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Do you understand the difference between “Good at the game” and “Feels fluffy”?

I could make Marines T2 4+, but also 3 PPM. They’d be stonkingly good-but not fluffy at all.

ccs wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

ccs wrote:

Play-wise in general.

Well that's pretty broad don't you think? What about those units that used to go toe-to-toe with Marines and are now getting crumped?

What of them? Their players will figure out (again) how to beat the SMs.
I simply don't buy the claim that non-SM factions aren't good. RT - now, there's always been plenty of decent things you can play that aren't SM.

You must have missed a good portion of the conversation to type this.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:
This is something to judge when they get their codex, I think.

Oh, so, to put it another way: Wait and see?

 Daedalus81 wrote:
That doesn't really happen, since most verticals are blocked regardless. If you want to break out the old vehicle pivot tool be my guest, but I don't miss it.

Yeah, but he didn't suggest that. Once again someone comes up with a problem, and your response - because it's always your response - is "Well we can't do X because Y happened in the past.".

No one has said anything about a "pivot tool". That hasn't been in use since 2nd Ed, and we didn't have tanks firing through themsleves and via track links problems in 3rd through 7th.

Wait and see in the same manner that the only thing different about GW is that they added a Facebook page, right?

Shooting from antennas isn't actually a problem. It used to be. People desire weapon arcs and all that - that's fine, but it isn't an easily balanced concept, which is puzzling when people here all seem to be very concerned about balance issues.

Shooting from antennas sounds more like a player problem than a rules one.

And I guess I've been waiting and seeing since october 2017. That sounds like a reasonable amount of time don't you think?

Waited, saw, waited more, saw again.

nou wrote:
I have read the past few pages of this thread in one go, and one thing that is clear as day after reading this, is that people have very different views on what the "game" word even means.

1) For some, the game is core rules - the potential of the "engine" of the game to represent various concepts expected from a wargame, or recently, a war themed game. If those have depth, then the whole game potentially has depth.

2) For some, the game is the relationship between factions and if this is bad, then the whole game is bad, if it's good, then the whole game is good.

3) For some, the game is listbuilding, and if there are plenty of options here, the game is better than the version with less options. But there is a catch here, directly related to the next point.

4) For some, the game is "the meta" - the real life experience of the game how it is being played in their community. And this is the point that is both most varied and least varied at the same time. By that I mean that the most common context here is a cut-throat tournament prep or random pick-up, which invalidates most options that exist under point 3. and make or destroy the experience in the context of point 2. This also makes the point 1. matter very little, because the core rules are just a technical way the problems with all other points manifest themselves.
But, this point is also varied the most, because the problems with points 2. and 3. disappear almost completely and point 1. gets emphasised the most, when 4. is a laid back, likeminded, truly friendly (as in "cooperative preparation for adversarial gameplay") environment. Suddenly, all of the customisation options become available and there are no trap options, because exactly the same as in historical wargames community, army construction is scenario driven, not competitively driven and you are free to enact whatever encounter you fancy.

And because those four points are being "mix and matched" there is never any sort of agreement in such threads.

As to Crusade being the best the game was from narrative context - this is not true, not true at all, because there were Forgeworld campaigns before. But because of point 4., the only way "Doom of Mymeara" existed for most of the folks were Warp Spider Spam through Pale Courts cutom craftworld rules. But the same book also gave the opportunity to some of the players to either play with or play against Eldar Corsairs, or field all sorts of fluffy alternative Craftworlds. Anphelion Project was another great book, with a very good campaign, built upon all those fluffy, wargame rules like blasts, facings etc. But those books could as well never existed in the pick-up, tournament prep all the time communities.

That said, after switching to alternative ruleset for the last few years, I must say, that even in peaks of narrative capabilities of 40K during 2nd and 7th eds, 40K is a piss poor game all around when it comes to conveying any sort of a trully compelling wargame feel, be it deeply narrative or merely pretextual for a "gamey game", and even worse at portraying it's own setting, because of fundamental limitations of overly lethal IGOUGO. This, combined with trap purchase choices in "the meta" context is the root cause for so much toxicity accompanying this game for all 30 years of it's existence - for great many players, the game does not provide the feel one expects when preparing for the game. I remember the same discussions happening here during 7th, how this was the worst edition ever and how X editions ago all things were so much better and now it's also the same 7th which is being praised as so much better than "9th ed gak show" and meeting the same fierce opposition as in those discussions of the past.

