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Here's and idea I've had for limiting fliers - Only one per 750 pts.

This would restrict flier spam in lower point games, but would allow more liberal use of them in higher-point games, where opponents are more capable pf dealing with them.

This would mean:

Maximum of one flier at 0-750 pts,
Maximum of 2 fliers at 750-1500 pts,
Maximum of three fliers at 1500-2250 pts.

What do you think of this?

So because you don't like a particular type of unit, you want to restrict everyone from using them?

What if I want to play some sort of air cavalry list because its what I enjoy?

Your gaming group could house rule this in, but really, fliers are a part of this game now. Not liking them or not wanting to bring their counters shouldn't restrict other players from using them.

This idea occurred to me too, I might bring it up with my group next time we play as they're not big flier fans either. It sounds good to me at least.

I think having a limit of something like 4 in 1500pts isn't going to affect anyone but the cheesy players, but I don't think we need it. If someone has a flyer spam list, just don't play them. And if you're in a tournament, then it's a tournament and you should have a cheesy list to counter their one.

 Blacksails wrote:
So because you don't like a particular type of unit, you want to restrict everyone from using them?

What if I want to play some sort of air cavalry list because its what I enjoy?

Your gaming group could house rule this in, but really, fliers are a part of this game now. Not liking them or not wanting to bring their counters shouldn't restrict other players from using them.

A fine point, but I can understand the OP's sentiment.

Some unnamed flyers (Ok, Helldrakes and Vendettas) are very, very good. Tough, powerful, and usually counter the very thing that threatens them the most. My crisis suits and broadsides, for example.

And if the meta is accustomed to non-flyer play, mass Vendetta might come across as a slap to the face.

I know, "grow a spine and deal with it", but sometimes it's fine to artificially balance an unbalanced ruleset, if it increases the overall enjoyment of the game.

Lumipon wrote:
A fine point, but I can understand the OP's sentiment.

Some unnamed flyers (Ok, Helldrakes and Vendettas) are very, very good. Tough, powerful, and usually counter the very thing that threatens them the most. My crisis suits and broadsides, for example.

And if the meta is accustomed to non-flyer play, mass Vendetta might come across as a slap to the face.

I know, "grow a spine and deal with it", but sometimes it's fine to artificially balance an unbalanced ruleset, if it increases the overall enjoyment of the game.

I think the problem isn't with the overall rules, it's that these flyers are too cheap. Rather than setting a limit, we should just make such flyers more expensive so that they can't make such an unkillable list.

 Blacksails wrote:
So because you don't like a particular type of unit, you want to restrict everyone from using them?

What if I want to play some sort of air cavalry list because its what I enjoy?

Your gaming group could house rule this in, but really, fliers are a part of this game now. Not liking them or not wanting to bring their counters shouldn't restrict other players from using them.

Do I have to dislike fliers to suggest a limit to them?
If you don't like the idea, feel free to ignore it. It's not like GW is going to implement anything said here.

this change is kinda pointless actually, as most tournament lists don't take more than 3 flyers at the standard 1850 line...

Necron flyer spam isn't as efficient as people like to pretend it is.

 Blacksails wrote:
So because you don't like a particular type of unit, you want to restrict everyone from using them?

What if I want to play some sort of air cavalry list because its what I enjoy?

Your gaming group could house rule this in, but really, fliers are a part of this game now. Not liking them or not wanting to bring their counters shouldn't restrict other players from using them.

Your argument would hold water if there were sufficient skyguard alternatives available. Currently only Tau are in that position. It's not a situation as in with tanks "it's your own fault for not brining a counter to tanks", since with air that line would read "it's your own fault for playing an army that is not able to counter air" which is just bad game design - something that the OP's suggestion fixes to some degree. The introduction of fliers has been bad and air cavalry lists obsoletes far too many codexes. And this is really bad game design.

So, to answer your (attempted) rhetorical question, I'd say "if you really want to play me, you'd better let me have some Skyguard otherwise find someone else to play"

Selym wrote:

 Blacksails wrote:
So because you don't like a particular type of unit, you want to restrict everyone from using them?

What if I want to play some sort of air cavalry list because its what I enjoy?

