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How well did any SM place that weren't IH-IF-RG, or using CT other than Master Artisans or Stealthy?

Genuinely curious.

My take; GW doing balance is analogous to a colorblind person painting a rainbow while being apathetic to the results. Not only are they largely uncaring to balance, but they also don't even know what balance looks like. I no longer have any interest in matched play outside of trusted friends I can rely on for decent matchups.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I no longer have any interest in matched play outside of trusted friends I can rely on for decent matchups.

I feel like that's how 40k was designed. It's not made as a tight and limited game with a focus on competition, more of a sprawling mess to create memorable moments with friends.

Check out Tabletop Tactics smashing fluffy lists into each other and having a good time. The game works really well in that kind of context.

Lol so cynical. This is a specific tournament with cash price incentive.
It's not an indication of what pick up games would be like in all instances.

For whatever reason GW has not wanted to try and manage the scope of the game, nor adjust marine statlines or basic costs terribly radically. As a result, they've decided to just pile on special rules to compensate for metagame balance issues instead of addressing the core gameplay and design problems, and used that same route to add "flavor" in the form of blatant power bloat with the supplement books. At this point it's nigh impossible to keep track of all the special rules, hat tricks, combos, exceptions, character gimmickry, and reroll availability to armies in general, but especially prevalent in marine armies. My head was sent spinning trying to keep track of everything against a game with Raven Guard this weekend as my opponent blew through 7 CP before the game even started supercharging stuff (more relics, making someone a chapter master, etc), and almost every action/attack made through the game had some sort of reroll or ignored some sort of restriction or had enhanced AP or something similar (or combination thereof). Meanwhile I think I used 1 CP for a command reroll the whole game

GW's scope of "flavor" also doesn't help. They attempt to represent often subtle concepts like guile and cunning or ambush and preparation with direct power bonuses. For instance, sneaky stuff ends up effectively playing "tanky", receiving bonuses that make them difficult to hurt in some way and as a result they become oddly resilient, when they're often supposed to be glass cannons (as we've often historically seen with Eldar for instance through many editions and different games such as BFG). GW seems loathe to examine other options such as being able to alter/choose deployment types or change objectives or obj control distance or terrain placement or game duration and other such concepts that would better reflect such capabilities without cranking up the direct tactical power levels. They want something that'll have an effect on a statline or dice roll most of the time.

 Ishagu wrote:
Lol so cynical. This is a specific tournament with cash price incentive.
It's not an indication of what pick up games would be like in all instances.

So are you actually arguing that loyalist marines new rules and superior internal codex balance doesn't translate to an advantage over other armies in a casual setting as well as tournaments? If I bring a fluffy Night Lords list to a pickup game do you think I'd start out on equal footing against a fluffy loyalist marines list? With their doctrines and superior chapter tactics?

 Ishagu wrote:
Lol so cynical. This is a specific tournament with cash price incentive.
It's not an indication of what pick up games would be like in all instances.

You're right; pick up games are often much worse since tournaments at least have a shared mentality and expectation.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Yoyoyo wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
I no longer have any interest in matched play outside of trusted friends I can rely on for decent matchups.

I feel like that's how 40k was designed. It's not made as a tight and limited game with a focus on competition, more of a sprawling mess to create memorable moments with friends.

Check out Tabletop Tactics smashing fluffy lists into each other and having a good time. The game works really well in that kind of context.

It isn't 'designed' really. The entire game is a toolbox for players to make an experience out of. Open/narrative/matched are just examples of some ways it can be done.

Gadzilla666 wrote:
If I bring a fluffy Night Lords list to a pickup game do you think I'd start out on equal footing against a fluffy loyalist marines list?

If not, why wouldn't you just adjust the armies to make things more fair?

It's quite easy to tone down lists just through relics and HQs. Proxy a Warpsmith instead of Feirros, no 5+++ aura WLT for the Apoc, no Ironstone, no character-status for the Relic Leviathan, no Indomitus Intercessor WLT. Chaplain Dreads are still a problem but they're due for the nerfbat at some point.

IH will still be as hard as nails of course, but we broke most of the synergies in a top-tier list without touching a model. So don't pretend as if there's nothing to be done.

