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Should the concept of an elite strike force or a last ditch heroic effort be a legit game play concept for Warhammer 40k?

Draigowing in 5E was a nightmare, but 6E it's pretty tame. My Sisters of Battle deathstar makes a bunch get really nervous until they realize that "just shooting it" is a quite effective thing to do.

On the other hand, we have the battle brother'd Voltron mess of Jetseers, O'Vesa Stars, and what not, that I would agree are pretty stupid (even though they tickle my fancy).

Would it be throwing the baby out with the bath water by eliminating them all or are some "okay"?

Yes, they should be part of the game, GW just doesn't care enought to balance.

While I don't mind the concept of big tough killy units, they certainly have their place both in terms of gameplay and lore. I love the concept of the big scar Terminator unit smashing everything in its path and laughing off most fire, taking notice only of the big guns.

I dislike that almost all of them seem to function through "gimmicks" rather than just their innate stats. In 5E this was wound allocation, in 6E, it's psychic powers and tons of rerolls. They're *too* hard to kill.

I hate the concept, but I would like to clarify that there's a huge difference between a tough unit and a death star. A tough unit is expensive and powerful, but is still just a normal unit. For example, a unit of terminators is tough to kill and will kill most things it charges, but it's still in the same general range as other units. To be a death star a unit has to go way beyond what is normal for a unit, especially in durability. It has to be the kind of thing that ignores buckets full of shooting dice, slaughters everything in its path without question, and generally makes the entire game revolve around it. True death stars are bad for two reasons:

1) The game is at its best when you have lots of different units interacting with each other. A death star reduces the entire game to "kill the death star or lose", the death star player has no real army besides their single unit that would make target priority even vaguely interesting, while the other player has no real hope of stopping it without throwing their entire army at the problem. If the death star lives and kills enough stuff then its player wins, if it dies too early then the other player wins. You might as well not even bother setting up the game, just roll some D6s and see who gets better numbers.

2) The sheer durability of the typical death star unit can be extremely frustrating. One of 40k's basic principles is that everything dies, so it can be a real morale killer if you spend your whole turn throwing attacks at the death star with little result. In that case it's very easy to start feeling like you're just rolling saves and removing models until the game finally ends. This problem is especially bad because death stars often depend on exploiting balance mistakes and broken rules to get that durability (re-rollable 2++ saves and IC abuse in 6th, 5th edition wound allocation, etc) which makes it feel like you aren't even playing the real game.

I adore them thematically, especially against large swarm armies. I usually prefer it to be a marine "deathstar" as that was the way the lore was presented to me so many years ago.

Mechanically, I feel they are hit and miss. My first attempt at one failed, so I was a tad bias against them (any deathstar not 'nid was broke basically). A lot of deathstars tend to be CC oriented, which isn't the best these days, so its hard to gauge them.

I like them provided you don't cross a line. Either that or I view things differently to others in this matter.

I like the idea of big powerful units, but I think the reality is that in 40k they are quite difficult to balance. Deathstar units in WHFB I feel aren't quite so bad because they tend to be easier to wittle down. I think if you do have Deathstar units, probably the best way is if they have lots of wounds that are easy to remove rather than only a few wounds that are damned near impossible to remove.

Why don't the answer to your poll actually answer the question of your poll.

Liking them has nothing to do with whether or not they should exist.

I think they should exist but should have viable counters besides "Buy more from GW!".

I'd argue that chronologically, "deathstars" have always been part of 40k.

Waay back in 4th edition, a Hive Tyrant surrounded by a Tyrand Guard was nigh unkillable in close combat and you'd best avoid getting near them altogether.

It's only when 6th edition came and completely screwed up the wound allocation mechanic that actual deathstars started to exist.

I want the old wound allocation back - 1 wound per model, each one gets 1 wound before the 1st gets a second one. Yes, this makes multi-wound characters that much more potent (as they should be!) but that's what insta-kill templates are for. Place it over their heads and delete the entire unit.

