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Keep in mind that 40k generally starts with the base case of 1 unit = 1 FOC slot. It is likely that the draft KP rules under discussion didn't consider Combat Squads or Platoons at all.

The real questions are:
1. Is some version of KPs preferable to VPs?
2. If so, how should KPs work?

I think that the basic concept of KPs are generally better than VPs. Counting and adding VPs and half VPs opens the door to more issues for the math-challenged. It's not too uncommon to have errors in tallying VPs, somebody forgetting to divide halves or screwing up "carry" of 100VPs. And that makes VPs a lot easier to cheat. On the other hand, it's a lot easier for the opponent to calculate the enemy KPs by inspection, as they KP values are small and easily determined.

Now as for details, GW uses 2 KPs for most units, 1 KP for Troops, and 3 KPs for HQs.

There's nothing wrong with this, as Troops *should* be more expendable, and HQs more protected. This encourages players to field Troops, which fits the theme of 5th Edition.

Putting a bull's eye on the forehead of the HQ is also a good thing, as it makes herohammer play a little bit riskier, and encourages HQs to function more as commanders supporting.

lumping an entire FOC choice together as a single entity for KP purposes seems to be reasonable. It keeps the total KP count down, and pays good attention to the FOC concept. It further encourages players to take larger units over MSU, so there is a nice design decision to be made between fielding Squadrons vs individuals - individually, 3 Landspeeders risk 6 KP, but they can affect 3 areas of the board.

Finally, putting this all together, with HQs worth 3KP, Troops worth 1KP, it is interesting and elegant that each section of the FOC is has the same number of KPs:
- 2 HQs @ 3KP = 6KP
- 3 Elite @ 2KP = 6KP
- 6 Troop @ 1KP = 6KP
- 3 Fast @ 2KP = 6KP
- 3 Heavy @ 2KP = 6KP
Nice!

Overall, it appears to me that 5th Edition is trying very hard to force the player to make more decisions that have risks and costs. These decisions are compositional, strategic, and tactical. So I think this is good.

JohnHwangDD wrote:Overall, it appears to me that 5th Edition is trying very hard to force the player to make more decisions that have risks and costs. These decisions are compositional, strategic, and tactical. So I think this is good.

Overall, GW is trying hard to force people to only use the armies that have the very best troops (Orks and Marines-Especially drop podders) as troops are the best unit to take in the new edition. Hardly more decisions there.

skyth wrote:
Overall, GW is trying hard to force people to only use the armies that have the very best troops (Orks and Marines-Especially drop podders) as troops are the best unit to take in the new edition. Hardly more decisions there.

I doubt that they are making those rules specificaly for that purpose, but that appears to be the effect the rules will have. The problem with rewarding people for taking troops is that some armies have significantly better troops than others. Lets look at marines vs guardians vs orcs vs basic IG squads. 2 of those troop units are really good and 2 are not. Can you tell which is which? Heck, other than the marines, the other 3 are also almost the same point cost but very definately not the same level of power.

While kill points will shift the way armies are made, I don't think it will bring more balance, it will just shift the weight in a different direction.

@skyth: aside from the fact that Troops are ordinary, slow, and non-killy, yeah, they're great.

@Phoenix: Marines will be good from Combat Squads and Razorbacks; Guard Platoons will be very good from sheer numbers of scoring units and resilience vs KPs. Orks will have bulk numbers on their side. Overpriced and fragile Guardians suck, of course, which is why Eldar aren't ever going to take them. Thankfully, Eldar can take Jetbikes which are fast and tough.

The fact that some Troops choices are "better" doesn't really make that much difference. But moving away from Herohammer and Heavyhammer is a good thing.

Depends on the army John. Yes, they are ordinary, which is why I despise troop-based comp. But there are some good troops out there...

Tactical Squads (If we lose the 6 man las/plas to the combat squads, it's a little hit, but in a Drop Pod, they are one of the best units out there).

Genestealers (Slow, non-killy...Hardly)

Ork Boys (Hardly slow, and hardly non-killy)

Plague Marines in Rhinos will be pretty nasty in the new edition.

