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So.... I have successfully avoided Necrons since their new release but over the last 2 weeks I decided to take a stab at em with my IG. Now, in the first two games I completely slaughtered them. However, during this process I noticed several annoying facets of their army design/rules. The primary and all connecting thread was the army's design concept: near complete and sole reliance on special rules for everything! The list is so extensive I would essentially have to re-write their entire codex to list all of their special abilities and how they tie together. The most obvious are "we'll be back," "living metal," their teleportation shenanigans, glancing on 6's with their most common weapon (gause), the Stormlord special character, and crypteks (*sp). All of these abilities presented themselves in the first 2 games but, as I said, it was a slaughter. However, even though it was a veritable slaughter-fest, those rules kept him in the games longer and in the most inexplicably annoying ways (destroyer lord died 4 times and got back up each time, eventually requiring me to assault him with a conscript squad and just disable him from being able to be placed within the the required number of inches of where he died).

The 3rd game was pretty even until I just called it quits due to the level of annoying. Its not that the units themselves are overpowered, its the way their rules fly in the face of expectations at almost every turn. I am sure almost everyone remembers when that one EPIC thing happened that one time in that one game... and it totally saved your butt? Those are the games you remember. The Necrons seems to take those rare once in a blue moon occurrences and make them happen every turn of every game. The other thing is that (showing some of my age here) while in prior editions (3rd for example) you could only use special characters with your opponents permission, in this and the last few editions you can use them willy nilly. That is all fine by me, so long as the characters don't do some too game changing. I am fine with super psycho unstoppable killer guy because he really is able to die if I just shoot him enough. The problem I have is with characters that can change the entire game mechanic at will,e.g., Stormlord. The ability to make an entire turn night-fight (and if you don't make your easy roll you can use a cryptek to re-roll it) gives too much power to one player without the ability for the other player to counter it. I will gladly allow anyone to put a Primarch or whatever on the table, but when a character changes things like whether or not the sun is up.... that is just annoying. While it is true night-fight rules can be countered.... and I did with searchlights, its just annoying. This goes yet again to my thread title; the rule isn't OP its just annoying.

Many game designers of other games have realized that taking too much control away from either player detracts from the enjoyment. After all, who liked early editions of WoW when you could be a sheep for minutes and just keep getting re-sheeped over and over without any real decrease in the time (WoW fixed this a loooong time ago). Giving control of army-wide affecting abilities to a player begins to breach a touchy area. This MAY be ok if there is a way to counter that ability at its heart (some sort of psychic defense that brings the sun back?), and not just fight its side-affects (search lights).

While the Stormlord himself is super annoying, its more than just him. It is the entirety of the army list and its rules design. I don't think many players like playing against an army that has a special ability for every single unit, especially one that negates what damage they were able to get through despite the other army rules that make it extremely hard to do that damage in the first place.

You know what i find anoyying? IG gunlines that dont move the enitre game, for the most part, and just shoot while an army who possesses very few weapons that are beyond range 24" has to move up the board for turns to even get some shots off. God for forbid we make it harder for you to just sit there and pew pew away... Yea necrons, so unfair.

I think you could say this about most armies. Part of 40k is that there are many army-wide affecting special abilities that make each army unique. Many of those are completely not counterable. It has been this way for many years. Necrons have no lock on this, you just encountered them recently.

I hate Necrons too, in my limited experience even when you know all the special rules they have it's still a "gotcha" game going against them. My biggest complaint is MSS and the flying transports that break all the flying transport rules. MSS are so boring, I'd prefer to just have the model removed from play instead of hitting itself and I think everyone knows how frustrating the croissant of doom lists are...

I agree with the initial rant... I lose lots of games but losing to Necrons usually feels like you didn't even get to play the game properly unlike going against all the other armies. "Designed to Tick you Off" is spot on imho.

Honestly I lost allot to necrons as well

My only complaint is that the abilities and units they get are way to cheep to be fair. Something about spam able av13s at low points is just brutal. And unless you’re tailoring your list for high av, generally you won’t be able to do anything. Not to mention the flyers though I haven’t experienced that as much.