So, I add one last point to the list:
5) for me, the most constant trait, that defines what "game" means in the context of 40k, is toxic discontent in the community and the Stockholm syndrome of "the only game in town".

A very insightful post, thanks for that!

A wargame is a toolbox for doing many battle-game-related things from historical refights to what-if scenarios and straight competitive gaming, and as such, you're right - there are many interpretations. At best, we can judge the game against two things:

1) Your expectations for effective (also "fun") participation in a given game, rules edition or style of play within your local gaming ecosystem; and

2) The author's design intentions which, given the sheer range of things you can do with a game ruleset, really need to be written down explicitly in every game.

I'd add a couple of points here.

a) Implicit in point 2 above is that THE GAME RULES ARE NOT NEUTRAL. At a minimum, they will promote styles of play or certain units. At times, different facets of gameplay will conflict: unlike a battle, everyone "knows" when a game ends, so "last turn objective rush" is a thing, for example. In order to produce a game that looks more like some sort of battle, GW introduced scoring throughout the match which is at least as unrealistic.

A competitive ruleset may undergo iterative pressure to promote and reward system mastery (as expressed in list-building and gameplay), and rules may be added to clarify rules-algorithm failures, edge cases and poor wording - although such rules clarifications benefit any game ruleset. Combinations of units or stratagems may become explicitly rewarded; trap options are also a feature of such a system (but see b) below). Such battles, like the traditional matched play, depend on external balance, and the end of the game is the conclusion of the fight. Next game, your guys start afresh.

However, nor are the rules a physics engine, as you might see in a computer milsim. Simulationist games may tend towards rules exceptions based on realism (or rather "realism" that matches fictional lore). The emphasis may be more on in-game balance: a terrible unit in the source material will remain a terrible unit, but may be costed appropriately or left to the player to decide how to use them in a historical refight. Your survivors from a game may form the starting units for the next game - making game rules where even the winner has three guys left standing potentially unsuitable for your campaign plans.

As you say, there are multiple axes on which a game may be judged. Not every game can meet every player's expectations (or existing army). The roleplayers got this right, and a lot of games sell themselves on genre-emulating mechanics, along with recognised genre keywords and hooks. There's at least some understanding in the design community that not every game can (or should even try to) be based on D&D 5th edition.

b) Which leads on to the second point. GW AS A RULES PUBLISHER AND MINIATURES MANUFACTURER IS ALSO NOT NEUTRAL. Tabletop miniatures games already skew away from many aspects of "real" warfare - the ability to freely choose and tailor your units, knowledge of what the enemy has and where it is. Really though, the most fundamental decision in a miniatures wargame is WHAT TO BUY, BUILD AND PAINT. Or more often, what you have already bought, built and painted, and what you need to add to stay current. That may be driven by "historical" considerations, or for rules performance on the tabletop. I know a lot of my minis purchases are driven by what I like the look of, regardless of actual utility in the game it was produced for. I'm pretty sure I'm not alone there, but I'm lucky to play with some really chilled gamers.

Miniatures manufacturers are in a tight spot here - nobody wants to make a mini that won't sell because of bad rules, doubly so if you wrote the rules yourself. Trap options (bad units or universally weak model builds) are a problem in miniatures games (at least without a historical backdrop) because there is a real-world set of costs (time, money, opportunity cost) associated with each unit, but they are very common - more through bad design than providing an opportunity to show system mastery. GW at least attempts to shake up the meta consciously - it can hardly be unaware that past wholesale rules changes that invalidate or break entire armies do nothing for their bottom line.

But yeah - there are so many good games out there that will do exactly what YOU want them to. 40k can't be everything to every gamer.

And yet Battletech is an rpg, massed battle game, classic board game, scenario / historical game, and campaign game. How you might ask?

