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As the topic say, here in Sweden many tournaments use a System known as Komp (you can find it here http://www.svenska40k.se/forum/viewtopic.php?f=52&t=5612&sid=110dc1f0eb2927594e90cc5601ed4501 and check it out for your self)
This system is like a second point system for your list that is higher the weaker your list are and goes down as the list gets stronger.
This is used to balance out the game and also gives you extra point in the tournament (as said a weak list have higher points).
So I was wondering how the people of dakka think about this and if this or something similar is used were you live?

Might add that I don't really like Komp myself.

In the US people are generally anti-comp. (comp = composition)

Comp systems have the problem of creating further imbalance by imposing guidelines on armies that cause some armies to suffer while other armies are not penalized, simply based on the way they are set up.

For example, I know that some comp systems penalize duplicate units. Some armies are written so that in order to compete, they must take multiples of these units. These units are often crucial things like anti-tank, where restricting them simply creates more problems.

Overall comp assumes that the creators of the comp system know more about balance than everyone else in the tournament scene, and that they are capable of understanding all the implications of imposing restrictions that effect every army in totally different ways.

And all it does is shift what the power armies are. It's inevitable that in any rigid system like this there will be some result that is more effective than it's points would suggest. Someone will be able to game the system, and you'll end up no better off than when you started.

Alternatively, and as I've found when I run armies through, you end up with a system that further penalises someone for making thematic choices that are not particularly effective. A full Thousand Sons army isn't that good unless your opponent is foot slogging power armour, but most rule based comp systems end up penalising it for the duplication and other attempts made to give the list some ability to deal with threats other than foot slogging marines.

I think its awful. It creates more problems and to be honest why should anyone be penalized for making a list a certain way or spamming some unit? Its almost as ridiculous as a sportsmanship score. I think scoring like that should just be eliminated. Painting makes sense, and how well you performed in the game should count, and not anything else.

ph34r wrote:An insightful, concise, and remarkably well written post.

Ph34r already did a remarkably good job of covering the subject, but I felt it necessary to add one last point to the discussion.

Comp is based on the idea that there is some super-competitive but boring "netlist" for every codex which will instantly win against what should be other valid tactics. Suppose for a moment that this assumption is correct. (In all but the worst designed codices, it usually is not. But suppose it is.)

Under a comp system, the successful strategy is then to choose the list which best approximates the "netlist," without breaking the established tournament rules. So if you're not allowed to take the three "best" units, you take two of them. When you have points and FOC left over, you select the elements which fill in whatever weaknesses the rules forced you to add.

The point is that there's no more depth to a comp system than there was to the original game, since you just end up playing watered down versions of the previously competitive options. Worse still, codices that rely on strategies disallowed by the comp rules lose the ability to compete, since they lack essential properties like mobility or anti-tank. (And until recently, Necrons only had one scoring unit!)

You can keep the rules secret or have a private panel judge the lists, but that just means that the winner is the one who's best able to fool the judges. And now you're not even playing a game with well-defined rules anymore, so we can't offer any advice on how best to play it.

For these (and other) reasons, Dakka generally frowns on comp rules. You're welcome to play the game however you like, but please understand that you're playing a different game. We almost certainly don't play your particular variation, so our interest is diminished.

If you read this far, thanks for hearing me out.

Edit: I had a look at the rules. It seems like there's an arbitrary penalty associated with almost every unit, but the penalty is only very loosely correlated with the actual value that unit provides. Azdrubael Vect, a questionable choice at best, has a whopping -10 points associated with taking him. His Dais is one of the most overpriced options in the entire codex, and incurs a further -2 penalty. Even Urien Rakarth, who is considered one of the worst ICs in the 'dex, has a -6 penalty.

Even if you felt this sort of change was necessary, it's one of the worst rebalancing implementations I've ever seen. If you really have no other choice than to play under these rules, you have my sympathy. Good luck to you all the same.

Happy to read that "Dakka generally frowns on comp rules".
I don't really myself feel it necessary myself to ad another point system on top of the other one, since it will never create a true balance.

Another concern is what happen to me the first time I found out about comp is that I suddenly had to rewrite my entire tournament list and buy new models (cost me about 100$ for the new models and about 200$ of models that now was obsolete) and then paint everything to be able to have a Comp certified list.

You all had good arguments and valid points which feels good since in my experience many in Sweden seem to like Comp and I fear it wont go anywhere soon.

