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What kinds of capabilities should I use as a checklist for seeing if a list makes sense as a Take All Comers list.

This question has two parts for me:

1) I'm building an army from scratch and will start with a TAC list to use at my FLGS for non-competitive games. It's a laid back group with some variety of lists an no particular army is dominant.

2) By next summer I'll be doing a tournament. What does it take to be TAC for that.

I'm not looking for army specific advice I'm looking for what kinds of capabilities make a list TAC e.g. how much AT, what kind of anti-infantry, other things. I'm getting back into this after having last played 3rd edition.

Thanks,
Steven

Those general type of rosters are still a bit of enigma to me. I am a Space Marine Player at my heart, and I often feel handicapped by their jack-of-all-trade-diness because I want specialized squads to do their job.

Not every army has an ability to build TAC style. Some are designed about very special themes, while others are so powerful they don't really need anything.

To be both versatile and good, you got to take in account regular targets and objectives that are common and pick your squads to do it.

Examples of your objectives :
1) Kill MCs
2)Kill Tanks
3) Kill flyers
4)Kill Hordes
5)Counteract their psychic plan
6)Be mobile to do Maelstorm objectives etc.

Also you got to have your own active plan of killing your opponent, if they doesn't bring what you are going to counter. Your squads got to be able to serve a double duty or have their primary task so wide you'll always find a target.

Good example of such armies are CAD Built Eldar+Dark Eldar, arguably the strongest army these days.

They have a wide array of tools to combat anything that comes against them.

Psychic plan? Farseer or two is a bunch of deny dice, and if not - it's a decent buffing units, punishing your opponent for not having Psyker plan.

Hordes? Eldar have scatter bikes, hands down the best Troops in terms of output damage. They handle lot of infantry, armored infantry and even light tanks/MCs.

Scat Bikes are also unparalleled in their ability to roam around and score objectives for VP.

Tanks? You have Fire Dragons or WraithGuard with two flavored of D-strength, while being able to deliver them with allied Raider or Webway Portal. Swooping Hawks are a decent filler unit to Haywire their AV and deliver blasts/dakka aswell.

MCs? Meet Wraithguard once again.

Fliers? You have Crimson Exarch, a decent and versatile flyer of your own.

Bike spam? Dark reapers.

And if your opponent durdles around with something, you can just have your Wriathknight beat him with the mighty D!

Hope I covered some points and gave you an explanation.

Just play eldar with scat bikes and far seer conclave and 4 wraith knights.

 Filch wrote:
Just play eldar with scat bikes and far seer conclave and 4 wraith knights.

Not an option I'm considering


Automatically Appended Next Post:
To be clear. I'm not asking for suggestions as to which army to play. I'm asking for general purpose advice. The concepts to apply when making any TAC list with any army.

Thanks,

In general, the idea of "Take All Comers" is dead. There are simply too many variables in play in the current meta to allow for one army to deal with every conceivable threat. Instead, it's often better to specialize toward one aspect of an army that it does very well. For example, Space Marines are a very mobile army, and can do MSU very well.

However, that doesn't mean that one shouldn't be prepared for the various threats you will encounter on the table. When building a list, you should consider how best to deal with the following kinds of units:
-Flyers/FMCs
-Superheavies/Gargantuan Creatures
-Massed Armour/Vehicles
-Monstrous Creature Spam
-Psykers
-Cover Camping Infantry

If your list has elements that can deal with most of these kinds of units, you should be relatively prepared for anything. Beyond these generalities, it's down to specific tactics on the tabletop and how you incorporate those tactics into your army.

Most flyers in the game can be ignored safely. I would rank flyer defense at the lowest priority. None of my lists have it.

I guess what i can advise is to make my csm tac, I usually use obliterators because they can morph their guns into lascannons, plasma cannons, tl plasma gun, multi melta, tl melta gun, tl flamers.

Can take on all comers...

But the down side is low rate of fire and cant choose the same firing gun. Also even with MoN giving it t5 it is still vulnerable. 76ppm means i need to alteast kill 38pts per turn.

