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 Nitro Zeus wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 Nitro Zeus wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Don't forget that "use more terrain" is not a panacea. Ruins are the best thing that block LOS, but ruins also slow down non-infantry assault armies (e.g. my Slaanesh with monsters and beasts and cavalry).

Having 14" move is not helpful if most of it is spent running around the perimeter of a 12" box ruin.

How are you finding Slaanesh in 8th? Not aware of many people running them.

I only run mono-Daemons, which is a sin against chaos or something (apparently) but unless you hate people it's kinda meh.

If you make it to their army Turn 1, you get to systematically dismantle everything they hold dear without much effort. Keepers of Secrets have 10 attacks at -3, 3 damage. They also have good protection in melee (-1 to hit, always strike first, etc). Slaanesh has good tools to prevent fallback as well, but they're super fragile.

If you don't make it to the enemy quickly, you get evaporated off the board because T7 with a 5++ save is not strong in an era where people table Knights in two turns (as you can see in this battle report).

So basically it's a decisive engagement either way, but someone's going to feel bad at the end by losing all their stuff without feeling like they can do much. I don't think I've had a "close game" yet, except in games of unequal skill where big mistakes are made by the player who is way ahead and the give up some ground.

Thanks for the info. Props to you for sticking to your favorite. You mind sharing your list? Might be a good example of what contributes to games being over by turn 2, and I'm interested to see what a mono Slaanesh list would look like. Bet it looks dope on the table

My list fluctuates depending on my opponent's competitiveness, what I'd like to try out, what I've painted recently, etc. but here's some examples:

Less Competitive (more "fun")
Zarakynel
2x Keeper
1x Syll'esske
3x20 Daemonettes (icon and musician on one unit)
Herald
Mirror (Contorted Epitome)
Infernal Enrapturess

More competitive:
3x Keeper
3x30 Daemonettes (icon and musician on each unit)
Shelaxi Helbane
Syll'esske
Mirror
3x10 Daemonettes
3x Fiends (in one unit)

Most Competitive:
2x Keeper
2x 30 Daemonettes (icon and musician on each unit)
1x 20 Daemonettes
3x Fiends
20x Seekers
Syll'esske
Mirror
Third Keeper

 Galas wrote:
Bad games are decided by turn 2 or even 1.

By bad games I mean games were players play full alpha strike lists and don't think about how to engage the enemy to maximize their chances of winning so they go all out on an early offensive leaving the game to basically a coin flip.


In tables were you see players that actually know how to play, games aren't decided as early. Normally they come down to turn 3-4.

It bothers me how easily that can be parsed down to "You're losing turn 1-2? Git gud.", especially when an entire LGS has tried and failed for 18 months to try to come up with even one list that doesn't get utterly shredded turn one by 5 Leman Russ tanks and some bubble wrap, and that's including the guy who came up with that list and loans it to other players to stress-test his BA and DG lists.

The Newman wrote:

 Galas wrote:
Bad games are decided by turn 2 or even 1.

By bad games I mean games were players play full alpha strike lists and don't think about how to engage the enemy to maximize their chances of winning so they go all out on an early offensive leaving the game to basically a coin flip.


In tables were you see players that actually know how to play, games aren't decided as early. Normally they come down to turn 3-4.

It bothers me how easily that can be parsed down to "You're losing turn 1-2? Git gud.", especially when an entire LGS has tried and failed for 18 months to try to come up with even one list that doesn't get utterly shredded turn one by 5 Leman Russ tanks and some bubble wrap, and that's including the guy who came up with that list and loans it to other players to stress-test his BA and DG lists.

I would definitely say the players in that LGS do need to git gud if 5 Leman Russ are winning games on turn 1.

That seems insane to me.

 Bosskelot wrote:

The Newman wrote:

 Galas wrote:
Bad games are decided by turn 2 or even 1.

By bad games I mean games were players play full alpha strike lists and don't think about how to engage the enemy to maximize their chances of winning so they go all out on an early offensive leaving the game to basically a coin flip.