ImO all the Komp is, is a way for the creators to feel high and mighty of themself.

I really gotta ask... who is the one that determines what incurs a penalty and how much of a penalty etc?

I'm really against comp in general, but I think a more effective method would be to have a 'voting system.' Before the tournament starts every player receives a packet containing each players army list (except their own) and rates them according to a couple different metrics, such as "theme", "originality" "balance" and then a 'flex' category which is basically a players own personal assessment of whether they would have fun playing against that list or not.

Red Comet wrote: Its almost as ridiculous as a sportsmanship score. I think scoring like that should just be eliminated. Painting makes sense, and how well you performed in the game should count, and not anything else.

Amen.

No, sportsmanship should definitely count too. I've seen people defeat their opponents purely psychologically by giving their opponent a hard time, making them doubt themselves, playing slowly to drag out their turns to prevent their opponent from being able to get a late game advantage, and in general just not being a very good sportsman. The behavior is quite obvious to everyone involved, but its not out and out hostile or threatening, therefore its hard to convince anyone that he should be ejected. Sportsmanship helps a lot, since in these situations you can check "No" to "Did I enjoy playing this opponent"/"Would I play this opponent again" and depending on his exact actions you can also sometimes justify checking "No" to "Did my opponent know the rules" if they are questioning things and constantly looking at the rulebooks (either to make you doubt yourself or to intentionally delay the game).

Comp and Sports scores are both concepts that absolutely should be included in scoring. The problem is that most executions are hugely lacking and introduce massive problems with score sniping or arbitrary penalties for things that aren't actually problems.

I've yet to see a comp score system that isn't arbitrary or full of holes. Sports score systems have been steadily evolving in the NZ scene, and seem to have reached a point where they do what they are intended to without huge problems. Mostly by insisting people justify giving poor sports scores in person to the TO.

salix_fatuus wrote:As the topic say, here in Sweden many tournaments use a System known as Komp (you can find it here http://www.svenska40k.se/forum/viewtopic.php?f=52&t=5612&sid=110dc1f0eb2927594e90cc5601ed4501 and check it out for your self)
This system is like a second point system for your list that is higher the weaker your list are and goes down as the list gets stronger.
This is used to balance out the game and also gives you extra point in the tournament (as said a weak list have higher points).
So I was wondering how the people of dakka think about this and if this or something similar is used were you live?

Might add that I don't really like Komp myself.

I think GW should run a dual track tournament system, one with comp and one without comp. While I'm not a competitive player and frankly don't understand why anyone would want to be, those people are out there and they should be able to do their thing. They were pretty well served by ard boyz until GW axed the program. I like composition because it recognizes people's investment in the overall hobby, as opposed to the more narrow challenge of bludgeoning the crap out of someone with a flavor of the month list. Alot of people who play the game are hobbyists who put too much time and energy into their models to switch armies every couple of months. Throne of Skulls and other events cater to them. I think the key to everyone enjoying tournaments is to include both these groups, but to keep them seperate. Personally I'm not sympathetic to all the whining that happens in the US over how "unfair" comp is, as if its any more fair to copy someone else's list from the internet and then claim to be some kind of master strategist.

I don't believe comp as a system is fixable. While the ideal certainly exists, I don't believe it's at all possible for us to attain it. From a competitive perspective, 40k is in its infancy. People can't even agree on what metrics to rank units on and still believe that 'playstyle' can strongly influence how good a unit is. Whether or not one likes to charge forward and get into CC is irrelevant at evaluating how bad a Strike Squad is in close combat. To compare to Magic, I think 40k's competitive scene is still on the backward side of The Solution (an early blue/white control list that revolutionized how people fundamentally thought about how to build decks). Many people still fall into the trap of evaluating units in a total vacuum without looking at the codex as a whole. If you have (let's say) a codex with a super awesome charging CC unit but no way to deliver it reliably, or even support it with other combat units, and has largely unimpressive shooting units, that codex is not that overpowered, even if the unit makes assault terminators look like chumps. When the community can't even agree on what IS truly overpowered and is likely incorrect when it approaches a consensus, all comp does is warp the meta around the new rules. And given that 40k is twenty-five years old and still has a playerbase primarily concerned with aesthetics, I don't think it'll ever truly get to a competitively mature state, especially combined with the fact that there are like five different points values that people like to play. And without that state of competition, sufficiently correct assessment to determine what truly is overpowered is out the window.

my biggest problem with comp scores is that they're arbitrary. A single person comes by and says "I don't like your army", and you're screwed, often without appeal. It's based on the secret, personal opinions of other people who have unassailable power. The only thing worse is when comp scores are divvied out by vote. Then it's basically a game of seeing how low you can make the people above you so that you still might win in the end (or place better).

