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Honestly at this point there are only 2 tiers.

Necrons and later all compete against eachother.

Everything before crons all compete against eachother.

That being said, many of the army books printed before crons reward you for having sound tactics and knowing your force from front to back. If you do, you can definitely compete with the top books. The problem is that it takes a very high amount of knowledge and skill.

Requizen wrote:
Out of curiosity, what do you guys consider the "Daemon Top Tier armies"? I always see them being ranked highly, but I feel like their Deathstars are becoming less good thanks to more D and Stomps, and they don't really have a MSU list that works. Sure, Summoning is a big thing, but I don't really know any tourney players that utilize it all that much.

The only Daemon list I've seen topping recently has been the D-Thirster with Psychic Support (Invis/Grim/Endurance), but that's honestly a gimmick and once people start accounting for it I don't see it going much farther.

I'm not a demon player but nick navanti won adepticon in March with this list
Fateweaver
2x Heralds of Tzeentch Level 3 Discs, and Exalted Reward.
2x Herald of Nurgle Level 2, (one locus of Fecundity)
10 Pink Horrors
11 Pink Horrors
2x 8 Screamers
8 Plague Drones with Venom Sting, and Champion with a Greater Reward.

And Alan bajarovich won bao in July with this list
http://bloodofkittens.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Alan-Bajramovic-BAO-2015-List.pdf

Both different but basically about controlling the board and psychic shenanigans. (The only major changes since July has been a new tau codex and the revised eldar fw book. Dark Angels released before BAO.)

gungo wrote:

Requizen wrote:
Out of curiosity, what do you guys consider the "Daemon Top Tier armies"? I always see them being ranked highly, but I feel like their Deathstars are becoming less good thanks to more D and Stomps, and they don't really have a MSU list that works. Sure, Summoning is a big thing, but I don't really know any tourney players that utilize it all that much.

The only Daemon list I've seen topping recently has been the D-Thirster with Psychic Support (Invis/Grim/Endurance), but that's honestly a gimmick and once people start accounting for it I don't see it going much farther.

I'm not a demon player but nick navanti won adepticon in March with this list
Fateweaver
2x Heralds of Tzeentch Level 3 Discs, and Exalted Reward.
2x Herald of Nurgle Level 2, (one locus of Fecundity)
10 Pink Horrors
11 Pink Horrors
2x 8 Screamers
8 Plague Drones with Venom Sting, and Champion with a Greater Reward.

And Alan bajarovich won bao in July with this list
http://bloodofkittens.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Alan-Bajramovic-BAO-2015-List.pdf

Both different but basically about controlling the board and psychic shenanigans. (The only major changes since July has been a new tau codex and the revised eldar fw book. Dark Angels released before BAO.)

This
Daemons will always be at least top tier as long as grimoire shenanigans can still happen. Hell, the new Chaos Knight/Kytan Daemon Engines are allowed in ITC tourneys now, aka invisible/grimoired SH fun* stuff can happen.

Orks are kind of great in this edition.

The better the shooting of other armies becomes (aka the more killy toward MEQ) the better the Ork boy gets

gungo wrote:

Requizen wrote:
Out of curiosity, what do you guys consider the "Daemon Top Tier armies"? I always see them being ranked highly, but I feel like their Deathstars are becoming less good thanks to more D and Stomps, and they don't really have a MSU list that works. Sure, Summoning is a big thing, but I don't really know any tourney players that utilize it all that much.

The only Daemon list I've seen topping recently has been the D-Thirster with Psychic Support (Invis/Grim/Endurance), but that's honestly a gimmick and once people start accounting for it I don't see it going much farther.

I'm not a demon player but nick navanti won adepticon in March with this list
Fateweaver
2x Heralds of Tzeentch Level 3 Discs, and Exalted Reward.
2x Herald of Nurgle Level 2, (one locus of Fecundity)
10 Pink Horrors
11 Pink Horrors
2x 8 Screamers
8 Plague Drones with Venom Sting, and Champion with a Greater Reward.

And Alan bajarovich won bao in July with this list
http://bloodofkittens.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Alan-Bajramovic-BAO-2015-List.pdf

Both different but basically about controlling the board and psychic shenanigans. (The only major changes since July has been a new tau codex and the revised eldar fw book. Dark Angels released before BAO.)

I do know those lists. I honestly think the Deathstar lists (and not just here, but in general) kinda died when the new Eldar book hit. They were already not too great against Imperial Knights, and Wraithknights just really made it worse. Dronestar really was great because it was a big, unkillable deathstar that tied up your opponents big, slightly less unkillable deathstar. D weapons and Stomp laugh at that.

