whimsy to use anything but these 3 options.
So for instance say you wanted some anti-vehicle firepower in your Marine Army. You could take devastators, Centurion devestators or a predator (or various other options, flyers for instance).
In theory you could conclude regular devastators are better in one situation but worse in others and the same with the other two units. So you take a mix of all three. In practice though this has very rarely happened. You are usually going to be better taking three of one option.
Does this upset competitive players? Not really. Its always been and always will be the case. There are much bigger problems for ensuring there is a healthy tournament scene (which seems to be doing okay anyway).
It mainly upsets players who play for the collecting and painting side. To my mind its much more fun to own and paint up a mix of units. So you can say you have say a full Tau collection consisting of every unit type rather than "I have only the models for my 1850 list and yes it contains 5 riptides".
In the same way its more fun to see lots of different units on the table. People like variety.
Despite that however I don't think you can fix it beyond lots of hard and fast rules declaring "you are permitted no more than 2 of these units". GW are not going to go down this road though because they want to sell models. Also while it may help the super-mono lists it won't change things that much.
"I came in 1st in a tourney, and 2nd in a 2nd tourney using vanilla marines in 2nd Ed. So whoever was playing vanilla marines in your neighborhood clearly didn't know what they were doing. "
Good luck when the Tyranid strategy cards killed a 1/3 of your list before the game started. What a great game! I guarantee you could not beat the chaos and tyranid players in my meta with your frickin vanilla marines. Marines had like what? Two effective weapons? I don't know who is in this tournament, but in 2nd ed, I saw TWO table flips vs tyranids. (And a lot of damaged metal hormagaunts) Both marines. Marines were 30 pts a model! For a boltgun! Really? In a game with to-hit modifiers! I personally played a 3K game against CSM where the CSM killed my entire list before I could take a single turn! Not even 7th ed Eldar could that!
2nd was a dumpster fire, and I really do NOT understand how anyone derives any joy from that edition.
Tyel wrote: The problem in 40k (and similar games) is that you have a lot of choices for units that serve a very similar role in game.
Only if you play space marines.
Tyel wrote: It mainly upsets players who play for the collecting and painting side. To my mind its much more fun to own and paint up a mix of units.
So the painting and collecting players can shut up and do that.
Tyel wrote: In the same way its more fun to see lots of different units on the table. People like variety.
Actually, I hate seeing armies where every single unit is different. They look ugly, there's no consistency, it looks like you haphazardly and lazily threw gak together at the last second and you don't really care, so you're wasting my time.
But spamming GW broken units of doom is fine. Spam all the conscripts you want.
Spamming troops is always fine. And conscripts are not overpowered.
Spamming big stuff is not fine. Imperial knights lists, tau with basically only riptides and stormsurges (luckily they are no more), stormravens spam lists, big daemons spam, etc... those kind of list based on spamming something really strong are an issue. And some of these units should belong to apocalypse games only. Flyers should be 1 allowed per 1000 points, maybe even 1 per 2000 points.
A list with 180 orks, 200 conscripts, 5 units of kabalites in venoms plus 3 ravagers, any possible tyranid list, etc are not a problem, they're actually cool and BG based.
Orks and guards are supposed to be hordes actually.
Some armies have 10 units, including characters, and like any other army some of these available options are not viable at all, so they can't be played without spamming their best stuff.
Well, if spamming troops gets a blanket pass then a pretty obvious "solution" would be to make all/most troops brokenly overpowered to the point that there isn't much reason to take anything else beyond edge-case utility. Then people would spam troops, but they're troops so it wouldn't count.
It wouldn't really solve spam though, and I'm sure that after a few rounds of SM players getting stomped by non-SM troops the definition would quickly narrow to "if people spam Tactical Marines it's okay, all other troops need some kind of anti-spam measure".
But spamming GW broken units of doom is fine. Spam all the conscripts you want.
Yeah, because everything from FW is super broken. I mean, have you seen the rules for the Sicaran and Siege Dreadnought? So scary!
$5 says the guy you quoted says spamming Conscipts is fine because they aren't broken and that's more fluff based than an Armour company or 10th company of Scouts.
For instance, Tactical Marines are a solid flexible choice, and theoretically the backbone of any given Marine force.
But if it's say, 'I'll only take Predators' for Heavy Support, does that not depend upon how the rest of the force is comprised?
Well apparently there are actually people here that think that more than 2 of any unit is spam, so who really knows. Apparently redundancy and a cohesive looking army is terrible.
I didn't answer the poll because I don't think it addresses it's intent: what is the cause of game imbalance?
Spam may exacerbate imbalance, but it is not the cause of it. Units too weak or powerful for their cost create imbalance. Sometime imbalance is caused by rules that apply under specific conditions, such as rules for a formation or a scenario. But to say 'spam' is the culprit is like saying rolling too many dice creates imbalance - the the cause and effect are only related when other factors are considered.
Any solution to restore balance without addressing the actual problem is doomed to fail and an utter waste of time.
Tyel wrote: What is spam? Picking the same unit over and over.
Why would you do this? Usually for competitive reasons. Possibly fluff reasons but if in 7th your "fluff" was "spam the units everyone knows are the best" I wonder what was wagging the dog.
The problem in 40k (and similar games) is that you have a lot of choices for units that serve a very similar role in game. Unfortunately however they are never going to be equally good. One will be better than the others.
This means that a roster of say 20 codex entries can be broken down to just 3-4 "good options" and there is no real reason beyond whimsy to use anything but these 3 options.
So for instance say you wanted some anti-vehicle firepower in your Marine Army. You could take devastators, Centurion devestators or a predator (or various other options, flyers for instance).
In theory you could conclude regular devastators are better in one situation but worse in others and the same with the other two units. So you take a mix of all three. In practice though this has very rarely happened. You are usually going to be better taking three of one option.
Does this upset competitive players? Not really. Its always been and always will be the case. There are much bigger problems for ensuring there is a healthy tournament scene (which seems to be doing okay anyway).
It mainly upsets players who play for the collecting and painting side. To my mind its much more fun to own and paint up a mix of units. So you can say you have say a full Tau collection consisting of every unit type rather than "I have only the models for my 1850 list and yes it contains 5 riptides".
In the same way its more fun to see lots of different units on the table. People like variety.
Despite that however I don't think you can fix it beyond lots of hard and fast rules declaring "you are permitted no more than 2 of these units". GW are not going to go down this road though because they want to sell models. Also while it may help the super-mono lists it won't change things that much.
And how does that help Sisters, Scions, Inquisition, AdMech, and Skitarii players (such as myself)? Am I not allowed 3 Dune Crawlers or Chicken Walkers? Is there an issue when I get 3 squads of Infiltrators?
This isn't some conspiracy of "GW wants to sell models". This is you being unreasonable.
GreaterGood? wrote: Whoa.... I'm out of this thread. I forgot how prevalent the anti-competitive mindset was within the 40k community.
There's no point in even discussing issues when people think:
jeff white wrote: Spam is a symptom of a general lack of intelligence. Spammers who spam units to make an auto win button for themselves are unable to understand that winning at all costs including excessive reflexive financial costs is not the aim of the game hobby or LIFE for that matter. Mostly I blame the collapse of culture around the worship of Mammon but this is beside the point. I would refuse to play with anyone with a netlist of X units and would rather sit at a table and paint while listening to someone else suffer the bad decision to engage with such.
Maybe not with me. But others, well, you may be able to change someone else's mind.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Martel732 wrote: "I came in 1st in a tourney, and 2nd in a 2nd tourney using vanilla marines in 2nd Ed. So whoever was playing vanilla marines in your neighborhood clearly didn't know what they were doing. "
Good luck when the Tyranid strategy cards killed a 1/3 of your list before the game started. What a great game! I guarantee you could not beat the chaos and tyranid players in my meta with your frickin vanilla marines. Marines had like what? Two effective weapons? I don't know who is in this tournament, but in 2nd ed, I saw TWO table flips vs tyranids. (And a lot of damaged metal hormagaunts) Both marines. Marines were 30 pts a model! For a boltgun! Really? In a game with to-hit modifiers! I personally played a 3K game against CSM where the CSM killed my entire list before I could take a single turn! Not even 7th ed Eldar could that!
2nd was a dumpster fire, and I really do NOT understand how anyone derives any joy from that edition.
Play with different people. Though I have to say the my main opponent during that time always moved his orks an extra bit and in those year I never won. Not once. But still I like some things about that game that in 8th I don't. Terrain and cover effects. Charging. RPG attitude. More collectible. Less card game deckbuilder... I wonder whatvwe would have iif geedubs just tweaked that system rather than the Wardization enema they gave it ...
In the context of this thread I take spam to be " competitive" people using multiple same units to win at the expense of immersion and in the end sportsmanship... There used to be sportsmanship scores at GTs. Sure spam is also six units of gobbos but this does not represent the intentions of the op. Multiple - as in forty warp spiders for example - OP or broken units kitted out to exploit rules and game mechanism rather than test strategy and army Comp including thematic elements, this is spam afaiac.
GreaterGood? wrote: Whoa.... I'm out of this thread. I forgot how prevalent the anti-competitive mindset was within the 40k community.
There's no point in even discussing issues when people think:
jeff white wrote: Spam is a symptom of a general lack of intelligence. Spammers who spam units to make an auto win button for themselves are unable to understand that winning at all costs including excessive reflexive financial costs is not the aim of the game hobby or LIFE for that matter. Mostly I blame the collapse of culture around the worship of Mammon but this is beside the point. I would refuse to play with anyone with a netlist of X units and would rather sit at a table and paint while listening to someone else suffer the bad decision to engage with such.
Maybe not with me. But others, well, you may be able to change someone else's mind.
Ha... thing is, you could make a good fluff argument for a lot of spam lists, and given that 40k is an entirely fantasy universe you could stretch some hack narrative to fit even the grossest Net-spam list... that said, if you are so desperate to 'win at toys' then I'd agree you are kind of a loser at life.
My OCD likes things uniform and organized so I like the look of some spammish armies, but even the staunchest defender of "competitive 40K" or "spam" or "net-lists" or "WAAC" etc... has no know that this edition of 40k [8th edition] was promised to address those "loop holes" because it was ruining the fun for most people and that was not the intent of the game.
Ha... thing is, you could make a good fluff argument for a lot of spam lists, and given that 40k is an entirely fantasy universe you could stretch some hack narrative to fit even the grossest Net-spam list... that said, if you are so desperate to 'win at toys' then I'd agree you are kind of a loser at life.
My OCD likes things uniform and organized so I like the look of some spammish armies, but even the staunchest defender of "competitive 40K" or "net-lists" or "WAAC" etc... has no know that this edition of 40k [8th edition] was promised to addressed those "loop holes" because it was ruining the fun for most people and was not the intent of the game.
Yeah in added a definition of spam in context of this thread that assuages these concerns.
And I agree about army comp and multiple same or similar units in some armies. Sure.
GreaterGood? wrote: Whoa.... I'm out of this thread. I forgot how prevalent the anti-competitive mindset was within the 40k community.
There's no point in even discussing issues when people think:
jeff white wrote: Spam is a symptom of a general lack of intelligence. Spammers who spam units to make an auto win button for themselves are unable to understand that winning at all costs including excessive reflexive financial costs is not the aim of the game hobby or LIFE for that matter. Mostly I blame the collapse of culture around the worship of Mammon but this is beside the point. I would refuse to play with anyone with a netlist of X units and would rather sit at a table and paint while listening to someone else suffer the bad decision to engage with such.
