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With your army(or armies) do you approach writing a list for Etenal War any differently than Malestrom missions, when you know which youll be playing? Do you favor highly mobile units for Maelstrom, and slow durable units for Eternal War? Or do you use a single list that you can use for either?

ObSec is more useful in Eternal War. If you have the right unit on an objective the other guy almost literally can't win.

I try to build for either since we roll off here and the winner picks the mission set.

Eternal war missions favor last turn objective grabs while maelstrom favors cheap mobile scoring from the get go.

Some armies can do both rather easily like my DE/Eldar. Others like my GKs are reduced to being the aggressor in either mission meaning they much prefer eternal war.

Some of the major things that Maelstorm missions make really useful are;
*Assault. Units that are good in close combat are much more useful when your opponent will have to try to get to objectives on your side of the board during the early game.
*MSU. Having lots of small units lets you go after more of the objectives at the same time and makes you more flexible. You also don't have KP only missions so it is not a huge draw back.
*Turn 1 Mobility. In maelstorm I need to be able to get to forward objectives by turn 1-2. This means my normal unit X in flyer that I used in altar of war missions is not appropriate. This has actually made me take units like ratlings just to have something to try for these early points.
*Durable and ObjSec units. In altar of war missions you have 5 turns before you need to hold an objective. This is 5 turns to kill all your opponent's units. This means that the only scoring units that really matter are units that 1) can jump onto the objectives turn 5 from hiding or reserves and 2) deathstars which are nearly impossible to kill. ObjSec is actually not that important because if you take more firepower instead you can just kill the units that might contest. In maelstorm missions when you are trying to get points in turns 1-3 most of the opponent's army is still alive and trying to contest or kill you. This means that you need ObjSec units because there will still be lots of units left to contest you and you need either lots of mobile scoring units (to replace the ones that get killed after scoring) or durable scoring units (so you can reuse them the next turn).

Altar of War tends to favor deathstars and gunlines much more. This is because by the time you need to claim objectives you have a fair shot to nearly table most lists if you concentrate on killing potential. Not to mention KPs which is a straight up comparison of who brought the least number of units and the most firepower. Alter of war missions also favor units that can just jump on objectives turn 5/6 and don't have the ability to stay there.

Building lists for these two types of missions is a pretty different prospect. There are actually relatively few lists that work well in both mission types.

 Sinful Hero wrote:
With your army(or armies) do you approach writing a list for Etenal War any differently than Malestrom missions, when you know which youll be playing? Do you favor highly mobile units for Maelstrom, and slow durable units for Eternal War? Or do you use a single list that you can use for either?

My list never changes. I just use fundamentally sound lists with at least four Obsec components or more in them for most armies. My Coven list obviously cant have Objective Secured so there's that. but for the majority of lists I go with a fundamentally sound, mobile toolbox type of arrangement. I dont get outclassed often and I am in every game. I tend to win this way much more than I lose.

My weakest army is Militarum Tempestus. It is a fast army that you would think Ideal for Maelstrom or Eternal War but it does much better in Maelstrom. other than that one outlyer amongst my forces, I'd say I am pretty much boning up for both in the same list.

Normal missions reward an army with durable scoring units and the ability to create a plan at the beginning of the game and then execute that plan for several turns in a row, modifying it in reaction to your opponent's moves (and not random cards) and counter-moves.

Malestrom missions reward an army that is as simple to play as possible, so once you've had a few beers to dull the pain of playing such an awful game type you can still remember most of how to play your army.

Maelstorm rewards tactical approach and ballanced lists.

Eternnal war rewards hardhitters, deathstars and turn 5 objective grabbers.

Maelstrom also makes armies with heavy reserve components (other than drop pods/deathwing/etc) a problem - since you're waiting at least a turn, maybe more, before they're in a position to help with objective grabs.

Much is the same, but IMO:

- Maelstorm lists need fast units on table from turn 1.

- Non-scoring units or units in normal reserve, should not be no many in maelstorm. Like flyers and FMC.