On the flip side i often use 3x5Havocs with 4 ac. Great for just about everything besides av13/14.
I need ti be running marines with meltaguns to make that work.

For tournaments you'll be hard pressed to build any kind of TAC list because you'll need to be able to counter all the cheesy builds and their tactics. For example...
- The psychic power invisibility is used in almost every Death Star list and is very hard to counter. It usually requires very specific units (that anti-psycher assassin would be one).
- Then there's the gladius space marine list, where you need an enormous amount of firepower and objective secured units to win the objective game because you can expect to be facing a ton of Transports with marines that all have scout.
- Then there's the FMC spam lists such as triple or quad Hive Tyrant with Mawlocs or the Daemon flying circus summoning lists.
- Then you might get surprised by a Khorne demonkin lists with a swarm of melee.
- Then of course there's Eldar and their Wraithknights... Toughness 8 GMCs with D weapons will swipe you hard if you don't have a counter. Better hope that counter isn't susceptible to scatter laser spam though.

So there's an idea of what the tournament lists look like and what you can expect to find. Each list has it's counter, but trying to cram all those counters into one list just isn't possible. Good luck!

Just have a plan for what you'll do against each type of common army in whatever your meta is.

In my area, we have a couple Nids/daemons with some FMCS, an Eldar Scatterbike/wraithknight list, a bunch of mechanized SMs and CSMs, and a couple ork and guard hordes.

So when constructing my harlequin list, I made sure it had:

-Haywire and melta, to deal with heavy armor
-AP3/2 to deal with marines
-S with skyfire for those FMCs
-Auto-wounds and psychic powers that wound on LD to knock off GMCs
-some high volume attacks and stuff that mitigates overwatch to take on hordes
-Ignores Cover to destroy bikes.

Psychers tend to be solid TAC choices due to versatility, ignores cover is vital, Fleshbane is very nice if you can get it, skyfire id say is low priority unless you're gonna field a plane anyway then you get it free.

I believe that if you are wanting to build an all comers list you need only couple of things. I'll list below what I usually think about when I build my all comers list.

List objectives:
-mobility (transports of some sort)
-ap3/ap2 anti-infantry units
-high strength anti-armor units
-psyker yes/no (Personally, I don't use psykers. Just means they are a little higher on my target priority list)
-flyer either as an anti-flyer or back field dug in unit hunter

You are getting some good advice here.

TAC lists can out shoot assault armies and out assault shooty armies. Some posts mention writing a list down of the most common list archetypes you will expect to encounter and have 2-3 units in your army that can work to counter that archetype. Not necessarily defeat it, just counter it to slow it down or degrade their abilities enough that your other units can win the game.

TAC lists should never face an auto lose mission. If there is an auto lose mission for your army, then you have to many eggs in one basket.

TAC lists should never be crippled by the lose of one unit. No one unit should ever be relied on so much that it's lose would cripple you.

Diversify your rolls within your list. It's ok to have a unit that is primarily your assault/counter assault unit, but you have to have a secondary unit which could do the same roll effectively if needed. The same goes for your long range antitank, horde control, etc....

Probably the one piece of advice you should keep in mind about TAC lists is this. If you and your opponent got to remove one unit from each other's list before the game started, then you would still be fine and have a shot against most lists and all scenarios.

My KDK "TAC" is pretty much just regular melee units, Soul Grinder for armor, and a lot of high-mobility melta (bikes and Raptors)

Generally speaking, I build TAC lists mostly by favoring weapons/units that can accomplish multiple tasks. For example, my Gladius SF contains a large amount of assault cannons, plasmaguns/cannons and grav weapons, because these can all tackle most threat categories with a modicum of efficiency. I will tend to leave at home "single purpose" weapons (such as meltaguns, heavy bolters and the like) unless they are really really efficient (such as a 3-strong Whirlwind squadron in a Suppression Force).