In tables were you see players that actually know how to play, games aren't decided as early. Normally they come down to turn 3-4.

It bothers me how easily that can be parsed down to "You're losing turn 1-2? Git gud.", especially when an entire LGS has tried and failed for 18 months to try to come up with even one list that doesn't get utterly shredded turn one by 5 Leman Russ tanks and some bubble wrap, and that's including the guy who came up with that list and loans it to other players to stress-test his BA and DG lists.

I would definitely say the players in that LGS do need to git gud if 5 Leman Russ are winning games on turn 1.

That seems insane to me.

TBF, that list would crush my Slaanesh list on planet bowling ball, barring some bad dice rolling.

Unless I got the first turn, then I would crush it. Barring some bad dice rolling.

The Newman wrote:

 Galas wrote:
Bad games are decided by turn 2 or even 1.

By bad games I mean games were players play full alpha strike lists and don't think about how to engage the enemy to maximize their chances of winning so they go all out on an early offensive leaving the game to basically a coin flip.


In tables were you see players that actually know how to play, games aren't decided as early. Normally they come down to turn 3-4.

It bothers me how easily that can be parsed down to "You're losing turn 1-2? Git gud.", especially when an entire LGS has tried and failed for 18 months to try to come up with even one list that doesn't get utterly shredded turn one by 5 Leman Russ tanks and some bubble wrap, and that's including the guy who came up with that list and loans it to other players to stress-test his BA and DG lists.

Do you mind posting the list in full, and some of the ideas people have tried to counter it with?

A picture of the kinds of tables you normally play on would also help.

Yeah, I, uh...haven't had a ton of problems with basic leman russes+bubblewrap. Seems like the win condition on that bad boy would be "turn 1 shred the infantry, turn 2 do a deep strike and get something into combat".

Which again, to be clear, is a game being over turn 2, but definitely nowhere near unwinnable.

Basically any infantry horde list should be pretty solid against all russes and infantry squads.

the_scotsman wrote:
Yeah, I, uh...haven't had a ton of problems with basic leman russes+bubblewrap. Seems like the win condition on that bad boy would be "turn 1 shred the infantry, turn 2 do a deep strike and get something into combat".

Which again, to be clear, is a game being over turn 2, but definitely nowhere near unwinnable.

Basically any infantry horde list should be pretty solid against all russes and infantry squads.

I was thinking that you'd just start by deleting the Russes and neutering the enemy's firebase. 5 naked Russes are ~700 points and there are builds that have a good shot at wiping all 5 out with an alpha strike even through bubblewrap.

 Canadian 5th wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:
Yeah, I, uh...haven't had a ton of problems with basic leman russes+bubblewrap. Seems like the win condition on that bad boy would be "turn 1 shred the infantry, turn 2 do a deep strike and get something into combat".

Which again, to be clear, is a game being over turn 2, but definitely nowhere near unwinnable.

Basically any infantry horde list should be pretty solid against all russes and infantry squads.

I was thinking that you'd just start by deleting the Russes and neutering the enemy's firebase. 5 naked Russes are ~700 points and there are builds that have a good shot at wiping all 5 out with an alpha strike even through bubblewrap.

Depends what you have in your list, I guess. A lot of my lists don't have enough long range firepower to crack russes reliably, so it's much easier for me to tie up non-fly vehicles than actually take them out.

the_scotsman wrote:
Depends what you have in your list, I guess. A lot of my lists don't have enough long range firepower to crack russes reliably, so it's much easier for me to tie up non-fly vehicles than actually take them out.

*Nods*

My own list would have to worry if the wrap managed to keep me more than 18" from the tanks. At that point, I either hunker down for a turn or make ready for some potential T1 charges.

Got a little side-tracked halfway through posting about our LGS' issues with Russ Spam and left out the important little tidbit "at 1000 points". Five Russes at 2000 wouldn't be any sort of a problem. I also intended to note that this was before Marine Codex 2.0 and PA hit.