It's because the base rules serve as the baseline for the game and how its played. They don't try to steer you one way or the other. No one single way of playing dominates the discussion or intent in those base interactions. Other books and supplements actually provide the players OPTIONS in how the game is played rather then simply being a mechanism to sell power / dlc.

Why can't GW adapt an rpg book as an addendum to the 40k rules with extra mechanics and wargear? Where are my hidden unit rules, recon rules, city fighting and dog fighting rules?

By the time GW gets to the point where those are possibilities the entire line of codexes are thrown out, the base rules get changed and all of those options are now invalidated. 7th edition had cool additions and OPTIONS that while imperfect did give you the opportunity for more varied experiences. Cities of death, apocalypse, death from the skies (yes it sucked), and the forgeworld campaign books were all another tool in the tool bag. No longer do we have any of those options.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Yet I expect a Nob to handily be able to tear a Marine limb from limb.

Can't imagine why, considering that's never especially been the case in the tabletop or the fluff most of the time but sure, a Nob will beat your average Marine in hand to hand most of the time. And almost all of the time will be lit up like the fourth of July by the far more disciplined shooting of the Marines.

Also, source for Nobs being "dumber than a sack of hammers".

Because all Orks save Meks and some Warbosses are dumber than a sack of hammers. Orks are really stupid. Sometimes portrayed with a certain low cunning, but stupid the majority of the time. Are you going to argue that Nobz are generally portrayed with as much intelligence on the battlefield as Marines?

 Insectum7 wrote:
So Tyranid Warriors can't exist by your logic.

If it were up to me they would be strictly inferior to Marines too but they're the only one on the list that I think might actually be portrayed as superior in general.

Are you aware that wars aren't fought by infantry lining up and going at it, phalanx-style? I can't believe that people are actually using this as some sort of justification. Explain to me why you feel forced to follow this logic in a world where machine guns, artillery, force concentration, carpet bombing and friggin nuclear warheads are readily available.

They usually are in 40k my friend.

And more to the point, you\re being disingenuous. "Wars aren't fought by line infantry lining up and going at it phalanx-style" might be true, but that doesn't imply that Marines don't have to go up against the troops of other armies on-foot regularly. Indeed, it's how they are most often depicted deploying and fighting. If Space Marines are strictly inferior to the line infantry of other factions, if a single Necron Warrior to use your favorite example to whine about was on par with or superior to a Marine, then how could the Marines function? How would they be expected to carry out an op against the Necrons when the most basic troop in a Tomb World is on par or better? How would a relatively small amount of Marines have been able to combat per the text thousands of Necrons in the World Engine over the course of the battle and then destroy it? If this so-called elite group of soldiers isn't actually elite, if the chaff numbering in billions is on par with or better than them, how are they expected to fight infantry battles against them?

They couldn't, yet they do. Marines have not been portrayed as weak as you'd like them to be for a long time, if they ever were. I'm sorry this upsets you.

 Void__Dragon wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
So Tyranid Warriors can't exist by your logic.

If it were up to me they would be strictly inferior to Marines too

Black Library already churns out tons and tons of Marines-are-the-best-at-everything media for you to peruse. We don't need the tabletop game to lean further in that direction. It's bland game design, it's boring to play, it's annoying when you can't fit many units into 2K, and it makes for constant oneupmanship because Grey Knights have to be even best-er at everything and then Custodes have to be best-er still.

 Void__Dragon wrote:
"Wars aren't fought by line infantry lining up and going at it phalanx-style" might be true, but that doesn't imply that Marines don't have to go up against the troops of other armies on-foot regularly. Indeed, it's how they are most often depicted deploying and fighting. If Space Marines are strictly inferior to the line infantry of other factions, if a single Necron Warrior to use your favorite example to whine about was on par with or superior to a Marine, then how could the Marines function? How would they be expected to carry out an op against the Necrons when the most basic troop in a Tomb World is on par or better?

They wouldn't arrange battles that consist entirely of attrition contests. They'd employ hit-and-run, defeat in detail, use the environment to their advantage, and leverage strategic assets as force multipliers. Pre-industrial societies understood this (see: Battle of the Teutoburg Forest), it's not exactly rocket science.