But I will agree that Troops are 'ordinary'. Boring to play with and against most troop-heavy armies.

If GW wanted you to take more troops then just make the troop selection a min 3 instead of 2. That alone would shift some armies around and well, not bother others. It would just be more fair to those armies that are not all ready troop heavy to begin with.

It seems to me that such as system as the 5th edition pdf proposes for missions requires people not to increase their troop selection, but face a decision about what risks they're willing to take. If they take lots of troops to capture objectives or deny kill-points, they may not have the hitting power to capture those objectives with or to accrue kill-points with, and conversely without enough troops to capture objects and deny kill-points they're going to be playing with a glass hammer. I like it.

Some troops are good at capturing objectives and accruing kill points...Some are not. The new system just skews the balance in favor of certain armies and army types.

If GW changed the FOC to require 3+ Troops, then that would make many armies illegal due to only having 2 Troops. Making Troops more valuable is better, as 2-Troop armies stay valid, but just become less effective.

So, some Troop-class units are better than others, so what? Usually they're more expensive as well, and embedded in different armies with different sorts of supporting units. It's good that some armies will be faced with different decisions about composition - it means there's variety.

Less variety you mean, as everyone just switches to the most efficient troops-based armies out there, with troops generally representing the blandest unit in the codex.

Nope, I mean that different armies offer players a different set of strategic and tactical choices. Some armies will not be considered 'most efficient' with its Troops choices maximized, and some will be.

Among those players of armies that will be popularly considered most efficient with maximized troops, you'll get the usual risk-adverse herd proclaiming both their own tactical genius in fielding Troop heavy armies and promoting that as the only 'competitive' or 'viable' way to play the game. You'll also get the usual risk-takers and obstinate grognards who either don't give a damn about what is popularly considered 'competitive' or 'viable', or will find beyond that narrow blinkered viewpoint something to take advantage of (i.e. something involving risk and tactical skill, rather than a 'no-brainer' list and luck).

Amongst the players of armies that will not be popularly considered most efficient with maximized troops, you'll find something of the opposite, except the risk-adverse will complain about their 'nerfed' armies and GW's conspiracy against...and here's me fishing around in my "Oh Noes, Nerf!" randomizer hat...Necrons, Tau, and Eldar. Naturally these people won't learn: they're too busy dumping their models on the table and expecting to just roll dice so that their spiffy 'competitive' new army list cribbed off the 'net does all the work against players of equally indifferent skills (all the while complaining that Warhammer 40k isn't tactical and it's all about lists....). They won't take risks, and they especially won't risk the terrible loss of face that comes with trying non-obvious combinations and tactics that might actually educate them about the game that they claim to be experts at because they win lots of games in small ponds.

I'm certainly expecting people to switch to "the most efficient troops-based armies", or at least the ones that they think are "the most efficient". Most people who play this game are sheep like that. They read some posts by blowhards on the 'net and count their chickens before they've hatched. It would be amusing except the tedium of it is boring and it gets in the way of interesting discussion about learning how to solve tactical problems on the table-top. By all means complain that you'll be forced to take troops, "the blandest unit in the codex". It's just that it would be more interesting to talk about solving the tactical problems faced by interesting armies and the ways they can face them.

Man, that was cathartic. Also, here's a comic:

http://www.shortpacked.com/d/20080227.html

skyth wrote:Less variety you mean, as everyone just switches to the most efficient troops-based armies out there, with troops generally representing the blandest unit in the codex.

Who has the time and can afford to do that?

Don't get me wrong, I'll be fielding more Troops, but the idea that I'd dump any of my armies, after spending much effort to collect, build, and paint them is kind of silly. Because I'd be right back at the start, so I'd have to do it all over again. And quite frankly, I just don't have the time or inclination to do that. Plus, with GW raising prices and limiting discounts, it's just not worth it.

No, I'll just put my less competitive armies on the shelf, and take them down when they get buffed again. Or when I feel like actually having fun.