We have been heavily favouring Maelstrom, so my local group are favouring the sorts of units that do well in that situation, as mentioned above.

However, as we are a small group, we have started rolling to see which mission set we will use, not just which mission from within the set. His means we have to take more flexible armies, rather athan the quite narrow focused ones we already have.

 Peregrine wrote:
Normal missions reward an army with durable scoring units and the ability to create a plan at the beginning of the game and then execute that plan for several turns in a row, modifying it in reaction to your opponent's moves (and not random cards) and counter-moves.

Malestrom missions reward an army that is as simple to play as possible, so once you've had a few beers to dull the pain of playing such an awful game type you can still remember most of how to play your army.

Eternal war is actually more random than maelstrom, at least that's what math suggests.

One scores all points on a random turn, the other scores a random number of points each turn for a random number of turns. Of the two random events one depends on a single variable, the other depends on a combination of many small variables, which means that maelstrom is more predictable.

If you want the prove of this then check the battle reports in this forum and count how many end with this sentence "I would have won/lost if the game ended/didn't end on x turn".

People consider maelstrom randomic, but only cause it is a different kind of randomness compared to the one they are used to.

 Peregrine wrote:
Normal missions reward an army with durable scoring units and the ability to create a plan at the beginning of the game and then execute that plan for several turns in a row, modifying it in reaction to your opponent's moves (and not random cards) and counter-moves.

Malestrom missions reward an army that is as simple to play as possible, so once you've had a few beers to dull the pain of playing such an awful game type you can still remember most of how to play your army.

Spoletta wrote:
Eternal war is actually more random than maelstrom, at least that's what math suggests.

Care to share this maths?

Spoletta wrote:
One scores all points on a random turn, the other scores a random number of points each turn for a random number of turns. Of the two random events one depends on a single variable, the other depends on a combination of many small variables, which means that maelstrom is more predictable.

Eh? That's some impressive anti-logic right there. How, pray, does adding more random variables somehow make maelstrom more predictable?

Spoletta wrote:
If you want the prove of this then check the battle reports in this forum and count how many end with this sentence "I would have won/lost if the game ended/didn't end on x turn".

Which is proving what exactly? That many people prefer to blame the dice than their tactics?

Spoletta wrote:

People consider maelstrom randomic, but only cause it is a different kind of randomness compared to the one they are used to.

And not a good kind of randomness.

Ending the game on a random turn does not hinder or benefit either player. Both players know that they need to be controlling enough objectives by turn 5, and they they potentially need to hold those objectives for 2 more turns, in order to score them.

However, random objectives can and do favour one player, for no objective reason. If both players draw "capture objective 6" on turn 1, it it one player's fault that objective 6 is in his opponent's deployment zone? If a player draws "cast a psychic power", is it his fault that he's using Dark Eldar or Necrons or some other army with no psykers? Is it his fault that he can't capture every objective on the board on demand?

Virtually every maelstrom mission I've watched or participated in begin with one player getting 3 easy objectives, and his opponent getting 3 impossible or virtually-impossible objectives. And, each time, that set the tone of the game - one player would be breezing through easy objectives, constantly refreshing most or all of his cards, whilst the other player struggled to score even a handful of points.

 vipoid wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
Eternal war is actually more random than maelstrom, at least that's what math suggests.

Care to share this maths?

Spoletta wrote:
One scores all points on a random turn, the other scores a random number of points each turn for a random number of turns. Of the two random events one depends on a single variable, the other depends on a combination of many small variables, which means that maelstrom is more predictable.

Eh? That's some impressive anti-logic right there. How, pray, does adding more random variables somehow make maelstrom more predictable?

I'll answer this part first then the rest when i've got more time. (i'm at work )

I'll do it with an easy to understand example:

Immagine shooting with a weapon at a tank which rolls a single ice and : On a result of 1 2 and 3 does nothing, on 4+ it blows the tank.
Then you got a second weapon which rolls 10 dices. If at least 7 roll 4+ or more it blows the tank, if not it inflicts one glancing for every two 4+.