If the other player just wants to stomp you in a "friendly" game, fair or not... sounds like there are going to be issues with more than game balance.

Yoyoyo wrote:

Gadzilla666 wrote:
If I bring a fluffy Night Lords list to a pickup game do you think I'd start out on equal footing against a fluffy loyalist marines list?

If not, why wouldn't you just adjust the armies to make things more fair?

It's quite easy to tone down lists just through relics and HQs. Proxy a Warpsmith instead of Feirros, no 5+++ aura WLT for the Apoc, no Ironstone, no character-status for the Relic Leviathan, no Indomitus Intercessor WLT. Chaplain Dreads are still a problem but they're due for the nerfbat at some point.

IH will still be as hard as nails of course, but we broke most of the synergies in a top-tier list without touching a model. So don't pretend as if there's nothing to be done.

If the other player just wants to stomp you in a "friendly" game, fair or not... sounds like there are going to be issues with more than game balance.

Yes but negotiations before a game wouldn't be required if gw hadn't jumped the shark with some of the supplements and such negotiations aren't an option for tournament players.

You mentioned pick up games, not tournaments. That IH LVO list which passes off wounds pulls from 5 different rules sources and has 3 Chaplain Dreads, which were probably conversions You're never going to see it fielded by accident in a casual context.

If you brought a "fluffy NL list" to a tournament? You'd get stomped by any highly optimised faction in the game.

Yoyoyo wrote:
You mentioned pick up games, not tournaments. That IH LVO list which passes off wounds pulls from 5 different rules sources and has 3 Chaplain Dreads, which were probably conversions You're never going to see it fielded by accident in a casual context.

If you brought a "fluffy NL list" to a tournament? You'd get stomped by any highly optimised faction in the game.

My point was that loyalist marines are broken in all formats. But you are correct. No fluffy list could compete at tournament level.

Gadzilla666 wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:

It's gak from a balance stand-point that armies should be getting buffs a couple factions at a time.

Maybe but GW knows people won't buy a single massive 100 dollar book that gives every faction a buff at the same time

And yet they expect us to spend $40 on roughly 6 pages of rules?

Well, I think they'd say that the rest of the material in the book contributes towards the cost of it.

I'm not convinced by that, but then I think they lost the plot when they changed 40k from a setting to a story.

Gadzilla666 wrote:

Yoyoyo wrote:

Gadzilla666 wrote:
If I bring a fluffy Night Lords list to a pickup game do you think I'd start out on equal footing against a fluffy loyalist marines list?

If not, why wouldn't you just adjust the armies to make things more fair?

It's quite easy to tone down lists just through relics and HQs. Proxy a Warpsmith instead of Feirros, no 5+++ aura WLT for the Apoc, no Ironstone, no character-status for the Relic Leviathan, no Indomitus Intercessor WLT. Chaplain Dreads are still a problem but they're due for the nerfbat at some point.

IH will still be as hard as nails of course, but we broke most of the synergies in a top-tier list without touching a model. So don't pretend as if there's nothing to be done.

If the other player just wants to stomp you in a "friendly" game, fair or not... sounds like there are going to be issues with more than game balance.

Yes but negotiations before a game wouldn't be required if gw hadn't jumped the shark with some of the supplements and such negotiations aren't an option for tournament players.

In all my (30) years of minis gaming, no matter what companies stuff, or who's playing, or where, I've almost never had any type of PU/casual game that didn't involve some sort of discussion. 40k, WHFB, AoS, other Gw stuff, Battletech, WWII, Naval games, space ships, Historical stuff, Star Wars, Clix, whatever... Agreeing what/how to play is part of the hobby.
Reducing that discussion down to: 40k, 2k pts, play = Y/N? is absurd.

As far as tournaments? No you don't get a discussion. You chose to forgo that step when you signed up. And as you signed up to play tourny 40k despite all it's flaws &/or issues with the tournies format? Well, you get what you get.

I do believe that W40k is in need of rework. To me endless special rules are just not attractive. Its inherent gameplay is nonsensical and not attractive. I think that GW can do a lot better by taking few pages from other popular games.