If there were some well-documented, transparent system to assign comp scores, it would start to approach acceptable, but that's only because you can know in advance to avoid the tournament altogether...

chaos0xomega wrote:I really gotta ask... who is the one that determines what incurs a penalty and how much of a penalty etc?

I'm really against comp in general, but I think a more effective method would be to have a 'voting system.' Before the tournament starts every player receives a packet containing each players army list (except their own) and rates them according to a couple different metrics, such as "theme", "originality" "balance" and then a 'flex' category which is basically a players own personal assessment of whether they would have fun playing against that list or not.

I think a group of people with too much power issues Joking aside it's most likely some senior tournament organizers tired of seeing the same lists at every tournament, who then think they can make a difference and adds a comp list which only temporary change things since there is always a way around it and people will find it.

Voting system sounds good but isnt. Since there will always be some donkey-caves who vote bad on those they dont know or lists they felt would be a threat to theirs, and good on their friends or list they didn't feel would be much of a threat to their specifically. Voting was tested with painting and it ended the way I just mentioned.
You sadly can't trust people in competitive settings.

-10 for the avatar, I'm starting to think these have been evaluated in the vacuum of the codex not how they actually perform.

Chrysis wrote:Comp and Sports scores are both concepts that absolutely should be included in scoring. The problem is that most executions are hugely lacking and introduce massive problems with score sniping or arbitrary penalties for things that aren't actually problems.

I've yet to see a comp score system that isn't arbitrary or full of holes. Sports score systems have been steadily evolving in the NZ scene, and seem to have reached a point where they do what they are intended to without huge problems. Mostly by insisting people justify giving poor sports scores in person to the TO.

Absolutely. Some builds are undeniably more powerful than others, and it's not hard to work out what those builds are. These builds are more powerful due to a range of features, often rising from the meta-game but just as often rising from an inherent imbalance in a particular codex. Some options should be more expensive, or more restricted, etc. People should be encouraged to NOT deliberately take advantage of those imbalances.

Further, anyone who is simply being a dick deserves to be penalised.

It's the implementation that really needs work. Any arbitrary system is going to have holes to be exploited, and any judge based system relies on fallible humans to make judgement calls.

After reading the ork points, I really think this is one of the worst komp system I've ever seen.

- Penalty for playing a hordes. When playing the #1 horde army.
- Bonus points for 'ard boyz while negative points for much worse choices.
- If you take four battlewagons, you can no longer buy models to fill them. Unless you are picking 'ard boyz, of course.
- Killa kanz get penalties for grotzookas, but not for rokkits.
- A deff dread is penalized more than buzz koptaz
- A big mek gets extra penalties for using a bike. I bet most people don't know big meks can take bikes at all.
- Ghazghkull Thrakka is -25 points (i.e. 25% of your army) if you field him in anything but a horde. Oh wait, hordes are penalized, too.
- A unit of storm boyz is -14. Just like seven kanz with rokkits.

I could go on forever. Simply put, the one writing this thing had no idea he was doing. You are getting penalized for every non-stupid choice, and some more penalties are randomly added on top. And the best part, two perfectly viable armies are:

Kan wall:
-40 for nine rokkit kanz
-12 for three units of boyz
- 5 for model count
- 28 two KFF meks
-15 three units of lootaz
Total: 4 points left

Nob bikerz:
-22 two biker warbosses
-77 two fully kitted out units of 10 nob bikers
Total: 5 points left

And for good measures, exploiting every loophole in IA8:
- 4 two SAGs
- 35 five mekboy junkas with two grot bombs each
- 9 three units of shoota boyz for inside the junkas
- 9 three guntrukks with supa-skorchas
- 15 three big trakks with supa-kannons
- 30 vehicle penalty
Total: 2 points left.
Say hello to orks blasting you with 10 large blasts in round one and two, followed by dozens of fast moving heavy flamer templates.

Yeah, really good job preventing metagaming... but you really taught that guy with the stormboy army a lesson!