Maybe not with me. But others, well, you may be able to change someone else's mind.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Martel732 wrote: "I came in 1st in a tourney, and 2nd in a 2nd tourney using vanilla marines in 2nd Ed. So whoever was playing vanilla marines in your neighborhood clearly didn't know what they were doing. "
Good luck when the Tyranid strategy cards killed a 1/3 of your list before the game started. What a great game! I guarantee you could not beat the chaos and tyranid players in my meta with your frickin vanilla marines. Marines had like what? Two effective weapons? I don't know who is in this tournament, but in 2nd ed, I saw TWO table flips vs tyranids. (And a lot of damaged metal hormagaunts) Both marines. Marines were 30 pts a model! For a boltgun! Really? In a game with to-hit modifiers! I personally played a 3K game against CSM where the CSM killed my entire list before I could take a single turn! Not even 7th ed Eldar could that!
2nd was a dumpster fire, and I really do NOT understand how anyone derives any joy from that edition.
Play with different people. Though I have to say the my main opponent during that time always moved his orks an extra bit and in those year I never won. Not once. But still I like some things about that game that in 8th I don't. Terrain and cover effects. Charging. RPG attitude. More collectible. Less card game deckbuilder... I wonder whatvwe would have iif geedubs just tweaked that system rather than the Wardization enema they gave it ...
In the context of this thread I take spam to be " competitive" people using multiple same units to win at the expense of immersion and in the end sportsmanship... There used to be sportsmanship scores at GTs. Sure spam is also six units of gobbos but this does not represent the intentions of the op. Multiple - as in forty warp spiders for example - OP or broken units kitted out to exploit rules and game mechanism rather than test strategy and army Comp including thematic elements, this is spam afaiac.
So you don't actually have advice for 2nd Edition games besides play with other people that don't abuse the worst the edition has to offer. Got it. Utterly useless piece of wisdom there, bud.
So please do go on how using three Predators and 10 man Deathmark squads makes me less intelligent. I'm waiting.
They should have revamped the unit type and detachment system more than they did. As is you get way too much flexibility as seen in the flyer spam lists. Command points rewarded for diverse detachment design is a step in the right direction given that a brigade does require you to use at least 5 different types of units, but I believe that the reward is too small and the design constraints a bit too harsh in that case. Since you get some extra CP even with the spammiest lists there isn't enough of a opportunity cost and CP is not that impactful overall. Maybe faction-specific stratagems will change that.
If it were up to me I'd make more "big" detachments like the brigade with similar CP rewards but high diversity demands. The spammy detachments shouldn't give any CP, the flyer detachment and superheavy detachment should even take away CP. It should be enough that the system allows you to play a knight army, getting 3 CP on top of that is too much.
So how exactly are armies that have little diversity supposed to make use of those detachments that require diversity? Because not every army is Space Marines with more unit types than you will ever bother to use.
Brigades are bad enough; at least with them, you can spam the one half-decent heavy support or fast attack or elite choice you have to make up those three slots without having your army be gimped. And you think that more unit types should be demanded?
How about instead of making more and more restrictive rules, you fix the goddamn unit balance instead? Because that would actually solve the damn problem.
This argument is silly, but will likely never go away.
No matter what, uncompetitive players will continue to look at armies with 3 long fang units and call it spam, when in reality it is just redundancy.
If you only have one of a unit, you might as well not have it at all, because of the enemy wants to kill it right away, they probably can.
If a unit is worth taking once, it's better if you take it twice or three times, because it makes it harder for the enemy to remove the threat.
For example, if i am looking at my heavy support slots and decide i need some anti tank, 2 predators, or 2 devastators units, is likely to be better than 1 predator and 1 devastator squad, because they both fill the same role (anti tank) but present very different targets (infantry and tanks). A well balanced list is likely to have the ability to kill one tank and one infantry unit in a single turn, but may have a harder time killing 2 tanks or 2 units of infantry in one turn, making it harder for them to remove all of your anti tank shooting.
Thus, taking 2 or 3 of a unit is always going to be a good coffee no matter what changes are made to the game. This concept of target redundancy is furthered by making lists with all tanks or all infantry to make the enemy lose out on the effectiveness of their shooting. Las cannons having nothing to shoot at but Boyz, and heavy bolters at rhinos, for example, will always be good list building.
In my opinion, the problems only start to arise when one unit or unit type is objectively better than all of the other options, so you only ever see long fangs, or only ever see predators, and the game starts to get boring. Playing 10 games vs 3 long fangs might get old. But playing 10 games and seeing 3 long fangs, 3 predators, 3 cent units, biker spam, terminator spam, and foot space wolves, should be enjoyable despite the unit repetition. This (making all units good enough to take in some kind of competitive army) should be GWs number one goal, in my opinion.
And thankfully, this is something i think GW is getting better at this edition with many units being usuable and there not always being an obvious choice or only one possible build for an army. Plus they have stayed they care about balance, and we can expect them to nerf things every so often if they get out of control.
I don't think storm raven spam will win many more tournaments, and if it does, and it becomes apparent that it is way better than most other armies, GW should nerf them and we can move on. The problem with the list isn't spam, it's that the list doesn't lose that much (assuming that's the case).
So we should never take more than 1 of any unit, not have a cohesive list either in the game or in a picture, and be punished for thinking otherwise. Got it
Oh, no. You mistake my post for any form of anti-spam. I don't mind it at all. I was just taking a jab at the T9A mentality that they've got all the problems solved.
Spam is not a problem in itself, but WAAC players who write extreme lists that take advantage of under-costed or overpowered units are a problem and will never get a game from me. Sorry guy with 500 conscripts.
No, redundancy spam is not healthy for the game. But not enough people wanted to play warhammer fantasy battle that requires you make decisions during a game in order to win.
The people that spend money want to play a list building game.
T9A exists people. If you want a sci-fi version then its completely possible to do so. ...although I'm sure there is ample competition in other sci fi games.
Does T9A thoughtfully address the spam issue?
Yes. The main reason for that is because T9A is not a 360degree, true line of sight, kill 20 guys through a broken window type game.
360degree shooting, no los blocking, full turn based, will inherently make a game that requires redundancy spam. When your one gun that kills tanks is always in LOS and in range of the enemy, and your opponent goes first and kills it - the only solution is to spam it so he can't kill them all.
------------------
So does spamming units hurt the game?
...it is the game.
But spamming GW broken units of doom is fine. Spam all the conscripts you want.
Again with the freaking conscripts?
Tell me, if you can't kill conscripts, how do you plan to deal with orks? Sure boyz are twice the price, but they also have around 4x the hitting power along with morale immunity that CAN'T be sniped out.
But spamming GW broken units of doom is fine. Spam all the conscripts you want.
Again with the freaking conscripts?
Tell me, if you can't kill conscripts, how do you plan to deal with orks? Sure boyz are twice the price, but they also have around 4x the hitting power along with morale immunity that CAN'T be sniped out.
4x the hitting power is quite the claim, how do you figure?
So you admit that spamming is not a problem because of balance reasons (as spamming overpowered units is still a balance problem even if they're troops, see 7th edition scatter laser jetbike spam), you hate it because it involves building a list in a way that you don't like building your own lists. IOW, "YOU AREN'T HAVING FUN THE RIGHT WAY STOP IT NOW."
But spamming GW broken units of doom is fine. Spam all the conscripts you want.
Again with the freaking conscripts?
Tell me, if you can't kill conscripts, how do you plan to deal with orks? Sure boyz are twice the price, but they also have around 4x the hitting power along with morale immunity that CAN'T be sniped out.
4x the hitting power is quite the claim, how do you figure?
Conscripts shoot twice and punch once.
Boyz shoot once and punch thrice...unless there's more than 20 of them, in which case they punch four times.
Conscripts are S3.
Boyz are S4.
Conscripts and boyz shoot on 5+.
Conscripts punch at 5+. Boyz punch at 3+.
If you give conscripts a lord commissar, I'm giving da boyz a nob with waaaaagh! banner which will let me hit in CC on 2+ instead of 3+. If you use your commander to issue FRFSRF to your conscripts, I'm using a wyrdboy to give the orks an extra attack.
50 conscripts + a lord commissar is 200 points.
30 boyz + a waaaaagh! banner is 235 points, and the orks are far more likely to have multiple units of boyz than the IG are to have multiple units of conscripts.
If you can't kill the conscripts, how can you possibly take orks? Conscripts are possibly the least scary horde unit in the game. The only thing they have going for them is their low cost. They universally suck at everything they do, except die.
And before you say it, no. 50 conscripts + FRFSRF is not 200 shots because it's not realistic to get that many conscripts into 12" of their target at the same time. At best they'll get a about a third of the squad into rapid fire range for roughly 134 shots @ S3. About 44 of which will hit, and 22 of which will wound when shooting T3 targets. The list of T3 is fairly short...so to keep things fair we'll go with T4. So out of 44 hits, only about 15 will wound.
After that you charge, which shouldn't be all that exciting since, again, your numbers will work against you. Even with a good charge distance, you're entirely dependent on the size of your target unit's facing to maximize your attacks. Realistically, if you're in initial contact rather than adding yourself to a fight in progress, you won't be able to get into CC with more than half your conscripts. And that's being generous. So add 25 attacks, hitting on 5+. Out of 8 hits, you wound T4 on 5+ so add 3 more wounds.
Grand total of ~18 wounds.
Compare to orks, who with their charge distance re-roll and smaller mob are far more likely to get entirely into CC with you than you are with them...
We'll say you get 24 into CC on the charge. That's 24 * 5 = 120 attacks that hit on 2+. Out of 103 hits you're wounding on 4+ against most targets actually worth wounding for 51 wounds. Plus your pistol shots. If you got 24 into CC, you probably had roughly the same number shooting so 24 shot, 8 hit, and another 4 wounds...
55 wounds from 24 models...compared to 18 from 50...it's pretty simple math past that point. 2 wounds per boy vs 0.5 wounds per conscript. 4x the hitting power at twice the cost per model.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: It's actually easier to kill Orks for the price. The 6+ is entirely easy to negate, and T4 isn't too big a deal in terms of small arms.
Sure. But they're still ridiculously easy to spam as "large mobs of boyz" is kind of the whole point.
Also, compared to conscripts, their T4 makes up for the 6+. All losses are by ratio, so it's pure multiplication from the top to the bottom. That means order of operations doesn't matter. Vs the same strength, conscripts are going to get +1 to their armor save, but they're going to be at -1 to their wound rolls vs small arms. This evens out because order of ops doesn't matter.
The only army conscripts actually have an advantage over orks when fighting is Tau because the extra point of S they get going from S4 to S5 is wasted on the conscripts T3.
Meanwhile, there are no armies that field small arms with S2.
While orks beat conscripts point for point via number of attacks, nids beat them on shere quality and maneuverability (though they pay through the nose for it). Termagaunts can be fielded in large groups with an HQ choice that refills the squad. Hormagaunts are highly mobile, first turn charge capable with just a little support from the army (by way of a swarmlord or onslaught psychic power letting them double-move-advance)
Lets look at Hormagaunts for a second. At 6 ppm (same as ork boyz) because we're giving them Adrenal glands for the +1 on advance and charge moves...
