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waefre_1 wrote: Wasn't that already the case in 6e and/or 7e after the advent of Hull Points? I know those weapons usually didn't have the AP to directly negate MEQ armor, but if you're already spamming them to critfish against vehicles...
Well I'm reasonably certain nobody holds 6th-7th as any sort of pinnacle of 40k
As Marines the issue I see is that a Grav Cannon, in particular, is better than a HB against hordes (more shots), great against Elites (multishot high AP), and better against vehicles than a Lascannon (high ROF, multi-damage, high AP). Why take anything else? Only the Multimelta has a superior bracket of target.
But if S5 only wounded T7-8 on a 6 like previous editions, you cut out some targets. Previously, a Pred could only even be hurt by a S7 or higher weapon from the front. That changes the nature of the tools and tactics required.
Said Grav cannon is very bad against a lot of targets though. Namely DG, Dreadnaughts, Artist of flesh, ramshackle or any of the very common -1D targets.
2D weapons are high reward high risk weapons in 9th. They tend to have a good efficency compared to the points, but can run into some very hard counters.
That's really just a confirmation of my point, hehe. GW has been forced to create a new special rule for damage resistance because of the mashed target profiles resulting from post 8th to-wound chart and AP system.
GW creates multiple categories of special durability rules in order to make different weapons optimal vs different targets, instead of defaulting towards a race to the middle where a couple specific values of strength and a couple specific values of AP are vastly more valuable than others.
The horror. Oh man, really shows how completely imbalanced the game is now. I might have to take something other than a las-plas razorback to win games. How awful.
I genuinely don't understand the point of this post. There appears to be a lot of misapplied sarcasm.
Every edition I played before the 8e/9e paradigm suffered from a massive problem with there being 'ideal weapon values' that the most competitive builds defaulted towards. All las-plas razorbacks. All missile launcher long fangs. All wave serpents. etc. The natural tendency of GW to pull all baseline troops towards the T3 6+/5+ W1 statline where nearly every basic anti-troop weapon in the game got AP5 handed out like candy, rendering all distinctions moot. The tendency to make nearly all elites and characters T4 with 3+ or 2+ armor. nearly all tanks AV12 or AV11 in the front, AV11 in the sides and AV10 in the rear. It meant every edition the competitive players would just figure out a 'solve' for the meta, and from the research ive done on 4th edition, it was no different - competitive lists were stuff like "heres my 6 gun-wielding carnifexes and my minimum ripper troops" and the like. in 7th, the edition I know the best, grav and strength 6 weaponry represented a 'solution' to 90% of the defenses in the edition, for almost the entire extent of the edition.
Pick any edition and look at a tournament-winning list, and then look at a tournament-winning list right now. Odds are EXTREMELY good that youre going to see drastically more variety in what people take in their unit choices, precisely because they've finally finally broken free of the idiotic self-restriction of creating 4-5 balance levers for durability but making 95% of the units in the game durable in exactly the same ways. And the types of units that have issues - say, vehicles atm - are having issues exactly because they havent diversified their defenses at all, you can 'solve' for vehicles by just taking something that will be optimally effective vs T7 3+.
But now if youre talking about elite infantry - do i take D2 to tailor vs marines? do I take D1 because I might be up against Necrons or Sisters who make my D2 pointless? Do I take AP, or is the elite unit im going to be up against Harlequins or Custodes, with solid invulnerable saves? Will the elite unit be T3, T4, or T5 - there are actual units in the meta at appreciable quantities that actually have all those values.
Invulns, high toughness+wounds with low save, to-hit mods, -1 damage, feel no pain, res prots, 1+ saves and ignore AP, all operate differently now, which makes finding "the perfect profile" much more difficult and the meta much more diverse. I have many problems with the current edition, but this is undeniably one of the things that is the best about it, and wanting to go back to the old days in this regard is just idiotic.
"Got you, Yugi! Your Rubric Marines can't fall back because I have declared the tertiary kaptaris ka'tah stance two, after the secondary dacatarai ka'tah last turn!"
"So you think, Kaiba! I declared my Thousand Sons the cult of Duplicity, which means all my psykers have access to the Sorcerous Facade power! Furthermore I will spend 8 Cabal Points to invoke Cabbalistic Focus, causing the rubrics to appear behind your custodes! The Vengeance for the Wronged and Sorcerous Fullisade stratagems along with the Malefic Maelstrom infernal pact evoked earlier in the command phase allows me to double their firepower, letting me wound on 2s and 3s!"
"you think it is you who has gotten me, yugi, but it is I who have gotten you! I declare the ever-vigilant stratagem to attack your rubrics with my custodes' ranged weapons, which with the new codex are now DAMAGE 2!!"
"...which leads you straight into my trap, Kaiba, you see I now declare the stratagem Implacable Automata, reducing all damage from your attacks by 1 and triggering my All is Dust special rule!"
Every edition I played before the 8e/9e paradigm suffered from a massive problem with there being 'ideal weapon values' that the most competitive builds defaulted towards. All las-plas razorbacks. All missile launcher long fangs. All wave serpents. etc. The natural tendency of GW to pull all baseline troops towards the T3 6+/5+ W1 statline where nearly every basic anti-troop weapon in the game got AP5 handed out like candy, rendering all distinctions moot. The tendency to make nearly all elites and characters T4 with 3+ or 2+ armor. nearly all tanks AV12 or AV11 in the front, AV11 in the sides and AV10 in the rear. It meant every edition the competitive players would just figure out a 'solve' for the meta, and from the research ive done on 4th edition, it was no different - competitive lists were stuff like "heres my 6 gun-wielding carnifexes and my minimum ripper troops" and the like. in 7th, the edition I know the best, grav and strength 6 weaponry represented a 'solution' to 90% of the defenses in the edition, for almost the entire extent of the edition.
Pick any edition and look at a tournament-winning list, and then look at a tournament-winning list right now. Odds are EXTREMELY good that youre going to see drastically more variety in what people take in their unit choices, precisely because they've finally finally broken free of the idiotic self-restriction of creating 4-5 balance levers for durability but making 95% of the units in the game durable in exactly the same ways. And the types of units that have issues - say, vehicles atm - are having issues exactly because they havent diversified their defenses at all, you can 'solve' for vehicles by just taking something that will be optimally effective vs T7 3+.
