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Technically, if you go Mono-Tzeentch, your entire army is psyker =P

Jayden63 wrote:

Vaktathi wrote:

purplefood wrote:.
SW hates sorcery and distrusts psykers. Like most of the IoM.

And yet can field more psykers than most armies and probably the best psykers

Errt. Try again, of armies that can actually field psychers, SW come in somewhere in the middle. The only codexs that SW beat out are those where the only psycher units comes in the HQ selection, in which case those armies are limited to two. I can't think of a single codex that can field a max of 3 of them, then SW has 4, then everybody else has more.

IG can field 32 psychers
Chaos - 8
BA - 5

Just to name a few armies that can put out more psychers. As for better, LD10 is still LD10. No SW psycher can cast more than 2 powers per turn, there are a few out there that can cast 3.

Granted they have a multiple good anti-psycher equipement. Which fits with their anti-psycher mentality. You have the tools to defeat your enemy. But its not the psycher itself doing the work.

Note that, I said "MOST" armies, I'm not incorrect in this. Also, the correct IG number is 29 (the other 3 are Overseers) and 27 of those function as only 3, so functionally 5 if you take up 5 FoC slots, not the 4 in two FoC slots.

And lets face it, for CSM's, 6 of those psykers barely qualify, being basically there for a single S8 shot.

Technically, if you go Mono-Tzeentch, your entire army is psyker =P

Not really, only the HQ units and Thousand Sons Troops units squad leaders.

When you say best do you mean ruleswise? or fluff wise?
Because fluff hardly ever says anything bad about it's own codex.

It doesn't matter, in fluff they don't like Psykers, in game they use Psykers.
Fluff DOES NOT equate to game, we all know it.

Not only that but IIRC Space Wolves don't actually believe Rune Priests (or at least didn't during the HH) to be Psykers but actually gaining their abilities from nature, rather than the warp.

Just Dave wrote:It doesn't matter, in fluff they don't like Psykers, in game they use Psykers.
Fluff DOES NOT equate to game, we all know it.

And that's unfortunate, the game rules should reflect the fluff. Sometimes it does, thought it doesn't always, but its rather blatant in this case.

I completely understand what you are saying, and can agree to what you are saying, but i still have to somewhat disagree that this is the "creep" and the book is unfair.

In my local tourny scene there are now 3 Space wolves players (i was the original one playin the old dex cause space vikings rule!) the new dex came out i was rocking it, playing pretty much what i used to with some new flair, and i was still winning tournys mostly cause people didnt know how to play tourny. now with the new blogs and the new flair and the new tactics for tournaments....i think there are very FEW codex's that cant do "cheesy" and "ugh" when you look to them. Blood angels still have the "space marines...rerolling everything, and FNP!?" Nids still have the "Instant Death -everywhere- and suuuuper fast/deepstriking all over the place" i could go on, im just saying the problem isnt the codex, the problem is the new "atmosphere" gamers are adapting, where evey game, at every local, HAS to be tournament POWERED. you cant have anything fun and unique, it has to be last years 'ard boys kinda tournament set up. Or equially set up tournament. you just dont see fun things in games unless its very private because of the way the game has shifted to tournament play.



(btw, deamons have to bring fateweaver to be competative imho, otherwise they just get smoked like summer sausage! : )

My tuppence:

I was quite excited about the SWolves codex when it came out. They suit my Khornate nature down to the ground in fluff, and have a Norse (always good) theme to boot. But when it boiled down to my lists, it was always the same old stuff, and same old advice:

Rune Priests>Other HQs
Razorbacks = Necessary
3x LFs w/ 5x MLs per squad and a razorback each = Heavy Support
Grey Hunters x5 w/ meltagun and WG + PF + Combi-Melta x however many razorbacks you have.
Add MM/HF Land Speeders to taste.
Ignore all other choices.

That was basically what it boiled down to. To date, the only way i've managed to build a list unlike the above and stay reasonably effective have been at 1.5kpts or less and still had to include some elements, such as the Long Fangs (simply because our other HS choices are too fragile, suck or are too expensive, with LFs being affordable and reliable, not to mention effective; it's like being told to kill someone in a suit of armour at range and being given a selection of pebbles and a missile launcher, why would you choose the pebbles when you can simply wipe him away with the missile launcher?).

My idea of Space Wolves were battle-hardened and battle-hungry marines that strived to get up close and personal; what I got was an army that rests on a bed of missile launchers and las/plas razorbacks, with token troops to capture the odd objective.