I ran my not particularly cheesy (or effective) 1,500 Ork list through the system. Orks start at 104 'KP', and apparently I should be somewhere around 50 'KP' by the end.

Big Mek - 125pts (-12: -1 for PK, -5 for KFF, with additional -6 for KFF and list options combination. This would be -6 for a fully kitted out warboss, arguably more effective for my list.)
Nobz - 6 models for 295pts (-17.5)
Battlewagon - 130pts (-17, ouch)
20 Shoota Boyz - 170pts (-6: -1 per part of 6 due to PK, -1 each for BP and PK)
20 Slugga Boyz - 170pts (-6: -1 per part of 6 due to PK, -1 each for BP and PK)
20 Slugga Boyz - 170pts (-6: -1 per part of 6 due to PK, -1 each for BP and PK)
20 Gretchin - 80pts (+1 for being over 20 gretchin, due to the 2 runtherds)
6 Warbikers - 190pts (-4 for PK, BP - have these guys tried playing Orks without powerklaws?)
1 Deffkopta - 70pts (-3)
Deffdread - 100pts (-4)

I then lose -5 for having over 84 models (86 infantry, 2 vehicles, natch); but they say not to count 'grots', which are only upgrades on vehicles. Maybe they mean 'gretchin', as in the unit? Then -2. They sure seem to love gretchin.

This is 10 Kill Points, 1 HQ, 1 Elites, 5 Troops, 2 Fast Attack, 0 Heavy Support. According to this Comp thingy, it is 27.5 'KP', making it legal but half of the 50KP that they urge me to aim for. Don't take the desperately effective single battlewagon in a footslogging army, kids.

Scored comping systems tend to fail, and fail large, as despite usually being complicated they still dont manage to model all the interactions correctly.

Hard comp, where you are simply restricted from taking e.g. 5x12pt troops choices in a 50 point psyback tend to be slightly more effective, but even then can be long, are obviously still subjective and can still make certain lists awkward.

You then have soft comp, where (hopefully) a panel of players judge the lists, rejecting any that break the "rules". this is just about doable in 40k, JUST, but tends to fail in fantasy as even very experienced players dont spot all tricks.

Whil i am sick to the back teeth of spam lists dominating, too many comp systems just dont work - they get broken in seconds.

I like that "Chaos Spawns" are worth just +1 point for each modell.
"Chaos Spawns" are by far one if not the worst unit in 40k and they are worth +1 point? even at +4 I would never incould them.

I don't like the "komp" system. I just think it ruins the fun for everyone:
- Want to use a competitive list? No, you get too much komp points
- Want to use a themed list? No, its spamming or bad komp
- Want to use a "bad" list? The unit is probably still crap

I like to think that GW who actually does this for a living and invented it has a better sense of balancing (yes, even GK) than some random fanboys who want their army to be more competitive.

I've always wanted to see a system where several major tournaments all get together. Then, they total up each and every unit played in a tournament.

The most used 1% of units gets a 10% point increase. The 2-10% top used units gets a 5% point increase. The 1% least used units get a 10% point decrease, and the 2-10% least used units get a 5% point decrease.

You then take those new point totals to the next tournament, and repeat the same process again and again, slowly adjusting points to some to make them more balanced.

Stvafel wrote:I like to think that GW who actually does this for a living and invented it has a better sense of balancing (yes, even GK) than some random fanboys who want their army to be more competitive.

If only they did.

salix_fatuus wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:I really gotta ask... who is the one that determines what incurs a penalty and how much of a penalty etc?

I'm really against comp in general, but I think a more effective method would be to have a 'voting system.' Before the tournament starts every player receives a packet containing each players army list (except their own) and rates them according to a couple different metrics, such as "theme", "originality" "balance" and then a 'flex' category which is basically a players own personal assessment of whether they would have fun playing against that list or not.

I think a group of people with too much power issues Joking aside it's most likely some senior tournament organizers tired of seeing the same lists at every tournament, who then think they can make a difference and adds a comp list which only temporary change things since there is always a way around it and people will find it.

Voting system sounds good but isnt. Since there will always be some donkey-caves who vote bad on those they dont know or lists they felt would be a threat to theirs, and good on their friends or list they didn't feel would be much of a threat to their specifically. Voting was tested with painting and it ended the way I just mentioned.
You sadly can't trust people in competitive settings.