But now if youre talking about elite infantry - do i take D2 to tailor vs marines? do I take D1 because I might be up against Necrons or Sisters who make my D2 pointless? Do I take AP, or is the elite unit im going to be up against Harlequins or Custodes, with solid invulnerable saves? Will the elite unit be T3, T4, or T5 - there are actual units in the meta at appreciable quantities that actually have all those values.
Invulns, high toughness+wounds with low save, to-hit mods, -1 damage, feel no pain, res prots, 1+ saves and ignore AP, all operate differently now, which makes finding "the perfect profile" much more difficult and the meta much more diverse. I have many problems with the current edition, but this is undeniably one of the things that is the best about it, and wanting to go back to the old days in this regard is just idiotic.
I agree with the thrust of what you're saying, but mechanics like -1 damage just seem like really clunky methods for addressing these issues.
blood reaper wrote: I will respect human rights and trans people but I will never under any circumstances use the phrase 'folks' or 'ya'll'. I would rather be killed by firing squad.
the_scotsman wrote: Yeah, when i read the small novel that is the Death Guard unit options and think about resolving the attacks from a melee-oriented min size death guard squad, the thing that springs to mind is "Accessible!"
Argive wrote: GW seems to have a crystal ball and just pulls hairbrained ideas out of their backside for the most part.
You're not. If you're worried about your opponent using 'fake' rules, you're having fun the wrong way. This hobby isn't about rules. It's about buying Citadel miniatures.
Please report to your nearest GW store for attitude readjustment. Take your wallet.
Every edition I played before the 8e/9e paradigm suffered from a massive problem with there being 'ideal weapon values' that the most competitive builds defaulted towards. All las-plas razorbacks. All missile launcher long fangs. All wave serpents. etc. The natural tendency of GW to pull all baseline troops towards the T3 6+/5+ W1 statline where nearly every basic anti-troop weapon in the game got AP5 handed out like candy, rendering all distinctions moot. The tendency to make nearly all elites and characters T4 with 3+ or 2+ armor. nearly all tanks AV12 or AV11 in the front, AV11 in the sides and AV10 in the rear. It meant every edition the competitive players would just figure out a 'solve' for the meta, and from the research ive done on 4th edition, it was no different - competitive lists were stuff like "heres my 6 gun-wielding carnifexes and my minimum ripper troops" and the like. in 7th, the edition I know the best, grav and strength 6 weaponry represented a 'solution' to 90% of the defenses in the edition, for almost the entire extent of the edition.
Pick any edition and look at a tournament-winning list, and then look at a tournament-winning list right now. Odds are EXTREMELY good that youre going to see drastically more variety in what people take in their unit choices, precisely because they've finally finally broken free of the idiotic self-restriction of creating 4-5 balance levers for durability but making 95% of the units in the game durable in exactly the same ways. And the types of units that have issues - say, vehicles atm - are having issues exactly because they havent diversified their defenses at all, you can 'solve' for vehicles by just taking something that will be optimally effective vs T7 3+.
But now if youre talking about elite infantry - do i take D2 to tailor vs marines? do I take D1 because I might be up against Necrons or Sisters who make my D2 pointless? Do I take AP, or is the elite unit im going to be up against Harlequins or Custodes, with solid invulnerable saves? Will the elite unit be T3, T4, or T5 - there are actual units in the meta at appreciable quantities that actually have all those values.
Invulns, high toughness+wounds with low save, to-hit mods, -1 damage, feel no pain, res prots, 1+ saves and ignore AP, all operate differently now, which makes finding "the perfect profile" much more difficult and the meta much more diverse. I have many problems with the current edition, but this is undeniably one of the things that is the best about it, and wanting to go back to the old days in this regard is just idiotic.
Gathering data and short on time atm, but already posted from earlier in the thread:
Pre 8th, Heavy Bolter (BS agnostic) vs.
Marine 3x .666 x .333 = .6 wounds
Guardsmen 3 x .83 = 2.49 wounds
Post 8th Heavy Bolter (BS agnostic) vs.
Marine 3x .666 x .5 = .999 wounds
Guardsmen 3x .666 x .83 = 1.65 wounds
Old system naturally provided for more diversity of defensive profiles, while the new system mashes them together. Old system also has hard cutoffs where weapons can no longer even hope to damage a defensive profile. Also Lasguns were AP -, Shootas AP 6, so some pretty major players were using less than AP 5. While Fleshborers were AP5, Devourers were AP -. So basic troops of IG, Orks and Nids, being canonically the most numerous factions of 40K.
The new system you laud for it's "diversity of defensive profiles" is the same one where lasguns and boltguns are strangely equally effective against T5, Orks and Immortals. At the same time the side effect of giving Marines 2W is taking a big dump on basically every other troops unit.
Edit: Getting bent out of shape over Las/Plas seems pretty silly. That's an AT weapon and an Anti-Elite weapon. Throw that in a Tac Squad and you have a unit with weapons against anti-light infantry, anti-elite, and anti-tank. That seems to be a rather ideal spread of weapons against a spread of targets.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/11/29 10:11:45
I think that you are using the wrong example with the heavy bolter.
The heavy bolter was a terribly bad weapon against marines pre 8th, which was redesigned to become a good marine killer in recent editions.
You are also not accounting for the damage/wound system.
Using a more apt example, let's look at lasguns, which stayed exactly as they were.
A BS agnostic shot of lasgun used to kill 0.11 marines and 0.33 guards.
Now that same shot still kills 0.33 guards, but only 0.055 marines.
In this case you can see that the defensive profiles were actually broadened.
Let's use a weapon with AP, inferno bolters.
An inferno bolter shot killed 0.66 guards, and 0.5 marines.
Now that same bolter shot kills 0.66 guards and 0.16 marines.
Again, you can see that the difference between the defensive profiles was increased.
Now let's look at a weapon which also changed in damage. Force swords (using the 8th version before the strenght buff).