They just need a general price adjustment and I think they will be fine. (Though I wish they would adjust that av13 BS quantum shielding [or make it a upgrade that costs a bit])

Everyone has special rules.

The Necrons just have overpowered ones.

I don't necessarily think they are overpowered (which they may be, maybe the lists I faced just didn't seem overpowered). Like I said I slaughtered the first two guys but still found their rules annoying in the process. The 3rd game was pretty uneventful actually. By turn 4 I'd only lost 1 tank, 1 65 points infantry squad, and like 3 guys from a second squad..... like nothing at all for being in turn 4 of a 2000 point game. The annoying thing was that it was turn 4 and I had done just about as little damage to him as he had done to me... and i carry a lot of firepower (2 Vendettas, Manticore, a standard Leman Russ, a Leman Russ executioner (the plasma tank), about 90 infantry, multiple chimeras, etc). I'd get lucky and drop 2 Manticore plates on a bunched up squad and kill a bunch only to have 60% get back up then some nearby vehicle was able to spawn more dudes to replace the ones I had killed. Then, it was night fight so I couldn't target the damn vehicle in the first 2 turns (both vendettas didn't show up till turn 3) while in the mean time he had a squad of warriors teleporting around each turn and some squad of guys with guns like haywire grenades teleporting around as well.

The game essentially went... night fight the every turn (got hopeful when he rolled under on turn 3 but got said again when he got to re-roll with a cryptek... which he said can re-roll a dice every phase....) then I light up a target with search lights and drop tons of pie plates, autocannons, plasma, etc... into a unit except like 1 or 2 guys live then by the start of his turn maybe all but 1 is back (we'll be backs and re-spawns from some vehicle thing). it just continued like that until turn 4 when I decided the game had been going on for 90 minutes and it wasn't even fun cuz nothing was really happening. I was doing enough to keep him off my but that was about it. It was an utter stalemate. Now, I skipped 4th edition but didn't the Necrons 3rd edition codex not allow we'll be back rolls on instant kills (str double the toughness) or from wounds that ignored armor? I can't really remember but when 12 warriors get up after taking a manticore blast to the face... you're left to say "wtf dude"... this is just annoying.

P.S.

To the first response above, my IG are not a gunline and this rant is not about something nefing a gunline's ability. Additionally, this post is not about overpowered special rules. This post is about rules that work in an annoying way. If something is T6 with a 2+ invul and some special rule that allows it to regen wounds... its tough but not annoying. When something can make the entire table subject to night-fighting and you have noway to counter it... that's annoying. When something gets back up turn after turn and you literally have to stand 30 guys over its dead body to keep it from re-spawning, that's annoying.

There is a difference between - tough, competitive, powerful units - and - something that isn't even that powerful but just annoys the hell out of you. The prime example of weak but annoying is the destroyer lord I discussed earlier. The game was effectively over turn 3 but the lord just kept getting back up each turn, would zoom around, die, get up again, die, get up again, etc.... that doesn't even serve a purpose other than to be annoying.... and that is why necrons annoy so many people. I think a lot of players say things like overpowered when they really mean annoying (in reference to necrons) because thats what they are. They aren't necessarily more powerful than any other army, their rules are just designed to work in a manner that pisses off people at a psychological level (e.g., would you be annoyed by having trouble killed 2+ save terminators or by 4+ save necrons that keep getting back up after you do kill them? The first is just a competition of force, the second is an example of head games....)

If nercons didn't have the storm lord, mind shackle scarabs and doom scythes didn't have a nonsense railgun, the codex wouldn't be changed from what it actually is.

So your opponent rolled 12 5+ saves in a roll (or even 4+ with a res orb)? That's just crazy rolling. That happens with every army. Would you post if you played against a Deathwing player and he made 30 2+ saves in a row and complain about how broken terminator armor is?