Apart from calculating the average result (i didn't balance it, didn't have time), which of these 2 weapons woud you use if you were targeting for predictable constant results?

Spoletta wrote:

I'll answer this part first then the rest when i've got more time. (i'm at work )

I'll do it with an easy to understand example:

Immagine shooting with a weapon at a tank which rolls a single ice and : On a result of 1 2 and 3 does nothing, on 4+ it blows the tank.
Then you got a second weapon which rolls 10 dices. If at least 7 roll 4+ or more it blows the tank, if not it inflicts one glancing for every two 4+.

Apart from calculating the average result (i didn't balance it, didn't have time), which of these 2 weapons woud you use if you were targeting for predictable constant results?

I guess the second, though I fail to see the relevance of either to maelstrom of war or eternal war.

For my DE, I do exactly what you said: slow and durable for Eternal War, highly mobile (and numerous) for Maelstrom.

There are durable DE? sorry, I kid.

What is wrong with a balanced approach? I've only played one game in seventh, but we had built our lists then rolled for mission.

What about the current tournament scene where they have tried to combine some of both?

Guess we'll just have to have some of both then? Makes for "balance" of hard hitting but fast and numerous things (yet possibly survivable though most folks tend to just want to kill off the obj sec thing on an objective and claim for themselves lately from what I've seen so killing potential seems to trump pure survivability)

 Jimsolo wrote:
For my DE, I do exactly what you said: slow and durable for Eternal War, highly mobile (and numerous) for Maelstrom.

Out of interest, what do you consider slow and durable in the DE book?

 vipoid wrote:

 Jimsolo wrote:
For my DE, I do exactly what you said: slow and durable for Eternal War, highly mobile (and numerous) for Maelstrom.

Out of interest, what do you consider slow and durable in the DE book?

The Engines have pretty decent durability. T7 3W plus feel no pain/it will not die.

 Sinful Hero wrote:

The Engines have pretty decent durability. T7 3W plus feel no pain/it will not die.

Indeed.

But, is there anything else?

I mean, do you consider Wracks slow and durable, or Grotesques?

 vipoid wrote:

Spoletta wrote:

I'll answer this part first then the rest when i've got more time. (i'm at work )

I'll do it with an easy to understand example:

Immagine shooting with a weapon at a tank which rolls a single ice and : On a result of 1 2 and 3 does nothing, on 4+ it blows the tank.
Then you got a second weapon which rolls 10 dices. If at least 7 roll 4+ or more it blows the tank, if not it inflicts one glancing for every two 4+.

Apart from calculating the average result (i didn't balance it, didn't have time), which of these 2 weapons woud you use if you were targeting for predictable constant results?

I guess the second, though I fail to see the relevance of either to maelstrom of war or eternal war.

It was just to point out the fact that it is easier to predict the outcome of an event depending on multiple variables (in that case rolls), than an event depending on a single one. It's the same as saying: what is easier to predict, the result of 1d6 or 1000d6/1000?
Without descending into distribution probability and stuff like that you can easily see why in theory maelstrom (many events = card draws) should be more predictable than eternal war (one single roll on turn 5).

Spoletta wrote:

It was just to point out the fact that it is easier to predict the outcome of an event depending on multiple variables (in that case rolls), than an event depending on a single one. It's the same as saying: what is easier to predict, the result of 1d6 or 1000d6/1000?

But that's the thing - this only applies if the outcome of those rolls is also the same.

Rolling a d6 and rolling 1000d6/1000 will get you the same result (a number between 1 and 6).

However, maelstrom of war and eternal war do not have any such equivalence. You simply cannot compare random game length to randomly drawn cards in this way, because the outcomes are totally different.

Spoletta wrote:

Without descending into distribution probability and stuff like that you can easily see why in theory maelstrom (many events = card draws) should be more predictable than eternal war (one single roll on turn 5).

No, sorry, that's just plain wrong.

In order for this to be even plausible, the maelstrom cards would have to have the *sole* effect of determining game length somehow.

