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People say they want a balanced, competitive book. But the truth is that the little kid inside of us want exactly what my 7 yr old voices out loud. Uber killy and sustaining.

Face it. Watching your opponent remove models from the table is hella fun. Why would you want to play an army that makes doing just that difficult. No, we want to see those guys come off in droves, not a small handfull every two turns.

Yes we can put on the breaks, we can say wait that is just a little too much. We all like to believe that we have some self control. However, when those uber powerful things do make it into a codex, its not like they never see the field of play. its because we loose out to the other side of our brain that says, hey, its available, why not use it. It lets us do exactly what we have fun doing. Removing enemy models from the table.

Now, I know there are some who say... well thats not me. Well, congrats, you are part of the infantesmal percentage of the entirety gaming comunity (which only a fraction show up on boards like dakka) that doesn't secretely want to play the best codex in the game.

 Anfauglir wrote:

Makumba wrote:
but everything which can be legaly taken from a codex or FW book is automaticly fluffy . If it wasnt fluffy then it wouldnt be in those books in the first place.

On an individual level, perhaps. But not in various and certain combinations, including the type that can be spammed into waac lists. Eamples;

- a msu Black Templars army, with Initiate-only bolter squads in razorbacks, vanilla termies, no crusader tanks, no chaplains
- gunline Orkz (nuff said)

Now wait just a minute. Orkz gotta balance choppy with the shooty. A git that takes nothin but choppa is just gonna get dakka'd on cuz he's a git. Just like a git dat takes nothin but shootas is gonna get smacked upside the 'ead cuz e' can't fight.

Besides, orks have always been obsessed with guns. Having them sit there and just annihilate the enemy with nothing but gunfire is not unheard of. Heck, they had a war with the Tau that is literally named THE WAR OF DAKKA. They got to the point where they were stealing Tau weapons and using them against the Tau themselves, and of course, were making their own "improvements" to the Tau's inventions.

Other than that, I agree, there are a ton of non fluffy army compositions out there.

For example, nothing but missile launcher longfangs

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
Now wait just a minute. Orkz gotta balance choppy with the shooty. A git that takes nothin but choppa is just gonna get dakka'd on cuz he's a git. Just like a git dat takes nothin but shootas is gonna get smacked upside the 'ead cuz e' can't fight.

I agree. Our comments are not mutually exclusive. A gunline focuses on two things; fixed positions and shooting. Any Ork Boss worth 'is dakka will be focusing on the opposite; mobility and melee.

Having them sit there and just annihilate the enemy with nothing but gunfire is not unheard of.

Exactly the kind of example I was going for; not unheard of (therefore not illegal), but also incredibly unfluffy.

Jayden63 wrote:Why would you want to play an army that makes doing just that difficult.

It's already been brought up several times why.

If you've ever played a video game on a level harder than the easiest possible level, you'll understand why players would want to play with a handicap, whether that be self-imposed (in the list building phase), or imposed from without (like a weak codex).

 Ailaros wrote:

Jayden63 wrote:Why would you want to play an army that makes doing just that difficult.

It's already been brought up several times why.

If you've ever played a video game on a level harder than the easiest possible level, you'll understand why players would want to play with a handicap, whether that be self-imposed (in the list building phase), or imposed from without (like a weak codex).

I don't buy that analogy though. Video gaming and table top gaming are two way different experances. (I'm 40 so I've played a good deal of both for a very long time). Even hard video games create a pattern. You know when/where the next wave will come in, as well as you know where the power ups are, etc. and lastly you can do it over and over and over again until you get it right. It is very satisfying when you finally pass that level that has been beating you over the head for the last two hours or so, I'll give you that. However, in table top gaming dice decide everything and no two games will ever be the same. As such you really only get 1 chance to get it right for a win. I think most people would like to hedge their bets towards that win, other than just let the dice decide.

 Anfauglir wrote:

Having them sit there and just annihilate the enemy with nothing but gunfire is not unheard of.

Exactly the kind of example I was going for; not unheard of (therefore not illegal), but also incredibly unfluffy.

But, if it already exists to some degree in the fluff than it is fluffy. And even if there wasnt a precedent, one of the nice things about the warhammer universe is the incredibly large scope of it. It makes it very easy to come up with your own fluff, and the game designers encourage this.

 Anfauglir wrote:

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
Now wait just a minute. Orkz gotta balance choppy with the shooty. A git that takes nothin but choppa is just gonna get dakka'd on cuz he's a git. Just like a git dat takes nothin but shootas is gonna get smacked upside the 'ead cuz e' can't fight.

