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 Luke_Prowler wrote:
And that is pretty scary, but when determining the strength of a codex it should be by it's own feet, not using allies/fortifications/the generic powers as a crutch.

This is the stupidest thing I ever heard. Fortifications and generic powers are not a crutch. For all intents and purposes every codex may as well have been reprinted with them in the back.
Why would you even want to gauge the power of codices without taking into account all they could do, unless you're houseruling against all of the 6th ed stuff? It makes the whole discussion pointless.

It's my philosophy that a product should be judge by it's own merits. Even if you take the added stuff into consideration, it doesn't remove the problem, just covers it up. Can anyone honestly say the tyranid psyker powers get used anymore when the biomancy ones just completely trump them?

It's a fair point - but the strength of the codex is on how many psykers they can take. All psykers got better overall (apart from eldar - If people try to take guide or fortune off me then there will be tears...probably mine... )
Should we only count eldar as psykers as everyone else uses the brb?

 Luke_Prowler wrote:
Can anyone honestly say the tyranid psyker powers get used anymore when the biomancy ones just completely trump them?

Irrelevant. It's an option they are allowed to take. As someone already said, these options might as well be added into every codex. It's just in the BRB for simplicity.

can someone explain something to me? I've heard, on this thread and others, that 6th killed the Iguard Powerblob. I don't get it. I've been playing them in 6th and have only lost 1 game, and narrowly that time. Is there something i'm missing here that makes my masses of DOODZZ suck?

androcles138 wrote:
can someone explain something to me? I've heard, on this thread and others, that 6th killed the Iguard Powerblob. I don't get it. I've been playing them in 6th and have only lost 1 game, and narrowly that time. Is there something i'm missing here that makes my masses of DOODZZ suck?

Cover save nerf, focus fire, can't hide sergeants in assault. There's workarounds but blobs took it pretty hard.

Almarine wrote:

androcles138 wrote:
can someone explain something to me? I've heard, on this thread and others, that 6th killed the Iguard Powerblob. I don't get it. I've been playing them in 6th and have only lost 1 game, and narrowly that time. Is there something i'm missing here that makes my masses of DOODZZ suck?

Cover save nerf, focus fire, can't hide sergeants in assault. There's workarounds but blobs took it pretty hard.

Which is of course why a variant on a power blob army won both the NOVA Open and the Invitational.

Why is everyone rating Blood Angels so highly? 6th Edition really nerfed us BA players. =(

The things that affected blood angels affected everyone. There were no redmarine specific nerfs. (IMO)

You still have assault vehicles and fnp - what more do you want?
Compared to eldar who now cannot charge at all unless on foot.
And fnp went to 5+ - but now you get it a lot more, eg power weapons don't negate it now.
Dante's axe makes him 2+ 4++ and ap1. And I6 for sweeping advance, so you just don't charge terminators and you're fine

The new rule set really changed the balances of a lot of armies. I for one am glad to see this change. Except to my poor poor Wyches

PredaKhaine wrote:
The things that affected blood angels affected everyone. There were no redmarine specific nerfs. (IMO)

You still have assault vehicles and fnp - what more do you want?
Compared to eldar who now cannot charge at all unless on foot.
And fnp went to 5+ - but now you get it a lot more, eg power weapons don't negate it now.
Dante's axe makes him 2+ 4++ and ap1. And I6 for sweeping advance, so you just don't charge terminators and you're fine

That's great, but what I'm looking for is someone to actually prove this. I'm looking at the GT results post-6th, and tournaments will typically have BA players in the bottom, or in some cases, none at all. So my claim is that BA are an awful codex right now and while we can disagree all we want, they're just not showing up as a top codex in tournaments.

 Red Comet wrote:
Why is everyone rating Blood Angels so highly? 6th Edition really nerfed us BA players. =(

BA's didn't come off significantly worse than anyone else, it's very difficult to see where they lost out so much.

