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I have always collected Imperium Armies (DA, IG, GK) and I like allies becasue I can now mix and match my armies together to represent alliances between imperial factions. Also the fact that I can now field Deathwing Terminators with Leman Russ support is just...awesome

I could see FAQ's down the road preventing Gaz and Yarrick from being on the same side "If you pick one you cannot have the other kind of deal" any player who wants to put them together should have their army confiscated by GW lore police and put into GW fluff re-education class. I imagine something like a chair you are strapped into with your eyelids tapped open and some guy in a white lab coat dropping saline into your eyes, oh wait already saw that one...

Ghazgkul and Yarrick - together they fight crime

Helbrecht and Imotek - sailing the void together in search of adventure

Vecht and Vulkan - enjoying a quiet drink

Hotsauceman1 came up with:

Khan and Lilith, Fighting for a brighter tommorow

There are very few instances in the 40K universe where a faction stands entirely alone, just about any faction could ally with any other in exceptional cuircumstances. Even Tyranids should be able to ally with Imperial Guard (Genestealer cults).

The problem that I have is that people take combinations purely for thier on table effectiveness and not from a fluff or modelling perspective. To be honest though there is little difference between this and flavour of the month 'internet' armies.

"why do people like the allies rule?"

Because through out the history of time different countries have allied in order to whoop ass .The anti-German coalition at the start of the war (1 September 1939) consisted of France, Poland and the United Kingdom, soon to be joined by the British dominions (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa). After 1941, the leaders of the United States of America, the British Commonwealth, and the Soviet Union known as the "Big Three".

people are moaning about cheese allies lists... why? for gods sakes. we construct these models spending countless hours painting them. spend every last penny we have available to us, to then be able to field the best army list possible to whoop ass. plain and simple.

its the year 40k where a human general can have a bale eye and a huge power klaw on his hand. anything is possible! the universe is infinate of options and different situations will occur. where maybe a space marine army will have to allie with a chaos deamon army to team together to escape an exploding star or they will all die, i dont know, the lists are endless.

all i know is that if you want to play a wargame on an exact level playing field, go and play chess.

I don't think the allies rules are perfect (I would like something a little more intricate to allow things like Genestealer Cults and some small sublists only available for allies like Adeptus Arbites) but I think they're a step in the right direction. I would change a few things around in the allies matrix, but frankly I don't need to have my IG and Orks ally if I don't want to, so it's basically a non-issue for me.

I like that it not only gives Chaos their daemons after 5 years without them, but also is a means to plug gaps in armies here and there. If your codex is old and doesn't quite compete as well as some others, now you can add an allied force from a more powerful codex to bring it up to snuff. Frankly that part doesn't matter to me much, but I know for many it does.

It's a system that can lead to some interesting allied armies and some unique painting/modeling challenges as well. Imagine an IG army modeled as gretchin to ally with some Orks, or Tau battlesuits modeled as Space Marine exo-armor suits when they ally to your Marines. There's some cool possibilities out there!

Ork cannon flodder slaves with out playing Apoc.

TedNugent wrote:

Shovan wrote:

TedNugent wrote:Because it's exploitable cheese, and it allows for completely unfluffy combinations.

Such as?

Eldar are "Battle Brothers" with Dark Eldar? Tau allied with Orks? Imperial Guard allied with Chaos Daemons?

Eldar and Dark Eldar are the same species, Orks have been known to work as mercenaries, and traitor guard worshiping chaos. Now I want to make a traitor guard army lead by a primaris psyker with daemon allies. Rogue psyker unleashing daemons.

Sebbyp538 wrote:all i know is that if you want to play a wargame on an exact level playing field, go and play chess.

The Sicilian is the most popular and best-scoring response to White's first move 1.e4. "Indeed, most statistical surveys suggest that 1.d4 is the most successful first move for White, but only because 1...c5 scores so highly against 1.e4."New in Chess stated in its 2000 Yearbook that of the games in its database, White scored 56.1% in 296,200 games beginning 1.d4, but a full two percentage points lower (54.1%) in 349,855 games beginning 1.e4. "The main culprit responsible for this state of affairs" was the Sicilian, which held White to a 52.3% score in 145,996 games.

-Sosonko, Gennady; Paul van der Sterren (2000). New in Chess Yearbook 55. Interchess BV. p. 227

Sebbyp538 wrote:all i know is that if you want to play a wargame on an exact level playing field, go and play chess.

