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GW appears to be learning from old mistakes, and course correcting, in the new codecii.

However, that learning certainly needs to be retroactively applied through CA, and other changes; but - we all know that won't happen.

Maybe 9th edition can be a culmination of lessons learned and rebalancing, but... it's not worth holding out on something that could be so far away (even though it would just essential be CA, but for 8th edition in general). Heck, maybe we'd even get some decent terrain rules out of it.

One can hope... but hope is the first step on the road to disappointment.

 Galef wrote:

 Galas wrote:
I don't know. Look at Riptides, in the index they sucked but the Codex fixed them.

And the Eldar Codex did nothing to help the WK, so what is your point? The only potential upcoming change for the WK would be the next Chapter Approved, which will only address points cost, if anything.

-

That reputation isn#t reason. Riptides had it too.

Gw just being bad designers as usual. They couldn't design half balanced game even if fate of universe dependent on it


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fe40k wrote:

StrayIight wrote:
As is so often the case, the issue is points.

Many things, especially in the case of Knights and their equivalents just cost too much for what you're really getting on the table. I think so much could be solved with a sensible and consistent points allocation system at design level, and I'm pretty convinced no such thing exists.

Even the most powerful and useful of units can generally be made really pretty sensible if it's costed correctly.

They don’t have a point allocation system for stats and abilities; they go with “this feels about right”.

It’s bullfeth, but it is what it is - they confirmed it on a stream somewhere.

Well point systems are all total worthless crap so...what is issue is they don't think nor playtest properly. But any formula is 100% quaranteed to give incorrect value


Automatically Appended Next Post:

StrayIight wrote:

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

StrayIight wrote:

fe40k wrote:

StrayIight wrote:
As is so often the case, the issue is points.

Many things, especially in the case of Knights and their equivalents just cost too much for what you're really getting on the table. I think so much could be solved with a sensible and consistent points allocation system at design level, and I'm pretty convinced no such thing exists.

Even the most powerful and useful of units can generally be made really pretty sensible if it's costed correctly.

They don’t have a point allocation system for stats and abilities; they go with “this feels about right”.

It’s bullfeth, but it is what it is - they confirmed it on a stream somewhere.

Yep - which is precisely my point. One is needed.

If GW won't create one, at some point I suspect the competitive community will have to, at least if they don't wish to keep the idea of competitive 40K being a running gag.

That's something I don't get. I mean, I have a decent stats background and it wouldn't be hard to generate a number to represent average cost/damage/durability/buffs value and adjust units to closely match it. With how homogenized 8th is, it's simpler than ever it certainly couldn't hurt.

Yeah, it does boggle the mind a bit that this situation exists doesn't it? I wouldn't know how to create a system like that personally, but it's common sense to see that you need something in place like that... They're damaging their reputation and their relationship with the community every time they use a dart board to assign point values to something.

They need something that's quaranteed to fail to create balanced points?

WHY? Wouldn't it be better to have balanced points?

tneva82 wrote:


They need something that's quaranteed to fail to create balanced points?

WHY? Wouldn't it be better to have balanced points?

...at the risk of starting an argument that's just going to derail the thread, I literally have no clue what you're saying.

Wouldn't it be better to not have a system to create balanced points... and instead to have balanced points? Say what now? O.o

You know what, I'm just going to agree, because I already see where this is going.

"Yes, absolutely! Balanced points everywhere! Or not. Delete as appropriate."

I've said it before and I'll say it again, GW need to address the points values of all of the LoW units as even the units that would have been not that far off, where nerfed in CA with points raises.
GW seams to vastly overvalue BS in assigning points for units.

But I don't expect this to happen before CA 2018 and even then I don't expect GW to actually use it to bring about balance.

This is my thread and i don't give a flip about what you talk about.

Go crazy if you want... talk about how hot your mates mum is... I don't care... my only one rule is that you say it as if you're a knight!