A swing from this weapon killed 0,66 guards and 0,50 marines. Now, a swing from this weapon kills 0,66 guards and 0,42 marines. They remained almost the same.
As you can see, GW acted on the problem of defensive profiles by introducing a third degree of freedom, the wound/damage system. This makes it possible to model many more defensive profiles compared to previous editions.
Every edition I played before the 8e/9e paradigm suffered from a massive problem with there being 'ideal weapon values' that the most competitive builds defaulted towards. All las-plas razorbacks. All missile launcher long fangs. All wave serpents. etc. The natural tendency of GW to pull all baseline troops towards the T3 6+/5+ W1 statline where nearly every basic anti-troop weapon in the game got AP5 handed out like candy, rendering all distinctions moot. The tendency to make nearly all elites and characters T4 with 3+ or 2+ armor. nearly all tanks AV12 or AV11 in the front, AV11 in the sides and AV10 in the rear. It meant every edition the competitive players would just figure out a 'solve' for the meta, and from the research ive done on 4th edition, it was no different - competitive lists were stuff like "heres my 6 gun-wielding carnifexes and my minimum ripper troops" and the like. in 7th, the edition I know the best, grav and strength 6 weaponry represented a 'solution' to 90% of the defenses in the edition, for almost the entire extent of the edition.
Pick any edition and look at a tournament-winning list, and then look at a tournament-winning list right now. Odds are EXTREMELY good that youre going to see drastically more variety in what people take in their unit choices, precisely because they've finally finally broken free of the idiotic self-restriction of creating 4-5 balance levers for durability but making 95% of the units in the game durable in exactly the same ways. And the types of units that have issues - say, vehicles atm - are having issues exactly because they havent diversified their defenses at all, you can 'solve' for vehicles by just taking something that will be optimally effective vs T7 3+.
But now if youre talking about elite infantry - do i take D2 to tailor vs marines? do I take D1 because I might be up against Necrons or Sisters who make my D2 pointless? Do I take AP, or is the elite unit im going to be up against Harlequins or Custodes, with solid invulnerable saves? Will the elite unit be T3, T4, or T5 - there are actual units in the meta at appreciable quantities that actually have all those values.
Invulns, high toughness+wounds with low save, to-hit mods, -1 damage, feel no pain, res prots, 1+ saves and ignore AP, all operate differently now, which makes finding "the perfect profile" much more difficult and the meta much more diverse. I have many problems with the current edition, but this is undeniably one of the things that is the best about it, and wanting to go back to the old days in this regard is just idiotic.
Gathering data and short on time atm, but already posted from earlier in the thread:
Pre 8th, Heavy Bolter (BS agnostic) vs.
Marine 3x .666 x .333 = .6 wounds
Guardsmen 3 x .83 = 2.49 wounds
Post 8th Heavy Bolter (BS agnostic) vs.
Marine 3x .666 x .5 = .999 wounds
Guardsmen 3x .666 x .83 = 1.65 wounds
Old system naturally provided for more diversity of defensive profiles, while the new system mashes them together. Old system also has hard cutoffs where weapons can no longer even hope to damage a defensive profile. Also Lasguns were AP -, Shootas AP 6, so some pretty major players were using less than AP 5. While Fleshborers were AP5, Devourers were AP -. So basic troops of IG, Orks and Nids, being canonically the most numerous factions of 40K.
The new system you laud for it's "diversity of defensive profiles" is the same one where lasguns and boltguns are strangely equally effective against T5, Orks and Immortals. At the same time the side effect of giving Marines 2W is taking a big dump on basically every other troops unit.
Edit: Getting bent out of shape over Las/Plas seems pretty silly. That's an AT weapon and an Anti-Elite weapon. Throw that in a Tac Squad and you have a unit with weapons against anti-light infantry, anti-elite, and anti-tank. That seems to be a rather ideal spread of weapons against a spread of targets.
...Come on, Insectum, try a few more examples buddy, dont just assume everyone's gonna take your word on literally one single weapon example that they literally changed to be more of an anti-MEQ weapon in a weapon update by making it D2
(all examples are assuming auto-hits to remove ballistic skill)
boltgun pre-8 vs
guardsman 1.332
kabalite 1.332
ork boy 1
marine .33
boltgun 9th vs
guardsman .887
kabalite .666
ork boy .554
marine .1665
plasma pre-8 vs
guardsman 1.666
kabalite 1.666
ork boy 1.666
marine 1.666
(Gets Hot means 1s always kill the bearer)
plasma 9th vs
guardsman 1.666
kabalite 1.387
ork boy 1.332
marine 1.387
(1s only kill the bearer vs Marine)
Battlecannon pre-8th vs
guardsman .833
kabalite .833
ork boy .833
marine .833
Battlecannon 9th vs
Guardsman .833
kabalite .694
ork boy .666
space marine .666
assault cannon pre-8th vs
guardsman 5
kabalite 5
ork boy 5
space marine 2
assault cannon 9th vs
guardsman 4.16
kabalite 3.33
ork boy 4
space marine 1
Damn, I sure miss pre-8th! I remember the good old days when my non-marine units' stats seemed to never matter at all ever, or were just the same because everybody and their mother was just T3 5+!
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/11/29 13:04:18
"Got you, Yugi! Your Rubric Marines can't fall back because I have declared the tertiary kaptaris ka'tah stance two, after the secondary dacatarai ka'tah last turn!"
"So you think, Kaiba! I declared my Thousand Sons the cult of Duplicity, which means all my psykers have access to the Sorcerous Facade power! Furthermore I will spend 8 Cabal Points to invoke Cabbalistic Focus, causing the rubrics to appear behind your custodes! The Vengeance for the Wronged and Sorcerous Fullisade stratagems along with the Malefic Maelstrom infernal pact evoked earlier in the command phase allows me to double their firepower, letting me wound on 2s and 3s!"
"you think it is you who has gotten me, yugi, but it is I who have gotten you! I declare the ever-vigilant stratagem to attack your rubrics with my custodes' ranged weapons, which with the new codex are now DAMAGE 2!!"
