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How do!

Looking to pick brains here, as it’s not something I’ll get a proper handle on until I’ve finally got some games under my belt. And it’s a question of army selection.

In short, LI has two limiting factors on army design. First of course are your points. The second is your Formation, and inherently limited slots to field.

But influencing that is that as you increase the size of a given detachment in your formation, you get a points discount. So there, it seems sensible to do just that.

Except it occurs to me that starts limiting our orders, because to the best of my knowledge, a single detachment can only be given a single order.

Let’s use Predators as an example of what I mean. There, minimum squadron is 3, and I can increase it to a maximum of 9. And there’s a not insignificant points saving in taking the 9. But when I do that? All 9 will be subject to the same order. But if I split it to say, 5 and 4? I get much less of a saving, but gain two units which can still act in concert, and potentially more efficiently. For instance, one could go on Advance, the other First Fire. Or if I put both on Advance, they can go different sides of an enemy unit.

Oh and of course, a single unit is but a single target.

What are your thoughts and experience on this area of army design?

Alternate activation mechanics usually have that dilemma.

If there is no discount in points, you get into the activation war and try to squeeze as many units as possible in order to out activate the opponent.

Where do you find the balance though, specifically in Legions Imperialis?

I find that I aim for 18-25 acts in a 2k list. I think my current one is 22.

Often I have found that bigger units are a waste, take your pred example, its a big target and it all has to shoot at the same thing,risking overkill.
That said though Ass marines and Termies I always run at full strength.

My metric is hit minimum acts number then look to add and only add onto what makes sense.

In a true alternating activation game, like the previous Epic30k, activation advantage was huge. Meaning you could do lots of things after your opponent had already done all theirs. Move, shoot etc.

LI has sub-phases with alternating activation within each, but you can't for example move after your opponent has already fired everything. So it's not a very big advantage. It's mostly the movement imo, where an opponent can't move away from chargers (of smaller scale) if you go last for example.

Overwatch and first fire will still get you if you try to move around flanks, buildings etc with the last activations. The advantage is more that you now know where all the enemy detachments are positioned.

I tend to go the middle way in detachment size. Add models but not up to maximum size. E.g 4 Kratos not 6. Gives me some discount but I can bring many different tools (and activations). I rarely waste shots on overkill this way.

From a more competitive gaming perspective so far my take is medium to big detachments are better than more smaller ones in LI.

From my experience, and what I have heard from others, big formations are the way to go - much harder to break which means they are an effective force for longer into the game.
The same for detachment sizes, although the application of discount is haphazard (it seems to apply for some and not others) just not having to take breaks tests (it is amazing how often you fail! Although that might just be me playing Night Lords )and be able to still be an effective unit can make up for one less activation and the extra unit to move - on that second point, I have found manoeuvre and flanking matters less in Legions, unless playing a 1.5k or less, simply because you have so many minis on the board (so dont have space) and in all cases everyone is trying to smash together on those objectives.

The other caveat to large formations and uses is that the lack of activations means you can 'lose' the air supremacy game. I think in almost every game I have had, turn 1 turns into a little game of who has to deploy their Thunderhawk first. That thunderhawk is then dead as the unit of Xiphons comes in immediately afterwards and kills it.. so having the more activations does let you make the more meaningful actions at the end of your turn.

I think there are arguments for both..the guys I know who have played dozens of games seem to go for larger formations and units, so on balance that is most likely the more effective option

Yeah, LI's phased alternation and generally less meaningful maneuver makes activation numbers less critical than pumping up the numbers in your important detachments. My money is on at least maximised formations that have clear goals and can be sacrificed efficiently after breaking down, even if each detachment might not be. If you'd want to be serious about it, which I cannot recommend with LI, anything that gives you more dudes to roll more dice is pretty much the way to go, so chasing savings is worth it particularly if you want to gain some value from playing lots of tanks.

Re: room to manouvre vs parking lots - I can't recommend bigger tables enough. We use 6x4 at 1500-2000 and I wouldn't mind bigger for 3000.

Yes I absolutely agree with that.

I would say unless both sides are taking an expensive titan, 2k on a 5x4 feels too crowded so 6x4 is more interesting. I played a 1.5k on a 5x4 and it was great fun, a lot of flank and manoeuvre and we managed to bring the game to a close in an evening's play.