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I don't normally makes posts about this sort of thing, mostly cause I am not great at remembering which things I know about GW stuff are secret and which aren't. So I'm just going to leave this piece of information here for people to look at and slowly back away.

The designers who wrote 7th edition 40k fully expect comp and house rules to be used for their games and wrote them with this in mind. Even the GW run events will now be using comp rules. The out of the box framework, of take whatever, is playable, but leads to abuses. Rather than attempt to write these out of the rules (and potentially remove a lot of cool/fun options) the decision was made to write a broad rule set that has room for easy comping.

One of the main ways the designers expect you to use comp is by detachment restrictions (such as you may only have X combined armed detachments, Y allied detachments and Z Formations). They also expect that limits such as you may have a maximum of X mastery levels/generate Y warp charge/have Z summoned units or other such restrictions will be added as comp/house rules as per the taste of the players.

The above is not speculation, or my opinion, it is a paraphrase of comments made by members of the design team. I'm not going to bother trying to prove credibility or anything and I'm not saying whether I agree with this decision or not, but I thought you might like to know.

Drager wrote:
I'm not going to bother trying to prove credibility

Here's your problem.

Without the credibility, its just different coloured text.

While it sounds within the realm of plausibility, I'd need to some sources to believe it.

It's no news for us that any GW-released ruleset needs to be comped in order to be playable on said level.

GW does not playtest new rules. That is the problem.

So essentially they're lazy and want the fans to do the work?

Awesome. Clearly the makers of Command and Conquer Generals should have followed this philosophy.

Agreed. It sounds like real GW process but without credibility of any kind it also sounds like, "hey i don't like x, y, z and the community on Dakka seems to agree so i'll post a pseudo real comment from the GW development team that says exactly what they want to hear. This in turn will lead to people believing their points and implement them."

Not really buying it even though i agree with some points.

Well...they bolded a rule to the same effect, so ts not like its a big secret.

Real or not, his does make sense. GW will never being able to make a perfectly balanced game, and whatever imbalance there is, however minor, will be exploited by a certain section of the playerbase.

So it's better that they leave in options for those that want to used them in the intended way, and leave then competitive WAAC players intent on breaking the game to their own devices. GW have made their own stance on the issue clear, so it makes sense that they concern themselves with those that share that stance (ie narrative driven gamers rather than the ultra competitive crowd).

If that's their intent, then they're morons. They've got to understand what this attitude will do to the next five years of their miniature sales. Way to embrace the downward spiral G'dub.

 Paradigm wrote:
perfectly balanced game

Nobody expects a perfectly balanced game. Drop the word perfect.

As you said, whatever minor issues there may be will likely be exploited, but the point is that they will be minor.

What GW has chosen to do (if this thing is real, or just going off the rules themselves) is take the laziest route possible and justify it with silly catchphrases like 'forge the narrative'.

For the record, I'm not ultra-competitive, but the lack of balance and poor design hurts me as much as the regular tournament goers.

Sounds true, and IMO shows how out of touch with reality the designers are. It's long been common speculation (I won't use the term "knowledge" as it's not 100% proven) that the designers basically play in a glorified gaming club, and wrongly assume that everyone else does as well - now part of this might be cultural (there are many more local gaming clubs in the UK than elsewhere, in part due to the original Wargames Society of ages past), but in any event they believe that all of their "hobbyists" play in small local groups where everyone knows each other and nobody abuses the rules because why would they want to make an unfun game for their friends?

It's obvious this is how they think, because 40ks sweet spot is an environment like that. When you play with close friends, most of the abusive rules go away because nobody is going to do it. When you play in a regular league or campaign, you're more concerned about enjoying a few hours eating/drinking/laughing/gaming with your "mates" than turning up and coming away with a decent win-loss ratio.

