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 JohnnyHell wrote:
And tbh Unit used to post about being annoyed his opponents didn’t wanna face his multiple superheavy list back when that was a little oppressive, so it’s odd to see them hewing a different path!

I have grown since then. Wasn't that like 2017 or 2018?

Plus, if they truly were oppressive, it isn't wrong to tell my opponents to ask GW to fix them so they aren't. those aren't mutually exclusive positions

 Canadian 5th wrote:

ccs wrote:
Ok, let's try this again. This time make the assumption (like the rest of us are doing) that both players want to play 40k in the here & now. How much $ is/is not being spent has nothing to do with it.
They've identified a problem,
They've forwarded it to GW,
GW has yet to answer....

How would you suggest they improve their game while they wait for GW?

They can start by playing by the actual fething rules and not making the games balance worth with harebrained house rules that clearly favor one player over the other.

You can let the OP know they’re misreading the rules without being insulting, you know.

At the OP…
The rules allow it, but if you’re not having fun, definitely talk to your friend and figure out how to both have a good time. Consider changing up missions and whatnot, if your buddy can’t swap something else for Magnus.

Have you tried swapping forces? Can be good fun to try things the other way around.

 JohnnyHell wrote:
What if… players talked before the game about what kind of game they wanted to play?

This concept is anathema around here but kids, I can tell you: it works.

No it doesn't. I remember right when the Tyranids codex dropped a player at my lgs insisting that the codex wasn't good and that Tyranids were a gatekeeper army at best. He had a Leviathan Warriors/double tyrant/harpy setup that was clearly optimized from the leaks on the Tyranid discord. When he absolutely destroyed his opponent, after refusing to alter his list, and then was called out on it, he started ranting about how Tyranids have been bad for so long that he deserved to get wins now.

The community is too toxic for this to work, and it's so toxic because gw has encouraged imbalance for so long.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

ccs wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

Dai wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:
Your friend is 100% in the right to bring Magnus. Magnus isn't even that GOOD. Anyone saying "TaLk BeFoRe GaMe" shouldn't be listened to. If there's actual balance issues, take it to GW.

Yep op thats what to do, dont talk with your mate, email gw theyll sort it for you any day now.

Bad balance is for GW to fix, not the player. Telling the players to fix the game is a copout.

Please, share your expert opinion on what players should do once they've sent their issue to GW & are waiting for GW to fix it. Bear in mind that the GW fix is at best months off & possibly never....
What should the players do?

Play Infinity ;-)

Love that you try one skewed anecdote about an unreasonable human like that somehow negates my point. Did you know; the world is about more than your experience, and an unreasonable douchebag will always be an unreasonable douchebag?

Now imagine people who want the same type of game talking.

And if they don’t want the same type of game they can save 2-5 hrs of their life.

Being reasonable and not a douche is the key. But sure, go off about That One Tyranid Guy.

 JNAProductions wrote:
You can let the OP know they’re misreading the rules without being insulting, you know.

I didn't force the OP to make up terrible house rules. If they can't figure out that they're playing incorrectly, that's not on me.

 JohnnyHell wrote:
Love that you try one skewed anecdote about an unreasonable human like that somehow negates my point. Did you know; the world is about more than your experience, and an unreasonable douchebag will always be an unreasonable douchebag?

My point is that a lot of the people who aren't unreasonable douchebags leave for other games.

 JohnnyHell wrote:
Now imagine people who want the same type of game talking.

They probably don't need to do much talking. But let's say they do want the same kind of game, but aren't professional game designers and thus don't know how to re-balance 40k every week for their pickup games? What then?

 JohnnyHell wrote:
And if they don’t want the same type of game they can save 2-5 hrs of their life.

Or they could play a different game that doesn't require players to do hours of legwork rebalancing it before they start playing.

Agree with a lot of what's already been said, it sounds like putting Magnus on the table in this case is a 'can do rather than should do' situation. A conversation between friends like Gert put so well is your easiest fix.

Steiner wrote:
Agree with a lot of what's already been said, it sounds like putting Magnus on the table in this case is a 'can do rather than should do' situation. A conversation between friends like Gert put so well is your easiest fix.

Why should the friend need to compromise on what models to bring? Why shouldn't OP?

EviscerationPlague wrote:

Steiner wrote:
Agree with a lot of what's already been said, it sounds like putting Magnus on the table in this case is a 'can do rather than should do' situation. A conversation between friends like Gert put so well is your easiest fix.

Why should the friend need to compromise on what models to bring? Why shouldn't OP?

Watch them avoid answering this question lol.