Your gaming group could house rule this in, but really, fliers are a part of this game now. Not liking them or not wanting to bring their counters shouldn't restrict other players from using them.

Do I have to dislike fliers to suggest a limit to them?
If you don't like the idea, feel free to ignore it. It's not like GW is going to implement anything said here.

I'm providing feedback to your proposed idea, as that's the purpose of this forum, and the purpose of you posting it in the first place. I'm well aware GW will never use any ideas from this board, but that's not the point. Posts in this section are for garnering feedback on possible houserules for your friends and gaming group to use.

Mahtamori wrote:

 Blacksails wrote:
So because you don't like a particular type of unit, you want to restrict everyone from using them?

What if I want to play some sort of air cavalry list because its what I enjoy?

Your gaming group could house rule this in, but really, fliers are a part of this game now. Not liking them or not wanting to bring their counters shouldn't restrict other players from using them.

Your argument would hold water if there were sufficient skyguard alternatives available. Currently only Tau are in that position. It's not a situation as in with tanks "it's your own fault for not brining a counter to tanks", since with air that line would read "it's your own fault for playing an army that is not able to counter air" which is just bad game design - something that the OP's suggestion fixes to some degree. The introduction of fliers has been bad and air cavalry lists obsoletes far too many codexes. And this is really bad game design.

So, to answer your (attempted) rhetorical question, I'd say "if you really want to play me, you'd better let me have some Skyguard otherwise find someone else to play"

In 6th edition, you have to now be concerned with fliers and the ability to either destroy them, or survive long enough and win through other means. Several armies have options within their book for skyfire or fliers to deal with enemy fliers, and the few that don't have the ability to take in allies from codices to fill that role.

Furthermore, Imperial Armour Aeronautica has several more fliers for other codices to fill in the anti-air role.

I'm not going to deny its poor game design on GWs part. 40k is a rather poor ruleset overall, and the codex release schedule only aggravates it. The issue here though is that its imposing a restriction on other players that may enjoy the addition of fliers. Your gaming group may despise fliers, and this would work with that group, but imagine you have a large and diverse group of players. Its hard to justify a limit on someone's army because its strong, or because people don't want to include skyfire units.

If I built a beautiful army with a bunch of fliers, why would I have to alter my army and list to suit the needs of people who don't want to alter theirs?

Gaining Skyfire currently is not simply "getting allies". Allies are cumbersome to manage and limiting yourself to fielding allies in order to fill a glaring design error with the new edition also means you're severely limited in your ability to customize your army.

Strongly limiting the use of fliers until Games Workshop has been able to fix this problem (one to two years from now) is not at all a bad thing.
Why would you have to alter your army? To provide a fair and challenging game for both participants.

Currently the situation can be described like this:
Begin with setting the stage and remove Lance, Melta and Gauss from all weapons unless it's an Eldar or Dark Eldar weapon as well as removing any weapons with a strength above 8 except for the Demolisher Cannon for Imperial Guard. Remove infantry's ability to hit the rear on vehicles. Increase armour value on front armour by 1 on tanks (don't increase their cost).
After this you start bringing out new codexes which feature the odd Lance or Melta in the newly made codexes. Not enough to actually let these codexes effectively combat heavy armour, though, and force them to pay for them as upgrades. Also, the new codexes will have AV14 vehicles in them where some cost half what they should and others cost twice with no visible consistency in pricing. When Necrons are released give everything with a long barrelled weapon melta.
This is essentially how 6th edition and flyers have been so far.

To clarify; I dislike flyers. I dislike 40k fundamentally as a ruleset. I dislike the way codices are released and the inevitable power creep often associated with them.

However, putting a limit on anything that goes beyond the rules is not the solution. It hurts players who have built an army within the confines of the edition that use flyers, and punishes them by adding another restriction. You can't force players to play the game you want if you won't play the game they want.

I do have to point out that gaining skyfire is quite literally as simple as getting allies. They really aren't cumbersome, and in fact, allies can make for some incredibly thematic and interesting armies. Ignoring them or dismissing them as a means to get skyfire is simply wrong.

It comes down to the fact that putting a restriction on unit X forces some players to play the game you want to play, which essentially renders some armies illegal.