Necrons have always been an army where you must focus fire them or they will get back up. That's just the way it is.

In the immortal words of Lord Solar Macharius: "Less QQ, more pew pew."

The only way armies can be unique is if they have special rules that are exceptions to the normal base rules.

Necrons represent the faction with hyper advanced technology, to the point where they have mastered the physical universe.

Its quite facinating actually.


And why are you complaining when you are winning? Ok, they have some annoying abilities. Thats what they do. They are immortal space undead that just don't die.

There's a lot about Necrons that's infuriating. Not necessarily because of the fact that it's broken/OP/whatever, but because there's no skill/ability/interactivity involved.

The Stormlord in as an excellent example. As long as he's in the list, you get to have nightfight assured turn 1 and likely turn 2, and get lots of free hits on enemy units that avoid all issues of LoS, Range, targeting restrictions, etc. There's no skill or ability to it, it's just "include stormlord, ensure yourself nightfight and a couple of dead enemy tanks without having to do anything but roll dice at the start of your turn, and your opponent can't do anything about it".

It's stuff like that, hallmarks of Mat Ward books, that isn't just restricted to Necrons, that makes such armies not fun to play. He writes rules like a crazy internet fanboy would, and that's why we get things like Vulkan He'stan, the Stormlord, Draigo, the Sanguinor, AV13 Fast Scouting battle tanks in FA slots, Flyer transports that ignore all the bad things about being a flyer transport, etc.

In direct response, no I would not complain about terminators. They are an example (that I used above) of a unit that is just tough and competitive. If point for point necrons have the exact same effect but achieve it by we'll be back, then yes I will rant. The difference between the two is their annoyance factor. The reason for this is the psychological factor. With terminators you know where you stand when the wounds are caused. If you shoot 4 squads at terminators, deal 7 wounds and he saves 6, you know where you stand. Do the same thing to Necrons and 7 fail their saves but 6 stand back up... its definitely more annoying even though the result is the same. That is the entire point of this post. The way the necron army works is designed in a manner that just pissed players off. It makes them not fun to play against if you constantly feel frustrated. The we'll be back rule is only 1 example of what I am discussing. The ENTIRE book is designed that way.

As an aside, I actually did play against a Deathwing army in 5th edition that made 62 saves in a row (you remember things like that)! I was flabbergasted but nowhere near as annoyed as when Necrons do their shenanigans. My rant was not even aimed at Necron players but rather simply at the way their list is designed to work. Its bad rule writing as games that require 2 players should be designed to be entertaining to both players, not enjoyable to one and infuriating to the other. And while I am stating my opinion in different format than others, which just claim they are overpowered, I believe most of those complaints are actually the result of the Necron annoyance factor and not any really overpowered aspects.

 DKokCommissar wrote:
If you shoot 4 squads at terminators, deal 7 wounds and he haves 6, you know where you stand. Do the same thing to Necrons and 7 fail their saves but 6 stand back up... its definitely more annoying even though the result is the same. That is the entire point of this post. The way the necron army works is designed in a manner that just pissed players off. It makes them not fun to play against if you constantly feel frustrated. The we'll be back rule is only 1 example of what I am discussing. The ENTIRE book is designed that way.

You know exactly where you stand (on average) with Necrons as well, if you do the math:
Put 24 wounds on Terminators, 4 die.
Put 24 wounds on Necrons, 12 die. 4 Get back up if you didn't wipe the squad.

The math isn't difficult. it is a 5+ (or 4+ with wargear) to stand back up. Your examples of 6 of 7 dead necrons standing back up are just unlikely. That's why I brought up 30 2+ saves in a row, it is also very unlikely. Your example is like saying that guardsmen are broken because they made 6 of 7 5+ armor saves. No, the dice were broken in that case, not the rules for the unit.

You say its because you know where you stand with Terminators, but you don't with Necrons?

Well, you obviously know that WBB on 3+ armor is the same as a straight 2+ save(assuming nothing is ignoring any saves)

So how can you be surprised?