Avatar 720 wrote:My tuppence:

I was quite excited about the SWolves codex when it came out. They suit my Khornate nature down to the ground in fluff, and have a Norse (always good) theme to boot. But when it boiled down to my lists, it was always the same old stuff, and same old advice:

Rune Priests>Other HQs
Razorbacks = Necessary
3x LFs w/ 5x MLs per squad and a razorback each = Heavy Support
Grey Hunters x5 w/ meltagun and WG + PF + Combi-Melta x however many razorbacks you have.
Add MM/HF Land Speeders to taste.
Ignore all other choices.

That was basically what it boiled down to. To date, the only way i've managed to build a list unlike the above and stay reasonably effective have been at 1.5kpts or less and still had to include some elements, such as the Long Fangs (simply because our other HS choices are too fragile, suck or are too expensive, with LFs being affordable and reliable, not to mention effective; it's like being told to kill someone in a suit of armour at range and being given a selection of pebbles and a missile launcher, why would you choose the pebbles when you can simply wipe him away with the missile launcher?).

My idea of Space Wolves were battle-hardened and battle-hungry marines that strived to get up close and personal; what I got was an army that rests on a bed of missile launchers and las/plas razorbacks, with token troops to capture the odd objective.

I hate to say this, but if thats all you get out of the SW codex, your doing it wrong. So much more available than razorback spam.

Yeah the SW codex has a bit of an "easy button" look about it. But there are so many different ways of playing the list, and strongly effective ways too.

When I played against a logan wing in a 1750pt tourny, I was less then impresses. So they are good in close combat? Shoot them. So they can shoot? Assault them. They are just marines, and As a marine player, I know that we have some big weaknesses. All you need to do is calm down and fight it like all other marines. Remember, Jack of all trades, master of none.

At my GW there's a ten year old who plays SW, he always beats me because he has 2 special characters at 500 points. Is that even allowed?

Honestly I agree with the OP. Personal Story.

I play Orks, and my brother played marines. We both mostly non-optimized armies. We took some units we thought were good, and then duked it out. When my brother was playing marines, I would win, maybe a little over half the time. Eventually he decided to get a new army, new models and everything. At first he wanted to do a Canis army, with a bunch of Fenresian Wolves and thunder wolves. Eventually, he ended up with a "standard" wolf army, just because it is so much better. Grey hunters in rhinos, Thunder wolves, Wolf Guard, Rune Priest, and Long Fangs. There are SO many things in that army that my Orks hate. Even normal people want to win their games.

1) JotWW is so good against orks. They rely on having huge mobs to protect a PK Nob or other character. Couple this with low Int and you are golden. I have lost so many PK nobs and it essentially makes the squad of boys Nearly Useless. Also loosing a Painboy from my Nob mob is really bad as well. If he can roll well, he can neuter my army very quickly.

2) Long Fangs base are grey hunters, but they have 9 LD instead of 8 and they cost the same as the grey hunters. If anything they should be more expensive.

3) Grey Hunters have SO many attacks, once you factor in counter attack (almost always works), Wolf Standards, MotW, and 2 CCWs. My orks could very easily take out tactical squads. They had around 13 attacks at the most, and that just does not kill many orks. Once you start getting around 35 attacks, that takes down enough orks that I Lose combat and either take Fearless saves or run away/get swept.

Honestly, I think what they were trying to do with the space wolf codex was balance it by making their LD 8 for grey hunters instead of 9 like a tactical squad. The problem is that in a small squad, (razorback) you have room for the wolf quard to boost it to 9. In a Larger squad, it is harder to kill enough guys to force a LD test, and they do not lose combat either. IF LD was a very important stat in the game, Grey hunters would be hurt for their lack of it. It is not however a very important stat, and as such Grey hunters are undercosted for what they do. I would say they belong at about the 17-18 pt range to be balanced.

I just get the feeling that the play testing for the space wolves was not very extensive. it would only take one game against JotWW to see how anoying it can be against certain races. It would only take one game against regular marines to see how much better the gray hunters are than a tactical squad. It feels like it was a fandex, where nothing was tested or checked, but they just put down what they felt was a good price.

The same thing can be said for guard I think. Chimeras are just worth more than the 55 pts you pay for them. The cynic in me thinks that GW is messing with the balance to sell kits. This can be seen with the Nid book, as Carnifexes were Nerfed in order to sell more Trygon kits... or maybe they are just bad with balance... I do not know.

I think that the rest of the 5th edition Armies (baring Guard) are mostly well balanced. They are able to win, but are also able to loose. I think that the only way to beat the wolves is to tailor your list to beat them, which then limits the armies/lists you can play.