I'm all for your gaming group to come up with some sort of gentlemen's agreement, but the solution is not to impose some sort of hard and fast rule that needs to be met for you to consider a game. There are probably a significant portion of 40k players who are in fact very excited to play with flyers, and having to include an extra element in their list building. This rule forces them to alter and tailor their lists to your needs, which is no different than the player with flyers expecting you to tailor your army to his needs.

Your example setting is a little strong, to be honest. Flyers aren't that excessively gamebreaking, and really only two flyers are giving the others a bad name. No one is particularly afraid of a Nephilim Jet Fighter, or a few Dakkajets.

If I were in a gaming group with some sort of dislike for flyers, but with players who have 3+ in normal 1500-2000pts games, I'd be making houserules to tweak the costs and abilities of the good flyers, like the Vendetta and Heldrake, rather than invalidate some players armies.

 Blacksails wrote:
So because you don't like a particular type of unit, you want to restrict everyone from using them?

What if I want to play some sort of air cavalry list because its what I enjoy?

Your gaming group could house rule this in, but really, fliers are a part of this game now. Not liking them or not wanting to bring their counters shouldn't restrict other players from using them.

It's not a case of not liking them. It's a case of only 5/16 armies actually having any real way of dealing with them, and of those armies, only one, maybe two, can do anti air reliably. Every army can bring anti tank, anti infantry, anti meq, anti teq. But only a handfull, can bring anti flier, and this is the real issue.

It's a new unit type, in which only a few armies can cope with it. What if I want to play a...well...any kind of army besides a flyer army. Should I have to bring allies to get anti air, even if I don't want them? Should everyone? Because unfortunately, that's what fliers tend to do, they force people to take allies they don't want nor like in their army, purely because it's very likely they will lose without the anti-air, if someone decides to run flierspam

I agree to a flyer limit per point's level, however, I myself, would have it work more like the fantasy army building system, say, no more than 25% of your armies total points may be spent on fliers. That way, people could take one expencive flier, such as a fully tooled out stormraven, or 3 or so dirt cheap and managable fliers, like dakkajet's.

However, once more and more armies start to get some form of skyfire or anti air, or fliers of their own, that's when I would be more than happy to drop this.

It's like allowing terminator's, if only 5/16 armies can take AP2.
It's like allowing land raiders, if only 5/16 armies have strength higher than 8
See my point?

 Evileyes wrote:
Should I have to bring allies to get anti air, even if I don't want them? Should everyone? Because unfortunately, that's what fliers tend to do, they force people to take allies they don't want nor like in their army, purely because it's very likely they will lose without it.

This right here is what I'm trying to get at. You don't want to change your army or make any additions, but you want other players to make significant changes for you.

If I wanted to play in an Elysian Drop Troop list with 9 flyers, why would I have to change my army to play you if you won't change your army to play me?

Player A loves flyers and runs a thematic flyer heavy list.
Player B dislikes flyers and doesn't want to add in allies or use any FW supplements.

B: If you're going to play with us, we're limiting your flyers to three in a 2000pts game.
A: But that completely invalidates my army. Why don't you bring allies or skyfire units from other sources?
B: Its not that simple/easy. It would ruin the theme of my army to bring in my own flyers or skyfire allies. I need you to stop running all those flyers though.
A: But that ruins the theme for my army in doing it.

Both players want to play the game a certain way. Expecting people to play the game the way you want to play it is not the solution. There are plenty of 40k players who love flyers, allies, and the addition of skyfire.

 Blacksails wrote:

 Evileyes wrote:
Should I have to bring allies to get anti air, even if I don't want them? Should everyone? Because unfortunately, that's what fliers tend to do, they force people to take allies they don't want nor like in their army, purely because it's very likely they will lose without it.

This right here is what I'm trying to get at. You don't want to change your army or make any additions, but you want other players to make significant changes for you.

If I wanted to play in an Elysian Drop Troop list with 9 flyers, why would I have to change my army to play you if you won't change your army to play me?

Player A loves flyers and runs a thematic flyer heavy list.
Player B dislikes flyers and doesn't want to add in allies or use any FW supplements.