Wouldn't a fix to all balance and points problems, be pre build armies? Instead of people breaking the game with unit combinations GW did not think of, everyone could be playing GW tested armies that are balanced vs each other.
This way GW could work on army synergy better, ally wouldn't be a problem, because they would either not be an option or there would be a prebuild army with a set number of ally units.

StrayIight wrote:

tneva82 wrote:


They need something that's quaranteed to fail to create balanced points?

WHY? Wouldn't it be better to have balanced points?

...at the risk of starting an argument that's just going to derail the thread, I literally have no clue what you're saying.

Wouldn't it be better to not have a system to create balanced points... and instead to have balanced points? Say what now? O.o

You know what, I'm just going to agree, because I already see where this is going.

"Yes, absolutely! Balanced points everywhere! Or not. Delete as appropriate."

He is saying that such a formular would be inherently flawed as not every stat point is worth the same in every context.
T5 2+/4++ is worth a lot more on a fast moving model then it is on a tartaros terminator. A 5+ armor save is awesome on 4ppm infantry and terrible on 200 point tanks. Upgrading a weapon from S7 to S8 is worth a lot, upgrading a weapon from S9 to S10 does next to nothing.

Even if you account for all those problems in a huge and complex formula that for some reason isn't chaotic yet, you then need to consider that everything needs to be pointed properly in the context of its army. The exact same model with the exact same rules might be worth more points in one army than it is in the other. For example, a shooting unit in a Space Marine army is always going to be more powerful than the very same model in an ork army - because Space Marines have auras, stratagems and abilities that help shooting and orks do not.

A points system worked out as "+1 BS=3 points, +1 Toughness=5 points" - i.e. the sort of system they tried in 2nd edition 40k and.... 5th edition and lower (?) Fantasy is obviously doomed. It didn't work very well and some codex always broke the rules anyway by special rules or just favouritism.

With that said I firmly believe you can build a spreadsheet that looks at units on a 3-axis basis (damage output, resilience and battlefield utility - covering movement, range, other special rules etc) and get a reasonable idea of what is competitive and what is not. You could then do some informed play testing to check rather than just going "eh, feels okay to me".

When you look at an Eldar Wraithknight you can see it doesn't do the damage or have the resilience for a model costing nearly 500 points. It doesn't add anything to the army beyond this - so you are better spending those points elsewhere.

Now its a lot harder to balance than a Riptide. Riptides only really shoot (sure you might assault a tank or something to stop it shooting, but you don't expect to do much damage.) Shooting is dead easy to calculate - especially if you have solid movement (fly) and range. You will get to shoot something every turn - probably something optimal - so can be priced accordingly. Assault is much more difficult to price effectively as there are far more variables.

You also need to account for feel and the fact that it isn't right to drop a big centerpiece model down to 200 points because that's what it's currently gunned at. A knight-class unit should make up a substantial part of your army; if the wraithknight isn't worth being in the 4-500 point range then the solution is to increase it's potency, not reduce it's points.

 MarcoSkoll wrote:

 vaklor4 wrote:
Stompas and Wraithknights are absolute, unfiltered, 100% organic, GMO free, locally sourced, allergy free, triple filtered garbage.

I think that metaphor may have got away from you at about the point they were both unfiltered and triple filtered...

The joke

 Jidmah wrote:

StrayIight wrote:

tneva82 wrote:


They need something that's quaranteed to fail to create balanced points?

WHY? Wouldn't it be better to have balanced points?

...at the risk of starting an argument that's just going to derail the thread, I literally have no clue what you're saying.

Wouldn't it be better to not have a system to create balanced points... and instead to have balanced points? Say what now? O.o

You know what, I'm just going to agree, because I already see where this is going.

"Yes, absolutely! Balanced points everywhere! Or not. Delete as appropriate."