So, because of their move of 8", and either the Swarmlord or Onslaught, they're getting the charge. Add in adrenal glands and their 6" pile-in, and it's safe to say they're getting all 30 models into CC (which is the opposite of orks, who will be giving up attacks, and doubly-so for conscripts).
30 models @ 2 attacks each with scything talons with WS 4+ means 30 hits + half the 1's (5/2 or 2 more) for 32 hits. S3 vs T4 means 10 wounds + rerolling 1's for another 2 (same math as the hits) or 12 wounds.
So for 180 points + the cost of support you'd probably be taking anyway you get 6 less wounds than conscripts do with twice the support that is even more immune to sniper-removal, and any unit they pin in CC is going to have a much harder time withdrawing from CC because of the Hormagaunts vastly superior movement ability (seriously, that 6" consolidation/pile-in move is nuts).
While I don't mention a plan for synapse, if you're playing around a 1st turn charge with gaunts, you're going to have a plan for 1st turn synapse. If you don't, you're just being dumb.
Less wounds, more utility.
I'm not even going to math out 30 genestealers, and yes they can get a 1st turn charge. It's a lot more expensive than conscripts, but if you think for a minute the conscripts are going to get a better value for their points than genestealers in CC on 1st turn from deepstrike, you're insane.
So you admit that spamming is not a problem because of balance reasons (as spamming overpowered units is still a balance problem even if they're troops, see 7th edition scatter laser jetbike spam), you hate it because it involves building a list in a way that you don't like building your own lists. IOW, "YOU AREN'T HAVING FUN THE RIGHT WAY STOP IT NOW."
Scatter bikes were a mistake, they basically are the "exception that proves the rule" Bikes should have never been troops, but fast attacks, and that specific bikes were extremely underpriced.
I don't think that the spam concept is wrong, spamming decent or weak units is not an issue at all, even if you bring 2-300 bodies.
The problem comes when you spam units that are clearly a mistake in judgment when the GW guys wrote their profiles. And about big stuff I still think that there are several units that shouldn't belong to regular games but only in 3K points or higher formats. I feel free to complain about that The problem is having some overpowered units available, like stormravens, those things should be limited somehow.
For the record I'm an ork player that doesn't like playing hordes, but I defend them since I love the concept and to play against them.
GreaterGood? wrote: Whoa.... I'm out of this thread. I forgot how prevalent the anti-competitive mindset was within the 40k community.
There's no point in even discussing issues when people think:
jeff white wrote: Spam is a symptom of a general lack of intelligence. Spammers who spam units to make an auto win button for themselves are unable to understand that winning at all costs including excessive reflexive financial costs is not the aim of the game hobby or LIFE for that matter. Mostly I blame the collapse of culture around the worship of Mammon but this is beside the point. I would refuse to play with anyone with a netlist of X units and would rather sit at a table and paint while listening to someone else suffer the bad decision to engage with such.
Maybe not with me. But others, well, you may be able to change someone else's mind.
Spoiler:
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Martel732 wrote: "I came in 1st in a tourney, and 2nd in a 2nd tourney using vanilla marines in 2nd Ed. So whoever was playing vanilla marines in your neighborhood clearly didn't know what they were doing. "
Good luck when the Tyranid strategy cards killed a 1/3 of your list before the game started. What a great game! I guarantee you could not beat the chaos and tyranid players in my meta with your frickin vanilla marines. Marines had like what? Two effective weapons? I don't know who is in this tournament, but in 2nd ed, I saw TWO table flips vs tyranids. (And a lot of damaged metal hormagaunts) Both marines. Marines were 30 pts a model! For a boltgun! Really? In a game with to-hit modifiers! I personally played a 3K game against CSM where the CSM killed my entire list before I could take a single turn! Not even 7th ed Eldar could that!
2nd was a dumpster fire, and I really do NOT understand how anyone derives any joy from that edition.
Play with different people. Though I have to say the my main opponent during that time always moved his orks an extra bit and in those year I never won. Not once. But still I like some things about that game that in 8th I don't. Terrain and cover effects. Charging. RPG attitude. More collectible. Less card game deckbuilder... I wonder whatvwe would have iif geedubs just tweaked that system rather than the Wardization enema they gave it ...
In the context of this thread I take spam to be " competitive" people using multiple same units to win at the expense of immersion and in the end sportsmanship... There used to be sportsmanship scores at GTs. Sure spam is also six units of gobbos but this does not represent the intentions of the op. Multiple - as in forty warp spiders for example - OP or broken units kitted out to exploit rules and game mechanism rather than test strategy and army Comp including thematic elements, this is spam afaiac.
So you don't actually have advice for 2nd Edition games besides play with other people that don't abuse the worst the edition has to offer. Got it. Utterly useless piece of wisdom there, bud.
So please do go on how using three Predators and 10 man Deathmark squads makes me less intelligent. I'm waiting.
Remove the offending cards like virus cards or choose not to use them for example.
As for intelligence and wisdom there is a difference.
Truly intelligent people want a challenge, not a win button.
Building auto win buttons is not challenging, but it can be expensive.
Wisdom involves recognizing the benefit of a challenge, this being experience, improvement and wisdom.
Auto win buttons do not make people wise.
Usually it is loss that makes people wise.
So I suppose I may offer another bit of wisdom.
Aim to share your time with people who don't mind losing, or at least who appreciate the value in a challenge that may well result in their loss.
I don't know how easily it is to find this mindset wherever you are living working playing.
I can say that in the thirty odd years that I lived in the USA the general lack of either coupled with the attention spans of gnats and the consideration of selfish six year olds led me to leave and never regret it.
But this is likely due my bad luck and poor judgment when it comes to people as much as anything else.
Maybe you are more fortunate.
Arandmoor wrote: If you give conscripts a lord commissar, I'm giving da boyz a nob with waaaaagh! banner which will let me hit in CC on 2+ instead of 3+.
If you use your commander to issue FRFSRF to your conscripts, I'm using a wyrdboy to give the orks an extra attack.
50 conscripts + a lord commissar is 200 points.
30 boyz + a waaaaagh! banner is 235 points, and the orks are far more likely to have multiple units of boyz than the IG are to have multiple units of conscripts.
50 conscripts + a lord commissar and a platoon commander is 225 pts, which you can bring down to 201 by taking a normal commissar. So that's 75 pts of support staff per 150 pts of conscripts, normally 51 pts of support staff.
30 boyz + a waaaaagh! banner and a weirdboy is 321 points. There's a scalability issue as well, the weirdboy can only buff one unit of boyz every turn (assuming that he succeeds) and the power can only be attempted once per turn. That's 141 pts of support staff per 180 pts of boyz.
So I think that you are comparing apples and oranges in this case. I'm not doubting that the orks put out more damage per point, but the increase isn't 100% and they need to get into melee without too many losses in order to bring that damage to bear.
So you admit that spamming is not a problem because of balance reasons (as spamming overpowered units is still a balance problem even if they're troops, see 7th edition scatter laser jetbike spam), you hate it because it involves building a list in a way that you don't like building your own lists. IOW, "YOU AREN'T HAVING FUN THE RIGHT WAY STOP IT NOW."
Scatter bikes were a mistake, they basically are the "exception that proves the rule" Bikes should have never been troops, but fast attacks, and that specific bikes were extremely underpriced.
I don't think that the spam concept is wrong, spamming decent or weak units is not an issue at all, even if you bring 2-300 bodies.
The problem comes when you spam units that are clearly a mistake in judgment when the GW guys wrote their profiles. And about big stuff I still think that there are several units that shouldn't belong to regular games but only in 3K points or higher formats. I feel free to complain about that The problem is having some overpowered units available, like stormravens, those things should be limited somehow.
For the record I'm an ork player that doesn't like playing hordes, but I defend them since I love the concept and to play against them.
I am in general agreement here.
Anyone who after reading eighth edition rules
goes out and buys six weirdboys and three hundred boys to take advantage of da jump wit extras because casualties
and a hundred stormboys then pays someone else to paint and assemble them simply because that person thinks that he or she has found an auto win button then twists the army comp rules to be able to field them all perhaps complaining about arbitrary limitations on how many times orks can use da jump per turn (in 7th there was deamon summoning for instance along with scatter laser bikes - i know no longer things but beside the point) is spamming in the bad way as this practice is imo bad for the game and the hobby and for that person, actually, as well as most anyone he or she games with. It is reactions to rules systems like this in the name of competiveness - Gotta stay competitive! - that count as spam in my book. It is more than fielding multiple units. It is an attitude. And sure to play against such a person and such a "list" maybe a challenge and even fun if invited and voluntary but being stuck with a group or local community that is rife with this attitude is torture in my opinion and should be considered a war(game) crime punishable with warm mountain dew and smashed chip bags.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Khaine wrote: Spam is not a problem in itself, but WAAC players who write extreme lists that take advantage of under-costed or overpowered units are a problem and will never get a game from me. Sorry guy with 500 conscripts.
500? Dayam... My elbow hurts just thinking about movement phases cuz i would be spending thirty minutes with them on the table waiting for my opponent to move five hundred conscripts.
Can we please not derail yet another thread whining about conscripts? Because frankly, given how many models you'd have to paint to "spam" conscripts, if anyone tried, I'd just pat them on the back and say "I'm sorry".
Melissia wrote: Can we please not derail yet another thread whining about conscripts? Because frankly, given how many models you'd have to paint to "spam" conscripts, if anyone tried, I'd just pat them on the back and say "I'm sorry".
Troof.
Cuz you wouldn't be able to shake his or her hand as it would have fallen off painting 500 conscripts.
Truly a sad case.
Melissia wrote: and you don't really care, so you're wasting my time.
Wow is it really all about you? That is exactly how you are coming off. I really hope not.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Can I say the thing I loved most about 3rd edition was the Detachment lists. So when I suggest using percentages I am only acknowledging that taking 2 min strength ranger units so I can utilize the better units WAS A WAY TO abuse the system
And an FYI for those not in the know or others who have obviously forgotten.
a 25% minimum troops (50% in some 2nd ed tournaments) would not be 'troops' as it is now. It would be all infantry, or whatever tyranids and other races pass for infantry.
Does that mean taking 3 super heavy scorpions would not fit or 6 ork flyers? I don't know. What is the aim in a competitive format? Is it open like Narrative or are there some restrictions like Tournament Matched Play.
This is going to be a different answer for every player.
Arandmoor wrote: If you give conscripts a lord commissar, I'm giving da boyz a nob with waaaaagh! banner which will let me hit in CC on 2+ instead of 3+. If you use your commander to issue FRFSRF to your conscripts, I'm using a wyrdboy to give the orks an extra attack.
50 conscripts + a lord commissar is 200 points.
30 boyz + a waaaaagh! banner is 235 points, and the orks are far more likely to have multiple units of boyz than the IG are to have multiple units of conscripts.
50 conscripts + a lord commissar and a platoon commander is 225 pts, which you can bring down to 201 by taking a normal commissar. So that's 75 pts of support staff per 150 pts of conscripts, normally 51 pts of support staff.
30 boyz + a waaaaagh! banner and a weirdboy is 321 points. There's a scalability issue as well, the weirdboy can only buff one unit of boyz every turn (assuming that he succeeds) and the power can only be attempted once per turn. That's 141 pts of support staff per 180 pts of boyz.