We have all the Xenos races (although the ork player only dables with them on the side), all the snowflake Marine chapters, all the vanilla chapters, DG and vanilla CSM, and Slannesh and Khorne Daemons spread over ten players ...and I think we have an irregular TS player too. That's a lot of different forces to be chewing on that problem for a year and a half.

The Newman wrote:
Got a little side-tracked halfway through posting about our LGS' issues with Russ Spam and left out the important little tidbit "at 1000 points". Five Russes at 2000 wouldn't be any sort of a problem. I also intended to note that this was before Marine Codex 2.0 and PA hit.

We have all the Xenos races (although the ork player only dables with them on the side), all the snowflake Marine chapters, all the vanilla chapters, DG and vanilla CSM, and Slannesh and Khorne Daemons spread over ten players ...and I think we have an irregular TS player too. That's a lot of different forces to be chewing on that problem for a year and a half.

If I had to make a Slaanesh Daemons list to beat that one, I'd make it:

KOS w/ Forbidden Gem relic
Shelaxi
Contorted Epitome
2x10 Daemonettes
1x30 Daemonettes with Icon & Musician
Fiend

Battleplan:
Pregame: Put the 1x30 'nettes in Deep Strike and buy them the banner for 1 CP, costing 3 total.

1) get the KOSs, Fiends, Mirror into combat Turn 1. Use Mirror to cast Phantasmagoria, maybe throw some smites on units you're not intending to charge. On a cramped 4x4, this should be trivial, especially with the enemy DZ full of men and machines.
2) In a cramped DZ, it's very easy to attack first with the KOSs, wipe their targets, and then consolidate into other targets. Make sure not to get into B2B when charging or piling in so you can still move if there are survivors.
3) Once the KoS's swing, pile in&consolidate with the fiend and mirror. Touch as many guardsmen as possible with this 6" of free movement - make sure to touch the same squads the KoSs consolidated into.
4) The squads not with the Fiend need to roll under a 6 on 3d6 should they choose to fall back, and the squad locked with the fiend cannot fall back.

If you did this correctly, the KoS's should be immune to shooting. If morale or a passed LD check exposes one KoS, don't forget to pop Warp Surge for a 4++ to try to keep it alive. Use the Forbidden Gem relic to shut down any Tank Commanders so they can't shoot or give orders; should be within 12" after a 14"+3d6" move.

Next turn,
0) Deep strike 30-girl unit to fully pin the enemy in their DZ and finish off infantry screen/charge tanks if a hole has opened up; should only be an 8" charge with the musician.
1) Cast hysterical frenzy with the mirror and smite with the other psykers to break out of combat with the locked squads.
2) Charge tanks.
3) Victory.


EDIT:
5 LRBTs is something like 750 points at cheapest, leaving only enough points for about 30 guardsmen or so. Should be trivial on a 4x4 to blenderize the Guardsmen in one turn, then deep-strike the 30 girls Turn 2 to wrap the tanks and GG.

The Newman wrote:
Got a little side-tracked halfway through posting about our LGS' issues with Russ Spam and left out the important little tidbit "at 1000 points". Five Russes at 2000 wouldn't be any sort of a problem. I also intended to note that this was before Marine Codex 2.0 and PA hit.

We have all the Xenos races (although the ork player only dables with them on the side), all the snowflake Marine chapters, all the vanilla chapters, DG and vanilla CSM, and Slannesh and Khorne Daemons spread over ten players ...and I think we have an irregular TS player too. That's a lot of different forces to be chewing on that problem for a year and a half.

That's a pretty nasty skew list at 1k points, but the solution is to play at a proper points level. The game is designed around 2,000 point games. 1,500 should still allow enough answers to keep skew in check, but 500 and 1,000 point games are always going to be a bit crap in terms of balance.

This is no different than taking a front AV 13 dreadnaught in a 500 point game in earlier editions, except that you can actually hurt the tanks now.

The Newman wrote:
Got a little side-tracked halfway through posting about our LGS' issues with Russ Spam and left out the important little tidbit "at 1000 points". Five Russes at 2000 wouldn't be any sort of a problem. I also intended to note that this was before Marine Codex 2.0 and PA hit.