He is saying that such a formular would be inherently flawed as not every stat point is worth the same in every context.
T5 2+/4++ is worth a lot more on a fast moving model then it is on a tartaros terminator. A 5+ armor save is awesome on 4ppm infantry and terrible on 200 point tanks. Upgrading a weapon from S7 to S8 is worth a lot, upgrading a weapon from S9 to S10 does next to nothing.

Even if you account for all those problems in a huge and complex formula that for some reason isn't chaotic yet, you then need to consider that everything needs to be pointed properly in the context of its army. The exact same model with the exact same rules might be worth more points in one army than it is in the other. For example, a shooting unit in a Space Marine army is always going to be more powerful than the very same model in an ork army - because Space Marines have auras, stratagems and abilities that help shooting and orks do not.

I am not a mathematician. So I couldn't speak to formulas and how effective they would be.

I think it's common sense though to see that any consistent system *has* to be better than 'it feel like it should cost about this much' - which is what we seem to have right now :/

GW needs to buff Riptides, Y'vahras, and R'varnas. I have absolutely no ulterior motive.

As a Necron and Tyranid Play player, I'd love GW, not FW, knight equivalents!

StrayIight wrote:
I am not a mathematician. So I couldn't speak to formulas and how effective they would be.

Consider this: Once a formula reaches a certain order of complexity, it becomes indistinguishable from chaos. Some things just cannot be calculated.

An easy example: In computer sciences, there is something called the "Knapsack" problem. I had a run-in with that very problem in one of my hobbies: MtG.

When buying cards you have to consider the price of each card and shipping costs of each vendor. Vendor cost also depend on how many cards you order from each vendor.
Some clever guy wrote a program which would help you find the optimal combination of card and shipping prices to have the lowest possible cost. You just need to find the lowest combination of shipping and card price for every card.

Easy, right?

Not.

Calculating this for 50 cards takes about 30 seconds.
Calculating this for 100 cards takes about 5 Minutes.
Calculating this for 200 cards takes more than two hours.
Calculating this for 400 cards takes around ten years.

So, just because you can describe a formula or an algorithm for something, doesn't mean you actually solve it.

I think it's common sense though to see that any consistent system *has* to be better than 'it feel like it should cost about this much' - which is what we seem to have right now :/

Unless that consistent system is flawed, then you just get junk numbers for different reasons. Since there are so many game rules which simply cannot be quantified properly, iteration is the best way to solve problems for GW.
This is how most games do it: Improve the under-powered game piece (in this case the WK), see if it works better then (preferably in play testing), and keep adjusting and testing until it's in the right spot.

Personally I’d like to see ork vehicles get a massive raise in wounds, failing that they don’t degrade at all to represent that you can take massive chunks out of them and they keep coming

 Arachnofiend wrote:
... if the wraithknight isn't worth being in the 4-500 point range then the solution is to increase its potency, not reduce it's points.

I agree. However the "easiest" fix for it is to drop 100pts off it. It would still be over 400pts at that rate, save the sword and board version that has no guns (shoulders gun no counting here).

If I were to "increase its potency" I'd start with what some others in this thread have suggested: Invul of at least 6 on all builds, Shield makes that 4++. Spirit stones as standard (which is why I wouldn't suggest a 5++).
I might also add a rule to the Heavy Wraithcannons that if you roll 6 to wound, the target suffers d3/d6 Mortal wounds in addition to the normal damage.

And drop the Suncannon's to about 70-80pts. It's already a potent gun, but it shouldn't cost more than 4-5 Star cannons, cuz that is basically what it is.
Less reliable on the shot count, but more reliable on the damage.

-

Spare a thought for the Fellblade chassis while you’re at it.

A slightly tougher Baneblade, with a main weapon that has the same profile as a bog standard Leman Russ? That’ll be 740 points, thanks. You’ll even get a weapon with half the firepower of a Leman Russ Demolisher thrown in for free!

I don’t know what’s going on with Superheavies this edition...