So I think that you are comparing apples and oranges in this case. I'm not doubting that the orks put out more damage per point, but the increase isn't 100% and they need to get into melee without too many losses in order to bring that damage to bear.
Unrelated: Where does it say you can only attempt to use a psychic ability once per turn? Best I can find you can attempt them once per turn per psyker that knows it.
I mention that the boyz are more expensive. That's not the issue.
The issue is the claim that conscripts are somehow OP, when by all math they straight up suck at everything but dying quickly. Other tarpit type units can do much the same job, and also kill things while they're at it. So if you're having trouble with conscripts, there's simply no way you'll ever be able to take on orks or nids who, yes, pay more for their hordes, but also get horde units that can kill you while they're tarpitting something valuable.
This is important because it illustrates WHY conscripts suck as hard as they do. When conscripts tarpit, they do so until they die because, generally, they aren't going to kill whatever it is they're tarpitting.
An ork mob or nid swarm, OTOH, is going to tarpit for a turn or two, kill whatever it is they were tying up, and move on.
If you don't have the tools to handle the conscripts, orks and nids are going to wreck you. That's why conscripts aren't OP.
Melissia wrote: and you don't really care, so you're wasting my time.
Wow is it really all about you?
Is this incessant whining about "spam" all about you, then? People are saying "Spam armies are ugly!" and I'm disagreeing. If you don't like my opinions you're free to ignore or dispute them. Fact remains, I find "one of each kind of unit" armies ugly and lazy.
Your "solution" remains a non-solution. There's no problem here that your "solution" would fix, so why do you keep pushing it, out of blind nostalgia?
So far as I can tell there are three kinds of spam:
1) An over-powered or under-costed unit is taken in order to maximize a player's chance at winning. This is bad kind of spam, because it creates an unbalanced game. The fault for this kind of spam is on the game developers for not balancing the units and discouraging spam.
2) A player spams a unit in an effort to appear 'in the know' and ape the expected forms of 'efficient' armies. This is an annoying kind of spam because it involves a false value judgment, but it's ultimately harmless because it rarely creates an imbalanced army - just an army that desperately wants to be imbalanced.
3) A unit is spammed as a joke or a stylistic choice by a player. This is a value-neutral spam, as it can add to the game or make it worse, just like all of the myriad other choices a player can make.
I think it's perfectly okay for a list to be 50%-75% the same models. It's when it gets beyond 75%-80% that there's a balance issue. If you don't need to use at least some of your army to shore up the weaknesses of what you're spamming, then the spammed model obviously doesn't have enough weaknesses.
Tylendal wrote: I think it's perfectly okay for a list to be 50%-75% the same models. It's when it gets beyond 75%-80% that there's a balance issue. If you don't need to use at least some of your army to shore up the weaknesses of what you're spamming, then the spammed model obviously doesn't have enough weaknesses.
Oh get it! It's because Space Marines have a max squad size of ten per unit and they don't have much in the way of countering 20 to 30 model size groups of disposable units.
a 25% minimum troops (50% in some 2nd ed tournaments) would not be 'troops' as it is now. It would be all infantry, or whatever tyranids and other races pass for infantry.
I oppose this part. Look at it this way. If at least 25% of my army has to be Sisters Dominions, who are infantry, and really good infantry, that's no big deal, because half my army is Dominions and the other half is their transports.
On the other hand, my guard list spends 250 points of infantry and 1750 points of tanks. I bring a lot of tanks, because that's what my army is. To even get 25% of my army to be infantry, I'd be putting out at least 110 models, probably more because Conscripts are cheaper than Guardsmen. And my riflemen are crap, and I bring just enough to form a blockade resilient enough to protect my tanks for two and a half turns.
Forcing a significant chunk of your army to be such a broad category of units, upon which some armies are entirely reliant and have extremely good options, and some armies would rather not have at all, is bad.
But how does one judge when an army has inherently limited options?
Consider my Thousand Sons, if you will.
I have.....Sorceror Lords, Rubricae, Tzaangor and Scarab Occult as my unique units. Plus of course Magnus and Ahriman should needs must.
My army is comprised entirely of said same units. Is that spam? I mean, I can pack an awful lot of Smites of varying potency into a given list, and Mortal Wounds are pretty damned saucy, especially for an army with few reliable Anti Tank options.
At what points does a particular theme become spam?
Also, I think armies that consist of a large number of one-of-a-kind units are unfluffy, obnoxious, and not really all that fun, and tend to feel incoherent and not like there's a coherent theme or strategy.
An army should consist of a large number of a couple of units that form the core of its strategy, and then a few other units attached as support.
I have.....Sorceror Lords, Rubricae, Tzaangor and Scarab Occult as my unique units. Plus of course Magnus and Ahriman should needs must.
My army is comprised entirely of said same units. Is that spam? I mean, I can pack an awful lot of Smites of varying potency into a given list, and Mortal Wounds are pretty damned saucy, especially for an army with few reliable Anti Tank options.
At what points does a particular theme become spam?
As someone who plays admech I feel you. It's very difficult for me to avoid spam in the first place, given my army has 16 units total, and building a competitive list cuts those options down even further. The fact I'm also one of the few armies discouraged to mix and match due to how canticles function doesn't help.
My army basically drops over half it's points into rangers with the sniper arquebus and onagers with the anti air array, to counter the major sources of spam in my local meta.
Unrelated: Where does it say you can only attempt to use a psychic ability once per turn? Best I can find you can attempt them once per turn per psyker that knows it.
Its under the battleforged rules in the main rulebook. Smite is the exception.
Unrelated: Where does it say you can only attempt to use a psychic ability once per turn? Best I can find you can attempt them once per turn per psyker that knows it.
Its under the battleforged rules in the main rulebook. Smite is the exception.
mondo80 wrote: Oh get it! It's because Space Marines have a max squad size of ten per unit and they don't have much in the way of countering 20 to 30 model size groups of disposable units.
...they're called stock Centurion Devastators backed up by a Primaris Rhino and/or a Captain.
I have.....Sorceror Lords, Rubricae, Tzaangor and Scarab Occult as my unique units. Plus of course Magnus and Ahriman should needs must.
My army is comprised entirely of said same units. Is that spam? I mean, I can pack an awful lot of Smites of varying potency into a given list, and Mortal Wounds are pretty damned saucy, especially for an army with few reliable Anti Tank options.
At what points does a particular theme become spam?
As someone who plays admech I feel you. It's very difficult for me to avoid spam in the first place, given my army has 16 units total, and building a competitive list cuts those options down even further. The fact I'm also one of the few armies discouraged to mix and match due to how canticles function doesn't help.
My army basically drops over half it's points into rangers with the sniper arquebus and onagers with the anti air array, to counter the major sources of spam in my local meta.
Unrelated: Where does it say you can only attempt to use a psychic ability once per turn? Best I can find you can attempt them once per turn per psyker that knows it.
Its under the battleforged rules in the main rulebook. Smite is the exception.
So...it's NOT under the psychic phase rules?
Goddamnit GW. WHY IS THIS NOT ON PAGE 178????????
Seriously...can I get a page number for this? I can't find it. This is frustrating me to no end.
I mean, I'm fine with it, but if I can't find it, I know I won't be the only one, and I want to be able to point it out to people who try to cheese me with four uses of Da Jump on turn 1.
mondo80 wrote: Oh get it! It's because Space Marines have a max squad size of ten per unit and they don't have much in the way of countering 20 to 30 model size groups of disposable units.
...they're called stock Centurion Devastators backed up by a Primaris Rhino and/or a Captain.
I have.....Sorceror Lords, Rubricae, Tzaangor and Scarab Occult as my unique units. Plus of course Magnus and Ahriman should needs must.
My army is comprised entirely of said same units. Is that spam? I mean, I can pack an awful lot of Smites of varying potency into a given list, and Mortal Wounds are pretty damned saucy, especially for an army with few reliable Anti Tank options.
At what points does a particular theme become spam?
As someone who plays admech I feel you. It's very difficult for me to avoid spam in the first place, given my army has 16 units total, and building a competitive list cuts those options down even further. The fact I'm also one of the few armies discouraged to mix and match due to how canticles function doesn't help.
My army basically drops over half it's points into rangers with the sniper arquebus and onagers with the anti air array, to counter the major sources of spam in my local meta.
Unrelated: Where does it say you can only attempt to use a psychic ability once per turn? Best I can find you can attempt them once per turn per psyker that knows it.
Its under the battleforged rules in the main rulebook. Smite is the exception.
So...it's NOT under the psychic phase rules?
Goddamnit GW. WHY IS THIS NOT ON PAGE 178????????
Seriously...can I get a page number for this? I can't find it. This is frustrating me to no end.
I mean, I'm fine with it, but if I can't find it, I know I won't be the only one, and I want to be able to point it out to people who try to cheese me with four uses of Da Jump on turn 1.
CrownAxe was correct. its page 215 of the big rulebook, in the matched play rules.
In my opinion, spam is terrible. I got out of Warmahordes because armies were just "find the best thing, take as much of it as you can fit in" and now you see the same kind of nonsense here, 100+ razorwing flocks to abuse Soulburst, 6 stormravens, etc.
Honestly? I say bring comp back. Punish the people who do this kinda crap. I used to play in 2nd and 3rd and there was a reason why Army Composition was a key part of placing in events; to prevent just maxing out on the "best" units with minimal anything else. You could win all your games and not even place in a tournament if you got dinged on comp and/or sportsmanship for trying to game the system.
Wayniac wrote: In my opinion, spam is terrible. I got out of Warmahordes because armies were just "find the best thing, take as much of it as you can fit in" and now you see the same kind of nonsense here, 100+ razorwing flocks to abuse Soulburst, 6 stormravens, etc.
Now you see it? Spam has always been part of 40k, I don't know why you think this is a new thing.
Honestly? I say bring comp back. Punish the people who do this kinda crap. I used to play in 2nd and 3rd and there was a reason why Army Composition was a key part of placing in events; to prevent just maxing out on the "best" units with minimal anything else. You could win all your games and not even place in a tournament if you got dinged on comp and/or sportsmanship for trying to game the system.
Comp is a laughable failure. Not only does it almost always consist of insane "YOU AREN'T HAVING FUN THE WAY I TOLD YOU TO HAVE FUN STOP DOING IT NOW" rules that punish whatever random thing the TO lost their last game against and have very little to do with objective balance it doesn't even do the thing it's supposedly intended to do. Comp lets you bring the overpowered thing and ruin everyone's day, and only penalizes you at the end once those games are over and it's too late to give your opponents their fun experience back. So it becomes little more than a bunch of "casual at all costs" players masturbating over how "casual" they are and how poorly optimized their lists are while shunning everyone who ever beats them. If the balance issues are clear enough that you can point them out in a comp system then fix it the correct way. Change the rules, adjust point costs, etc, until there is no more balance problem and no need for comp.
Spam is an effective way to build an army if there's nothing in the rules to prevent it.
If only because you get target saturation, redundancy, remove clear priorities for the enemy... people are going to naturally gravitate towards taking a lot of one type of unit because killing 4 of X or 4 of Y is harder than killing 2 of each.
It's especially prevalent in newhammer due to the 'everything can hurt everything' rules. Because of this it is very easy to boil down units to a single efficiency calculation. We don't have the situation where eg you can take out MEQs with ease but struggle with TEQs, or good vs hordes but bad vs vehicles.