 Stoffer wrote:

PredaKhaine wrote:
The things that affected blood angels affected everyone. There were no redmarine specific nerfs. (IMO)

You still have assault vehicles and fnp - what more do you want?
Compared to eldar who now cannot charge at all unless on foot.
And fnp went to 5+ - but now you get it a lot more, eg power weapons don't negate it now.
Dante's axe makes him 2+ 4++ and ap1. And I6 for sweeping advance, so you just don't charge terminators and you're fine

That's great, but what I'm looking for is someone to actually prove this. I'm looking at the GT results post-6th, and tournaments will typically have BA players in the bottom, or in some cases, none at all. So my claim is that BA are an awful codex right now and while we can disagree all we want, they're just not showing up as a top codex in tournaments.

While you have a point and I completely agree, GT's skew the results a bit so its not certain at the moment, but I do feel that BA really fell out of the limelight.

Edit: The rest of this post isn't aimed at you Stoffer, but at people saying BA are amazing. BA's best choices for troops were either Jump Infantry with or without Jump Packs. Jump Pack Marines just don't cut it anymore and DoA is gone. The mobility from Jump Packs is nice, but with most people going to foot lists and staying away from MSU it hampers us a bit. The loss of +1 initiative is a huge blow because now we can't strike first.

FNP going to 5+ is about the same, but I have a horrible luck with dice so getting those 5+ is like trying to roll a 7 on a d6 for me (and I use perfect cubes as dice).

Going back to our troops, transports got nerfed hard. BA were great because of cheap transport spam and fast vehicles. Vehicles aren't as relevant anymore and while a fast vindicator is now better it competes with the Stormraven with the same slot. And before anyone mentions Double FOC just look at how ready and willing most tournaments are to allow Double FOC.

Dante was never great. He's still meh. Sanguinary Guard still are meh too, even though having a 2+ is great. I'm sure Dark Angels will put a stop to 2+ armor in general once they are released. BA came out of things pretty bad. GK got nerfed, but its still competitive. BA just cannot compete how they used to.

 DarkCorsair wrote:

TOURNAMENT WINNERS
Necrons
Grey Knights
Imperial Guard
Chaos Daemons

STRONGLY COMPETITIVE
Space Wolves
Orks
Blood Angels

COMPETITIVE
Chaos Space Marines
Dark Angels
Space Marines
Sisters of Battle
Tyranids

Almost might have a chance maybe?
Tau Empire
Black Templars
Dark Eldar
Eldar

This.

I'm really suprised to see Chaos Daemons at the bottom of many peoples lists. I guess they have not felt how good the WD updates yet.

 labmouse42 wrote:

 DarkCorsair wrote:

TOURNAMENT WINNERS
Necrons
Grey Knights
Imperial Guard
Chaos Daemons

STRONGLY COMPETITIVE
Space Wolves
Orks
Blood Angels

COMPETITIVE
Chaos Space Marines
Dark Angels
Space Marines
Sisters of Battle
Tyranids

Almost might have a chance maybe?
Tau Empire
Black Templars
Dark Eldar
Eldar

This.

I'm really suprised to see Chaos Daemons at the bottom of many peoples lists. I guess they have not felt how good the WD updates yet.

Indeed. Last game I played I had one third of my army destroyed on turn one by the Daemon preferred wave. We were playing a 2v1 with me 2000pts and them at 1000+1000pts. The Chaos Space Marine dude never made it into combat since the Daemon player single handedly destroyed everything but my two flyers. The new Flamers and FMC are absolutely horrible to face, and the Screamers aren't nice, either...
On a lighter note, Phoenix is absolutely fun-tastic against power armour bikers. Gleeeeeee.

Red Comet wrote:
While you have a point and I completely agree, GT's skew the results a bit so its not certain at the moment, but I do feel that BA really fell out of the limelight.

Edit: The rest of this post isn't aimed at you Stoffer, but at people saying BA are amazing. BA's best choices for troops were either Jump Infantry with or without Jump Packs. Jump Pack Marines just don't cut it anymore and DoA is gone.

what's wrong with jump pack marines? You can also still make use of DoA, you just can't throw *everything* in reserve.