"...which leads you straight into my trap, Kaiba, you see I now declare the stratagem Implacable Automata, reducing all damage from your attacks by 1 and triggering my All is Dust special rule!"
2021/11/29 13:57:38
Subject: Re:2W marines should get rolled back to 1W
New AP system is primarily (not entierly) what requires us to look into other avenues of durability. It inheritley favors low armor 5+/6+ units that didnt get armor before and punishes those who use to ignore it.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/11/29 14:01:44
New AP system is primarily (not entierly) what requires us to look into other avenues of durability. It inheritley favors low armor 5+/6+ units that didnt get armor before and punishes those who use to ignore it.
Are you intentionally or un-intentionally skipping over the fact that marines are W2 now (thus dividing the damage number for marines in half)?
the main purpose of my breakdown is just: I enjoy that 9th has added a large number of mechanics that actually meaningfully differentiate various types of units from each other in terms of durability. I don't like how muddy the waters have become in terms of adding in strats, auras, subfactions, doctrines, etc, but I like that even within the umbrella of "Space Marines" you have
-Disgustingly Resilient (-1D)
-All is Dust (if 1D then +1sv)
-Storm Shields (+1Sv effectively negating -1AP)
-Inner Circle (only wound on 4+)
That uncertainty moves 40k away from a game that can be 'solved' purely at the strategic level, and incentivizes a varied offensive array on the part of the player as opposed to just stacking on the same weapon types.
In particular, I love the decision to make Dreadnoughts -1D, which makes D2 weaponry the single least effective weapon against them. In my eyes the only problem with this was the fact that they then also left out every other marine vehicle from getting that rule - I'd have called it 'armored ceramite' or something, and had marine vehicles in general have lower wound counts but -1 damage - basically naturally fixing the issue with moving all marines to a W2 base incentivizing opponents to stack D2. As it stands, people are basically just only taking dreadnoughts in their marine armies because it naturally fixes an army wide weakness while other vehicles have zero purpose within the marine ecosystem.
if you want 'the scot take' - we need to differentiate vehicle statlines much much further than they currently are. I like the new paradigm of necron vehicles, I dont mind Ramshackle that much though I do think with its edition you really need to make sure to create a whole faction category of vehicles and monsters that really are not a fan of autocannon-equivalent weaponry to compensate. I'd make Eldar, GSC, and Dark Eldar heavy units around a baseline tough value of 6 and give them a mechanic that incentivizes multiple shots while disincentivizing single shots, and I'd make tyranid monsters extremely high toughness and wounds but with a very low save value.
You can basically resolve the deadliness problem by buffing up cover and stripping away layers of rules bloat. Ditch the 'doctrine' layer of army-wide rules/make it narrative only or whatever, and redesign strats to be like AOS rather than the current state of the game where theyre basically just a way to on-demand double or triple a couple units' firepower throughout the game.
"Got you, Yugi! Your Rubric Marines can't fall back because I have declared the tertiary kaptaris ka'tah stance two, after the secondary dacatarai ka'tah last turn!"
"So you think, Kaiba! I declared my Thousand Sons the cult of Duplicity, which means all my psykers have access to the Sorcerous Facade power! Furthermore I will spend 8 Cabal Points to invoke Cabbalistic Focus, causing the rubrics to appear behind your custodes! The Vengeance for the Wronged and Sorcerous Fullisade stratagems along with the Malefic Maelstrom infernal pact evoked earlier in the command phase allows me to double their firepower, letting me wound on 2s and 3s!"
"you think it is you who has gotten me, yugi, but it is I who have gotten you! I declare the ever-vigilant stratagem to attack your rubrics with my custodes' ranged weapons, which with the new codex are now DAMAGE 2!!"
"...which leads you straight into my trap, Kaiba, you see I now declare the stratagem Implacable Automata, reducing all damage from your attacks by 1 and triggering my All is Dust special rule!"
While I like the idea of such a rule, it would just take one high AP shot to take down the shield before melta works just as well as it did before.
7 Ork facts people always get wrong: Ragnar did not win against Thrakka, but suffered two crushing defeats within a few days of each other. A lasgun is powerful enough to sever an ork's appendage or head in a single, well aimed shot. Orks meks have a better understanding of electrics and mechanics than most Tech Priests. Orks do not think that purple makes them harder to see. They do think that camouflage does however, without knowing why. Gharkull Blackfang did not even come close to killing the emperor. Orks can be corrupted by chaos, but few of them have any interest in what chaos offers. Orks do not have the power of believe.
The third dimension if you want to argue that line has always been points.
Back in 7th mass S6 AP- shooting was great because yes, you could mow down Marines and Terminators (who had their full save, but were wounded on 2s), provided instant-death versus T3 characters, and also wounded T8 and glanced AV12 on 6s.
But... if Scatbikes (for instance) had been dramatically more expensive or nerfed (as they surely would have been if GW had operated a vaguely active FAQ programme back then), every Eldar Army wouldn't have turned up with a huge amount of this attack profile.
In a similar note, 8th ended up dominated by mid-strength, mid-AP, 2 damage weapons with lots of rerolls because such weapons were far too cheap compared with everything else. 9th by contrast brought the triplewhammie of generally nerfing these things hard (see the slow rehabilitation of the Dissie) and -1 damage armies which make 2 damage attacks utterly awful - while generally buffing the "D6 damage" style weapons.
It has been a consistent problem with GW - something that is too good or too weak one edition gets 2-3 boosts or nerfs rather than just 1, pushing it from weak to OP or OP to useless. If I didn't have a low opinion of the talent and professionalism of the GW design studio when it comes to rules, I'd say they did it on purpose. Instead I think they are well meaning but incompetent.
Tyel wrote: The third dimension if you want to argue that line has always been points.
Back in 7th mass S6 AP- shooting was great because yes, you could mow down Marines and Terminators (who had their full save, but were wounded on 2s), provided instant-death versus T3 characters, and also wounded T8 and glanced AV12 on 6s.
But... if Scatbikes (for instance) had been dramatically more expensive or nerfed (as they surely would have been if GW had operated a vaguely active FAQ programme back then), every Eldar Army wouldn't have turned up with a huge amount of this attack profile.