For all its flaws, 40k does a decent job in the area it shines, the problem is that it tries to appeal to everyone and fails miserably because it can't. If the game had a built-in campaign or league rules or something and said "This is the intended way to play" it'd be easier to swallow because they aren't pretending that 40k is a game suitable for everybody when the reality is that it's only suited and realistically intended for the quintessential UK "wargamers club" populated by adults with disposable income, with some thought given to bored kids with parents who have disposable income (but realistically those kids don't last - they buy some Space Marines and eventually move on) to milk the short-term viability of selling a few expensive models to people who don't know better.

In short: If you have a wargames club (and/or play games as part of a league or campaign), 40k can work great. If you only play pickup games in a game store against whoever happens to turn up for "miniatures night" or, worse, tournaments then 40k is terrible.

They think removing restrictions will sell more models which is all Kirby cares about, he does not get that removing restrictions and allowing broken combos with allies is what drove people away.

Sand box games are fun for a little while then you get bored and walk away to play a game with structure.

7th jumped the shark.

Frankly, "Unbound" is not game design, it is the antithesis of game design.

Just do whatever you want!

Thanks, GW! Yes it can be very good fun but we can already do that if we like and we don't need you to make it official.

You need to write real rules to justify us paying for them.

I think a good short-term solution would be for GW to simply release a one page BRB addition of recommend house rules for competitive play. At least that way casual plays get to play with their toys however they want, and TOs have a common starting point around which to build a fairer game.

EDIT: Better yet would be two BRB rulesets, one sandbox and one structured...

 Blacksails wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:
perfectly balanced game

Nobody expects a perfectly balanced game. Drop the word perfect.

As you said, whatever minor issues there may be will likely be exploited, but the point is that they will be minor.

What GW has chosen to do (if this thing is real, or just going off the rules themselves) is take the laziest route possible and justify it with silly catchphrases like 'forge the narrative'.

For the record, I'm not ultra-competitive, but the lack of balance and poor design hurts me as much as the regular tournament goers.

Does it hurt the tournament players, though? The new options open up even more ways to exploit the issues, which from he prevailing attitude of those players, surely must be a good thing? I know thats not true, but that is why it annoys me so much when tourney players rail against a lack of balance; if the game were even close to being balanced, half the stuff they rely on would be gone. So while it would be good for the game as a whole, it seems to me that it would be worse for the tourney players if there was nothing to exploit.

But that's a tangent. To be honest I think the new options, if you play them as intended, benefit the fluff players a lot, as you can now build the army you choose with no restrictions. There's no need to exploit it, all you need is an opponent who holds the same mindset. I can see how it would caused a problem if competitive and fluff players played against each other, but a game like that was always going to be one sided anyway, and probably unenjoyable for both players.

At the end of the day, my point is this; it is the attitude of WAAC players that is largely the 'problem', not the rules themselves, so GW are better off just focusing on making the game fun and more open for their target audience, which unbound and the other options does.

At the end of the day, if you don't like something, don't play it or play against it. There is no requirement in 40k, the rules are guidelines and at a basic level everything requires agreement from an opponent, so 40k really is what you make it. It's only when units/combos are deliberately spammed/exploited that balance is an issue.

I still still think aspects such as demonology for loyalists and superheavies in 500 point games are ridiculous, but the overall changes in 7th seem OK. It's the business practice that has stopped me from buying it, rather than the content in most cases.

God In Action wrote:
I think a good short-term solution would be for GW to simply release a one page BRB addition of recommend house rules for competitive play. At least that way casual plays get to play with their toys however they want, and TOs have a common starting point around which to build a fairer game.

EDIT: Better yet would be two BRB rulesets, one sandbox and one structured...