As for a lot of models. I do not think that quantity is a problem. It is rather that quantity and quality is too great. W40k kinda has to have a lot of models. Giving a faction countless mediocre pieces will rarely cause issues, it is when faction has no identity and you keep piling good stuff on it, this is where problems emerge.

I would recommend stripping most special rules. Anything which is special has to count and make unit unique. More reliance on stats. More power shifted towards the fantasy of faction/race of what they were supposed to be good at. This way out of place units will offer less problems, because if your main combination is designed to be stronger than single units, it is unlikely that bloated unit choices will ever result in unforseen OP combinations. When done right it is more of an individual preference what he would like to have more or less in his army and having greater potential to optimize his list against specific threats if any single faction proves to be too powerful.


Btw: I play Infinity and Warmachine. Discussions there do not happen at least not as often as it had been described. The most problematic things is when you are pushing something to happen, like unit being just that tiny bit from getting what it wants to do. Though in Warmachine we have special tools to quickly and without question to resolve ranging disagreements.

While I'm often one of the first to criticise GW for their rules writing and what I think are sales focused rules, I don't think this period of Marine domination will last for much longer.

GW have been far better at fixing problems more quickly than we've seen in the past. I'm sure they'll jump on the most egregious marines as they no doubt understand that leaving them as they are will cause players to leave.

AOS seems to have a better and more balanced design philosophy behind it, but it didn't exactly start well - it's something that has developed over time. It has also had a much slower release schedule than 40k. Finally - it tends to be the test bed for future 40k ideas, hopefully the same balanced design philosophy will enter the 40k rules writing soon enough.

On a bit of an offshoot...as an old skool player from the start of 40k/Fantasy....I have no interest at all in AOS in this conception.

Not sure what it is..just preferred the old world.

My question though out of general interest in the hobby is how is AOS actually doing? Is it pretty popular?

 vict0988 wrote:

You are trying to obfuscate the power of Marines, it is not working, go play 30k. 40k can be played with any mission format and as the most common tournament format ITC is valuable in determining balance.

Except ITC gives only data regarding ITC enviroment which is "sit back and shoot all as you can win with just killing without actually moving or controlling board".

Marines are problem yes but ITC exaggerates it. Outside ITC gap isn't as big.

And it's actually rather logical why ITC isn't as relevant and anybody interested in balanced competive game should be able to see why. It's different rules. When you change mission you change entire game style. Unless GW uses just ITC to balance(rather than their own scenarios) then the data isn't telling the true picture. You can't change huge part of the game and expect it to have no effect to game balance. The idea that you could is unicorn land level idea. Totally busted concept.

 Ordana wrote:
Go back to before the SM books released and you see a wide variety of armies in 40k tournaments.

But in broad terms GW simply shat the bed with the Marine release. Its entirely possible the AoS team screws up at some point and releases a horribly broken book that will have the same result. (And I think it looked like that for a while when Slaanesh first came out).

AoS has managed to release quite a few OP armies over time. The difference is that they have managed to up their nerf rate faster than the 40k one. When Skaven and FEC came out they were massively OP, but then they released a FAQ that changed a few wordings and re-pointed units and Skaven went from Massively OP to very strong armies.

Same with Slaanesh recently as their Christmas FAQ again included point changes and rule changes to existing armies.

That is one of the things I like currently with AoS. The design team has shown themselves to be slightly more responsive and fluid in regards to their balancing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

My question though out of general interest in the hobby is how is AOS actually doing? Is it pretty popular?

It's been growing by leaps and bounds and with almost every existing faction as well as new being near up to date it is in a decent place.

I know ticket sales for AoS LVO has increased a lot over the years and Cancon's server apparently died when they added more tickets to the pool. So there is a lot of excitement for AoS these days.

I've personally shifted much more towards AoS over the past year as I find the game having less baggage than 40k due to the fact that "stratagems" in AoS are just bespoke command abilities on the Warscroll. On top of that I like the AoS missions more than ITC and I have every warscroll at my fingertip in the AoS app. It means when I compete I only take my phone, my Battletome, and mini-rulebook with me.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Amishprn86 wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
Also, when AoS came out it re-invented stat lines...starting with essentially fresh units/armies. GW made 8th and for some reason...felt the need to convert stats almost directly from 7th edition despite changing the game fundamentally. Old stats don't work with the way 8th edition plays and it has caused a gak ton of problems.

