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Before I begin, I greatly apologize if I do not address what is being discussed because really, I have no clue what you are saying.

From my view, it seems ideas of top tier are based more in the exploitation of rules of the game rather than a unit's mathematical breakdown. Nidzilla is so powerful because TMC's have a huge advantage of durability and firepower as a lucky railgun shot has no chance of insta killing a gunfex, as opposed to a demolisher. This makes a carnifex, based on the rules, much more powerful. It also helps to note that you can have more carnifex's than leman russ's in a typical army.

Rules are written by normal folk, so it doesn't seem surprising that they can be manipulated, poorly put, or even unfair. I don't believe all codex's are balanced because some lists have special rules that can be manipulated to a greater extent than others. Again, I go with Tyranids in this example as you can field 8 monstrous creatures, which is a great benefit seeing how vehicles, with the exception of certain fast skimmers, are still quite vulnerable to enemy fire.

The rise of top tier armies seem to be people that play warhammer as a competitive source of entertainment and so search for a way to be the most competitive, which often involves using the nuances of the rules to their advantage.

The game would be boring otherwise as every codex would have the same things, just bugs with guns or nuns with guns. Generalship, the ability to plan ahead, to abuse the variables like terrain and mission, is what makes the game enjoyable, in my eyes. It is not to say that top tier armies are unbeatable, I don't think anybody is making that claim, but rather top tier armies are lists specifically designed to maximize a player's advantage based on the rules of the game, but this certainly does not guarantee a win. If a player knows the rules and knows how to manipulate them, then these lists may be more powerful than others, based on the fact that the player using them knows how to work within the ruleset. I think a complete novice to the game would not get the most out of a perfectly constructed top tier list since, in my opinion, the advantage lies in the rules of the game, not just what units are used.


And on the point of the thread,
I'd say that Footslogging Orks and Stealer/hormie swarm will be very competitive and popular. 5th edition seems to give much more favor to CC based armies with massed troops and so these lists will utilize that to the extreme based on the number of units that can be fielded (180 ork infantry Troops and either 72 stealers or 180 hormies or a mix thereof), all of which count as scoring for objective based missions, and all of which are formidable CC fighters. With the run ability, you have orks that can move up to 12" a turn, with one turn where they can feasibly move up to 18" and assault. Hormies can move up to 12" a turn and feasibly assault up to 24". Stealers are still fast as hell and while rending is no longer as potent, it is still very very effective.

Nurglitch: Cheers for the link. I'll not read it now, as I'm behind on some work (stupid tendancy to procrastinate).
But I think if you examine the forum more carefully, you'll see less groupthink than you have implied exists here. A lot of discussion is more heated and adversarial than you would expect if people were just trying to get along (although socialising is part of the reason people come here, obviously). Some people's opinions are given more weight than others by certain groups, but it's not like we're all a hivemind who unilaterally agree about what's the best.

I think I've made a linguistic mistake that always irritates me when other people do it: I should have said hypothesis instead of theory. Your talking about theory sorta distracted me. I think it is acceptable to formulate a hypothesis, look for evidence for and against your hypothesis, and run with it. In my actual job, I'm very critical of that sort of thing, because I'm a research scientist (I literally just spent nearly a year on my experimental design, nearly driving myself demented trying to get it just right. And I'm still not 100% happy, so every presentation now comes with two pages of warnings and statements of limitations). I do not feel it nessicary to apply the same amount of rigour to my hobby. I'm happy to speculate and enjoy reading anecdotes, and to ramble on about optimum configurations and the like.

I also think your ghost analogy is a bit wierd, and misses the point of my counterargument somewhat. My point was that not everything in life needs to be tied down to empirical truths and a scientific framework. Other ways of thinking about these things are fine and dandy as far as I can see.

I didn't particularly take offense at your monkey comment, but surely if you acknowledge that people might, you should take it into account when posting? You could have easily have made that point and not used a potentially offensive term, and still kept it true.

I think your zeal (hope that's the correct word!) for correct, clear thinking about this stuff is probably a symptom of being so specialised in your knowledge. If the discussion ever rambled near my specialty, I'm sure I'd be just as tenacious.

Da Boss: I pointed out that groupthink isn't a "everyone agrees and gets along" kind of thing. It's about people putting socializing before truth, whether that's trying to win arguments and being adversarial, weighting arguments by the people that put them forth, or getting along.