Well, the best way would be for them to just separate the rules out into "Core" and "Advanced" with the idea that Core is meant for competitive play and pickup games and Advanced is all the random charts, random this, random that, Unbound, etc. to spice up narrative games, but the kicker is that its not all or nothing, you could use say certain random charts but not others.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Paradigm wrote:
Does it hurt the tournament players, though? The new options open up even more ways to exploit the issues, which from he prevailing attitude of those players, surely must be a good thing? I know thats not true, but that is why it annoys me so much when tourney players rail against a lack of balance; if the game were even close to being balanced, half the stuff they rely on would be gone. So while it would be good for the game as a whole, it seems to me that it would be worse for the tourney players if there was nothing to exploit.

Incorrect. The current meta with things that tourney players rely on is a byproduct and consequence of 40k not being balanced. In a balanced game, there would be more options for tournaments because you wouldn't be penalized if, for example, you wanted to take a Night Lords CSM army with some squads of regular CSMs, Raptors, Warp Talons and the like instead of the typical Nurgle/Daemon spam. Most players don't WANT to rely on the cheese combos in tournaments (you always get TFG though) but don't have a choice because nothing else can compete.

In an ideal world, you could bring almost anything to a tournament and have victory or defeat hinge on your tactical acumen with a bit of luck of course with the dice. The netlists are a result of 40k's imbalance, not the goal.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Frankly, "Unbound" is not game design, it is the antithesis of game design.

The thing is, I understand what "unbound" was trying to do.

But it really could have been done better, I think, such as giving it more penalties/advantages for not using it., or more advantages to the opposing army if you use it, etc.

GW does not sponsor tournaments so are under no obligation to try to balance anything for competitive play.

7th is just a means of expanding Armageddon to the "official" rules to allow what they always wanted: "play how you want".

It just has no safety net for dealing with people who insist on fielded the most overpowered list they can get their hands on and get all angry when they cannot get anyone to play them "But it is made according to the rules! You must play me!" they cry...

I like the stories and background of the game and I CAN play any scenario I thought was cool with friends with few problems and have much fun.

I now have to depend on games like X-wing to be able to meet and play strangers at the local hobby shop.

At the end of the day, if you don't like something, don't play it or play against it. There is no requirement in 40k, the rules are guidelines and at a basic level everything requires agreement from an opponent, so 40k really is what you make it. It's only when units/combos are deliberately spammed/exploited that balance is an issue.

And what if your enviroment is such that the armies cost so much , that no one buys weak armies and you always face the best of the best stuff out of codex. How do you don't play , what you don't want to play against.

If I wanted to play against armies against which I have a good chance to win , I would have 0 opponents. I technicly can play against my boyfriends demons or his brothers eldar , but those games aren't much fun , no matter if they are in a tournament or not.



It is as if GW was telling people that don't play in communties, where everyone has more the 1750pts of models, to get stuffed or buy that extra 1000-2000pts of bad models , so you could make all the bad armies to play against other bad armies and forge the narrative.

 Melissia wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Frankly, "Unbound" is not game design, it is the antithesis of game design.

The thing is, I understand what "unbound" was trying to do.

But it really could have been done better, I think, such as giving it more penalties/advantages for not using it., or more advantages to the opposing army if you use it, etc.

Agreed 100%. In theory I like the idea of Unbound because it'd let me play say an all Terminator army. But that idea quickly breaks down when I think that playing Unbound means dealing with all the crazy lists. Something like an all-termie army should have a built-in way to be fielded (not Deathwing) without going into the swamp that is Unbound.

You know, this could bring about a whole new game for GW

**IS**

**IT**

**DOUCHEY!!!!**

Welcome back to "Is it Douchey!!", the show where we, the audience, rate the overall douchiness of our contestant's 40k armies. As always, players are judged on unit selection, paint quality, fluffercising, cohesion, and overall personal demeanor.

Let's take a second to look back to the surprise win by Jonathan and his "Wolf Time" army. Jonathan was able to argue for his army of Rune Priests, Thunderwolf Calvary, and Helldrakes by modelling each unit as a distinctive large wolf. The big win was convincing the judges that the flying, fire-breathing wolves *were* in fact consistent with the Space Wolf background. What a show that was!