I agree. Our comments are not mutually exclusive. A gunline focuses on two things; fixed positions and shooting. Any Ork Boss worth 'is dakka will be focusing on the opposite; mobility and melee.

Having them sit there and just annihilate the enemy with nothing but gunfire is not unheard of.

Exactly the kind of example I was going for; not unheard of (therefore not illegal), but also incredibly unfluffy.

Yes, but remember, the only thing orkz find funnier than stomping in the face of some git who can't fight, is gunning down some gitz who didn't bring enuf dakka and thought they could krump orks (silly oomies)

To be perfectly honest, I don't see it that unfluffy.

Now, if we had orks that were highly civilized, signing peace treaties, and setting up orphanages for children who's fathers never came back from wars, that would probably be unfluffy. But the fun thing about orkz is that they're so crazy, odds are, somewhere in the universe, there probably is in fact an army running whatever rediculous list you can come up with.

However, I'm getting REALLY off topic, just felt like arguing that one just for the fun of it. Cool thing about orkz is that we're both wrong and right at the same time

Jayden63 wrote: In gaming dice decide everything and no two games will ever be the same.

Then why does it make sense to powergame?

If the dice decide things, and you never get a redo then what's the point of fielding the strongest list you possibly can or to try as hard as you are able?

I kinda do. I hate Krak Missles going right into my Crisis suit. an 80pt model dead by a stupid 16pt marine.
I also want cheaper Firewarriors. Bring them down to 8 if they stilll have BS3.
I also want sternguard to have Bs5.
So yeah i want a Broken army.

 Ailaros wrote:

Jayden63 wrote: In gaming dice decide everything and no two games will ever be the same.

Then why does it make sense to powergame?

Because the dice still only have 6 possible outcomes. In most cases the higher the number the better. Powergameing is choosing to use units that make getting favorable, yet still random, results the most often in a set number of die rolls. Choosing these units and multiple of them is the basis of power gaming.

If the dice decide things, and you never get a redo then what's the point of fielding the strongest list you possibly can or to try as hard as you are able?

By using only the strongest units you are increasing your chance of this one shot event to a favorable outcome. Think of it this way, if you had to choose a number between 1 and 10 or had to choose a number between 1 and 3 with a wrong guess being no more detrimental regardless of which set you choose to guess from and a correct guess winning the game outright. Which set would you choose to guess from?

Jayden63 wrote:By using only the strongest units you are increasing your chance of this one shot event to a favorable outcome.

So?

 Ailaros wrote:

Jayden63 wrote:By using only the strongest units you are increasing your chance of this one shot event to a favorable outcome.

So?

The short answer being that anyone who says they don't want to win is lying and those saying that they enjoy a challenge are telling the truth, but will still tell you that loosing ultimately sucks.

As such, everybody will hope that their chosen army (for whatever reason the army is chosen) will ultimately be strong and with all things being equal give them the win. Sadly, not all of us will get what we want.

 Jayden63 wrote:

 Ailaros wrote:

Jayden63 wrote:By using only the strongest units you are increasing your chance of this one shot event to a favorable outcome.

So?

The short answer being that anyone who says they don't want to win is lying and those saying that they enjoy a challenge are telling the truth, but will still tell you that loosing ultimately sucks.

As such, everybody will hope that their chosen army (for whatever reason the army is chosen) will ultimately be strong and with all things being equal give them the win. Sadly, not all of us will get what we want.

The first line of this is true, the second is not. Anyone who really enjoys competitive gaming wants balance because winning with something overpowered is unsatisfying and boring (since you didn't win really, your OP faction did most of the heavy lifting) and losing with an underpowered faction is frustrating (since you feel you couldn't really compete due to the imbalances involved). This doesn't really hold true in tournaments however because then people really will just take whatever edge they can get.

Most people aren't really that interested in competitive gaming though and simply want to win so will take broken stuff. Want most people really want is a faction that is stronger than most but still capable of losing occasionally (this validates their opinion that in fact their army is not overpowered despite what everyone is saying because they lost that game just the other day).

 Ailaros wrote:
If you've ever played a video game on a level harder than the easiest possible level, you'll understand why players would want to play with a handicap, whether that be self-imposed (in the list building phase), or imposed from without (like a weak codex).

Except that's a terrible analogy.

A video game is a single-player game. The only challenge is from the NPCs, and let's be honest, AI isn't usually a very challenging opponent. Once you figure out how to play the game there's no challenge at all from the easiest difficulty levels, and the only reason to keep playing is to finish the story. And once you finish the story there's no replay value unless you turn the difficulty up, since there's nothing new to experience.