About hypotheses: it is not reasonable to posit hypotheses in the absence of a justified theoretical framework. That's why I used the example of ghosts, something that scientists are often familiar with, those theoretical entities whose existence is posited to fill up the ontological holes in a theoretical framework. Sometimes it works (see: Neptune) and sometimes it doesn't (see: Vulcan), but the utility of doing so is only ever confirmed after the fact and doing so is never anything more than theoretical jerry-rigging. Ghosts are just those embarrassing entities that, like Vulcan and Phlogiston and so on, turn out to be superfluous and indeed distracting from what is actually going on. Proposing entities to explain phenomena is rightly the last resort beyond even returning to theory selection to determine the most parsimonious theory available (or to design one that is).

The reason I brought up ghosts is to point out that no, other ways of thinking about things like Warhammer and so on are not fine and dandy. If we think about Warhammer in sloppy ways, then we're going to end up with bad conclusions and stupid discussions like how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, or what army is going to be top tier in the 5th edition of Warhammer 40k, and it's the kind of subtle and insidious stupid like that that poisons reasonable discussion in general.

Acknowledging that some terms might offend people, particularly when those terms are particularly apt, is no good reason to avoid using those terms. There is, for example, a particular shade of dark brown whose name goes unspoken because of a particular stupid chip on people's shoulder about it. Part of what makes it so offensive to some people is the fact that a consistent and widespread effort has been made to make it clear that the word is offensive.

My "zeal", if you can call it that, is a response to being bored stiff at the endless cavalcade of incorrect and woolly thinking (and seeing the problems that result from people ignoring the small yet important details) and knowing that change starts somewhere. It's not enough to point out the truth, it must be constantly tested, promulgated, explored.

lemurking23's post demonstrates at least a willingness to give the matter some careful thought, and if that's a result of my effort then it's a start on who's going to be in the top tier because a careful discussion of who's going to be in the top tier will eventually clear the board of candidates.

Okay. I don't want to misrepresent you or anything so please correct me immediately if I'm wrong, but are you dismissing non-scientific thought as lacking in real value? Because I would have to disagree with you there.
I'm going to go off and think about this some more, and read up on what you said. I'm interested in what you have to say, so would you mind if I took this to PM so we're not clogging up this thread, or would you prefer to continue the discussion here.

Nurglitch wrote:Da Boss: I pointed out that groupthink isn't a "everyone agrees and gets along" kind of thing. It's about people putting socializing before truth, whether that's trying to win arguments and being adversarial, weighting arguments by the people that put them forth, or getting along.

Well, I see that you have a point here, and may be right. I'm not sure that there are any absolutes on the topic per se, and that there is a great deal of grey area here.

~snicker~

Seriously, though, this topic is something that keeps me up at night, and it all goes back to the basic "how do we know what we know?" conundrum. How much am I, as an individual, willing to dig into the basic principles that rule my life? Science, politics, math, sociology, psychology, etc, all deep (to a greater or lesser degree) disciplines, most of which I won't do more than dip my toes in. I posit that you could spend your whole life and not feel like you've got a really good grasp on how everything works, and so you base your information off of personal observation and information imparted by sources you trust. Hell, sometimes you have to make a decision based on a source you don't trust as that may be all you have to go on. And this is where groupthink comes in.

What groupthink, in this scenario, allows us to do is make certain assumptions because we don't want to spend the time and energy to solve a very complex problem. We simplify, we rely on anecdotal evidence, we come up with working models that seem to hold up. This isn't the best solution if you really want to find out if there are top-tier codexes or not, but it is the best solution if you have limited resources to spend on the problem. A solution to this would be rather long and involved and I think you'd be hard pressed to get many people to follow your reasoning even if you had solid proof. It's one of those accurate yet not practical sort of things.

I don't dispute that just about any codex can be used to make an effective army, but for most of us, it's just not worth spending the time or effort to do it.

Also, Nurglitch, you really need to write textbooks.

Iorek: The reason that there isn't a best solution out there for finding out whether there are top-tier codicies is there isn't one. The methods for proving this are quite simple, if you have the time (which we have available), the information (which we have available), and the will to put them together (which is the stumbling block).

As for the textbooks I'm working on it. The trick seems to be explaining an economic treatment of ethics to ethicists and non-well-founded logics to economists...

Isn't 'ethinonmics' pretty well established? I remember studying it a few years ago.

You might find this article: http://www.hartjournals.co.uk/le/volumes/8/issues/1/733.html interesting Nurglitch. It's by the Prof who I studied ethics with a few years ago.

No, it's something rather different from ethinomics/ethonomics. That stuff is pretty old hat, and Amartya Sen certainly said it best so far.

Still, that's off-topic, unless we want to do something like apply an economic analysis or "intentional stance analysis" to the problem of which army is going to be the top tier in the 5th edition of Warhammer 40k.

So essentially Nurglitch's point is that theoretically, one can never empirically or definitively prove which army or unit is "top tier".