The mobility from Jump Packs is nice, but with most people going to foot lists and staying away from MSU it hampers us a bit.

I fail to see why, use full sized squads, they're faster than their footslogging counterparts, not all that much more expensive than footslogging troops, wayyy faster, and get an extra attack on the charge.

The loss of +1 initiative is a huge blow because now we can't strike first.

While noticeable, it was never necessary by any means for BA's to function well (it was part of that whole "marines+1" thing) and the extra Hammer of Wrath attack should mitigate that.

FNP going to 5+ is about the same, but I have a horrible luck with dice so getting those 5+ is like trying to roll a 7 on a d6 for me (and I use perfect cubes as dice).

It's less reliable on an individual basis but you get to take it against a far larger array of attacks so it's more consistently available. Functionally it makes them less effective against high RoF units and more effective against elite CC units and low AP firepower, in most cases for weapons S7 and lower being identical to a stacking 5+ invul save.

Going back to our troops, transports got nerfed hard. BA were great because of cheap transport spam and fast vehicles.

So was every strong army in 5th. BA's, SW's, IG, GK, etc. All those armies very heavily relied on transport utility, and all took big hits in that regard.

Dante was never great. He's still meh. Sanguinary Guard still are meh too, even though having a 2+ is great. I'm sure Dark Angels will put a stop to 2+ armor in general once they are released. BA came out of things pretty bad. GK got nerfed, but its still competitive. BA just cannot compete how they used to.

I'm finding it difficult to see where BA's lost out so much more than GK's here, almost everything here applies just as much to them.

No way are Space Wolves anything less than number two, if not arguably tied with Guard for the top spot. They combo better with Guard than any other force, bring the most cost effiecient psychic defense/offense to the table, and still have the most woefully undercosted troop and shooting units in the entire game. The ludicrous stuff they can do when added to an IG power blob alone makes them superior to every other MEQ that might ally with guard. The only thing that sets them back from IG at all is a dependance on Allies for a strong air defense.

You guys are also succumbing to emotion by putting Crons in the top tier, at least assuming you are playing actual book missions instead of 5th editionish stuff. Daemons I can agree with being much better, thanks to the buff to fearless units in general and GKs are certainly the next best MEQ book after Wolves. Almost all those lower end armies you are touting as competitive have the "when paired with IG in one build" qualifier to them, while the true power lists (SW, IG, Crons, GK) have several viable builds available to them and can funtion well without resorting to allies or even sometimes fortifications. Any army book that can work on its own is going to be inherantly much stronger than one that needs another book to be competitive.

 Vaktathi wrote:
what's wrong with jump pack marines? You can also still make use of DoA, you just can't throw *everything* in reserve.

I fail to see why, use full sized squads, they're faster than their footslogging counterparts, not all that much more expensive than footslogging troops, wayyy faster, and get an extra attack on the charge.

While noticeable, it was never necessary by any means for BA's to function well (it was part of that whole "marines+1" thing) and the extra Hammer of Wrath attack should mitigate that.

It's less reliable on an individual basis but you get to take it against a far larger array of attacks so it's more consistently available. Functionally it makes them less effective against high RoF units and more effective against elite CC units and low AP firepower, in most cases for weapons S7 and lower being identical to a stacking 5+ invul save.

So was every strong army in 5th. BA's, SW's, IG, GK, etc. All those armies very heavily relied on transport utility, and all took big hits in that regard.

I'm finding it difficult to see where BA's lost out so much more than GK's here, almost everything here applies just as much to them.

Yes DoA can still be used but is splitting up your forces like that really worth it? Yes reserves are more reliable now, but having half of your army on the board and then Deep Striking the rest in just isn't that great as it was before. Anti Infantry is more prevalent than before and the Deep Strike rules force you to bunch up making it easy for you to be one Plasma Cannon shot away from losing most of your squad. DoA was really good against mech in 5th Edition. The meta trends now have completely shifted making DoA as it was used before meh even if there was no half reserves.