GW should have taken 8th as an excuse to fully rethink all of the statlines of major units.

This, 8th is broken at the core, and they only been trying it patch it via codex's instead of fixing the problems. They did change a couple core rules at least (Ro3, limited factions for detachments, Fly)

T1 deepstrike, boots on the ground, CP regen limitations, prepared positions, full deployment, smite fix, beta bolters, and character targeting as well.

GW has hardly been sitting on their hands.

The current issues won't be fixed easily by core changes and some won't be concerned about point changes. GW has to fix the codexes causing the lion's share of problems.

They fix core rule yes, i even said they did, i was referring to the problems with balancing issues, Fly, smite, CP regen, DS turn 1,Booots on the ground, was all things players exploited and spammed. And beta bolters is not a general rule, not all bolters get it only Marines thats a Marines rule.

When talking about the core balances, its the AP system, Wounding/hit system, Tanks are equal to units system, MC can melee in buildings, Fallback has no penalty and to easy, terrain, etc.. then there is the detachments/CP system that is also messing everything up even more do to power combos and spam units.

Example: Why were marines bad? b.c everyone basically auto killed them lol, no one still takes tac marines for a good reason.

So LVO was won by marine list with something like 40+marines, a few dreads, no flyers, no big high cost sets. I love it. A good list everyone can get without spending thousands of dollars.

Karol wrote:
So LVO was won by marine list with something like 40+marines, a few dreads, no flyers, no big high cost sets. I love it. A good list everyone can get without spending thousands of dollars.

If you don't care about "counts as" or conversions sure.
Genuine Chaplain Dreads would be Black Lotus cards from MTG.

Anyway,

I feel these debates always range from
"Marines are a bit too good" to "40k is literally unplayable, I don't know why you bother, please change literally the entire game."
Its possibly why the debate never really evolves in an interesting way.

I don't think 40k is that bad, and people all over the world clearly are having pickup games every week, so this view its impossible is a bit hard to square.
Marines are however the best faction and that maths does tell.

Its not even really maths - its the potential. Most troops units don't for example get to have 4 attacks with a thunderhammer that can (luckily) kill 4 slightly underperforming shining spears. Its not that this is guaranteed to happen - its just that when it does, it swings games.

I think ITC exacerbates this, because it arguably is more strategic and precise. Picking secondaries "is" a skill. Calculating out whether you can get killed more/hold more or the bonus point "is" a skill. As we saw in the finals, two top armies played by top players are often decided at the wire by a point.

Arguably making the game more "skillful" is good. But it also makes a lot of potential army builds artificially crap, because giving your opponent an "easy" 12 points on the secondaries and probably "killed more" clearly reduces your chances of winning and this cannot easily be factored into the game.

It turns out that converting's pretty straightforward, though sourcing the bits may prove challenging in light of the demand spike..?

https://lourollinsminis.blogspot.com/2020/01/proper-librarian-livery-conversion.html

Catulle wrote:
It turns out that converting's pretty straightforward, though sourcing the bits may prove challenging in light of the demand spike..?

https://lourollinsminis.blogspot.com/2020/01/proper-librarian-livery-conversion.html

Could also just get Bits wings and glue on, this is what everyone i know did. The Scourge wings of DE work, so does BA wings.

 Amishprn86 wrote:

Catulle wrote:
It turns out that converting's pretty straightforward, though sourcing the bits may prove challenging in light of the demand spike..?

https://lourollinsminis.blogspot.com/2020/01/proper-librarian-livery-conversion.html

Could also just get Bits wings and glue on, this is what everyone i know did. The Scourge wings of DE work, so does BA wings.

Flat-backed wings that fit neatly onto the Dreadnaught plating might work better. The Blood Angels icon panel off of the Stormraven is a pretty cheap bit and about the right size.

Not allowing the half damage strat to work on dreads with invulnerable saves would make it much less obnoxious.