Mainly because you can't apply a real scientific method to 40k in order to do so.

However, Nurglitch seems to be an academic. Lots of good, solid theory.

I'm an Engineer, we take that theory stuff they teach us and at the end of the day we've got to build something that works.

I'd like to think that with enough practice and experience, limiting our scope to the main missions and rules in the rulebook, and in this case, the new 5th Ed Missions and Rulebooks, we can work out which units and armies are able to utilize the new rules to the most effect in order to win the most games against the widest variety of opponents using the same points value.

While the theory says that you can't ever truly prove which army or type of build is the "best", you sure as hell can get enough experience to find out which lists have more advantages over their competitors.

This is something I think that Nurglitch even halfway admits:

In fact that's the reason my current group plays like it does, because we were all sick of the internet game where people played armies rather than games. Since we all know each other and play at each other's places, and none of us have large collections, we take the time and effort to make the games about more than just the troops.

You essentially had to change the rules of the missions in order for "the internet game" to not play a significant factor in your own games of 40k.

Much like how now, Mech Eldar, traditionally 2 units of 6 Harlies, 6 Fire Dragons, 2 or so units of Jetbikes, and 3 Falcons, is a "top tier army" or something that's considered to be very strong in normal 40k missions and 4th Ed rules is suddenly going to become absolutely terrible under the 5th Edition rules because all of a sudden only troops score (which the list lacks), the fact that absolute last turn grabs are highly improbable to rely on (random game length, every game), the Falcons don't move as fast, aren't as survivable, Victory Points are far less Important, and Rending on Harlequins is not as good as it is now.

By the virtue of this set of observations and reasons, one who has experience playing 40k in 4th edition and sees the coming rules of 5th can say that a Mech Eldar army which would be very effective on the table top using 4th Ed rules is going to be far less effective using the 5th edition rules.

Of course this is relying on my experience as a player to come to this conclusion. Now I can support these statements with pointed facts of the differences in the game, which support my position.

While this isn't the most empirically perfect solution, it sure as hell does give us a statement that I feel is valid in terms of comparing an armies performance in 4th ed to 5th ed.

Um, so, to re-rail to the original topic...

The lists I'm expecting to get big bumps are:

- Jetbike-trooped Eldar. They're already good troops choices, and in 5th I'm not sure any list will have better ability to claim objectives. Same cost as a vanilla SM assault marine, get jetbike movement (especially the assault move) and better shooting in exchange for weaker assault -- they even share the same armor save and toughness. A lot of the rest of the list suffers somewhat in the new edition, although I'm wondering if Blackmoor-pattern Warwalker squads won't be very good. Falcons won't be nearly as dominant -- holo-fields will still be quite good, but they're (relatively) expensive non-scoring units and the Eldar list doesn't have any scoring units that are going to be worth transporting in a Falcon, so they're going to lose their lock on the Eldar HS slots.

- Blood Angels (and/or similar traited marines). It's been said again and again, but assault marines as troops is going to be good.

- Chaos. While Guardian Jetbikes will be better objective grabbers, Plague Marines will be peerless ad objective holders. Of course, they'll also have some competition in that regard from Thousand Sons... If some of the other rumors hold out and Chaos gains access to Drop Pods, the strength of Plague Marines and Thousand Sons with good deployment rules stands to put Chaos as one of the lists to beat. Then you lash the other guy's troops away from the objectives... I sense the potential for Dual-lash Plague Marine-heavy Chaos lists to become one of the most hated lists -- lots of very resilient troops, special abilities that instead of killing, just push other units to where their scoring status doesn't matter.

- Drop Pod marines. Unfortunately for my lovingly-painted Space Wolves, the Power Fist nerf (no extra attack from Power Fist + Bolt Pistol) makes them even more overcosted for what you get. Other Drop Pod lists should work out well -- especially with the guaranteed drop by turn 5, they'll have one of the best troop delivery mechanisms sending down cheap T4 3+ wounds.

- Necrons. I'm hoping the final rulebook has a USR that overrides Living Metal. If not, Necrons stand to be the list to beat.

- Orks. Run. Enough said.

Of course, that's about half the lists as they stand. 'Nids look to suffer without any particularly resiliant troop choices, but still more expensive than Orks to get anywhere close to the same combat effectiveness. Guard gets better, but still has issues -- like, the base guardsman is still overpriced, and while Russes are really good now, they aren't scoring and lose some mobile firepower -- maybe guard that never leave their Chimera could work, though.

So what's the worst 5th ed list? Dark Angels?

Jetbike Eldar actually are going to be not all that I think.

Their best Jetbikes are HQ (Warlocks) or Fast (Spears). The main issue is the random game length. They'll do well because they can zoom in on the objective and score at the end - like most fast objective takers now.

