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Hi all again!

Serious questions here... the last discussion about meta gaming got me thinking that to some degree it does exist even if we choose to ignore it. I am curious how veteran gamers here believe the new edition will affect the current state of the meta game.

G

You may have opened a can of worms there.

I wouldn't say I am a veteran, but in my opinion the two most important changes are the revised movement rates (vehicles slower, infantry quicker) and the increased importance of Troops. This clearly alters the relationship between infantry and other units especially vehicles, and must make infantry assault armies more powerful.

I don't see a lot that benefits shooty armies so I think the balance of power has changed in favour of horde assault.

But what do I know?

Don't forget the new marine book could kill las/plas.

Tacobake wrote:Don't forget the new marine book could kill las/plas.

Yes, though I expect SMs to take more troops and have as many Las and Plas as before but spread out among more bolters in more squads. Since nearly all armies will probably also have more troops and fewer special units, this means the SMs will be at no big disadvantage, except possibly against each other (and MEqs.)

It will be interesting I think. Vehicles all of a sudden are pill boxes and really tough ones. Transports got tougher (no entanglement and softer damage chart) and skimmers got nerfed (no skimmer moving fast). In the end, I'm not sure if tanks are going to be more or less prevelent. I think what we will probably see is an increas in the use of light tanks, particularly transports like the rhino. This will lead to a shift away from heavy tank busting weapons like the las cannon towards more mid range multi purpose weapons like the missile launcher or the auto cannon. This, in turn, may up the viability of heavy tanks if anti tank power starts to become less attractive to more players. All in all though I think some armies are going to disapear (las/plas) and other are going to see a huge boost in popularity and power (hord orcs, nid zilla, gaunt hord)

I don't think you can discount lascannons as anti-tank, simply because they're AP2. Being stuck with autocannons and/or missile launchers is kind of death sentence against a 2+ winged hive tyrant, which aren't exactly uncommon.

So far, everything I have seen leads me to believe that horde armies are going to have a field day, and specialist armies will have issues.

It's a bit harder to predict until the SM codex comes out. However, going with what is available now seems to be striking the delicate balance of anti MEQ/anti armor/anti horde. My Eldar are going through the revamp while my Orks are in a slow state of being built.

For my Eldar, I'm looking at the Eldar Missile Launcher as a key weapon that seems to fit all three roles previously mentioned. With the lack of area terrain as we know it is forcing me to look at other ways for my fragile army to remain intact. Reserves/Deep
Strike/Flanking and Autarchs seem a good way to help with that.

Orks, well, lots of bodies and lots of shooting. Not a whole lot more than that at this point.

Who knows untill all the codex are out. Lets wait and see. Relax people dont panic, we will be ok

Nidzilla and Trifalcon players, if they haven't already, will drop their armies and pick up Spaz marines (again).

Kilkrazy wrote:

I don't see a lot that benefits shooty armies so I think the balance of power has changed in favour of horde assault.

Besides the fact that lanes of fire are going to be WIDE open due to true line of sight and no consolidation into hth combat?

Shooty armies are smiling indeed....and cannot wait for 5th, at least mine cannot.

Shooty armies should indeed be smiling. The missle launcher, if it indeed will benefit from 2d6-BS and all partials are now hits (????), just got a huge boost for the points cost. I think we will see many more of those, given the assumptions. I know for a FACT that I will be seeing more of those around my FLGS.

Are jump infantry getting the d6 run in shooting phase as well? That'll be sick.

I have to agree with beef. I haven't seen too much freaking out lately, but I'm sure that as Release Day approaches some of the Nancy boys will be watering the ground at their own feet.

We won't know until we see the rules and know the extent of the changes. I mean, we can view the pre-game metagame in all the 5th Ed threads lurking in the tactics and army lists forum, but until we have the rules, we won't know.

BYE

Deadshane1 wrote:

Kilkrazy wrote:

I don't see a lot that benefits shooty armies so I think the balance of power has changed in favour of horde assault.