You will also have people ignoring that the game isn’t particularly well balanced, and that some choices are bad no matter what you try.

Nurglitch wrote:It seems to me that such as system as the 5th edition pdf proposes for missions requires people not to increase their troop selection, but face a decision about what risks they're willing to take. If they take lots of troops to capture objectives or deny kill-points, they may not have the hitting power to capture those objectives with or to accrue kill-points with, and conversely without enough troops to capture objects and deny kill-points they're going to be playing with a glass hammer. I like it.

You are associating troops with units that are not good at killing or getting on objectives. This is not the case for all armies. Likewise, some armies have troops that are not good at holding objectives or hiding KP. The KP system attempts to normalize the value of unlike things. If 40k actually was just Marines running at each other, then the KP system would make more sense.

I'm not talking about all armies, I'm talking about what's going on within armies. Troops are within armies, so it's rather silly to compare them across armies without comparing what they're competing with for points in those armies. Sure, some army's Troops are better than other army's Troops at killing things and getting on objectives, so what? Are they better at killing things than some unit occupying another non-Troop Force Organization Chart slot? Are they better at capturing objectives than some unit occupying another non-Troop Force Organization Chart slot? Are they cheaper, more numerous, or have better special rules than their competitors? If not, then players will still be motivated to choose non-Troops even when they have not filled out an army's Troops choices. This motivation will exist because there are HQ, Elite, Fast Attack, and Heavy Support choices that, despite not being Troops, are better at supporting Troops than other Troops are!

People dumping their current armies in favour of all Troop armies will be in for a disappointment.

Right now armies seem to be Troops supporting HQs, Elites, Fast Attack, and Heavy Support choices. The emphasis on Troops turns that around and back to the way it should be: you choose your army around supporting your Troops and enabling them to carry out their mission, and your decision is balancing the Troops with the supporting elements of your army.

[EDIT]: Post removed due to being largely a rant. Grumble...

JohnHwangDD wrote:If GW changed the FOC to require 3+ Troops, then that would make many armies illegal due to only having 2 Troops. Making Troops more valuable is better, as 2-Troop armies stay valid, but just become less effective.

Umm... You misunderstand. Just like now where a minimum army comp is 1 HQ slot and 2 troop slots. Change it to 1 HQ choice and 3 troop slots. It just means Necrons (for example) will have to take 3 units of warriors and a Lord. Its doesn't matter how many different choices there are.

Huh? I think I understand, and that maybe *you* misunderstand?

I am fully aware that requiring a 3rd minimum Troop slot would mean that armies have at least 3 Troops. That should be "obvious".

My only point is that doing so only makes Troops more of a "burden" because in many armies, they're still objectively the worst way to spend points. So minimum Troops / maximum non-Troops remains attractive.

However, the 5th Edition approach of making Troops have strategic value (non-Troops cannot score) and lower risk (only 1 KP for a Troops slot vs 2+ KP for non-Troops) is a superior balancing mechanism.

From a comp standpoint, requiring only 2 Troops, but making them valuable is a preferred approach. The player can continue to play with their existing army, even if it has only 2 Troops. They aren't required to change (or buy) anything. The choice to change remains with the player.

Nurglitch wrote: The emphasis on Troops turns that around and back to the way it should be: you choose your army around supporting your Troops and enabling them to carry out their mission, and your decision is balancing the Troops with the supporting elements of your army.

Actually, that's not the way it 'should' be...

skyth wrote:

Nurglitch wrote: The emphasis on Troops turns that around and back to the way it should be: you choose your army around supporting your Troops and enabling them to carry out their mission, and your decision is balancing the Troops with the supporting elements of your army.

Actually, that's not the way it 'should' be...

This, of course, goes into a whole separate debate on whether the tabletop game should reflect what would most commonly be seen battlewise as far as the fluff goes, or just make it an open, free-form wargame.

Most real armies have a standard troop type. For example, a US infantry company is mostly made up of regular infantry squads led by platoon HQs. There are some specialty sections that assist (MG teams, mortars, AT, attachments from Battalion, etc), but the bulk of the unit is regular troops.