I do use full sized squads. Yes they are faster, but they lost a lot of tools. Let's look at the new flamers as an example. How does BA counter that? How do Assault Marines deal with flamers? We can't assault them since they destroy us, and screamers is even worse. A lot of the good codices have nerfed us. Losing that +1 initiative hit us a lot harder than you think. Hammer of Wrath barely comes into play and here's why. If you want Hammer of Wrath attacks you can only move 6 inches in the movement phase. Essentially you trade mobility for a reroll on charge distance and an extra S4 attack. WOW! An extra S4 attack. AND its only on guys that touch enemies in base to base on the initial move up. That doesn't sway the battle alone, but if all my Assault Marines swung before other marines now we'd be talking.

I agree with you on FNP.

All of those armies you listed still do well though even though their mechanized 5th Ed lists no longer function as well. Look at SW, IG, and GK. They can all function well in a competitive environment, but BA cannot any longer. On paper they are small changes, but in play its tactically huge.

Best at bottom worst at top-
Dark Angels
Black Templars
Dark Eldar
Sisters of Battle
Eldar
Space Marines
Chaos Space Marines
Orks
Grey Knights
Imperial Guard
Space Wolves
Blood Angels
Chaos Daemons
Tyranids- 3rd place
Tau Empire- 2nd place
Necrons- winner

 Vaktathi wrote:

Red Comet wrote:
While you have a point and I completely agree, GT's skew the results a bit so its not certain at the moment, but I do feel that BA really fell out of the limelight.

Edit: The rest of this post isn't aimed at you Stoffer, but at people saying BA are amazing. BA's best choices for troops were either Jump Infantry with or without Jump Packs. Jump Pack Marines just don't cut it anymore and DoA is gone.

what's wrong with jump pack marines? You can also still make use of DoA, you just can't throw *everything* in reserve.

The mobility from Jump Packs is nice, but with most people going to foot lists and staying away from MSU it hampers us a bit.

I fail to see why, use full sized squads, they're faster than their footslogging counterparts, not all that much more expensive than footslogging troops, wayyy faster, and get an extra attack on the charge.

The loss of +1 initiative is a huge blow because now we can't strike first.

While noticeable, it was never necessary by any means for BA's to function well (it was part of that whole "marines+1" thing) and the extra Hammer of Wrath attack should mitigate that.

FNP going to 5+ is about the same, but I have a horrible luck with dice so getting those 5+ is like trying to roll a 7 on a d6 for me (and I use perfect cubes as dice).

It's less reliable on an individual basis but you get to take it against a far larger array of attacks so it's more consistently available. Functionally it makes them less effective against high RoF units and more effective against elite CC units and low AP firepower, in most cases for weapons S7 and lower being identical to a stacking 5+ invul save.

Going back to our troops, transports got nerfed hard. BA were great because of cheap transport spam and fast vehicles.

So was every strong army in 5th. BA's, SW's, IG, GK, etc. All those armies very heavily relied on transport utility, and all took big hits in that regard.

Dante was never great. He's still meh. Sanguinary Guard still are meh too, even though having a 2+ is great. I'm sure Dark Angels will put a stop to 2+ armor in general once they are released. BA came out of things pretty bad. GK got nerfed, but its still competitive. BA just cannot compete how they used to.

I'm finding it difficult to see where BA's lost out so much more than GK's here, almost everything here applies just as much to them.

Again, if BA were a competitive army now, you'd see top players using them and winning, which isn't the case. I'd love it if people would top telling me BA are great and start showing me.

The way I see it, there were two good builds, one was mass JP infantry (either starting on the board or DoA) and vehicle spam (typically Rbacks).

Challenges, overwatch, nerfing FnP, furious charge, random charge length and removing the wounds off fearless all hurt assault marines and they pretty much got nothing in return. Oh yeah, HoW, right. That wonderful str4 hit for models in base to base. That's a terrible trade in 6th edition where people are massing small arms fire; plasma and power weapons were never the issue, you'd account for losing one or two models from that, but the mass amount of regular wounds were the ones you needed to shed. Small expensive specialized assault units in large numbers won't cut it anymore and that sadly hits BA where it hurts.