Besides the fact that lanes of fire are going to be WIDE open due to true line of sight and no consolidation into hth combat?

Shooty armies are smiling indeed....and cannot wait for 5th, at least mine cannot.

The second bit is very helpful, true, also rapid fire shots can now now out 24 inches (30 for Tau.) Against that, while LoS is more open, cover values have increased and screening by units is back. Also, isn't it true that units don't become non-scoring until eliminated? This will favour large horde units, if morale will not make them run away.

Maybe it will become the screaming horde vs the static gun line.

True. The proof is in the rulebook.

The big meta change out there will be nidzilla: since rippers don't count as scoring units in 5th, they will have to switch over to genestealers/gaunts, unless they're banking on wiping the opponent out which is a huge gamble. Also, with the run rule, and blast templates getting a lot better, suddenly all of the tyranid guns look appealing. Shooty warriors might just make a comeback, and lictors and broodlords will definitely see a re-appearance with the change to preferred enemy.

They may not be scoring, but they can contest objectives

rebmonk, were people using Rippers anyway? Seems to me most Nidzilla already uses gaunts or stealers.

Me likey that my missle-launcher troops will be feared again. Always liked the ML.

5th ed combined with new Ork 'dex radically changed the metagame. Although I haven't played an actual game in over two years (playing real war), it seems that horde armies are going to be in vogue - that's why the eldar army list I posted recently had so much anti-horde.

Overall, I think the rules will have to be digested before the metagame settles down. I think the 40k community is still trying to digest the Ork codex. We may have figured it out but armies take a while to revamp.

tegeus-Cromis wrote:rebmonk, were people using Rippers anyway? Seems to me most Nidzilla already uses gaunts or stealers.

all the nidzilla lists i played against used the 6 ripper swarms and then focused on alot of raveners/warriors to get their rending. I presume though alot will use genestealers and then have a wall of spinegaunts for the 4+ cover save wall.

After looking through the 5th ed. rule book today the one rule that seemed to spark the most discussion of the shops gaming group was how after destroying a unit in cc one can't then consolidate into another unit.

I think this may make the horde ork armies a better choice than the speak freak lists (30 boys can take a shooting after winning cc better than 12 trukk boys, right?).

Just a thought.

hand of gork: again, without seeing the book, it sounds like elite assualt armies may be in trouble. Plow in, win assault, get leveled by a bunch of pissed-off surrounding enemy squads. This really sounds like it will throw a wrench in the works.

I'll probably try to play a game after 5th edition. Of course
I said that about 4th edition, but Warmachine took off for
me instead.

I'm going to go out on a limb here.

My answer: Not much.

Now, everyones going to think I'm nuts here, but after reading through the rulebook quickly today, I have to say that the biggest changes were in the missions in the book. Aside from that, a tweak here, a tweak there, some significant stuff about vehicles, balanced by other changes here and there...but aside from that, I think that the core principles behind the strong army builds today will keep them strong builds in a month and a half.

Seriously, what are the Tier 1 builds right now (the ones people plan armies around).

Godzilla Nids
Necron Flying Circus
Tri-falcon Eldar
Shooty Horde Orks

Then what are the Tier 2 builds (armies that, in the hands of a good player, can reliably defeat a Tier 1 build)?
SM Drop Storm
Mech Guard
Mech/Semi-Mech Tau
Stealer Shock

There's some other stong builds out there that should be Tier 2 too...but these are the ones that come to mind for me. Notice anything about those builds...every one, except for the Stealer Shock, is a shooting-based design. Most of them have at least some assault capability, but except for the Stealer Shock, none of them utilize assault as their primary means of destroying the enemy.

To be honest, I don't see this changing. Sure, there's going to be cover saves up the wazoo for everyone...but I think that ultimately it'll mean very little.