StrayIight wrote:

I think it's common sense though to see that any consistent system *has* to be better than 'it feel like it should cost about this much' - which is what we seem to have right now :/

Super simple q. You don't even need to be that exact. New small knights. One has saw and melta weapon. Other twin autocannons. Both have speed 14". Melta guy in codex will be about 160pts. Let's say other is same for sake of example. Now let's say there was upgrade that gives +2 speed to both. Roughly how many points you think it should be?

In 6th/7th, a great example of this was Relentless.

How many points was Relentless worth to ScatterBikes? I'd argue tons, but clearly more than 0.

How many points was Relentless worth on Shining Spears? Exactly 0 (guns were Assault).

So how many points is Relentless worth?

If you say 0, ScatterBikes prove you wrong.
If you say any other number, Shining Spears prove you wrong.

There is no constant value that properly pointed Relentless in the last edition.

You could argue that you could have factored in weapon types. But you'd also need to factor in weapon ranges, strengths, durability, mobility, CC ability, and far more. The number of factors is absurd.

Bharring is absolutely correct. The eyeball test and empirical testing is the ONLY real way to determine point costs. Mathematical approaches for balancing are impossible because of variable count. Mathematics are great for determining unit efficacy, but modifiers like relentless can't be quantitatively determined.

Martel732 wrote:
Bharring is absolutely correct. The eyeball test and empirical testing is the ONLY real way to determine point costs. Mathematical approaches for balancing are impossible because of variable count. Mathematics are great for determining unit efficacy, but modifiers like relentless can't be quantitatively determined.

But you can calculate how much that rule is really worth as a general estimate though.

With last edition you just couldn't do it with formations, as either you're priced for the formation or not.

we'll see how Orks are handled, if the wraith knight is bad for an edition well... the eldar have plenty of good options as it stands, so unless you built a "WK Spam army" you should be ok. not saying it doesn't suck to have a prized centerpiece model collecting dust, but at least craftwords players have options. Ork well.. if their stompa is underpowered and the rest of their codex isn't brought up level will be much worse positioned.

HuskyWarhammer wrote:
That's something I don't get. I mean, I have a decent stats background and it wouldn't be hard to generate a number to represent average cost/damage/durability/buffs value and adjust units to closely match it. With how homogenized 8th is, it's simpler than ever it certainly couldn't hurt.

Wouldn't be too hard?

Ok, first example. How do you rate bumping up the model BS to 2+? Zero points? Any other proposal would be laughable on unit like Genestealers or Assault Terminators, where upping BS does jack squat and you'd be paying points literally for nothing. Or would you literally double the point price of models, like such a buff would warrant on say IG HWTs or SWSs? Which one is it? We're talking about simplest possible thing, base stat, yet the answer could be vastly different, depending on something as intangible as one potential upgrade on the model.

Decent, you say?

While we're on the subject of Xenos Knight Equivalents, how does everyone feel about the Stormsurge's current cost? I think it's okay, but not as powerful as last edition. It suffers a lot from the lack of the <BATTLESUIT> keyword, but it does have decent weapon options. Definitely better than the Wraithknight or especially the Stompa.

 ZergSmasher wrote:
While we're on the subject of Xenos Knight Equivalents, how does everyone feel about the Stormsurge's current cost? I think it's okay, but not as powerful as last edition. It suffers a lot from the lack of the <BATTLESUIT> keyword, but it does have decent weapon options. Definitely better than the Wraithknight or especially the Stompa.

I played against my friends SS, it was pretty underwhelming. But give it the BATTLESUIT keyword and I think it would be fine

 ZergSmasher wrote:
While we're on the subject of Xenos Knight Equivalents, how does everyone feel about the Stormsurge's current cost? I think it's okay, but not as powerful as last edition. It suffers a lot from the lack of the <BATTLESUIT> keyword, but it does have decent weapon options. Definitely better than the Wraithknight or especially the Stompa.