The problem is that all 5th Ed Games use random game length. 1/3 of the time, the game ends on Turn 5. That means 2/3 of the time the game is going to continue and your opponent can remove them from the objective via shooting or assault (likely assault).

This continues since you've now got a 50/50 shot that a Turn 7 will be played and the same situation applies.

The problem with the Jetbikes is that they're inherently small in size and will fold in assault.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:So essentially Nurglitch's point is that theoretically, one can never empirically or definitively prove which army or unit is "top tier".

Incorrect. My point is that there is no 'top tier' army and that it can be proven, though it would have to be mathematically rather than empirically because it is a normative claim rather than an empirical one.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:Mainly because you can't apply a real scientific method to 40k in order to do so.

More exactly you can't apply descriptive methods to normative matters.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:I'm an Engineer, we take that theory stuff they teach us and at the end of the day we've got to build something that works.

Cool. After you're done building a machine that logs which army is 'top tier' maybe you can get on with that cold fusion engine I've been pining for.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:I'd like to think that with enough practice and experience, limiting our scope to the main missions and rules in the rulebook, and in this case, the new 5th Ed Missions and Rulebooks, we can work out which units and armies are able to utilize the new rules to the most effect in order to win the most games against the widest variety of opponents using the same points value.

I suppose everyone needs a rock to roll uphill. Maybe Camus was right.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:While the theory says that you can't ever truly prove which army or type of build is the "best", you sure as hell can get enough experience to find out which lists have more advantages over their competitors.

Which is why it's important to get right which theory and what exactly it says before you start hammering in nails. The "theory" I'm putting forward is simply the point that you cannot even find out which lists have more advantages over their competitors (which seems to be rather synonymous with 'top tier' I would say) because that would again attempt to apply empirical methods to a normative problem.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:This is something I think that Nurglitch even halfway admits:

This is another good reason to admit to some rigor in everyday conversation, so these misunderstandings do not take place.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:You essentially had to change the rules of the missions in order for "the internet game" to not play a significant factor in your own games of 40k.

Nope. We just found that where we chose armies first we ended up with imbalanced missions. The problem was not that armies were tailored to fit each other, they problem was that they rarely fit the mission. The emphasis on armies doesn't strait-jacket the players into standardized armies unless they think it should. The emphasis on armies does, however, mean that armies often do not match the mission and terrain, which means that the distribution of the advantage is not only often unequal, but arbitrarily so as well.

The internet game is where people think they need to take a particular kind of army in order to win under any conditions, is where armies are tailored to fit each other as if material were the beginning and end of the game. Perhaps it's the lack of a board on the internet. The problem, it seems, is that the actual game is about the army in the context of the terrain, mission, and the latter are not completely arbitrary so people gravitate towards armies that perform under certain specific conditions, rather than general armies. There's a reason why it's useful to ask new players about the size of the board and the amount of terrain employed when they complain about army x.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:By the virtue of this set of observations and reasons, one who has experience playing 40k in 4th edition and sees the coming rules of 5th can say that a Mech Eldar army which would be very effective on the table top using 4th Ed rules is going to be far less effective using the 5th edition rules.

Or by appealing to one's prejudices. Experience does not always equal expertise. Indeed it often equates to prejudice when one's experiences were not understood in the proper context. In this case the proper context includes terrain and missions, the experience of which I doubt few players have of the 5th edition of Warhammer 40k.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:Of course this is relying on my experience as a player to come to this conclusion. Now I can support these statements with pointed facts of the differences in the game, which support my position.

So lay them on the table.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:While this isn't the most empirically perfect solution, it sure as hell does give us a statement that I feel is valid in terms of comparing an armies performance in 4th ed to 5th ed.

So why should the rest of us consider your feelings in the matter? What makes them accurate with regard to the facts of the matter?

Voodoo Boyz wrote:I'm an Engineer, we take that theory stuff they teach us and at the end of the day we've got to build something that works.

Cool. After you're done building a machine that logs which army is 'top tier' maybe you can get on with that cold fusion engine I've been pining for.

You can make the smarmy comments you want, but I'm talking about building a list that's "better" than something most other people will field.

Better meaning that it has a higher chance of achieving the victory conditions for the missions outlined in the new rulebook, maximizing their ability to use the rules of the game to my advantage.

For instance in 5th edition, a Tyranid army with two small units of Rippers as Troops, some Ravenors in Fast Attack, 6 shooty Carnifex's and two Hive Tyrants is going to be very poor in terms of actually winning 2/3 of all games played using standard missions.

Conversely, that same army in 4th Edition will stand to do far better than most others in the missions in the current BGB.