 Canadian 5th wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
You can let the OP know they’re misreading the rules without being insulting, you know.

I didn't force the OP to make up terrible house rules. If they can't figure out that they're playing incorrectly, that's not on me.

No-but your rude attitude is.

I, for one, like to help new players. Not crap on them for making mistakes.

Hecaton wrote:
No it doesn't. I remember right when the Tyranids codex dropped a player at my lgs insisting that the codex wasn't good and that Tyranids were a gatekeeper army at best. He had a Leviathan Warriors/double tyrant/harpy setup that was clearly optimized from the leaks on the Tyranid discord. When he absolutely destroyed his opponent, after refusing to alter his list, and then was called out on it, he started ranting about how Tyranids have been bad for so long that he deserved to get wins now.

The community is too toxic for this to work, and it's so toxic because gw has encouraged imbalance for so long.

Sounds a bit like that guy got shafted in the past by the other players with their lists. If your mindset is a typical example of your local community, you might be part of the problem that fosters such behaviour.
Maybe the water in my local town is different, but people are usually open for a short talk about army composition / houserules / special missions or whatever when arranging a game.

If you treat the other player like a human being to actual play and have fun with and not just some faceless entity to play against for 2-3h, people tend to be reasonable.

Hecaton wrote:
Or they could play a different game that doesn't require players to do hours of legwork rebalancing it before they start playing.

"Do you mind not bringing Magnus for the next game? I don't feel I have the tools to take him on just yet and didn't really enjoy the last 5 games getting creamed."
"Sure"
...literal hours of legwork.

There are several approaches how to tackle the Magnus situation:
- Switch armies. Controlling the problematic unit yourself gives you a great experience what to look out for and how to counter it.
- Switch the mission around. Without going straight to a tournament mission pack, introducing secondaries and multiple objective markers will help to reduce the impact of a single, large and expensive unit.
- Talk with your buddy and tell him about that you're not having fun getting pounded by Magnus game after game. Maybe they can bring some other units until you both are ready to play bigger games where units like Magnus have less of an impact.
- Switch up your tactics. For this to work you have to play a different kind of mission that is not just "go in the middle and stab each other".
- Get some more units that are good for dealing with Magnus. Good advice what units those are can probably be found in the tactica thread of your respective faction in this forum.

a_typical_hero wrote:

Sounds a bit like that guy got shafted in the past by the other players with their lists. If your mindset is a typical example of your local community, you might be part of the problem that fosters such behaviour.
Maybe the water in my local town is different, but people are usually open for a short talk about army composition / houserules / special missions or whatever when arranging a game.

Considering I just moved here in the last year, no, it's not me, but nice try flinging insults like that. Moreover, the communities for other games (Infinity and ASOIAF) that I play don't have this problem. It's not the town, it's Warhammer/GW.

a_typical_hero wrote:
If you treat the other player like a human being to actual play and have fun with and not just some faceless entity to play against for 2-3h, people tend to be reasonable.

Nah. There's a lot of people who have drank GW's kool-aid about not being able to make a balanced game, so the only good meta environment they can imagine is one where *their* faction is overpowered.

a_typical_hero wrote:

"Do you mind not bringing Magnus for the next game? I don't feel I have the tools to take him on just yet and didn't really enjoy the last 5 games getting creamed."
"Sure"
...literal hours of legwork.

"I'm playing Guard. How can I have a good game against your Tyranids?"

That's something that basically requires a re-balancing of the game. Or the player says "I bought 1k sons because I think magnus is cool, why don't *you* run something that counters him if you have a hard time with it?" or "I don't have things besides this Magnus list."

 JNAProductions wrote:
No-but your rude attitude is.

I, for one, like to help new players. Not crap on them for making mistakes.

I expect new players to make rules mistakes and build really bad lists. I don't expect them to start adding on random houserules and then come here because it broke their game.

 Canadian 5th wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
No-but your rude attitude is.

I, for one, like to help new players. Not crap on them for making mistakes.

I expect new players to make rules mistakes and build really bad lists. I don't expect them to start adding on random houserules and then come here because it broke their game.

you are a genuinely unpleasant person, welcome to my small ignore list.

 Canadian 5th wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
No-but your rude attitude is.

I, for one, like to help new players. Not crap on them for making mistakes.

I expect new players to make rules mistakes and build really bad lists. I don't expect them to start adding on random houserules and then come here because it broke their game.

Yes, how dare they...be wrong? What nerve they have asking for help!