Because there are only two possible binary states, of course; either you're playing chess (or Go, which would have been a better example), or you may as well forget about balance, right?

You do understand that within an army list more powerful/versatile choices in one area are notionally balanced by poorer choices elsewhere? (Or so apologists for GW's terrible balancing between lists have always claimed.) And that representing alliances by simply welding lists different lists together breaks that principle?

Buttons wrote:Now I want to make a traitor guard army lead by a primaris psyker with daemon allies. Rogue psyker unleashing daemons.

That would be a brilliant army. I love this idea.

htj wrote:

Buttons wrote:Now I want to make a traitor guard army lead by a primaris psyker with daemon allies. Rogue psyker unleashing daemons.

That would be a brilliant army. I love this idea.

Couldn't you actually make it even bigger, by adding those psyker battle squads so you'd have full squads filled with a ton of psykers and "Overlords"

ZebioLizard2 wrote:

htj wrote:

Buttons wrote:Now I want to make a traitor guard army lead by a primaris psyker with daemon allies. Rogue psyker unleashing daemons.

That would be a brilliant army. I love this idea.

Couldn't you actually make it even bigger, by adding those psyker battle squads so you'd have full squads filled with a ton of psykers and "Overlords"

Definitely what I'd do with the concept. Hmm, I do have a Daemons army, and some spare Guardsmen kicking around...

English Assassin wrote:

Sebbyp538 wrote:all i know is that if you want to play a wargame on an exact level playing field, go and play chess.

Because there are only two possible binary states, of course; either you're playing chess (or Go, which would have been a better example), or you may as well forget about balance, right?

You do understand that within an army list more powerful/versatile choices in one area are notionally balanced by poorer choices elsewhere? (Or so apologists for GW's terrible balancing between lists have always claimed.) And that representing alliances by simply welding lists different lists together breaks that principle?

According to a few Warmachine players I've encountered, their game system is incredibly well balanced, which has led to some of them getting bored out of their minds.

Bit of a twist? The reason, I've been explained, is that they consider overpowered units/lists as a challenge, and that defeating an unbalanced list is akin to a mortal slaying a dragon.

So yes, GW knows nothing of balance, but this makes their game system more interesting. If anything, constantly considering balance would limit the abilities of some unit choices, and we'd have plenty of choices with only marginal differences.

Of course, the main culprit is the folks who still think Warhammer 40k is meant to be a competitive game system. By the fact that 6th ed tries very hard to convince the players to create a narrative and enjoyable game experience for both, where rules bending is acceptable, I think there's the proof.

Shovan wrote:

htj wrote:I await that eagerly then.

Come to find from looking around google a little that older fluff has some Dark Eldar worshipping Slaanesh. Since the new codex this is not the case.

Ben Counter included Slaanesh worshipping DE in "Crimson Tears." It's a novel and therefore non-canonical. All canon I've been able to locate does not mention Slaaneshi worship. Indeed, all Eldar souls are of particular delight to She Who Thirsts. She doesn't want their assistance or worship. She wants to eat them. Daemons allied with the Great Enemy will eat them. Plain and simple. There is no greater enemy for any of the Eldar race than Slaanesh. Period. End of. Only Dark Elves in Fantasy ever had a Slaanesh cult, and even that was held in abhorrance by the majority of Druchii culture. 40k =/= WHF

I will enjoy Allies for modelling opportunities and fluff based armies I couldn't have before. However, since most of the best combos aren't even allowed or as strong as they should be (IG+CSM for closeness, IG+nids for Genestealer cults, GK+IG for inducted guard, etc) this won't make much difference. As someone else mentioned in another thread, and as I have mentioned to my gaming group, the matrix should be more complex than it is. GK should be able to be BB with any IoM, for instance (allowing them to give their powers and strategies to "lower ranking" armies) while other imperials would have a harder time allying with them. Similarly any SM army with IG. IG can have Tyranids as BB, but Tyranids are "Come the apocalypse" with IG. (GS cults are there to soften a planet, but once the invasion comes they just march happily to the nearest spore tower to be digested while the bugs do the rest of the actual killing work) Tau can accept anyone (barring nids) as allies, BB with IG (see a pattern?) and Eldar as they try to convert those armies to "The Greater Good," but no Marines will trust the filthy Xenos.