We have all the Xenos races (although the ork player only dables with them on the side), all the snowflake Marine chapters, all the vanilla chapters, DG and vanilla CSM, and Slannesh and Khorne Daemons spread over ten players ...and I think we have an irregular TS player too. That's a lot of different forces to be chewing on that problem for a year and a half.

Russes were gak then. A "Russ Spam" list is a strictly worse [and much strictly worse] Imperial Knights list. It will be over fast... for the tanks


At 1000 points, I can only see it being worse. 5 Leman Russ Tanks at 1k doesn't leave a lot of room for not-tanks to protect them, even less if they're kitted with sponsons and stuff, from being tagged and the game being over.



Also, your games will be over faster if you use smaller armies. That's just a given.

Yeah 1k is really not a good indicator of how the game plays or is meant to be played. GW do make an attempt to balance for all points values but it's just an inherently impossible thing to do and sometimes their efforts have the opposite effect, where trying to balance stuff for lower points values causes huge issues in 1.5-2k games (Necrons being the prime example)

Plus I can think of plenty of ways to deal with Russ spam at lower points values. I'm fairly sure Tau would eat it for breakfast with one Riptide and 30 drones.

Marines, IG, and Tau are still too good at crippling enemies at range with little to no effort or movement needed. They have so many shots they don't even need good target selection much of time. Their general plan is to give points on turn 1 and 2 and then soak all the points on turn 3+ because the opponent has nothing left to oppose them.

BA, as currently played, are one of the worst offenders. If they get critical tripoints turn 1 and 2, it's really bad for the opponent. If not, they disintegrate. BA are now codex: tripoint and I suspect other assault lists have similar problems unless they have crazy durability like grotesques. So BA can easily beat that Russ list about half the time, which is when they go first. The question is that a worthwhile game to be playing.

Canadian 5th wrote:The game is designed around 2,000 point games.

(citation needed)

GW uses 1,750pts for their tournaments. What was 2K back in 4th/5th is typically 1250-1500 now, so I've found 1500pt games to be my preference in 8th: More room on a 6x4 board to maneuver, more hard decisions about what to take in a list, and big things like Knights and Land Raiders feel appropriately significant rather than something you can delete at least one of every turn. Oh, and it plays faster too.

I've never seen it explicitly stated that 8th Ed was designed around 2,000 point games, nor any compelling evidence from a balance perspective that that's where the game is most fair.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
At 1000 points, I can only see it being worse. 5 Leman Russ Tanks at 1k doesn't leave a lot of room for not-tanks to protect them, even less if they're kitted with sponsons and stuff, from being tagged and the game being over.

Also, your games will be over faster if you use smaller armies. That's just a given.

In terms of actual time, sure, but we're talking about turn counts, and there is no reason a smaller game should be more lethal than a larger one.

If anything, I find the reduced access to high-powered stratagems, improved ability for units to hide and maneuver without the board looking like a parking lot, and fewer stacked auras tends to make low-points games less alpha-strike-y than larger ones.

Also, re: Leman Russ spam, you can quite comfortably fit 2 Tank Commanders, 3 normal Russes, and 50-60 infantry in a 1K list. It's a skew list but it's not short on bubble wrap.

Imperial guard are one of the best armies at low point games because they can basically spam artillery and tanks and still have points for a "ton" of very good infantry. The higher points you play, the worse they become because they run out of "good " options before they run out of points to fill.

2000 is the current tourney size, so it's what the balance data is collected from. That's why it's designed around 2k games.

That said, I think 1500 would be a better size to use for competitive games for a bunch of reasons that are not pertinent to the thread, but 2k is pretty standard so I'm not going to push it too hard.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
2000 is the current tourney size, so it's what the balance data is collected from. That's why it's designed around 2k games.

GW's Grand Tournaments are played at the 1,750pt level. Lots of third-party tournaments have various tweaks on the game (eg ITC secondaries) that I think most would agree GW is not designing their game around, despite collecting data from those events.

