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Hoodwink wrote:
Saying "well they didn't show up but they are strong" isn't really a very good backup to your inference. Giving someone the option and choice based on multiple units being viable is what creates balance.

Well, saying they weren't good because they didn't show up competitively is like saying a Ferrari isn't fast car because it'd never win a Formula 1.

Lists used in the competitive scene are a tiny fraction of the entire game. Maybe 1% at best. Balance needs to consider the entire game. Otherwise your benchmark is skewed.

 Arachnofiend wrote:

 JimOnMars wrote:
Getting a chuckle about all the Mortal Wound grief. Playing Orks teaches you that Saves are for Wusses.

I'm sure you would feel differently about mortal wounds if they actually scaled with model quality rather than demolishing elite armies while leaving hordes unaffected.

Not at all. The Orks have plenty of elites (like the 900 point stompa) that gets no invul. Our book has 2 5+ invuls, which are very hard to buff our primary units (and don't work at all in combat, because reasons.)

We've been taking AP shots on the chin for years now, and others are finally being brought down to our level. I say pour on the mortal wounds!

Wonderwolf wrote:

Hoodwink wrote:
Saying "well they didn't show up but they are strong" isn't really a very good backup to your inference. Giving someone the option and choice based on multiple units being viable is what creates balance.

Well, saying they weren't good because they didn't show up competitively is like saying a Ferrari isn't fast car because it'd never win a Formula 1.

Lists used in the competitive scene are a tiny fraction of the entire game. Maybe 1% at best. Balance needs to consider the entire game. Otherwise your benchmark is skewed.

Well if the option to have a Ferrari was there but everyone chose other cars for Formula 1, then that would say that the Ferrari sucked compared to other options.

If you want to talk about game balance, then you balance based on how often units are chosen and why units are chosen. The Leman Russ in the Index wasn't taken in anything competitive because it didn't accomplish anything that other options would for cheaper. That alone says that the unit is underpowered. That alone is why the unit was buffed. You are giving no evidence as to why the Leman Russ was fine (or even strong as you say) previously other than because you say so. Then I give evidence based on statistical information with the competitive scene because that's the only evidence we really have a record of AND is a good indication to see how strong a unit is, and you say it's skewed. Balancing based on anything but statistical data will bring a skewed result.

Okay, so what about the various Space Marine stuff that wasn't buffed? Or Ad Mech stuff?

Clearly an improvement but I predict it will get worse and worse in balance.
Also terrain and similar elements are lacking.
Finally the scaling is still weird, in this case toward hordes.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Okay, so what about the various Space Marine stuff that wasn't buffed? Or Ad Mech stuff?

They need buffs and changes. That doesn't mean anything to the AM codex. The AM codex is pretty much how every codex really should have been released. Lots of good and useful units that cause someone to actually have choices to make in how they build their army. It gives a plethora of options on how to build your army to accomplish different results. The AM codex is far better balanced within its own units than other armies. There are very few units that are just bad. That doesn't necessarily mean on its own that it's overpowered. But it will mean that it will at least be a very strong army. The individual power of the army will be based on how well balanced the other armies are released. AdMech is surprisingly decent but their internal balance is garbage. Their list of units isn't long but they have several that are not useful at all and several that are autopick. SM have so many units that a good number just aren't useful enough to include or straight up bad.

Wonderwolf wrote:less impact of morals

To be fair, morality has never been a strong suit of the 40K universe, and has often back-fired in the tournament scene (comp lists, any one?).

Hoodwink wrote:


Well if the option to have a Ferrari was there but everyone chose other cars for Formula 1, then that would say that the Ferrari sucked compared to other options.

But plenty of people choose the Ferrari (and/or the vast majority of Index entries even weaker than the Leman Russ). Just not the tiny, unrepresentative sub-group of the hobby that is tournament players, hence why tournament lists, rankings and results are irrelevant for balance.

Got to sample a few hundred lists from store games with 12-year olds, lists from painters, list from people with vintage miniature collections, etc., etc.. Probably skew towards the weaker lists you find in there to be on the safe side and balance against them.