Its the same durability through a different mechanic. You simply plan accordingly.

Killing Immortals requires a different strategy then killing Terminators.

The Terminators can get roasted by a Demolisher cannon. The Immortals get their WBB against it. Both have the same durability.

However, the Immortals don't get their WBB if the entire squad is gone. Terminators get their 5+ invuln always.



Part of the fun of this game is applying the proper counter to the right target.

A longer ranged battlecannon will have the same effect on the Immortals as a short ranged Demolisher Cannon, but against Terminators the Battle Cannon is useless.

First of all averages mean nothing in any individual instance. on a D6 averages mean very little unless you plot it out over many many games. That is why you really can't rely on math hammering any individual firefight on one specific turn. Additionally, im not saying any rule in particular is rant worthy. I am saying the entire book is filled with minor annoying rules that, when combined, make the army about as baby poop in your chili.

It's stuff like that, hallmarks of Mat Ward books, that isn't just restricted to Necrons, that makes such armies not fun to play. He writes rules like a crazy internet fanboy would, and that's why we get things like Vulkan He'stan, the Stormlord, Draigo, the Sanguinor, AV13 Fast Scouting battle tanks in FA slots, Flyer transports that ignore all the bad things about being a flyer transport, etc.

Vulkans fine, stormlord is annoying, draigo was only good cause of paladins in 5th, and now they aren't that great, Baal predators were the exact same before Ward got them, the flying one is annoying though.

 DKokCommissar wrote:
First of all averages mean nothing in any individual instance. on a D6 averages mean very little unless you plot it out over many many games. That is why you really can't rely on math hammering any individual firefight on one specific turn.

In that case, I would like to complain about grots. Theoretically, they can take out an entire squad of terminators in one turn for far fewer points.

Additionally, im not saying any rule in particular is rant worthy. I am saying the entire book is filled with minor annoying rules that, when combined, make the army about as baby poop in your chili.

Right, we get your point. And then you bring up examples of extremely unlikely things happening. I can write a rant about how I played against an IG player who hit with every single blast scatter, every single order was received successfully and he rolled 6's on all of his penetration tables. It doesn't make it a good example of why the IG codex is annoying to play against though.

If you just want us to agree that there are a lot of special rules in the Necron codex, sure, you got it.
Am I going to agree that they are annoying because you had a couple games you didn't enjoy and were annoyed? No.

I think the op list people complain about are the "flying circus" ones. And judging by ur comments you didn't come up against one of these luckily

 Zande4 wrote:
I think the op list people complain about are the "flying circus" ones. And judging by ur comments you didn't come up against one of these luckily

Way not to read the thread...

 DKokCommissar wrote:
First of all averages mean nothing in any individual instance.

The average results have meaning as any deviation on an individual instant is just luck. A BS of 3 is a 4+ roll which is a 50% chance, if you hit 3 out of 10 or 7 out of 10 is just luck and the nature of dice but it is still a baseline.

Honestly my only other gripe with necrons is that they literally get all the toys at the greatest discount. (stormsheild jump pack cc monsters that go through walls? or av 13 heavy support with decent guns for under 100?) They basically have every option to take with almost no drawbacks whether that doesn’t have to make them op but that does mean there codex isn’t very balanced
wethere that dosnt have to make them op but that does meen there codex isnt very balanced.