1000 and 5 russes will have a field Day for any other non skew list otoh as soon as that list runs into any mobile melee list Gilles with deepstrikers or at tools then good knight irene.

But as it is said,it's a skew list so normal for them.

 catbarf wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
2000 is the current tourney size, so it's what the balance data is collected from. That's why it's designed around 2k games.

GW's Grand Tournaments are played at the 1,750pt level. Lots of third-party tournaments have various tweaks on the game (eg ITC secondaries) that I think most would agree GW is not designing their game around, despite collecting data from those events.

I think your statement is incorrect, given that IIRC GW officially set their Spring FAQ to be close to right after Adepticon so that they can issue their FAQ's based off of Adepticon results.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Not Online!!! wrote:
1000 and 5 russes will have a field Day for any other non skew list otoh as soon as that list runs into any mobile melee list Gilles with deepstrikers or at tools then good knight irene.

But as it is said,it's a skew list so normal for them.

Or anything that's like it but better. Which there's a lot of. Knights for example. A more efficient Guard list. Iron Hands guncastle.


5 Leman Russes isn't the epitome of a skew list design. It's pretty low on the totem pole, I'd say. 1000 points might kick some of the ones above it, but even then it just has too many weaknesses to actually be that good, I think.

 catbarf wrote:
GW uses 1,750pts for their tournaments. What was 2K back in 4th/5th is typically 1250-1500 now, so I've found 1500pt games to be my preference in 8th: More room on a 6x4 board to maneuver, more hard decisions about what to take in a list, and big things like Knights and Land Raiders feel appropriately significant rather than something you can delete at least one of every turn. Oh, and it plays faster too.

I've never seen it explicitly stated that 8th Ed was designed around 2,000 point games, nor any compelling evidence from a balance perspective that that's where the game is most fair.

Every major non-GW tournament runs at 2k. There are vastly more of these events to gather data from than there are GW tournaments. We've seen GW react to solve problems that pop up mainly in ITC that aren't nearly as problematic at events running CA missions.

Regardless of it being a specific targeted points total, they clearly have to design around 2,000 points being competitive.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
Also, re: Leman Russ spam, you can quite comfortably fit 2 Tank Commanders, 3 normal Russes, and 50-60 infantry in a 1K list. It's a skew list but it's not short on bubble wrap.

Can that few guard bodies bubble wrap out to 18"? If not, it does nothing to stop Plasma Talons from tearing into them.

If I were to trim my 2k list down to 1k it would look something like.

HQ - 380 points
Sammael in Sableclaw
Talonmaster

Troops - 175 points
2x Min Scouts
1x Min Scouts w/ Sniper Rifles

Fast Attack - 442
10 Ravenwing Black Knights
3 Ravenwing Black Knights

997 points

I have all the mobility in my favour while also being able to delete pretty much anything at will.

In an ideal scenario, I can delete 3 Russes turn 1 and charge their screen while keeping at least 2 units of scouts between his tanks and my HQ cluster. Otherwise, I'd hide out of LOS for a turn, and get him on turn 2.

Unless my dice go cold or we play on literal planet bowling ball there's no way that list beats mine. In theory at least.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

 catbarf wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
2000 is the current tourney size, so it's what the balance data is collected from. That's why it's designed around 2k games.

GW's Grand Tournaments are played at the 1,750pt level. Lots of third-party tournaments have various tweaks on the game (eg ITC secondaries) that I think most would agree GW is not designing their game around, despite collecting data from those events.

I think your statement is incorrect, given that IIRC GW officially set their Spring FAQ to be close to right after Adepticon so that they can issue their FAQ's based off of Adepticon results.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Not Online!!! wrote:
1000 and 5 russes will have a field Day for any other non skew list otoh as soon as that list runs into any mobile melee list Gilles with deepstrikers or at tools then good knight irene.

But as it is said,it's a skew list so normal for them.

