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 Blacksails wrote:

"Well this is awkward. One of us has to change!"

I'll cite my seniority.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 vipoid wrote:

 DarknessEternal wrote:
There are no blocks of 15 in Power. It's a different way to take units.

That's incorrect. Power Levels state "up to 10 additional warriors."

Thus 15 warriors is very much allowed.

It's allowed, sure, but you're deliberately trying to break it.

If you were using points, and your unit said, you can have 11-20 Warriors and the unit costs 240 points, would you still take 15 Warriors and claim the system is broken?

Power is a fundamentally different system for army creation. Just like everything in this edition, you have to throw out your old mindset.

 DarknessEternal wrote:

 Blacksails wrote:

"Well this is awkward. One of us has to change!"

I'll cite my seniority.

Bah. These old people who think they own everything.

 DarknessEternal wrote:

It's allowed, sure, but you're deliberately trying to break it.

I'm not trying to break it. I literally have just 30 warriors and would prefer to run them in 2 squads of 15.

 DarknessEternal wrote:

If you were using points, and your unit said, you can have 11-20 Warriors and the unit costs 240 points, would you still take 15 Warriors and claim the system is broken?

Yes. Not least because it goes against the whole purpose of having points in the first place.

 DarknessEternal wrote:
Power is a fundamentally different system for army creation. Just like everything in this edition, you have to throw out your old mindset.

Sure. Done. My old mindset is dead and gone. However I still seem to be absent 10 warriors.

hobojebus wrote:
but the power level still stands

 vipoid wrote:

I'm not trying to break it. I literally have just 30 warriors and would prefer to run them in 2 squads of 15.

I'd prefer to run my Guardians in squads of 5 since they used to come in squads of 5-10 too, but I haven't been able to do that in 15 years.

Times change, rules change, what you field changes.

 DarknessEternal wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

I'm not trying to break it. I literally have just 30 warriors and would prefer to run them in 2 squads of 15.

I'd prefer to run my Guardians in squads of 5 since they used to come in squads of 5-10 too, but I haven't been able to do that in 15 years.

Times change, rules change, what you field changes.

Or I could just use points and use the squad sizes I want.

The purpose of power level is to give a broad-stroke estimation of an army's strength. Quick and easy.

If you're spending time figuring out how to maximise your army's strength for a particular power level then you're doing it wrong. You should be using points.

I don't see any sane reason to be minimising your army's strength for a particular power level ...

 jamopower wrote:

And as a clarifying note, this is not to mean that one would be better than the other (although of course it might be so). They are just different. You will have different units that are "broken" and different units which are "not worth it" and therefore different kind of "meta". Probably some of the good units are the same in both systems, as there are some units that have just really good abilities.

But that is no the case with the Ork index list. GW FINALLY internally balanced the orks, and then they create power levels and piss that all away. I get that some armies do not have internal balance issues with power levels. Bully for them.

But what should people do who have internal balance levels that are as bad or worse than much of what we saw in 7th?

It's the same old story. All GW has to do is make tankbustas PL5 and Lootas PL4. It would take 5 minutes. But now I guess we have to wait until 9th edition.

Or play points.

> throw spiders on an opponent

Or play a Chaos summoning list

 JimOnMars wrote:
All GW has to do is make tankbustas PL5 and Lootas PL4.

Why should they do that? Lootas are more expensive than Tankbustas.

Lootas get 3 Spanners with Killsaws and Kombi-Rokkits, that's +48 points per guy.

 DarknessEternal wrote:

 JimOnMars wrote:
All GW has to do is make tankbustas PL5 and Lootas PL4.

Why should they do that? Lootas are more expensive than Tankbustas.

Lootas get 3 Spanners with Killsaws and Kombi-Rokkits, that's +48 points per guy.

Holy cow, you are right.

Sorry all...it would help if i read my own index

But...

Just found I can do exactly the same thing with burna boyz for PL5. Sounds like the ultimate melee unit now...

 Xenomancers wrote:
Personally - PL seems more balanced to me as it allows you to field the optimal loadout of any unit for less points than youd spend in comparison. It's the points I have an issue with because it seems like the general rule for assigning point values to things was - Step 1 - smoke lots of crack. Step 2 Assign point values to things.

This.

It eliminates the problems of trying to balance certain wargear thats way overcosted or undercosted. They really only have to balancing on the unit level. You equip the tool for the job, Or the one you want. If one weapon turns out to be most optimal then great it's assumed when balancing it that's the power level it belongs in.

momfreeek wrote:
The purpose of power level is to give a broad-stroke estimation of an army's strength. Quick and easy.