40k is a two (or more) player game. The challenge is from the person across the table, who is doing everything they can to beat you. The game is already challenging, and part of that challenge is bringing a better list than your opponent (who has access to everything you do). You don't need to make it harder on yourself, unless you just enjoy making bad decisions and losing the game because of them.

I'd rather play a totally gak codex than an OP one.

Probably why I won't pick up the new CSM codex. I liked them when they were slow and got things done without fancy stuff. When you won with CSM before, it was one of two things:

1. You used Oblits, Plagues, Lash Princes and Kharne
2. You were totally bat-gak crazy and tried ridiculous things like death starring with Kharne and a Daemon Weapon Khorne lord in a land raider with four terminator champions armed with double lightning claws and a MOK

 Jayden63 wrote:
Face it. Watching your opponent remove models from the table is hella fun.

I think it was hilarious when I rolled 10x with 12 D6 in my last game. What is fun in the game in my opinnion is to see units perform well or just epicly bad and get a good laugh out of it. It can be fun to see your own models being removed too depending on how it happened. If the battle get's one sided though it ain't really fun anymore.

Yeah and what is next participation is as fun as being the first ?

You were totally bat-gak crazy and tried ridiculous things like death starring with Kharne and a Daemon Weapon Khorne lord in a land raider with four terminator champions armed with double lightning claws and a MOK

and you didnt get instant disqualification for having 12[or 13 depands if the lord was a termi] in a 10 man sized transport?

YES, GODDAMNIT, PARTICIPATION IS JUST AS FUN AS BEING FIRST!

We all like winning, you can't deny it. But would you win knowing that you were destined to win by using a spam Necron flyer list or Grey Knight doom list? Of course not! You'll just wipe the floor with your opponent in 2 turns, where is the fun in that?

 ExNoctemNacimur wrote:
YES, GODDAMNIT, PARTICIPATION IS JUST AS FUN AS BEING FIRST!

We all like winning, you can't deny it. But would you win knowing that you were destined to win by using a spam Necron flyer list or Grey Knight doom list? Of course not! You'll just wipe the floor with your opponent in 2 turns, where is the fun in that?

Yet those lists do exist. Just look in the modeling forum and you can find whole fleets of Necron flyers. So obviously, someone thinks they are fun.

Are they trying to play to have fun with their friends and have a good game OR just win games?

My analogy is this.

Which would feel better.

Winning a fight against a pro boxer, with the odd's stacked against you?

Smacking a kid round the back of the head because you know they can't really fight back?

One, makes you feel epic. The other just makes you feel like a git.

That's why I like being (Slightly) underpowered, or balanced. Because there is a challenge there, and if I just liked to win, I'd play all my video games on easy mode.

 Anfauglir wrote:

On an individual level, perhaps. But not in various and certain combinations, including the type that can be spammed into waac lists. Eamples;

- a msu Black Templars army, with Initiate-only bolter squads in razorbacks, vanilla termies, no crusader tanks, no chaplains

How is that a WAAC army? Furthermore, the Black Templars prefer orbital assaults and armoured spearheads. A Razorback-heavy list would actually be fluffy.

Makumba wrote:
Yeah and what is next participation is as fun as being the first ?

You were totally bat-gak crazy and tried ridiculous things like death starring with Kharne and a Daemon Weapon Khorne lord in a land raider with four terminator champions armed with double lightning claws and a MOK

and you didnt get instant disqualification for having 12[or 13 depands if the lord was a termi] in a 10 man sized transport?

4 terminators (8 slots), Lord (9 slots), Khârn (10 slots).

Siphen wrote:
I was recently talking with a friend about the eventual Tau update and I was pretty surprised with his wishlist. He hoped for 8 point, BS 4 Fire Warriors. He wants cheaper railguns with a jotww effect. He went on and on, basically saying that he wanted the "new" Tau book to utterly crush the competition. Now...without comment on the Tau or any of his examples...what do you think about this? Would you actually want your army to be updated and be completely broken?

Personally, I love playing an under-powered codex. I get to pick my army based completely on the fluff and the models AND I get satisfaction from winning without needing any fancy, broken

What are your thoughts?