If it were much cheaper, Stormsurges would be oppressive and we'd see lots of people complaining about triple Stormsurge lists and rightfully so. Stormsurges are already a mid-tier tournament list (probably never a winner because they can't even begin to grab objectives). But free up some points and let that Tau player field more objective grabbing stuff and triple Stormsurge is a very nasty list.

Martel732 wrote:
Bharring is absolutely correct. The eyeball test and empirical testing is the ONLY real way to determine point costs. Mathematical approaches for balancing are impossible because of variable count. Mathematics are great for determining unit efficacy, but modifiers like relentless can't be quantitatively determined.

I'm not convinced.
I mean yes - saying that "BS 2+/Relentless/deep strike ability should be worth 5 more points on any unit regardless of other features" is stupid.

But lets take your favourite hobby horse. Why are Tactical Marines considered by most to be a pretty poor unit?
I mean you could play 50 games with marines, and 50 games with guardsmen, and 50 games with fire warriors, kabalites etc etc and go "hmmm, there just seems to be something missing. Marines don't seem to be tough for their points, they die about the same rate point for point, and they really seem to struggle with killing stuff. I get the feeling they are not very good for their points."

Or you could break out a relatively simple excel spreadsheet and go "oh look, they are likely to lose about as much for their points as those comparable troops choices from other books (slightly more typically), but their damage is about half as effective. This is why they are performing this way on the table. "If GW lowered their points/upped their damage so they performed more in line with these units they would likely cease to be a bad option."

I guess certain abilities would have a more empirical element - just how much is an ability to reroll charges or deep strike worth - but I suspect you could model that to at least a passable degree.
Really the point of the spreadsheet is to get comparative balance both within the faction and across all the factions. You are not looking for perfection - there are bound to be units that are slightly better and slightly worse - but you could avoid the ones that are obviously of a different tier level either up or down.

As an engineer I can tell you straight away that trying to create a mathematical model for points is a fool’s errand. The number of quantifiable variables is large enough to require professional simulation software. The number of unquantifiable variables might be even larger, and even one unquantifiable variable is an enormous problem. Iteration is the only viable solution - and that’s exactly what they’re doing.

BrianDavion wrote:we'll see how Orks are handled, if the wraith knight is bad for an edition well... the eldar have plenty of good options as it stands, so unless you built a "WK Spam army" you should be ok. not saying it doesn't suck to have a prized centerpiece model collecting dust, but at least craftwords players have options. Ork well.. if their stompa is underpowered and the rest of their codex isn't brought up level will be much worse positioned.

If you bought into Wraithknight spam in 7th Ed and are now upset that it’s underpowered, my sympathy for you is only zero because I’m not sure a negative value would make logical sense. It’s the only model I know of where a GW employee has admitted that they realised was horrifically underpowered but were instructed not to fix it to increase sales.

ZergSmasher wrote:While we're on the subject of Xenos Knight Equivalents, how does everyone feel about the Stormsurge's current cost? I think it's okay, but not as powerful as last edition.

While I haven’t played against one this edition and hence can’t say how it is, I will say that using the Stormsurge’s performance in 7th Ed as a baseline is a horrible idea. The thing was obnoxious last Edition; a toning down was welcome.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

Tyel wrote:

Or you could break out a relatively simple excel spreadsheet and go "oh look, they are likely to lose about as much for their points as those comparable troops choices from other books (slightly more typically), but their damage is about half as effective. This is why they are performing this way on the table. "If GW lowered their points/upped their damage so they performed more in line with these units they would likely cease to be a bad option."

This only works because you’re confining the situation to a micro level. By doing so you’ve eliminated almost all of the variables and focused down to only a handful. Mathematics is very powerful at the micro level.