Only than do you have a shot to balance an army against as large a % of the GW range of miniatures as possible.

Good news guys!

So far the clear winner are:

Yes 37%
[ 155 ]
Yes, more than 7th ed 45%
[ 187 ]


and the losers are

No 3%
[ 13 ]
No, and even less than 7th 4%
[ 18 ]

Wonderwolf wrote:

Hoodwink wrote:


Well if the option to have a Ferrari was there but everyone chose other cars for Formula 1, then that would say that the Ferrari sucked compared to other options.

But plenty of people choose the Ferrari (and/or the vast majority of Index entries even weaker than the Leman Russ). Just not the tiny, unrepresentative sub-group of the hobby that is tournament players, hence why tournament lists, rankings and results are irrelevant for balance.

Got to sample a few hundred lists from store games with 12-year olds, lists from painters, list from people with vintage miniature collections, etc., etc.. Probably skew towards the weaker lists you find in there to be on the safe side and balance against them.

Only than do you have a shot to balance an army against as large a % of the GW range of miniatures as possible.

What? No. Just...no dude. Your logic is like...waaaaay out there. Trying to use games where Bill just painted a drop pod and really really wants to run it as some balance data point is incredibly silly.

Tournament lists are used as data points because they cut down on a number of unknown variables that could cause units to punch way below or above their weight in points.

For example:
-We can assume that the tournament games were played very close to the written rules, rather than a couple garage players deciding that they either don't like or more commonly, don't understand a rule and play it different.
-We can assume that the tournament games were played using reasonably fair missions, rather than zany Konor campaign stuff like where your table edge is collapsing behind you. It'd be kind of silly to run a fortification in that mission, no?
-We can assume that the tournament players have at least a passable skill level at the game, and are reasonably close to each other in skill level. We can't say the same for you and your game against little Timmy's 25 power level unpainted primaris marines.
-We can assume that the tourney players are actively trying to win the game, rather than just watch a narrative unfold.
-We can assume that the tournament game is an even X vs X points game. We can't assume the same of your garage game. Some people like those last stand narratives. I know I do!
-Tournaments actually collect data. Do you record your results and send them in to GW when you finish a garage game? And do you play 300 games in a weekend to provide some measure of reliable data that isn't heavily influenced by rare statistical outliers like "that one time the terminators all died to 5 gretchin shooting?"

To sum up, you have things backwards. The kitchen counter games are the ones irrelevant for balance. The tourney data, even though they are actually the minority of games overall, are the best tool to use for the balancing process.

 niv-mizzet wrote:

For example:
-We can assume that the tournament games were played very close to the written rules, rather than a couple garage players deciding that they either don't like or more commonly, don't understand a rule and play it different.

That's not the case. Tournaments, at least those along ITC formats or similar type, are based on dozends of pages of formalized house rules that significantly change the game as presented in the rulebook. Layering Eternal War and Maelstrom missions for example, outright changing rules like First Blood, etc., etc.. These games are barely 40K to begin with.

 niv-mizzet wrote:

-We can assume that the tournament games were played using reasonably fair missions, rather than zany Konor campaign stuff like where your table edge is collapsing behind you. It'd be kind of silly to run a fortification in that mission, no?

Whether you find it silly or not, Konor campaign is part of normal, offical 40K. Zany ITC "mission"-abominations are not.

 niv-mizzet wrote:

-We can assume that the tournament players have at least a passable skill level at the game, and are reasonably close to each other in skill level. We can't say the same for you and your game against little Timmy's 25 power level unpainted primaris marines.

Which is why balance is more important and should be bencmarked against Timmy's unpainted Primaris Marines. "Skilled" players would use the weakest available army anyways to prove their skill, as using an army that is above the curve would invalidate any victory as "rules-writer-incompetence"-based as opposed to being "skill-based".

 niv-mizzet wrote:

-We can assume that the tourney players are actively trying to win the game, rather than just watch a narrative unfold.