My point about you focusing too much on theory and not enough on experience shows when you talk about how an Elite Dakka Fex (2x TL Devourers, +1BS) is a terrible unit choice that is highly ineffective. Going by other posts you've made, you said you didn't start playing 40k again till recently. I'm going to say that your experience, or at the very least, your judgment skills are poor. Because I like other people who have done well playing 40k in a competitive environment (GW run National Tournaments) have noted the extreme effectiveness of a Dakka Fex in playing 40k.

You can call it bias, but much like with the current rules and the choice to equip a sarge with a Power Weapon or a Power Fist, experience playing 40k shows that the Power Fist is the better option to take 99% of the time. This is something you get from experience and examining the rules and units in the game. All the theory you want to go on about isn't going to change that fact in 4th edition.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:I'd like to think that with enough practice and experience, limiting our scope to the main missions and rules in the rulebook, and in this case, the new 5th Ed Missions and Rulebooks, we can work out which units and armies are able to utilize the new rules to the most effect in order to win the most games against the widest variety of opponents using the same points value.

I suppose everyone needs a rock to roll uphill. Maybe Camus was right.

The context of the game that we're discussing is not that complex. Especially in 5th Edition where the victory conditions for the 3 missions we can see are so cut and dry.

You can't state something to be true for all cases, but my god man you can observe general trends.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:While the theory says that you can't ever truly prove which army or type of build is the "best", you sure as hell can get enough experience to find out which lists have more advantages over their competitors.

Which is why it's important to get right which theory and what exactly it says before you start hammering in nails. The "theory" I'm putting forward is simply the point that you cannot even find out which lists have more advantages over their competitors (which seems to be rather synonymous with 'top tier' I would say) because that would again attempt to apply empirical methods to a normative problem.

Top tier implies that one army is better above all competitors. This is becoming less and less the case as new codex's come out, even in 4th Edition.

That doesn't mean I can't say that the new Ork Codex is capable of building a much more powerful army to take on all comers than say, codex Dark Angels.

This extends to units. I can say with some authority based on experience that Storm Guardians are generally a very poor unit for their points, especially compared to say, Ork Boyz.

Once you acknowledge the fact that some units are overall better for their points than other units, even in the same codex, then you infer that some codex's are better than others by the sheer fact that the codex with more "points efficient" units must be better than other codex's without such units.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:You essentially had to change the rules of the missions in order for "the internet game" to not play a significant factor in your own games of 40k.

Nope. We just found that where we chose armies first we ended up with imbalanced missions. The problem was not that armies were tailored to fit each other, they problem was that they rarely fit the mission. The emphasis on armies doesn't strait-jacket the players into standardized armies unless they think it should. The emphasis on armies does, however, mean that armies often do not match the mission and terrain, which means that the distribution of the advantage is not only often unequal, but arbitrarily so as well.

The internet game is where people think they need to take a particular kind of army in order to win under any conditions, is where armies are tailored to fit each other as if material were the beginning and end of the game. Perhaps it's the lack of a board on the internet. The problem, it seems, is that the actual game is about the army in the context of the terrain, mission, and the latter are not completely arbitrary so people gravitate towards armies that perform under certain specific conditions, rather than general armies. There's a reason why it's useful to ask new players about the size of the board and the amount of terrain employed when they complain about army x.

And what about armies that don't really need much terrain to work properly? What if all they need are a few pieces of blocking LOS terrain in their deployment zone, and a few pieces of it scattered about the rest of the board in various places?

In 40k, my experience tells me that at tournaments and in most game stores, you can invariably setup terrain with some kind of cover and/or blocking LOS terrain in your deployment zone. Simply because they either let you have some say in how the terrain is setup, or that is how organizers deem a "fair" terrain setup to be in order for one side to not have a "terrain advantage" over the other.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:Of course this is relying on my experience as a player to come to this conclusion. Now I can support these statements with pointed facts of the differences in the game, which support my position.

So lay them on the table.

I did, see the example of the Mech Eldar army which is a very competitive army under 4th Edition (for the reasons given), and the same army will not be nearly as competitive in 5th edition for the reasons I also stated. It's all right there in my post, you simply didn't even look at it (otherwise you wouldn't be asking me to lay it out for you).

Voodoo Boyz wrote:While this isn't the most empirically perfect solution, it sure as hell does give us a statement that I feel is valid in terms of comparing an armies performance in 4th ed to 5th ed.

So why should the rest of us consider your feelings in the matter? What makes them accurate with regard to the facts of the matter?

Because by it's very nature determining what the "best army" for a given rules set or mission type is something that's more akin to figuring out "who was the best quarterback of all time" rather than trying to scientifically prove a physics equation.