They've got bombardment cannons, they've got nukes, they've got virus bombs, they're physically and operationally faster than Necrons (that alone is a huge advantage), they have a whole bunch of dirty tricks on top of objectives that don't generally require killing every single Necron on a tomb world in single combat mano-a-mano. You're treating them like Orks, as if the only way they can fight is to just line up and slug it out.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Not to mention pointing to specific fluff examples and saying 'well if my guys aren't amazing, how could they do this?' is rather silly. Power levels in the fluff are all over the place- sometimes Marines are unstoppable ubermensch, and sometimes a whole company of Lamenters gets killed to a man by 'Nids in thirty minutes (Fall of Malvolion), or a centuries-old Dreadnought dies to a literally-born-yesterday Carnifex (Anphelion Project), or a battle-hardened Chaos Marine gets matched in a swordfight with a commissar and then obliterated by a Guardsman with a meltagun (Cain).

Someone has to set a ground truth power level for the sake of a tabletop game, but it doesn't have to strictly inversely correlate to their numbers in the background, and it's best if the most-played army is archetypical rather than all the way at one extreme.

Hecaton wrote:


The thing stopping people is that Boyz are wastes of points on the table. Back in 3e I definitely ran more than the minimum required FOC amount of boyz.

Maybe FoCs are more flexible, but the internal and external balance of the ork codex is terrible, contrary to what you and Daed are saying.

Currently internal balance for orks it's the best it's ever been.

I also used to run more than the minimum required FOC amount of boyz in 3rd. Know why? Because like 10ish units in a codex with 30ish datasheets were basically boyz and most of the toys were so cheap that even maxing out FAs and HSs left you with tons of points left. Besides, our vehicles were paper things while most of the armies couldn't kill tons of infantries from distance. Now it's the opposite, the infantries are definitely too squishy to rely on them in huge numbers and we have tons and tons of good alternatives in the codex.

I don't even think boyz were better in older editions, and I think they're still ok. Snaggaboyz are definitely ok. It's just we didn't have much else in the past. Now we do.

 Blackie wrote:

Hecaton wrote:


The thing stopping people is that Boyz are wastes of points on the table. Back in 3e I definitely ran more than the minimum required FOC amount of boyz.

Maybe FoCs are more flexible, but the internal and external balance of the ork codex is terrible, contrary to what you and Daed are saying.

Currently internal balance for orks it's the best it's ever been.

I also used to run more than the minimum required FOC amount of boyz in 3rd. Know why? Because like 10ish units in a codex with 30ish datasheets were basically boyz and most of the toys were so cheap that even maxing out FAs and HSs left you with tons of points left. Besides, our vehicles were paper things while most of the armies couldn't kill tons of infantries from distance. Now it's the opposite, the infantries are definitely too squishy to rely on them in huge numbers and we have tons and tons of good alternatives in the codex.

I don't even think boyz were better in older editions, and I think they're still ok. Snaggaboyz are definitely ok. It's just we didn't have much else in the past. Now we do.

erm, sorry what?
Kommandos are what 2-3 ppm more expensive boys that just get everything ontop of that beyond shootas? How is that balanced?
Same with the buggies some you will never see realistically (especially after getting nerfed to death, others you see all the time?)

How is that internally balanced?
And no snaggaboys are not good, they look paltry next to 1W csm and these are also paltry lacking troop choices initself.

I said it's more balanced than older editions, when you had like 10 viable units in the entire codex. Now it's many more than that. We've already seen more than half the codex in lists that placed at tournaments, which is totally new for orks.

For example both boyz and kommandos are played, while gretchins and snaggaboys also see the tables, so are pretty much all the buggies except currently the squig ones. So 4 out of 5, with the 5th that did see a lot of play during the edition.

Kommandos are much better than boyz, of course. So are many other specialists from other codexes compared to their basic troops. But they don't have the trukk boyz option, which is how boyz are mostly played and a decent option to use anyway. In the past when we used to bring lots of boyz we didn't do it because they were good, but because anything else was trash.