Or anything that's like it but better. Which there's a lot of. Knights for example. A more efficient Guard list. Iron Hands guncastle.


5 Leman Russes isn't the epitome of a skew list design. It's pretty low on the totem pole, I'd say. 1000 points might kick some of the ones above it, but even then it just has too many weaknesses to actually be that good, I think.

Tbf skew list are regardless most of time the bottom of the totem Pole in regards to design.

Fitting in a squad of 10 bubblewrappers per tank, with couple of those being Tank Commanders, is entirely possible.

With current LoS rules and the terrain most games are played with (not necessarily planet bowling ball, but often without extensive solid LoS blocking terrain sufficient to hide everything at deployment from 72" guns, and lots of tall GW terrain has holes and windows to draw LoS through), I can very easily see that Ravenwing list getting absolutely obliterated by that Russ list, as I've done almost exactly that a couple of times, the firepower output at 72" is entirely capable of killing every Black Knight in one round of shooting if given the chance (especially so if playing something like Hammer & Anvil deployment) with marginally favorable rolling.

More generally however, I think that matchup going to come more down to "who gets the first turn" than anything else I think, both lists are entirely capable of deciding the game in the first turn or two with a modicum of luck and is indicative of the Alpha strike issue in general on both ends, at least as far as can be in a 1k game.

There isn't a huge difference between 1750 and 2000. I think GW moved down to 1750 after on of their tournaments ran on too long?

I guess its sort of turning into a pile on, but I'm mystified how 5 Russes can dominate a meta for 18 months. It seems like you could stack the odds in your favour with almost every faction I can think of with a bit of list tailoring. I guess if the guard player "always" went first for some reason - but still. As people have said, knights, flyers, horde infantry lists (maybe if all the Russ have punishers - but then you have range problems versus plenty of things.) Basically anything beyond "Timmy's first army" - which back in the day would be say 3 tactical squads, an assault squad, a devastator squad, a captain and a librarian.

But then meta does matter. I'm not convinced the whinge was that Castelans could get a 3++ (although this was too cheap). Its that they totally warped the meta into "do you have a chance to kill this, if not gg, because a ludicrous number of lists in any tournament will be bringing one". Which isn't surprising - because if you can't beat them, join them. If its damage wasn't so bad it would be fine - but yes, destroying two Russ a go was very likely, more if you could get it across the table to clear something in assault as well.

This why GW had to bring in the Marine FAQ, because the obvious meta effect was just to make every good player play Marines (and everyone else whinge about marines).

The comparison with computer games is that if a certain faction or class is overpowered, it will likely become very popular very quickly. Now admittedly you can say "maybe it isn't overpowered, you just haven't found the answer from amongst the various other options" - but this assumes such an answer exists. List building in 40k tends to be about the alchemy of finding a list with no hard counters. I'm highly suspect anyone found a list which had say a 70% win rate versus the traditional Castelan list in its peak - or the various Marine lists in theirs. You can say those lists were outliers and therefore deserved to be nerfed - but its quite common for meta dominance to reach that point. You build to compete with, not to crush such lists.

In 40k's long history, can anyone thing of a relatively natural organic shift to the meta, that wasn't cause by GW adding or changing rules?

 Vaktathi wrote:
Fitting in a squad of 10 bubblewrappers per tank, with couple of those being Tank Commanders, is entirely possible.

With current LoS rules and the terrain most games are played with (not necessarily planet bowling ball, but often without extensive solid LoS blocking terrain sufficient to hide everything at deployment from 72" guns, and lots of tall GW terrain has holes and windows to draw LoS through), I can very easily see that Ravenwing list getting absolutely obliterated by that Russ list, as I've done almost exactly that a couple of times, the firepower output at 72" is entirely capable of killing every Black Knight in one round of shooting if given the chance (especially so if playing something like Hammer & Anvil deployment) with marginally favorable rolling.

More generally however, I think that matchup going to come more down to "who gets the first turn" than anything else I think, both lists are entirely capable of deciding the game in the first turn or two with a modicum of luck and is indicative of the Alpha strike issue in general on both ends, at least as far as can be in a 1k game.