I have to agree with Peregrine here, a deathstar is more than a units that is merely tough. Your typical deathstar will be nigh invulnerable, at least within the shooting phase, with weaknesses that can only be exploited by very specific list (typically they will require something along the lines of mass str 8 ranged firepower or a specific psychic power to hurt, if they can be hurt reliably at all). They also tend to be remarkably fast (guaranteed 12" movement minimum) and can guarantee the removal one unit if not more per turn. Anything that can be killed with conventional shooting, is slow, or is not particularly killy does not qualify as a deathstar. Deathstars must be able to singlehandedly dominate the game.

For example, this

I'd argue that chronologically, "deathstars" have always been part of 40k.

Waay back in 4th edition, a Hive Tyrant surrounded by a Tyrand Guard was nigh unkillable in close combat and you'd best avoid getting near them altogether.

does not qualify. Its too slow, not particularly killy and can simply be shot off the board.

As best as I can tell, the first deathstar arrived with the last Ork codex, those were the Nob bikers. They were a terror even in 4e but the complex wound allocation was what ultimately put them over the edge. A combination of bike speed, armor/cover/inv saves, FNP, and complex wound allocation meant conventional firepower had to often chew through 10 wounds that always got a save and usually got a FNP resulted in a unit that was unkillable by many list and used a 24" turbo-boost round 1 followed by 12" + 6" mutli-assaults to quickly eliminate multiple enemy units from the board each turn. It was tame compared to some of the stuff around now, but if you lacked a high volume of str8 to cause a large number of instant death wounds, this unit was unstoppable and would single handedly wipe your army.

To answer OPs original question, deathstars do not belong in the game, in any form. They are the embodiment of everything that is wrong with 40k: an overpowered unit that is consequence of rules interaction either missed or ignored by GW, that cannot be overcome with tactics but is only counterable with specialized listbuilding, which single-handled dominates that table, rendering other units on both sides of the table worthless, and often ruining that game for one if not both players. As far as I am concerned every deathstar is a broken unit, and many of them are built around outright rules exploitation of questionable sportsmanship. I for one would not miss these units at all if GW got rid of them, and think 40k would become a much better game without them.

I want the old wound allocation back - 1 wound per model, each one gets 1 wound before the 1st gets a second one. Yes, this makes multi-wound characters that much more potent (as they should be!) but that's what insta-kill templates are for. Place it over their heads and delete the entire unit.

No, no and heck no. The old wound allocation was probably the single worst problem with 5e. For starters, wound allocation was never supposed to work that way. For homogeneous multi-wound models, wounds were always stacked on a single model rather than spread around. Wound spreading was a consequence of exploiting the complex wound allocation system of 5e, a system that was established to force players to allocate wounds to models equipped with special weapons, heavy weapons, sergeants, etc. so their was a chance of killing important models in a unit prior to those using just basic equipment (bolters, lasguns, etc.). Enterprising 40k players quickly turned these rules in a way to spread wounds across large number of multiwound models. This resulted in large Nob and Nob biker squads that could absorb 10+ wounds before suffering and casualty. Additionally, complex wound allocation could also be used to undermine instant death by assigned instant death wounds to already wound models, which is in direct contradiction to the way instant death wounds are normally allocated.

No unit should be able to absorb 10 wounds without suffering any consequences. Multi-wound models are already tougher than their counterpart and possessing multiply wounds is a huge advantage (see Wraiths, Broadsides). We do not need to bring back the absolutely worst rules in 5e to make them stronger.

 Sir Arun wrote:
I'd argue that chronologically, "deathstars" have always been part of 40k.

Waay back in 4th edition, a Hive Tyrant surrounded by a Tyrand Guard was nigh unkillable in close combat and you'd best avoid getting near them altogether.

It's only when 6th edition came and completely screwed up the wound allocation mechanic that actual deathstars started to exist.

I want the old wound allocation back - 1 wound per model, each one gets 1 wound before the 1st gets a second one. Yes, this makes multi-wound characters that much more potent (as they should be!) but that's what insta-kill templates are for. Place it over their heads and delete the entire unit.

5e Wound allocation caused more death stars than it solved, and makes zero sense thematically/cinematically/narratively/whatever.

Also 40K goes back more than 2 editions.

Viable strategy? Yes. Dominating strategy? No.

