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Just what the title says.

It takes both.

Even with good rolls you can't win without skill, but you can win a game with skill without much luck.

If it is luck, why do the same people win tournaments repeatedly?

If daemons are on the table it is luck. And I would say the game in general is getting more and more luck based.

Luck is a significant factor, but it's your job as a skilled player to mitigate whatever damage bad luck can wreak upon you. But yeah, you need both.

 curran12 wrote:
If it is luck, why do the same people win tournaments repeatedly?

Luck can play a factor, but I'd say it is 80% skill... enough that you can minimize the impact of luck. Skillful players set up situations where luck favors them. But, you can't help somethings. Sometimes you just roll snake eyes at a critical moment, really can't help that.

So, 80% skill and 20% luck is my take on it.

Clearly both matter but anyone who actually thinks skill is preeminent should try out some luck variation schemes so they can see how important dice rolls are in 40k.

40k is like poker, skill matters, but its always better to be lucky than good.

I doubt any player could win a game where every die roll was as good as possible for their opponent (and I've played games like that from time to time, sometimes luck plays unfair with everyone)

 curran12 wrote:
If it is luck, why do the same people win tournaments repeatedly?

Because they're lucky. Moreover, they don't need to be objectively lucky, they merely need to be luckier than their opponents in the few die rolls that really matter over the course of the game.

Anyways, this thread is quickly going to devolve without a definition of player skill. I'll link here and here for mine.

In brief, it goes like this. You need to kill stuff to win games of 40k. Killing stuff happens by rolling dice. Player skill is therefore learning how to play the odds better. Like in blackjack, for example, except 40k has a lot more odds and is more complex.

Once you get better at playing the "correct" odds (something which I don't even know exists), it becomes more and more difficult to play the correct odds more correctly. As such, player skill becomes closer between players the better that players get. When this happens, player skill becomes a control variable, just like how list strength is a control variable if two players are playing the exact same list.

Once this happens, you're only left with uncontrolled variables. The one thing that's not controlled in 40k is the results of individual die rolls, because they're random. Which means the only thing that matters in the end is luck.

When you're talking about opponents wherein one player plays the odds very well, and the other player doesn't, then the fact that they're different matters, which means a good player hammering a noob will be partially decided by the odds playing disparity. That said, you're still playing odds, which means that good odds players can still very much loose games to bad odds players. So even here, where skill matters most, it's still mostly luck.

It's the nature of a dice game, really.

I dunno guys...

I played a game against Iyanden last week at our club and the game came down to...

Last turn ( as it turns out...stupid random game length )
and the Wraith unit rolls a 6 for difficult terrain and comes within 3" of my objective and gets the tie...I had his objective and we were tied in all other aspects of objectives.

It's a game that involves dice, of course luck is a factor to the game. Examples like the one above will happen from time to time, where there's simply a 1/6 chance, or whatever, of one player winning. However, the player's job is to swing the odds in his favour and reduce the amount of situations where the opponent could 'get lucky'. So, in the example above, perhaps you should have eliminated some of those Wraiths (only one would have been necessary) rather than thinking "Oh, it's only a X chance that he'll make it"

Good point Shadow, but....Had i had another turn, those wraiths wouldve been taosted !!
Not complaining, just throwing it out there to you guys..
It was a great game and probly one of the best nail biters ive had in a while!!

 Ailaros wrote:
Because they're lucky. Moreover, they don't need to be objectively lucky, they merely need to be luckier than their opponents in the few die rolls that really matter over the course of the game.

Nonsense. You might be able to get lucky and win a single tournament, but consistent success through luck alone requires too much luck to be plausible. Like it or not the pattern of tournament results is exactly what we'd expect to see in a game where skill is the deciding factor, so there is no reason to insist on odds-defying luck for certain special players.

Which means the only thing that matters in the end is luck.

So why do you keep playing the game, writing battle reports about all the decisions you made, participating in forum arguments about tactics, etc? Maybe you have fun with this absurd "it's all about luck" forum argument, maybe blaming luck makes losing easier to accept, but whatever the reason you don't act according to your supposed beliefs. So please stop trolling.

Its about pregame choices, in game skill, and the ability to handle luck... in that order

Choices: are you running a min/max cheese list or a fluff battle company for a story? Are you keeping your Ravenwing, or chasing White Scars? Sticking with the Orcs through thick and thin or taking a lean TauDar list to the club this evening?

Skill: Don't waste 2 rounds of shooting on a walker you can tarpit and ignore. Don't take a combination of drop pods and rhinos when you can't support one with the other. Hold those eldar bikes in reserve in an objective game instead of rushing them out to finish that annoying lone marine.

Luck: So that LC just one shot a LR, can you roll with it or are your emotions so fragile and your plan too thin to survive the turn (or on the flip side, exploit the gain). Every game (including football) has luck... skill helps you take advantage of luck, helps you play the odds, and informs your ability to minimize the randomness of the dice

BTW, I average 1.5 games a week and haven't lost since Aug '11... I wish it was luck, I'd be in Vegas... but its more about list building and choices to me, than skill during the game (which, honestly, does factor in).

I assume you "luck" voters think poker is luck too, right?

I'd say 50/50. I feel that most of the "skill" based choices are blindingly obvious to see to everyone in the room.
"Dur dur should I move my Orks Boyz forward? Should I put them in the open or in cover? Should I spread them out or keep them clumped?"

I've had too many 40k games come down to one or two dice rolls, and no amount of maneuvering or shooting could have prevented that.

