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 Swastakowey wrote:


As games get bigger though things get cluttered. I know some people enjoy having 3 tanks, 1 flyer, 4-5 squads of infantry and so on.

But at that point its too easy to simply fit everything you need to win. At 500 I find you cant afford to loose units. There isnt always another one there to replace your tank, or you may have only 2 anti air guns to stop his aircraft and so on. But if he is taking these big things the rest of the army suffers because as you said the more you take of the big stuff the less of the main things are there and so on.

It feels like more of a game and less of a big blow up match in my opinion.

I've been stuck playing smaller games using the models I still have or recently picked up so 500pts was the obvious solution. It was a good way to get back in the swing of the game but every single game I played, no matter the opponent, my army choice, mission type, the game was decided in Turn 3. There was no point continuing past that because the game became one sided. At 1000pts, the game was decided when it ended and not a moment before that. I'm expecting that sort of seat-of-the-pants action to be more common in even larger games. 1850 is the goal but building three armies at once is painful to my poor wallet. 1000pts for now.

 Grey Templar wrote:
I think 1850 is the sweet sport for 40k.

Anyone reasonably familiar with the rules should be able to play 1850 in no more than 2 hours.

Really? I've been playing for a year now and our groups' battles still last for 4-5 hours. We're very talkative in battles and can't imagine going at double speed without doing a game of just throwing dice, not talking except declaring targets and stuff.

4' x 8' table, 4000-8000 points total (between all players), and 2 sides with up to 4 players.

This fixes many of the problems that people have mentioned here. Games go quickly, everyone gets to play, and it's much more forgiving to less skilled players. Most commonly, we play 2v2, and it goes something like 2k + 1k vs 2k + 1k, with the two 1k players being newer players that essentially play each other first on the other side of the table. The more experienced players get to help the newer players, this way, too.

In games I play, I also usually allow handicapping, so if I suspect a game is going to be horribly unfair, I'm happy to allow the other side an extra squad. Also, I never play units or combos that my opponent can't field a defense against. I would rather lose a close game, than win an badly unbalanced one.

Oh, yes, and 3 hours actual play time is my preferred game length -- which means about 4-5 real hours, as there's a lot of time wasted just shooting the breeze, setup, cleanup, etc

A question without one answer in my opinion.

It depends on:
A) How much time you have/want to play for
B) Who you are playing with
C) What mood you are in
D) What armies you are playing/playing against
E) Where you are
F) What day it is
G) If you have had reasonably long term plans to have a certain battle against a certain person and what points you arranged such a battle.

I usually play from anything between 750 to 3000pts. I've played larger and smaller, but prefer to be between those points.

1850 is my ideal I've been away from my gaming group for a while but I believe the last tournament was 1750 and that worked nicely. Smaller games are good for multiple players. I think the smallest game I played was 750 with four players and that was a good size. I just believe the higher ranges allow for more combos on both sides of the table and make you have to think further into "is this the unit I need or the sacrificial lamb".

I like 2k best. It lets you take a nice balanced TAC force. I find that most game under 750 points can easily be come a Rock/Paper/Scissors situation.

1850 for me. Though.
1500 in a pinch,

Aaaaand ill happily play up to 5k a side if not more if you wanted.

500-1000 just doesnt hold the appeal, i play CSM, and unless you run cultists and a naked lord, their isnt space for much else at 500 pts..

I generally play 1500 and find that a nice place for a Marine army.

I also do like quick little skirmishes at 500 though, even with vanilla marines you can make a nice little army.

1500 points:

Big enough to open an army to any standard FOC choices from a given codex but small enough to force tough decisions on which units to take.