Another factor to consider is Objective Secured. A list with a strong ObSec contingent can contribute to the TAC-ness (that's a word, right?) of a list by allowing you to win against stronger, more efficient lists by outright out-playing your opponent. This is something I've become fairly profficient at, often snapping victory from the jaws of defeat with only a handful of ObSec bodies. That said, the validity of this advice varies tremendously on the character of your Troops. Marines do this very well, being tough(ish) to kill and being immune to being wiped out in Sweeping Advance. Eldar Jetbikes are also amazing at this because they can play keep-away all game while pumping you full of scatterlaser fire, only to do a 48 inch dash on T5 to steal your objectives. Guardsmen blobs with an attached priest can also do this well, since they compensate their squishyness through numbers and because they are Fearless. On the flipside, things like Dark Eldar Warriors, or Tau Firewarriors... yeah...

A good way to fake a TAC list is to build an army to your liking at half the points, then double it. Nets you automatic redundancy, increased resiliency, and gives you more flexibility in how you handle unplanned for situations. From there, you can swap out units to taste as long as you stay within the same roles.

For example, I like to field a GK army with a Librarian, 10 or more GKT, at least 10 Interceptors, two NDK, and Draigo. With those models, I can field a CAD or an NSF, I can split them into two separate forces or use them together as a single coordinated army. Either way, I'm ignoring flyers that aren't FMCs.

SJ

Just look at the possible missions in the tournament, and what armies are popular within that tournament structure, and try to think of combinations that will give you the most trouble. Then try to address those combinations as much as possible.

Building a TAC list is more about knowing every other army and mission, than it is about knowing your own list.

 Tinkrr wrote:
Just look at the possible missions in the tournament, and what armies are popular within that tournament structure, and try to think of combinations that will give you the most trouble. Then try to address those combinations as much as possible.

Building a TAC list is more about knowing every other army and mission, than it is about knowing your own list.

I disagree. Building a TAC list is about including a mix of capabilities so that at the army level you have a good balance of mobility, survivability, and firepower. This lets you adapt to any situation you face (i.e. the essence of tactics).

My current TAC list achieves mobility through tanks (I have 12 total, 6 of which are transports of some kind) and survivability through MSU. Every unit dies relatively easily, but I have a ton of units. Firepower is achieved through a mix of high strength, high AP 48"+ range weapons for anti-tank/anti-MC along with a heavy dose of meltas (with some plasma and flamer support) for close range anti-tank/MC/MEQ/TEQ. Its supplemented with some S10 blast with access to ignore cover and some wyverns for their high ROF blasts. I have one small assault unit capable of dealing with small MEQ remnants or shooting units that are weak in assault.

I bring my TAC list (or a slight variant of it) to every tournament, regardless of mission format. I have tons of scoring units so I can compete in Eternal War or Maelstorm. Kill points can be rough depending on match up but that is always true when you have an MSU build. Utilizing a TAC list is about understanding your units, what they can do and then adapting how you use them to the enemy army, terrain and mission presented. Its not about trying to guess what others will bring and throwing in specific counters.

PanzerLeader wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
Just look at the possible missions in the tournament, and what armies are popular within that tournament structure, and try to think of combinations that will give you the most trouble. Then try to address those combinations as much as possible.

Building a TAC list is more about knowing every other army and mission, than it is about knowing your own list.

I disagree. Building a TAC list is about including a mix of capabilities so that at the army level you have a good balance of mobility, survivability, and firepower. This lets you adapt to any situation you face (i.e. the essence of tactics).

My current TAC list achieves mobility through tanks (I have 12 total, 6 of which are transports of some kind) and survivability through MSU. Every unit dies relatively easily, but I have a ton of units. Firepower is achieved through a mix of high strength, high AP 48"+ range weapons for anti-tank/anti-MC along with a heavy dose of meltas (with some plasma and flamer support) for close range anti-tank/MC/MEQ/TEQ. Its supplemented with some S10 blast with access to ignore cover and some wyverns for their high ROF blasts. I have one small assault unit capable of dealing with small MEQ remnants or shooting units that are weak in assault.