 Void__Dragon wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Yet I expect a Nob to handily be able to tear a Marine limb from limb.

Can't imagine why, considering that's never especially been the case in the tabletop . . .

20+ years of stat supremacy over a Marine in the CC department. My references (3rd, 5th, 8th) give Nobs double the wounds, and triple the attacks over a basic Marine. Pretty straightforward.

 Void__Dragon wrote:

Also, source for Nobs being "dumber than a sack of hammers".

Because all Orks save Meks and some Warbosses are dumber than a sack of hammers. Orks are really stupid. Sometimes portrayed with a certain low cunning, but stupid the majority of the time. Are you going to argue that Nobz are generally portrayed with as much intelligence on the battlefield as Marines?

"Not equal to a Marine in intelligence" does not mean "dumb as a sack of hammers". Absolutely Marines are, on the whole, smarter. But there are numerous warnings about not understimating an Orks intelligence. They have language, use tools, form abstract thoughts, and can even plan battles and campaigns. Their gods are both brutal and cunning, after all.

 Void__Dragon wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
So Tyranid Warriors can't exist by your logic.

If it were up to me they would be strictly inferior to Marines too . . .

Why? Why would this be so, especially if they are the elite of the Tyranid infantry and known for being superior to a Genestealer, and Genestealers are already famed for their abilities.

 Void__Dragon wrote:

Are you aware that wars aren't fought by infantry lining up and going at it, phalanx-style? I can't believe that people are actually using this as some sort of justification. Explain to me why you feel forced to follow this logic in a world where machine guns, artillery, force concentration, carpet bombing and friggin nuclear warheads are readily available.

They usually are in 40k my friend.

And more to the point, you\re being disingenuous. "Wars aren't fought by line infantry lining up and going at it phalanx-style" might be true, but that doesn't imply that Marines don't have to go up against the troops of other armies on-foot regularly. Indeed, it's how they are most often depicted deploying and fighting. If Space Marines are strictly inferior to the line infantry of other factions, if a single Necron Warrior to use your favorite example to whine about was on par with or superior to a Marine, then how could the Marines function? How would they be expected to carry out an op against the Necrons when the most basic troop in a Tomb World is on par or better? How would a relatively small amount of Marines have been able to combat per the text thousands of Necrons in the World Engine over the course of the battle and then destroy it? If this so-called elite group of soldiers isn't actually elite, if the chaff numbering in billions is on par with or better than them, how are they expected to fight infantry battles against them?

They couldn't, yet they do. Marines have not been portrayed as weak as you'd like them to be for a long time, if they ever were. I'm sorry this upsets you.

Possibly your assessment of Ork intelligence applies to the above post.

How could near peer adversaries possibly see a battle in which one side emerges victorious? Is it just in the thickness of armor, range of the weapons and availability of troops? Or perhaps there are other factors such as strategy, tactics, morale, discipline, leadership, operational maneuverability, etc. at play? Are you aware of these things? Are you aware that Space Marines are the in-universe masters of such things? Why would Space Marines engage with a more elite foe on equal footing? Why would Space Marines allow greater numbers of near peer adversaries engage them if they could avoid it?

Why does a Space Marine have to be able to defeat a Nob in CC if a better solution would be to just toss a Krak grenade at it? If you're so keen on pointing out that Space Marines are smarter than Orks, why aren't you looking for more focus on that rather than the prolific huur-duur stat-inflation we have now.

In the past, Space Marines had to punch the shooty things and shoot the punchy things. If they can just punch the punchy things and shoot the shooty things, where tf is the intelligence to that, eh?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Blackie wrote:

Hecaton wrote:


The thing stopping people is that Boyz are wastes of points on the table. Back in 3e I definitely ran more than the minimum required FOC amount of boyz.

Maybe FoCs are more flexible, but the internal and external balance of the ork codex is terrible, contrary to what you and Daed are saying.

Currently internal balance for orks it's the best it's ever been.

I appreciate that it's possible that more units are deemed useable in the current book (although there might be some that dispute it, I am not an expert of Orks), however there have been numerous threads where it's been noted that Boyz suck/are not competetive/etc. An Ork codex where Boyz are not viable does not seem to be a successfully "on theme" book to me.