Now let's see how our contestants do today!!!

Please, nothing GW does is particularly douchey compared to 9/10ths of the crap that goes on on the internet on a day to day basis.

WayneTheGame wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:
Does it hurt the tournament players, though? The new options open up even more ways to exploit the issues, which from he prevailing attitude of those players, surely must be a good thing? I know thats not true, but that is why it annoys me so much when tourney players rail against a lack of balance; if the game were even close to being balanced, half the stuff they rely on would be gone. So while it would be good for the game as a whole, it seems to me that it would be worse for the tourney players if there was nothing to exploit.

Incorrect. The current meta with things that tourney players rely on is a byproduct and consequence of 40k not being balanced. In a balanced game, there would be more options for tournaments because you wouldn't be penalized if, for example, you wanted to take a Night Lords CSM army with some squads of regular CSMs, Raptors, Warp Talons and the like instead of the typical Nurgle/Daemon spam. Most players don't WANT to rely on the cheese combos in tournaments (you always get TFG though) but don't have a choice because nothing else can compete.

While I agree that a game where everything was balanced would be great for all, it strikes me that the competitive scene automatically looks for the broken option whenever a new book comes out. Look at the tactics threads after the last SM codex came out. As there seemed to be no out-and-out broken option (until tiggy gravstar was discovered) people lamented what is a perfectly reasonable codex as underpowered, suggesting that it's regarded as a bad thing if there is no OP option, and therefore suggests that people DO want there to be imbalance, so they can exploit it! I'm not suggesting it's all or even most players, but it's certainly a real phenomenon.

 Paradigm wrote:

Does it hurt the tournament players, though? The new options open up even more ways to exploit the issues, which from he prevailing attitude of those players, surely must be a good thing? I know thats not true, but that is why it annoys me so much when tourney players rail against a lack of balance; if the game were even close to being balanced, half the stuff they rely on would be gone. So while it would be good for the game as a whole, it seems to me that it would be worse for the tourney players if there was nothing to exploit.

Tournament players (though admittedly, still a loose term given casual players still play in tournaments for the ease of getting in games) don't love the idea of using gimmicky broken balance to win. Given the choice between winning based on player decisions, and winning based strength/brokenness of lists, I'm sure most would rather have a tournament whose outcome was determined mostly by player ability. You seem to have a very negative view of tournament players to start, so that may be clouding your judgement of players like that.

But that's a tangent. To be honest I think the new options, if you play them as intended, benefit the fluff players a lot, as you can now build the army you choose with no restrictions. There's no need to exploit it, all you need is an opponent who holds the same mindset. I can see how it would caused a problem if competitive and fluff players played against each other, but a game like that was always going to be one sided anyway, and probably unenjoyable for both players.

But what is intended? The implication of saying 'play it as intended' is that there is a right or wrong way to play the game. This is absolutely false, not to mention a little arrogant. The issue, beyond the obvious gimmicks and exploits, is that even from a more tame perspective, the balance is borked. Further, you seem to have a very strict line between fluffy and competitive, when really, there is no such hard distinction. The line is blurred and overlaps, and indeed, many strong lists are very fluffy, and many weak lists are unfluffy. So when you say 'competitive' player against a 'fluffy' player, what do you mean?

All that only shows how balance is an issue for everyone. Games between strong lists and weak lists would be unenjoyable for both players, so why not make a game where one-sided matchups don't exist (or to a much lesser extent, anyways)?

At the end of the day, my point is this; it is the attitude of WAAC players that is largely the 'problem', not the rules themselves, so GW are better off just focusing on making the game fun and more open for their target audience, which unbound and the other options does.

No, the attitude is not the problem. Frankly, your attitude of claiming one way of playing is superior to another is the issue.

GW should focus on writing rules that are clear, and codices that are balanced both internally and externally. Everyone wins, no one loses.