I bring my TAC list (or a slight variant of it) to every tournament, regardless of mission format. I have tons of scoring units so I can compete in Eternal War or Maelstorm. Kill points can be rough depending on match up but that is always true when you have an MSU build. Utilizing a TAC list is about understanding your units, what they can do and then adapting how you use them to the enemy army, terrain and mission presented. Its not about trying to guess what others will bring and throwing in specific counters.

It's a little bit of both. You probably have a lot of experience and knowledge of different armies and don't realize how much of that knowledge goes into making your TAC list. Someone who just came back into the game from 3rd edition (the OP) won't have that experience to tell them what kinds of units to bring. So knowing what armies are out there in a tournament is just as important as knowing your own army.

The key phrase there is "to adapt to any situation" because how can you adapt when you don't know what the situation is? It's easier to play against an opponent knowing how to counter them with a generic list, then it is to play a list that counters them but being on aware of how to counter them.

That's true for any game with complex design, since there's rarely such a hard counter that it can't be at list tied in a game if one player has more skill than the other.

Zimko wrote:

PanzerLeader wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
Just look at the possible missions in the tournament, and what armies are popular within that tournament structure, and try to think of combinations that will give you the most trouble. Then try to address those combinations as much as possible.

Building a TAC list is more about knowing every other army and mission, than it is about knowing your own list.

I disagree. Building a TAC list is about including a mix of capabilities so that at the army level you have a good balance of mobility, survivability, and firepower. This lets you adapt to any situation you face (i.e. the essence of tactics).

My current TAC list achieves mobility through tanks (I have 12 total, 6 of which are transports of some kind) and survivability through MSU. Every unit dies relatively easily, but I have a ton of units. Firepower is achieved through a mix of high strength, high AP 48"+ range weapons for anti-tank/anti-MC along with a heavy dose of meltas (with some plasma and flamer support) for close range anti-tank/MC/MEQ/TEQ. Its supplemented with some S10 blast with access to ignore cover and some wyverns for their high ROF blasts. I have one small assault unit capable of dealing with small MEQ remnants or shooting units that are weak in assault.

I bring my TAC list (or a slight variant of it) to every tournament, regardless of mission format. I have tons of scoring units so I can compete in Eternal War or Maelstorm. Kill points can be rough depending on match up but that is always true when you have an MSU build. Utilizing a TAC list is about understanding your units, what they can do and then adapting how you use them to the enemy army, terrain and mission presented. Its not about trying to guess what others will bring and throwing in specific counters.

It's a little bit of both. You probably have a lot of experience and knowledge of different armies and don't realize how much of that knowledge goes into making your TAC list. Someone who just came back into the game from 3rd edition (the OP) won't have that experience to tell them what kinds of units to bring. So knowing what armies are out there in a tournament is just as important as knowing your own army.

So I might be the odd duck then, but I consciously try to avoid building against the meta. I certainly have experience (I've been playing TAC lists since 3rd edition came out), but I generally focus on getting as many capabilities into my own army as possible so that I have the tools to handle anything I get paired up with. I have no control over what my opponent's field and with the innumerable combinations possible under 7th, its an exercise in frustration trying to wargame against popular builds. When I do plan against an opponents army, its in broad, Codex level turns. For example, I want 48"+ range shooting to let me take advantage of the generally shorter range Tau and Eldar models. If you really want a good TAC list, you need to focus on building the best Swiss army knife you can.

Basically having an answer to a question isn't useful without the question itself, just think of the number 42. You can have a unit or more that you know is there to answer MCs but each MC functions differently, and each player can use their MCs differently. More so, just because you intended it to be your answer to MCs doesn't mean it can't have a better use elsewhere given the right game situation.

 Tinkrr wrote:
Basically having an answer to a question isn't useful without the question itself, just think of the number 42. You can have a unit or more that you know is there to answer MCs but each MC functions differently, and each player can use their MCs differently. More so, just because you intended it to be your answer to MCs doesn't mean it can't have a better use elsewhere given the right game situation.