Couple that with very few inter-unit synergies, its easy to find the 2-3 choices which are worth taking. The buff units (Changeling, Guilliman, Dante, Draigo) are also the ones being spammed.
IMO the way to solve it is putting unit limits on each unit's datasheet. Warmachine has other issues with army lists, but it doesn't suffer that much from spam because most things are limited to 2 or 3 per army.
@ Peregrine : Comp may not be an ideal solution, but the unfortunate reality is that adjusting points values outside of official erratas is a non-starter for 99% of the community.
Redundancy is definitely an important factor to consider, especially in a high points game. I generally believe that if you're not taking at least three of something, you're not really committing to taking it. If you only take one, you're just asking for it to be shot off the board on the first turn.
Redundancy is one thing, and you sometimes need multiples just so the unit does its darn job - like troops. IG squads are useless in ones or twos. If you're going to bring troops at all with IG, you should be bringing 40+ in all realisticness.
Also, is one large blob a spam? I'm thinking 1-2x 30 Ork Boyz. Which is a fluffy and necessary part of any good Ork army.
I don't much like armies that avoid spam at all costs, because they end up being a scatterbrained mess of things that don't fit together.
Company Commander
IG Squad (10 men)
Conscript Squad (20 men)
Sentinel Sqn (3 walkers)
Valkyrie
Leman Russ Battle Tank
Manticore
The above is a possible kind of list that avoids any definition of spam, and I hate it with a vengeance.
People won't like it when my list consists of a Pask Battle Tank, a Tank Commander Vanquisher, a Punisher, a Exterminator, a Deathstrike, a Basilisk, a Manticore, a Wyvern, and a Shadowsword. It's spam even though there isn't a single repeated unit in the list, because it consists entirely of a single kind of target. The list above isn't a good list by any margin, but people won't want to play it because it's a list that renders over half their army ineffective, and it's hard to kill. Because it has no infantry targets, the approximately 60% of an army that consists of weapons optimized for infantry-killing are mostly ineffective against it. This was why, even though Knights and the Armored Battlegroup were kind of weak last edition, they weren't whole lot of fun to play against, because the majority of your all-comers' list has nothing to do.
I'd also point out that people don't generally have a problem with the repetition of fragile units, unless they're really, really good, so I think the "problem" with "spam lists" has to do with how you perceive yourself as faring against them. If your entire army is able to kill 1 or 2 out of 9 tanks a turn, you don't feel like you made a difference the same way you feel if you killed 1 or 2 tanks and 1 or 2 infantry squads out of 4 tanks and 6 infantry squads, and therefore you have less fun. In addition, when all the units are identical, it doesn't feel like you're affecting their strategy for killing one unit off, because they have 4 more just like it. You might actually be winning, but you don't feel like you affected their strategy
Spam has always been a viable "tactic" both in reality and in war-games.
I have heard many times the cry for "Boys before toys!" at least in regards to Orks! (never mind soviets during WW2).
I would also add however, just like anything in real life: too much of ANYTHING can be toxic.
Spam can be healthy if it gets players to invest in a good quantity of basic troop types that can act as the core for dabbling with other unit types to make the game interesting.
I admit that it would seem very odd for Imperial Guard, Orks or Tyranids to not have close to 100 basic troop models
I think it also depend on the player, it can even be a weapon.
I have a 'SPAM' List I play with, it has only two Repeated Squads, 2 Tactical Squads and 2 Devastator Squads along with a mix of others, but what is being SPAMMED is Plasma Weapons, at my last count it was 37 counting the Plasma Guns, Plasma Pistols, Plasma Cannons and Combi-Plasmas. I have been playing a list similar to this since 2nd Edition.
I know some people look at this and roll their eyes, so I don't take it out every game. Just like I don't take out my 6x Grey Hunter List often. Part of the reason is so others can take a break from it and the other, it can get boring on my part.
I also have a friend that does not have a budget to buy a lot of things, so him taking his 4 Tactical Squads with a Razorbacks for each game is ok, because that is what he has.
Melissia wrote: and you don't really care, so you're wasting my time.
Wow is it really all about you?
Is this incessant whining about "spam" all about you, then? People are saying "Spam armies are ugly!" and I'm disagreeing. If you don't like my opinions you're free to ignore or dispute them. Fact remains, I find "one of each kind of unit" armies ugly and lazy.
Your "solution" remains a non-solution. There's no problem here that your "solution" would fix, so why do you keep pushing it, out of blind nostalgia?
I'm with Melissa on this one.
Armies where all of the squads are differently equipped and there's one of each vehicle type aren't "immersive" or "fluffy". Quite the contrary, they make no sense and are often ugly.
Couldn't agree more with Selym, Melissia, and Scott-S6. I don't think I've seen a universal definition of spam anyways, and the 'highlander' armies look awful to me.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with spam, and I in fact move to change the name to something more appropriate; redundancy.
If you have a problem with multiple, overpowered units, then your issue is with the balance of those units, not that there's 3 of them. No one cares if I put down 6 scout sentinels. The issue isn't the redundancy, its the balance. Focus on the issue, not the symptom.
Redundancy is fluffy, logical, thematic, tactical, and looks fething good.
mondo80 wrote: Oh get it! It's because Space Marines have a max squad size of ten per unit and they don't have much in the way of countering 20 to 30 model size groups of disposable units.
...they're called stock Centurion Devastators backed up by a Primaris Rhino and/or a Captain.
I have.....Sorceror Lords, Rubricae, Tzaangor and Scarab Occult as my unique units. Plus of course Magnus and Ahriman should needs must.
My army is comprised entirely of said same units. Is that spam? I mean, I can pack an awful lot of Smites of varying potency into a given list, and Mortal Wounds are pretty damned saucy, especially for an army with few reliable Anti Tank options.
At what points does a particular theme become spam?
As someone who plays admech I feel you. It's very difficult for me to avoid spam in the first place, given my army has 16 units total, and building a competitive list cuts those options down even further. The fact I'm also one of the few armies discouraged to mix and match due to how canticles function doesn't help.
My army basically drops over half it's points into rangers with the sniper arquebus and onagers with the anti air array, to counter the major sources of spam in my local meta.
Unrelated: Where does it say you can only attempt to use a psychic ability once per turn? Best I can find you can attempt them once per turn per psyker that knows it.
Its under the battleforged rules in the main rulebook. Smite is the exception.
So...it's NOT under the psychic phase rules?
Goddamnit GW. WHY IS THIS NOT ON PAGE 178????????
Seriously...can I get a page number for this? I can't find it. This is frustrating me to no end.
I mean, I'm fine with it, but if I can't find it, I know I won't be the only one, and I want to be able to point it out to people who try to cheese me with four uses of Da Jump on turn 1.
CrownAxe was correct. its page 215 of the big rulebook, in the matched play rules.
Again, I'm not doubting that it's a thing. But...why isn't something this basic on page 178?
Blacksails wrote: Couldn't agree more with Selym, Melissia, and Scott-S6. I don't think I've seen a universal definition of spam anyways, and the 'highlander' armies look awful to me.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with spam, and I in fact move to change the name to something more appropriate; redundancy.
If you have a problem with multiple, overpowered units, then your issue is with the balance of those units, not that there's 3 of them. No one cares if I put down 6 scout sentinels. The issue isn't the redundancy, its the balance. Focus on the issue, not the symptom.
Redundancy is fluffy, logical, thematic, tactical, and looks fething good.
So, Eldar armies with a bunch of different Aspect Warrior squads, some guardians, some jetbikes, a wraithlord and some war walkers are out then. . .
I get the desire for "sameness", and thats how I usually play. But theres always an exception. Besides, variety is the spice of life, can't we agree that variety of army styles is fine too?
Blacksails wrote: Couldn't agree more with Selym, Melissia, and Scott-S6. I don't think I've seen a universal definition of spam anyways, and the 'highlander' armies look awful to me.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with spam, and I in fact move to change the name to something more appropriate; redundancy.
If you have a problem with multiple, overpowered units, then your issue is with the balance of those units, not that there's 3 of them. No one cares if I put down 6 scout sentinels. The issue isn't the redundancy, its the balance. Focus on the issue, not the symptom.
Redundancy is fluffy, logical, thematic, tactical, and looks fething good.
So, Eldar armies with a bunch of different Aspect Warrior squads, some guardians, some jetbikes, a wraithlord and some war walkers are out then. . .
I get the desire for "sameness", and thats how I usually play. But theres always an exception. Besides, variety is the spice of life, can't we agree that variety of army styles is fine too?
I think it's according to the army. As a guard player, it really goes against the fluff not to spam since regiments are typically one type of unit (infantry, armor, mech, ect.) On the other hand, Scatterbikes and Riptides almost broke 7th by themselves. Eldar armies make sense fluff wise to be more diverse.
iGuy91 wrote: I hate that someone can bring something like 8 stormravens nowadays, and call it a list...its boring garbage and takes 0 imagination to play.
Hard to argue with that. I don't play competitive, so I might just decide to not play if somebody showed up to play me with a garbage "list" like that.
Real militaries are operated by extreme WAACTFG's, whose idea of "fun" is to curbstop the enemy into oblivion with as little effort as possible. OTOH, it proves that spam is realistic.
And they get crushed by armies that employ combined-arms tactics. 'Spam' in the real world is the sign of a poorly trained force (admittedly, an awful lot of armies fall into this category). Waves of tanks or infantry attacking unsupported get annihilated by balanced forces every time.
Unless you're taking a literal view of a company of tanks (20 or so vehicles) being present on the battlefield at once and fighting as a cohesive unit, then translating that over to 40K on a one-for-one basis and calling both 'spam.' That would be rather foolish, as ideally that company of tanks would also have a company of infantry, a company of heavy weapons, and a battalion of artillery in support, to say nothing of air support - all of which would be present on the same battle at the same time, fighting in concert.
I have no particular objections to 'spam' in 40K but pointing to the real world for evidence seems like a slender reed.
And they get crushed by armies that employ combined-arms tactics. 'Spam' in the real world is the sign of a poorly trained force (admittedly, an awful lot of armies fall into this category). Waves of tanks or infantry attacking unsupported get annihilated by balanced forces every time.
Unless you're taking a literal view of a company of tanks (20 or so vehicles) being present on the battlefield at once and fighting as a cohesive unit, then translating that over to 40K on a one-for-one basis and calling both 'spam.' That would be rather foolish, as ideally that company of tanks would also have a company of infantry, a company of heavy weapons, and a battalion of artillery in support, to say nothing of air support - all of which would be present on the same battle at the same time, fighting in concert.
I have no particular objections to 'spam' in 40K but pointing to the real world for evidence seems like a slender reed.
Napoleonic-era warfare was a lot of spam.
Lemme bring my 20 or so infantry regiments with 4 cavalry regiments to meet your 17 units of artillery, 20 infantry regiments and 1 cavalry regiment. (Not realistic numbers, but you get the gist).
Selym wrote: Napoleonic-era warfare was a lot of spam.
Lemme bring my 20 or so infantry regiments with 4 cavalry regiments to meet your 17 units of artillery, 20 infantry regiments and 1 cavalry regiment. (Not realistic numbers, but you get the gist).