What maths can’t do is the macro level. That’s what we’re asking it to do here - create a global model of a complex system. This isn’t a new idea - it’s the dream of anybody who works with the design of complex systems, as it’s powerful, elegant and solves so many problems. Unfortunately it just can’t be done. You end up spending more time working out how to stack variables upon variables upon variables than you would have done just going the eyeball-iteration route, then spend the rest of eternity trying to figure out why variable #3086 interacts weirdly with variable #1522 when variable #549 is bigger than variable #2.

Tyel wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Bharring is absolutely correct. The eyeball test and empirical testing is the ONLY real way to determine point costs. Mathematical approaches for balancing are impossible because of variable count. Mathematics are great for determining unit efficacy, but modifiers like relentless can't be quantitatively determined.

I'm not convinced.
I mean yes - saying that "BS 2+/Relentless/deep strike ability should be worth 5 more points on any unit regardless of other features" is stupid.

But lets take your favourite hobby horse. Why are Tactical Marines considered by most to be a pretty poor unit?
I mean you could play 50 games with marines, and 50 games with guardsmen, and 50 games with fire warriors, kabalites etc etc and go "hmmm, there just seems to be something missing. Marines don't seem to be tough for their points, they die about the same rate point for point, and they really seem to struggle with killing stuff. I get the feeling they are not very good for their points."

Or you could break out a relatively simple excel spreadsheet and go "oh look, they are likely to lose about as much for their points as those comparable troops choices from other books (slightly more typically), but their damage is about half as effective. This is why they are performing this way on the table. "If GW lowered their points/upped their damage so they performed more in line with these units they would likely cease to be a bad option."

I guess certain abilities would have a more empirical element - just how much is an ability to reroll charges or deep strike worth - but I suspect you could model that to at least a passable degree.
Really the point of the spreadsheet is to get comparative balance both within the faction and across all the factions. You are not looking for perfection - there are bound to be units that are slightly better and slightly worse - but you could avoid the ones that are obviously of a different tier level either up or down.

The problem with tac marines can be largely crunched on a spreadsheet, I agree. But movement, and things like quantum shields HAVE to be playtested.

Martel732 wrote:

Tyel wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Bharring is absolutely correct. The eyeball test and empirical testing is the ONLY real way to determine point costs. Mathematical approaches for balancing are impossible because of variable count. Mathematics are great for determining unit efficacy, but modifiers like relentless can't be quantitatively determined.

I'm not convinced.
I mean yes - saying that "BS 2+/Relentless/deep strike ability should be worth 5 more points on any unit regardless of other features" is stupid.

But lets take your favourite hobby horse. Why are Tactical Marines considered by most to be a pretty poor unit?
I mean you could play 50 games with marines, and 50 games with guardsmen, and 50 games with fire warriors, kabalites etc etc and go "hmmm, there just seems to be something missing. Marines don't seem to be tough for their points, they die about the same rate point for point, and they really seem to struggle with killing stuff. I get the feeling they are not very good for their points."

Or you could break out a relatively simple excel spreadsheet and go "oh look, they are likely to lose about as much for their points as those comparable troops choices from other books (slightly more typically), but their damage is about half as effective. This is why they are performing this way on the table. "If GW lowered their points/upped their damage so they performed more in line with these units they would likely cease to be a bad option."

I guess certain abilities would have a more empirical element - just how much is an ability to reroll charges or deep strike worth - but I suspect you could model that to at least a passable degree.
Really the point of the spreadsheet is to get comparative balance both within the faction and across all the factions. You are not looking for perfection - there are bound to be units that are slightly better and slightly worse - but you could avoid the ones that are obviously of a different tier level either up or down.

The problem with tac marines can be largely crunched on a spreadsheet, I agree. But movement, and things like quantum shields HAVE to be playtested.

and it's worth noting that approperately costing mobility has ALWAYS been a challange in designing a point system. Battletech DOES have a mathamatical formula to calculate points costs, and there are VERY MUCH plenty of examples of when the math doesn't quite work right producing mechs whose cost doesn't match their performance