I'm not even convinced playing objectives and standard rules would help all that much with the core problem anyway. In small points games models like Magnus are easily capable of deleting multiple units a turn and fast enough to influence huge swathes of the board. Playing objectives doesn't help when Magnus is capable of clearing units from two a turn through psychic and close combat superiority. Equally, playing objectives isn't that relevant if Magnus gets deleted in one turn.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

ccs wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

Dai wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:
Your friend is 100% in the right to bring Magnus. Magnus isn't even that GOOD. Anyone saying "TaLk BeFoRe GaMe" shouldn't be listened to. If there's actual balance issues, take it to GW.

Yep op thats what to do, dont talk with your mate, email gw theyll sort it for you any day now.

Bad balance is for GW to fix, not the player. Telling the players to fix the game is a copout.

Please, share your expert opinion on what players should do once they've sent their issue to GW & are waiting for GW to fix it. Bear in mind that the GW fix is at best months off & possibly never....
What should the players do?

They should do nothing. Don't give GW money for the garbage they spew, and be patient.

Bull****. They should definitely give GW money if they like the models or if they have a way to increase balance to their games by adding new stuff, and/or the other hand they should absolutely leave immediately if they are not satisified with the game's direction but still want to play miniature wargames, or if they refuse to play under pre-game talks since they just play to prove the point of how good they are in that game and anything unofficial doesn't validate their records.

That's not a healthy way to experience the hobby. If you're satisfied with that way of thinking good for you, but I wouldn't recommend your suggestions to other people.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

Steiner wrote:
Agree with a lot of what's already been said, it sounds like putting Magnus on the table in this case is a 'can do rather than should do' situation. A conversation between friends like Gert put so well is your easiest fix.

Why should the friend need to compromise on what models to bring? Why shouldn't OP?

They're both on the same level, one or both have to compromise. In general playing 40k with limited collections and no alternatives is a terrible experience in my opinion, unless it's early stages into the hobby and such players will expand their collections at some point, not to far from now. But if it's early stages they should also be extremely open to house rules or proxies.

a_typical_hero 805744 11390612 wrote:
Sounds a bit like that guy got shafted in the past by the other players with their lists. If your mindset is a typical example of your local community, you might be part of the problem that fosters such behaviour.
Maybe the water in my local town is different, but people are usually open for a short talk about army composition / houserules / special missions or whatever when arranging a game.

I have seen the reverse happen in 8th. One of the guys from my school started IH, because he liked robots and found IH easy to paint. His 2000 army was 2 No know Fear, 1 Dark Imperium and two of the , at that time, horrible primaris dreads. Painted his dude, played every week with them and got destroyed. Then 2.0 came out, and suddenly his army of intercessors, dreads and foot HQs was a clear sign of him being an evil WAAC player. And this was coming from people who were beating his list up week prior.

As the special missions goes and house rules go. How is a new player suppose to do that? If GW seems to not be able to do it with 40+ years of expiriance in design a bunch of noobs designers are suppose to sit down and start changing points costs , unit rules etc. Plus from what I have seen on forums, the special rules seem to be often writen to nerf everyone elses army, while leaving the writers army more or less intact.

Karol wrote:


As the special missions goes and house rules go. How is a new player suppose to do that?

Trial and error. Like anything. Or else reach out to others for advice.

Imo its eapecially important for vets* to support, guide and suggest the new players in the community. This, imo is part of that. Otherwise communities ultimately wither and die.

*and yes, in real life I do this. Happily too.

Karol wrote:


If GW seems to not be able to do it with 40+ years of expiriance in design a bunch of noobs designers are suppose to sit down and start changing points costs , unit rules etc.

Gw might have been around for 40 year but a lot of the designers individually have about 35 years less than that, if not more. Remember the game shifts with every release. Gw are not interested in balancing it, only 'changing' it.

Ans besides, most gamers probably have a better grasp on the game than the designers. Or at least they claim to. Considering the specific circumstances imo players are better placed to be aware of the issues and imo, are in a place to fix and adapt as well.

Karol wrote:

Plus from what I have seen on forums, the special rules seem to be often writen to nerf everyone elses army, while leaving the writers army more or less intact.

Meh, forums aren't everything. in our games I don't think I've ever seen anything that skewed the game, or one player over the other to the point that the game was unplayable.

Trial and error. Like anything. Or else reach out to others for advice.

Why should a player , to use the example from the thread, the magnus using one, want to change anything if he is having fun? He is not doing anything illegal. w40k is not optimised to be played at 1000pts. What advice can be given in a situation like that anyway, stop using the model you like, buy models you don't like or like less, in order for others to have fun? You would be paying your own money for others to have fun. Instead of them paying for their own fun stuff, the way you just did it. Lets say the situation was reveresed for what ever reason the 1ksons player loved the bird beastman, and his army was full of them, almost non 1ksons in them. the army would also be crap, would he be in the right to tell other people to rebuy their armies to fit his bad build one?