Then the other builds. Razorback spam? Sure, but why would I do that when GK does it much better? BA are just at the point where all their good lists are done better by other armies.

Anyway, go to a GT and prove me wrong, but till you do that, the fact is that BA is not a competitive list looking at current tournament results.

I haven't seen it in tourneys, but BA sure seem to screw me over with some of their drop pod or sanguinary guard lists. I actually thing BA are quite competitive in 6th in my opinion.

 Stoffer wrote:
Again, if BA were a competitive army now, you'd see top players using them and winning, which isn't the case.

Just a quick question as a non-BA player. I don't recall Blood Angels winning very many tournaments in 5th edition either, and yet they were still considered a strong Codex then. Tournament results have not changed for BA through the transition between 5th and 6th. Could you enlighten me as to which big GTs Blood Angels won and when during 5th?

Stoffer wrote:Again, if BA were a competitive army now, you'd see top players using them and winning.

Not true. A tournament is only a couple of games of 40k, it's pretty easy for a lot of uncontrollable factors to determine the outcome of a tournament.

BA got a bit worse, yes, but that was just because the main way people play them got worse. The codex itself is still very, very solid. I'm sure once the 6th ed shakes wear off, and we see more BA players again, they'll be back towards the top.

Rampage wrote:

 Stoffer wrote:
Again, if BA were a competitive army now, you'd see top players using them and winning, which isn't the case.

Just a quick question as a non-BA player. I don't recall Blood Angels winning very many tournaments in 5th edition either, and yet they were still considered a strong Codex then. Tournament results have not changed for BA through the transition between 5th and 6th. Could you enlighten me as to which big GTs Blood Angels won and when during 5th?

Have you never heard of Jawaballs?

Ailaros wrote:

Stoffer wrote:Again, if BA were a competitive army now, you'd see top players using them and winning.

Not true. A tournament is only a couple of games of 40k, it's pretty easy for a lot of uncontrollable factors to determine the outcome of a tournament.

BA got a bit worse, yes, but that was just because the main way people play them got worse. The codex itself is still very, very solid. I'm sure once the 6th ed shakes wear off, and we see more BA players again, they'll be back towards the top.

Also if that were truly the case then every single BA player has had a lot of bad luck.

People played them that way because those were the viable builds. Blood Angels don't have the answers to a lot of the new questions that 6th Edition poses to them and from a lot of games that I've played I can see just how much power Blood Angels lost from one day to another. I reserved my judgment until about a week ago when I was deciding what army to take to a tournament and honestly BA has lost a lot of its luster. If you don't play the codex you just don't understand the power its lost.

 Red Comet wrote:

Rampage wrote:

 Stoffer wrote:
Again, if BA were a competitive army now, you'd see top players using them and winning, which isn't the case.

Just a quick question as a non-BA player. I don't recall Blood Angels winning very many tournaments in 5th edition either, and yet they were still considered a strong Codex then. Tournament results have not changed for BA through the transition between 5th and 6th. Could you enlighten me as to which big GTs Blood Angels won and when during 5th?

Have you never heard of Jawaballs?

Of course, I don't live in a cave. Could you please fill me in on exactly which major GTs he won with his Blood Angels in 5th?

 Rampage wrote:

 Red Comet wrote:

Rampage wrote:

 Stoffer wrote:
Again, if BA were a competitive army now, you'd see top players using them and winning, which isn't the case.

Just a quick question as a non-BA player. I don't recall Blood Angels winning very many tournaments in 5th edition either, and yet they were still considered a strong Codex then. Tournament results have not changed for BA through the transition between 5th and 6th. Could you enlighten me as to which big GTs Blood Angels won and when during 5th?

Have you never heard of Jawaballs?

Of course, I don't live in a cave. Could you please fill me in on exactly which major GTs he won with his Blood Angels in 5th?