Aside, there's also the matter of availability.
40k tended towards a rough paradigm wherein most units - and troops especially - couldn't just spam heavy or special weapons. There did exist specialist units but these were generally limited to footslogging with few to no additional advantages. So for example, a Chaos Chosen unit could all take plasmaguns but if you wanted the extra toughness and mobility afforded to Chaos Bikers, you were limited to just one special weapon per three men - the rest were stuck with bolters.
However, Eldar bikes broke this completely - they were jetbikes with (in addition to extra toughness and speed) a 4++ *and* a JSJ ability, yet you could freely outfit the entire unit with Scatter Lasers or Splinter Cannons (which, being naturally Relentless, they could fire on the move without penalty). Oh, and they were a troop unit. By comparison, the closest comparable DE unit was a fast attack choice which was limited to one special weapon per 3 bikers.
If Eldar had had to pay for 3 jetbikes to get just 1 scatter laser or splinter cannon, it might have made them a far less appealing option.
blood reaper wrote: I will respect human rights and trans people but I will never under any circumstances use the phrase 'folks' or 'ya'll'. I would rather be killed by firing squad.
the_scotsman wrote: Yeah, when i read the small novel that is the Death Guard unit options and think about resolving the attacks from a melee-oriented min size death guard squad, the thing that springs to mind is "Accessible!"
Argive wrote: GW seems to have a crystal ball and just pulls hairbrained ideas out of their backside for the most part.
You're not. If you're worried about your opponent using 'fake' rules, you're having fun the wrong way. This hobby isn't about rules. It's about buying Citadel miniatures.
Please report to your nearest GW store for attitude readjustment. Take your wallet.
Tyel wrote: The third dimension if you want to argue that line has always been points.
Back in 7th mass S6 AP- shooting was great because yes, you could mow down Marines and Terminators (who had their full save, but were wounded on 2s), provided instant-death versus T3 characters, and also wounded T8 and glanced AV12 on 6s.
But... if Scatbikes (for instance) had been dramatically more expensive or nerfed (as they surely would have been if GW had operated a vaguely active FAQ programme back then), every Eldar Army wouldn't have turned up with a huge amount of this attack profile.
Aside, there's also the matter of availability.
40k tended towards a rough paradigm wherein most units - and troops especially - couldn't just spam heavy or special weapons. There did exist specialist units but these were generally limited to footslogging with few to no additional advantages. So for example, a Chaos Chosen unit could all take plasmaguns but if you wanted the extra toughness and mobility afforded to Chaos Bikers, you were limited to just one special weapon per three men - the rest were stuck with bolters.
However, Eldar bikes broke this completely - they were jetbikes with (in addition to extra toughness and speed) a 4++ *and* a JSJ ability, yet you could freely outfit the entire unit with Scatter Lasers or Splinter Cannons (which, being naturally Relentless, they could fire on the move without penalty). Oh, and they were a troop unit. By comparison, the closest comparable DE unit was a fast attack choice which was limited to one special weapon per 3 bikers.
If Eldar had had to pay for 3 jetbikes to get just 1 scatter laser or splinter cannon, it might have made them a far less appealing option.
Sure. And it always, always....didnt work, because people would always just take the version of the unit that could spam weapons and then spam them.
its like people didnt play these old editions - do people not remember 'every guard squad is a triple-plasma vet squad, every kabalite squad is a blasterborn squad, every dreadnought is double the same ranged weapon on each arm, every jetbike squad is all scatter lasers, yadda yadda yadda yadda'?
turns out people can do math. Go figure!
"Got you, Yugi! Your Rubric Marines can't fall back because I have declared the tertiary kaptaris ka'tah stance two, after the secondary dacatarai ka'tah last turn!"
"So you think, Kaiba! I declared my Thousand Sons the cult of Duplicity, which means all my psykers have access to the Sorcerous Facade power! Furthermore I will spend 8 Cabal Points to invoke Cabbalistic Focus, causing the rubrics to appear behind your custodes! The Vengeance for the Wronged and Sorcerous Fullisade stratagems along with the Malefic Maelstrom infernal pact evoked earlier in the command phase allows me to double their firepower, letting me wound on 2s and 3s!"
"you think it is you who has gotten me, yugi, but it is I who have gotten you! I declare the ever-vigilant stratagem to attack your rubrics with my custodes' ranged weapons, which with the new codex are now DAMAGE 2!!"
"...which leads you straight into my trap, Kaiba, you see I now declare the stratagem Implacable Automata, reducing all damage from your attacks by 1 and triggering my All is Dust special rule!"
2021/11/29 17:05:08
Subject: Re:2W marines should get rolled back to 1W
Are you intentionally or un-intentionally skipping over the fact that marines are W2 now (thus dividing the damage number for marines in half)?
You are ignoring the purpose of Insectum7's original discussion point. Breaking down WOUNDS caused per gun is the factor that matters when determining the lethality of a weapon. The ap system using the old profiles from 7th is what caused a breakdown in 8th and a complete re-assessment of the stat lines in 9th, hence the 2nd wound on marines, bonus T on orks etc etc.
I am not advocating the reversion to the pre-8th stat lines or AP system. I am simply stating that you are misrepresenting the position that Insectum7 was making.
...
-Disgustingly Resilient (-1D)
-All is Dust (if 1D then +1sv)
-Storm Shields (+1Sv effectively negating -1AP)
-Inner Circle (only wound on 4+)
That uncertainty moves 40k away from a game that can be 'solved' purely at the strategic level, and incentivizes a varied offensive array on the part of the player as opposed to just stacking on the same weapon types.
The pre-8th system had numerous methods of durability modification, though it wasn't as necessary because armor actually meant something.
Cover saves being actual pseudo invuls
Going to ground
Jink
Feel no Pain
The entire AV system for vehicles
The S:T chart having caps
The ap system is a rip off of the Rend system from Sigmar, which also takes its roots from WHFB, but every profile in that game was designed from the ground up with this system in mind, when it was ported into 8th, they just copy and pasted the stat lines from 7th, which doesn't work.