Unfortunately, as was mentioned above, many army lists have crap for troop choices, or at least the troop options aren't as good as the rest of the army list. Look at most competitive Tau lists...they have the bare minimum for firewarriors and/or kroot, because the main units in the army are either ineffective or have no synergy with the rest of the list. If you think the changes to troop-heavy lists will make the game boring because all the armies will look the same, take a look at the current game situation. There's not a lot of variety, at least not if you're looking for competitive armies.

I think the 5th edition proposed solution is actually pretty interesting. It lets players keep their all specialty army lists if they want, and they may be much more effective if they're fighting mostly troop-heavy armies, but there is a new risk involved. Obviously the best answer would be to make army troop choices worth taking, but that would require rewriting most codexes out there, and that would take years. This simple rule lets armies of both types (troop heavy and competitive) compete more fairly while not forcing anyone to change through some heavy-handed, arbitrary rule change (like an extra troop force org chart requirement). A fairly elegant solution, as far a GW is concerned.

I wonder if this is meant to somehow make it easier for casual players, who may focus more on troop choices, to compete against optimized lists? If so, why? I've often read about the large, stay-at-home player base that doesn't care about super clear-cut rules and such...are they coming out to tournaments more and complaining about the list discrepancies? Does GW plan on trying to promote new tournaments to draw these players out? Either they expect more interaction between hard-core and casual gamers, or someone at GW is just trying to get the game closer to his vision of 40K representing the fluff of the universe.

It promotes more sales of basic troops.

Take orks for example. If I want to run a KOS style list with 4 trukk mobs, I only have to spend $88 for four boxes and I have 4 full squads.

If I want to run 4 squads of 30 though, I'm looking at $264. Granted that's for a horde army, but if the change gets long time players to cough up the money for a few more boxes of basic troopers, GW sees a bit more money that wouldn't normally be seen.

I doubt I'll ever run a true ork horde. I like my trukks a bit to much. Manuverability is still vitally important to the game reading through the pdf. If some of those objectives are on the other side of the table, you'd better have some way of getting there - hopefully somewhat intact (even if it's just one trooper as long as he isn't fleeing) they can capture it.

Smaller, faster units still have a place.

Might shelve the tau for a while though. While I take 2 10 man squads in fish, they are generally scarificial to a point (rarely do they finish a game on the table). I would probably have to change the whole flavor of the army to make it viable - adding in a couple of kroot units, which means changing the supporting suits and tanks also.

But the problem is, those specialty armies will go away if you want to win. There is no chance in hell of my 30 KP tau army (using just two troop choices) ever winning against an Ork, Guard, SOB, or Necron army that brings 5-6 troops to the table and only 10 KPs. It doesn't matter what sinerio or mission we are playing. All the other guy has to do is concentrate on my two units of firewarriors (24 models, 240 points of force) for the objective missions or take down three or so my elite, HS, or FA choices... of which there are 9 to choose from.

My only chance of winning in objective missions is to somehow obliterate all of his troop choices (probably 1250 - 1500 points worth vs my 240) as well and hope I end up with more more VPs for the tiebreaker. However in annilation I can't ever win. ever. He only needs to kill 7 models out of my army. 7 to guarentee a win.

So is this a fault of my army design, my play style, or GW shoehorning the direction my army has to go into?

6 10 man marines will out kill and out last 6 12 man firewarrior squads any day of the week. No matter what other back up units you bring. Horde troop heavy armies don't need manuverability when they only have to kill 7 models to guarentee a victory. You have 6 turns to do it it, and the tables aren't that big. KPs and troop only scoring units will only be balanced when each codex has troop choices of equal power. And that will never happen.

I agree - which is why the tau will probably sit on the shelf.

So is this a fault of my army design, my play style, or GW shoehorning the direction my army has to go into?

Mostly the last - especially for some armies (like suit heavy tau). To make that army viable under KP rules, you'd have to make crisis suits troops. Which I don't ever see happening. I think KP are a horrible idea.