 Sledgehammer wrote:
Why can't GW adapt an rpg book as an addendum to the 40k rules with extra mechanics and wargear? Where are my hidden unit rules, recon rules, city fighting and dog fighting rules?

Quite a few of those things have appeared as supplements in the past. I guess they don't sell enough for GW to warrant continuous support.

I have heard many a GW manager state that outside of the core rules and tournament required books, that the other material struggles to move much at all overall so yeah - hard to get those type of rules when the community largely is not interested in them or won't buy in to them at the very least.

 Eldarsif wrote:

 Sledgehammer wrote:
Why can't GW adapt an rpg book as an addendum to the 40k rules with extra mechanics and wargear? Where are my hidden unit rules, recon rules, city fighting and dog fighting rules?

Quite a few of those things have appeared as supplements in the past. I guess they don't sell enough for GW to warrant continuous support.

Sounds like Kill Team and Aeronautica, respectively.

 auticus wrote:
I have heard many a GW manager state that outside of the core rules and tournament required books, that the other material struggles to move much at all overall so yeah - hard to get those type of rules when the community largely is not interested in them or won't buy in to them at the very least.

Or perhaps the communities that WOULD be interested are looking for a better product before spending money.

Why buy something that is lower quality than what I could scribble on a napkin?

 Void__Dragon wrote:
And more to the point, you\re being disingenuous. "Wars aren't fought by line infantry lining up and going at it phalanx-style" might be true, but that doesn't imply that Marines don't have to go up against the troops of other armies on-foot regularly. Indeed, it's how they are most often depicted deploying and fighting. If Space Marines are strictly inferior to the line infantry of other factions, if a single Necron Warrior to use your favorite example to whine about was on par with or superior to a Marine, then how could the Marines function? How would they be expected to carry out an op against the Necrons when the most basic troop in a Tomb World is on par or better? How would a relatively small amount of Marines have been able to combat per the text thousands of Necrons in the World Engine over the course of the battle and then destroy it? If this so-called elite group of soldiers isn't actually elite, if the chaff numbering in billions is on par with or better than them, how are they expected to fight infantry battles against them?

They couldn't, yet they do. Marines have not been portrayed as weak as you'd like them to be for a long time, if they ever were. I'm sorry this upsets you.

Stop being disingenuous. Nobody's saying that Astartes should be portrayed as being less useful of a warrior than an individual Necron - what they're saying is that Necron Warriors should be on par or slightly higher in terms of durability than a marine.

Necron Warriors shouldn't be chaff where Marines can be outnumbered a hundred to one or more and come out on top in a straight up fight. Could Marines fight their way through and blow up a Necron tomb before exfiltrating or getting retrieved via teleport, effectively defeating many times their number? Sure.

If the fluff is disagreeing with what I'm stating here, then it's stupid fething fluff.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Blackie wrote:

Currently internal balance for orks it's the best it's ever been.

Nope. Look at the one ork player who did ok in Seattle - it was all about making bomb squigs work. That's not good internal balance.

Hecaton wrote:
Could Marines fight their way through and blow up a Necron tomb before exfiltrating or getting retrieved via teleport, effectively defeating many times their number? Sure.

Worth pointing out that the early Necron fluff, where Deathwatch are often sent to deal with them, has a lot of this stuff. The Marines use speed, surprise, and violence of action to get in, get it done, and get out before the Necrons can really bring their force to bear. When the Necrons do start to fight back, it's scary, because they're extremely hard to kill and have weapons that are very lethal to even Marines, and then it's a fighting retreat to get out as the tomb awakens around them.

That kind of fluff shows off Marines as elite veterans- well-coordinated, fast, intelligent, quick to react to changing threats, keeping their cool- and more importantly their role within the Imperium and why the small size of each chapter can still make a difference. If you just need a battle of attrition against hordes of mooks, that's the Guard's specialty.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Blackie wrote:

Hecaton wrote:


The thing stopping people is that Boyz are wastes of points on the table. Back in 3e I definitely ran more than the minimum required FOC amount of boyz.