In short, Marines are far less likely to ally with non-imperials "out of desperation" unless they are fighing Chaos or Nids, and only then will barely tolerate them. A more complicated matrix could reflect this to be at LEAST fluffy, even though obviously still broken competatively. GW did neither, thus their motives are obvious.


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Shadelkan wrote:

English Assassin wrote:

Sebbyp538 wrote:all i know is that if you want to play a wargame on an exact level playing field, go and play chess.

Because there are only two possible binary states, of course; either you're playing chess (or Go, which would have been a better example), or you may as well forget about balance, right?

You do understand that within an army list more powerful/versatile choices in one area are notionally balanced by poorer choices elsewhere? (Or so apologists for GW's terrible balancing between lists have always claimed.) And that representing alliances by simply welding lists different lists together breaks that principle?

According to a few Warmachine players I've encountered, their game system is incredibly well balanced, which has led to some of them getting bored out of their minds.

Bit of a twist? The reason, I've been explained, is that they consider overpowered units/lists as a challenge, and that defeating an unbalanced list is akin to a mortal slaying a dragon.

My experience was that there were too many releases. GW never releases fast enough and nothing is balanced, WM/H releases things for each of its 9 factions every bloody month. It was exhausting trying to keep up with the Meta. Now I play WM/H casually and its MUCH more fun than 40k/FB casually because the rules are consistant. We can focus on playing the game and cinematic fights rather than rules disputes eating into our play time (because in my circle playing to win and playing to rofflestomp are two very different things. We can still play to win and have a good time, but rules issues will still disrupt game flow in 40k that they just don't in WM/H)

As a Tyranid player i like the allies rule because wait . . . Nm. Same ol same ol

xttz wrote:

Shovan wrote:

TedNugent wrote:Because it's exploitable cheese, and it allows for completely unfluffy combinations.

Such as?

Dark Eldar and Slaanesh Daemons?

DE who were slaughtered and their souls enslaved by demons, who find it amusing to force their tormented spirit essences to manifest and fight for them beyond death. In Path of the Renegade a spur of Comorragh was overrun with demons in a summoning gone wrong and was sealed of from the rest of the city. The souls of the DE who were trapped in there still exist, playthings of the daemonic beings who infest the place. The great thing about 40K is that you can make up almost any in-universe explanation that fits in with the fluff.

What happens if someone models his army as DE + demons who are BFFs? Well that's no different than someone who fields female marines or a furby army, its a personal choice on the part of the gamer, beyond our control and there's nothing we can do about that. But don't blame the allies table.

Right, you can be as fluffy or unfluffy as you like. In 5th I could have an armoured Imperial Guard column, with Lord Commissars running around trying to bash things with their power fists
Personally I'm looking forward to seeing my friend's Nurgle Marines/Deamon army.

It would have been bette rif the matrix had been more centrered aound the fluff rather than some very strange ideas. Shame really as the idea behind the Alliances is good - just make it so the right level is assigned:

so Tau - SM = Alliance of Conveience
BT-SOB = Alliance of Conveience
Tau-Orks = Desperate Alliance

etc etc etc

I'd say orks would ally of convenience with tau vs most other things..

nob "eh boss rumor has it some shiny undying metal gitz been beating on the fish people"

boss "what but they are our fish sticks ... hey gill heads lets go take care of this shiny problem we'll take a few of those suits and a tank .. payment due up front"

I like it for what I assume is the very reason they made the rule: it lets me buy, assemble, and paint units that aren't part of my army without needing a whole army worth of them, but still allowing me to play with them.

I'm glad that they made SoB and SM allies of convenience. In the fluff, the sisters dislike the marines because they have psykers among their ranks.

Smitty wrote:I'm glad that they made SoB and SM allies of convenience. In the fluff, the sisters dislike the marines because they have psykers among their ranks.

Mostly it's because they think Marines are heretics (don't worship the Emperor), mutants (certainly aren't human), and witches (they have psykers). You know, the top 3 things the Imperial dogma is against.

Yep. It's easy to see why they don't like marines. That said, they recognize them as servants of the Emperor, which is the only reason they are willing to work with them at all.

DarknessEternal wrote:

Smitty wrote:I'm glad that they made SoB and SM allies of convenience. In the fluff, the sisters dislike the marines because they have psykers among their ranks.

Mostly it's because they think Marines are heretics (don't worship the Emperor), mutants (certainly aren't human), and witches (they have psykers). You know, the top 3 things the Imperial dogma is against.