At the end of the day, if you don't like something, don't play it or play against it. There is no requirement in 40k, the rules are guidelines and at a basic level everything requires agreement from an opponent, so 40k really is what you make it. It's only when units/combos are deliberately spammed/exploited that balance is an issue.

Not playing against someone because of a list isn't a solution; its a symptom of the issues of the game.

I still still think aspects such as demonology for loyalists and superheavies in 500 point games are ridiculous, but the overall changes in 7th seem OK. It's the business practice that has stopped me from buying it, rather than the content in most cases.

I disagree that the changes have been ok. The reasons are quite long, so I'll just agree to disagree on that point.

God In Action wrote:
I think a good short-term solution would be for GW to simply release a one page BRB addition of recommend house rules for competitive play. At least that way casual plays get to play with their toys however they want, and TOs have a common starting point around which to build a fairer game.

EDIT: Better yet would be two BRB rulesets, one sandbox and one structured...

That is what we used to have, the core rules and a variety of optional add-on rules like Apocalypse, Planetary Assault, Forge World and so on.

 Melissia wrote:
Please, nothing GW does is particularly douchey compared to 9/10ths of the crap that goes on on the internet on a day to day basis.

I, uh, don't remember saying it was GW who was being douchey. More so that 7th will bring about a higher degree of people having to make shades-of-grey decisions about playing games with players whose armies appear to be cheesy.

So I guess if I'm getting at anything it's that GW is lazy and is leaving the onus on people to sort out matches when what they should have done was put some effort into balancing units throughout the game, giving restrictions when necessarily, and then people could theoretically pick anything and face a balanced opponent.

God In Action wrote:
I think a good short-term solution would be for GW to simply release a one page BRB addition of recommend house rules for competitive play. At least that way casual plays get to play with their toys however they want, and TOs have a common starting point around which to build a fairer game.

I think TOs they already have a common starting point:

Batle-Forged, Unbound, or Both?

Limits to the # of units?

Limits to the type of units?

Limits to the #of FOCs?

Limits to the # of Allied Detachments?

Limits to the # of Formations?

 Paradigm wrote:

WayneTheGame wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:
Does it hurt the tournament players, though? The new options open up even more ways to exploit the issues, which from he prevailing attitude of those players, surely must be a good thing? I know thats not true, but that is why it annoys me so much when tourney players rail against a lack of balance; if the game were even close to being balanced, half the stuff they rely on would be gone. So while it would be good for the game as a whole, it seems to me that it would be worse for the tourney players if there was nothing to exploit.

Incorrect. The current meta with things that tourney players rely on is a byproduct and consequence of 40k not being balanced. In a balanced game, there would be more options for tournaments because you wouldn't be penalized if, for example, you wanted to take a Night Lords CSM army with some squads of regular CSMs, Raptors, Warp Talons and the like instead of the typical Nurgle/Daemon spam. Most players don't WANT to rely on the cheese combos in tournaments (you always get TFG though) but don't have a choice because nothing else can compete.

While I agree that a game where everything was balanced would be great for all, it strikes me that the competitive scene automatically looks for the broken option whenever a new book comes out. Look at the tactics threads after the last SM codex came out. As there seemed to be no out-and-out broken option (until tiggy gravstar was discovered) people lamented what is a perfectly reasonable codex as underpowered, suggesting that it's regarded as a bad thing if there is no OP option, and therefore suggests that people DO want there to be imbalance, so they can exploit it! I'm not suggesting it's all or even most players, but it's certainly a real phenomenon.

I get your point but to be fair I think that was because in a world of OP things, a "perfectly reasonable codex" *IS* underpowered if there's nothing that can take on the OP goodness. If everything else was reasonably balanced, I could see this point better but you're basically saying that people were lamenting the fact there was no nuke to compete with the other nukes.

My biggest issue with Unbound is that TOs are likely to just ban it wholesale which still punishes fluffy Unbound armies like all Terminators, since you won't be allowed to bring that despite it being fairly tame.