There is growing pains right now because not all of the profiles have been updated to fully realize the introduction of AP modifying save. It certainly feels a lot like the old ALL or NOTHING style of armor, but instead it's "Do you have an invul?" if you don't too bad, no Armor for you. This style of play only affects elite armies that use to rely on their good armor save now, its reliant on excess wounds, bonus damage mitigation rules and invuls.
You can basically resolve the deadliness problem by buffing up cover and stripping away layers of rules bloat. Ditch the 'doctrine' layer of army-wide rules/make it narrative only or whatever, and redesign strats to be like AOS rather than the current state of the game where theyre basically just a way to on-demand double or triple a couple units' firepower throughout the game.
Also, this 100%. Sigmar Command abilities are way more balanced. There is counter-play by tying the usage of them to the heroes. If 40k could adopt this it would be amazing.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/11/29 17:16:34
Well yeah. What I'm trying to say is that it would be good to get rules to encourage this asymmetry - i.e. you want one weapon type for Marines, another for DG, another for Orks, another for Tyranids etc etc - but if points mess it up, people end up with the weapons the the power/point ratio encourages.
Which I guess is obvious - but I thought it a more meaningful point that arguing about whether Heavy Bolters were any good in 7th (at least by my memory, they weren't.)
Sure. And it always, always....didnt work, because people would always just take the version of the unit that could spam weapons and then spam them.
its like people didnt play these old editions - do people not remember 'every guard squad is a triple-plasma vet squad, every kabalite squad is a blasterborn squad, every dreadnought is double the same ranged weapon on each arm, every jetbike squad is all scatter lasers, yadda yadda yadda yadda'?
Sure, but you were also more limited in how many of those you could take.
You could take 3 Blasterborn squads but then (assuming the old FOC) that's your entire Elite selection gone. Plus you needed to take transports for each of them if you actually wanted them to accomplish anything. You can take 3 Havocs but that's your entire heavy support section gone.
With scatter-bikes, you were able to spam heavy weapons with troops. So not only could you take twice as many of them (as well as fulfilling mandatory slots), you also left your elite, FA and HS slots free for spamming even more weapons. Also, unlike units like Blasterborn (which required additional costs in the form of transports) or units like Havocs (which, until very recently, couldn't move and shoot), they had mobility and relentless built in.
I'm also not even sure why you talk about old editions as if this has meaningfully changed. Are people now taking 4 different weapons on their Havoc units? I guess Trueborn have since ceased to exist but otherwise I'm not aware of any great change in the ability of units to spam weapons and the fact that players will naturally tend towards that when able.
All I was saying was that you typically had to look to elite or HS slots to spam weapons, and on units with additional mobility (like bikes or jetbikes) you generally still couldn't get a 1:1 ratio of models to heavy/special weapons. Thus, being able to spam heavy weapons on a jetbike unit that could be taken as troops constituted an insane change to the formula.
blood reaper wrote: I will respect human rights and trans people but I will never under any circumstances use the phrase 'folks' or 'ya'll'. I would rather be killed by firing squad.
the_scotsman wrote: Yeah, when i read the small novel that is the Death Guard unit options and think about resolving the attacks from a melee-oriented min size death guard squad, the thing that springs to mind is "Accessible!"
Argive wrote: GW seems to have a crystal ball and just pulls hairbrained ideas out of their backside for the most part.
You're not. If you're worried about your opponent using 'fake' rules, you're having fun the wrong way. This hobby isn't about rules. It's about buying Citadel miniatures.
Please report to your nearest GW store for attitude readjustment. Take your wallet.
...Come on, Insectum, try a few more examples buddy, dont just assume everyone's gonna take your word . . .
If you read my post I did say that I didn't have the time to do a full workup. (Hint, it was the very first sentence) I'll get to it, don't you worry.
That said:
the_scotsman 801877 11263911 wrote:
turns out people can do math. Go figure!
But are they doing the right math?
"boltgun pre-8 vs
guardsman 1.332
kabalite 1.332. Revised to 4+ save .666
ork boy 1
marine .333
boltgun 9th vs
guardsman .887
kabalite .666
ork boy .554. Revised to T4 .83
marine .1665" Removing extra wound .333
The profile of the Kabalite has changed to 4+, which changes the math. Better to just say T3 4+ in that case, such as a Dire Avenger or Tau Fire Warrior. You'll get a more honest assessment. Doing likewise with Ork profile.
In the case of the boltgun, the extra wound on the Marine is required in order to get a spread of results greater than pre 8th. Stats like T and Save were adjustable under the old system as well, so could have been implemented if desired.
....I'm sorry, why is it more "honest" to evaluate the offensive stat changes of weapons vs the same defensive stats when both were changed, and this is a thread discussing the defensive change to make marines W2?
The point i'm trying to make is that GW DIDNT make adjustments to, for example, ork toughness or kabalite save in older editions. Basic statlines were this sacred cow for 4 straight editions even when they became increasingly comical (see: Marines at 1A as HuMaNiTyS GrEaTeSt WaRrIoRs).
Now theyre changing them. That's good. Thats a positive to the current edition. Thats the argument I'm making. If your counter-argument is "if you ignore the changes, less change has occurred" then you got me, I concede that point wholeheartedly.
"Got you, Yugi! Your Rubric Marines can't fall back because I have declared the tertiary kaptaris ka'tah stance two, after the secondary dacatarai ka'tah last turn!"
"So you think, Kaiba! I declared my Thousand Sons the cult of Duplicity, which means all my psykers have access to the Sorcerous Facade power! Furthermore I will spend 8 Cabal Points to invoke Cabbalistic Focus, causing the rubrics to appear behind your custodes! The Vengeance for the Wronged and Sorcerous Fullisade stratagems along with the Malefic Maelstrom infernal pact evoked earlier in the command phase allows me to double their firepower, letting me wound on 2s and 3s!"
"you think it is you who has gotten me, yugi, but it is I who have gotten you! I declare the ever-vigilant stratagem to attack your rubrics with my custodes' ranged weapons, which with the new codex are now DAMAGE 2!!"