That's the spirit: crumple as soon as you imagine a challenge! Don't actually take the risk of losing (oh, the shame of it), stick that army on the shelf where it won't embarrass you!

LOL. No, mostly the tau will be sitting on the shelf because I'm bored with them. Losing? I've had my ass handed to me many times while playing with tau.

Nah, the orks are out to play again. Now that I finally have new stuff for them, I'll probably play them exclusively until I need a change of pace again. Besides, they'll still be a challenge with small squads in trukks. Trying to keep 12 man cc orientened squads alive can be challenging enough... ;D

The other thing that I’ve been noticing with the new rules is that they favor hard, mobile, short ranged / hand to hand troops over soft, static, long ranged ones. Troops are almost a non-factor in kill point games since they give up so few kill points. So as long as you are not losing squads in droves, you’re fine. However, in objective missions, you have to get your troops to the objectives and keep them alive there. This is going to shift not only the purpose of troops, but which ones are taken. I’ll use eldar as an example since they have a wide variety of troop choices. Guardians are not going to be very useful. This is due to the fact that while they may be able to get to an objective in a reasonable amount of time, they are way too frail to hold it. Rangers / pathfinders are also not going to be very useful. While they have some decent shooting power, they lose it if they start moving. And while they are tough as nails at range (assuming they are in cover), they drop like flys if they get assaulted, so they can't really move up too close to the enemy. The only purpose I can see for them is to hold your own objective in missions where one objective starts in your deployment zone. Jet bikes and dire avengers will both see an increase in use since both are fast (assuming the avengers are in a serpent), both are fairly hard (3+ saves for the bikes and shimmer shield for the avengers), and both are short ranged units. I think this sort of change in the role of troops is going to seriously cut down on the diversity of troops you see on the field since the role of troops is going to be capturing objectives. Marine scout sniper squads will be a thing of the past. So will las plas squads (at least the 6 man versions). There will be even less reasons to take guardians (if that’s possible) and fire warriors without a devil fish will be completely unheard of.

FW's with an ethereal camped on objectives near/in their deployment zone will be hard to dislodge. Especially if they are in cover. With kroot on the forward edges to threaten counter-assualt/reclaim you could potentially end up with a pretty good firebase.

skyth wrote:

Nurglitch wrote: The emphasis on Troops turns that around and back to the way it should be: you choose your army around supporting your Troops and enabling them to carry out their mission, and your decision is balancing the Troops with the supporting elements of your army.

Actually, that's not the way it 'should' be...

Really? If one pretends there is some kind of correlation between Fluff and comp, then one must defer to the Fluff of lots of Troops. For example, the SM OOB is based on the Battle Company, with fully-mechanized Combat Squads, equal numbers of Assault and Devastators, and one Tactical squad per Assault / Devastator squad.

If a SM army varies in any significance from the SM OOB, then it fails to be a "proper" SM army.

Grimaldi wrote:I think the 5th edition proposed solution is actually pretty interesting. ... A fairly elegant solution, as far a GW is concerned.

I wonder if this is meant to somehow make it easier for casual players, who may focus more on troop choices, to compete against optimized lists? If so, why? I've often read about the large, stay-at-home player base that doesn't care about super clear-cut rules and such...are they coming out to tournaments more and complaining about the list discrepancies?

Totally agreed. The new, Troops-oriented games will be more plausible.

It's GW recognizing that casual (i.e. "normal") players are the overwhelming majority (polls show 90% "friendlies", and I think this is understates considerably), so the game really should cater to them - NOT the lunatic tournament-playing fringe. Building in lots of tournament-oriented crap adds no value to the vast majority of players.

If tournament 40k looks more like normal gaming, then perhaps, more of them will come out and be more active.

Jayden63 wrote:So is this a fault of my army design, my play style, or GW shoehorning the direction my army has to go into?

6 10 man marines will out kill and out last 6 12 man firewarrior squads any day of the week.

YES!, yes, and no.

Are those Fire-Warrior squads in full-defensive Transports? If so, those Marines are in for a tougher job.