The Thing is, Deathstars used to be good and not require skill to play, but where beatable with a modicum amount of skill.
When you cant feasibly hurt a unit, that kinda stinks.

The concept of the Deathstar fits in with the fluff of 40k, and I think it's a legitimate strategy. Love playing them, love playing against them.

I don't have a problem with deathstars as a concept. I've used them in a few of my armies, including my old Wolf Guard Terminator-heavy Space Wolves, and had a good time with them. It's just kind of an all eggs in one basket strategy, which should be viable, but not the be-all-end-all.

I don't care to play deathstars myself, as I'm a giant pile of mooks man, myself.

I'm all for them in principle, though. They fit in the fluff perfectly, and there are plenty of good reasons to have them in the game, not least of which because they are cheap to purchase and easy to transport. If you're poor or have a motorcycle, you'll know exactly why this is important. They also make for faster games, and can certainly be fun to play against (I like it when my big pile of mooks slowly grinds down someone who thought he was pretty badass until 100 lasguns fired at him), and with (why there are so many superhero games and dynasty warriors reskins).

Having strong, expensive infantry units is just as crucial to the game as strong, expensive heavy vehicles, or monstrous creatures, or any other "hard target".

And why get rid of this crucial part of the game? Because someone became a sad little panda because they lost a game against them a few times? Boo hoo?

If your deathstar is ruining your opponent's ability to have fun, well then don't run that specific deathstar in that particular way. If your deathstar is only ruining your opponent's ability to get an easy-button win, then you should ignore the whiners and the haters and just do what you want.

Calling for someone else's playstyle to get nerfed just so you can win a game is pretty tacky, at best.

And yet 6th edition's wound allocation has created all these tank ICs that are placed at the front and absorb ridiculous amounts of firepower. They would all disappear if we brought the old wound allocation back.

Am I the only person who remember Paladinstars? The old wound allocation mechanics were horribly abusive and, unlike the current ones, could not be dealt with via positioning, focus fire or barrage weapons.

There's nothing really wrong with deathstars in concept. Lysander and a squad of hammernators should be able to wreck face, for example. But the deathstars we have now are too tough. If the only counter to a deathstar is to field one of your own, or to drop a D-weapon on them, then there is a problem.

I quite enjoy my Shadowsun+2 special shield drone+3 XV9 "Shadowstar". T5 unit with stealth and shrouded all the time, 2 models with a 3++, everything has a 3+ armor save, hit and run, defensive grenades, 3d6 move in the assault phase, and lots`o dakka (all the hazard suits have advanced targeting systems so I get about 4-5 precision shots per round of shooting).

I'm guessing that's quite tame as deathstars go though.

 PrinceRaven wrote:
Viable strategy? Yes. Dominating strategy? No.

Pretty much this. I only have a real issue with them when they become essentially unkillable by most lists, and the only effective strategy is to tar pit or run away the entire game.

They can be fun and fluffy when taken from the same codex, but once you begin to add in all the allies silliness then it begins to suck the fun out of the game.

Mid tier ones can still be fun to play against be aren't as viable in a competitve environment. But from the battle reports I've been reading lately, the top TauDar, Cron and GravStar etc can pack a serious punch to any tournament army.

Read Jy2's Adepticon report and you'll see that the sheer amount of deathstars used proves that are still viable.

The real problem is that buffs are so cheap and available to newer armies that anyone who *doesn't* have them is at a huge handicap. It's incredibly easy to stack a fethload of buffs onto any unit to make them good at things they never, ever, ever should be able to do. Heck, I consistently pound face with SISTERS of BATTLE in Close Combat by giving them Rad and Psykotroke grenades, Hammerhand, and 3 Priests. For about 350-400 points, I can make Sisters of Battle one of the strongest Close Combat units in the game. This Deathstar will wipe out 30 Ork Boys in assault without breaking a sweat. They'll cut through a full squad of 10 Terminators like butter. In fact, I can't think of a single Close Combat unit who can win against them without exploiting the same buffs, or simply bringing twice as many points worth of models. You can shoot at them, but in a small game (Say, 750 Points, a value where I can still easily bring this,) it's hard to kill 20 3+ saves before they kill you back.