Then you score by averages instead of direct vote. Take the results, add them up and total them, and then assign them to a scoring bracket based on total number of points. Yeah, donkey caves are ever-present, but its been my experience that more tournament goers are honest than not. You will always have the bad seeds, but you drown out their impact with the voice of the masses. IMO, it will work better at a larger tournament, as the more honest people there are the less impact the bad seeds will have on scoring. Besides that, when the judges go through a particular players scoring packet and see that he marked down every single list (particularly those that shouldnt be), they can safely assume that they are dealing with a donkeycave and just toss out his votes.

Grakmar wrote:I've always wanted to see a system where several major tournaments all get together. Then, they total up each and every unit played in a tournament.

The most used 1% of units gets a 10% point increase. The 2-10% top used units gets a 5% point increase. The 1% least used units get a 10% point decrease, and the 2-10% least used units get a 5% point decrease.

You then take those new point totals to the next tournament, and repeat the same process again and again, slowly adjusting points to some to make them more balanced.

This is still working of the arbitrary assumption that using a unit means it's too cheap and that the army actually has options to take something else. In turn, you assume that every unit that is not take is too expensive, and that's the only reason it's not taken. At that point it has already failed before calculating a single value.

If an army has only limited access to ranged anti-tank(anti-horde, counter-charge), you are punishing them for bringing their only unit that can fulfill that role.
If an army has only one viable option in any given slot, you are punishing them for not taking a totally terrible option instead. Often enough, terrible doesn't have anything to do with point costs, but with how the army is set up.
If an army is themed to use one unit a lot, you are punishing it for being designed that way.

Sure, after a lot of point drops people would start picking flash gits, raptors and dark reapers, but probably not before they are heavily undercosted.
At the same time units like tactical marines, boyz, or guardsmen would increase in points until they are inferior as the other options in the same slot, because no one would pick scouts over tactical marines, boyz over gretchin or penal legion over a platoon unless the first is really overcosted. And lets not talk of armies that only have one choice in their troops slot.
But at the same time, you are basically killing any army based on a certain type of dedicated transport(chimera, rhino, trukk, battlewagon, serpent, etc), they are just used much more often than regular units.

The key to "fixing" the game requires an iteration as you described, but raising and lowering points automatically without thought will not do it at all. You'd have to get at least three people with a lot of insight on their army for any given codex and then have a look at units that weren't used and why. Why is everyone using long fangs and no whirlwinds, predators or vindicators? Because they do something no one else in that army can? Hardly. So lower points for the other options and see what happens. If they still aren't used, lower them some more. If now everyone is using predators and long fangs have disapeared altogether, that was too much.

On the other hand, you'd find that the looted wagon isn't used much. You could make it free (0 points base) and you would probably still not see it used too often. Allow units to pick it as dedicated transports an suddenly they start being used, without any change in cost. If you suddenly see doesens of unit dragging a boomgun allong, you better disallow for dedicated transports it next iteration.
You will probably still see platoons, boyz and tactical marines used a lot more than their alternatives. You don't need to fix that, boyz are supposed to be better than gretchin, and it's not like gretchin aren't used at all. The penal legion might need some help, but scouts are pretty much fine, like gretchin.

The trick would be providing alternatives to all those no-brainer units. You can hardly call the game being heavily unbalanced right now, so taking away those often used units without compensation(which is basically what every komp system is doing) rips up any sign of balance we already have and scatters it into the winds. There is no point in nerfing deff rolla battlewagons to the ground like the system in the OP is if it leaves orks without an option to handle a landraider at all. Fixing the system in a way that a player actually has a reason to bring a deff dread instead of kanz or flash gits instead of another battlewagon, that's something you should try to archive. And you need to get creative to do that, a fixed algorithm will never be that.
You also need to do the same for upgrades - if no one in their right mind would ever field anything but a las/plas razorback, there's something fishy going on there.

how do I even take a chaos spawn? It's not a model I can include in my army. I turn your guys into a spawn via boon of mutation, an ability. That just boggles my mind an in game interaction can affect my comp score when it's essentially a random effect.

Erm, its a Fast Attack choice in the Chaos Marine codex.

nosferatu1001 wrote:Erm, its a Fast Attack choice in the Chaos Marine codex.

He's probably talking about the Chaos Daemon one, where they don't have it as a unit option.

Chaos Space Marines can pay points and field them IIRC.

Jidmah wrote:Chaos Space Marines can pay points and field them IIRC.

Technically you pay the points to try and get the opposition to laugh to death.