Vaktathi wrote:

Technically, if you go Mono-Tzeentch, your entire army is psyker =P

Not really, only the HQ units and Thousand Sons Troops units squad leaders.

I was actually refering to the Daemon Army, not the CSM one. Hence "technically" because game-wise all of those "psychic" abilities are just normal shooting abilites or innate buffs.

The aspect of this that concerns me the most is not in fact the disenfranchising effect that a single (startlingly) imbalanced codex has on the player community. It's the likely cure to this problem that truly depresses me: ever-spiraling incremental nerfdom.

As a game designer, (and doubly so as a for-profit business) , you only need the one moment of weakness wherein you offer Easy Power over Disciplined Diversity to start the cycle. Once out there, the likely answer to Easy Power is always "More Easy" and "More Power!"

GW caved on the SW codex, in my humble opinion, and the consequences will echo through the remainder of 5e as the codices will have to be either Easier or More Powerful to draw competitive interest, and of course, sales. I believe we've already seen it with the BAs, as both C:SW and C:BA are considerably Easier Power than C:SM (your father's Easy Power codex!).

Redbeard's overall position of "this basically sucks" is an understandable one to me, and I am saddened to realize that it's likely to suck more before they're done.

...

The only real upside here (for me) is that the abundant SW and BA power lists have diminished my shame at running my Salamanders ( Vulkan!) successor chapter.

Generally when something like this comes up the people will call for a nerf. When they do nerf it, the people will say they went too far and then take away the nerf, causing everyone to think they're overpowered again. Unfortunately unlike an MMO, this problem usually takes years, if not decades, for GW to fix due to how only one codex per edition is ever released (with the exception of 3rd).

Jayden63 wrote:I hate to say this, but if thats all you get out of the SW codex, your doing it wrong. So much more available than razorback spam.

Yeah the SW codex has a bit of an "easy button" look about it. But there are so many different ways of playing the list, and strongly effective ways too.

Exactly. Ultimately however it's the "easy button" that's often pressed.

Vaktathi wrote:

Just Dave wrote:It doesn't matter, in fluff they don't like Psykers, in game they use Psykers.
Fluff DOES NOT equate to game, we all know it.

And that's unfortunate, the game rules should reflect the fluff. Sometimes it does, thought it doesn't always, but its rather blatant in this case.

They should but they rarely do. In the BA codex for instance the AdMech is annoyed at the BA for not sharing their nice new shiny predator STC they then go and give them a freaking plane for testing. Fluff doesn't always match the rules and vice versa it should but it doesn't.

Just Dave wrote:

Jayden63 wrote:I hate to say this, but if thats all you get out of the SW codex, your doing it wrong. So much more available than razorback spam.

Yeah the SW codex has a bit of an "easy button" look about it. But there are so many different ways of playing the list, and strongly effective ways too.

Exactly. Ultimately however it's the "easy button" that's often pressed.

That IMO is the problem with the gamer not the codex design or intent. Its like playing a video game where you choose to play the easy difficulty instead of nightmare.

The codex offers competitive design for any type of army style. The fact that it can do that, shows the success of the codex design.

Oh yeah, I'm not going to deny it is largely a problem with the gamer. Although they are still exploiting the [lack of] flaws within the Codex IMHO. But yeah, I agree with it being largely a problem of the player.

Jayden63 wrote:
That IMO is the problem with the gamer not the codex design or intent. Its like playing a video game where you choose to play the easy difficulty instead of nightmare.

The codex offers competitive design for any type of army style. The fact that it can do that, shows the success of the codex design.

I beg to differ on both points.

First, if the problem is with th gamer, then the even larger problem is with the community attitude, as advocated on any number of blogs, that winning is the only thing that matters. I don't know how much you have paid attention to the tournament scene, but things like sportsmanship and appearance have been lambasted in the last couple of years. The competitive community doesn't want fun events, they don't want a variety of armies, they want the guy who crushes the most heads to take all the prizes.

And the blogs and podcasts that are out there supporting this mentality are backing this up. You'll see things like "Hi, I'm newb gamer, can you help me with my list because my friend beats me all the time", and the response from the authority on the blog goes along the lines of "You'll never win any games with a list like that, what you need is 15 long fangs with missles..."

Is this really the advice that a friendly gamer needs to hear? For that matter, I don't think it's the advice that a tournament gamer needs to hear. But the community that is comprised of competitive types has taken a turn towards winning is everything, and the other reasons that people might pick an army (theme, appearance) take a backseat.