Yeah, deployment, terrain, and turn order are going to be huge factors in any game between those types of lists.

Tyel wrote:
In 40k's long history, can anyone thing of a relatively natural organic shift to the meta, that wasn't cause by GW adding or changing rules?

It's never been given enough space to breathe for a given - relatively balanced - meta to be fully solved. Even a shakeup for a new codex every few months drastically changes things.

You'd need a StarCraft like game state where there was a lot of high-level play for a long time after the last balance changes were made to see if an organically shifting meta could emerge. You'd also need balance tight enough and enough room for skill expression to allow for that to emerge and I'm not sure 40k has ever had that.

The Newman wrote:

 Galas wrote:
Bad games are decided by turn 2 or even 1.

By bad games I mean games were players play full alpha strike lists and don't think about how to engage the enemy to maximize their chances of winning so they go all out on an early offensive leaving the game to basically a coin flip.


In tables were you see players that actually know how to play, games aren't decided as early. Normally they come down to turn 3-4.

It bothers me how easily that can be parsed down to "You're losing turn 1-2? Git gud.", especially when an entire LGS has tried and failed for 18 months to try to come up with even one list that doesn't get utterly shredded turn one by 5 Leman Russ tanks and some bubble wrap, and that's including the guy who came up with that list and loans it to other players to stress-test his BA and DG lists.

Yes, your entire LGS does need to git gud if 5 Russes is ending every game turn one. That's pretty low level. Russes aren't even the best thing you could take there. This is such a good example of people assuming the strongest stuff at their own local must be representative of the strongest stuff in the entire game and thinking it's a measure of high level balance - it's not. Don't worry, you're not the only one doing it, but probably the most obvious one. 5 Russes doesn't even kill a single Tyrannofex out of my list. 1k points is neither representative of any sort of competitive meta, but I don't care what value you are playing at - this is not some bully list.

 Nitro Zeus wrote:

The Newman wrote:

 Galas wrote:
Bad games are decided by turn 2 or even 1.

By bad games I mean games were players play full alpha strike lists and don't think about how to engage the enemy to maximize their chances of winning so they go all out on an early offensive leaving the game to basically a coin flip.


In tables were you see players that actually know how to play, games aren't decided as early. Normally they come down to turn 3-4.

It bothers me how easily that can be parsed down to "You're losing turn 1-2? Git gud.", especially when an entire LGS has tried and failed for 18 months to try to come up with even one list that doesn't get utterly shredded turn one by 5 Leman Russ tanks and some bubble wrap, and that's including the guy who came up with that list and loans it to other players to stress-test his BA and DG lists.

Yes, your entire LGS does need to git gud if 5 Russes is ending every game turn one. That's pretty low level. Russes aren't even the best thing you could take there. This is such a good example of people assuming the strongest stuff at their own local must be representative of the strongest stuff in the entire game and thinking it's a measure of high level balance - it's not. Don't worry, you're not the only one doing it, but probably the most obvious one. 5 Russes doesn't even kill a single Tyrannofex out of my list. 1k points is neither representative of any sort of competitive meta, but I don't care what value you are playing at - this is not some bully list.

Yeah, there's a dude at my club whose thing has always been "Maximum tanks, minimum everything else" and he's been pretty intensely frustrated since the very start of 8th just due to how much vehicles without fly get shut down by tagging them in melee. and we have a blessedly uncompetitive meta by pretty much any standard.

Fortunately IG get infinite dudes for free to stand in the way. Not quite, I know but it sure seems like it.

Given the lethality of 8th edition, would it be better served going to a 4 turn game like 2nd Edition?

Would a shorter game force the incentive to play more optimized armies knowing that you only have 4 turns to win the game?

Also, losing on turn 2 or 3 might not feel as bad knowing that you only have 4 turns vs 5,6 or 7? Sometimes there is that embarrassment factor of getting tabled when you still have 5 turns to play vs 2.