A French infantry regiment contained at least three distinct kinds of troops in it, and then there were specialist regiments of light or elite troops, as well as the distinctions based on where the unit was from and what sort of honors were attached to it. Cavalry was likewise divided into three broad types (heavy, medium, light) with a dizzying array of sub-types who could wear lots of armor, a little armor, or no armor; they could fight on horseback or dismounted; they could be armed with a saber, a lance, a carbine, a brace of pistols, or all of those at once. Artillery was just as diverse, again coming in three main types, and much of it was organically part of the infantry regiments and not formed in separate regiments, and mortars and rockets were different weapons altogether.
And then there were all of the diverse allied troops with their unique fighting styles, uniforms, and customs. A Croatian sharpshooter was a different thing from a British riflemen or an Austrian jaeger.
Of course Napoleonic warfare was 'spammy' (if we ignore that this is a ridiculous word to apply in context) because there is only so much variation you can get by handing a guy a black powder weapon and a sharp thing, but considering all of those troops to be the same is not only not true it would also be roundly rejected by contemporary soldiers. They were highly aware of the differences between different kinds of regiment and tried to accentuate them as much as possible to let one body of troops stand out from another.
Spam is life...
Still, I'd like to see relic weapons that have a Strength characteristic until they successfully damage a unit, then wounds units with two matching keywords for the rest of the game on a 2+.
Eg. Damages a Wolf Lord on a Thunderwolf then busts up Harold or Canis on a 2+ for having Character and Thunderwolf keywords then shoots a Bloodclaw but uses the Strength characteristic since it doesn't have two matching keywords with the Bloodclaw.
Probably be cool if it could store three keywords rather than just the two needed to activate it.
There are a couple of options for dealing with spam:
1. Make all units in a codex perfectly balanced with one another, resulting in a boring monotone army list.
2. Force players to use sub-optimal units in every army, removing player agency from the army-selection aspect of the game.
Otherwise competitive players who are actively trying to win will automatically choose only the optimal units. This is a problem 40k has always suffered from as a competitive game. Luckily GW always has the "durr this isn't a sport, we're just trying to sell pretty models" excuse to fall back on. The whole business model is at odds with the idea of making the game balanced and spam-proof.
Actually if units are balanced against one another, you'd have more variety in lists as people would focus on taking what they wanted to play over what's more powerful.
This is the list I'm thinking of starting 8th off with, as it's a good part of what I have painted to a point where they won't need much extra work. It's spam, but is it "bad spam"? I wonder what some think?
Battalion Detachment:
Devilfish w/ SMS HQ-Aun' shi
HQ-Ethereal w/ slapsticks
Devilfish w/ gun drones
Troop-Rifle Strike Team x5 w/ ui, ml, marker drone (in fish)
Troop-Rifle Strike Team x5 w/ ui, ml, marker drone (in fish)
Devilfish w/ gun drones
Troop-Rifle Strike Team x5 w/ ui, ml, marker drone (in fish)
Troop-Rifle Strike Team x5 w/ ui, ml, marker drone (in fish)
Devilfish w/ gun drones
Troop-Rifle Strike Team x5 w/ ui, ml, marker drone (in fish)
Troop-Rifle Strike Team x5 w/ ui, ml, marker drone (in fish)
Fast Attack-Piranha w/ fusion blaster
Fast Attack-Tetras x2
Heavy Support-Railhead w/ SMS Heavy Support-Railhead w/ SMS Heavy Support-Ionhead w/ gun drones
(no, I don't own a longstrike model)
Flyer-Sunshark Bomber
Auxiliary Support Detachment:
Troop-Carbine Strike Team x10 (ethereal guard)
I think this was a under points for 2K, but I may be mistaken as I deleted the original list apparently. Seeker missiles on the tanks will fill any remaining points.
Melissia wrote: Actually if units are balanced against one another, you'd have more variety in lists as people would focus on taking what they wanted to play over what's more powerful.
Balance != everything's the exact same.
I mean the army list as a whole would be boring and homogenous, not individual players' lists. The models would be cosmetically different, but the rules would have much less variety across the board. If there were a serious effort at balance, then improved stats and special rules would all carry an appropriate points cost so 500 points of one thing would be exactly as effective as 500 points of another thing. Sure you can say that units can be specialized toward specific rules to break the monotony, but 40k's ruleset really isn't flexible enough to make that a viable option. Fast units would have to be very weak, and tough units would have to be less mobile and more expensive. Troops who benefit from special rules and synergy would have to be priced so that bog-standard troops are equally effective on a point-for-point basis. Stand-out units like thunderhawks, unique characters and flying daemon princes and ultra-cheap units like brimstones and conscripts get spammed because they break the mold that balance enforces.
Automatically Appended Next Post: The sad truth is that if 40k lists truly were balanced, the competitive scene would still be overrun by spam. Players would just spam the cheapest available models. Everyone would just be running hordes of those monopose plastic gretchin from the mid-90s, because the truth of human nature is that competitive gamers care about winning more than they care about fun.
Blacksails wrote: Couldn't agree more with Selym, Melissia, and Scott-S6. I don't think I've seen a universal definition of spam anyways, and the 'highlander' armies look awful to me.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with spam, and I in fact move to change the name to something more appropriate; redundancy.
If you have a problem with multiple, overpowered units, then your issue is with the balance of those units, not that there's 3 of them. No one cares if I put down 6 scout sentinels. The issue isn't the redundancy, its the balance. Focus on the issue, not the symptom.
Redundancy is fluffy, logical, thematic, tactical, and looks fething good.
So, Eldar armies with a bunch of different Aspect Warrior squads, some guardians, some jetbikes, a wraithlord and some war walkers are out then. . .
I get the desire for "sameness", and thats how I usually play. But theres always an exception. Besides, variety is the spice of life, can't we agree that variety of army styles is fine too?
By out you mean that I don't like them, then yes. Other people are more than welcome to build their army the way they want. I just don't like a 1 of everything approach.
Melissia wrote: Actually if units are balanced against one another, you'd have more variety in lists as people would focus on taking what they wanted to play over what's more powerful.
Balance != everything's the exact same.
I mean the army list as a whole would be boring and homogenous, not individual players' lists. The models would be cosmetically different, but the rules would have much less variety across the board. If there were a serious effort at balance, then improved stats and special rules would all carry an appropriate points cost so 500 points of one thing would be exactly as effective as 500 points of another thing. Sure you can say that units can be specialized toward specific rules to break the monotony, but 40k's ruleset really isn't flexible enough to make that a viable option. Fast units would have to be very weak, and tough units would have to be less mobile and more expensive. Troops who benefit from special rules and synergy would have to be priced so that bog-standard troops are equally effective on a point-for-point basis. Stand-out units like thunderhawks, unique characters and flying daemon princes and ultra-cheap units like brimstones and conscripts get spammed because they break the mold that balance enforces.
Homogeneity of rules =/= balance. Balance =/= homogeneity of rules.
I really wish this myth would die. It is the result of being unable to imagine balanced variety, despite the fact that such can exist. Take for example, the competing forces of life on Earth. With the exception of the extremely OP Humans, who are the only ones to have entered the new meta of consciousness, most things on Earth have struck some sort of combination of balance and function. Plants to not eradicate Trees, Trees to not eradicate Leopards, etc. Most components fit into a self-sustaining system where they perform some sort of cyclical function. Just because GW has trouble making a diverse and balanced ruleset, does not mean such is impossible.
The sad truth is that if 40k lists truly were balanced, the competitive scene would still be overrun by spam. Players would just spam the cheapest available models.
You forget that people also have a variety of stockpiled units, and often play for fluff. Only a very small % of the 40k community is truly competitive. And if everything is balanced, even competitive players would get bored of mono-lists and once in a while wander off to a GW for a new kit. Also note that "Everything is Balanced" =/= "All possible lists are viable". Because that's just not true either. Grots are not going to be able to knock out tanks, because they are a cannon fodder unit. Function and diversity is king in reality, and should be king here.
And they get crushed by armies that employ combined-arms tactics. 'Spam' in the real world is the sign of a poorly trained force (admittedly, an awful lot of armies fall into this category). Waves of tanks or infantry attacking unsupported get annihilated by balanced forces every time.
Unless you're taking a literal view of a company of tanks (20 or so vehicles) being present on the battlefield at once and fighting as a cohesive unit, then translating that over to 40K on a one-for-one basis and calling both 'spam.' That would be rather foolish, as ideally that company of tanks would also have a company of infantry, a company of heavy weapons, and a battalion of artillery in support, to say nothing of air support - all of which would be present on the same battle at the same time, fighting in concert.
I have no particular objections to 'spam' in 40K but pointing to the real world for evidence seems like a slender reed.
I'm talking about many units being equipped similarly, not only using one kind of unit.
Melissia wrote: Actually if units are balanced against one another, you'd have more variety in lists as people would focus on taking what they wanted to play over what's more powerful.
Balance != everything's the exact same.
I mean the army list as a whole would be boring and homogenous, not individual players' lists. The models would be cosmetically different, but the rules would have much less variety across the board. If there were a serious effort at balance, then improved stats and special rules would all carry an appropriate points cost so 500 points of one thing would be exactly as effective as 500 points of another thing. Sure you can say that units can be specialized toward specific rules to break the monotony, but 40k's ruleset really isn't flexible enough to make that a viable option. Fast units would have to be very weak, and tough units would have to be less mobile and more expensive. Troops who benefit from special rules and synergy would have to be priced so that bog-standard troops are equally effective on a point-for-point basis. Stand-out units like thunderhawks, unique characters and flying daemon princes and ultra-cheap units like brimstones and conscripts get spammed because they break the mold that balance enforces.
Automatically Appended Next Post: The sad truth is that if 40k lists truly were balanced, the competitive scene would still be overrun by spam. Players would just spam the cheapest available models. Everyone would just be running hordes of those monopose plastic gretchin from the mid-90s, because the truth of human nature is that competitive gamers care about winning more than they care about fun.
No, it wouldn't. Learn what balance means. The only unit I always build as terran is the marine, because its a mineral sink that shoots up. Balance doesn't "enforce" anything.
If my 502 points of Stormhammer were exactly as effective at general 40k as 502 points of gretchen or 502 points of valkyries or 502 points of carnifexes, then they might as well be the same.
It was my issue with balance before - I've been told that balance means that lists, given equal player skill, should be 50/50. So what does that mean for a conscript horde vs superheavy tanks?
I guess it does mean conscripts should be able to hurt superheavy tanks. After all, that's what we got this edition.
A good chunk of people don't want balance. They want listbuilding, which means winning the game before the game starts with a superior list. Its kind of like a deck building game. Only with super expensive models.
If my 502 points of Stormhammer were exactly as effective at general 40k as 502 points of gretchen or 502 points of valkyries or 502 points of carnifexes, then they might as well be the same.
It was my issue with balance before - I've been told that balance means that lists, given equal player skill, should be 50/50. So what does that mean for a conscript horde vs superheavy tanks?
I guess it does mean conscripts should be able to hurt superheavy tanks. After all, that's what we got this edition.
It should not mean that at all. If a "balanced" wargame just lets 502 points of Grots compete fairly against 502 points of Stormhammer, you have a bad wargame. Units ought to have FUNCTION.
Just like in real life, failing to bring an AT weapon against a tank should get you killed.
This is also why GW should have never departed from the FOC. Bringing a list of just one thing should be punished, not rewarded.
If my 502 points of Stormhammer were exactly as effective at general 40k as 502 points of gretchen or 502 points of valkyries or 502 points of carnifexes, then they might as well be the same.