I actually happen to know Alan, good guy. The D-Thirster list is pretty interesting, but it's pretty mono-build. Kind of like how Tyranid players are tired of seeing nothing but Flyrants, though a bit newer since the 'Thirsters are fairly recent.

Requizen wrote:

gungo wrote:

Requizen wrote:
Out of curiosity, what do you guys consider the "Daemon Top Tier armies"? I always see them being ranked highly, but I feel like their Deathstars are becoming less good thanks to more D and Stomps, and they don't really have a MSU list that works. Sure, Summoning is a big thing, but I don't really know any tourney players that utilize it all that much.

The only Daemon list I've seen topping recently has been the D-Thirster with Psychic Support (Invis/Grim/Endurance), but that's honestly a gimmick and once people start accounting for it I don't see it going much farther.

I'm not a demon player but nick navanti won adepticon in March with this list
Fateweaver
2x Heralds of Tzeentch Level 3 Discs, and Exalted Reward.
2x Herald of Nurgle Level 2, (one locus of Fecundity)
10 Pink Horrors
11 Pink Horrors
2x 8 Screamers
8 Plague Drones with Venom Sting, and Champion with a Greater Reward.

And Alan bajarovich won bao in July with this list
http://bloodofkittens.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Alan-Bajramovic-BAO-2015-List.pdf

Both different but basically about controlling the board and psychic shenanigans. (The only major changes since July has been a new tau codex and the revised eldar fw book. Dark Angels released before BAO.)

I do know those lists. I honestly think the Deathstar lists (and not just here, but in general) kinda died when the new Eldar book hit. They were already not too great against Imperial Knights, and Wraithknights just really made it worse. Dronestar really was great because it was a big, unkillable deathstar that tied up your opponents big, slightly less unkillable deathstar. D weapons and Stomp laugh at that.

I actually happen to know Alan, good guy. The D-Thirster list is pretty interesting, but it's pretty mono-build. Kind of like how Tyranid players are tired of seeing nothing but Flyrants, though a bit newer since the 'Thirsters are fairly recent.

Eldar have been out before either of those lists won.
Str d in the eldar codex does deter deathstars to a degree however it does nothing against invisibility and only really scares desthstars with invulnerability on a roll of a 6. What str d truly does is rape vehicles and multi wound troops such as MC or GC.

gungo wrote:

Eldar have been out before either of those lists won.
Str d in the eldar codex does deter deathstars to a degree however it does nothing against invisibility and only really scares desthstars with invulnerability on a roll of a 6. What str d truly does is rape vehicles and multi wound troops such as MC or GC.

Eldar came out after Adepticon (Adepticon in March, codex in April). I also went and faced against Eldar at the time and they were running the same Wave Serpent spam stuff. I honestly could not see Dronestar having won if Wraithknights were what they are now, though Nick is a really good player and probably could pull it off anyway.

Either way, you're partially right. Invis does somewhat stop D, but it does nothing against Stomp. If the WK gets into combat with anything, a 6 on a Stomp and they're gone. It is the Deathstar killer, even moreso than D Guns for most armies. If your Deathstar can't instagib the GC/SHW before I1, Stomp removes the important models.

Which is why the Flying Circus + DThirster list does well against it, since your Warlord, Grimoire, and Be'lakor are all in the air, and the DThirster actually usually beats WKs as long as it gets average rolls (and doesn't have to go through Difficult for I1).

I'm not saying Daemons are a bottom-tier or that the lists don't work anymore, but I don't really think that they're as dominant as people think they are other than the fact that many high-level players tend to play Daemons.

Most deathstars are generally beatsticks in melee further stomps in its current firm have been around just as long as the current deathstars. If 5 imperial knight lists didn't curb deathstars I doubt a single undercosted wraithknight will. The wraithknight isn't the most powerful unit in the game it's just undercosted by a lot. The good thing is most tournies restrict it to 1 unit. I'm honestly surprised that eldar still don't dominate even with that single restriction. However I think IA 11 gave them even more powerful units. So we will see how they do.

I'm not saying demons have the greatest codex I'm saying they can build one of the top winning lists with what they have available.

I agree with the poster who said that some armies perform better at smaller poins games like 1000pts for instance, for daemons, while others (like AM) does better at bigger games. Seems US games are most often 2000+, while games in UK are closer to 1500. Might explain the (imo) way to high rankings some give to AM.

Army ranking is also deemed by who plays them, large horde armies like Nids usually have more veteran players, while CSM appeals to newer players (they are in the starter set after all) who often leave or switch armies before they get very good, same with SM of course.