Those specific examples are just things I have experienced/seen happen. The point of my thread is simply that there are a lot of special rules in the Necron codex and that some of them just seem to be annoying.... I was giving some specific pointed examples because that conveys the message better, most of the time. The simple point is that whereas some armies have 1 or 2 rules that are powerful and seemingly easy to use, Necrons have many. The prime example was mentioned by another poster earlier, the Stormlord. You don't have to do anything with him other than pay points and you can ensure night fight for turn one and probably for turns 2-3 (and this ability completely screws shooty armies). Additionally, all he has to do is stand back and pick his nose while lightning strikes blasts a few vehicles and infantry. There is no skill, no strategy, no cunning, you just pay the points and boom. Perhaps I hate the Stormlord more than some because I run alot of units so the lightning has a better chance of blasting something and I am shooty so night fight hurts even more. Additionally, while crypteks ability to rerolls a dice from the unit he is in each "phase" is not annoying it self, but when combined with the fact that it allows people to reroll their occasional failed rolls to cast the annoying abilities, then the cryptek becomes part of that annoying shceme. I am sorry but Necrons are not like any other army in the way they play. Yes they are unique, but that unique feel is annoying. Sorry if you play them, like them, or even enjoy fighting against them. I think their abilities are annoying and do not fit well into the design mechanics of this game. That is my opinion and I simply wanted to state it. I find every other army in this game to be fun and challenging but Necrons just don't seem to fit in.

Yes I know standard deviation from the baseline blah blah on averages. I have just come to not count on averages as those "deviations" always seem to come at the worst time. I generally blast a unit until it is dead then move to the next target. Trying to plan out your shooting based on averages will not accomplish your goals because deviations will always occur. Averages are averages because they "average" out over many many many many rolls.

*One issue with needing to kill every necron in a unit is that shots don't carry through to models out of LOS. The necron players at my store manage to do this very well and I have seen it happen more often than not. 1 Necron stands behind a building, rock, whatever out of sight - the unit gets blasted but he lives as he is out of LOS. Next turn, they all get to try to come back.

 DKokCommissar wrote:

*One issue with needing to kill every necron in a unit is that shots don't carry through to models out of LOS. The necron players at my store manage to do this very well and I have seen it happen more often than not. 1 Necron stands behind a building, rock, whatever out of sight - the unit gets blasted but he lives as he is out of LOS. Next turn, they all get to try to come back.

Im not going to lie that is smart play and he is being rewarded for doing so. though your playing IG, assault quickly fixes that issue unless they are runing wrathes but thats a whole nother kettle of fish. he is playing to his advantages but if he is doing what i think he is doing he will be moving very slowlly through the battle field which should give you enough time to manuver around but this is all hypothetical though.

This thread is heading in a bad direction just like other QQ threads before it.

I had a friend QQ about Necrons and everyone just told him to man up. I suggest you do the same.

I never QQ'ed about the results or the effects of the Necron list. I just stated that the manner in which it accomplishes those objectives, the designed mechanics, leaves something to be desired insofar as equal enjoyment by both players in what is necessarily a multiplayer game. I think the overall army list is on par with almost every other codex (some really old ones excluded). I just don't like the feel it gives to me as an opposing player. It just doesn't lend itself to enjoyable play for the opposing party - at least not in my case.

I don't follow your reasoning.

You can beat the Necrons, yet you find their style of play sucks the fun away from your enjoyment?


It certaintly can't be because they are a boring opponent. As you mention all the convoluted things they do.

I'm just not seeing how what you are saying makes any sense.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/484235.page

End of discussion...

Edited by AgeOfEgos

 Monasou wrote:

Edited by AgeOfEgos

Aware.

Annoying might not be the right word, but the special rules do abound. SW Rune Priests can cast lightning at one unit at a time, the Necron HQ just casts lightning at everything. Many armies have dedicated AT weapons, Necrons have basic weapons that work for AT too. Rare heroes like Commissar Yarrick and St. Celestine can get back up after being knocked down, every single Necron can.

Someone tried so hard to make them special that they just seem cheap.

I find the fact that entire infantry platoons (including vehicles) are outflanked as a single unit annoying. Orders are annoying -FRFSRF makes you roll 150 dice with that blob squad. Even if they don't do anything with those flashlights it takes forever to figure that out. You don't have to roll Look Out, Sir! for the command squad - it automatically works. There's no skill involved! On top of the LD10 for every unit within 6" of a Commisar. Tack on the best AA unit in the game for horrendously cheap, Weaken Resolve...

All those special rules are just annoying.
(See what I did there?)