Which is why they are not representative of the game as a whole. Narrative is as much part of it as "winning", like it or not. People who only focus on one aspect miss the whole picture.

 niv-mizzet wrote:

-We can assume that the tournament game is an even X vs X points game. We can't assume the same of your garage game. Some people like those last stand narratives. I know I do!

If you sample lists from garage games, playtesters can still test them against equal points.

 niv-mizzet wrote:

-Tournaments actually collect data. Do you record your results and send them in to GW when you finish a garage game? And do you play 300 games in a weekend to provide some measure of reliable data that isn't heavily influenced by rare statistical outliers like "that one time the terminators all died to 5 gretchin shooting?"

Just because the data exists, and other data does not, doesn't mean the data is skewed. It's like researchers doing psychology experiments only on college students, because they are easily available, or election polling only going by data in urban areas, because it's more convenient than going out into the countryside.. The results are usually misleading and worse than useless, precisely people went with "what's there/easy to get" as data rather than making an effort to cover the full spectrum.

It started out good but now i've got a feeling that power creep is starting anew. Also, hating terrain rules, the increased potency of alpha-strike and the importance of 1-st turn. But the biggest disappointment so far is the amount of rolls and re-rolls. It's taking even more time than in 7-th cause everyone is re-rolling everything.

To sum up, you have things backwards. The kitchen counter games are the ones irrelevant for balance. The tourney data, even though they are actually the minority of games overall, are the best tool to use for the balancing process.

+1 niv-mizzet.

"We can assume that the tourney players are actively trying to win the game, rather than just watch a narrative unfold"
Which is why they are not representative of the game as a whole. Narrative is as much part of it as "winning", like it or not. People who only focus on one aspect miss the whole picture.

Games like a Sunday afternoon battle where all the Eldar hold out as long as they can but all die to Chaos invaders is awesome narrative and probably good fun, but not really useful for 'balance' discussions.

There's nothing wrong with it, but that sort of game doesn't generate useful data.

A few big tournaments will give stats like "12% of players brought Chaos and half of them finished in the top 20. 8% of players brought Necrons, and none finished in the top 50".

Then we can criticise the tournament format all we like, but it has generated something concrete worth discussing from a balance point of view.

I think the truth lies somewhere in the middle. Tournaments are only good for finding out what is totally broken and needs toned down. Beyond that they're no use as a metric of how the game plays.

40k was never intented to be played at a super competitve level. It was created so that nerds could have fun with their toy soldiers with other nerds in their kitchen. Acting as if GW rules writers goal is anything beyond making a fun game with a minimim of OP stuff is a fools hope. This isn't laziness on GWs part nor is it a bad thing, its just that, well, the tournament scene DOESN'T MATTER.

I keep reading about how Leman Russes are terrible but that didn't stop me running 6 of them in a big 3k, 4 player game my group had the other week. Just like how it the tau player in our group keeps taking his riptide. As long as they aren't utterly useless GW has achieved its goal.

Have to pitch in here. Narrative gaming cannot be used for statistical data and balance analysis. This is simply due to the fact that Narrative by its nature skews the environment and rules in which the game is being played and rules as written, and is not consistent with other games played by others within the consistent environment that the rules were written in and for.

Granted that Tournaments that have applied rules modifications are not perfect, as the Codexes and Indexes are not written specifically for those rules modifications to be applied, but they are all atleast consistent statistical points of reference and comparison.

Garage gaming and in particular Narrative gaming is simply not a consistent environment for data to be extrapolated from.

This does not even factor in the relative knowledge and skills of the players. At least in tournaments, after the first round you have more chance of being paired against someone with somewhat relative knowledge and skills to be able to draw competitive data from, garage gaming is more likely to get inconsistentices of skill level and ofcourse inaccurate or incomplete use of the rules.

I surely prefer this edition overall but 2 of my 3 armies (orks and dark eldar) were nerfed quite badly and I enjoyed them more in 7th edition than now. SW have become a little bit better but only because SM transports are overpowered now. I'll wait for the codexes for a final thought about the current edition.

Making an on-topic post here...

Ultimately I'm have less fun in 8ed then in previous editions before it but it's not because I think 8ed is a worse game then previous editions (It is much better then 7ed). The problem I'm having is that they over simplified my Daemon army with the transition to the Index.