Drager wrote:
Even the GW run events will now be using comp rules.

Wait, what? GW is tournaments again now?.

 Blacksails wrote:

 Paradigm wrote:

Does it hurt the tournament players, though? The new options open up even more ways to exploit the issues, which from he prevailing attitude of those players, surely must be a good thing? I know thats not true, but that is why it annoys me so much when tourney players rail against a lack of balance; if the game were even close to being balanced, half the stuff they rely on would be gone. So while it would be good for the game as a whole, it seems to me that it would be worse for the tourney players if there was nothing to exploit.

Tournament players (though admittedly, still a loose term given casual players still play in tournaments for the ease of getting in games) don't love the idea of using gimmicky broken balance to win. Given the choice between winning based on player decisions, and winning based strength/brokenness of lists, I'm sure most would rather have a tournament whose outcome was determined mostly by player ability. You seem to have a very negative view of tournament players to start, so that may be clouding your judgement of players like that.

You say that, but see my last post. When people can't find a broken OP option in a new codex, it is decried as underpowered, when in fact it is perfectly reasonable. So this does imply that there are people with a tendency to go for OP over player skill. Not all or most, but at least some.

But that's a tangent. To be honest I think the new options, if you play them as intended, benefit the fluff players a lot, as you can now build the army you choose with no restrictions. There's no need to exploit it, all you need is an opponent who holds the same mindset. I can see how it would caused a problem if competitive and fluff players played against each other, but a game like that was always going to be one sided anyway, and probably unenjoyable for both players.

But what is intended? The implication of saying 'play it as intended' is that there is a right or wrong way to play the game. This is absolutely false, not to mention a little arrogant. The issue, beyond the obvious gimmicks and exploits, is that even from a more tame perspective, the balance is borked. Further, you seem to have a very strict line between fluffy and competitive, when really, there is no such hard distinction. The line is blurred and overlaps, and indeed, many strong lists are very fluffy, and many weak lists are unfluffy. So when you say 'competitive' player against a 'fluffy' player, what do you mean?

All that only shows how balance is an issue for everyone. Games between strong lists and weak lists would be unenjoyable for both players, so why not make a game where one-sided matchups don't exist (or to a much lesser extent, anyways)?

It's not me saying there's a right way to play, but GW. They have made it quite clear that they want people to play in a narrative fashion rather than going all-in for winning. And I draw the line between fluff and competitive players by the following: If your primary motivation for choosing models in an army is based on the background or the look of the models, then that constitutes a fluff player, if the primary motivation is for in-game effectiveness, then that constitutes competitive. I appreciate there is often some overlap but the majority of players will fall on one side of the line or the other.

If everything were balanced, then that would remove the list-building aspect entirely, and therefore a layer of the game. There has to be some imbalance for there to be a degree of skill in making an army, otherwise it's all down to the dice. One-sided matchups are inevitable unless both players are playing identical lists. And I've found that in games in which both players adopt the same mindset (in my case choosing models for fluff and looks) the balance really isn't an issue when both sides don't exploit it.

At the end of the day, my point is this; it is the attitude of WAAC players that is largely the 'problem', not the rules themselves, so GW are better off just focusing on making the game fun and more open for their target audience, which unbound and the other options does.

No, the attitude is not the problem. Frankly, your attitude of claiming one way of playing is superior to another is the issue.

GW should focus on writing rules that are clear, and codices that are balanced both internally and externally. Everyone wins, no one loses.

I'm not saying it's superior, just that those playing 40k as a tournament game are using it for something it wasn't meant for, so shouldn't be surprised when it begins to break down. It's like trying to win a Formula 1 race in a hatchback and complaining you don't make the podium.

I agree in a perfect world, GW would make a game like you talk about, but in reality that will never happen.