It was my issue with balance before - I've been told that balance means that lists, given equal player skill, should be 50/50. So what does that mean for a conscript horde vs superheavy tanks?
I guess it does mean conscripts should be able to hurt superheavy tanks. After all, that's what we got this edition.
It should not mean that at all. If a "balanced" wargame just lets 502 points of Grots compete fairly against 502 points of Stormhammer, you have a bad wargame. Units ought to have FUNCTION.
Just like in real life, failing to bring an AT weapon against a tank should get you killed.
This is also why GW should have never departed from the FOC. Bringing a list of just one thing should be punished, not rewarded.
So how much balance is okay then? Because it's clear that armies shouldn't have a 50/50 win rate against eachother based on construction, at least in your version of balance. So what exactly does 'balanced' mean?
If my 502 points of Stormhammer were exactly as effective at general 40k as 502 points of gretchen or 502 points of valkyries or 502 points of carnifexes, then they might as well be the same.
It was my issue with balance before - I've been told that balance means that lists, given equal player skill, should be 50/50. So what does that mean for a conscript horde vs superheavy tanks?
I guess it does mean conscripts should be able to hurt superheavy tanks. After all, that's what we got this edition.
It should not mean that at all. If a "balanced" wargame just lets 502 points of Grots compete fairly against 502 points of Stormhammer, you have a bad wargame. Units ought to have FUNCTION.
Just like in real life, failing to bring an AT weapon against a tank should get you killed.
This is also why GW should have never departed from the FOC. Bringing a list of just one thing should be punished, not rewarded.
So how much balance is okay then? Because it's clear that armies shouldn't have a 50/50 win rate against eachother based on construction, at least in your version of balance. So what exactly does 'balanced' mean?
One possible form of a balanced wargame, is where:
- You are not put at an instant and serious disadvantage for being a different army than the opponent (Orks vs Tau, Nids vs Guard, DE vs Space Marines)
- Each codex's units has a viable purpose (this one is fast, this one is strong, this one is durable, this one is a jack of all but master of none...)
- Each unit is assigned a points value based on their use and expected synergies (Unit A is pointless with Units B, C and D, but perfect in unison with Units E and F, and helps counter Unit G)
- Points costs are revised over time incrementally to find the best costing for them (Unit Q was slightly undercosted in Revision 1, and then slightly overcosted in Revision 2. Time for Revision 3)
- Armies receive simultaneous codex releases, after 2-5 years of playtesting by the community
- Armies have multiple viable builds
- The game is NOT "take whatever to beat whatever"
- Players must make use of combined arms, or focus on a skill-based gimmick
- Strategy, planning and tactics all matter
- There is no "Auto-Take" anything
- You do not win at just the listbuilding level
I recognise that this is an ideal and thus incredibly difficult to do, but we can get close. If the game is designed to allow player skill to shine through, army imbalances will become a lot less important.
40k 6e-7e was almost always won at the listbuilding level. A balanced game will not allow such extremes.
If my 502 points of Stormhammer were exactly as effective at general 40k as 502 points of gretchen or 502 points of valkyries or 502 points of carnifexes, then they might as well be the same.
It was my issue with balance before - I've been told that balance means that lists, given equal player skill, should be 50/50. So what does that mean for a conscript horde vs superheavy tanks?
I guess it does mean conscripts should be able to hurt superheavy tanks. After all, that's what we got this edition.
It should not mean that at all. If a "balanced" wargame just lets 502 points of Grots compete fairly against 502 points of Stormhammer, you have a bad wargame. Units ought to have FUNCTION.
Just like in real life, failing to bring an AT weapon against a tank should get you killed.
This is also why GW should have never departed from the FOC. Bringing a list of just one thing should be punished, not rewarded.
So how much balance is okay then? Because it's clear that armies shouldn't have a 50/50 win rate against eachother based on construction, at least in your version of balance. So what exactly does 'balanced' mean?
One possible form of a balanced wargame, is where:
- You are not put at an instant and serious disadvantage for being a different army than the opponent (Orks vs Tau, Nids vs Guard, DE vs Space Marines)
- Each codex's units has a viable purpose (this one is fast, this one is strong, this one is durable, this one is a jack of all but master of none...)
- Each unit is assigned a points value based on their use and expected synergies (Unit A is pointless with Units B, C and D, but perfect in unison with Units E and F, and helps counter Unit G)
- Points costs are revised over time incrementally to find the best costing for them (Unit Q was slightly undercosted in Revision 1, and then slightly overcosted in Revision 2. Time for Revision 3)
- Armies receive simultaneous codex releases, after 2-5 years of playtesting by the community
- Armies have multiple viable builds
- The game is NOT "take whatever to beat whatever"
- Players must make use of combined arms, or focus on a skill-based gimmick
- Strategy, planning and tactics all matter
- There is no "Auto-Take" anything
- You do not win at just the listbuilding level
I recognise that this is an ideal and thus incredibly difficult to do, but we can get close. If the game is designed to allow player skill to shine through, army imbalances will become a lot less important.
40k 6e-7e was almost always won at the listbuilding level. A balanced game will not allow such extremes.
1) This is patently false, though. Armies do (and should) have engineered weaknesses, such as GK vs hordes or Orks vs heavy armour.
2) If every codex has the same collection of units, that's sameness. Every codex has that one Fast unit, every codex has that one Tough unit - and if, say, IG's Fast unit is worse than SM's Fast unit, then you'll never see IG's Fast unit because it isn't the most efficient choice for the army. That's imbalance, right?
3) If points values = capability, and balanced means every unit has roughly the same capability to influence the game, then this is the problem I illustrated earlier: 502 points of Stormhammer is equally capable of influencing the game as 502 points of anything else. Sameness.
4) This is fine with me, though I still reject point 3, which this seems to lean towards.
5) I suppose that could work, though 'community playtesting' is essentially 'finding the most broken unit and spam that' unless you think tournaments will stop for those 2-5 years.
6) This is sameness again - why should 2000 points of conscripts be equally viable to (or against) 2000 points of Stormhammers? And if it is, why wouldn't a competitive player just buy the cheapest 2000 points they can find and play that?
7) How is this compatible with 3 and 6 while allowing skew lists? If you ban skew lists, you're reducing options and making everything seem the same.
8) Why force people to rely on combined arms at the company level? If they want to play a Soviet tank company, they should be able to, even if the Soviets didn't combine unit types until the Battalion level.
9) This I agree with.
10) This I also agree with, though I am also convinced that people will find the most efficient choice anyways, even if it's only .5% better.
11) Listbuilding is a player skill, I believe, and so to say "listbuilding takes player skill out" makes me giggle. It's just a different skill.
So has anyone actually come up with definitions of "spam" vs "redundancy" vs "skew" vs "taking a lot of the same unit" yet, or are we still just BSing around with differing definitions of the same words as usual?
Melissia wrote: So has anyone actually come up with definitions of "spam" vs "redundancy" vs "skew" vs "taking a lot of the same unit" yet, or are we still just BSing around with differing definitions of the same words as usual?
You know I was gonna say spam instead of skew, but I chose Skew because even a 1-unit army can be a skew list, with the prime example being a Warlord Titan.
I recognise that this is an ideal and thus incredibly difficult to do, but we can get close. If the game is designed to allow player skill to shine through, army imbalances will become a lot less important.
40k 6e-7e was almost always won at the listbuilding level. A balanced game will not allow such extremes.
40k 3rd - 7th ed was almost always won at the listbuilding level. Every edition has its top x lists that destroy anything they come in contact with that is not also a top x list. I ran starcannon spam list in 3rd ed. Any concept of take all comers armies facing that were destroyed. The big weakness of the starcannon spam list was a horde army like orks or nids. Which no one ever took because the meta back then was nearly all blood angels or space wolves with a smattering of black templars (each of which had top spammed units)
4th and 5th ed had their own top x armies that annihilated everything they came in contact with barring another top x army.
Rose colored glasses and all. 40k has never been balanced and never been primarily about player-skill. Its always been won primarily at the list-building level, same as 6th and 7th, same as today. I say that having spent all of the 90s and most of the 00s as a powergaming GT attending tournament gamer that spammed to my little heart's content to garner as high a rank at GTs as I could. My high placements at the GWGTs was not from my superior player skill. It was because I built spam power min/max armies and got lucky I faced a lot of guys that weren't min/maxing as heavily as I was, and who were marine players that were all geared to die against my build. Same held true when I moved to IG guard blob dice saturation army, and same held true when I was running undead or demons in a bent and busted WHFB 5,6, and 7th edition.
When people deride list building being so heavy handed, its not because "list building is not a skill", its just that in 40k its about as challenging as primary school mathematics to determine what is undercost and point efficient, and people come in with an assumption that as a *GAME* that 2000 points vs 2000 points should present a decent *GAME*, when that is often not true... and listbuilding makes 2000 vs 2000 points actually 5000 vs 2000 points if one person is min/maxing and the other is not.
Thats where the disparity of expectations blooms from, and where the chasm of ideologies springs.
As to what "SPAM" means... that will always have different meanings to different people. I find that SPAM often means the same as "min/max the same powerful units" as opposed to "repeating units" because if you repeat non min/max units most people don't care. Its when you are powergaming against a guy not powergaming (or powergaming against a waac player and you win) that spam seems to become an issue.
2) If every codex has the same collection of units, that's sameness. Every codex has that one Fast unit, every codex has that one Tough unit - and if, say, IG's Fast unit is worse than SM's Fast unit, then you'll never see IG's Fast unit because it isn't the most efficient choice for the army. That's imbalance, right?
Units having purposes =/= everything is homogenous. What, you think I'm calling for Ork shooting to be on par with Tau shooting, while also expecting Fire Warriors to punch out Khorne Berserkers? Heck no.
Army = Theme
Armybuild 1: Method of thematic implementation 1
Armybuild 2: Method of thematic implementation 2
And if you find that Guard have a FA unit that is not quite on par with a SMFA unit, that does not render the former obsolete in any way. It's a different army, and the Guard's FA is in a different situation to the SMFA.
Efficiency of comparable choices is more commonly an internal balance issue, like when GW drops the rules for their new dreadnought. It will almost certainly turn out to be a straight improvement over the old dreadnought. At that point, that's a problem with GW and not wargaming mechanics.
Orks: Spammy melee playstyle
Khorne: Elite melee playstyle with some chaotic gimmicks
Tau: Mobile shooting
Guard: Cannon Fodder and Big Guns
Nids: Horde dotted with Gribblies
Different armies are supposed to be different. Otherwise, what's the point in having multiple lines?
You can still make a balanced wargame. Army themes is not guaranteed to result in homogeneity or imbalance. I mean, look at how 8e is faring - Nids are patently different than SM and yet aren't too much more powerful or weaker than them. We see right in front of us a number of armies that have congregated around eachother in terms of TT power, while still being wildly different.
2) If every codex has the same collection of units, that's sameness. Every codex has that one Fast unit, every codex has that one Tough unit - and if, say, IG's Fast unit is worse than SM's Fast unit, then you'll never see IG's Fast unit because it isn't the most efficient choice for the army. That's imbalance, right?
Units having purposes =/= everything is homogenous. What, you think I'm calling for Ork shooting to be on par with Tau shooting, while also expecting Fire Warriors to punch out Khorne Berserkers? Heck no.
