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I remember the exact game. My horde IG vs. the (then) new 6th Edition Eldar codex. After the game I realized that my 150+ infantry Guard army was too small to field as an effective horde anymore. I simply did not have enough models to avoid getting tabled before the end of turn 5.

Its sadly only gotten worse. As near as I can figure I would need to field 300+ infantry,to have any hope of surviving (not winning) against top-tier armies at 1850pts. Unfortunately attempting to play that list even casually, is seizure-inducing and miserable for both my opponent and myself. 30 minute long movement phases! 60 minute long shooting phases!! Every turn!!!
This is why I only play codex IG only at 1500pt or less these days.

I still find that I have fun, challenging games against Orks, Nids, Chaos, other IG, Blood Angels, Grey Knights, and some Space Marine lists. However my experiences lately are this. Top tier codex = awful, frstrating game; mid-bottom tier codex = enjoyable, exciting game. It sucks but its true! Its not a very flattering statement on balance in current 40k but it is my experience for over a year now! My local gaming group has almost stopped playing top-tier books because we have friends without access to those armies and its nearly impossible to enjoy games against them unless the losing player is really chill about losing.

Or use psychic buffs.

When fliers came out is when it really hit me that they didn't care about balance. I slowly stopped playing at that point, though I'm hoping to get back in to it with eighth...

When the 2nd ed Eldar codex dropped I realized they didn't care.

Definitely when flyers came out, from that point on it seemed to be whatever the new flavour +1 was of the month.

For me it was the end of 4th and start of 5th edition, especially the Tau "fish of fury" bollocks that every TFG abused to its zenith.

Now getting back into 7th, Necrons are indeed powerful, but Elder seem broken. However, seeing as I'm a rather chill gamer who would rather play what they like/rule of cool than cheese, I don't mind it as much. Back in 4th, I was a proper win at all costs player.

I cringe internally so much to remember how much of a bell end I used to be..

Unbound........ So many scary things........ So much fear lol. My poor orks my flash gits never stood a chance when they Un-learnt how to shoot.

I think 6th ed.

I played a game where my buddy brought his new Wraithknight, that was just released. Did not bring enough firewarriors.

When I saw people talking about Tactical Terminators and Land Raiders being useless rather than extraordinarily powerful but too pricy for most lists.

 Pouncey wrote:
When I saw people talking about Tactical Terminators and Land Raiders being useless rather than extraordinarily powerful but too pricy for most lists.

This has largely always been true, though. I'm told terminators were viable in 4th, but they sure weren't in 3rd or 5th.

Martel732 wrote:

 Pouncey wrote:
When I saw people talking about Tactical Terminators and Land Raiders being useless rather than extraordinarily powerful but too pricy for most lists.

This has largely always been true, though. I'm told terminators were viable in 4th, but they sure weren't in 3rd or 5th.

I think we just had different gaming circles where the relative potency of things changed depending on the opposition.

Maybe but terminators were a joke in 2nd even unless you were CSM. Because they had heresy-era weapons that were way better than imperial weapons. The Land Raider and terminators are flawed conceptually. The power creep is only trackable since 3rd. If we look at the efficacy of the humble tac marine, we can clearly see the power creep.

Martel732 wrote:
Maybe but terminators were a joke in 2nd even unless you were CSM. Because they had heresy-era weapons that were way better than imperial weapons. The Land Raider and terminators are flawed conceptually. The power creep is only trackable since 3rd. If we look at the efficacy of the humble tac marine, we can clearly see the power creep.

I don't really want to argue with you.

I just want to point out that Tactical Marines are anything but humble.

What do you mean by that exactly? I'm not following.

Martel732 wrote:
What do you mean by that exactly? I'm not following.

Space Marines are insufferably arrogant. They are the polar opposite of humble.

I suppose. I was talking crunch.

Martel732 wrote:
I suppose. I was talking crunch.

Ah, right, stats.

Still, not humble.

Guardsmen are humble.

You say that, but guardsmen are better with any kind of force multiplier and are more durable/pt if they have any kin d of cover. Plus there are more and more weapons that treat marines like grots.

Martel732 wrote:
You say that, but guardsmen are better with any kind of force multiplier and are more durable/pt if they have any kin d of cover. Plus there are more and more weapons that treat marines like grots.

Splendid.

I will enjoy watching Astartes get splattered across the terrain.

Martel732 wrote:

 Pouncey wrote:
When I saw people talking about Tactical Terminators and Land Raiders being useless rather than extraordinarily powerful but too pricy for most lists.

This has largely always been true, though. I'm told terminators were viable in 4th, but they sure weren't in 3rd or 5th.

IIRC, TH/SS Terminators were considered fairly efficient in 5e for the price.

Assault Terminators were generally okay (becoming good in some armies), it's the shooty ones that were universally panned (during 4th you could run Terminator Command squads with double Assault Cannons which was pretty much the only time shooty Terminators were respected).

nobody wrote:
Assault Terminators were generally okay (becoming good in some armies), it's the shooty ones that were universally panned (during 4th you could run Terminator Command squads with double Assault Cannons which was pretty much the only time shooty Terminators were respected).

I'll be a bit clearer.

I'm talking about 3e when I say they were powerful but too pricy to take most of the time.

Back then, my local "meta" was actually just a group of high school students (including myself), most of whom only played one army and stuck to it due to low funds.

We're not talking about skilled and experienced wargamers here, and it's very likely, given the responses my comment got, that my perception was limited to just my small circle of gamers. I wasn't active on WH40k forums at the time so I had no clue how things were being perceived by others.

And frankly, I was the worst of the group when it came to the game itself. I lost literally every game I ever played, including one against a person who had only been able to bring 900 points of models while I brought 1500.