Which is exactly my point. I build in capabilities, preferably with redundancy. That is all you can do. TAC lists very rarely have the perfect answer for a given situation, but they generally have an answer when built well. As long as you have a starting point, you can adapt to a situation.

It might also be an IG (AM?) thing. In my experience, IG armies focus more on their own internal synergy rather than what the opponent is fielding.

Zimko wrote:
It might also be an IG (AM?) thing. In my experience, IG armies focus more on their own internal synergy rather than what the opponent is fielding.

Almost exclusively marines until about a year ago when I switched to Sisters of Battle full time. Its not so much internal synergy (i.e. how units boost one another via orders/powers/etc.). Its more about internal balance (i.e. do I have enough ranged weapons/anti-tank shots/blast weapons/etc?).

PanzerLeader wrote:

Zimko wrote:
It might also be an IG (AM?) thing. In my experience, IG armies focus more on their own internal synergy rather than what the opponent is fielding.

Almost exclusively marines until about a year ago when I switched to Sisters of Battle full time. Its not so much internal synergy (i.e. how units boost one another via orders/powers/etc.). Its more about internal balance (i.e. do I have enough ranged weapons/anti-tank shots/blast weapons/etc?).

How do you know what is enough?

Zimko wrote:

PanzerLeader wrote:

Zimko wrote:
It might also be an IG (AM?) thing. In my experience, IG armies focus more on their own internal synergy rather than what the opponent is fielding.

Almost exclusively marines until about a year ago when I switched to Sisters of Battle full time. Its not so much internal synergy (i.e. how units boost one another via orders/powers/etc.). Its more about internal balance (i.e. do I have enough ranged weapons/anti-tank shots/blast weapons/etc?).

How do you know what is enough?

Eventually it has to be a judgement call based on the points limit and what you see as the trade offs. For example, I tried running variants with 3 exorcists and variants with 2 exorcists and a Culexus assassin. I generally found that given the randomness of the exorcist launcher (heavy d6) and just how ineffective the culexus is against no psyker armies, I value the reliability of the third exorcist more. It gives me additional S8, AP1, 48" range firepower every game and that it more important to me in a TAC list than the situational nature of the Culexus (i.e. stud or dud).

My general rule is "when in doubt, choose more firepower." It sounds cliché, but what I mean is that I'll add an extra special weapon over another upgrade like a veteran upgrade or vehicle add-on. I also would generally take 3 units over 2 marginally better ones.

So you're saying you used experience, after playing some games, to determine how much of something you needed. You realized that you didn't fight enough psyker armies to warrant using a Culexus assassin.

I mean, you're absolutely correct for making the choices you did. I'm just saying that whether you realize it or not, you're at least partially basing those choices on your local meta.

https://www.frontlinegaming.org/2011/10/27/list-building-101-by-reece-robbins/

http://www.frontlinegaming.org/2013/02/28/an-introduction-and-words-on-winning-with-tyranids-part-1/

^^ my personal favorite

Zimko wrote:
So you're saying you used experience, after playing some games, to determine how much of something you needed. You realized that you didn't fight enough psyker armies to warrant using a Culexus assassin.

I mean, you're absolutely correct for making the choices you did. I'm just saying that whether you realize it or not, you're at least partially basing those choices on your local meta.

I understand your point. There's some validity to it. I just don't have much of a local meta as I see it. Between work and family, I mostly only play GTs these days with the occasional RTT. Easier to get one weekend every 2-3 months than a consistent day off.

On the broader note of the Culexus, I'm not sold he belongs in a TAC list anyway. He's very situational and needs a method of deployment on top of his point cost. He also only really adds a lot of value against certain, psyker reliant builds that can't subsequently escape him.

PanzerLeader wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
Basically having an answer to a question isn't useful without the question itself, just think of the number 42. You can have a unit or more that you know is there to answer MCs but each MC functions differently, and each player can use their MCs differently. More so, just because you intended it to be your answer to MCs doesn't mean it can't have a better use elsewhere given the right game situation.

