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I think the hammerhead question was highly inadequate to discuss cheese. It's really hard for me to call three hammerheads cheese and yet a lot of people are strongly opposed to the fact it even exists, and I want to disagree with them!

Cheese clearly exists. There are more powerful builds, and there are builds, particularly out of older books, that clearly weren't really intended by the designer. The newer books, since roughly Eldar, all seem to be designed with the idea that people will spam good units, which in many ways is the essence of what people call cheese.

I think it's useful to seperate good old harmless cheese (assault terminator in landraider spam) from abusive or broken units or options (lash, nob bikers, the old tri-falcon list). A cheesy list is simply one built to maximize strength while minimizing weakness, the goal of most lists to be sure, but people complain when somebody succeeds. Broken stuff is generally the result of poor playtesting, and is genuinely "too good for the points."

I think that cheese isn't bad, as long as you're playing in an environment where everybody knows people are bringing tough lists. Genuinely broken stuff is a little dicier, and I'm not really certain how I feel about handling it. In general, I say live and let live.

I think people should be aware that taking cheesy armies may have them run out of opponents. You should be able to figure that out, if you're good enough to build a cheesy list you can tell if your opponents are deliberately weakening theirs.

At tournaments I think taking cheesy lists makes a lot of sense. Given the word cheese is synonymous with effective, you will do the best with a cheesy list.

I also believe tournaments are able to change what is effective by including composition. I did not just say it is any good, but composition most certainly changes army lists. Certain compositions, if done right, don't seem to have any effect on who wins the tournament. The same player would have won it without composition, with a nastier list.

So I think if you wanted to run a tournament with different lists than what shows up to no comp tournaments, you could do some research on composition and use a good comp system to encourage lists you do like.

In my opinion a bad composition is a restrictive one that places brackets around what is good and what it not, such as 40% troops. A good composition system is where everyone hands their list into the tournament organzier and he just gives it a score out of 5.

Proponents of composition systems tend to believe the game is not good when played at its highest level, and is good when the game is fought amongst nicer lists.

You can pick a "cheese list", and still give your opponent a fun and fair game on a regular basis.

My regular 40k opponent is an Ork player and loves him his Nob bikers. But he isn't an arse about it, and TBH, he probably feels the same way about my squad of 7 Terminators.

Everybody surely creates their list to provide themselves with fun in their games. Its the decent player that creates a list that doesn't just exploit a loophole to give their opponent a crap game even if they win.

Its the arsey player though that derives fun from lists that will stomp their opponent every which way until Tuesday.

Unless of course its *that* type of tourney/competition where the real game is about who creates the most macho list, not about playing a game out on the tabletop...

One thing I want to get out of the way is that there is no relationship between Cheese and Fluff.

Back in 3.5, an Iron Warrior list maxing out on Obliterators and artillery was fluffy as heck, but still overpowered. Here in 5th edition a twin lash list can be fluffy that don't make it balanced.

So let's avoid that false dichotemy.

I play cheese in tourneys, but rarely at my local gaming store. Not tooling up your list for a tourney is like taking a toothpick to a gunfight, imho.

onlainari wrote:I think people should be aware that taking cheesy armies may have them run out of opponents. You should be able to figure that out, if you're good enough to build a cheesy list you can tell if your opponents are deliberately weakening theirs.

At tournaments I think taking cheesy lists makes a lot of sense. Given the word cheese is synonymous with effective, you will do the best with a cheesy list.

I also believe tournaments are able to change what is effective by including composition. I did not just say it is any good, but composition most certainly changes army lists. Certain compositions, if done right, don't seem to have any effect on who wins the tournament. The same player would have won it without composition, with a nastier list.

So I think if you wanted to run a tournament with different lists than what shows up to no comp tournaments, you could do some research on composition and use a good comp system to encourage lists you do like.

In my opinion a bad composition is a restrictive one that places brackets around what is good and what it not, such as 40% troops. A good composition system is where everyone hands their list into the tournament organzier and he just gives it a score out of 5.

Proponents of composition systems tend to believe the game is not good when played at its highest level, and is good when the game is fought amongst nicer lists.

There is cheese in a friendly game.

There is no cheese in a tournament.

Don't expect me to bring a weak list that isn't optimized to a tourny

Ever game that has a point-based system has a cheese, borken, or even broken problem. There will always be Model/Unit X that is clearly 'the best' for the points. Pre-Prime Remix Warmachine had Sorscha. Fourth Edition 40k had Tri-falcon. Fifth Edition has Lash. There's always going to be something that is 'better'.

Nob bikers and Lash don't bother me. It's clear that they're legal builds. Are they really good? Yes, and they're arguably cheese.

The allies cheese does bother me (Vulkan and Sisters, the BoLS Culexus Assasin with Assault 20 firearm).