Of course this is why it makes not sense that SOB and BT are not Allies of Convience and instead Desperate Allies

Mr Morden wrote:

DarknessEternal wrote:

Smitty wrote:I'm glad that they made SoB and SM allies of convenience. In the fluff, the sisters dislike the marines because they have psykers among their ranks.

Mostly it's because they think Marines are heretics (don't worship the Emperor), mutants (certainly aren't human), and witches (they have psykers). You know, the top 3 things the Imperial dogma is against.

Of course this is why it makes not sense that SOB and BT are not Allies of Convience and instead Desperate Allies

Because the Black Templars, while they have the same personality traits as the SoB, aren't exactly keen on an army that would see the fact they are breaking a ton of Imperium rules and report them to the Church.

I like Allies simply because it more closely represents the "reality" of the fluff.

An IG force being able to take a SM detachment is perfect. Same with CSM and Daemons.

It opens up a LOT of interesting combos and will radically diversify the armies we will play against. A common complaint has been that certain dex'es only feature a very limited set of builds that are worth while; this was an effective way to fix that.

At the end of the day, allies on has a minor impact on our local meta. The reason is that we've been playing a version of allies for awhile. Sure it opened up a few broken combos, but we tend to build brand new lists for each game so it was always something new to face. Now it's just been formallized a little more.

We have had this discussion on other threads - the Black Templars are held in higher regard than some other Chapters - like the Wolves who break many more rules and have psykers.

But the new (and hopefully error ridden) table has the Black Templars as the only Astartes who are Desperate Allies rather than Allies of Conveience which makes no sense and to me is an error plain and simple. They should be on the same footing as the rest of the Astartes Chapters - and I have yet to see a coherent argument that is supoported by past and current fluff that does so.

Conversely they have no problem with the SOB - or at least not when they fought alongside them in both their Codex and BL novels such as Helsreach - why would they?

I like the allies rules - I just wish they had actually looked at the fluff before making it up.................... most of the problem alliance just need shifting up or down a level.

AlmightyWalrus wrote:Pray tell, what cheese?

I'd say it's a massive boon for those who want to play their CSM with Daemons or Traitor Guard, or for those that want to play their Sisters of Battle with IG support, for example. The more powerful army lists already have ways of taking care of everything, so I don't see them allying in stuff too much.

Yes these are good things for the ally rules, but the example above is annoying that chaos has to use allies to be able to include daemons as they have always been defined and existed in the 40k background until the stupid "generic" daemons in the most recent CSM codex.:

The biggest issue I see though is all of the overhyped different space marine lists being able to be combined however one chooses. The best that comes to mind would be blood angels assault units backed up by space wolves long fangs missile launcher spam and that is just one of the many options out there. On the Imperial side I would have liked to see each Space Marine chapter able to fully fight with Imperial Guard, but then have a more limited relationship with the other Imperial forces and other marine chapters. All the fluff shows a pretty adversarial relationship between the various marine chapters. So they shouldn't get full benefits from allying with them. The Sisters and the GKs are also separate entities and while they will fight together with marines, have their own agendas to fulfill that don't lead them to being "perfect" allies. In the fluff on Imperial Guard units seem to work consistently and effectively with a given space marine chapter. This would limit the allied space marine spam that can appear like a blood angels assault force backed up by a single space wolf, HQ, a small squad of wolf scouts and then multiple units of long fangs with missile launchers.

It also bugs me that the Xenos forces barely have any Battle Brothers level allies, so on allies the xenos forces get set behind on the power curve some more.

Skriker

TheLionOfTheForest wrote:I could see FAQ's down the road preventing Gaz and Yarrick from being on the same side "If you pick one you cannot have the other kind of deal" any player who wants to put them together should have their army confiscated by GW lore police and put into GW fluff re-education class. I imagine something like a chair you are strapped into with your eyelids tapped open and some guy in a white lab coat dropping saline into your eyes, oh wait already saw that one...

I'm a bit insulted. I fully intend to use Gaz and Yarrick.

GW will never make a rule that prevents people from spending money.

My army confiscated? GW lore police? GW dosn't police its lore, it ruins it.

Re-Education? How 'bout a reminder? Gaz loves Yarrick. Even let the 'Ummie live 'cause he's got a bit o' green in 'em he does!

Again, Everyone seems to forget that the "allies system" is not about highfives and drinking beer! It's about armies A and B getting ambushed by army C or even C and D.

Why is that so hard for people to wrap their heads around?