Which is exactly my point. I build in capabilities, preferably with redundancy. That is all you can do. TAC lists very rarely have the perfect answer for a given situation, but they generally have an answer when built well. As long as you have a starting point, you can adapt to a situation.

Except look at what you did to make that decision... The first thing was you identified the two most popular armies currently being Eldar and Tau, then you analysed both and realised they didn't have that much that reached to that 48" range, and only then you came to that basic assumption.

In other words, you used two data points from two different armies and one data point from the meta, to make the most basic of decisions. Now apply that to the countless decisions you make while building a list and you understand how much knowing the meta and other armies is more important than knowing your own codex. Basically if you're asking yourself how you're beating one unit, such a Wraith Knight, you're asking the wrong question, while still getting an answer, since you shouldn't be asking that question but rather the intersection of what you can do against a Wraith Knight, Riptide, and many more, and finding the best answer to all of the above, since once you know the intersection of all of those, you know the best answer, not just an answer.

Then there's an even more advanced question, of what are people doing to counter the meta, and what can you do to exploit the holes left by the answers they didn't consider, which requires even more consideration of those who aren't you to get that next level edge.

Edit: It's the old quote by John Stewart Mill: "He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, if he does not so much as know what they are, he has no ground for preferring either opinion..."

If all you ask is how can you beat ____ in an army, you're not considering that army as a whole, and even when you consider that army as a whole, if you don't ask how you beat other armies, you aren't considering much. To make the best TAC list you must know every army, every strategy, and every mission, but lacking that the more you know of your opponents as a whole, the better of a TAC list you can build.

 Tinkrr wrote:

PanzerLeader wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
Basically having an answer to a question isn't useful without the question itself, just think of the number 42. You can have a unit or more that you know is there to answer MCs but each MC functions differently, and each player can use their MCs differently. More so, just because you intended it to be your answer to MCs doesn't mean it can't have a better use elsewhere given the right game situation.

Which is exactly my point. I build in capabilities, preferably with redundancy. That is all you can do. TAC lists very rarely have the perfect answer for a given situation, but they generally have an answer when built well. As long as you have a starting point, you can adapt to a situation.

Except look at what you did to make that decision... The first thing was you identified the two most popular armies currently being Eldar and Tau, then you analysed both and realised they didn't have that much that reached to that 48" range, and only then you came to that basic assumption.

In other words, you used two data points from two different armies and one data point from the meta, to make the most basic of decisions. Now apply that to the countless decisions you make while building a list and you understand how much knowing the meta and other armies is more important than knowing your own codex. Basically if you're asking yourself how you're beating one unit, such a Wraith Knight, you're asking the wrong question, while still getting an answer, since you shouldn't be asking that question but rather the intersection of what you can do against a Wraith Knight, Riptide, and many more, and finding the best answer to all of the above, since once you know the intersection of all of those, you know the best answer, not just an answer.

Then there's an even more advanced question, of what are people doing to counter the meta, and what can you do to exploit the holes left by the answers they didn't consider, which requires even more consideration of those who aren't you to get that next level edge.

Edit: It's the old quote by John Stewart Mill: "He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, if he does not so much as know what they are, he has no ground for preferring either opinion..."

If all you ask is how can you beat ____ in an army, you're not considering that army as a whole, and even when you consider that army as a whole, if you don't ask how you beat other armies, you aren't considering much. To make the best TAC list you must know every army, every strategy, and every mission, but lacking that the more you know of your opponents as a whole, the better of a TAC list you can build.

We'll have to agree to disagree. My philosophy for building TAC lists is to build for the unknown. I want a good balance on the army level of firepower, mobility, and resiliency so that I can adapt and compete with any list, on any table, in any mission. This requires a strong internal focus and I take units because they add a capability I want within the army. Your philosophy seems more externally oriented. No issues with that approach, but we are looking at the problem from fundamentally different perspectives.