Secondly, you have a codex that can play multiple different styles, all more effectively than any other codex. That's not a success of codex design, that's a failure of codex design. Successful codex design is not done in a vacuum, it's done as part of a larger game design. When one codex is so extremely successful that people abandon their own codexes in order to use your rules (in spite of fluff or appearance), that's a failure in terms of appropriately designing the book within the overall game.

There's no reason that people should be playing Dark Wolves, Chaos Wolves, Ultrawolves, or the like, if the Wolf codex design was a success. It's not. It's out of place.

Mr Nobody wrote:At my GW there's a ten year old who plays SW, he always beats me because he has 2 special characters at 500 points. Is that even allowed?

As long as they have the minimum required (1 HQ 2 Troops) then yes it is. It's kind of stupid how they don't require a set point limit on special characters anymore but it's been that way for a while now.

First, if the problem is with th gamer, then the even larger problem is with the community attitude, as advocated on any number of blogs, that winning is the only thing that matters. I don't know how much you have paid attention to the tournament scene, but things like sportsmanship and appearance have been lambasted in the last couple of years. The competitive community doesn't want fun events, they don't want a variety of armies, they want the guy who crushes the most heads to take all the prizes.

I don't think that is necessarily true, and is a common "anti-competitive" attitude I see often.

What most competitive players want is for the person to win a tournament be the person who wins games, putting the emphasis on player skill rather then scoring placed upon an opponents perception. How many times have we need to see sportsmanship used as a weapon to consider the possibility it is flawed. Many tournaments in recent memory have proven that people just don't suddenly turn into jerks when there is no sportsmanship. Army appearance has it's place. I think there should always be an award for those players who put an honest effort into their army, but to effect the final outcome? I don't know about you, but I have been frustrated a few times that my actual performance in a tournament was high, but I lost out of placing because my army wasn't as pretty as another's army.

Is this really the advice that a friendly gamer needs to hear? For that matter, I don't think it's the advice that a tournament gamer needs to hear. But the community that is comprised of competitive types has taken a turn towards winning is everything, and the other reasons that people might pick an army (theme, appearance) take a backseat.

I can see that, but why can't we have both? I know for certain, that I can build an Iron Hands Themed Space Marine list, and do fairly well with it in the current environment. I have faith in my skill as a player, and the diverse army list choices the SM codex provides, that I may not have it as easy as the Space Wolf player that brought "defoult build 25", but I have a reasonable chance at winning consistently, even against other good players with the Space Wolves army.

Secondly, you have a codex that can play multiple different styles, all more effectively than any other codex. That's not a success of codex design, that's a failure of codex design. Successful codex design is not done in a vacuum, it's done as part of a larger game design. When one codex is so extremely successful that people abandon their own codexes in order to use your rules (in spite of fluff or appearance), that's a failure in terms of appropriately designing the book within the overall game.

This goes back to my earlier point that every other 5th edition codex, including Tyranids, can build lists that can handle Space Wolves rather well. Granted, it is harder, especially with Tyranids, but I don't see Space Wolves having as massive as an advantage as you are postulating. Yes, they have cheap Grey Hunters, Long Fangs, and Rune Priests. Most everything else they have is higher priced then then similar items in other codexes, and that is the balance of their book. If you can exploint those weaknesses but out assaulting them or out shooting them and apply concepts like good target priority, allocation of reasources, and manuvering, you can handle them rather well.

There's no reason that people should be playing Dark Wolves, Chaos Wolves, Ultrawolves, or the like, if the Wolf codex design was a success. It's not. It's out of place.

Honestly, the players that are doing so, no offense, but they are not really trying to build their own skill, but merely hopping on the internet bandwagon. I play Blood Angels, and I can, and have, consistently beat Space Wolves of all kinds of builds with vary different builds myself. The more I practiced and got good with my army against many different good opponents with good armies, including against Space Wolves, I feared them less and less. New Dark Eldar will have all the tools necessary to knock Space Wolves off this pedestal in people's mind, give it 6 month, I promise you that.

I will disagree with the idea that every other army out there is a Sapce Wolf but this is based solely on personal experience.

At the local store where I game there is a core of about 2 dozen players at least half of which play Space Marines on a fairly regular basis. Of that group there is exactly 1 Space Wolf player and he has been playing them since 3rd edition. None of the other marine players have switched over to wolves and as far as I am aware this has not even been considered. The real funny thing is that all of a sudden the marine army seeing a resurgence locally is Dark Angels as no less than five players are now running a DA army with three of those being new DA, but not new marine, players. This despite most people pointing out the DA shortcomings.

So at least locally we are not seeing this Space Wolf problem.

Mahu wrote:
I don't think that is necessarily true, and is a common "anti-competitive" attitude I see often.