Maybe FoCs are more flexible, but the internal and external balance of the ork codex is terrible, contrary to what you and Daed are saying.

Currently internal balance for orks it's the best it's ever been.

I appreciate that it's possible that more units are deemed useable in the current book (although there might be some that dispute it, I am not an expert of Orks), however there have been numerous threads where it's been noted that Boyz suck/are not competetive/etc. An Ork codex where Boyz are not viable does not seem to be a successfully "on theme" book to me.

The thing is, boyz were one of the main reasons why internal balance sucked in past iterations of orks.
The green tide archetype and "boyz before toyz" which everyone is so fond of is nothing but the result of vast parts of the codex being inferior to boyz and thus not competitive.
GW has cranked down the power level too much on boyz and ruined them, but there is no way you can claim that the current codex where kommadoz, MANz, beast snaggas, tank bustas, storm boyz, squighogs, warbikes, kill rigs, snazzwagons, scrap jets, SJD, mek guns, dakka jets, wazbomms, battlewagons, trukks and trukkboyzs see regular top competitive play has worse or equal internal balance to the previous ones where anything but boyz, gretchin, mek guns and their support characters was considered non-competitive.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Hecaton wrote:

 Blackie wrote:

Currently internal balance for orks it's the best it's ever been.

Nope. Look at the one ork player who did ok in Seattle - it was all about making bomb squigs work. That's not good internal balance.

The bomb squig list still is more varied than any ork competitive list since the end of 5th edition, proving both blackie and daedalus right.

 Jidmah wrote:


The thing is, boyz were one of the main reasons why internal balance sucked in past iterations of orks.
The green tide archetype and "boyz before toyz" which everyone is so fond of is nothing but the result of vast parts of the codex being inferior to boyz and thus not competitive.
GW has cranked down the power level too much on boyz and ruined them, but there is no way you can claim that the current codex where kommadoz, MANz, beast snaggas, tank bustas, storm boyz, squighogs, warbikes, kill rigs, snazzwagons, scrap jets, SJD, mek guns, dakka jets, wazbomms, battlewagons, trukks and trukkboyzs see regular top competitive play has worse or equal internal balance to the previous ones where anything but boyz, gretchin, mek guns and their support characters was considered non-competitive.

Yep.

Also Deffkoptas, Kustom Boosta Blasta, Nob on Squig, Wartrike, Big mek with KFF, Big mek in Megarmour, Warboss, Warboss in Megarmour, Biker Boss, Warboss on Squigosaur, Snikrot, Ghazghkull and currently even the Wurrboy all are or have recently been part of lists that placed at top events. IIRC also min squads of lootas and burnaboyz did show up in some footslogging based list at some point, so did Zagstruck. Kanz and Dreads are in their best place since ages, one squad of gretchins is still a legit option to consider, etc...


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Hecaton wrote:


Nope. Look at the one ork player who did ok in Seattle - it was all about making bomb squigs work. That's not good internal balance.

Why not? It's like claiming that a list that relies on assault or shooting doesn't have any internal balance, even if there's a significant amount of variety in it, in terms on units. Do you know what doesn't have good internal balance? Top 8th goffs greentide list with Ghaz, 2-3 additional characters, 90-120 boyz and whatever fits with the few remaining points.

But if someone likes ghaz and footslogging boys they will not see as bad balance, but as the codex being the way it should be.

Karol wrote:
But if someone likes ghaz and footslogging boys they will not see as bad balance, but as the codex being the way it should be.

Wrong.

Ghaz + footslogging ORKS still works. Much better than before actually since now you can field 10ish units for that archetype instead of one.

If it works, then why isn't it winning events?


Wait is this one of those , it works when you make the list for your opponent, play narrative and on top of that your opponent isn't trying to win or playing a list that more or less plays soliter?

Karol wrote:
But if someone likes ghaz and footslogging boys they will not see as bad balance, but as the codex being the way it should be.