If you're spending time figuring out how to maximise your army's strength for a particular power level then you're doing it wrong. You should be using points.

I don't see any sane reason to be minimising your army's strength for a particular power level ...

Here's the reason if your pugging a game you can't know they haven't minmaxed their list, in fact its safe to assume they have and if you don't you'll get steamrolled hard.

Pl works with people you know and trust but not with strangers because you never know when you'll encounter TFG.

 Galef wrote:

Emissary wrote:

They state in the FAQ that you're free to use PL in matched play. That's what my group is doing.

Which is great, but probably won't last long if some Daemon player ends up regularly fielding 100PL in 50PL games because he has enough characters to do it over the course of 3-4 turns
Successfully rolling 3D6 to get units of ~10PL isn't as hard as harnessing 3 WC for a unit half that size.
In Matched play, Summoning and Split are 'meh' rules, but in Narrative play both rules can easily double your army size.

I'm not trying to rant, but the difference between using Points and using PLs is huge for Daemons. It fundamentally changes how competitive they are, whether you are playing competitive or not.

-

You still need reserve points set aside for summoning, I'm not sure why you are making this point.

Eh, running undersized squads when you know point cost is the same regardless up to X size. Like the Tyrant seems like going out of the way to work stretch the bounds of the system.

It's like blaming D&D 3.5 for the infamous "5 million gold a day" cheat having a wizard create an iron wall and then making daggers out of it and selling them. It only works if no one peaks in with common sense and says this doesn't pass the smell test.

If it bothers you that much make a house rule that you can buy all your squads as if they are one unit and then break them up as you wish.

No one at my store plays power anymore.

I tried to make it happen, but the mindset is shifting more towards competitive gaming, with people preparing for tournaments.

It's kind of sad to me, since all the tables now have the "ITC" terrain setup. You don't see "what would make a cool battleground," or "let's play in a ruined city with street fighting!" anymore. It's bland, symmetrical maps, with fixed objective locations, and they're practicing with the same lists with minor variations.

Miniwargaming does it 100% right IMHO with their super terrain heavy maps. Autocannons are the new meta because ITC format features very little terrain. Of course a 48" range gun is going to be better than twin flamers when it's near impossible to get out of LOS.

For quick fun games with the ladies we play power, because they like it. They don't care if they're getting slighted by 20 or 30 points, because they have 0 interest in learning the actual point cost of their units. it's buffet style gaming, basically. These games are fun. It's an opportunity to play sub-optimal units and see what happens.

hobojebus wrote:

momfreeek wrote:
The purpose of power level is to give a broad-stroke estimation of an army's strength. Quick and easy.

If you're spending time figuring out how to maximise your army's strength for a particular power level then you're doing it wrong. You should be using points.
I don't see any sane reason to be minimising your army's strength for a particular power level ...

Here's the reason if your pugging a game you can't know they haven't minmaxed their list, in fact its safe to assume they have and if you don't you'll get steamrolled hard.

Pl works with people you know and trust but not with strangers because you never know when you'll encounter TFG.

I think you misread. My point was that *minimising* strength per PL (as some were doing to prove a point) is meaningless.

To put my first point another way: if you're not a casual gamer, you should be using points not PL. As you say, the casual gamer's downfall is TFG. I don't see that as a good reason to stop being a casual gamer if thats your thing.

momfreeek wrote:
The purpose of power level is to give a broad-stroke estimation of an army's strength. Quick and easy.

It's built poorly for that.

I look at it for use in an Apocalypse battle.
Fast and dirty adding up without the detail of the points system.
Seems to handily fit in the "play any model you own" category.
Like it or hate it, that is my use for it.

 Melissia wrote:

momfreeek wrote:
The purpose of power level is to give a broad-stroke estimation of an army's strength. Quick and easy.

It's built poorly for that.

How is that? Its quick enough to use isn't it? I'm not sure how you'd get a more accurate estimation of strength without making the system more cumbersome.. and we've already got that.

dosiere wrote:
Interesting, my opinion is that I also went from "this is a dumb idea" , to " ok I see the point, I'll use them" but for the opposite reasons. I think PL actually limit realistic options because it really punishes you for not having certain upgrades but also within a certain band of options leads to some freedom.

Personally I think it needs to be a little more granular but I'm on board with the idea now. A few things really bother me like sponsons on tanks or units with lots of upgrade options (like tau) but I think t has real promise for casual games.

IMO, if they made power level a little more granular, they could do away with points completely.