The fact is, that shooting armies have been dominating the metagame for years...because in most cases, even if you win an assault, you're going to take casualties. Making the assaults more decisive (which it looks like they've accomplished) just means that players looking for reliable, resilient performers are going to continue to focus on shooting.

Cent99: You make a good point. It's always a winning strategy to be able to destroy your opponent when he's out of knife range.

grizgrin wrote:Cent99: You make a good point. It's always a winning strategy to be able to destroy your opponent when he's out of knife range.

It's not so much that or stealer shock would be an unexplainable abberation.

Its that a shooting army doesn't have to worry about taking casualties in its own shooting phase.

I see the truth in your first statement about stealer shock. I made the mistake of speaking in absolutes, usu. a pet peeve of mine.

When you mention taking casualties in it's own shooting phase, I'm getting a little lost. Spoon feed for a minute, if you could? Are you speaking of stealer shock in particular, or H2H/assault armies in general? Damnit, this is going to be simple, and I'm going to be pissed at myself when I see the answer, I can feel it...

I don't think much of a tier system, as I (me personally) can beat any army with any army--and I laugh at some of the choices for top tier.

I think the tri-oblit dual lash list moves higher in the power categories...by quite a bit, sadly for my opinion of lash. I can smack stealer shock around pretty bad with it these days. Lash and PC barrages...it's just unfair really.

I've gotten quite good with it, I can bring all of those 'tier 1' lists down.

I'm not sure why you list necrap anywhere in the powerful lists. They're horrible in 5th edition.

All heavy weapons > Flyers. Everything else > Warriors and Immortals. Pray they keep megatron 'guarding' their lines so you can shoot them off the map.

I think you've totally underestimated the power of mechanized lists to make a comeback. Seriously, in a big way.

Nidzilla, TriFalcon Eldar, Flying Circus, and Shooty orks all cannot effectively deal with tons of vehicles backed by infantry.

Hell I can still shut down all 4 lists with my DE, which has been their prime feat during most of 4th edition. In 5th they're even more horrendous.

Cent I agree with you that most heavy shooting armies win. Been playing under that assumption since 3.5 really. Stealer shock can win because even 4 stealers out of 72 can feth you up. lol

However with getting shot in between combat rounds, I think stealer shock is moving down in power.

I think warrior shock will return. Do you remember when they were beasts and could run? Yeah, I had like 18 of the leaping warriors and they shut everything out. Don't even need carapace on them if they can run turn 1...

Ah well, sorry, rambling.

grizgrin wrote:I see the truth in your first statement about stealer shock. I made the mistake of speaking in absolutes, usu. a pet peeve of mine.

When you mention taking casualties in it's own shooting phase, I'm getting a little lost. Spoon feed for a minute, if you could? Are you speaking of stealer shock in particular, or H2H/assault armies in general? Damnit, this is going to be simple, and I'm going to be pissed at myself when I see the answer, I can feel it...

It's because that generally, even in an exceptional assault unit, when they get into assault, they're going to take casualties. This results in a continual degradation of power as the game progresses.

It's really, really tough to field a unit that dominates in an assault...most armies just can't do it. About the only two I've found that can do it reliably are Genestealers in a Tyranid army, and Wyches in a DE army. It's a combination of ability to hit hard, and to hit hard before your opponent can strike back.

The jury's still out on whether 5th ed will allow SS to remain viable. My gut feeling after reading through the codex is that it will, with some relatively minor changes.

Redbeard wrote:I don't think you can discount lascannons as anti-tank, simply because they're AP2. Being stuck with autocannons and/or missile launchers is kind of death sentence against a 2+ winged hive tyrant, which aren't exactly uncommon.

While I agree that you will be up the preverbal creek without a paddle should your army contain no high strength AP2 weapons, I think that the weapons that fill that role will shift from things like the las cannon towards more short range options like melta guns and possibly plasma. This will mostly be due to the fact that the longer ranged options are getting more and more expensive with each codex (dark angles, eldar, and the like) while the short ranged ones are staying more or less where they were. Just my thoughts.