"...which leads you straight into my trap, Kaiba, you see I now declare the stratagem Implacable Automata, reducing all damage from your attacks by 1 and triggering my All is Dust special rule!"
2021/11/29 19:52:30
Subject: Re:2W marines should get rolled back to 1W
Tittliewinks22 wrote: The ap system is a rip off of the Rend system from Sigmar, which also takes its roots from WHFB, but every profile in that game was designed from the ground up with this system in mind, when it was ported into 8th, they just copy and pasted the stat lines from 7th, which doesn't work.
Oh, you sweet summer child...
The armour modification system was used back in Rogue Trader and Warhammer 40,000 2nd edition, before the move to the AP system for 3rd through 7th editions. It's a reversion to a previous mechanic, not something lifted from AOS.
Given WHFB was around first, it was probably initially taken from the early editions of WHFB into RT.
Gamgee on Tau Players wrote:we all kill cats and sell our own families to the devil and eat live puppies.
Kanluwen wrote: This is, emphatically, why I will continue suggesting nuking Guard and starting over again. It's a legacy army that needs to be rebooted with a new focal point.
Confirmation of why no-one should listen to Kanluwen when it comes to the IG - he doesn't want the IG, he want's Kan's New Model Army...
tneva82 wrote: You aren't even trying ty pretend for honest arqument. Open bad faith trolling.
- No reason to keep this here, unless people want to use it for something...
2021/11/29 20:33:55
Subject: Re:2W marines should get rolled back to 1W
New AP system is primarily (not entierly) what requires us to look into other avenues of durability. It inheritley favors low armor 5+/6+ units that didnt get armor before and punishes those who use to ignore it.
And the new cover rules inherently favors armies with good armor. I used to get a 4+ save on my models when in cover, now its a 5+, Marines used to get a 4+ in cover, now its a 2+.
the_scotsman wrote: ....I'm sorry, why is it more "honest" to evaluate the offensive stat changes of weapons vs the same defensive stats when both were changed, and this is a thread discussing the defensive change to make marines W2?
Well, were Marines 2w, Orks T5 and Kabalites 4+ save during 8th?
What problem is 2w Marines trying to solve?
My point is that 8th ed decreased differentiation between defensive profiles through changes to both the AP system, to-wound paradigm, and for vehicles, AV.
9th appears to be addressing this issue primarily by boosting Marines in a way that leaves other other factions behind along the wrong axis of differentiation, specifically being problematic by reducing the effectiveness of basic weapons and CC attacks, areas that were really not the cause of the issues players like yourself seem to espouse. If the problem was the spamming of mid range, high-ROF weapons, well the solution appears to hit basic weapons harder instead. That's a big miss.
The point i'm trying to make is that GW DIDNT make adjustments to, for example, ork toughness or kabalite save in older editions. Basic statlines were this sacred cow for 4 straight editions even
Untrue. Necrons were shifted downward, both in T (Immortals) and Sv (Warriors). Eldar Guardians gained WS4 BS4. Dark Reapers I think went from 4+ to 3+ sv. Bloodletters lost a point of Toughness somewhere along the way. There are more examples I'm sure.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Spoletta wrote: I think that you are using the wrong example with the heavy bolter.
The heavy bolter was a terribly bad weapon against marines pre 8th, which was redesigned to become a good marine killer in recent editions.
A Heavy Bolter what???
The Marine save went from a 3+, to a 4+. That's the only change. That's the difference between "terribly bad" and "good killer"?
You are also not accounting for the damage/wound system.
Using a more apt example, let's look at lasguns, which stayed exactly as they were.
A BS agnostic shot of lasgun used to kill 0.11 marines and 0.33 guards.
Now that same shot still kills 0.33 guards, but only 0.055 marines.
In this case you can see that the defensive profiles were actually broadened.
But were LASGUNS really the problem? Were basic rifles really the reason Marines didn't feel tougher in earlier editions? Or was it maybe. . . Oh I dunno. . . Hellturkeys? Plasma and Starcannon Spam? Whatever the big gun on the Riptide is called? Etc. Etc.
Could there have been other fixes? That's another good question to ask too. Different cover mechanics? A better ability for Marines to engage high-threat targets (such as a Multi-damage Lascannon against Targets like Riptides).
This message was edited 5 times. Last update was at 2021/11/29 21:53:12
It is true that turkeys removed them in swats, like many weapons do now by the way. The difference is that right now you need an anti heavy infantry weapon to clear them, while they resist quite well to small caliber weapons.
In previous editions they were not only vulnerable to plasma pies, they were also quite reasonably killed with small weapons. The marine profile sucked terribly, and in fact you never saw them on tables (not without a free transport at least). It was vulnerable to both high power and low power weapons.
Terminators were even worse. A wrong 2+ save and that was one terminator in the bin. They were terrified by lasguns, shuriken catapults, boltguns and similar weapons. They were only good against AP3 weapons.
In fact I don't remember seeing many terminators on older edition tables.
To counteract this, GW was forced to progressively reduce the cost of the marines, until they became almost an horde army. We all thought that was wrong, I don't think anyone disagrees with that.
Now with this new wound/damage system, terminators are no longer scared of rolling a 1 against a lasgun, so they can finally be properly costed. Marines are finally back to being 20 point models, because they now indeed feel like 20 point models.
I feel the issue with Marines - and one shared with many units without bespoke stats - was the old problem of "base points for attack+defence" and then paying a flat block for +attack options.
So I don't think basic Marines at 14 points were that bad defensively with T4 and a 3+ save in either 7th or 8th. The problem was that a boltgun and a single S4 punch had grown progressively obsolete for 14 points.
The issue was that if you blinged them out with special weapons to up the damage they doubled in price. And at say 24-34 points but still only 1 T4 3+ save wound were now incredibly fragile.
So I think GW recognised that unless you want everything to be a glasshammer, units need to gain a balance of both offensive and defensive stats when they go up in points. The problem is that this has been intermittently implemented, creating the meta of the last 6 months.
Spoletta wrote: Yes, basic weapons were the problem for marines.
. . .