 Vaktathi wrote:
GW's scope of "flavor" also doesn't help. They attempt to represent often subtle concepts like guile and cunning or ambush and preparation with direct power bonuses. For instance, sneaky stuff ends up effectively playing "tanky", receiving bonuses that make them difficult to hurt in some way and as a result they become oddly resilient, when they're often supposed to be glass cannons (as we've often historically seen with Eldar for instance through many editions and different games such as BFG). GW seems loathe to examine other options such as being able to alter/choose deployment types or change objectives or obj control distance or terrain placement or game duration and other such concepts that would better reflect such capabilities without cranking up the direct tactical power levels. They want something that'll have an effect on a statline or dice roll most of the time.

To be fair, trying to incorporate guile, cunning, sneakiness, and strategic planning like ambushes can be hard to do in an environment where everything is known. The players are rather omniscient, knowing where units are, and even what units will be involved in the game. This is not something that most field commanders get to have their hands on.

Infinity seems to run it better, but then they do this with single models that you can only take a couple of with those rules as opposed to 100 models that are supposed to be so sneaky they can pass across an open field without being detected.

Battletech had an optional set of rules which effectively allowed one to be sneaky, but it required a game manager and 3 sets of the game in order to get it to work.

 Ishagu wrote:
They aren't using official GW rules for 40k so LVO means nothing in terms of indicating the meta.

AoS is using the official mission rules.

Only thing LVO shows is how armies perform in ITC homebrew missions. It's actually staggering that this topic doesn't point out the custom, 3rd party missions as a massive differential.

There are far too many people on the ITC Bandwagon pointing out how it's this great balancing factor that fills in the rules gaps that GW has for 40K, when it's essentially a bunch of House Rules that favor a certain type of army build, and if your army doesn't fit that mold, it won't do well.

Comparing 40K to AoS is a bit like apples to oranges. No army in AoS can shoot like a typical 40K army, and there is no Overwatch. There is a Hero Phase in AoS with no corresponding phase in 40K (conversely, 40K has the "Psykic Phase", but let's be real, it's basically a magic phase). AoS has no strategems beyond Command Abilities, and those can only be used by Generals and Hero's. The rules sets are similar, but very different.

If you play AoS, you quickly realize that there is usually only one way to play your army. To play it any other way is to hamstring yourself. You'll see dozens of different Space Marine lists using dozens of different units. If you play Iron Jaws, you'll have five or six units in total, and all they will be good for is running straight at the enemy and getting into close combat. In other words, army lists are very shallow in AoS, while in 40K they are very deep.

With all that being said, I prefer AoS over 40K for competitive play, as the "play space" for lack of a better word, is more narrower and well defined in AoS. In 40K, there are just too many combos, too many rules interactions, and when you have weak rules interactions, it opens up spam, abuse, interpretations... basically, there is a lot more wiggle room in 40K, and that's what ITC attempts to do- reduce that wiggle room, but all it does is add to it. It becomes a game of "OK, this month, there is no rule about unit X interacting with rule Y, so we'll spam unit X and abuse the heck out of rule Y until they make a ruling on it."

kingheff wrote:
Not allowing the half damage strat to work on dreads with invulnerable saves would make it much less obnoxious.

Or the Iron Hands "Operation Human Shield" tactics...

 Eldarsif wrote:

 Ordana wrote:
Go back to before the SM books released and you see a wide variety of armies in 40k tournaments.

But in broad terms GW simply shat the bed with the Marine release. Its entirely possible the AoS team screws up at some point and releases a horribly broken book that will have the same result. (And I think it looked like that for a while when Slaanesh first came out).

AoS has managed to release quite a few OP armies over time. The difference is that they have managed to up their nerf rate faster than the 40k one. When Skaven and FEC came out they were massively OP, but then they released a FAQ that changed a few wordings and re-pointed units and Skaven went from Massively OP to very strong armies.

Same with Slaanesh recently as their Christmas FAQ again included point changes and rule changes to existing armies.

That is one of the things I like currently with AoS. The design team has shown themselves to be slightly more responsive and fluid in regards to their balancing.

Also, those 'OP' armies were never anywhere near as OP as marines are(statistically going by tournament results during their OP time), even post IH nerf. A book like release IH would NEVER make it to print in AoS.

You must have missed Flesh-Eater Courts when the Archregent first dropped.