At least GW gives us hundreds of dice rolls per game, so the random factor SHOULD technically balance out. And it mostly does for shooting or melee. It's those really important rolls that DON'T happen a lot (ie: Charge distance, dangerous terrain, etc.) that have a greater effect than they should.

80% skill.
No matter how lucky you are, people will easily beat you unless you [b]always[b] roll 6's.

A week ago I played a game against Orks that had an average of BS4 whereas my Marines were stuck on BS2 and WS1.
I still won because I was better at tactics.

Is writing a tooled list that you and the internet help create by breaking a codex and ruining the game for everyone you play?

Neither. Experience is the most important factor in winning games.

Luck only plays a part when respective skill levels of the players
are the same. Otherwise, a more skillful player will win most of the time.

 Ailaros wrote:

 curran12 wrote:
If it is luck, why do the same people win tournaments repeatedly?

Because they're lucky

Thank you for deliverying me my daily dose of dumb.

Please keep in mind that Rule Number One is Be Polite. Thanks -- Manchu

50% listbuilding, 25% luck, 25% deployment, movement and positioning.

In my experience, choosing wisely is half the battle.

If you have absolutely no skill with your list/your tactics are gak, no amount of luck will salvage a win for you. Good rolls may dampen the defeat, but without using any skill in the game, luck becomes meaningless.

 namiel wrote:
Is writing a tooled list that you and the internet help create by breaking a codex and ruining the game for everyone you play?

Was that to me? or just in general.

Tooled lists....aahhh I love em!! Love crushing them that is...tooled list dont bug me a bit, Im just throwing it out there for debate

Luck matters. Anyone who crosses their fingers when trying to hit a tank at point-blank range with a meltagun knows this.

Skill, however, is knowing that the meltagun has to be next to that tank, knowing how to deliver that meltagun, and knowing to bring at least four meltaguns so that when three of them inevitably get killed en route and/or miss, you've still got a chance.

Skill is the factor that lets you have a measure of control over luck. Hence I rate it as the most important of the two.

It takes a big wallet, a dose of luck and know how to win tournaments, but a big wallet most of all.

Since most of us live in an individualistic society the majority of answers should be skill.

Lobukia-if you play that much and never lose, you need better opponents. because even against opponents I KNOW are better then me, I sometimes manage to pull off a win, and I can sense my skill level catching up (and my playstyle braking off the norm they are used to play against, also help.)

And while luck is a factor in this game, its mostly a game of skill.
I just had a small local turny today with custom missions and stuff.
I had nothing more the average kill ratio and death ration, yet in two of the games I knew, for a fact, at turn 3 already, that I would win unless a string of abyssal luck would strike me, just because I came up with a plan to spin the custom mission to my advantage in that matchup and saw that my opponent clearly didn't see it coming until it was too late. (and none were too clever, one was sneaking a multi-tank-shock to block off the objective by pure size, the other was constant roadblocking and sacrificing increasingly expensive units as bait/physical blockade)

It worked, mostly because it was so "wrong" nobody knew what to deal with first, what are the real threats or what am I even planning. it would not hold against NOVA lists, but it was not NOVA missions, nor that level of zealous shopping, so it worked.
I brought the right tools for the job in my list because I knew what to expect, and not by meta of "who plays what", but by considering what play-style the mission rewards-and countering it.
It was mostly skill, just like my losses are other times were mostly being outplayed.


Where luck came in there?
In some dice, but once we roll enough of them it is rendered moot. bell curves of high number of dice are VERY consistent.
Abyssal luck happens, but its rare. in fact the higher the skill-the lower the luck effect, because a proper strategy got multiple layers of contingency plans, and a proper countering is to figure out these contingencies ahead and brake them.
Wont help you to luck out my plan A, if plan B works just as well and you never noticed it.
Will help you if you broke plans A, B, C, D and all I got left is the shaky E plan, who failed out of luck. plan E only had like 40% yo fail on it own, the prior plans would have had much higher chance to go smoothly were they not taken down.

Just remember, the number of dice thrown in a 40k game is HUGE, beyond some point, the result of the dice are nearly predictable, by sheer numbers.
When shooting 36 shots, I know I should expect 2-4 sixes, and I plan accordingly. no sixes might happen, but once in about 666 such rolls, more is unexpected but welcomed.

It's a mix, but skill over luck. You have to at the least be able to set yourself up for equal or better odds in situations, if you set yourself up poorly, moving vehicles too close, placing units poorly, etc, but have all the 6s in the world, you'll still lose more than win.

While I'm not sure that pure luck can WIN a game, I do know that bad luck can sure as heck cost you the game.

It's definitely a mix. It takes a lot of luck to win if you're just terrible, but on the same token no amount of skill can save you if you're luck is just terrible on that day (and such is the name of a game based on die rolls).

But of course, skill means more than just moves in game. Skill can be your ability to build lists, the ability to analyze your opponents list and coordinate a rough plan to beat their best assets, and the like. This is a large part of the game. You could get lucky, but if your list is absolute trash and you just don't know how to counter anything than you're going to lose more often than you're going to win. This is why it's good to study up on all the major codices and rules not just your own.

Remember: "It is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will not be imperiled in a hundred battles; if you do not know your enemies but do know yourself, you will win one and lose one; if you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in every single battle."

But falling back to the same adage of luck, no matter how good your plan is (and no plan survives first contact) a single bad die roll can change the field for better or worse. Skill comes into play when you can take the results of that roll and adjust your plan around that.

So I say it's a mix.