While on one hand the answer is impossible to find out in any definitive sense, you can easily rule out completely stupid answers to the question. For instance if you tried to say that Michael Vick was a better quarterback than Brett Favre, you'd just get laughed at by anyone who followed the sport.

It's the same way with you trying to tell me that a Dakka Fex is a terrible unit choice that is ineffective. It's just something that's ludicrous to someone who's spent a good amount of time playing with and/or against that unit with a variety of different armies and missions.

Everything with hard troops will be the thing to go with the new senario rules.

Chaos demons might even be used to some degree.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:
However, Nurglitch seems to be an academic. Lots of good, solid theory.

I'm an Engineer, we take that theory stuff they teach us and at the end of the day we've got to build something that works.

Now thats something my Dad would say. Engineer powers ACTIVATE!

jfrazell wrote:

Voodoo Boyz wrote:
However, Nurglitch seems to be an academic. Lots of good, solid theory.

I'm an Engineer, we take that theory stuff they teach us and at the end of the day we've got to build something that works.

Now thats something my Dad would say. Engineer powers ACTIVATE!

You see it a lot in the field. Guys with too much book smarts and not enough experience.

Nurglitch has a history on Warseer of being the guy who likes to talk about generally considered effective units and say how bad they are. Conversely he brings up units that are considered terrible (ie. 3rd Ed Shining Spears) and sing their virtues.

And while his accusations of group think do ring true some times, with too many people just accepting something without really seeing how it does work out on the table, the general idea's that he'll sometimes come out with are laughable. Example here being his statement that a Dakka Fex is a terrible unit.

While group think is a problem, so are armchair generals. Guys who've got tons of posts on the subject of playing, but eventually you see them post that they play 1-2 times a month, or 4-6 times a year.

Compared to people who play 3-4 times a week who post tactical advice and unit evaluations, as opposed to talking about high level theories about whether the fact that something "top tier" can even exist.

From what I've seen in my experience as a player and as someone who's observed a fair amount of games, there are times when army list selection has determined the winner of a game. I've seen bad players with great "no-brainer" lists beat good players with a more toned down army. This happens a bit in 40k because of the nature of the game (everything has 360 LOS, most units can project force at a fairly long range, regardless of direction) and because of the limited set of victory conditions we get for the standard set of missions presented in the book.

Being a regular at a GW store, I happen to know a decent variety of people there. Vets who are in their 20's or 30's like me, down to 15 year olds who come in to play or hang out on the weekends. Now these 15 year olds, they're not better players than I am, but they know the game well enough to not make tactical blunders. I'm confident enough that if I had them run a semi-optimized Godzilla Nids list, that it would trounce my favorite fluffy styled Ultramarines army. And that's almost regardless of the mission being played or the terrain setups.

This is because certain unit types and unit combinations are much more powerful than what other armies can do with the same amount of points. Here's a fun example using my favorite fluffy UM list and a Godzilla list I came up with in about 2 minutes:

Ultramarines:

Master Of Sanctity - 122 Points
Jump Pack, Bolt Pistol, Frags

10 Tactical Marines, Plasma Gun, Power Fist Vet Sarge - 190
Rhino, Smoke, Extra Armor - 58 Points

10 Tactical Marines, Melta Gun, Power Fist Vet Sarge - 190
Rhino, Smoke, Extra Armor - 58 Points

10 Assault Marines, 2 Plasma Pistols, Power Fist Vet Sarge - 260

Landspeeder Tornado - 80

Landspeeder Tornado - 80

Predator Annihilator - 150
Extra Armor, Sponson Lascannons

Predator Annihilator - 150
Extra Armor, Sponson Lascannons

Vindicator - 160
Dozer Blade, Power of the Machine Spirit

vs.

Godzilla Nids

Hive Tyrant - 221
+WS, +I, +S, Flesh Hooks, Implant Attack, Bio Plasma, 2x Scything Talons, Wings, Warp Field

Hive Tyrant - 150
+WS, +BS, +S, +Sv, 2x Twin Linked Devourers

Dakka Fex - 113
2x Twin Linked Devourers, +BS

Dakka Fex - 113
2x Twin Linked Devourers, +BS

Dakka Fex - 113
2x Twin Linked Devourers, +BS

6 Genestealers - 126
+Sv, Flesh Hooks

6 Genestealers - 126
+Sv, Flesh Hooks

2 Ravenors - 80
Rending

2 Ravenors - 80
Rending

Gun Fex - 188
+BS, +Sv, +Wound, Barbed Strangler, Venom Cannon

Gun Fex - 188
+BS, +Sv, +Wound, Barbed Strangler, Venom Cannon

Now compare those lists. One is chocked full of "Internet Wisdom" that Nurglitch goes on so much about being terrible or not even applicable to the game, and one is just based on models I like the look of and what I feel represents a mobile strike force according to the fluff for my army.