Army = Theme
Armybuild 1: Method of thematic implementation 1
Armybuild 2: Method of thematic implementation 2
And if you find that Guard have a FA unit that is not quite on par with a SMFA unit, that does not render the former obsolete in any way. It's a different army, and the Guard's FA is in a different situation to the SMFA.
Efficiency of comparable choices is more commonly an internal balance issue, like when GW drops the rules for their new dreadnought. It will almost certainly turn out to be a straight improvement over the old dreadnought. At that point, that's a problem with GW and not wargaming mechanics.
Orks: Spammy melee playstyle
Khorne: Elite melee playstyle with some chaotic gimmicks
Tau: Mobile shooting
Guard: Cannon Fodder and Big Guns
Nids: Horde dotted with Gribblies
Different armies are supposed to be different. Otherwise, what's the point in having multiple lines?
You can still make a balanced wargame. Army themes is not guaranteed to result in homogeneity or imbalance. I mean, look at how 8e is faring - Nids are patently different than SM and yet aren't too much more powerful or weaker than them. We see right in front of us a number of armies that have congregated around eachother in terms of TT power, while still being wildly different.
Balance =/= homogeneity.
You are opening the door for imbalace though. What if you play a pure long-range shooty Ork army? Or a Close-Combat Guard army? Those are off-'theme' as you put it, and will lose games because they are less efficient than the other options.
That's imbalance, and is my point. If you have 'themes' built into the rules of the game, than anything 'off-theme' is going to be less competitively efficient, and in competition, efficiency is everything.
So either: You essentially admit that the off-theme playstyle is less efficient, and render every army within the faction essentially the same collection of on-theme units (sameness!) or you try to make the 'off-theme' stuff just as efficient as the 'on-theme' stuff and obliterate the 'themes' concept entirely, in which case, the factions are all the same, essentially, aside from looks.
Or your could realize that balance doesn't mean "everyone's the same" like you keep pushing.
Thing is, Ork mid-to-long range shooting actually was passably good at some point. It was good in a very different way than other long-range shooting though-- it lost that with 8th, but there's no reason it shouldn't be added back in.
And Guard actually, amusingly, have ways to be better at assault (include a few Priests and suddenly your guard infantry's assault capabilities double). They could still be made better via different options (pistol+ccw comes to mind), but again, in a different way than other assault armies.
Melissia wrote: Or your could realize that balance doesn't mean "everyone's the same" like you keep pushing.
Thing is, Ork mid-to-long range shooting actually was passably good at some point. It was good in a very different way than other long-range shooting though-- it lost that with 8th, but there's no reason it shouldn't be added back in.
And Guard actually, amusingly, have ways to be better at assault (include a few Priests and suddenly your guard infantry's assault capabilities double). They could still be made better via different options (pistol+ccw comes to mind), but again, in a different way than other assault armies.
So how do armies have theme if Guard are as efficient at CC as Khorne Berzerkers?
Or would a Guard CC army lose to Khorne Berzerkers more than 50% of the time, even if player skill was equal?
Elbows wrote: I don't think there is a real "community" to 40K, rather several separate communities.
Spam is effective due to poor rules or loopholes normally (failue to appropriately cost stuff - and people being drawn to tournaments/prize support). Is it "healthy"? Nah, but it's inevitable. You need look no further than the army composition part of this forum.
Q: "I want to run a 1500 point list of X!"
A: "Take these three identical HQ units and six identical units of this..."
Effective? Sure. Exciting? No. Interesting? No. Boring? God yes. I won't even bother playing a list like that. I don't give two gaks about winning, but if you're going to stomp me into the ground at least make it seem cool, or look cool doing it.
This is exactly correct. We all have different ideas about what this game should be. A lot of the complaining and bemoaning of balance and rules comes from a strictly competitive mindset. I want a game that is fun. I want a game that looks cool. If I want to put a power fist on a marine sergeant give the squad a meltagun and a heavy bolter just because I like the way it looks then thats fine. 8th allows this with power levels and split fire. Is it smart in a tournament with points values? Never. But I don't play in tournaments and don't really care about who wins as long as cool stuff happens along the way.
Melissia wrote: Or your could realize that balance doesn't mean "everyone's the same" like you keep pushing.
Thing is, Ork mid-to-long range shooting actually was passably good at some point. It was good in a very different way than other long-range shooting though-- it lost that with 8th, but there's no reason it shouldn't be added back in.
And Guard actually, amusingly, have ways to be better at assault (include a few Priests and suddenly your guard infantry's assault capabilities double). They could still be made better via different options (pistol+ccw comes to mind), but again, in a different way than other assault armies.
So how do armies have theme if Guard are as efficient at CC as Khorne Berzerkers?
Or would a Guard CC army lose to Khorne Berzerkers more than 50% of the time, even if player skill was equal?
Zealots in starcraft cost 100 mins but can't hit fliers. Marines are 50, but can hit fliers. Is the zealot overcosted?
No, not if you use it correctly. Points should reflect overall combat utility, but two units with same cost can have very different roles and abilities. I don't understand how sameness is even entering the discussion.
You are opening the door for imbalace though. What if you play a pure long-range shooty Ork army? Or a Close-Combat Guard army? Those are off-'theme' as you put it, and will lose games because they are less efficient than the other options.
That's imbalance, and is my point. If you have 'themes' built into the rules of the game, than anything 'off-theme' is going to be less competitively efficient, and in competition, efficiency is everything.
So either: You essentially admit that the off-theme playstyle is less efficient, and render every army within the faction essentially the same collection of on-theme units (sameness!) or you try to make the 'off-theme' stuff just as efficient as the 'on-theme' stuff and obliterate the 'themes' concept entirely, in which case, the factions are all the same, essentially, aside from looks.
Oh, I see! You want player choices to be meaningless, then! You can't make everything viable and have differentiaatoin. If IG is as good at melee as Orks, Orks as good at shooting as Tau, Space Marines as good at footspam as Nids and Nids as good at mechanisation as IG, you can only ever get homogeneity. At that point, there is no reason to have separate armies.
The whole point of the different army lines in the first place is that they play differently. You can have them do that and still be balanced, but you as a player will have to make some darn decisions. A good wargame is not entirely won or lost at the listbuilding level because allowing that makes gameplay worthless. But a bad wargame makes strategy and decisions pointless.
At this point in the argument the problem is you, not balance.
Unit1126PLL wrote: So how do armies have theme if Guard are as efficient at CC as Khorne Berzerkers?
They aren't, and I never said they would be, that was all on you-- you're the one blindly and straw-manningly insisting that everything must be identical. I merely suggested they're better in melee than you'd think they would otherwise be-- the priest gives <Astra Militaritum> units +1 attack in his 6" aura. For 35 points, that's not a bad choice if you want to surprise an enemy trying to assault your guardsmen, or make your guardsmen assault something and have an actual impact. Funny thing is he is impacted by his own rule, and thus has 4 attacks at WS4 S3 in melee, so he's not a bad assault character himself when given something like a power axe or power maul.
Armies should have "themes". I don't pick Tau to play a competitive meele army.
Every game system both in physical or digital form that has different factions has "themes": You can't play Protoss as a Rush-Horde army. You can't play a Priest in WoW as a Tank. You can't play Caitlyn as a support, etc, etc...
This doesn't means that you can't have a more flexible army that can be built in a full gimminicky version like, I don't know, a meele IG army full of Ogryns and Bullgryns, etc... it could work but normally something like that should be the "I'm so pro that I take a army that isn't as powerfull because I like them"
Or "I like how this army looks and I think it's fun to play, and if I do it right it can still win". Not "this army is better than a dedicated melee army from a melee-themed force".
Unit1126PLL wrote: So either: You essentially admit that the off-theme playstyle is less efficient, and render every army within the faction essentially the same collection of on-theme units (sameness!) or you try to make the 'off-theme' stuff just as efficient as the 'on-theme' stuff and obliterate the 'themes' concept entirely, in which case, the factions are all the same, essentially, aside from looks.
Or, third option, you have more than one theme per army. There. Diversity and balance at the same time.
Melissia wrote: Or "I like how this army looks and I think it's fun to play, and if I do it right it can still win". Not "this army is better than a dedicated melee army from a melee-themed force".
By just his core mechanics I think at the end of the day 40k has the list building phase being the most important phase of all of the game, so I think is just impossible to win just by pure hability. You can do this in other games, like a guy winning a Call of Duty game just with a Knive by how good he is. In 40k I doubt that is reachable without changing like... all of the game system.
But I agree tought that ideally differect factions should have variety even if they are as shoe horned into a "theme" as Tau. Full movile shooting Suits Tau, full Auxiliary and Kroot shot ranged shooting army, a mixed and balanced army, etc... everyone of that should be playable and have a chance to win if they are at least build upon sinergyes.
Yes. Marines have it easiest in that regard; their theme is being kinda expensive but good at everything. And that's how they should remain. If you want to specialize you'll play a specialist marine chapter.
Pancakey wrote: With the recent FAQ, it seems GW flyer sales have already peaked? I kid.
So is this GW offically saying spam is bad?
No, they were finding a way to balance Fliers without gouging your army points wise. That way you can still do it, but just be prepared for the possible consequences.
Spam doesn't hurt the game. Unbalanced units and armies do. Spamming abusive, unbalanced units may magnify the problem, but ultimately the problem is the unit itself. Fix the unit and any problems with the spam go away.
NorseSig wrote: Spam doesn't hurt the game. Unbalanced units and armies do. Spamming abusive, unbalanced units may magnify the problem, but ultimately the problem is the unit itself. Fix the unit and any problems with the spam go away.
I think most people agree with this sentiment.
That being said, do you think GW did the right thing by "balancing" flyer spam with a change to the core rules of the game?
Just to add my thoughts on spam its the point at which if you dont own a specific unit your army is no good. So spam should not be noted with how many of one unit is in an army list but by how many winning list use that unit.
Its funny how no one has mentioned the bane of eldar in 7th. I played a 95% loss in 7th edition because my army was based on blobs of gaurdians with a farseer to guid them and wraithlords walking amidst them firing heavy artillery across the field. Sometimes using wavesperpents to transport tacticle units like dragon and wraith gaurd. For all purposes my army was built to handle any situation except that all my opponents played armies that relied on only one type of attack. Nids flying circus, grey knights dread knight, deamons free summons, necrons warriors that never die, imperial knights oh they got the d cannon from my gaurds. Eldar without jet bikes could only do one thing take on heavy vehicals but nobody was bringing vehicals so the meta was going to force me to buy a different troop choice becasue my 90 points of gaurdians were less effective than 51 points of jetbikes.
So i take the losses and never win local tournies but still complain about that can not win without "min maxing"
My idea for eight is for my clubs to start announcing what detachment(s) the players armies must include which will help to negate some min maxing and force players to build a more well rounded army.
. The idea in Starcraft is that you build a group of attackers before anyone else can build anything useful and attack with it. It's easily defeated if your opponent knows you're going for it. While lots of people said it was cheesy, the existence of the Zerg Rush as an easy-to-do strategy created a bar for higher-level play. You had to know how to beat a Zerg Rush if you wanted to play well. There was a whole other level of gameplay if you advanced further, but that other level was likely beyond you unless you could beat Zerg Rush.
Bikes should have never been troops, but fast attacks, and that specific bikes were extremely underpriced.