I don't think he's won any GT's
If I'm wrong, my mistake.

jdjamesdean@mail.com wrote:

 Rampage wrote:

 Red Comet wrote:

Rampage wrote:

 Stoffer wrote:
Again, if BA were a competitive army now, you'd see top players using them and winning, which isn't the case.

Just a quick question as a non-BA player. I don't recall Blood Angels winning very many tournaments in 5th edition either, and yet they were still considered a strong Codex then. Tournament results have not changed for BA through the transition between 5th and 6th. Could you enlighten me as to which big GTs Blood Angels won and when during 5th?

Have you never heard of Jawaballs?

Of course, I don't live in a cave. Could you please fill me in on exactly which major GTs he won with his Blood Angels in 5th?

I don't think he's won any GT's
If I'm wrong, my mistake.

That's exactly what I think. I've had a look at his blog too and couldn't find reference to him winning a GT with Blood Angels anywhere. Tournament results have not changed for BA between 5th and 6th as far as I can see, although there may be a GT somewhere that I've missed.

jdjamesdean@mail.com wrote:

 Rampage wrote:

 Red Comet wrote:

Rampage wrote:

 Stoffer wrote:
Again, if BA were a competitive army now, you'd see top players using them and winning, which isn't the case.

Just a quick question as a non-BA player. I don't recall Blood Angels winning very many tournaments in 5th edition either, and yet they were still considered a strong Codex then. Tournament results have not changed for BA through the transition between 5th and 6th. Could you enlighten me as to which big GTs Blood Angels won and when during 5th?

Have you never heard of Jawaballs?

Of course, I don't live in a cave. Could you please fill me in on exactly which major GTs he won with his Blood Angels in 5th?

I don't think he's won any GT's
If I'm wrong, my mistake.

He won Mechanicon 2010 as well as placing 6th overall at NOVA Open 2011. I'm sure he probably has some other notable achievements, I just don't know them. He seems to be "famous" more for painting than gaming though.

Tournament results are overblown in terms of determining what armies are good. Why? You have to consider the base rates of what armies are seen in tournaments.

More people play new armies. This isn't thanks to "Codex Creep" (which has not existed throughout 5th/6th edition) but because new armies are shiny and cool, so people are more likely to be interested in them.

This in turn causes tournaments to have more new armies than old armies. A good example of this is Black Templars. In many respects, Black Templars are broken, with options that no other Codex can compete with-- for instance, they can take 5 man Terminator Squads with two heavy weapons and Tank Hunters. However, they don't win very many events. Is this because they are bad? No, it's because they are very old and as a result not many people play them.

In simple terms, if there is an event with 20 Marine players, only one of which is playing Black Templars, all else being equal one would expect such armies to win only one in twenty events. The real-world rates are typically more extreme than that. So when you evaluate what's good based on what wins, keep in mind that you need to look at what the overall makeup of the event was as well.

 Kingsley wrote:
Tournament results are overblown in terms of determining what armies are good. Why? You have to consider the base rates of what armies are seen in tournaments.

More people play new armies. This isn't thanks to "Codex Creep" (which has not existed throughout 5th/6th edition) but because new armies are shiny and cool, so people are more likely to be interested in them.

This in turn causes tournaments to have more new armies than old armies. A good example of this is Black Templars. In many respects, Black Templars are broken, with options that no other Codex can compete with-- for instance, they can take 5 man Terminator Squads with two heavy weapons and Tank Hunters. However, they don't win very many events. Is this because they are bad? No, it's because they are very old and as a result not many people play them.

In simple terms, if there is an event with 20 Marine players, only one of which is playing Black Templars, all else being equal one would expect such armies to win only one in twenty events. The real-world rates are typically more extreme than that. So when you evaluate what's good based on what wins, keep in mind that you need to look at what the overall makeup of the event was as well.

In 5th edition it had alot to do with Codex Creep.

SW's came out, we saw missile spam/ T-wolves with Las/plas razors. Blood Angels came out, we saw 5 man assault squads w/ cheap las/plas razor backs. GK came out we saw str 8 Psyfleman spam, w/ Coteaz and friends.