Both armies come to 1500 Points or less.

One army is markedly better at performing well against most opponents and is oriented to winning the missions presented in the 4th Ed BGB, while the other one isn't.

Now if you can't admit that certain army configurations are better than others, then I'd suggest that you haven't played the game enough. Once you admit that certain army configurations are better than others, especially at say, winning a tournament against 3 or 5 unknown opponents playing standard missions, then you're essentially admitting that some Codex's are capable of putting together stronger army configurations than other ones.

This doesn't mean that some armies automatically win while others automatically lose, or that some codex's are incapable of winning. It just means that there are imbalances in the game and that some armies give a player a better chance at winning in normal missions than others.

Heh heh switch out a gunfex for the 2nd HT, and add lots of genies and you have my 2000 point list, proof that mediocre people can play lists better than they are : )

Ayah. Nurgly has a point in that there are hidden gems. However, mitigation and reduction of risk variables, and extrapolating from that is part of my business. You can only make conclusions form the data that brung ya.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:Once you acknowledge the fact that some units are overall better for their points than other units, even in the same codex, then you infer that some codex's are better than others by the sheer fact that the codex with more "points efficient" units must be better than other codex's without such units.

Hard to acknowledge some fact when it is not actually factual. But I digress. Since you're no longer talking about top tier armies, having abandoned that (and, incidentally the topic) I'll just have to sit by the sidelines and watch you enjoy yourself.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:And while his accusations of group think do ring true some times, with too many people just accepting something without really seeing how it does work out on the table, the general idea's that he'll sometimes come out with are laughable. Example here being his statement that a Dakka Fex is a terrible unit.

What, you mean where I pointed out that in my experience and that of my gaming group that we gave up on the so-called "Dakka Fex" because we didn't feel it was particularly effective, that's armchair generalship? Nice to know. I guess my experiences just aren't as worthy as yours because they disagree with yours. How about that?

Nurglitch wrote:

Voodoo Boyz wrote:Once you acknowledge the fact that some units are overall better for their points than other units, even in the same codex, then you infer that some codex's are better than others by the sheer fact that the codex with more "points efficient" units must be better than other codex's without such units.

Hard to acknowledge some fact when it is not actually factual. But I digress. Since you're no longer talking about top tier armies, having abandoned that (and, incidentally the topic) I'll just have to sit by the sidelines and watch you enjoy yourself.

I'm talking about "top tier armies", or rather at least proving they exist by pointing out that certain units perform better for their points than others.

If that's true, then that means not all units, and thus, codex's are not created equally in terms of power.

And if that's true, then there are "tiers" of armies that can make more powerful lists than others.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:And while his accusations of group think do ring true some times, with too many people just accepting something without really seeing how it does work out on the table, the general idea's that he'll sometimes come out with are laughable. Example here being his statement that a Dakka Fex is a terrible unit.

What, you mean where I pointed out that in my experience and that of my gaming group that we gave up on the so-called "Dakka Fex" because we didn't feel it was particularly effective, that's armchair generalship? Nice to know. I guess my experiences just aren't as worthy as yours because they disagree with yours. How about that?

I'd say ether you were playing some kind of wierd missions that were definitely not the normal stuff you'd find in the BGB (ie. lets say you had missions where only Troops were scoring units), then I can see it not being effective.

But if you played normal missions (which is what are used at tournaments and most pick up games, which is what we're discussing) with it extensively, and found it ineffective, then the experience of most people who play the game would show that you either didn't use the unit properly or that you simply have no idea what you're talking about.

Much like how some people can try and say Mike Vick is a better QB than Brett Farve, they're entitled to their opinion, but it doesn't mean they know a whole lot about football.

The answer is obvious: Spase Mareenze!!!!!!

Mike Vick is a better QB than Brett Farve, they're entitled to their opinion, but it doesn't mean they know a whole lot about football.

Wait a second, those guys aren't football players. They play American football.

Since this thread isn't anything about 5th edition anymore, let's talk about the weather. A snowstorm just swept over Sweden and hit Finland his morning. It's annoying, but much more interesting than your theoretical debate about what constitutes a points effective unit.

Therion wrote:

Mike Vick is a better QB than Brett Farve, they're entitled to their opinion, but it doesn't mean they know a whole lot about football.

Wait a second, those guys aren't football players. They play American football.

Hold on, isnt that a quaint form of rugby where they pay an extra point for a 6+ save.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:I'm talking about "top tier armies", or rather at least proving they exist by pointing out that certain units perform better for their points than others.