Spamming boyz to succeed is bad internal balance. The issue just has been unaddressed for so long that people think it is how orks should work. It's not Codex: Boyz tough, it's Codex: Orks. A competitive ork army should want to run 2-3 units of boyz, not more, not less.


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Karol wrote:
If it works, then why isn't it winning events?


Wait is this one of those , it works when you make the list for your opponent, play narrative and on top of that your opponent isn't trying to win or playing a list that more or less plays soliter?

1. internal balance is not related to winning events, ork external balance is horrible
2. it's currently the most played competitive archetype
3. Liam Hacket won an event with such a list in January.
4. You're being a dick

Is 40k currently unplayable?

I don't think so. I also prefer 9th edition to 8th edition.

That said, I will concede that you can have a non-competitive army which makes playing decidedly less fun.

I play every couple of weeks and my win ratio is about 50% across my four armies, but my firstborn Ultramarines always lose. I'm actually thinking of retiring that army from play to focus on my other armies.

My Chaos Knights, TSons and GK armies are all fun to play. I've played Orks twice in 9th - lost with TSons and won with GK, so I don't think there's anything fundamentally wrong with Orks or the game in general.

 catbarf wrote:


That kind of fluff shows off Marines as elite veterans- well-coordinated, fast, intelligent, quick to react to changing threats, keeping their cool- and more importantly their role within the Imperium and why the small size of each chapter can still make a difference. If you just need a battle of attrition against hordes of mooks, that's the Guard's specialty.

Which is very much how Marines played in Epic: Armageddon, as I learned to my cost several times. They were all about fast movement, hitting hard and moving on before the other side could mass against them. Play them like a more-elite Guard army and they just die.

I'm not sure that style of play is even possible using 28mm armies on a 6x4 foot board.

 Jidmah wrote:

Karol wrote:
But if someone likes ghaz and footslogging boys they will not see as bad balance, but as the codex being the way it should be.

Spamming boyz to succeed is bad internal balance.

Or it's just one of several paths to victory. I mean, while we've seen some examples of it working, we've also seen massed buggy/flyers, defcoptas/speedwaahs, and now a guy winning with a bomb squig gimmick list....
But clearly it's not working well enough - else there wouldn't be all the sobbing about Drukari/Custodes/Harlies/Nids, & whatever's next.
There's also the fact that some people (many?) just like that style of ork army.
Oh yeah, and then there's us weirdos who'll pilot Grot armies.....

 Jidmah wrote:
It's not Codex: Boyz tough, it's Codex: Orks. A competitive ork army should want to run 2-3 units of boyz, not more, not less.

Why? Because the Great OZ/Jidmah has spoken?
I agree that boyz should be a viable enough unit that they're a consideration when list building. But after that it should be up to each player to decide what mix of units suits them. All boyz, no boyz, some mix in-between those extremes..... Fortunately the days of the 3e-7th FoC are behind us & the current detachment system allows us a choice.

 Jidmah wrote:
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Karol wrote:
If it works, then why isn't it winning events?


Wait is this one of those , it works when you make the list for your opponent, play narrative and on top of that your opponent isn't trying to win or playing a list that more or less plays soliter?

1. internal balance is not related to winning events, ork external balance is horrible
2. it's currently the most played competitive archetype
3. Liam Hacket won an event with such a list in January.
4. You're being a dick

On #s 2 & 3 - well, apparently from what you've written those people are doing it wrong....
So, what's your tourney winning list? How's it doing? Where can we see your record posted?

[deleted]

GW doesn't want to do a TSR. They'll do you a gangs game, or a fighting robot game, they'll even do you 40k variants so you can start playing with one £30 box of toys, but they won't do you 40k in 15mm, or 40k grand galactic strategy, or 40k where you can only use these particular minis.

One of the reasons I think things broke down between between FFG and GW is that FFG games were just better than GW games and they felt threatened. Chaos In The Old World and Forbidden Stars are far better games than anything GW has put out in years and GW knew it. It became especially evident to me when Wizkids got the license to reprint Fury Of Dracula but not Forbidden Stars, Disc Wars, CitOW or Bloodbowl Team Manager

Eh... those weren't miniature wargames though. They weren't analogous to anything GW makes.