B: If you're going to play with us, we're limiting your flyers to three in a 2000pts game.
A: But that completely invalidates my army. Why don't you bring allies or skyfire units from other sources?
B: Its not that simple/easy. It would ruin the theme of my army to bring in my own flyers or skyfire allies. I need you to stop running all those flyers though.
A: But that ruins the theme for my army in doing it.

Both players want to play the game a certain way. Expecting people to play the game the way you want to play it is not the solution. There are plenty of 40k players who love flyers, allies, and the addition of skyfire.

The difference is, any list you bring, it's possible to find a counter for in every army book. Except fliers. Because they are a new edition, only some codex's can deal with them.

It's better to limit fliers, than essentially limit using viable codex's to the few that can effectively deal with fliers at this stage.

It's not ideal to limit fliers, no. But, once the books get more up to date, this issue will be a thing of the past. For now, however, I feel its necessary.

The only other solution I can think of, is to issue a rule that if you are going to use 3 or more fliers, they act as they used to, like fast skimmers, if playing against a 5th edition codex.

 Evileyes wrote:


The difference is, any list you bring, it's possible to find a counter for in every army book. Except fliers. Because they are a new edition, only some codex's can deal with them.

It's better to limit fliers, than essentially limit using viable codex's to the few that can effectively deal with fliers at this stage.

It's not ideal to limit fliers, no. But, once the books get more up to date, this issue will be a thing of the past. For now, however, I feel its necessary.

You're right about the issue becoming less prevalent as the codices get updated, which is my hope as well.

However, every army has the ability to take allies that provide skyfire. Not to mention FW through Imperial Armour Aeronautica. Granted, I'll admit that Tyranids are pretty much SOL, which is a shame. However, literally every other army either has fliers available, allies who have the ability, or using FW units. Its less than ideal, but its quite simply the most universally fair option.

I guess my biggest point about adding limits to anything is that it expects other players to conform to your idea of how the game is played, without understanding that the other player may expect you to conform to their standard. Technically, the players with all the flyers are doing nothing wrong, and are following the rules exactly and within their limits.

Yeah, its not good, and I agree. It sucks for some armies, and it could get expensive for people to buy new models. Its the unfortunate nature of the beast with 40k, but there are players who love flyers and you can't deny them their joy by placing restrictions.

*Edit* On an unrelated note, I love how SOL is tagged as Shoot, out of luck. Classy dakka.

 Blacksails wrote:

 Evileyes wrote:


The difference is, any list you bring, it's possible to find a counter for in every army book. Except fliers. Because they are a new edition, only some codex's can deal with them.

It's better to limit fliers, than essentially limit using viable codex's to the few that can effectively deal with fliers at this stage.

It's not ideal to limit fliers, no. But, once the books get more up to date, this issue will be a thing of the past. For now, however, I feel its necessary.

You're right about the issue becoming less prevalent as the codices get updated, which is my hope as well.

However, every army has the ability to take allies that provide skyfire. Not to mention FW through Imperial Armour Aeronautica. Granted, I'll admit that Tyranids are pretty much SOL, which is a shame. However, literally every other army either has fliers available, allies who have the ability, or using FW units. Its less than ideal, but its quite simply the most universally fair option.

I guess my biggest point about adding limits to anything is that it expects other players to conform to your idea of how the game is played, without understanding that the other player may expect you to conform to their standard. Technically, the players with all the flyers are doing nothing wrong, and are following the rules exactly and within their limits.

Yeah, its not good, and I agree. It sucks for some armies, and it could get expensive for people to buy new models. Its the unfortunate nature of the beast with 40k, but there are players who love flyers and you can't deny them their joy by placing restrictions.

*Edit* On an unrelated note, I love how SOL is tagged as Shoot, out of luck. Classy dakka.

The thing is, even if the flier player is having fun, the person on the other end of the board won't be, if he can't deal with them, and can't shell out the silly money for a whole allies contingent, or forgeworld, for a passing phase like the lack of anti-fliers.

And that won't just suck for the non flyer player, it will suck for the flyer player, once it becomes hard for them to find games, because even casual players, don't want to play when the odds are so stacked against them to the point of having no reasonable chance of winning. So they won't play the flier player.

A limit, is better than breaking a gaming community into flyer group, and non flier group.