Perform where? When? How? In whose company?

Voodoo Boyz wrote:If that's true, then that means not all units, and thus, codex's are not created equally in terms of power.

I love the way you keep switching terms. It means that you move from proving that some units perform better to proving that some units are more powerful to proving that some codicies are more powerful. Your reasoning is invalid, full of undisclosed premises, and exactly three 'leaps of logic' (a bit of logical sleight of hand where one premise is switched for a non-equivalent one).

Voodoo Boyz wrote:And if that's true, then there are "tiers" of armies that can make more powerful lists than others.

So let's review: By proving that some units perform better, that some units are more powerful, that some codicies are more powerful, one can prove that there are "tiers" of armies that can make some lists more powerful than others. To be honest I'd love to see you do this. It'll certainly be entertaining. One question though: When you say "prove" do you mean actually demonstrate the soundness of the logic required, or do you simply mean "waffle on a bit, then declare your original assertion to be true"?

Voodoo Boyz wrote:But if you played normal missions (which is what are used at tournaments and most pick up games, which is what we're discussing) with it extensively, and found it ineffective, then the experience of most people who play the game would show that you either didn't use the unit properly or that you simply have no idea what you're talking about.

I take it you have heard of "argumentum ad populum" right? That's where an idea is valued because of it popularity. That's why I'm glad that I can point to my brother's Canadian Grand Tourament win, back in 3rd edition when nobody wanted to take Fireprisms, Shining Spears, and pretty much everything in the army that he won with, so I can point out that the majority is often dead wrong. The experience of most people is just that, experience. The value of it lies with how it relates to the truth.

Y'know, about a decade ago when I was still swimming competitively I swam for a club whose motto was "Perfect practice makes perfect". The point being something that all good athletes and coaches should recognize: you learn what you practice, and if you practice badly then you will learn bad habits and you will learn bad performance. The same goes for game, since they use the same learning apparatus. There are plenty of people out there whose experience is virtually worthless, whose understanding of that experience is non-existent, and who consider themselves experts because they have never thought rigorously about the game and never had their ideas critically examined.

Voodoo Boyz wrote:Much like how some people can try and say Mike Vick is a better QB than Brett Farve, they're entitled to their opinion, but it doesn't mean they know a whole lot about football.

I love this phrase. It's up there with "If so-and-so says it, it's good enough for me!" or "They can say the world is round, and they're entitled to their opinion, but it doesn't mean they know a whole lot about geology." I mean basically you're saying that they're obviously wrong because they disagree with you, not because the information they use to reach that conclusion is incorrect, or there is an essential flaw in their reasoning. They could, for example, be considering something that you are not, or they could be experts that are simply making an understandable but implicit error in their reasoning. But you won't know because you aren't checking what they actually know about football, you're simply dismissing them out of hand because they don't agree with you and you pride yourself on knowing football.

If I was really stupid I'd say: "Stick to engineering" but I'm not that stupid and instead will say: "Please, show us your reasoning."

Therion wrote:It's annoying, but much more interesting than your theoretical debate about what constitutes a points effective unit.

What, you mean as opposed to a non-theoretical debate?

Therion wrote:

Mike Vick is a better QB than Brett Farve, they're entitled to their opinion, but it doesn't mean they know a whole lot about football.

Wait a second, those guys aren't football players. They play American football.

Since this thread isn't anything about 5th edition anymore, let's talk about the weather. A snowstorm just swept over Sweden and hit Finland his morning. It's annoying, but much more interesting than your theoretical debate about what constitutes a points effective unit.

You deserve it for living in a country with attractive women. I'd be willing to put up with the occasional snowstorm for that.

Therion wrote:

Mike Vick is a better QB than Brett Farve, they're entitled to their opinion, but it doesn't mean they know a whole lot about football.

Wait a second, those guys aren't football players. They play American football.

Since this thread isn't anything about 5th edition anymore, let's talk about the weather. A snowstorm just swept over Sweden and hit Finland his morning. It's annoying, but much more interesting than your theoretical debate about what constitutes a points effective unit.

I'll bite. Whats considered a snowstorm there? If ice falls off the delivery truck its a blizzard here and the city shuts down.

Edit: ditto on the deserve it for having to put up with the blondes thing.

hey! Canada has all kinds of hot chicks.

I'll admit you have to watch out for the ones that are a little on the non-smiley side.

Nurglitch wrote:

Therion wrote:It's annoying, but much more interesting than your theoretical debate about what constitutes a points effective unit.

What, you mean as opposed to a non-theoretical debate?

I described your debate as theoretical and uninteresting. I never said I would like an alternative, or that one exists. Stop spamming the boards.