Lots of people would be thrilled to have that "killer" codex, but what is the point? Sounds like your buddy wants some serious compensation for having one of the oldest and most overpriced force books in the game. No thanks. Cut costs, make crisis suits more useful and more protective, add some troop and unit variety across the board and the Tau could be a good force to play again. I've been pleased with the things I've been hearing about the new CSM codex. It doesn't sound like it was turned into a mega-codex. Which makes me happy. I'd be a really happy camper if GW would learn to build their new codex lists within the bounds of the ruleset they have created and stop the stupid power gaming build up...

Skriker

 ExNoctemNacimur wrote:
Are they trying to play to have fun with their friends and have a good game OR just win games?

There is no reason to believe that these 2 are mutually exclusive.

I don't want a broken army and I prove it by playing terrible lists with both my BA and GK armies... I know I could them out pretty easily but I like to ensure that my opponent has as much fun as I do. I don't see it as intentionally handicapping yourself, I see it as being an active participant in the social contract you have with your gaming opponent to play a fun and fair game. I'd rather lose with my cool lists than win with an eyeroll inducing pile of .

Even as I digest the new Chaos book I am avoiding the OTT things and keeping my theme of Black Legion with no Cult troops... if I luck out and my collection creates a list that is overwhelming to most of my opponents I will happily back off that and throw in more fun stuff. Golden rule and all that.

YES, GODDAMNIT, PARTICIPATION IS JUST AS FUN AS BEING FIRST!

only dudes that come in second say stuff like that .

Lots of people would be thrilled to have that "killer" codex, but what is the point?

more options means dex doesnt start to suck as soon the next one comes out . look at the dex with multiple builds , they go through edition change like a breeze . they are not only awesome to play with when they come out , but are also good later. Necron are the bomb now , but when GW finaly nerfs flyers[either middle of edition or at worse then 7th rolls up] they will still have viable builds without spaming flyers . Now on the other hand bad dex like old chaos[more or less 1 unit per slot ,no FA , no FoC changes] are bad after 1-2 updates in the game .

"killer" dex are always better for everyone . fluff and gamers can build more armies out of them , they are more flexible[good for gamers] , they get boring slower because of how many possible builds there are[good for fluff players] , you end up with fewer mirror matches . They are always better. I mean no one is going to tell me that he would rather have a nid/DA/old chaos type of dex over an IG/GK/SW type of one . And if they do they lie.

I like the nid codex. Problem?

I just think that if people with power lists tried to play other power list players, and normal/ fluffy lists played others, then everyone would be fine. People would play in the way that they wanted. The worst thing is when someone asks for a game, says they play DE, and then proceed to crush my BT infantry list with venom spam. It's not anyone's fault, but people should just talk to people before about their lists, simply to see whether they want to see if they want to play each other. You wouldn't see a movie without finding out what it's roughly about, and in the same way one shouldn't start a game without looking into such things. If you subsequently get tabled or bored tabling it's poor pre-game communication that's a large factor.

Some people like games that are uncertain and exciting, while others like to fight more certain battles with more reliable and powerful troops. Both are perfectly valid, one focuses on pure strategy, while the other focuses more on the story and unlikely heroic feats.

 gaovinni wrote:

 Jayden63 wrote:
Face it. Watching your opponent remove models from the table is hella fun.

I think it was hilarious when I rolled 10x with 12 D6 in my last game. What is fun in the game in my opinnion is to see units perform well or just epicly bad and get a good laugh out of it. It can be fun to see your own models being removed too depending on how it happened. If the battle get's one sided though it ain't really fun anymore.

I know what you mean, I would play halo with my buddy all the time for just how funny the deaths can be, and that 1 in a thousand stuid thing that can happen.
Like i know people cant help but Laugh when a fire warrior takes out a terminator in close combat.

Hi all.
The problem is not so much the gamers desire to 'win'.
But the way a game allows them to 'win'.

IF GW plc is so focused on narrative gaming , why are the intent on making the game play so strategicaly biased?
Eg what you bring has such a large impact on the outcome of the game.
Use all 'cost effective' units ,and you have significant advantage over a selection of 'least cost effective ' units.

IF the game had more tacticaly viable options, to allow units to be used in more interesting and varied ways.

Lots of special rules added to an already over complicated rule set is not substitute for actual in game decision making type tactical play..

Eg in a rule set, that allows APCs to transport infanty unit then give them fire support. Then screen heavier armour.Then use thier fast speed to out flank an enemy, and use shots from rear arc to bust some heavily armoured tanks.

They perform the roles of transport, close support, diversion-screen , flanking and tank busting.
JUST FROM IN GAME DECISIONS made by the player.
No special rules required...

So the game play the devs tout 40k should have , is in fact the diametricaly oposite of the rule set they write for it...