Gw might have been around for 40 year but a lot of the designers individually have about 35 years less than that, if not more. Remember the game shifts with every release. Gw are not interested in balancing it, only 'changing' it.

From what I read people like Crudance or Phill Kelly have been in the company for decades. I also was talking about the company. After four decades there should be a culture designed on how rules are produced for GW games. And yes GW is not interested in balance, the odium of that falls on the players. Ergo the two guys who build the armies the wrong way, or picked bad armies , should either tough it out or buy stuff to properly play the game. It is sounds like people who don't do sports complain that someone who does do it, is better then them and wins every or close to every time. Very much want to fun and the wins, but don't want to invest and learn the game to me.

Meh, forums aren't everything. in our games I don't think I've ever seen anything that skewed the game, or one player over the other to the point that the game was unplayable.

That is true. But I think that if you get to read what people are saying in 4 different countries and a multi national forum, then you get a view of the game to a large degree. Specialy if the people are all saying the same things. My dudes were unplayable for almost the entire 8th ed, and when they got better corona started, and then they got bad again in 9th. I know that if I would want to win more game with my army, I would have to buy 4 NDKS and 6 boxs of power armoured troops. But I dislike both of those models, so I don't get the wins. Now I do want GW to fix the units I like, specialy when for other factions they can make termintors good, but it would be insane from me if I started going around the shop and asking for people to play only armies that are on the power level of my army. Double so, considering it would involve people to have to buy models to do so and play their armies they way they do not want to.

Karol wrote:

Trial and error. Like anything. Or else reach out to others for advice.

Why should a player , to use the example from the thread, the magnus using one, want to change anything if he is having fun? He is not doing anything illegal.

True, but you are not the only player in a game and you are not the only person in a community. Sometimes other people need to be considered as well, especially if you want to consider the long-term health of a community- for example, I'm married. I can't just consider myself, and neither can mrs.deadnight, it's 'us'. If I'm having all of my fun, and it's all at her expense, how long before our partnership falls apart?

Karol wrote:
w40k is not optimised to be played at 1000pts. What advice can be given in a situation like that anyway, stop using the model you like, buy models you don't like or like less, in order for others to have fun? You would be paying your own money for others to have fun. Instead of them paying for their own fun stuff, the way you just did it. Lets say the situation was reveresed for what ever reason the 1ksons player loved the bird beastman, and his army was full of them, almost non 1ksons in them. the army would also be crap, would he be in the right to tell other people to rebuy their armies to fit his bad build one?

40k is not optimised to be played at any level. Its a crude game.

What makes you think that I'm buying models for other people's enjoyment? I'm buying them for mine, too. Otherwise I wouldn't buy them.

To your example, would he be right? Possibly. Should other people consider accomodating him? Sure, in my case if he's a decent chap, I would. I have done. Just like id consider accomodating your awful grey knights. Bigger table, not higher walls.

Karol wrote:

From what I read people like Crudance or Phill Kelly have been in the company for decades. I also was talking about the company. After four decades there should be a culture designed on how rules are produced for GW games. And yes GW is not interested in balance, the odium of that falls on the players.

Most players aren't interested in balance either. 'The rules' isn't what sells 40k. Gw focus on awesome models. As do most of the fans.

Karol wrote:
It is sounds like people who don't do sports complain that someone who does do it, is better then them and wins every or close to every time. Very much want to fun and the wins, but don't want to invest and learn the game to me.

You'd be wrong. A sports analogy isn't really appropriate.We can all appreciate the olympian boxer doing his thing -its just context that's important. Them against their peers? Fine. Them taking that to a bunch of half-fit guys doing a bit of light sparring and fitness after work and refusing to pull their punches and just goung in for the kill evey time? I'm sorry but it just leaves a sour taste in everyone's mouth.

It's not about not wanting to learn the game - with your gk's you probably know the game as well as any player with an s-tier army.

Taking a more powerful army isn't 'playing the game better' or 'learning more of the game'. You're not a better player because your list is more powerful. Its thr same game, just bigger numbers.

It's about playing the game at the same level and with the wildly varying power levels, doing that, like being in a relationship, requires a bit of accommodation.

Karol wrote:

That is true. But I think that if you get to read what people are saying in 4 different countries and a multi national forum, then you get a view of the game to a large degree. Specialy if the people are all saying the same things.

Youre looking at it the wrong way. The internet generally self-selects for the most hardcore players, typically competitives. Casual players and less-serious players don't really trawl through forums.