In previous editions they were not only vulnerable to plasma pies, they were also quite reasonably killed with small weapons. The marine profile sucked terribly, and in fact you never saw them on tables (not without a free transport at least). It was vulnerable to both high power and low power weapons.
It took 5 Marines Rapid-Firing Bolters to kill a single Marine. 2x .666 x.5×.333 ×5 = 1.1
It took 10 Guardsmen to do the same (20 shots).
That seems just fine. Espescially in an era where Guardsman had no save vs.Bolters, and Flamers took them off the table in droves.
. . .
Here's my big beef with the old system though. Cover helped Marines not one bit against low AP weapons. If we're really going to point to an issue of those editions, I'd put it on that.
Tyel wrote: I feel the issue with Marines - and one shared with many units without bespoke stats - was the old problem of "base points for attack+defence" and then paying a flat block for +attack options.
So I don't think basic Marines at 14 points were that bad defensively with T4 and a 3+ save in either 7th or 8th. The problem was that a boltgun and a single S4 punch had grown progressively obsolete for 14 points.
The issue was that if you blinged them out with special weapons to up the damage they doubled in price. And at say 24-34 points but still only 1 T4 3+ save wound were now incredibly fragile.
So I think GW recognised that unless you want everything to be a glasshammer, units need to gain a balance of both offensive and defensive stats when they go up in points. The problem is that this has been intermittently implemented, creating the meta of the last 6 months.
This. There's an odd shift where some people want the game to be less lethal but I'm not sure they're not the same people who felt bolters were underwhelming. Which is how we kind of end up how we are now as you say.
Tyel wrote: I feel the issue with Marines - and one shared with many units without bespoke stats - was the old problem of "base points for attack+defence" and then paying a flat block for +attack options.
So I don't think basic Marines at 14 points were that bad defensively with T4 and a 3+ save in either 7th or 8th. The problem was that a boltgun and a single S4 punch had grown progressively obsolete for 14 points.
The issue was that if you blinged them out with special weapons to up the damage they doubled in price. And at say 24-34 points but still only 1 T4 3+ save wound were now incredibly fragile.
So I think GW recognised that unless you want everything to be a glasshammer, units need to gain a balance of both offensive and defensive stats when they go up in points. The problem is that this has been intermittently implemented, creating the meta of the last 6 months.
This. There's an odd shift where some people want the game to be less lethal but I'm not sure they're not the same people who felt bolters were underwhelming. Which is how we kind of end up how we are now as you say.
I want the game to be less lethal but outside of a couple exceptions like multi-meltas (which I still contend could have been easily, easily fixed via the exact same thing they did with the dreadnought-mounted plasma cannon, creating a "Heavy Multi-Melta" that gets 2 shots on a couple platforms but keeping regular multi-meltas 1 shot) the ridiculous lethality is not actually caused by the core stats of weaponry, it's caused by the stratagem system, which multiplies with auras, purchaseable abilities, relics, warlord traits and the usually 5 layers of army-wide rules to create ridiculous over the top damage spikes. Theres no reason at all I need to be able to multiply the damage of my Assault Intercessors by 7x on demand.
"Got you, Yugi! Your Rubric Marines can't fall back because I have declared the tertiary kaptaris ka'tah stance two, after the secondary dacatarai ka'tah last turn!"
"So you think, Kaiba! I declared my Thousand Sons the cult of Duplicity, which means all my psykers have access to the Sorcerous Facade power! Furthermore I will spend 8 Cabal Points to invoke Cabbalistic Focus, causing the rubrics to appear behind your custodes! The Vengeance for the Wronged and Sorcerous Fullisade stratagems along with the Malefic Maelstrom infernal pact evoked earlier in the command phase allows me to double their firepower, letting me wound on 2s and 3s!"
"you think it is you who has gotten me, yugi, but it is I who have gotten you! I declare the ever-vigilant stratagem to attack your rubrics with my custodes' ranged weapons, which with the new codex are now DAMAGE 2!!"
"...which leads you straight into my trap, Kaiba, you see I now declare the stratagem Implacable Automata, reducing all damage from your attacks by 1 and triggering my All is Dust special rule!"
Tyel wrote: I feel the issue with Marines - and one shared with many units without bespoke stats - was the old problem of "base points for attack+defence" and then paying a flat block for +attack options.
So I don't think basic Marines at 14 points were that bad defensively with T4 and a 3+ save in either 7th or 8th. The problem was that a boltgun and a single S4 punch had grown progressively obsolete for 14 points.
The issue was that if you blinged them out with special weapons to up the damage they doubled in price. And at say 24-34 points but still only 1 T4 3+ save wound were now incredibly fragile.
So I think GW recognised that unless you want everything to be a glasshammer, units need to gain a balance of both offensive and defensive stats when they go up in points. The problem is that this has been intermittently implemented, creating the meta of the last 6 months.
This. There's an odd shift where some people want the game to be less lethal but I'm not sure they're not the same people who felt bolters were underwhelming. Which is how we kind of end up how we are now as you say.
I want the game to be less lethal but outside of a couple exceptions like multi-meltas (which I still contend could have been easily, easily fixed via the exact same thing they did with the dreadnought-mounted plasma cannon, creating a "Heavy Multi-Melta" that gets 2 shots on a couple platforms but keeping regular multi-meltas 1 shot) the ridiculous lethality is not actually caused by the core stats of weaponry, it's caused by the stratagem system, which multiplies with auras, purchaseable abilities, relics, warlord traits and the usually 5 layers of army-wide rules to create ridiculous over the top damage spikes. Theres no reason at all I need to be able to multiply the damage of my Assault Intercessors by 7x on demand.
Completely agree, it doesn't seem to be slowing down or going away though. I'd personally like to see the bulk of strats removed or consolidated into a greater (but not too great) universal list with a small handful of flavour strats in the armies books. Maybe even the same with traits and relics, I know they attempted this a little in 6th/7th but I feel they'd actually manage a better job now.
Are people now taking 4 different weapons on their Havoc units? I guess Trueborn have since ceased to exist but otherwise I'm not aware of any great change in the ability of units to spam weapons and the fact that players will naturally tend towards that when able.