I've been playing Daemons since their first stand alone codex dropped at the end of 4ed. They were by the far the most fun I've had playing 40k because of how wild they played from. You had to think on the fly to account for their random way of deployment but they had so many cool options and ways to deal with the enemy that if played well you could pull out wins even in seeming dire situations (sometimes because of the warp's fault)

Then their 6ed codex came out. The zaniest rules were toned down (such as Daemonic Assault was just regular deep strike and they were all regular psykers again) but they still had a huge amount of tools and interesting ways to to come at situations. Sure they had some grossly overpowered abilities that resulted in it being of the most powerful armies in the broken mess that was 7ed. But those crutches afforded me the ability to have massive army variety as I could take units and lists I wanted while still being fairly competitve. I pretty much never played the same list twice as I could just spend hours playing around with potential unit combinations.

But now almost all of the flavor is gone. Almost no army special rules or hidden synergies. The only deployment trick Daemons get is Ritual Summoning which is just an inferior version of deep striking. They lost their army wide morale immunity (and were the only army to do so). Psychic phase is pretty much just spamming smite. The army doesn't even have weapon options for any units outside of the daemon prince. All the tactics and army building is just "take units and stand characters next to it for aura buffs" and it's just so boring. Its not even that they aren't competitive because they have broken undercosted units to play with but the list is basically spam brimstone horrors to screen for your characters. The last time I played in league I just didn't have any army list I wanted to play so I let a friend just pick models out of my case at random so I would have a list to play. Sure CSM have plenty of pretty toys but I want Daemons, not heretics.

It's a shame. I was really burnt out 7ed and was very hyped for 8ed. I hope the Daemon codex fixes this problem.

I'm enjoying it more than 7th, but that's such a low bar to clear I'm not sure that's a useful statement.

In general I'm fairly happy with 8th but I'm already starting to see some worrying trends in the armies that now have a Codex. I think re-rolls are too prevalent and there are some serious balance issues starting to rear their heads. The new AM Codex is worrying just for the leap in power it represents over other books. I'm also doubting the claims about this being the most playtested version of 40k ever. There are still a lot of really obviously bad units and options and I'm slightly annoyed that GW's reaction to this is to sell us another book in a month or so.

If GW can use Chapter Approved to balance the game properly, including making changes to Codex rules, not just Index ones, I'll feel a bit more positive.

It's good, but I feel it's a bit too random for a "skill test," like tournament games.

What an odd criticism to level. Did you play 6th or 7th? If THIS edition is too random, what did you think of those?

I'm liking it so far. The fact that I've played any games at all is a huge improvement since, by early 7th, my playing had dropped off pretty severely. This edition has brought a lot of people back that had previously quit, and it's a snap to introduce new people to.

They did completely botch terrain. I laugh now every time someone rolls out that old mantra of "if your games seem unbalanced you need to add terrrain". Terrain is officially meaningless. With multiple armies having access to no scatter DS and no scatter indirect fire, and with cover being difficult to get anyway, you may as well be playing on planet bowling ball half the time.

I'm also worried about knee-jerk reactions. It seems like people are especially quick this edition to want to nerf things (in many cases before those things are even released), and I worry that with GW being so quick to FAQ now, that we're going to get stuck in an endless cycle of "nerf this! Wait! Too far! Ok buff it! Crap! Buff everything else!" etc etc.

That said, the game as it stands right now, is better (imo) than it's been in several editions.

I'm enjoying it more than 7th, but man do I miss vehicle armour facings, exploding on a 7 (I know I'm about the only person who liked that mechanic) and the flavour of the game, which I feel has been gutted in a lot of cases. I also hate the current terrain rules and mortal wounds. But those are my two major gripes, I am actually enjoying it a lot.

Complaining about terrain? You probably aren't using enough or a variety of terrain.

Complaining about simplicity? You probably need to reread the section on the assault phase. (It's amazing!)

Complaining about overpowered units? Stop playing with special characters in matched play, they are a fluffy unit not a competitive play unit.