 Evileyes wrote:


The thing is, even if the flier player is having fun, the person on the other end of the board won't be, if he can't deal with them, and can't shell out the silly money for a whole allies contingent, or forgeworld, for a passing phase like the lack of anti-fliers.

And that won't just suck for the non flyer player, it will suck for the flyer player, once it becomes hard for them to find games, because even casual players, don't want to play when the odds are so stacked against them to the point of having no reasonable chance of winning. So they won't play the flier player.

A limit, is better than breaking a gaming community into flyer group, and non flier group.

But what about making the flyer player change his army? What if he doesn't own that many models besides his flyers and the necessary troops to go in them. You'd then be forcing him to spend money re-building his army, and changing to a composition he doesn't want, and therefore kills his fun. This also makes the game less enjoyable for the flyer player, which consequently makes it less enjoyable for the non-flyer player.

It goes both ways equally.

 Blacksails wrote:

 Evileyes wrote:


The thing is, even if the flier player is having fun, the person on the other end of the board won't be, if he can't deal with them, and can't shell out the silly money for a whole allies contingent, or forgeworld, for a passing phase like the lack of anti-fliers.

And that won't just suck for the non flyer player, it will suck for the flyer player, once it becomes hard for them to find games, because even casual players, don't want to play when the odds are so stacked against them to the point of having no reasonable chance of winning. So they won't play the flier player.

A limit, is better than breaking a gaming community into flyer group, and non flier group.

But what about making the flyer player change his army? What if he doesn't own that many models besides his flyers and the necessary troops to go in them. You'd then be forcing him to spend money re-building his army, and changing to a composition he doesn't want, and therefore kills his fun. This also makes the game less enjoyable for the flyer player, which consequently makes it less enjoyable for the non-flyer player.

It goes both ways equally.

There is a difference, in the fact, that the non-flier player, will simply not want to play the flier player, once it get's to the stage that they become quite aware that their chances of ever winning, are slim to none.

The flier player might enjoy their fliers, but it's an unfortunate inevitability that people will not want to play against flyerspam, until suitable ways of dealing with it become apparent for the majority of armies. The flier limit isn't there to hurt the flyer player. It's there to stop them becoming shunned as power-gamers, and to ensure they will still get games in a casual enviroment. Yes, the flier player has every right to spam fliers. But it will lead to most if not all casual players, exerting their right to choose not to play against them.

 Evileyes wrote:

 Blacksails wrote:

 Evileyes wrote:


The thing is, even if the flier player is having fun, the person on the other end of the board won't be, if he can't deal with them, and can't shell out the silly money for a whole allies contingent, or forgeworld, for a passing phase like the lack of anti-fliers.

And that won't just suck for the non flyer player, it will suck for the flyer player, once it becomes hard for them to find games, because even casual players, don't want to play when the odds are so stacked against them to the point of having no reasonable chance of winning. So they won't play the flier player.

A limit, is better than breaking a gaming community into flyer group, and non flier group.

But what about making the flyer player change his army? What if he doesn't own that many models besides his flyers and the necessary troops to go in them. You'd then be forcing him to spend money re-building his army, and changing to a composition he doesn't want, and therefore kills his fun. This also makes the game less enjoyable for the flyer player, which consequently makes it less enjoyable for the non-flyer player.

It goes both ways equally.

There is a difference, in the fact, that the non-flier player, will simply not want to play the flier player, once it get's to the stage that they become quite aware that their chances of ever winning, are slim to none.

The flier player might enjoy their fliers, but it's an unfortunate inevitability that people will not want to play against flyerspam, until suitable ways of dealing with it become apparent for the majority of armies. The flier limit isn't there to hurt the flyer player. It's there to stop them becoming shunned as power-gamers, and to ensure they will still get games in a casual enviroment. Yes, the flier player has every right to spam fliers. But it will lead to most if not all casual players, exerting their right to choose not to play against them.

the non-flier player NEEDS to re-adjust {his/her} expectations and tactica ingame.

there was a time before fliers (actually in 2nd edition to be precise) where the Eldar for example had several literally unkillable units/characters [PL], meq list's had to find a way around this, they did eventually.