At the end of the day, if you don't like something, don't play it or play against it. There is no requirement in 40k, the rules are guidelines and at a basic level everything requires agreement from an opponent, so 40k really is what you make it. It's only when units/combos are deliberately spammed/exploited that balance is an issue.

Not playing against someone because of a list isn't a solution; its a symptom of the issues of the game.

It is a solution in that it solves the problem of bad matchups and incompatible philosophies in list-building at an individual level. It won't fix the game, but it can make your own experience more enjoyable.

 Paradigm wrote:

If everything were balanced, then that would remove the list-building aspect entirely, and therefore a layer of the game. There has to be some imbalance for there to be a degree of skill in making an army, otherwise it's all down to the dice. One-sided matchups are inevitable unless both players are playing identical lists. And I've found that in games in which both players adopt the same mindset (in my case choosing models for fluff and looks) the balance really isn't an issue when both sides don't exploit it.

This fallacy again? You are incorrect. There are plenty of games out there that still have list building without making it so only a small handful of units in each army is actually good and the rest are going to make you lose games. It's very rare to have one-sided matchups in other games unless you get very unlucky with the list you end up facing (e.g. bringing mostly infantry against an anti-infantry list), and that's why games like Warmachine have multiple lists in tournaments, to reduce the chance even further. It's very rare to have a one-sided matchup in Warmachine, while in most cases you can (and people have, in tournaments no less) bring a subpar list and do well or even defeat a more powerful list.

The problem in 40k is that choosing models for fluff and looks actively penalizes you. If I want to play a fluffy Night Lords army and take mobile squads of CSM (unmarked), Raptors and Warp Talons, I'm deliberately gimping myself by not picking Plague Marines, a Nurgle Lord on Bike, Nurgle Spawn and all the rest. Without a single die being rolled, hell before I even deploy my forces, I'm going in at a disadvantage because the fluffy units I like the look of are inferior in basically every way to the units that I'm choosing not to take. Could I still win? Perhaps, but I'm fighting an uphill battle because the game is indirectly telling me that the units I like are bad, and by my choosing to play a fluffy army I'm at a disadvantage. I'm speaking straight from experience. I wanted to play Chaos, I did not want a Nurgle themed army, Death Guard or otherwise. I was told in no uncertain terms (on three or four different forums, from different people!) that winning games is going to be a lot harder without playing a Nurgle force because the other units generally aren't good, in fact my original fluffy army list I wanted critique on was gutted to be a generic Nurgle themed force to make it work; I literally had somebody tell me words to the effect of "Change out your {fluffy Chaos Lord, don't remember exact loadout but I think it was like a powerfist and combi-weapon} for a Lord w/MoN on a bike, drop your CSM squads for some Plague Marines in Rhinos" and the like with zero regard for the fact I wasn't playing a Nurgle army and didn't want a Nurgle army. Compare that to Warmachine: I asked about fielding Man-o-War Shocktroopers, generally considered to be a subpar unit for the Khador faction. I was given ways to make them work and given examples of battles in which they were used to good advantage, and told what warcasters work best with them and what units support them.

That's not even imbalance, that's quite literally lazy and incomplete design. There is a world of difference between "That unit isn't generally considered the best... but here's how to make it work" (Warmachine) and "That unit is bad, take Unit Y instead." with zero regard if you actually want Unit Y (40k).

This isn't some speculation, this is actual experience from a former 40k player who wanted to look at coming back after a very long break. The above actually happened and soured me on 40k because why would I want to spend money (and not a small amount either) on either a force that I didn't want to play (Nurgle Chaos) or one that's going to disadvantage me for playing what I actually wanted (non-Nurgle Chaos). I might like the fluff and the models, but not enough to pretty much throw hundreds of dollars away and either not have fun due to not playing something I enjoy, or not have fun due to going into every game likely to lose. Coupled with the fact there doesn't seem to be any kind of "narrative gaming" in my meta, just random pickup games and the occasional tournament, and 40k isn't the game for me at this juncture.