Hate the missions? (How? There are literally more missions than any previous 40k edition.)

8th ed is a blast imo, but if you try to break a game or refuse to use parts of it then you'll not have much fun.

Complaining about terrain? You probably aren't using enough or a variety of terrain.

Complaining about simplicity? You probably need to reread the section on the assault phase. (It's amazing!)

Complaining about overpowered units? Stop playing with special characters in matched play, they are a fluffy unit not a competitive play unit.

Hate the missions? (How? There are literally more missions than any previous 40k edition.)

8th ed is a blast imo, but if you try to break a game or refuse to use parts of it then you'll not have much fun.

Yep. Everyone with a legitimate complaint is doing it wrong. lol I agree w/you about the missions, and simplicity is more of a subjective thing so there's not really a "right" or "wrong" there, but like I said in my post a few above yours, terrain is a legitimate issue this edition.
You don't even need to be "trying to break the game" to see this. All it takes is a few DS units, and a few indirect fire units to really demonstrate that. These units can be taken in fluffy lists that aren't even trying to be overly competitive. That takes care of LoS terrain, and as for the rest of the terrain types - well, there's a reason people generally feel that Imperial Fist and Iron Warriors "chapter tactics" are the weakest.

If your games just run a lot of basic units (mostly troops and little else), I can see where you would think the terrain rules are fine. Unfortunately, any meta w/a varied number of lists and armies will begin to really expose the weaknesses in 8th ed terrain.

That said, I'll take the terrain issue all day every day over some of the issues we had in 7th.

I have fixed my problems with the basic terrain rules of 8th with two things:

-All my Terrain has bases. So I can put a 30-ork boyz blob in cover without a problem.

-I use the "Cities of Death" advanced rules. They make flamers and grenades much more usefull. Even playing in a open field with a normal amount of terrain, I use those special rules. (Not the stratagems)

30 Orks shouldn't be getting cover, imo. They are priced to NOT get cover, imo.

I'm at a loss for whit whole fuss about mortal wounds.

It's like 1 whole wound!

How is this a big deal?


Smite is the most common source I've seen, but it only hits the closest unit for D3.

Martel732 wrote:
30 Orks shouldn't be getting cover, imo. They are priced to NOT get cover, imo.

Normally not the whole 30 get cover, but as per the rules and FAQ once the 6-10 that are out of the "area of cover" die, the rest gain cover even agaisn't the same bolley of enemy fire.

two secs I'll roll a dice, hmm a 1, nope it sucks

Martel732 wrote:30 Orks shouldn't be getting cover, imo. They are priced to NOT get cover, imo.

If they can physically fit into the terrain I can't see why the 30 Orks receiving the cover bonus wouldn't be fine.

CrownAxe wrote:I hope the Daemon codex fixes this problem.

The Indexes are reminiscent of the army lists in the 3rd ed. rulebook, just intended to keep the game functioning while new codexes are drafted, so I wouldn't be too surprised at the lack of flavour or army specific rules. It definitely sucks to be stuck with lacklustre rules for the moment, but it'd be surprising if the actual Daemons codex turned out to be as bland as the Index list.

Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:I'm at a loss for whit whole fuss about mortal wounds.

Likewise. I mean, sure losing a wound without saves on that terminator or captain is nasty, but I haven't yet seen any particularly egregious examples of Mortal Wounds on the table top. I'm happy to be illuminated if anyone can elaborate on this,

I saw an example yesterday: my starweaver blew killed 2 harlies, then rolled 3 mortal wounds for the rest and 3 for the troupe master. Those 3 sixes cost me the damn game. But man did we both laugh of our ass of.

Regarding Orks in cover: +1 cover isn't that be a deal for horde units in 8th. In most cases it turns a 6+ into a 5+, which promptly gets reduced back to 6+ or nothing because of the AP system (which is one of my favorite things about 8th).

Where cover really shines in on units that already have 4+ or better saves. Most horde units do not have good saves, so I don't see the issue with 30 ork boyz getting a 5+ because of cover. It's still better than 7th where they would get a straight up 4+

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