Frankly, I am still a terrible 40k gamer. My issue comes from wanting to create an army that makes sense as a force in the lore, at the obvious expense of actually being useful on the tabletop.

 Pouncey wrote:

Frankly, I am still a terrible 40k gamer. My issue comes from wanting to create an army that makes sense as a force in the lore, at the obvious expense of actually being useful on the tabletop.

I've been doing that since the end of 5th edition, where before that I constantly played in tournaments (which made me hate the game). I was forced to conclude that this was the only way to have fun in this terribly written and unbalanced game. If I want to play balanced and competitive miniature games, I play Infinity the game.

Martel732 wrote:
Maybe but terminators were a joke in 2nd even unless you were CSM. Because they had heresy-era weapons that were way better than imperial weapons. The Land Raider and terminators are flawed conceptually. The power creep is only trackable since 3rd. If we look at the efficacy of the humble tac marine, we can clearly see the power creep.

Course, in 2nd it was more than the weapons. Back then they had no invulnerable save. They did save on a 3+ on 2d6, BUT... weapons then had negative modifiers to saves, so a bolter changed that to a 4+ on 2d6, a heavy bolter changed that (IIRC) to a 7+ on 2d6, and so on. Used to love using heavy bolters against standard power armor Marines...

 don_mondo wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Maybe but terminators were a joke in 2nd even unless you were CSM. Because they had heresy-era weapons that were way better than imperial weapons. The Land Raider and terminators are flawed conceptually. The power creep is only trackable since 3rd. If we look at the efficacy of the humble tac marine, we can clearly see the power creep.

Course, in 2nd it was more than the weapons. Back then they had no invulnerable save. They did save on a 3+ on 2d6, BUT... weapons then had negative modifiers to saves, so a bolter changed that to a 4+ on 2d6, a heavy bolter changed that (IIRC) to a 7+ on 2d6, and so on. Used to love using heavy bolters against standard power armor Marines...

And of course if you fought Eldar Shuriken weapons made practically all armor a joke, guardians equipped with Shuriken pretty much nullified most saves.

The save rate was practically the same vs -6 though. What really killed them was shuriken cannons with a -3 and high rof.

Back before imperial guard got their 5th edition book. The old doctrines book in 4th and before we got our 5th edition book.

That said it pales in comparison to being dark eldar vs tau in current 7th edition. Every move is so hard for me as dark eldar and tau can hit you anywhere esp. with their stupid smart missile systems which don't need line of sight and go through cover. It's so absolutely stupid. They are made to counter dark eldar and they are just broken good.

This is from a CSM (Worldeaters) and Ork player. Been playing since end of 2nd. It seemed like both of these armies went one direction after 4th edition, and almost every other army when the other direction.

For Chaos Marines - I noticed power creep when the codex dropped that pulled Demons out of the CSM codex and made them their own army. Was that 5th? The skinny codex with the berzerker on the cover was the absolute best CSM codex (3.5). Until now. I'm seeing a lot of CSM love with the release of Traitor Legions and Wrath of Magnus. Im actually happy again playing Chaos Marines. Until recently Chaos Marines were just spiky vanilla Marines with a lot of bad overcosted options.

For Orks- It was the Codex that dropped the choppa rule making all armor AC 4: The Codex Phil Kelly did that lasted 12-15 years roughly. (5th?) The skinny one before that was the best Ork codex. I guess that was 3rd-4th too. At that time you had the skinny Ork Codex and the Speed Freak rules in the Armageddon Supplement. That was the Apex for Orks.

Orks got hammered by the introduction of Overwatch rule and new CC rules in general (being based on Initiative) and they never adjusted troop points costs to reflect core rule changes. Orks still need help. I just think gdub doesn't know what to do with them or they don't have an advocate. They seem to be the 40k punching bag/comic relief.

Up to 4th Edition there had always been imbalances but they seemed to fluctuate and it appeared there was at least an attempt to address the worst cases. But when 5th rolled around the space wolves were most definitely marines +1, and grey knights were just plain stupid.

 Asmodai wrote:
3rd ed. - Blood Angels' 42" assault range and similar rules before the Great Rhino Nerf that meant choppy Marines could look most of the opponents' army in combat at the top of turn and sweep from combat to combat with the opponent not firing a shot in the entire game.

You DO realize that you could only consolidate 3", right? If someone rolled 2D6 they were advancing, and could be targeted by the entirety of the enemy army. I know Blood Angels were bad, but their MAX assault range in Rhinos was 32", and that is rolling perfectly. First, they'd have to roll a 1 to fail their Black Rage. THEN they'd have to roll a 6 for max distance for the Rhino to travel. Not good odds starting out. 12" move with a further 6" on anything but a 1. 2" disembark and 6" charge. So more realistically, the charge is more like 26" and easily accounted for by not putting your troops up against the deployment zone edge if you're facing BA. That, and shooting their transports before they can pull that stunt. And let's face it: you have a better chance at getting first turn than they do rolling up a perfect Black Rage result. The worst part about BA is all the perks they got at no cost. Even their weakness, the Black Rage, could be designed around. Hell, they had a HS Dreadnought when other Chapters didn't. Just coincidence that it happens to be the one vehicle that can fire at full effect after moving. Great example of why Gav Thorpe shouldn't write a codex or army book ever again. OR Pete Haines.

 Asmodai wrote:
4th ed. - Relatively balanced in my opinion.

...

Did you mean to type that? Already addressed were the customizable army spam in this edition, and that should be enough to blow "relatively balanced" out of the water.







I also think people are mistaking Power Creep for Broken Book. In my mind the first Power Creep started with the Nid codex and Mutable Genus. Wasn't the most overpowered, but still not the most balanced. Next, Guard had to have it, THEN Marines, THEN CSM before they reined that gak in. THAT is Power Creep. See also WFB 7th Ed.