What you're seeing isn't 'a view of the game to a large degree'. You're seeing 'a view of the game from a particular perspective to a large degree' and one that isn't bound to a particular geographical area - not a representative view of all the different perspectives.

Karol wrote:

My dudes were unplayable for almost the entire 8th ed, and when they got better corona started, and then they got bad again in 9th. I know that if I would want to win more game with my army, I would have to buy 4 NDKS and 6 boxs of power armoured troops. But I dislike both of those models, so I don't get the wins.

I played tau back in fourth. An extremely underpowered codex, especially by mid to late edition. And folks around me relentlessly took cookie cutter power builds of the day like iron warriors. Ruined my hobby to the point that I walked away from the whole hobby for about 5 years. &shrug& it's not nice being that miserable guy in that position and I resolved never to be the other guy in the other position because to me, unless everyone is having a good time, its a pointless exercise.

Karol wrote:

Now I do want GW to fix the units I like, specialy when for other factions they can make termintors good, but it would be insane from me if I started going around the shop and asking for people to play only armies that are on the power level of my army. Double so, considering it would involve people to have to buy models to do so and play their armies they way they do not want to.

I'd like gw to fix things too. Until they do though I can shamelessly wield all of the broken things and hypocritically feed the very same monster I claim to despise, or I can try to do something about it at my end, take a step back, consider the bigger picture and put the value on the person across from me. Or i can complain bitterly into the internet, and while it self-vindicates and reinforces my resentments, it doeant really solve or resolve anything. It just leaves me stewing. Or I can walk away from an ip and models I enjoy immensely. And that last choice does nothing but punish me more than it does them (as gw says, I will not be missed).


And accomodating the other person is not 'insane'. Thats a lazy cop out . Regardless of gws (in)action, you ALSO have a responsibility, both to yourself towards making your hobby work for you and to contributing towards a healthy community. What youve experienced is entirely down to your local group having an utterly selfish and self-centered focus, its not the only way to play and its not the 'right' way to play. If you said that to nou, gert, smudge, mad doc or his group or me and mine, you'd get accomodated. No question. That's Poland, UK, US so don't go thinking our way of playing is rare.

Call me old fashioned but there is a bit of a lack of awareness from the opposing player. If I won 5 on the bounce and the difference each time seemed to be my one big, shiny model then I'd want to mix it up and challenge myself by trying to win without that big, shiny model.

If it's tricky bringing it up politely with the opposing player, just make a joke about how you bet you could win against a list without Magnus.

 ComeFindMe wrote:
Call me old fashioned but there is a bit of a lack of awareness from the opposing player. If I won 5 on the bounce and the difference each time seemed to be my one big, shiny model then I'd want to mix it up and challenge myself by trying to win without that big, shiny model.

If it's tricky bringing it up politely with the opposing player, just make a joke about how you bet you could win against a list without Magnus.

Yeah I came back from a deployment after the change from 8th to 9th. I played my buddies guard army which was extremely tank and vehicle heavy. We played like two turns and realized the CSM list just didn't have the ability to answer that much armor so we re-racked, I pulled out more of my tanks and anti-tank systems, and had a much better game.

In a non-tournament setting you should prioritize both players enjoyment over the most efficient win condition. For OP, I'd either suggest proxying some units that do good damage against large models. Just be careful with the single shot high damage ones because invuls tend to hurt those the most. Also definitely drop the house rules for now. I definitely get trying to improve the game, but you have to rethink a lot to get to that point.

40k is a costly game and its at its most costly when players are just getting started. Without knowing you or your friend it's hard to say about the motives of your opponent. Maybe they bought Magnus bc they love Magnus, or maybe they bought magnus because they wanted a way to increase the points value of their army quickly, or maybe they bought Magnus because they considered what units you had and determined that it would be extremely difficult for you to deal with a Primarch, thus leading to easy wins.

Regardless of the motive, your friend as other people have pointed out is within the rules of the game to bring him. But I would at least say that in the case of #3 it was not socially appropriate.

Pertaining to the situation as it is *now*, your friend can not be blind to the fact that Magnus is really hard for you to deal with at 1k.

Discuss the situation with your friend. While asking your friend just to hold off on Magnus for a bit while your armies gather strength is an option; it isn't the only one.

If your friend really wants to continue using Magnus, I think this would be a good situation to go ahead and admit the use of proxies. Play a larger game, 1500 or 2k points. Your friend can bring Magnus, plus experiment with different directions in their list; and you can add some things to help you counter Magnus, and experiment a bit yourself.


best of luck to you both.