What most competitive players want is for the person to win a tournament be the person who wins games, putting the emphasis on player skill rather then scoring placed upon an opponents perception.

First off, I'm as competitive as the next guy. I don't have an anti-competitive attitude, I just think that to be successful, 40k events have to appeal to the average gamers, not just the highly competitive.

That said, the discussion of how soft scores factor into tournaments has been hashed out many times. I think it's semantics to bemoan that the guy who had the best combination of appearance and game scores gets the 'overall' award, when there's a 'Best General' award available for just winning games as well. Anyone who is bitter over losing a combined score (called overall or renaissance man or whatever) to an army that looks better than theirs simply doesn't understand the concept of a combined score. If you intend to award a combined award to the person who won the most games, why even call it a combined score?

This goes back to my earlier point that every other 5th edition codex, including Tyranids, can build lists that can handle Space Wolves rather well. Granted, it is harder, especially with Tyranids, but I don't see Space Wolves having as massive as an advantage as you are postulating. Yes, they have cheap Grey Hunters, Long Fangs, and Rune Priests. Most everything else they have is higher priced then then similar items in other codexes, and that is the balance of their book. If you can exploint those weaknesses but out assaulting them or out shooting them and apply concepts like good target priority, allocation of reasources, and manuvering, you can handle them rather well.

It's a lot harder. I have no doubt that any codex can yield a list that a good player can use to beat an average player with a generic space wolf list. But, that leads to the next questions: A) Is that list that beats the Space Wolves balanced enough to also beat other armies, B) is the cost-of-entry to that army lower than switching to Space Wolves, and C) is that list easy enough to play and understand that it will persuade the average gamers who have hopped onto the wolf bandwagon to hop off it? (In which case, do we simply go through this again with that new list?)

Honestly, the players that are doing so, no offense, but they are not really trying to build their own skill, but merely hopping on the internet bandwagon. I play Blood Angels, and I can, and have, consistently beat Space Wolves of all kinds of builds with vary different builds myself. The more I practiced and got good with my army against many different good opponents with good armies, including against Space Wolves, I feared them less and less. New Dark Eldar will have all the tools necessary to knock Space Wolves off this pedestal in people's mind, give it 6 month, I promise you that.

Sure, they're hopping on the bandwagon. It's a good bandwagon. Who cares if they're trying to build their skill - they're probably not, they're trying to win games instead. If using a better army and the same skill gets them the same result as putting in the effort to learn their game with the same army, which is faster? And, if they switch armies AND put in the time to learning their game, isn't that even better?

And, it has a low barrier to entry. I mean, let's say I'm playing Marines and I keep losing to Space Wolves. Do I pick up a handful of new models and call my guys Space Wolves, or do I drop the grand that it would take to make a Dark Eldar army, and hope that I picked the right stuff that will actually be effective? There's a very low barrier-to-entry for hopping on the Space Wolf bandwagon for anyone who already has MEQ models.

On top of that, whatever the Dark Eldar do against space wolves, they're also going to do against all other Marines, probably easier.

Think of it this way. A player plays in 100 competitive games. Do you believe that, with all other factors remaining constant, they'll win more or less games if they play Space Wolves instead of Chaos Marines or Vanilla Marines? Right, it's not that Space Wolves go undefeated, but that the cost-to-benefits ratio is just higher with the Space Wolf codex, and that will account for extra wins.

I would have to agree, about the Space Wolves Codex is OP and everything that Space Marines would like to have can't. I started my SW when I received the Black Box at the beginning of the year and realize the power of this codex. Remeber that Tyranids Codex come out before the SW. Since the SW Codex, every other Codex are trying to match the SW codex.This does not include Tyranids, they miss the boat by alot. DE codex with all posion weapons and weapons that can cause instant death, plus there a picture of Space Wolves fighting against DE, come on GW we know that ya'lls are up to something.

mrblacksunshine_1978 wrote:Remeber that Tyranids Codex come out before the SW.

Pups came out in October 09. Nids came out in Jan 10. People expected a lot from the nid codex based on all the goodies that the pups got.

Slightly OT but are SW about the same size as ordinary SM, or bigger? They look bigger in the pictures.

Ordinarily they should be about the same size...

So about 10 feet tall.

Somehow I thought they would be taller, probably because Vikings are so tall.

Probably just their viking helmets that make them look taller than all the other Space Marines...

Seriously though, I don't recall ever hearing that the Space Wolves are physically taller or [muscularly] superior to a normal Space Marine in any way, probably just your age showing KK.

Like policemen you mean? No, they look young.

I just mean the pictures make them look taller.