as will the non-flier player. it appears you have a severe dislike of fliers,

most of your examples only note the benefits towards the NFP (non Flier Player), and against a PFP (pro-flier player), that's your right each plays the game how they enjoy the game. until GW fixes certain units or allow certain options for certain units lacking in AA [skyfire etc] then we all have to deal with the fact we either love or abhor the flyer inclusion.

if you and your group doesn't mind a "limit on fliers" then good games may happen. [the majority of gamers are for the inclusion. many who are against find tactical ways to deal with fliers]

but if outside that group then it is a per player basis. or there are many games without fliers

(not to be rude, but there are other wargames without fliers, and although many comments [on dakka] end like this, it is not my intention to cause offence, rather stating the obvious)

I start having problems with flyers as soon as one is on the table (and if I'm the one bringing a Nightwing you can bet it's not showing up until turn 4)

3 fliers at 1500 and upwards is very reasonable. It is sufficient amount of fliers to saturate the board unless you're using one of the few fliers that's reasonably priced (hint: they exist in the Dark Angels codex).
A player who is willing to spend half or more of his point allowance on fliers is only looking to exploit the hard counters that fliers present to several strategies.
"But what about my nice air cav list?" Well what about my nifty fluffy Space Wolves allied with tank-IG? Or what about that guy's Tyranids? Why aren't we allowed to play a fluffy army and still have fun?

There are some extremes in this game.
Terminators - Have hard counters, soft counters will kill them and are effective. Every unit in the game is a soft counter.
Heavy vehicles - Have hard counters, have soft counters. Not all units have soft counters but all armies have access to both soft and hard counters. Necron army IS a hard counter.
Monstrous Creatures - Have hard counters (typically the same as TEQ or H-Veh), have soft counters. Similar to TEQ every unit in game is a soft counter.
Wraithlords - Since it's the only model I know that has T8, this deserves it's own category. Few real hard counters, but plenty of soft counters. Every single army can deal with it. Dark Eldar army IS a hard counter.

Here's where fliers fall flat.
I haven't read the Tau codex, but I can't think of a single hard counter to fliers in other codexes that isn't solved with large amounts of missiles directed at the turret. Well, maybe the Necron Doom Barge, that's a real air-killer.
Other than that it's all soft counters. Massive amounts of War Walkers with Scatter Laser or other air crafts.

What other unit type in the game is best countered by units of the same type?

Flyers at the moment exist in the realm that 4th edition clown cars (reputedly) existed in, but at the moment the game hasn't got the counters - it's not a case of people not having discovered them.

Conclusion:
Add in Skyguard or limit fliers as house rules. This is a good recomendation.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Actually, here's an alternative approach to the problem:

Anti-Air Weapons Mount. 5 points. Adds Skyguard to any single weapon that a vehicle or monstrous creature can use.
- Does not work for psychic powers!
- It's cheap because it also means it can't shoot ground targets well.
- It works for MC because Tyranids need an option as well.

Fluffy suggestions:
* Does not work for pintle-mounted weapons.
* Does not work for sponson-mounted weapons.
* Does not work for weapons mounted under the vehicle.
* May be allowed for artillery pieced. You know, the rare few that doesn't shoot blasts of one shape or another.

I dislike fliers too, mainly because of the whole paper-scissors-rock thing with fliers, non-fliers and anti-air. Hate that gak with a passion.

Wait, if I don't have any fliers in my list I can't have fun? Hate when I don't get the memo. Hate it, Hate it, Hate it.

My last game I fired everything my dread, devestators, and combat squad tactical lascannons at a doomscythe for two turns. Every thing that managed to hurt it the dang thing jinked out of. Then my Captain leveled his inferno pistol at it, one shot, one smoking hulk. Even managed to crash it into a unit of immortals and take a few out. Though they all got right back up....

I won 7 to 1, because invisibility will not save your Librarian and Sternguard squad when a unit of 10 necron warriors puts 19 wounds on you in one shot. Great game, great opponent who insisted on taking that one EVIL doomscythe. Too bad it ruined the entire afternoon....

Give me back the days when the local Necron players were running a full air list and my Sternguard in Pods were able to take out everything they had on the table in turn one. Now that was fun!