Spoletta wrote:
It was just to point out the fact that it is easier to predict the outcome of an event depending on multiple variables (in that case rolls), than an event depending on a single one. It's the same as saying: what is easier to predict, the result of 1d6 or 1000d6/1000?
Without descending into distribution probability and stuff like that you can easily see why in theory maelstrom (many events = card draws) should be more predictable than eternal war (one single roll on turn 5).

Except you're completely missing the fact that the two game types aren't just two ways of rolling the same event. A normal game has a single roll to end it, but the outcome of the game is determined by which player was better at executing their strategy over the whole length of the game. You don't know exactly when the game will end, but you know that it is ending soon and you know which objectives you're going to set up to claim. And, most importantly, these things are decided by your choice of strategy, not the dice. In a maelstrom game the objectives are entirely decided by the dice with no long-term planning. You don't decide "I'm going to focus on this area of the table and make sure I claim these objectives to win", you roll the dice and hope for a good result. And you roll those dice every turn, with the previous turn's results having no effect on what the next turn's objectives will be. This makes the dice a much bigger part of the outcome of the game, almost entirely replacing strategy and player choices.

 Peregrine wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
It was just to point out the fact that it is easier to predict the outcome of an event depending on multiple variables (in that case rolls), than an event depending on a single one. It's the same as saying: what is easier to predict, the result of 1d6 or 1000d6/1000?
Without descending into distribution probability and stuff like that you can easily see why in theory maelstrom (many events = card draws) should be more predictable than eternal war (one single roll on turn 5).

Except you're completely missing the fact that the two game types aren't just two ways of rolling the same event. A normal game has a single roll to end it, but the outcome of the game is determined by which player was better at executing their strategy over the whole length of the game. You don't know exactly when the game will end, but you know that it is ending soon and you know which objectives you're going to set up to claim. And, most importantly, these things are decided by your choice of strategy, not the dice. In a maelstrom game the objectives are entirely decided by the dice with no long-term planning. You don't decide "I'm going to focus on this area of the table and make sure I claim these objectives to win", you roll the dice and hope for a good result. And you roll those dice every turn, with the previous turn's results having no effect on what the next turn's objectives will be. This makes the dice a much bigger part of the outcome of the game, almost entirely replacing strategy and player choices.

And that is my point.

We had years to manage the randomness of Eternal War, so we are now used to it and it looks less random (to a certain degree, many games go from 10-5 win to tabled from turn 5 to turn 6/7, just think of eldar bikes).
Maelstrom games are no different, there are many parts of that randomness that can be easily mitigated, and players are already doing that. I honestly think that in a no long time we will consider Eternal war missions to be the odd casual ones and maelstrom the ones good for competitive play, but that may be just wishing from me.

I make my lists never knowing if I will be playing a normal game or a maelstrom game. I drive 4.5 hours to get to my games and military duty, in addition to other stuff I carry so what I bring typically is what I will be using. That said I plan accordingly. However, most of the lists I write, their purpose is more to wipe out the enemy, taking objectives is a secondary as long as I stop my opponent from taking his.

Maelstrom favours people who are flexible to change, whether it's battlefield conditions or a new edition.

I don't often play EW missions, but when I do I always bring my fedora.

Spoletta, I just can't understand your point at all, and the dice analogy is not linked, but if it makes sense for you, that's cool.
In terms of OP's original question, at my FLGS we usually just play kill points, relic or basic objectives for simplicity, so I line up my guard or tau, then charge with the mobile units and make a gunline out of what is left, and it works on a 50/50 basis. In terms of maelstrom of war, I have only played once, and I lost 9/4 using tau vs DE. The problem was I played exactly how I would play in a kill points game, without adapting to the random card draws, meaning that once my small amount of mobile stuff was dead I couldn't really go to the other side of the bird for objective 6. However, if it had been kill points it would have probably been 6/5, a much closer loss. I have now decided to take the much hated route of buying loads of suits so that I have mobility and unfair amounts of dakka.